The Black Butterfly

by Shirley Reva Vernick

  We zigzagged our way in the direction of the beach. “Too bad it’s overcast,” George said. “On a clear day, you can see Spruce Island.”

  “It’s a great view anyway.” The ocean was smooth and waveless, broken only by a pier and an occasional bird diving for a meal. Everything was so still, I thought time itself must be frozen over. It felt like we were far away from the inn and the rest of civilization, suspended here between ocean and sky, our own secluded alternate universe.

  As we came to a stop a few yards from the water, I wondered if George’s old girlfriend had ever stood here. Did she used to visit the Black Butterfly? Did they make love in his room or in the van or even right here on the beach late at night? A spasm of jealousy shot through my belly and rose to my chest, where it made me cough out loud.

  Stop it, I told myself. George is here with you—not the girl from college, not Iris, not anyone else. As hard as it is to believe, he has chosen you to bring to this very private place.

  This very private, very cold place. I loved being here, but I was cold now that we were standing still. I squeezed my arms and shoulders in an effort to stifle a shiver, but I shivered anyway.

  “You’re getting chilly,” he said. “C’mon, let’s head back home.”

  I opened my mouth to say okay, but before I could get the word out, a strange noise distracted me. Part yelp, part howl. I glanced in the direction of the sound and saw Starla standing on the pier. Her back was turned to me, but it was obvious that she was crying. She was wearing the same outfit as yesterday—no jacket, no gloves, no hat—and she was standing there bawling her eyes out.

  George took a step back in the direction of the inn. “Let’s go.”

  “Not yet,” I said, my eyes locked on Starla. What was I not remembering about her? Something she’d said, but what? It seemed like something I should know. Something I’d want to know.

  “Well, if we’re going to stay out, we’re going back to get you some more clothes,” George said. “Come on—it’ll just take a minute.”

  “Good idea, but I’ll wait for you here, if that’s okay. It’ll be a lot quicker without me dragging down the pace.”

  He pinched his lips and looked like he was about to protest, but instead of saying anything, he kissed me and took off across the beach. When he was out of sight, I walked toward the pier.

  “Starla?” I called.

  She turned around, looking surprised and embarrassed.

  “Starla, what’s wrong?”

  “It’s B-Blue,” she choked. “I think he…I just can’t believe it…he…he…” She plunged into a sobbing bender and couldn’t speak.

  “Starla, please, tell me what happened.”

  “You’ve got to help him!”

  I ran—well, my version of running, on snowshoes—onto the dock and headed toward her. If Blue needed help, I’d do anything. What I or any other mortal could do to help a ghost, I didn’t know. But I’d do it once I found out from Starla.

  I was almost at Starla’s side. Just a few steps more. Maybe ten feet away from getting her to tell me what was going on. So close. So very close. Practically there.

  In the first instant, I barely felt the boards beneath my feet start to splinter, hardly noticed the crackling of wood or the turning of my ankles. In the next instant though, I knew I was in trouble. A splinter became a fracture. The fracture became a gap. The gap became the doorway to a watery abyss. And then the planks gave way. Just before I disappeared into the icy sea, I craned my neck to see Starla. She was smiling wickedly at me, a stolen cordless saw in her hand.

  At the moment I hit the water, I heard a thwack. It was a strange, hard clunk, not the kind of sound you’re supposed to make in water. Could that be how a body sounds when it falls, snowshoes and all, six feet into the winter ocean? Or was Starla up to something? Stunned by cold and fear, I looked up to see if she was running the saw again, but she was gone, thank God. Now if I could just make it to shore.

  My head started hurting before I could take a single stroke—really hurting, in quick, sharp jabs. I took off a mitten and touched the back of my head. My hand came back smeared with blood and strands of hair. “Oh, God,” I whispered. I must have hit a rock or one of the fallen planks. That was the sound I’d heard. My heart began to pound, and as it did, it pumped fresh pain into my head.

  “George?” I shouted. Nothing. I tried to swim again, but my legs and arms had turned to useless pieces of flesh. My nose tingled violently and then lost all feeling. “George?” I called one more time, then shut my eyes. “Please,” I breathed to no one.

