You and I are Butterflies

Sailing. Camping at Deadman’s Island. The weekend was going to be one of the best of Benji’s life.

 
Benji had lived in Lockport for two months; Alex had always lived there. Benji and his mom were a family of two. Not so for Alex. He was the youngest of five.

Benji and his mom were always moving. It was a weird thing, being on what was basically an extended visit someplace. Get to know the people there, and then start over. Life, for them, was perpetually getting ready to start. And no matter how old Benji got, it had been this way. Getting ready, getting ready. Never starting.

No matter where they lived, every night at bedtime, Benji’s mom took his face in her hands, made lovey pouts, her own face close enough he could smell her breath. You and I are butterflies, she would always say. We flutter by. And Benji used to nod. Because he could see how that was true… for her. His mother was divorced, frequently unemployed, thin. She was accustomed to floating. It was her habit. But he himself? In his mind, Benji was a bruiser.

A quiet, keep-to-himself kind of bruiser, as it had played out that spring in Mrs. McDaniels’ fifth-grade classroom. Benji had been assigned a seat in the back. He liked it there. He felt it important that nobody look at him while he was looking at the teacher. Benji had all sorts of ready responses for any kid who might give him a hard time. He knew bad words. He’d practiced the glares. So far nobody had though. Lockport was nicer than his last school. Safer.

With Benji in the back and quiet, it was remarkable that a boisterous boy like Alex, who had been assigned a seat in the very front row so Mrs. McDaniels could put her hand on his desk whenever he started with the lightsaber noises, had taken it upon himself to befriend Benji. Alex called him over on the playground one day at recess. He waved to Benji, then gestured at the basketball under his arm.

And they played together, tossing the ball at the hoop some foolish construction worker had long ago put up way too high, higher than the ones at the park even, NBA height or something, so high no student in the history of Lockport Elementary had ever made a basket. Nobody. Ever. The hoop had been hanging there, untouched (Alex said) for generations. Alex claimed he himself had bounced a ball off the backboard once.

Benji had snickered. “I bet you did,” he’d said in a disbelieving voice.

“Ask anyone.” Alex had gotten into a dribbling stance and was paddling the ball against the pavement. “I did.”

“Bet you can’t do it again.”

So Alex had tried all the rest of recess, tossing the basketball as high as he could, but no luck.

“Liar,” Benji had said.

Alex had not replied.

Regardless, after that they were friends.

“Wanna go on my sailboat this weekend?” Alex said some days later, after another recess tossing air balls. The Duty had just blown the whistle and all the kids were moving in a herd to the door.

“You have a sailboat?”

“My family does.”

“Awesome,” Benji said. “Yes!”

At bedtime, Benji told his mom about the invitation. The news transformed her. First, “I’m glad you found a friend your age!” Then, “But how could I send my child to sea with strangers?”

Benji got out of bed, retrieved the corner of the math worksheet from the depths of his backpack, and handed it over. He got back into bed and listened to her talk herself into it.

Benji’s head lay on her lap while she typed in Alex’s digits and spoke mom-to-mom, going over the details. Their boat was a 30-foot built in 1982. There was to be not one, but two boat rides. One in. One out. In between, they’d camp overnight at a place called Deadman’s Island.

That weekend was going to be one of the best of Benji’s life.

On Friday, Benji took pains selecting items to pack. While he had incurred experience packing for household moves, he had never once packed for an overnight and was unsure of what would be needed. (And Mom was working swing at her new steakhouse job, so no help there.) They were due to sail early Saturday, and for Benji, most of Friday night was him putting his red collared shirt in his backpack, then taking it out again and replacing it with his sweatshirt, then changing his mind and putting in both, as well as sneakers, coat, his Ziploc of Easter candy (mostly wrappers now), and of course a toothbrush, toothpaste, underwear, PJs, water bottle, and finally last year’s pair of waterproof boots which pinched at the toe but still fit.

When he finished he had to sit on his backpack in order to zip it up.

He didn’t think of anywhere as home. Home, for Benji, was the sweet-sour smell of his mother’s breath. It was just her.

Saturday, at the marina, while their moms talked, Benji and Alex made a contest of drop-kicking small rocks. Then Benji’s mom brought up the question of a life jacket, as she’d told him she would, and hung around while Alex’s mom dug in their boat, came back with a stinky orange thing she draped across Benji’s shoulders, tightened the straps and finally gave a firm tug, jagging Benji’s hips in a way that made him blush. (And there was to be absolutely no taking off the life jacket in the boat, regardless of who else did or did not choose to wear one.) It had been expressed at length in the car.

