Butterflies Fluttering

[Ciel†]

Zach Jamis did not want to go back into Bayview Secondary School. He hated that shit enough. He did NOT want to spend another minute in there. If it were up to him he would not go to school at all. This was what Zach kept telling himself when he realized his lighter was missing. He checked his pockets, his glove compartment, the floor, everywhere in his car but it wasn't anywhere to be seen. Where the hell could he have left it? Zach held his palm in his hand and let out a deep sigh. Oh, he knew exactly where it was. The art room.

"Bullshit." Zach growled on his way back to school. "Whole thing. Bullshit."

So Zach was back in school. Whoopie. He was so happy to be back. How long was he away from this shithole? Three hours? He parked near the entrance and locked his car. It was about 5 PM. The club freaks had already left. Good enough for Zach. He didn't really want to run into anyone he vaguely knew. They might want to chat him up.

Zach tried the heavy front door. Locked. Just his luck. There was a tiny window in the door and Zach looked inside, moving his black hair out of his eyes. The Janitor was running the

Janitor Ryder looked at the boy, squinting his eyes. "Yeah?

"I need to get in."

Janitor Ryder stared. "Yeah?"

"Left my book in the art room. My textbook. I need it for homework."

Janitor Ryder had an unimpressed look on his face. "Yeah?"

"Yeah. I need to get in there. To get my book. Can I come in?"

The balding man hesitated for a moment. He studied Zach with his eyes. "Yeah."

Janitor Ryder opened the door. Zach was hoping that the old bastard didn't follow him into the school and to his luck the guy just went back to vacuuming. Zach liked the Janitor. Didn't stick his nose into anyone's business.

The Art Room was nestled across from the Drama Room. Unlike Drama class, which had shitloads of funding, the Art room was a puny little troll room that looked more like a storage closet. Not many kids came here; in fact most tried their damned hardest not to have a class in there. Zach didn't care. Art class was at least semi-better than any Algebra class he could have chosen. Between solving for x and making a clay bracelet, Zach would get his hands dirty.

Zach was a little surprised to see that the door was unlocked. He was a lucky guy. They knew he was coming. He gracefully threw it open

It didn't take Zach long to find it. It was on his chair not too far from the door. Zach liked his seat. Meant he could be the first to skip out. The Zippo (at least the guy selling the thing said it was a Zippo) was silver, a color that Zach absolutely hated. There were little green gems engraved into the edges of the lighter, circling around a large black Z. Z for Zach. The thing was an ugly piece of shit but Zach was fond of it. It was his little buddy.

Zach picked it up. Threw it into the air and caught it.

That was when Zach turned to the girl that was staring at him.

"The hell are you staring at?"

Zach had noticed her going to work on a canvas at the other side of the room but didn't pay that much attention. She had been staring at him the whole time. She was already off to a shaky start with Zach. The girl had dyed her hair blue. Dyed hair seemed to have become a bit of a trend in Bayview and if there was one thing that Zach absolutely hated it was trends. Fuck. Why the hell would you change your hair just to fit in? It didn't make any sense. Plus, he hated the color blue. Why not green so she could look like the joker? It would certainly fit her face. The way she was smiling at him was creeping him out.

"What?" Zach deadpanned. "Do I have something on my face? What?"

The girl just shrugged. "Oh, it's nothing. I was just looking at your lighter."

Zach looked down at his Zippo. "The fuck about it?"

The girl smiled. She had a cute, wide smile that seemed to make Zach's blood boil. "Oh," she said dismissively, "I was just wondering if I could use it. I haven't had a smoke all day, it's getting to me."

"You're not supposed to smoke in school." Zach said, feeling like a damn boy scout.

"I know that," the girl responded, pushing the matter aside with a swipe of her hand. "Even so, it's not like the principal's going to come in and see us. No one else is here."

