Butterfly Arising

by Landis Lain

  “That’s not fair!”

  Sasha was tired of her mother constantly throwing shade on Craig. Sure, he was a little rough around the edges, but he had always treated her nicely, hadn’t he? He bought her gifts and drove her around in his tricked-out SUV. She never had to take the bus to school or get rides because Craig always came to pick her up. All the girls at school who weren’t afraid of Craig were jealous of Sasha. Craig was fine and edgy. He was all macho swagger, making the other boys at school look like little boys. He made Sasha feel like a princess. Sasha didn’t like the fact that he got high so much, but nobody was perfect.

  “You’re not going.”

  “Mama,” said Sasha. “He’s not a bad person. He has some really good qualities.” She was standing in the bathroom, putting the finishing touches on her lip gloss. She pursed her lips.

  Her mother snorted. “That’s like saying the devil can quote scripture. As you children would say, whatever. That fool stays in trouble. You’re a smart girl. Why do you have to hang with a hood roach? Mark my words, he is going to come to a bad end.”

  Sasha sighed. “Please don’t be so judgmental.”

  Evangeline shook her head. “Where does that boy work?” she asked. “Where does he go to church? Who are his people?”

  “He just goes to school,” said Sasha. “Like me. He had some problems in school, but he is doing a lot better now.”

  “If he doesn’t work, how does he afford that pimp mobile he sports around the neighborhood?”

  “His mother bought him the car,” said Sasha. “I wish you’d buy me one.”

  Evangeline laughed. “I’m sure you do. However, you do not need a car and I won’t be buying you one any time soon. You drive mine when you need to go someplace. I’m paying for college come fall. Maybe you can ask your Daddy for a car.”

  And that ended the conversation. Because both Sasha and her mother knew that waiting for her father to buy such a big-ticket item was probably futile. Sasha hadn’t talked to him in a while, anyway.

  Sasha borrowed her mother’s car and told her that she would be spending the night at Gabrielle’s house. And that was the plan. She just had a pit stop to make. She thought about taking Gabby to the party with her, but immediately discarded the idea. Gabby hated Craig; thought he was a loser. It was one of the few things that Sasha and Gabby had ever disagreed on.

  When Sasha got to his mom’s house, Craig and his boys were already there. She’d been waiting all week for this party at Craig’s. Usually, he didn’t want her hanging around him and his boys too much.

  But last Monday, he’d thrown it out there casually, “Hey, I’m throwing this thing on Friday. My house. Be there.”

  Craig always spoke as few words as possible, saying that the cops told a person they had the right to remain silent for a reason. Sasha had been amused by the criminal reference. She knew that Craig had a criminal record and had been in trouble, but he kept that part of his life separate from her. Just like he didn’t get high around Sasha. He respected her.

  “Hey,” Sasha said when Craig came to the door. She followed Craig to the family room at the back of the house. He was wearing his black sweatshirt with the arms cut out, tattoo of a dragon dog snarling on his right bicep, dagger stabbing a heart gleaming on the left bicep.

  “You’re a little early,” Craig said, pulling Sasha close. He kissed her hard.

  “I can’t stay long. Mama would be mad,” she said. The rap music was pumping, and the television was loud. She looked around the room, puzzled. “Where is the actual party?”

  “Everybody else will be here in a little while. We were just watching the fight.” There was T-Bone, D-Money, and Ray-Ray all arrayed on the couch and chairs in the living room in various slouches. The speaker on the television kept a running fight commentary going. Bottles of Corona, Heineken or cans of pop sat on the floor. The fifth boy was someone Sasha didn’t know but had seen around school. He was standing in the kitchen with a Corona in his hand. Four of the boys had on the purple and black gear of the Death Lord’s. The boy in the kitchen had on jeans and a black polo shirt. Sasha’s eyes were big because every one of the boys was underage, except Craig.

  “Oh,” Sasha said. “Hey, y ’all.” Everybody nodded or tossed their chins up in greeting. She was a little uncomfortable, being the only girl in the house with five young men, but she shrugged. She knew them all from school. She didn’t much like Craig’s little gang banger flunkies, but they all did whatever he told them to do, so for the most part, she ignored them.