“Snug as a bug,” Alex’s mom said.

Benji wondered if his mother would leave soon, and worried about what she might do or say to embarrass him in the meantime. He smiled at her, trying to look perfectly content. She snapped a photo, squeezed him tight, lifejacket and all, and left.

So then they were about to sail. But it was taking Alex’s parents a long time. (It felt like a long time to Benji.) First, they had to get everyone’s bags on board. They had other stuff too. Tent. Pillows. Groceries. Coolers. There was some dial in the boat’s innards which needed to be assessed and calibrated, a task which both Alex’s mom and dad separately explained was routine and not a problem, but took time. Alex’s mom talked to Benji for a while, about nothing. Alex had four older brothers but all of them were already grown up and away at college. Then Alex’s mom went around wiping off all the pollen because (she said) it made Alex sneeze.

Benji liked the hollow plonk of footsteps on the marina’s long wooden dock. He liked watching Alex’s parents get ready to go. The sailboat itself was bright white on the blue water. There was one very tall post sticking straight up from the center of it, and a number of thick, tight ropes making diagonals between the post and the boat.

While his parents worked, Alex sat on top of a picnic table playing his Nintendo Switch. Alex had never brought or talked about his Switch at school, so Benji was surprised he had one.

“Can I see?” Benji said, perching beside Alex on the picnic table.

Alex didn’t reply.

“Can I see what you’re playing?” Benji said again.

“What?” Alex said. “Sorry. I get really into games.”

“Oh,” Benji said. “What game?”

“Animal Crossing New Horizons.”

“Oh.”

Benji hadn’t asked again to see, and Alex hadn’t moved to show him. Benji didn’t know if Alex really hadn’t heard him ask, or if he had heard but didn’t want to. Benji didn’t know why Alex wouldn’t want to let him see his game, but he also didn’t know how to ask, so he just sat beside Alex on the picnic table while Alex’s parents finished up whatever on the boat. In case an adult’s eyes were on him, he pretended to be watching Alex play, but really he was only watching Alex’s fingers on the directional buttons, clicking around at images only Alex could see.

And then it was time, finally, to get on the boat, to sail. Alex had somehow snuck two fairly large tree branches on board, and as soon as Alex’s dad had pulled the cord and begun to maneuver the boat out of the marina, Alex handed one to Benji and started making lightsaber noises. Soon the cool morning air was filled with electronic sounds. Phht. Ving. Zzzip. Benji joined him, making noises too, and the two boys did battle in the bow of the ship, smashing their branches together until they broke (it was soft wood, soggy and pockmarked with lichen) then continued to battle with the stump ends, their noises aggressive, their lunges jabby, their smiles starting to fade.

In a short time, Alex’s mom popped out of the cabin holding a broom and ordered Alex to sweep all the scattered bits of wood overboard, so he did.

When he was done, Alex got his Switch out again and flopped down at the opposite bench. Alex’s dad hoisted the sail, ducked under, and went to the wheel.

Alex’s mom leaned against the railing. She smiled. “Alex says you’re new. Where you from?”

“Nebraska,” Benji said, not thinking. The truth is Nebraska was only five of seven states he’d lived in. Seven states in 11 years. They’d left his dad there. But Benji didn’t think of Nebraska as home. He didn’t think of anywhere as home. Home, for Benji, was the sweet-sour smell of his mother’s breath. It was just her.

“A cornhusker.” Alex’s mother smiled.

Benji wasn’t sure if this was a question. He was too young, he had not lived in Nebraska long enough to hear it called the Cornhusker State. Benji was nervous. It became difficult to meet Alex’s mom’s eyes. His gaze dropped instead to her chest.

Alex’s mother had a large chest. A large bosom. Now there was a word Benji knew the meaning of but had never spoken aloud, a word which made him a little pukey just for thinking. Bosom. Alex’s mom had freckles on her bosom, a smattering of pancake-colored ones, evidence of sun. Benji’s mom was just the opposite—very pale.

“No, actually. My dad’s a meat packer at JBS,” Benji said. His throat was dry. “They divorced.”

At this misunderstanding, she laughed. She tilted her head, arched her back, opened her mouth, and her bosom heaved. What a thing for Benji to witness. This woman’s heaving bosom, her casual, unfettered bliss. Not to mention, in the close proximity forced upon them by the sail. His life vest was already touching her shirt. The merest head nod would have landed him in cleavage.

Alex’s mom laughed and laughed some more.