Zach liked her logic. That smile was creepy but he liked the way she thought. He hesitantly took a . The girl held out her hand, as though she were expecting him to just hand the lighter over. Zach just flicked it open and turned it on in one practiced motion. Ocean stared at him with her strange green eyes. For a moment he thought she had a problem but she just shrugged and took a pack of cigarettes.

"Marlboros are for pussies." Zach spat.

"Really?" The girl held the stick between her fingers. "Why do you say this?"

"Use to smoke them when I was twelve. Tasted like plastic."

"Plastic?" The girl held the cigarette over the light. Lit up. "And you know this how?"

"I just said." Zach said, a little annoyed. "Used to smoke them. When I was twelve. Gave up a long time ago."

"Really. Pray tell me, what brand do you smoke?" She inhaled.

"Sobranie Black."

Ocean turned her head away from Zach and let the smoke out. "Isn't that a Russian brand?"

"Yeah."

The girl turned back. "Don't those cost, like, thirty dollars?"

"Forty." Zach corrected her. "Forty a pack."

"Oh," the girl said with a hint of amusement. That creepy smile slipped back onto her lips. "I see. I guess that's a big difference, I apologize. I should have know."

"Was that sarcasm?"

The girl looked back. She hesitated. "Perhaps."

Zach closed his eyes. "Sarcasm sucks. It's not funny. Only self-centered fucks use sarcasm when they want to stroke off their egos."

"You certainly are a delightful conversationalist."

"Think that's nice? You should see my pops. Nicest guy, hasn't washed his mouth with soap in ages."

Zach didn't think it was that funny but for some reason Ocean giggled a raspy giggle.

"You've quite a sense of humor." She smiled that Joker smile. "Your name's Zach right?"

"Yeah."

Ocean didn't say anything. She was waiting for him to ask what her name was. Zach knew this right away. That's why he didn't do it. He just kept his trap shut. After a minute of silence Ocean decided to answer the question Zach hadn't posed to begin with.

"I'm Kitty," she said after another exhale. She prodded the tip of her cigarette against the edge of canvas, ash pouring to the floor. She didn't seem to care.

"Kitty?" Zach squinted.

"Mhmm. That's the name my parents gave me."

Zach sneered. "Who the fuck name's their kid Kitty?"

Kitty smiled again. "My mother came up with it. She thought it was trendy."

"What, your imaginary parents?" Zach stared. "Jesus, I thought my old man was mental."

Kitty didn't respond to the insult and kept on smiling. "So, uhh, what brought you back here? There's no one around."

Zach just held up his lighter. It was all the answer he was going to give her. She just nodded.

"Oh." She looked at Zach. "Then you're in a hurry I take it?"

"Nope." Zach shrugged. "Got nowhere else to be."

"So you're not busy?"

Zach didn't like questions. This was like some kind of retarded game show, Kitty's Questionaire of some shit. His tone grew deeper. "No. I'm not."

"Oh. Well, then in that case. Do you have a cellphone?"

Zach was a little confused. Why the hell was this bitch talking to him again? No girls ever went up to him and started talking about going out. Fuck, it's like she going to start confessing a crush or something. Too sappy. Zach crossed his arms."Yeah. I do."

"Well," Kitty twirled her finger around. "Then I don't suppose you'll mind if I gave you my number right? I mean," She ran her hand through her hair. "just in case if I have nothing else to do."

This girl was a little nutty wasn't she? Zach just stared.

"No thanks."

Kitty looked surprised. "W-What?"

"No thanks."

Kitty tilted her head. "Are you saying... no to meeting up or no to the phone number?"

"No. Overall. In general. To everything."

"Okay?" She giggled. "Umm, that's fine. Well, you can stick around and we could talk, if you want. I was getting kind of lonely in here."

"No thanks."

Kitty's expression suddenly changed. "Are you stupid or something?"

Zach didn't react. "What?"

"Are you a thick-headed loon or just stupid?" Kitty repeated herself.

"You've lost me." Zach admitted. "Weren't you just going on about how you were lonely an shit? How was I being stupid?"

