The Fall of Butterflies

by Andrea Portes

  But this. This here. Welp, this is the only thing I’m good at. Throwing myself into my books. If I can just drown myself in my tests and my papers, none of this gets to matter anymore. It gets to evaporate in a poof of superfluous gunk, and I never, ever have to care again.

  Of course, it comes up.

  If I stop.

  Or if I have a break where I’m supposed to eat or, I don’t know, use the bathroom or something.

  So, I’m avoiding those things.

  Eating. Not for me.

  Resting. Not for me.

  An occasional walk to relax the mind. No way.

  That’s the danger time—when Remy or Milo come flying into my brain and all of a sudden I get lost in a sea of questions and annoyances and frustration that I was stupid enough to fall for any of it.

  Nope.

  Instead, work. Work, work, work. Study. Write a paper. Study. Write another paper. Study. Cram for the calculus final. Read. Write another paper.

  I’m even doing extra credit.

  In every class.

  Anything and everything a student here at Pembroke can do, I am doing. I am even visiting the teachers during office hours to ask pithy and insightful questions in order to write even better papers.

  In short, I am a robot.

  An academic robot.

  With no heart. No soft places where I can get hurt.

  There is a ten-minute shower allowed in my daily regimen, which doesn’t even get to last that long because my thoughts begin to wander and I jump out, soaking wet, hustle down the hall in my towel, and throw myself into the required and not-so-required reading.

  At one point I do text my dad. I tell him “it’s crunch time” and “will call soon.” But, honestly, it hasn’t helped. It hasn’t staunched the flow of communication. He really has been texting a lot. Maybe he’s lonely . . .

  I make up my mind to send him something. With a nice card. Maybe cupcakes. I go down the rabbit hole of the interbot finding the best cupcakes to deliver to him, and that takes me two hours, which is good, because that’s two hours I don’t have to think.

  Except for one problem. There is a problem in my plan. Despite the fact that I have become a machine who has spent the last two weeks with blinders on and a focus on only the greatest, most impeccable achievement, grade point average and academic prose . . . there . . . somehow between my blinders, is someone standing in my doorway, someone standing right there, distracting me from my true purpose, and of course that person is the one person I am dying not to think about, and of course that person is Remy.

  SIXTY-SIX

  Of course, she’s thinner. There’s something almost somber about the way she’s dressed. All black. Or maybe dark gray. All those festive, thrown-together, mismatched, kicky outfits are out the window. Now it’s just make do, I guess. Now it’s just whatever happens to be there when she rolls out of bed. Now it’s just whatever covers her arms.

  I see her, but I don’t say anything. I mean, what am I supposed to say?

  She is all manic energy and cheer. “Hi! Can I come in?”

  “Sure.”

  She steps in and looks around. Books, papers everywhere. The room of a girl possessed.

  “Wow, you’re really going for it here, I guess.”

  She really doesn’t look that different from how she did that night at the Lamplighter. Clammy. Purple. Sick. “I could say the same for you.”

  “What?”

  I shake my head. “Nothing.”

  “Look! Look what I got us!”

  And this I can’t believe.

  Remy is standing in front of me, all eighty pounds of her, gray skin, sunken eyes, and showing me something on her phone.

  “What is that?”

  “Paris! Two tickets—I just booked them. I thought we could leave right after graduation. You know, for, like, the whole summer.”

  I feel like I’ve just lit down in an alternative universe.

  “Remy . . .”

  “And I found a place in Le Marais, just like we talked about. You’re gonna love it. We’ll take the Eurorail. Go to Italy. Maybe even Amsterdam.”

  And there she is, pleading with me, with that clammy skin and those sunken eyes. This is the same Remy who appeared behind the tree that first day I got here. The same girl. But not the same girl.

  I miss that girl.

  “Remy . . . stop.”

  “What? Oh, is it Amsterdam? We don’t have to go there, I can—”

  “We’re not going to Paris.”