All that jiggling reminded Benji of Santa’s belly, an out-of-nowhere association which further shamed him. It made him a bit sick to his stomach actually, made him flushed and nauseous, even as he recognized a certain festive (unbidden) blossoming in his Wranglers.

Benji turned to Puget Sound. He frowned, breathed in the cool breeze, felt it trace his cheek.

And Alex’s mom, seeing this, mistook Benji’s expression for grief. She bubbled over at once with apologies and condolences, deriding herself for her own thoughtless stupidity, calling up anecdotes of relatives who’d divorced, recounting it-was-hard-but-they-made-it stories of friends who’d grown up in broken homes. Tossing all of this at Benji, these stories she seemingly had at the ready, vomiting them on him, such endless effusive jibber-jabber that Benji’s head swam and his heart pounded and he could think only about how to make it stop.

Also, Benji’s throat was quite dry. He coughed a little, clearing it.

At this she paused. She tilted her head at him. Then she pouted. It was an expression so similar to the one his own mom made that it plucked something in Benji’s heart, made him all fuzzy and punch-drunk, like when his elbow came down wrong and it made his arm reverberate.

“Are you and your mom doing okay, sweetheart?”

“We’re doing okay, Mrs. Knutson. It was a long time ago. I don’t really think about it anymore.”

This, apparently, was enough. It did the trick. She smiled. She leaned forward and made scritchy fingers on the top of Benji’s unwashed head, something his own mother never did. It felt exquisite. Benji gasped. He couldn’t help himself.

“Well, that’s good. I’m glad. You’re a stoic little soldier, aren’t you?”

“Yes,” Benji said before realizing it was the sort of question you aren’t supposed to answer.

Alex’s mom took her hand back, sipped her drink and laughed again, a breathy titter. But now Alex caught the odor of alcohol. It reminded Benji of his father, just smelling it. He shuddered.

Further conversation was avoided because Alex began shouting “Frick! Frick!” and flung his beeping Switch to the floor of the boat, where it bounced against the plastic and came to rest on Benji’s foot. Benji picked it up.

“Why don’t you put your Gameboy away now, sweetheart, and play with your friend?” Alex’s mom said, ducking under the sail. “I think poor Benji’s over here feeling quite abandoned.”

Alex had his arms crossed and was scowling off into the distance. Still, it was a small boat and it would be a good two hours (Alex’s dad had said) before they got to Deadman’s Island. There really wasn’t anything else to do. So Alex and Benji went to the back of the boat and flung their arms over the side and hung by their hips and looked for jellyfish. Benji was transfixed by the blue-green color of the water, the shimmering ombre gradations which sunk thrillingly to the deepest depths, as well as the way the June sun blazed bright white over his shoulder, a fireball boutonniere.

Now there was a thing to think about, the way the sun always seemed to hover above Benji’s shoulder wherever he went. It was as if out of all the billions of people in the world, the sun had chosen to follow him. Was it true for everyone? It had to be. Benji felt silly for even wondering. He tossed an overlooked chunk of lightsaber into the water and watched it float away.

Benji was in a daydreamy mood, happy to be on his first-ever boat ride, and would have been fine for hours without speaking. Alex was not. Alex peppered Benji with questions. Have you ever been to Deadman’s Island? What’s the highest thing you’ve dove off of? Do you know how to swim underwater? Alex allowed Benji only the briefest replies before shooting off into long stories, boring Benji, showing the whole point of the question had been to provide an opening in which to stuff details of his own unique, exciting life.

After 20 minutes of this, hanging off the back of the boat, Alex knew this much: Benji had never been to Deadman’s Island. He hadn’t ever dove off anything, because he did not know how to dive. Benji did not know how to swim underwater. Benji did not know how to swim at all.

Benji by then knew a lot about Alex.

Benji had begun to feel lightheaded from the squeeze of his lungs against life vest, so he pushed himself up and sat down. Then he wrapped his index finger in a loose thread from his Wranglers and watched as the skin went pink-purple.

A minute later Alex plopped down too.

“If you want I could teach you to swim,” Alex said. He was sitting cross legged, with a peacemaker expression, as if he regretted his blathering.

“I guess. That’d be fun. Maybe over the summer.”

“No. I mean I’ll teach you today.”

“I didn’t bring a swimsuit.” Benji didn’t have a swimsuit. Was not having the same as not bringing?

Alex snorted. “It’s an island. You can swim naked.”

Benji looked up from his finger. He didn’t know what to say.

“I mean, swim naked if you want. No one’s around. Swim in your boxers. That’s what I do.”