  I was sure I was going to die right there, a stone’s throw from the beach. But when I had my eyes closed for a few seconds, the strangest thing happened: I started to feel a little better. My hysteria downgraded to anxiousness, my pulse slowed a notch, and the stabbing in my skull eased a bit. Red and black starbursts floated in front of me, then blew away. Most amazing of all, the water wasn’t so terribly bitter anymore, now that I was used to it. In fact, it was sort of invigorating, as long as I didn’t get the salt water near my cut head.

  How can this be? I wondered. My jacket and mittens are already iced up, yet I don’t feel cold anymore. I feel good.

  I swam a few strokes out into the ocean, then a couple more, and then I turned back. Alone in winter was not the right time for me to go swimming in strange waters. Besides, I needed to get this gash cleaned up. I pressed my fingers to the cut place, hoping the blood was drying, but it came off wet and fresh in my hand. “Damn. Where is he? George, where are you?” I said, but not too loudly. I could wait a while longer for that extra jacket. I really wasn’t ready to get out of the water anyway. It was so tranquil here in the ocean, like a warm bath. No, like a comfortable bed. Or a home. That was it—it felt like coming home to a warm bath and a comfortable bed.

  “Bed. That’s what I need,” I affirmed as a wave of fatigue overtook me. “Right after I get cleaned up. Bed and a good night’s sleep.”

  I looked up at the pier. The platform was higher than I’d expected. Had I really fallen that far? Could I manage to climb back up? I was so tired all of a sudden. Too tired. Maybe I could take a rest right here…

  I must have fallen asleep there in the water, because the next thing I knew, I was in someone’s arms. “Penny?” he said. “Penny?” I didn’t recognize the voice at first, but it was male and it was urgent. I, on the other hand, only wanted to be alone and drowsing. “Penny!” he said again, and I felt his hand on the back of my head, which was tender to the touch. “Penny, wake up.”

  My mouth felt rubbery and warped, too clumsy to make words, but I tried. “Dun wanna,” I sputtered. I’d been having a delicious dream. I dreamt I was going to live in the ocean, that I was already making a coral bed for myself and learning how to breathe water. Waking up, the air seemed too thin for my lungs, the atmosphere too dry. I wanted to go back to my new home.

  “Penny, stay with me,” he demanded. Then gently, “Please.”

  My eyelids were cooperating about as well as my mouth, but I managed to get one of them open. “Who…?” I started but couldn’t finish.

  “Shhh,” he said. “You don’t have to talk. Just be awake. Be here.”

  With effort, I got my other eye to open. Now I just had to get both eyes to work together. Why was everything so blurred, so spinning?

  He cradled the back of my head more snugly and lifted me to his bare chest. “Take a deep breath,” he said.

  My eyes closed again. I longed for my coral bed.

  “Penny!” he ordered. “Look at me…good, now breathe.”

  I opened my mouth and sucked in the thin, dry air. “Blue?”

  “You can see me now—good.”

  “I’ve always been able to see you, remember?”

  He lowered his face until his nose was practically touching mine. “Not ten minutes ago, you couldn’t.”

  “You’ve been here for ten…?” I couldn’t get the rest of the words out. I felt s
o strange.

  “Keep listening to my voice, Penny. Keep looking at my face.”

  I leaned my head against his chest and gazed up at him.

  “I know what happened,” he said. “I’m so sorry.”

  “I’m glad you came,” I said. He looked taller than I remembered, his face almost touching the clouds. “Hey, would you do something for me, a favor?”

  “Anything.”

  “Would you tell Starla…tell her…tell her…”

  “Don’t worry, I know exactly what to tell her. I’ll take care of her. Right now, why don’t we just enjoy the water together, just for a little while longer. Look, the moon is up.”

  I turned my head skyward to see a full yellow-orange ball hanging low in the sky. How had it gotten so dark out?

  “Nice, huh?” he said. “It’s a blue moon tonight.”

  I squinted. “Looks kind of red to me.”

  He touched my face. “Yes, but blue moon means it’s the second full moon this month. An extra full moon. Happens once every few years.” His fingers were tracing the hollow of my neck with a light, swirling motion.

