The Butterfly Girl

by Rene Denfeld

  Today she had an appointment with Sean Richardson. Then she was going to find Celia. She didn’t want anything to happen to the girl.

  * * *

  Jerome spent some time cleaning up after Naomi left—she had made an effort this time, but boy, she had a long way to go—and called Ed Ashtree, arranging to visit him. Then he went online for a while, fruitlessly searching for any information about Wesley. It appeared the man had dropped off the face of the earth. There was nothing.

  The mail slot banged open, and a thick manila envelope dropped through the slot. It landed in the basket Diane used for mail. Elk Crossing School District, Archives, the return address said. Patty had added a smiley face to the front.

  Setting it down on the kitchen table, Jerome slipped a sharp knife under the flap. The faded red yearbook slid out. elk crossing high, the front said, in crooked gilt lettering.

  Jerome sat down, broke the spine, flipped open the yearbook, and began turning the pages.

  There. A thumbnail photo. Wesley Thurman. He frowned, remembering what Naomi had told him.

  “There’s something we’d like to share with you,” Agent Richardson said.

  Naomi walked into his office. There, sitting in the chair she had once refused, was the scar-faced man. He was wearing a suit.

  He rose, holding out a thick hand. His broad face smiled, the scarred seams of his lips moving. “Specialist McConnell,” he introduced himself, in a thick, warm brogue.

  “Shit,” Naomi said.

  Specialist McConnell, as he told her, was a field agent from New York. Hearing about these cases, he had offered to come out—he had a sensitivity for work involving street kids, he said. He had been on and off the streets himself when he was growing up. He understood the culture.

  The scars? Naomi asked. “I started boxing when I joined the Marines,” he said, folding his legs. “Obviously I didn’t stop in time. Truth to tell, the scars help in the undercover work. No one believes someone who looks like me is FBI.”

  “You were following Celia outside the library because you were worried about her?” Naomi asked, swinging her arms restlessly with anger. Not at him. At the sense of dread creeping on.

  “I’ve been worried about her. All of the girls.” He paused. “I didn’t know who you were, so I thought it best to vamoose when you came running up behind me. Then Agent Richardson told me, and I haven’t wanted you to blow my cover.”

  “Have you found anything out?”

  “I’ve been posing as a john. A creep. Asking around,” he explained. “I know all the code, the language. Asking for ‘sweet treats.’” He made a disgusted expression with his mouth. “I’ve gotten a break. Rumors. There is a house where a man takes the girls.”

  “But no one knows where it is.”

  He looked over at Richardson. “You were right about her.” He turned back to Naomi. “He’s hiding in plain sight.”

  Naomi felt a wave of sickness coming. A generic-looking man who had led a generic-looking life, she remembered having thought scornfully. “Oh no.” Naomi almost doubled over with the pain. Her phone pinged, and she reached for it.

  It was a message from Jerome, with a picture of the yearbook photo of Wesley Thurman attached. Naomi looked down.

  Even as a young man he had looked the same: small and fussy, with round glasses, and shorn hair.

  Chapter 37

  It was Celia’s birthday.

  After eating, she said good-bye to Rich and then jumped the fence for the Goodwill truck, rummaging through the black plastic bags left by others. She found a fresh pair of boys’ jeans, a newish top, and a stained white sweatshirt that said dance. She even found new socks, soft and white and pink.

  She lugged these treasures up the steps to the library. The scar-faced man was not around, and Celia felt relief. Inside, the elderly librarian said hello.

  In the family washroom Celia locked the door, then filled the sink with hot water and hand soap. She stripped, shoving her dirty clothes into the trash can. She washed her pits with their soft beginnings of hair, her tummy, her cloven buttocks, and, last, the place between her legs. She dried off the best she could with the rough paper towels. Finally she doused her head in the now grayish sink, scrubbing her scalp with her nails, and vigorously washed her face.

  Drying off with more paper towels, she leaned forward at her reflection.