Kitty pouted. "You didn't answer my question. Are you thick-headed or just stupid?"

Zach didn't miss a beat. "Could be both. I call it thick-headed stupidity."

"You don't get it?"

"I get a lot of things. Might not be what you're trying to get across."

"I'm hitting on you." The girl made an overly dramatic gesture with her hand. "I am physically attracted to you and I felt the need to show you by presenting myself in a way that might appear attractive to you."

"I fucking know what you're trying to do."

Kitty scrunched her nose up. "Really now? You knew that I was hitting on you and yet you pretended not to notice?"

"Yeah." Zach fiddled with his lighter. "Lemme ask you. This flirting thing. How's that going for you?"

Kitty opened her mouth. It was pretty clear to see that she wanted to say something and just didn't know what "You're asking ME that?"

"Of course."

"How's it going for me? Well, I think it's going quite terribly seeing as how the boy I'm literally throwing myself at is acting all indignant about my attempts. Thank you for asking."

"Sarcasm must come easy to you Kitty. You seem to be full of it." Zach paused, looking down at his cigarette. "You're terrible at flirting too. No one goes up to people and ask to give their numbers away. Sides, chicks don't get so forward, they just let the guys do all the work."

"Well I," Kitty sighed, stumbling over her tongue. "I thought I'd do it all myself. Is that a crime?"

"No crime I ever heard of, no." Zach sighed. "So... what? Did you plan this ahead? Write "Fuck a random stranger" down in your little calendar?"

Kitty's face lit up. "Don't be so facetious. I never implied anything of the sort. I'm not a slut. "

"Well that was pretty hard to tell, seeing as you just said you were throwing yourself at me."

"I meant – I" Kitty closed her eyes. "That was a figure of speech!"

"Really." Zach looked unimpressed.

"Yes! I saw you, you seemed pretty and I started talking to you. What part of that don't you understand? I was trying to attract you. It's what people do."

"So attraction is like a cold. You can give it others by just breathing in their faces and shit like that."

Kitty puffed her cheeks out like a fish. "Well, uhh..." Her face was red. "Yeah. Isn't that how it works?"

"Sorry. That's not how it works. You're wrong."

"And you know this how?" Kitty retorted.

"Cuz you've been hittin on me for, what, ten minutes? And even after all that shit, I still don't feel a single fucking thing."

"At all?"

"No," Zach said. "Nope. Not a single thing. You're just a person. Couldn't give less a shit."

Kitty glared at the boy. The brush looked almost ready to snap in half.

"I was wrong about you Zach Jamis. I thought you were just rough around the edges."

"Really." Zach nodded, uninterested.

"Yes! Now I know what you're really like. You are an asshole, a selfish selfish asshole who has no consideration for anyone else."

Zach blinked. "You some kind of psychologist?"

Kitty smirked mockingly. "What are you talking about? I just think you're an asshole."

"My pops is a psychologist. You sound just like him."

"Is that sarcasm?" Kitty glared.

Zach let the question hang in the air. "Perhaps."

"No." Kitty rolled her eyes. "No, of course not! I'm no psychologist! I'm just telling you how I feel!"

"Oh."

Zach looked back at Kitty.

"Well," Zach said, "if we're going to be analyzing each other..."

Zach took the cigarette out of his mouth and stared at Kitty. Studied her. Kitty stayed quiet the whole time, silently fuming. She broke the silence after a moment of waiting.

"What the hell are you-"

"You crave satisfaction." Zach interrupted. "You hunger for attention, attention that your parents won't give you. When you got into high school, they thought that you are old enough to do things on your own without the need for them to guide you. They wanted you to be who you want to be, and you were happy as shit. At first. It was your dream come true – no parents sticking their nose into your business. You wander, doing what you like and putting off school, so much so that you'd stay after school barfing paint on a campus. And yet the longer you spend slapping shit on cardboard, the emptier you feel. Now it's senior year. You've got no direction, bad grades and no job. The paintings are nice but no one is calling you the next great painter. No satisfaction. No attention.