  The boy in the kitchen handed her a Mountain Dew over the counter and smiled at her.

  “Thanks,” she said, and took the drink. “This is my favorite pop.”

  “I know,” he said. “D Dog told me. I’m K-Smooth.” He smirked at her like he knew something she didn’t. Sasha smiled back at him and then looked at Craig.

  “Aw,” she said, “That is so sweet, you remember my favorite drink.” She took a long swallow of the citrus flavored soda.

  “I remember everything about you, baby,” he said, pulling her close. He caressed her behind and she pulled away. “You are my woman.”

  “Don’t do that in front of people,” she said, feeling slightly unsteady.

  “I won’t do it again,” he said and kissed her again.

  Someone snickered behind her. Sasha ignored him.

  “I told Mama that I was going to Gabby’s,” said Sasha. She was feeling fuzzy around the edges and her head felt like it was filled with cotton. She shook her head to clear it.

  “Sounds like a plan,” said Dragon Dog.

  DEVASTATED

  March 17th,

  When I woke up, I had death inside my mouth and bruises on my body. It was the first day of the end of everything good in my life; that moment when I woke up in a never finished nightmare.

  “Please, wake up!”

  Sasha groaned and turned over. She tried to open her eyes but found that they had heavy weights on them. She was shaking and felt like someone had run over her with the car. Her consciousness returned to her in pieces.

  “Uhm!” she groaned. “What time is it?”

  “Ten in the morning,” said Gabby. Sasha finally got her eyes open. She looked around at Gabby’s blue and green soccer paraphernalia laden bedroom with blurry eyes.

  “How did I get here?” asked Sasha. She was still wearing her dress, but it was stained and wrinkled.

  “D Dog dropped you off, about three a.m.,” said Gabby. “You were in bad shape.”

  Sasha sat up and then grabbed her head. “What happened?”

  “You tell me,” said Gabby. “I waited for you until about eleven and then I went to the late movie with Keisha. I came home because you weren’t picking up your phone. I was worried.”

  “Then, what?”

  “You are just lucky my parents are out of town,” said Gabby. “D Dog came with you in your mama’s car and you were crying and singing and all messed up. One of his boys drove him off. I had a time getting you into the house. Your bones were like water. Then you fell out. I had to keep checking you to make sure you were breathing. Since when you start drinking or taking stuff?”

  “I didn’t,” said Sasha, shaking her head. She stopped and held her hands to her temples. “I can’t remember. Oh, K-Smooth or somebody gave me a Mountain Dew.”

  “Did you see him open the can?” asked Gabby. “You know you are not supposed to take a drink from somebody you don’t know.”

  “I don’t know?” Sasha massaged her pounding temples. “But Craig was there.”

  “Girl, you were so messed up, I was scared,” said Gabby, touching Sasha on the shoulder. “I couldn’t wake you up. I was afraid to call the ambulance or the police. I didn’t want to get you in trouble with your mom.”

  “I don’t know what happened,” said Sasha, rubbing her face with one hand. “That’s all I remember.”

  “Girl, I think you got roofied!”

  Gabby was silent for
a few moments. Sasha could hear them breathing harshly, as she absorbed what her friend was telling her. She had heard about this kind of thing happening to other girls. But not to her. She was smart. Craig loved her.

  “I need to tell you something,” said Gabby. Sasha met Gabby’s teary eyes.

  “What?”

  “When D Dog brought you here, you were missing your underwear,” said Gabby. Sasha froze.

  “What?” She looked to confirm. She felt below her skirt, Naked to the waist. She felt her breasts, no bra. The vague soreness she felt in places that usually only she touched started to ache and burn.

  “He said you were all over his boys and he was through with you,” said Gabby, her voice broke. “I hate that fool.”

  “What?”

  “D Dog showed me this video on his phone of you and him and…”

  “No.”

  “And some more guys,” finished Gabby.

  Sasha pressed her hands to her chest. “He wouldn’t do that!”