  Her eyes, staring back in the clean mirror, were large and luminous. Her skin, relieved of dirt, was soft and pale, with honey-colored freckles on her cheeks. She touched the thin skin under her eyes, saw the eyebrows, the soft pink of her lips.

  She smiled defiantly. Fuck you, Teddy. I am pretty.

  She put on the new clothes, enjoying them against her skin. Finally she slipped on her worn shoes, unlocked the door, and ran up the marble stairs, her hand barely touching the rails. Below her the librarian smiled.

  The library had a new book about butterflies. Celia was immersed in it, aware of the sun passing over the windows. She was in her favorite chair, where the sun traveled the corner of the building, catching like fire on the tables. Celia felt her breathing slow, turning the pages. She was lost inside the book, seeing herself in a different world—among the butterflies.

  “Hello, miss.”

  She looked up, annoyed. This was the cost of getting clean: every creep would want to talk to her. Instead she was surprised to see a small man with round glasses. It took her a moment to place him. He was the one who had helped her that night someone spiked her drink.

  “Hey,” she replied with cold caution.

  “Mind if I sit?” He flashed a smile at her and signaled at the chair opposite her. Between them the table gleamed.

  Celia shrugged. She could always get up and move if he bothered her.

  He had a book and soon opened it, reading across from her. Celia snuck a glance, her own concentration broken. It was something about police work. She saw his silver hair, cut short on the sides, just like a cop. A flash of understanding came to her. This was the undercover man Naomi had mentioned! Relieved, she returned to her own book, wiggling a little in her chair, pleased she had figured it out.

  The clock ticked. The sun was behind clouds. Celia kept sneaking glances at the man, but he seemed immersed in his book. For some reason, he looked mildly put out, and this caught at her. Gave her a tug.

  “Are you . . . studying?” she asked.

  He gave her a curt nod and turned a page.

  She yawned and put her book down. Getting clean made her sleepy. She wished there was a place she could lie down for a nap.

  “Tired?” the man asked. It was hard to see his eyes behind his glasses.

  “It’s not a big deal,” Celia bragged.

  “What are you up to today?” he asked indifferently, as if it didn’t matter.

  “It’s my birthday,” Celia said, proudly, and then added, “I’m going to find my friend Naomi later. I bet you know her.”

  “I bet I do.”

  “I’m going to help her.”

  “Help her what?”

  “Find her sister.”

  “And how are you going to do that?”

  “I think I know where her sister might be.”

  “Oh.” The small man put down the book. Now she could see his blue eyes behind the glasses. They were grave and—what was it? Worried. No, Celia told herself. Not worried. It was respect, for her. “And where would her sister be?” he asked.

  “I saw this house. In the industrial area.”

  Now the face was still. The blue eyes were on her, watching.

  “I saw it a while ago,” Celia said. “There was someone inside, watching me. I think it might be the man who is taking the girls. I bet he took Naomi’s sister, too. That’s where she’s at, and I’m going to help Naomi get her.”

  The small man spoke slowly, carefully, like her answer mattered. “Did you tell Naomi where this house was?”

  She saw an edge of his narrow teeth—she was surprised they we
ren’t nicer. “No.” She shook her head, embarrassed. “I was going to, only . . .” She trailed off.

  She didn’t think the undercover man would understand what it was like to be told your entire life you were a liar. How after a while you started believing no one would ever believe you, and maybe you even stopped believing yourself.

  But he was smiling. It was okay after all.

  “You can show me,” he offered.

  They walked down the wide marble stairs, and below them the librarian looked up to see Celia leaving with an older man in a suit. The man looked professional, but all the same, the librarian frowned. She swallowed her instinct to say something, to call out. She wasn’t sure why.

  Above them the sky was a clear blue, with fluffy white clouds.

  “It’s pretty, isn’t it?” He smiled. “Just like you.”

  “How long have you known Naomi?” Celia asked and, just for a second, caught a passing look of surprise on his face.

  “Oh, I’ve known her . . . forever.” He smiled to himself.

