Chatterbox: Inkwell

Purple Butterfly

I reach up and slap a brown marker out of my cousin’s hand, which she has just dotted the top of our fort with. Or rather, the bottom of our grandparent’s chair, with which we had made an elaborate fort with towels, blankets and our garden fence. My two twin cousins, Christine and Christian, had been taunting me ever since I’d told them not to draw on the nice, white chair that Nana and Papa had allowed them (god knows why), to play with. That was just how it went with 4 year olds, and I would know, because I had been in charge of them most of Christmas break, when we had flown to Seattle to visit them, my aunt and uncle, and my grandparents. And while I was glad to give my aunt and uncle a break (my uncle worked all day as a nurse and my aunt was battling cancer), boy, those two were a handful. “Let’s try this a different way,” I say, angrily capping every pen in the vicinity and stuffing them into Christine’s bright pink bag. “Since you two obviously won’t listen to me, why don’t you find Nana and Papa and ask them what they would think about you drawing on their chair.” I blow out a breath as they slam into the front door, which groans under their weight and slowly opens. They rush inside, slamming the door shut, and I hear them yelling over each other as they try to find Nana and Papa, even though they could just look in the sitting room where our grandparents spend all their time. Their voices fade away as I look around the garden. I don’t know why I let Christine and Christian build their fort here. Without their screaming voices, the garden is beautiful and serene, the air wet and the leaves dewy. A purple butterfly meanders through the flowers, oddly enough. I hold out my finger and the butterfly lands on it. I hold my breath, hoping upon hope that the twins wouldn’t rush out and spoil this moment. The butterfly tightens its grip on my finger, and a freaky energy seems to ripple around me. I try to shake the butterfly off, but its grip is iron, and it starts to flap its wings. My feet lift of the ground as I scream and thrash, but my noise is sucked into the freaky energy surrounding me. Hearing Papa’s low, gravelly voice come out the window, I now hope upon hope that the twins will come out the door, alert Nana and Papa, and get me down safely. But no. The butterfly pulls me up, up, up, until I can see all around Seattle. Soon, I realize that there is nothing I can do about the butterfly, and I relax. It’s actually really cool, flying so high, when you don’t think about the fact that the only thing stopping you is one lone butterfly. By the time we break through the clouds, I am completely relaxed. The butterfly drops me on one of the clouds, but I am not scared. Somehow, I know the cloud will be solid, like cotton balls. Ahead of me, I see hologram-like pictures popping up, and I take a few steps forward, almost in a daze, to the first one. A woman with red, fizzy hair takes the first steps on mars. Christine. The next hologram shows a man with the same hair type, giving some sort of speech. Christian. After watching for a minute I realize he is talking about cancer. A cure for cancer. 

Ok I'll post more later bye!