Untitled (for now)

Butterflies were always attracted to Hana. Her father told her it was because of her sweetness, and he teased that she was born from a flower. Nevertheless, she had to be careful on school field trips to arboretums and gardens, lest half the populace flock to her in a flurry of jewel tones and whisper-kiss her with their tickly feet. Other insects never bothered her; not one mosquito bite ever marred her olive complexion, nor had she ever captured a jar of lightning bugs and watched them in their frantic escape dance, but luna moths clustered around her house at night like leaves caught in a twister and would ricochet off her window screen, dash their bodies against the house with every effort to get close to her. For a while when she was ten years old she was terrified that they were going to sink their feet into her flesh and twist up in her hair, and then she would be gone, floating away with the clouds and her father would wonder where she’d disappeared.

Sometimes it hurt when they landed on her, though she never found any bite marks or red hives speckling her skin afterwards, but she could still feel the dull ache deep inside her gut days later. Then she noticed that her deep brown eyes—more black than the chocolate her father claimed them to be—were slowly turning blue. Oh, it was hard to see at first, and she wouldn’t have noticed the pinpricks of color if she hadn’t become obsessed with eye makeup the summer she turned fourteen—she was obsessed with the wide, round eyes that the blonde girls in her softball league had and thought that maybe if she had those eyes too, she could fit in better. It was only during her third botched attempt at dragging the goopy black liner across her eyelid that she noticed her eyes were freckled with blue.

She ran to her father, crying that she was going slowly blind, the liner dripping down her cheeks like a pathetic mime’s makeup. He took her to the optometrist, who tested her vision, gave her drops, and checked her for glaucoma. Hana was fine, the doctor merely shrugged and suggested that puberty was bringing about changes. Her father forced a laugh that nobody believed and hurried her out of the office. A tiger swallowtail hovering nearby flitted over and landed on her cheek, its long straw proboscis prodding at her flesh. Her father watched for a moment, its black and yellow wings unable to conceal the misery in his daughter’s face.

When they got into the car, he finally told her the truth. Her mother wasn’t off in Reno with a new husband. She’d been a wild woman that he had met in the woods, ivy tangled in her black hair, her small eyes half black, half blue, and butterflies had swirled around them as they consummated their lust in that clearing; a clearing he’d never found again, save for when he’d received Hana as a baby. A monarch butterfly landed on the window nearest to Hana, waggled its orange wings as she considered the story that he told to her.

She dismissed it, though she desperately wanted to believe in the mystical powers of the woods. But the rational blue already had a foothold, and as the months and years went on, the speckles slowly spread across her iris as though they were measles. Nobody else seemed to notice; not her classmates or teachers, or even the few friends she’d managed to scrape together. It wasn’t until late in college that someone finally commented how unique her eyes were. By this time they were almost completely as blue as the sky at its apex, but a small ring of brown still surrounded her pupil like lightning. He said how much he liked her eyes one day when they were sharing a microscope. He had a kind smile, a peaky nose and an unfortunate smatter of freckles across his face. They went out for coffee, and she fell hopelessly in love with him after their fifth date. She took him home to meet her father the spring before they graduated.

Hana’s father greeted them warmly and insisted in a fatherly way that they sleep in separate beds. Rory flashed his charming smile and informed Hana’s father that he—much to Hana’s disgruntlement, but she hadn’t voiced her opinion on this yet—was determined to wait for marriage. Hana’s father of course approved, and after a rather rambunctious game of Balderdash, everyone headed to bed.

Hana couldn’t sleep. She was used to air conditioning in her dorm, and she’d forgotten that her father didn’t use it. The night was humid and sticky, and she kept going to the window to look out in the woods, the call of the forest singing through her marrow. Finally, she could stand it no more and snuck out through the trees.

Most moths hadn’t had a chance to pupate yet, but several caterpillars nodded silently in her direction as she slipped between the trees, barely more than a shadow herself. She didn’t quite know what she expected to find, but the blindingly sunlit clearing with its jade-green moss and emerald green grass made her jaw drop. Everything, from the fallen log at the center to the climbing ivy that draped overhead was in technicolor, or maybe that was just what it was like to step from mindnight into noon.

The woman who sat on the log was no different, her prominent cheekbones the same shape and height as Hana’s. Her eye color divided diagonally across the iris, though Hana didn’t actually notice till she stepped closer. The woman smiled and stretched a hand out to Hana. Butterflies hovered nearby, but they didn’t land, and Hana found herself not wondering why they stayed away, but why so many different species weren’t still in caterpillar phase this early in the year as she cautiously approached her mother.

“Mama,” Hana said, and the woman nodded, raised a concerned hand to touch Hana’s cheek. The young woman knelt in front of her mother, who did not look much older than Hana herself. Mama asked Hana why her eyes were so blue, and Hana didn’t know what to say. Suddenly Mama was angry.

Father should have told you, Mama said, but Hana could only shake her head. Mama cupped Hana’s face in hers. You are going to lose your immortality if you let the butterflies take any more of you away, and then you will be rotten, corrupt just like all those Humans.

But there is a way out. You must seduce the one made for you, because in the intimate joining all the loose threads will be finally healed together. And then you can come here and live with me, forever in this world of magic.

Hana wasn’t sure what she should say. Her mother kissed her between her eyebrows, turned her back around and gave her a shove. Darkness enveloped her and she stood in the woods, every muscle trembling. Despite the rational blue of her eyes, the brown lightning in them flashed, and she knew that if she were to go to Rory tonight, he would never be able to resist her. She fought with herself for a moment, trying to rationally overcome the rising desire, but all the loose threads inside her screamed their raw edges against her flesh, and she managed to sneak upstairs to Rory’s room where he was awake and waiting for her.

She stripped off her clothes and lowered her smooth skin down onto his, felt every wave of ecstasy rising inside of her body, sealing in her immortality. All she thought about was the place she could finally belong, with its bright jewel tones and permeating magic. With every kiss, every touch, every clench of her fists, it came closer and closer. When the final wave hit, he sagged against her breast and she held him for a long time, till the pale gold dawn light began to creep in the window.

Into the misty green morning she walked, barefoot and naked, not a care in the world. No one could see her now. She was officially a creature of the fey, belonged to the natural world for all of eternity. No more butterflies could harm her. The caterpillars from the night before watched mournfully after her with their huge black eyes. She entered the clearing, but the jewel tones were gone, left with deep shadowy greens and grays in the mist. Hana walked over and looked at her reflection in the still pond, her mother’s face stared back, teeth sharp and eyes wicked. Flocks of butterflies floated down around her, but they ignored her. Instead they landed on the carcass of a dead and rotten fish that lay on the pebbles, its eyes and mouth wide in terror, and they began to feed.

1498 words. This story went way off on its own, down a path I wasn’t expecting it to, and then fell into a frigging canyon.  Gotta love the creative process!

Based on this.