  “Really?”

  He asked, slyly, “Do you know what I do?”

  “You’re undercover,” Celia answered, proudly. In the blocks below them was skid row. Her friends would be there, and the strip clubs, the gay bars. But the streets were empty here, and besides passing the corner market, they would stay empty until she showed him the boarded-up house. Celia felt a small sense of disquiet at that, but she told herself he was okay; he was like Naomi: a good guy.

  “See that store up there?” he asked, pointing at the corner market.

  Celia nodded.

  “I’ll buy you a soda. You can drink it on the way. You like black cherry cream, right?”

  “How do you know that?” she asked, slowing.

  “That night we met, remember? That’s what you were drinking.”

  “Oh.”

  Celia really didn’t want the soda. She wanted to show the man the scary house so Naomi would be impressed. She would find out Celia was a nice girl after all.

  “I thought I told you, you ought to be careful what you drink on the streets.”

  Celia remembered him handing her the soda outside the store, the top already opened. Watching her, carefully, as she drank it.

  They were outside the house. The blank boarded-up eyes of the windows, tufted with blankets, stared back with horror at her. Her limbs felt numb. Celia watched one eye become five become nothing. She was whirling. She saw his teeth: narrow, edged in dark. She was falling.

  “I got you,” he said.

  * * *

  Naomi came sprinting down to skid row. “Have you seen Celia?” She stopped, leaning over, panting, asking Rich.

  Rich was on the corner, panhandling. “She said she was going to the library,” he said.

  “I was just there,” Naomi said. The librarian said Celia had left with a man in a suit. Naomi had shown her the picture of a younger Wesley on her phone, and the librarian said yes, that was him.

  Naomi felt pure, unadulterated panic. Nothing in her recent life had felt like this. Rich, his own thighs tingling with fear, was unable to speak.

  “You looking for Celia?” It was the girl with the phone. “I saw her a little bit ago. She was in the corner market.”

  “Was she with anyone?”

  “Some dude in glasses.” The girl shrugged, chewed a hangnail.

  Naomi ran to the corner market. Inside, the clerk shrugged. Outside, Naomi spun around in a circle.

  Celia was gone.

  Three

  Butterfly

  Chapter 38

  In the basement of every house there was an urn. It was the bowl of water he gave her to wash her face. It was the toilet that had to be flushed with the waiting buckets. It was something more: love in the night.

  Sarah liked the basement because she could catch a glimpse of the world outside the barricaded windows. Sometimes she touched the boards nailed over the window—lightly, because Wesley had told her he could see and hear everything she did. Sometimes she thought Wesley crawled inside her skin and saw through her eyes. But no. That was too scary to be true.

  In the basement Sarah could talk to Little Self. Little Self lived under Sarah’s armpit. She hid under the skin between her rib and her rushing heart, where Wesley could not see or hear her. When Sarah was alone, Little Self came out, scampered down her arm, and Sarah opened her hand so Little could perch in her palm and they could talk.

  The dirt floor of the basement was spotted with blood. Wesley did that. He said he would do it to Sarah, but she didn’t think so, though she didn’t know for sure.

  He has the girl I saw outside, Sarah told Little Self. He put her in the room, Sarah said, her lips moving silently.

  Little Self shook her tiny head. This was bad. This was worse than bad.

  Sarah had seen the girl outside through the window before. She had short curly hair and was just standing there, staring at the house. Sarah had wanted to yell, Run away! Run now! Before he catches you! But now it was too late.

  You need to leave now, Little Self said. She often told Sarah to escape. But the last time Sarah had tried, Wesley had hurt her real bad. It had taken her forever to mend, and now one of her ankles was twisted forever. If she tried to run, she would not get far.

  I’m waiting for Big Sister, Sarah mouthed.

  You can’t wait anymore, Little Self announced.

  Big Sister said she would come back for me, Sarah replied stubbornly.