Everyone gets scared. Some people just aren’t brave enough to admit it.

They got to Deadman’s Island, finally. At first it was a blue haze indistinguishable from the shoreline behind it. Then it was a slightly darker haze that stood out, then it was an island, with a tall, craggy part and a long low part and a smaller lump on the far side. Alex helped Benji unbuckle his life vest and fling it across the sand. Then, both of the boys helped haul stuff to shore. They searched for tiny crabs while Benji’s mom and dad made a fire and waited for it to get hot and cook down into coals.

Then, Alex’s parents wanted the boys to set up the tent, but that took a long time, because Alex said he knew how to do it, but kept putting short poles in where long poles should go, or vice versa, until Alex’s dad started yelling because they were walking all over the tent with their wet sneakers on, and getting sand all over it, so that Alex’s dad had to take out the tent poles, shake out the tent, lay it flat, and start all over again himself, replying No, thank you when Benji offered to help, and scowling at Alex when he was done.

By then the fire had burned down to coals, so they roasted hot dogs and ate them with dirty hands (dodging Alex’s mom with her bottle of hand sanitizer) then wiped their mouths on paper napkins and tossed their balled-up napkins onto the coals where they flared up and disappeared.

Then the two boys ran off to the far side of the island to look for bigger crabs (or so Alex told his parents) but actually, of course, so that Alex could teach Benji to swim.

“Don’t stay too long,” Alex’s mom said. Alex’s dad’s back was to them—in the beer cooler.

Benji didn’t know why Alex didn’t tell his parents the truth about what they were doing. “If you swim after you eat, will you drown?” Benji asked as soon as he felt they were out of earshot.

“Only if you’re over your head, doofus,” Alex said. “We’ll stick to the so-called kiddie pool.”

“Oh,” Benji felt like a doofus. He was sorry he’d asked. He thought about how to change the subject. “Do you know how they came up with the name Deadman’s Island?”

Just then Alex lost his footing on kelp. He stuck his hands out one way and his butt out the other. “Frick!” Then he righted. “Sounds like somebody’s scared.”

“No…”

Alex didn’t say anything. They kept walking. “Yeah, there’s a legend. I don’t know. Old Man Something-Something met his end here. Big ghost dude haunts the place. WooOOoo. Ask my dad, if you want the story. It’ll scare you. If you’re the kind of person who gets scared.”

Afterward, Benji kept his mouth shut. What kind of person doesn’t get scared? That’s what he was thinking. Everyone gets scared. Some people just aren’t brave enough to admit it. Benji tried to think about what might scare Alex. It would scare him if his parents divorced. Benji imagined Alex’s mom and dad sitting down all teary-eyed. Son, we have something to tell you. It made Benji happy, in a mean way, to think about Alex’s parents divorcing.

 

Soon the boys reached the other side of the island. The whole place was less than a half-mile in length, and much of that was sandbar, but at the far end, a few downed trees as well as a muddy outcropping obscured their view of Alex’s parents. It was as if they had the island to themselves.

Alex stripped off his pants and waded out to the water, as he’d said he’d do, in his boxer shorts. He walked out up to his waist. He wrapped his arms around his torso, clenched his teeth and smiled. Benji followed him bravely.

“Not too cold today,” Alex said. “Refreshing.”

They stood for a while, very chilly. “The first thing is to learn how to blow bubbles in the water,” Alex said after a while. Then he bent at the waist and simply dropped his face into Puget Sound. Bubbles tumbled to the surface. A moment later Alex stood, turned, wiped dry with the crook of his elbow. “Now you try.”

Benji repeated what Alex had done. Quite easy. If the lesson felt babyish, they didn’t speak of it.

“You’re a fast learner. That took me a week to do. I mean, I was three years old. But still.”

Alex’s course of study next had Benji learn how to float on his back. This was not difficult, as Benji at first feared it would be. And it was not dangerous. Anytime he wanted to check his position he only needed to drop a foot to the ground and stand. Benji was buoyant in salt water.

The two boys floated on their backs a long time. Benji had fun making his chest undulate. Inhale and his chest went up. Exhale and it went down. It wasn’t anything more than a scientific principle, but to Benji the rise and fall of his chest felt like a key to the universe, a centermost koan, the origin of all mysteries and the source of all answers. It was a wondrous thing.

But soon both boys’ lips were blue and their teeth, when they talked, kept chattering. They slugged heavy-legged out of the water, draped themselves on sunbaked rocks and shivered.

“What happens in Animal Crossing New Horizons?” Benji said after a bit.