  “He said he had to get you out of there, so he brought you to my house,” said Gabby, tears coursing down her cheeks. “He–he-he said t-t-that snitches get stitches and for me to tell you that he doesn’t want to see you again.”

  Sasha moaned. “I do not believe it!”

  Gabby was sobbing.

  Sasha stumbled off the bed and sprinted to the bathroom. The room spun. She dropped to her knees, slammed the commode lid up and vomited into the toilet.

  “I should take you to the hospital,” said Gabby, when Sasha finished throwing up.

  Sasha wouldn’t hear of it. She stripped off her dress and got into the shower. Gabby stood helplessly as Sasha scrubbed and scrubbed. Gabby finally silently let herself out of the bathroom. The warm water ran over her Sasha’s head and down her body. The white washcloth was streaked with blood when she wiped herself and she winced at the soreness between her legs. The sight of the blood froze her for a second. Sasha realized why the fifth boy wasn’t wearing Death Lord purple and black last night. She knew in no uncertain terms that last night had been an initiation and the next time she saw K-Smooth, he’d be wearing the Death Lord colors. He would have three razor slices in his left eyebrow and a tattoo of a dagger plunging into a heart on his left bicep. He had kept her underwear as a trophy. Sasha sank down to the floor of the shower, leaned her back against the cold porcelain wall and started to cry, loud wrenching sobs.

  BEWILDERED

  March 18,

  There is this hole in my mind. Seems like the anniversary of my blanket party should be chiseled in my consciousness, like the writing on the bricks outside the administration building; but there is only a big old white board of despair. Why is despair a white board? I search and search and come up with Blank, Blank, Blank. In my mind there is not even enough to be dark. It’s like I watch my life from the outside looking in. I don’t even know if it really happened to me or if I made it up in my mind. The worst thing is not to be in pain. The worst thing is to have pain about something you don’t understand and don’t remember. I lost that time. I can’t get it back because I never had it. But it’s there, a living phantasm of disgrace.

  “What kills me is I can’t remember what happened,” said Sasha. “Not a moment past the first sip of Mountain Dew. I was so out of it that I knew nothing until Gabby woke me up the next morning.” Her voice trailed off to a mumble of shame.

  “I’m sorry,” said Dr. Michelle.

  “So, it wasn’t real to me,” said Sasha. She looked at her feet, shod in sheepskin suede boots. “It was like it happened to somebody else. I could see in everybody’s eyes at school that it had happened. They spread it around that I wanted it. I became the school tramp two months before I graduated.”

  “Did they put the video online?”

  Sasha nodded her head. “Yes. But I didn’t see it there.”

  “But you did see it?”

  “Yes.” Sasha swallowed around the lump in her throat.

  “You know the worst thing?”

  “What?”

  “They stole my choices,” Sasha looked down at her lap. “But, they stole my memories, too.”

  ASSAULTED

  March 30,

  I did not believe until I saw with my own eyes. That it happened. I had to talk to Craig, look him in the eyes. I didn’t have sense enough to be afraid. I told my mother I was going to the store to get snacks and then to pick up Gabby…

  Sasha picked up Gabby and went to meet Craig by the dam outside of Washington Park. She’d had to threaten to call the police to get him to meet with her. He had warned her to come alone. Gabby had warned her against going. Sasha didn’t have any real fear of Craig yet, but she wasn’t taking any more chances. She still couldn’t remember what had happened. Her only concession was to bring Gabby with her. She shook as she drove her mother’s car, but she managed to park it in the lot. She left the car running so Gabby could stay warm. It was late March in Michigan and the trees were still naked and denuded of life. Sasha could relate. Even though she could not remember, she felt stripped of all life. It would be dusk soon, but Sasha wanted to see Craig outside in daylight.

  The water from the nearby river poured down from the dam gates in a loud roar. Craig stood lookout gazing out at the water. He had on the purple and black starter jacket, dark jeans and black steel toed boots, trademark gear of the Death Lords. She walked up behind him slowly. He turned and looked at her. She studied his face for a long time.