  “What do you mean? Of course we are. I’ve got the tickets.”

  “Remy. I’m not going to Paris with you. Or anywhere.”

  And this look. This look that washes over her face. Like the last hope. Last train out of the station.

  “Why not?”

  “Remy, look at you.”

  “What?”

  “You think it’s not obvious?”

  She doesn’t say anything for the longest time.

  And then, “Why?”

  “Remy. I can’t go with you. Where you’re going.”

  I am looking at Remy and then I realize. I realize it this second. This is the last time I will ever see her. It’s like I’m looking at her, but I’m looking at a person who is getting smaller and smaller, fading and fading more, until there’s just an image, then the trace of an image, then nothing.

  And a part of me wants to be mad at her. A part of me wants to reach out and shake her. Just shake her until she comes back to her senses.

  But that would be like trying to grab a shadow.

  There’s a silence. The sun is starting to set, and the light in the room is a hazy lilac. Little bits of gold on the wall.

  It’s soft now. It’s gentle.

  “Are you sure? You could change your mind, you know. I mean, the ticket’s in your name . . .” She trails off.

  And the air in the room, heavy as stone.

  Then, “Y-you said you would never leave me.”

  It’s a sucker punch.

  And it’s true.

  But I feel like she left me a long time ago.

  “I wanted to stay with you . . .”

  We both just stand there.

  And I’m looking at her. There she is. That lost little girl that I would do anything to save.

  But I can’t. I can’t save her.

  “I’m sorry, Remy. I’m really fucking sorry.”

  And that last part comes with tears. They just come out of nowhere. And I want to grab her and bring her back, just bring her back to me. Just get her back.

  This is the moment it hits her.

  That this is it for us.

  She nods. A kind of terrified little nod. Nothing I’ve ever seen before.

  And now she’s out the door, down the hall, down the stairs.

  And there she goes, walking across the green into the setting sun. I can see her through the arched windows, making her way toward something far away from me. There she goes, and I am jealous of the world for getting to have her, jealous of all the nights and days that get to have her. There she goes, someone great and singular and unlike anyone ever invented and the best person in the world and the worst person in the world. And, oh, what a noble mind is here o’erthrown.

  I stay on her until she is tiny in the horizon, a little dot, turning the corner by the arch. And then almost gone, hidden by the gray-green stones.

  There she goes, and I might as well be watching a ghost.

  SIXTY-SEVEN

  I get to go home for Christmas. Thank fucking God. If you had asked me a month ago if I would ever want to go back to Iowa, I would have said, “Are you kidding? No way, no how.”

  But not now.

  Now I might as well be flying to the moon.

  To be home. To be home with my dad and that sweet little farmhouse and a tree in the window and my dad will grill a steak and add a baked potato and a pecan pie and every other thing you could eat to make you fat.

  The city is makin
g way now, through the suburbs and out through Pennsylvania, starting to get white, blankets of white, the snow falling down, patient. It’s gonna be about a day and a half on this thing, but I don’t really mind it, rocking back and forth. There’s something gentle about it, cradling, lulling you to sleep.

  I sort of just threw everything in a backpack and hustled over to the train station. I didn’t have time for much because the grades were given out this morning and we had to wait forever for our transcripts. They were supposed to be out by ten, but they were out by eleven, so everything was wackadoo.

  Looks like all my studying paid off and I am not destined to be homeless. In fact, looks like I got a 4.0, if I may toot my own horn. That means my scholarship is intact.

  Praise the Lord and pass the cornflakes.

  And that’s not all.

  Remember how I told you about how my dad kept texting and texting like a deranged stalker? Cakey-pie, CALL ME!! WHERE R U?! HELLOOOO, EARTH 2 Cakey-pie?! COME IN, Cakey-pie?!?!?! Well, somehow he just wouldn’t stop so I had to just pick up the phone and make sure he hadn’t lost his marbles for good.

  So, dear friends, I call him and this is what went down, word for word:

  Ring. Ring.