  “You know what I like best about the moon?” he went on. “I like how it melts right into the ocean. Look. Look straight out there. Doesn’t the water’s surface look like a moon spill?”

  I looked at him, at his warm brown eyes, and then out where he was pointing. He was right. Silvery threads of moonlight, like a soft blanket, glimmered on the water’s surface as far as you could see. A blanket of moonlight. I wanted to lie under that blanket and stare at the sky forever.

  “It’s not that way with the sun,” he said. “The sun turns the ocean colors, blue or sometimes green, but it doesn’t get into the water, not the way moonlight does.” He pulled me a little closer. “It doesn’t get inside.”

  For a while, we watched the sky without talking. At last, I said, “Look at that bright star next to the moon. It’s so big.”

  “That’s because it’s not a star. It’s Jupiter. Now, see over there, lower in the sky and not as bright?” He repositioned me so I could see. “That’s Saturn.”

  I liked being in his arms, having him hold me, having the water hold me too.

  “Penny, open your eyes,” I heard him say. “Penny!” He jostled me a little, and I obeyed. “How about I tell you a story?” he asked. “Will that keep you awake?”

  “Mmm, make it a long one,” I said, tipping my head back into the water, happy to discover that the salt no longer stung my wound.

  “I’ll tell you a tale I learned from one of the men I fished with, an Inuit man,” he said. “It’s about Sedna, a girl who lives in the ocean.”

  A girl who lives in the ocean. I envied her.

  “Sedna lived even farther North than here,” Blue said. “One day, a giant seabird promised her a palace to live in if she would be his bride, so she climbed onto the bird’s back and flew across the sea. But the so-called palace was only a nest on a cliff where the bird kept her imprisoned day and night. She was miserable. Thankfully, her father kayaked across the sea and rescued her.”

  “Nice to have a father who cares,” I mused.

  “I’m sorry?”

  “Nothing. Go on.”

  “Well, as Sedna and her father rowed back home, the seabird suddenly appeared. The creature tossed Sedna into the water and then pecked off her fingers when she tried to climb back into the kayak. Her fingers grew into the first whales and seals. Then she sank to the bottom of the ocean, where she became the goddess of all the sea creatures forevermore.”

  “Forever at the bottom of the ocean,” I repeated longingly.

  Blue’s face grew grim. “Don’t say that.”

  “Why not? It’s beautiful down there. So quiet, so dark.”

  “Stop it, Penny.”

  “Okay, fine. Let’s change the subject. Hey, I noticed you’ve been practicing.”

  “Practicing what?”

  “Holding living things.” I pushed my spine into his upper arm. “You’re doing great.”

  “No.”

  “What do you mean, no? You’ve been holding me this whole time. That’s fabulous.”

  Blue’s forehead screwed up into a knot, and the color drained from his face. His jaw was working overtime.

  “Do you mean…?” I didn’t really need to ask. I knew perfectly well what he meant. I glanced over at the pier. It was supposed to be just a few feet away, but it seemed like leagues. The shore was nowhere in sight. It was just Blue, the ocean, the planets and me. I pointed in the direction of the beach. “I’m not going back there, am I?”

  “I don’t know.” His voice was cracking.

  “The fact that you’re able to hold me right now—doesn’t that mean I’m already dead?”

  “You feel that way, you look that way, but I don’t think you are. Your spirit is still inside you. You have a chance.”

  “What percent chance?” I asked, making no effort to hide my boredom with this angle of the conversation. “Exactly…what…percent…”

  “Penny!” he said, patting my cheek, and it was only then that I realized my eyes were closed once more.

  “I know, I know. But I can’t make it back there by myself. Will you take me?”

  His chest heaved. “I cannot. If you go the route of life, I won’t be able to carry you anymore. My hands, my arms, will go through you. I’ll be useless. You’ll sink.”

  This was interesting, but somehow not interesting enough to coax me to open my leaden eyelids. “So, okay,” I slurred. “So I can either drown…or…”

  The next thing I knew, I was lying on the pier, coughing up seawater and feeling like I had a pickaxe lodged in my skull. I was so incredibly cold, so strangely disoriented. My hair and all my clothes were coated in ice. I couldn’t catch my breath. I was terrified, although I didn’t know why.