“You go to a deserted island and you have to find things and do stuff.”

“That’s just like us right now.”

“No. Not at all. You don’t get it. You’d never make it in Animal Crossing. You’d fail.”

Benji was silent.

“But at least now you know how to swim. You’re welcome,” Alex said a minute later.

“I still don’t know how to swim,” Benji said.

“Yes you do, doofus. I taught you.”

“I know how to float, but I can’t do the swim stroke.”

“Which swim stroke?” Alex sat up on one elbow and looked at him. “Breaststroke? Butterfly? You don’t even know what you’re talking about. God, you’re dumb.” Alex lay back down and pointed his face at the sky. The sun was directly overhead.

Benji sat up. He glared at Alex, who appeared to be sunbathing. Benji’s mind flashed to the bottle of sunscreen his mom had wedged into his backpack right before they left. He’d forgotten all about it. “Okay. Whatever. Thanks for teaching me to swim.” He pulverized a clam shell.

Alex stood. “I don’t think you sound grateful.”

“Oh, I am so grateful. Thank you, thank you,” Benji said in a sing-song voice.

“No.” Alex said again. He walked over to Benji and stood directly in front of him. His shoulders were up and he was scowling. “I don’t think you are.”

Benji stood. The two boys were face to face.

Then Alex pushed Benji. No warning. He just pushed him hard with two hands in the chest.

Benji’s foot went up. He tried to step. He could not. A rock caught the back of Benji’s shoe, held it just long enough, and Benji fell. He fell hard, his head bouncing two times on the rocks. His eyes closed and he lay still for a moment, unmoving. When he came to, there was a drumming in his head, and Alex’s eyes were directly above his.

“Doofus,” Alex said again. He shook his fist in Benji’s face. He stood up. “Stupid little sucker.”

Alex walked away then, back around the way they’d come; Benji just sat there watching him. All the while, watching Alex pick his way across wet rocks, Benji hated Alex. He wanted him gone. Benji felt the band across his chest that forecast tears. He wished he was back home with Mom.

But then, right before Alex disappeared around the outcropping, Benji became very afraid. It was a stupid fear, he knew, but that did not stop him from having it. Benji was afraid that as soon as he was alone, he would be alone forever.

And so, Benji got slowly to his feet. He plucked his cast-off Wranglers from the sand. And he began following. As he walked, Benji brought his fingers gingerly up to his head wound.

And brought them back bloody.

Good, Benji thought. It was good he was bleeding. Watching Alex’s parents lay into Alex would be nice after everything he’d put up with. He followed Alex to the other side of the outcropping.

There he stopped.

The tide had come in. The long sandbar had gone. Deadman’s Island was now two.

Benji was alone on one island, and the red triangle of the camping tent was visible on the other. Alex’s head was a dot bobbing here to there.

“Alex!” Benji screamed. His words were eaten by wind. The drum inside his head exploded.

Alex’s arms went up and down, doing the swim stroke. He gave no sign he’d heard.

Now, Benji knew that Alex’s mom and dad could not yet be anywhere near drunk enough to miss that one child had not returned. They would have inquired. Panicked. Gone searching. But Benji was in no mood for rationality. He stalked as far as he could into the water, until his sneakers lifted off from the ground. Then he tried to float as he had before. But this time he tried to do it on his front, not on his back. By accident, he took in a big gulp of seawater when he meant to be taking in air. The seawater went into his windpipe and Benji right away went down. His whole head went under, then up, then under again.

Benji splashed uselessly in the ocean while a tablespoon of ocean splashed uselessly in him.

When Benji surfaced, he was frightened as he’d never been before. Benji’s nostrils were close to the water, close and hoovering up air. His thoughts were so wildly illogical, full of panicky dread. In this state, the seawater smell, that briney stench, reminded Benji of his mother’s breath. The brain makes odd connections in the face of death. And one fishy note was the same.

And Benji loved that smell. Benji loved his mom. So much so, that even as water and panic took Benji down another time, dunked his stringy head and knocked it about—because what fight is more unfair than a child versus Puget Sound? Even while drowning, Benji’s heart blinked light, because he was reminded of his mom.

Now there was a funny thing. Right there and then, blood and sea becoming one around him, something finally made sense to Benji. He finally got it about butterflies. He understood not just his mom but also he himself really were, at the core, really butterflies. Because life, as people say, kept dragging them down. But they weren’t scared. They just preferred to keep floating. If they could have, if they’d the ability, they would have just floated up. Floated off. Floated away.

Just gone on fluttering by.