  “Hello?”

  My dad always answers the phone very cautiously. Maybe he thinks it’s a bill collector.

  “Hi, Dad, it’s me.”

  “Willa?”

  “Um . . . do you have another daughter?”

  “I had a daughter once. We used to speak every day.”

  “Sorry, Dad.”

  “Well, where have you been? I’ve been trying to get ahold of you . . .”

  “Dad, it was an insane amount of studying, and I’m sorry, but it was a little bit crazy. So I’m sorry I didn’t get a chance to call you. Until now. But I am calling you now, see. This is me. On the phone. Calling.”

  “Well, I hope it wasn’t too much.”

  “It’s okay, Dad. I did it. I got a 4.0.”

  “Oh, Cakey-pie, that’s wonderful!”

  “Thanks, Dad. Tell Mom, I guess.”

  “Well, I will, honey. But that’s not why I was texting.”

  “Well, why were you texting, Dad?”

  “All right, well. I’ll make it quick.”

  “Okay . . .”

  “There’s an envelope for you here.”

  “Um, okay.”

  “It says it’s from University of California at Berkeley.”

  “Oh. Oh . . . oh my God.”

  “Berkeley, honey?”

  “Dad, describe the envelope.”

  “Huh?”

  “Describe the envelope! Please.”

  “Well, it’s just a regular-size envelope.”

  “Oh, fuck.”

  “Willa Parker!”

  “Sorry, Dad. I didn’t mean to swear. It’s just . . .”

  “Well, do you want me to open it?”

  “No. Not really. It’s just gonna make me more depressed.”

  “Okay.”

  “Thanks anyway, Dad. I’ll see you in a couple of days.”

  “Okay, well, you know what? I’m just gonna open it.”

  “Dad!”

  Dads never do what you tell them. It’s like they were here first or something.

  Now I’m just sitting here on the phone with nothing doing. God, I hate being on the phone. Why doesn’t everybody just text? Why does everybody have to talk to everybody all the time anyway?

  “Willa?”

  “Yes?”

  “Willa?”

  “Ye-es?”

  “Willa.”

  “Dad!”

  “Okay, okay. Here’s what it says . . . ‘Dear Willa Parker, On behalf of the admissions committee, it is my pleasure to offer you admission to the University of California–Berkeley.”

  “Oh my God. Oh my God.”

  “Willa! What about your mother? What about Princeton?”

  “You know what, Dad?” I pause, thinking it over. “Fuck Princeton.”

  If it’s possible to hear someone smiling over the telephone, I hear that now. “You know what, sweetie? You’re right. Fuck Princeton.”

  “Oh my God.”

  “You’re going to Berkeley, honey! You’re gonna be a radical!”

  And now, I won’t lie to you, there are tears in my eyes and I’m kind of hyperventilating, too, and everything from this year, everything bad and good, comes rushing over me and I can barely breathe.

  “Willa, honey, what’s the matter? Why are you crying? Was it your safety school?”

  “No!” I can barely talk, thinking how strange it all is, how unfair and strange and hurly-burly life is that this is what I get, that I get this, and Remy gets . . . what? How none of it makes sense and none of it is ever fair and don’t try to pin it down because you’ll never be able to.

  “Well, I’m proud of you, Willa. I’m so proud of you.”

  “Thanks, Dad. You should probably tell Mom. She doesn’t know. I didn’t tell her I was applying or anything. You know . . . ’cause either she’d forbid it or she’d try to pull strings and then I’d never really know, you know? Like if it was me who got in or the strings.”

  “Oh, that is so noble. You’re like a noble little lion.”

  “Oh, Dad.”

  “I’m so proud of you.”

  Hearing that, I could walk on the clouds.

  I love my dad, and now, suddenly, back on this train, I love this whole stupid year and all the horrible things in it and I love the snow falling down around me and the train chugging over and over again on the tracks.

