Buzzfeed, Boys, Black Magic

the butterfly exhibit

Rafi scanned the ceiling. There were fifty different butterflies fluttering around up there. Thirteen different species. His eyes were huge.

"My grandma used to say that butterflies contained the souls of your recently-deceased relatives," he said.

"That's unsettling," I said. I didn't want that to be true. It wouldn't be fair, I thought, for my mother to suffer the way she did, only for her soul to be immediately reincarnated in the form of a Newton Center butterfly. To be trapped among those morons seemed a fate worse than the cold void of death. 

"The summer after she died," Rafi continued, "I saw so many monarch butterflies. They're some of my favorite things now."

Okay, I thought, that was pretty cute.

His gaze finally fell on me. He met my eyes until something on my shoulder stole his attention. I glanced to my right.

A monarch butterfly. So delicate and so gentle I hadn't noticed that it had landed on me. I looked back at Rafi, but his gaze had now drifted to my other shoulder. He wore a small, satisfied smile.

I peeked to my left.

A painted lady.

"Don't move," he whispered and pulled his phone from his back pocket. He opened the self-facing camera and handed it to me.

Three more butterflies had landed on my head.

If it weren't for my fetal-alcohol-syndrome face, I would have looked like one of those Snapchat butterfly-crown beauty filters.

"You're like a woodland fairy," he said.

I couldn't understand why this was happening, but I didn't like it.

"A woodland fairy with facial asymmetry," I said.

"I like your facial asymmetry," he said. "You're so magical."

I should have snorted. Abby would have snorted. That would have been a cringe compliment had it come from any other fuckboy's mouth. And yet, the way he said magical seemed sincere. Uncomfortably sincere.

I didn't snort, and Rafi stepped a little closer to me.

Maybe this would be a good time to advance a notch on the Chipotle napkin, I thought.

"You want to be my boyfriend or something?" I asked, like a robot.

He chuckled. He dropped his gaze to the floor for a short, almost imperceptible moment.

"Yeah," he said. "Sure."

"Sure?" I asked, as his face moved toward mine.

"Sure," he repeated. I watched his gaze bounce from my eyes to my nose to my lips and back up again.

I supposed he would kiss me. This wouldn't be ideal, but in order for this to count as a 'relationship,' I decided it would be necessary. I closed my eyes and braced myself.

And.

Nothing happened.

"I KNEW IT," he said.

I opened my eyes. His nose hovered over my shoulder.

"What?"

"You wear vanilla perfume," he popped his head backward and met my gaze. "My grandma did that too. She said it attracted the butterflies."

"It attracts the butterflies?" I thought of the copious amounts of body spray Janice had doused me in that morning. Everything made sense. A woodland fairy I was not.

"You smell like my grandma," Rafi said.

I knew then that he wasn't going to kiss me. For this, I was thankful beyond words.

***