The Butterfly House. Marcia Preston
the fixed social structure of hometown kids. They’d all hushed to hear my voice, the first time I’d spoken aloud inside the classroom. I confessed, my face steaming, that I had lived in four different states: Atlanta, Oklahoma, New Mexico and now Shady River. Mrs. Hanson was tactful enough not to correct my geography.
Thus Petey’s interest in me. “We need one more player for the other team,” he said.
Still suspecting a prank, I shook my head again. Was sock-her the Shady River version of dodgeball? I’d played that before, and wanted no part of a rerun.
Petey and the boys didn’t leave, and I realized he expected more of an answer.
“They play football in Oklahoma,” I whispered. Then added, “But not the girls.” Actually, in Oklahoma, I’d played running back during a touch football game organized by one of my first-grade teachers. I was small but evasive, swiveling through a gauntlet of classmates to the goal line, my frizzy braids flying free. The moment illuminated my memory with a freeze-frame of rare joy.
But I wasn’t inclined to share that recollection with Petey Small.
He twirled the ball and watched me with blank eyes, his mouth hanging open. Petey’s mouth always hung open.
At that moment, salvation appeared. A crescent of dark hair swung into the corner of my vision, followed by Cynthia Jaines’s oval face.
“Wanna jump rope with us?” She eyed my plate. “After you eat?”
I hadn’t had so much attention in my entire life. My cheeks burned, and I could feel my freckles standing out like Cheerios in a bowl of milk.
“Yeah!” I popped from my chair, grabbing the cookie and a celery stick. “I’m finished.”
Cynthia turned to Petey Small with a smile that showed two missing front teeth, one dimpled cheek, and mischief sparking in dark-chocolate eyes. Already she knew how to wield her charm like a weapon. I watched her, wide-eyed.
“Petey’s such a mensch, he’ll take your tray,” she said. “Won’t you, Petey?”
Neither Petey, nor I, nor his merry men had any idea whether he’d been flattered or insulted, but the strength of Cynthia’s superior knowledge struck the boys silent.
“Thanks,” I said to Petey, and shrugged.
As I hurried away from the table with Cynthia, aware of the stares that followed us, our eyes met in a moment of feminine collusion. We burst into giggles.
Cynthia’s patronage saved me from a miserable school year. At Shady River Elementary, every child among the eighteen in my class had spent not only first grade but kindergarten together. I hadn’t attended kindergarten. And after switching schools twice during first grade, I struggled to catch up. Because of Cynthia, the other children accepted me with tolerant indifference, in my view the perfect response. Left alone, I navigated safely within my three-cornered universe: the fantasy land of books, the reality of the shabby rented house I shared with my often-absent mother, and the exotic world of Cynthia Jaines.
The first time Cynthia took me home with her after school and we approached the strange rock house on the hill, I thought it looked like something from the Aesop’s Fables our teacher sometimes read aloud. I’d never heard of a real house that had a name.
The door to Rockhaven stood open to an October breeze, and Cynthia bounded in. Before my eyes could adjust from bright sunshine to the interior darkness, something huge and fluttery brushed past my head, chilling me to stone. I strangled a scream, and Cynthia’s laughter bubbled.
“That’s Zoroaster,” she said, holding up a finger as if the wild-winged thing might alight on her hand. “Isn’t he beautiful?”
He was indeed. My mouth stretched open as I watched an iridescent-blue butterfly waft toward the light of the sunporch. Wide as a dinner plate, its wings beat as if in slow motion. “Wow,” I said, while goose bumps tickled my skin.
“It’s actually a blue Morpho from South America,” she said, “but Mom gives pet names to her special ones. We have lots more. Come on, I’ll show you.”
I followed her toward the light.
The green aroma enveloped us even before I stepped onto the tiled floor and gaped at the ceiling of vines, backlit by diffused sunlight. Plants tangled at our feet and sprouted like fountains from massive pots. Along the glass walls, table planters of dark soil nourished a jungle of spiky fronds and lacy ferns. Occasional bright flowers glowed like Christmas lights among the greenery. And weaving through the maze, multicolored butterflies flapped and floated, random and slow as the river beyond the glass.
Cynthia’s mother separated from the forest and spoke to her, startling me.
“Hello, sweetie. Oh, good! You’ve brought a friend.”
Her voice was the forerunner of Cynthia’s, low-pitched and slightly sandy. Lenora Jaines smiled at me, her temples crinkling around sea-green eyes. I’d never seen eyes quite that color before.
“This is Bobbie,” Cynthia said, shortening Roberta into the nickname we’d agreed on after much consideration. I’d never had a nickname before, and to me it represented acceptance in my new world. For her, we’d picked Cincy, Cindy being far too common.
Lenora Jaines’s dark hair was swept back into a low ponytail, and loamy soil clung to her hands. Her skin was moon-colored against the backdrop of leaves. She said, “Hello, Bobbie,” and I knew then that Bobbie was my real name.
“Her mom works at the River Inn and isn’t home yet,” Cincy said. “What can we eat? Can we make rock cookies?”
Lenora appeared to think that over. “I’ll wash up and we’ll see what we can find in the kitchen.” She brushed off her hands and followed Cincy into the main house, but I lingered a moment on the sunporch, unwilling to leave the mysteries of that indoor Eden.
Once alone, I stood stock-still, my head thrown back in wonder, and inhaled the chaos around me. A zebra-striped butterfly flitted from bloom to bloom. In all four states, I’d never seen anyplace so beautiful. I wanted to take it all inside me—to sip nectar and float above the world on psychedelic wings.
“Bobbie? Come on!” Cincy called. “We’re going to bake rocks!”
I hesitated a moment longer, then turned and skipped toward the kitchen.
Lenora Jaines occupied her house with the same airy freedom as the butterflies. Mundane things like grocery shopping rarely occurred to her. In the midst of putting together supper for the three of us, she’d discover with genuine surprise an absence of milk, or cooking oil, or bread. This delighted Cincy and me, because then we’d be sent on a mission to the market.
Rockhaven sat on the Washington side of the Columbia, but the village of Shady River spread along the Oregon bank. Riding double on Cincy’s silver bike, we flew down the winding road at terrifying speeds and crossed the wide river bridge, arriving at the grocery store breathless and giddy. After making our purchase and storing our booty in the bike’s wicker basket, we walked the bike back up the incline, chewing licorice whips or sucking on sour mints—whatever dime treasure we’d chosen as our reward. In winter we rode Cincy’s homemade sled down the hill.
One balmy spring evening, we arrived back at Rockhaven bearing a dozen eggs and found a car in the driveway.
“Company!” Cincy shouted. Her mom seldom had visitors.
My neck prickled. “That’s my mom’s car,” I whispered.
Cincy clutched my arm, the aroma of jawbreaker warm on her breath. Her black eyes were caverns in the twilight. “Are you in trouble?”
“Who knows?”
She stowed the bike and we hurried inside.
Mom and Lenora sat at the scrubbed pine table in the dining room. Lenora cradled a coffee mug in her hands, and her smile looked