  Right before he gets off the phone, he says, “I love you so much, little Willa.” He always says it. He’s said it a million times. Every night before bed and then some. But for some reason this time it lands exactly in the center of my soul. And I can’t wait to see him. And I can’t wait to make him proud.

  And I know I will.

  Now it’s getting dark on the train and the stars are all about to come on one by one. There’s a crescent moon halfway up the sky. Here I am, looking out at all that infinite space and wondering how anything gets to be anything. Sometimes it all just seems like a dream anyway. Like maybe I am dreaming this and you are dreaming your dream, too. Like it’s a fake, somehow. A paper plane.

  The snow is falling down in swirls now, getting more and more impatient. Building up. Gunning.

  I think about Remy and Milo, and it’s okay. They get to be who they are.

  I get to let them be.

  And I forgive them. I forgive them with every electron in every cell of my body. I forgive them. But you know what’s funny? I know no matter what . . . they will never forgive themselves. For anything. For everything. Anything that can be made hard . . . they do. And anything that can be made easy . . . they make hard.

  It’s kind of preposterous now, looking out at the snow-swirled sky, all that swooshing past me now, back to that place, that time, those city lights.

  All that time, all that feeling like I was in a Fitzgerald novel, wishing I could be like them, trying to be like them, being mad at myself for not being like them. Hoping somehow I could become them, never thinking, not once, not one time, that maybe, just maybe, I could become something better.

  Maybe I could become something that wasn’t about twelve-million-dollar estates and summers in Amasandwich and people with last names like Hobbes and Peabody and Tate.

  Maybe, just maybe, it wasn’t so bad to be myself.

  The snow is coming down in sheets now. Stirring. Nothing but the spruce and the pine and the cedars to make a say. All the way through the desolate Pennsylvania panhandle, chugga-chugga-chugga. It isn’t until the white sheet blanket coming up through Ohio that I realize I am never going back.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I am extremely grateful to the following people for helping me along the way and helping me with this book, in particular. My editor, Kristen Pettit, of course. Katie Shea Boutillier. Fred Ramey. Dan Smetanka. Ros
emary Stimola. Elizabeth Lynch, and everyone over at Harper. I would like to thank my mother, as well as the rest of my family, for the incredible support and love every step along the way. I’d like to thank my best friend, Brad, for having helped me all through the years. With all of my heart I’d like to thank my husband, who is gleefully supportive and understanding of every step of the process, and of me. I tend to be a slightly strange person to actually be around, and my husband not only understands me but embraces my generally bizarre behavior. And last, but not least, my little baby boy Wyatt, who is growing now into a little boy, and who is so effervescent, curious, hilarious, and sweet that every day is a new adventure, not only out into the world but into my own heart. How infinite the heart is! For you, Wyatt, my little prince.

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  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  PHOTO BY NIELS ALPERT

  ANDREA PORTES is the bestselling novelist of two critically lauded adult novels, Hick, her debut, which was made into a feature film starring Chloë Grace Moretz, Alec Baldwin, Blake Lively, Eddie Redmayne, and Juliette Lewis, and Bury This. Her first novel for young adult readers, Anatomy of a Misfit, was called “perfection in book form” by Teen Vogue.

  Andrea grew up shuffled around between such disparate locales as Nebraska, Brasília, Texas, Rio de Janeiro, Baltimore, North Dakota, California, Wisconsin, and North Carolina. Finally Andrea was granted relief from this nomadic existence when she was accepted to Bryn Mawr College. She attended on a full scholarship and later graduated cum laude, with a major in English literature. She then earned her Masters in Fine Arts degree from UC San Diego.

  After her relentless education, Andrea moved to the neighborhood of Echo Park in Los Angeles, where she spent years mostly getting into trouble. It was in this period of vague nothingness that Andrea penned her debut novel, in longhand in three notebooks. Currently, she lives in Los Angeles with her husband, Sandy Tolan, their son, Wyatt, and their dog, Rascal.