  “Penny! Penny, are you all right?” he asked. Only it wasn’t Blue. “Penny,” he shouted. “Penny, I’m here.”

  “George?”

  When he saw that I could breathe and talk, he sighed, “Thank God,” and pulled me to him. He was wet and cold too. “Jesus, Penny, I thought you were…how did this happen? I never should have left you alone, not even for the five minutes it took me.”

  “Five minutes?” I wheezed through chattering teeth. “That’s not right. The Sedna story alone took five minutes.”

  “The what? Never mind. It doesn’t matter. As long as you’re okay. Are you okay?”

  “Sort of. I want to go inside.” I tried to stand up but could only get as far as my hands and knees.

  George took my arm and helped me up. Fortunately, he didn’t seem to notice my gash. The water must have washed the last of the blood away.

  “My snowshoes,” I said. “Where are my snowshoes? I’ll need them to –”

  “I took them off. You aren’t walking. Come on, climb on my back.”

  “I’m all right. I can walk.”

  “No,” he said so severely that I didn’t try to resist. He bent over, and I climbed on—me and about ten pounds of water and ice. I don’t know how George did it, but he carried me—a waterlogged sack of potatoes—on his soaked back all the way to the inn. With each step, I could feel his lungs, shoulders and legs laboring. At one point, he had to stop to catch his breath and wipe the ice off his face. I’d have felt sorry for him if I hadn’t been so focused on not sliding off.

  George brought me in through a side entrance and set me down while he took off his snowshoes. The shock of warm air felt so good, I wanted to cry. Even more than that, I wanted to get out of my icy clothes. So, with our arms around each other, we lugged ourselves up a back staircase and into my room, where we shook the icicles out of our hair and kicked off our boots. Then George ran the Jacuzzi for me. I sat in front of the hearth and tried to unzip my jacket, but my fingers were too numb.

  “Need some help?” he asked on his way back from getting the water going. He’d already taken off his outerwear and shirt and was standing t
here in nothing but his black jeans. I swallowed hard.

  “I think I’m okay,” I said, an obvious fib. My hands were marmalade. But still, I didn’t feel ready for George to undress me—not like this, anyway.

  “Come on,” he said, kneeling in front of me and starting to work on my socks. “This will be strictly clinical, I promise. Out of the ice suit and straight into the tub, okay?”

  What could I say? I was a ragdoll.

  George pulled off my jacket and ski pants, then my jeans, sweater and turtleneck, leaving me in my nowhere-near-cute-enough bra and panties. At least my legs were shaved.

  When the last non-underwear item came off, I announced, “I can get it from here.” I wasn’t sure this was true, but the feeling was coming back to my fingers a little. I went into the bathroom, where a steaming bath was waiting for me. Not just any bath—a bubble bath. “You know what?” I called. “I haven’t taken a bubble bath since…I actually don’t think I’ve ever taken one.”

  He came to the doorway. “I was hoping the bubbles would help you say yes if I asked to take a shower.” He nodded to the standalone shower beside the tub.

  “I, uh…sure.” Well, why not? He was as cold and wet as I was, after all.

  George looked slightly surprised—happy, but surprised. I wondered, was he surprised that I agreed, or that I agreed so readily?

  “Just, give me one minute, would you?” I asked.

  “You got it,” he said, grabbing a towel before closing the door behind him.

  I got out of my skivvies and into the hot water, which hurt like hell at first, then felt heavenly. My skin started to pink up immediately, and I decided I never wanted to go outside again. “Okay, George, c’mon in.”

  When he opened the door, he was wearing only a towel and a bashful smile. “Hi,” he said.

  “Hi.”

  “I’ll, um, get to work here.” He stepped into the shower and pulled the curtain around him before removing his towel and starting the water.

  I sank a little deeper into the tub as the room filled with fresh steam. Try as I might to keep my mind empty, to simply soak up the heat and the moisture around me, I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t stop thinking about George, just a few feet away from me, separated by nothing more than a thin curtain. I’d seen enough of him by now that it wasn’t too hard to fill in the blanks. He was beautiful, and now he was wet and naked too, his silhouette swaying and flexing hypnotically before me.