"You don't know how to socialize. Sure, you have a way with words but where is that going to get you? You have friends and you've known them for a long time but you never speak to them outside of school. Not really friends, just girls you talk to. There's no one calling you up asking if you wanted to knock a few pins down. No one's knocking your door down with a box asking you to go the prom. No best friends, no nothing. You dye your hair because you think you'll fit in. You smile and ask people how they're doing because you think that's the key to making friends. You hope in vain that they'll invite you over for a sleepover just because you ask them twenty fucking questions. Yet none of this works. All you have now is that paint brush and no one wants to be friends with a blue haired girl who paints. They'd assume that she's a fucking selfish bitch with an ego the size of an SUV."

Zach didn't stop. Kitty wanted to retort but he didn't give her the chance. "You think you know how people think. You like to think you're a god damn genius but you know the truth. You know that if your name wasn't so fucking crazy that they wouldn't even remember you. They'd just call you 'that girl'. That's what bothers you the most. No one even looks at you. They just write you off. So, one day, some guy does actually notice you. What do you do? You leap at him. You think he's interested, maybe give you the attention you want."

Kitty's eyes went wide. "N-No, that wasn't it at-"

"You think that he could be your friend and yeah, maybe you'd be right if this were two years ago. And when he doesn't seem to react to your affections, well, you go off the wall. You insult him, belittle him. How dare he just ignore you? Lead you on? Just start calling him names so he'd start crying. You couldn't have known that he'd call you out on your shit. Zach Jamis must be a spineless little cock.

"Well," Zach sneered. "I'm here to tell you that you're a terrible people person and you can take your little hissy fit and shove it."

Kitty was no longer angry. She looked wounded. She shook. "I... How..."

"How dare me?" Zach sighed. "Yeah, fuck you, you brought that onto yourself."

Kitty didn't have another comment. She just stared at Zach incredulously.

"Listen," Zach started up again. "I don't need that much proof to figure out your little riddle. This ain't court. I am damn sure I'm right about you. The proof is staring me right in the face. Not just because you're sitting in an empty classroom three hours after school, rubbing a fucking brush on a piece of paper instead of getting out there and actually hanging out. I know cuz if you really paid attention to him, if you were really interested in this boy, you'd have known right from the start that getting him to act all lovey dovey with you would be a waste of time. For both him and you."

Zach turned away. "In fact, it was such a big waste of time that it didn't even leave an impression on him. If you stopped talking right now, he'd just walk out. He doesn't owe you anything. This fucking place is the last place he wants to be and your creepy ass isn't making it better."

Zach put his lighter in his pocket. "So if we're done here..."

Zach didn't wait for Kitty to respond. He walked out of the room, down the hall, out of the school and back into his car. His throat burned. Zach hated talking. He rolled down the window. Put the cigarette back to his lips. Inhale.

He took the cigarette out. It was out. Zach growled. Flicked the lighter. Light. Click. Inhale. Exhale. Moved on.

Kitty had not gone into that conversation looking for attention. Now she felt bad. She knew she had to move on and forget about it. She didn't though. It lingered in the air. Kitty tried to go back to her painting, into the groove that she was in before the boy had entered the room. Yet she couldn't get back to it. The feeling in her heart, the pain, it was too great. Kitty soon gave up.

"Fuck... I can't..."

She sighed.

"I just... wanted him to know..."

She stared at the painting. She didn't see a beautiful portrait. She saw lines on a canvas. It was all his fault. All his fault. He looked so cool in the hallways. How could she have known he was like that?

"Fucking asshole... talking like he... knows me. Where the hell does he get off?"

Kitty rested the brush on the table.

"I... I don't need him."

She clenched her fist.

"Don't need anybody."



Kitty ran a finger past her eye.

"Don't need anybody..."