  “Hey sweet thing,” he said, glancing at the car, where Gabby sat watching. “I told you to come by yourself.”

  “I’m not that stupid, anymore,” said Sasha.

  “You asked to see me,” he asked.

  “Gabby told me some really terrible stuff,” she said. “That you didn’t want me around anymore.”

  “That’s true,” he said. “You got it on with my boy, K-Smooth. I don’t date skanks.”

  “I did not!” she said, through clenched teeth. “Why are you lying?”

  He reached into his pocket and pulled out his cell phone. He tapped the face and then turned it around to face her. He showed her the video on his telephone. Eyes huge and disbelieving, she watched herself as boy after boy took his turn. First Craig, then K-Smooth, then T-Bone, then Ray-Ray and finally the last boy. She couldn’t remember his name she was so numb. She couldn’t look away, just watched the tiny video as it chronicled her violation in soft brown color, blaring Whiz Khalifa in the background. She couldn’t relate to the girl in the picture, dress balled up around her waist; couldn’t understand her moans. Couldn’t remember any of it. She shuddered, handed Craig back the phone and turned away.

  “I thought you loved me?” she asked, tears choking her voice. She gagged.

  “I never said that,” said Craig.

  “Why would you do that to me?”

  “So, you set me up to be an initiation sacrifice?” she asked. She turned and met his eyes in the fading daylight.

  “How could you?”

  “What you want me to say?” he asked. He grinned and waggled the phone.

  “I don’t believe it!” she cried.

  “Ask me no questions,” he drawled. “I’ll tell you no lies.”

  She felt a cold iron fist seize her heart and squeeze. She pressed her hand to her chest, hot tears coursing down her cheeks.

  “We didn’t hurt you,” he said. “We coulda’ really hurt you. K-Smooth even said, ‘pretend I’m your lover’, when he did it. I thought that was kind of passionate.’ We even dropped you off at Gabby’s. No harm, no foul.”

  “Why?” she whispered. “What did I ever do to you?”

  He touched the face of the phone. The video started up again.

  “Breeders before Bleeders,” he said, and pushed her forehead hard with his index finger, causing her to stagger backwards.

  Rage roared through her like the water rushing over the dam gates. She screamed and sprang forward, snatched the phone from D Dog’s hand and flung it over
the railing into the raging water before he could react.

  “You little-” Craig screamed and grabbed the railing. “That phone cost nine hundred dollars.”

  She stood and watched it sink into the depths of the swirling murky water. Tears gushed down her cheeks.

  “I’m going to tell the police,” she yelled, sobbing. “What you did…”

  He whirled and reached for her. He grabbed her arm and wrenched it up so hard, Sasha was standing on her toes. He leaned close to her ear.

  She screamed. “You are hurting me.”

  “You know what snitches get?”

  “Stitches?” she muttered.

  “Dead,” he said. “Along with friends and family.”

  Sasha was terrified.

  “You’re gonna kill me?”

  Now, when it was too late, Sasha believed everything that she had ever heard anyone say about Dragon Dog Frazier. He dragged her closer, close enough for her to smell his fetid breath. He showed her the butt of the gun he had tucked into his jeans.

  “Sasha, are you okay?” They both slewed around and saw Gabby standing outside of the running car, cell phone in her hand. “I’m calling 911.”

  Sasha snatched out of Craig’s grip and ran. She stumbled, then righted herself and kept running.

  “You better say you okay!” Craig yelled at her. “Tramp!”

  Sasha reached the car, got in, and peeled of, tires squealing.

  “You okay?” asked Gabby, once they were away from the park.

  “No,” she said, pitifully.

  Gabby reached over and patted Sasha’s shoulder.

  “I hope he dies,” she said. “He’s scum!”

  Sasha pulled over, stopped the car.

  “Oh, my God, Gabby,” sobbed Sasha. “It’s all true! The video is real. They really did that to me.”

  “I hope they all just die.” Gabby took her hand and squeezed. “I’m so sorry.”

  Sasha calmed down a bit.

  “Let’s go to the police.”

  “I threw the phone in the river.”