  Sarah wanted Big Sister to come back. She was scared. She had no idea what that world out there might be like. It might be full of worse men than Wesley. There might be giant monsters out there who would eat her, tear her skin from her bones.

  You need to—

  There was a sound on the wooden basement steps behind her, and all the spit in Sarah’s mouth dried up. She closed her hand, and Little Self scampered up her arm, ran under her armpit, and burrowed into her skin next to the noisy blood of her heart. There she curled into a tight ball so she wouldn’t have to hear or look at Wesley.

  Sarah heard his rough voice behind her. No matter how long it had been, just the sound of Wesley’s voice was enough to make Sarah’s legs watery with fear. She closed her eyes and, turning around, forced herself to see him in the only way she could.

  * * *

  Celia didn’t open her eyes at first. A smell came over her, like a formaldehyde she had never known. Dried liquid, crystalline on her cheeks. Dim memories of a forgotten place before it all. Can you dream what you don’t know?

  Celia’s eyes opened.

  * * *

  Wesley was sitting, hunched, at the kitchen table, eating. There was only one chair, and Wesley was the only one allowed to use it. His short silver hair shone in the lamplight. Inside one of the hall closets he kept the suits and shoes he wore when he went out. When he returned he took his street costume off, put on old pants and a dirty shirt. Like a boogeyman.

  Baked beans were the only thing on the plate in front of him.

  He scraped the plate with his fork and ate. He looked at Sarah standing in the corner. She made sure he could look through her, and that her hands were hanging like bags of meat at her side.

  Wesley had brought Sarah to this house when she was small. He put something over her head and put her in the back of something that bumped, and she threw up inside the cloth. When she had gotten bigger, Wesley had started leaving and finding others. He didn’t keep them very long, and lately he didn’t keep them hardly at all.

  He would have gotten rid of Sarah, too, if he weren’t trying to punish her sister for leaving. He did that by keeping Sarah alive.

  Then the beans were gone. He stood up, dunked the plate and fork in the plastic bin full of cold gray water. “Wash this,” he ordered her before going back upstairs.

  Sarah was back in the kitchen. Put crackers on a plate, Wesley had told her.

  Wesley didn’t know Sarah had thoughts. He thought she was dumb. That’s what he s
aid. Dumb as a post. Not like her big sister, who was the only one smart enough to escape. Sarah could tell Wesley hated that—he talked about her sister with hate—and yet he seemed to respect her, too.

  Wesley didn’t know about Little Self, or that at night she peeked out, looked around to check all was safe, and climbed carefully onto Sarah’s chest to protect her. Now, in the kitchen, Sarah held her arm straight out and watched Little Self slide down to land, triumphantly, in her open palm.

  Look, Little Self told her.

  Sarah looked around. The counters were covered with cans and boxes, kerosene for the lamps, big jugs of water that glimmered in the dark, and a hot plate for Wesley to heat his food. There was nothing sharp in the kitchen. The only metal was dull butter knives and forks. On the edge of the counter was a small locked box. That was where Wesley kept his gun.

  No, not that, Little said.

  Sarah looked around again, saw a box of rat poison in the back of the mess. Wesley put the little pellets around the house and Sarah found the rat bodies later, dried up and tiny at the waist. Sarah shook her head. So many times she had wanted to die but not here. She wanted to die on the outside. She wanted to die feeling free.

  Sarah looked at her soft feet on the dirty floor. The toes looked boneless. The twisted ankle hurt. She looked back at Little, perched in her palm. Little had hard feet that could run. Little had legs that could stretch. Not Sarah.

  I’m afraid, Sarah told her.

  Little Self shook her head. You need to leave soon.

  She climbed up Sarah’s arm and burrowed back into her armpit. When Sarah put the crackers on the plate, she heard crying.

  Chapter 39

  In the courthouse downtown Naomi and Jerome found records of the trial against Celia’s stepdad. They located Alyssa’s foster parents, unraveled the rotten core of Celia’s story until Jerome landed outside Teddy’s jail cell, where he was again awaiting trial, this time for raping Alyssa.