Butterfly Farm

Chapter Six: Deep End

Deep End by I Prevail
Lonely by Nathan Wagner

🦋🦋🦋

Ava woke the next morning already dreading the day ahead.

But nothing happened.

Mrs. Lennox took her to Church. They come home and ate breakfast and then went their separate ways. Ava stayed in the barn most of the day.

And there was no sign of the twins anywhere.

They'd left the previous afternoon and hadn't come back until midnight. Ava had heard them come in shortly after she'd gone to bed, instantly deciding she'd rather sleep on the roof than in her bedroom, locked door or no. From her vantage point, she'd watched them leave again early the next morning. The roof had a shallow slope to it and a long, almost flat spot at one end near her window that was perfect for those who could handle heights. She'd slept there a few times before when Major Lennox was home, until she'd realized he never even looked at her if his wife wasn't around. He didn't have even the slightest bit of inappropriate interest in her. He'd made sure she wasn't going to be a security threat to 'his girls' first, and then he'd seen to it that she was comfortable living with them. He was one of the few men she knew she could trust, and she respected him for it.

She wondered for Mrs. Lennox's sake when they'd get to see him again. The poor woman had been dealing with a lot lately. Mostly because of Ava. Ava had tried to stay out of trouble at school, but she was still new, and prickly, and the other kids tended to find it hilarious to try and mess with her. It usually didn't end well for them, and tended to result in a write-up from the principal and another complaint lodged in her record. Added to that was the weird episodes she'd had recently where she'd started blanking out and scribbling graffiti all over the place. It had started with just a few small symbols dashed down in her private notebook here and there, but after awhile, she'd found herself marking up her schoolwork, her books, the desk, a wall. The latest instance had apparently been the last straw, when she'd jumped up randomly in the middle of class and started drawing all over the teacher's whiteboard in permanent marker. Her classmates had all laughed themselves stupid while her teacher tried to yell for her to stop. One of the more annoying jocks who liked to tease her had volunteered to 'escort' her to the principal's office. He'd taken a knee to the important bits before he could ever lay a hand on her. She'd been suspended for a week, and now the episodes seemed to have finally died down a bit. She thought she was doing better.

Except apparently, she'd been carving the symbols into the dirt while she'd been lost in thought.

Ava stood abruptly, feeling upset and a little lost. An old rusted knife was clenched tightly in her right hand, and dirt covered her knees and shirt. The entire hallway of the barn was littered with giant symbols gouged into the dirt that didn't make any sense. The balls of her feet were sore from crouching for so long, and she could feel a tension headache starting behind her eyes from pinched shoulders.

Ava sighed and rubbed a dirty hand across her face miserably, feeling beyond confused. She didn't know what was happening to her. Didn't know how to handle this new stress. She could barely control herself around people now. Sure, her instant, unconscious reaction to people touching her -- usually -- was to fight until either she dropped or they did, and that was fine. It had gotten her into trouble a time or two, but most often it had gotten her out of it. That she could handle.

But this? Not being in control of her own hands? Writing down strange symbols from a language no one had ever heard of before, drawing attention to herself, causing trouble for the one home she really wanted to stay in? What was wrong with her? Why couldn't she just be normal for once?