AN: well, I worked on this for a while, and I got a friend to edit it, and I’ve just downloaded a bunch of stuff by the postal service (which is an amazing band) and my birthday is tomorrow, so I figured, what the hell. I really like this, actually. It’s sad though. Tiny bits of slash references, so definitely don’t read it if you don’t like gay people… in fact, stay away from me if you’re a homophobe.

I do realize that there is a manga called The Day I Become a Butterfly, and it is about a boy with a terminal disease, but similarities start and end there. It’s one of my favorites, I recommend it.

Also, my friend who read this didn’t realize the character was a boy for a while, and it’s not that important except one little bit, but I thought you should know.

Warnings: little kids with terminal diseases, sadness, butterflies, and homophobic dads.

When I Become a Butterfly

5/19

Daddy said I should talk into this machine for a little while every day. I said about what and Daddy said I should talk about me and my feelings or thoughts or friends or what’s happening with Miss Angelina. Miss Angelina is my teacher who comes to the hospital and teaches me maths and where Zimbabwe is and how to read big words like ‘princess’, which is the name of our cat, and ‘bullshit’, which Daddy says he will talk to Miss Angelina about and is a Bad Word I Should Not Use.

I asked Daddy why I have to talk into this little box machine that whirs, and is brown, and he said so that when I become a butterfly he can still hear me sometimes. I said is Mommy a butterfly because she’s gone now for a whole year, and he said yes. He also said I’m special because I get to turn into a pretty butterfly sooner and be a caterpillar for less time than everyone else. Then I said I think I like being a caterpillar, can I stay one a little longer please Daddy, and then Daddy started to cry and Auntie Cinnamon, whose real name is Cindy, came in and read me a book about trucks. I think I want to drive a truck when I’m a butterfly.

5/21

Grandpa came to see me today, and when he came in he looked kind of sad but then I said Grampa! and he smiled and the nurses let me out of bed to ride on his shoulders all around the hospital. He took me to the front desk, and saw Jamie, who always wears tight pants and who my daddy calls ‘That Fairy’ gave me a lollipop that was mystery flavored. It tasted a little like my favorite medicine that Katie the five PM to midnight weekday nurse gives me. On the weekends Tatiana gives it to me but she has hands that smell like yucky Russian food the old lady who lived close to us at the house on Bryant Street used to make.

The Daddy came and swapped Grandpa a coffee for me and took me on his shoulders and told me I was getting to be a really big boy. I said that’s because I am four and three quarters now. Grandpa’s mouth went sad at the corners, so I reached over and pushed up the sides to make him happy. He and Daddy laughed.

5/25

Today I asked Auntie Cinnamon why I couldn’t go home to the house on Bryant Street and play with Tommy who lives next door and has two scooters so he shares with me. She says it’s because I get tired and need shots and medicine, and because I get sick so easily, I said I got to play with Tommy before and that still happened, and she said it is just because it is worse now. She said did I remember what my Daddy said I had, and I said no, and she said AIDS. I said did Mommy have AIDS and she said yes, and looked sad.

I asked her if AIDS is what makes people into butterflies, and she started to cry but I couldn’t hug her or make the corners of her mouth happy because my arm had a needle in it giving me medicine.

5/27

Today I drew a picture of me and Daddy and Grandpa and Jamie and Auntie and Julia, the six AM to one PM weekday nurse, standing in a field. We were all smiling and waving and Daddy was holding hands with me and Grandpa and Jamie and Julia Had Jamie’s other hand, and Daddy wasn’t being mean to Jamie like he was yesterday when Jamie came into my room to give me the crayons I used for the picture and Daddy was visiting me and Daddy called Jamie a mean word starting with an F that I am not supposed to repeat. Julia asked me who the butterflies in the background were and I said Grandma and Mommy.

5/30

Julia says that this little box I have to talk into is called a tape recorder, and it catches my voice after it leaves my mouth and holds it inside so people can hear it over and over even after the sound has gone away. I said why would you want to keep a voice in a box and she said so my daddy can remember what it sounded like, and what I was like. I said is that for after I am a butterfly, and she said yes and smiled, but her eyes were sad.

6/2

The weekend nurse whose name I forget was reading picture books with me today and I said can we read The Very Hungry Caterpillar again, please. She said is that your favorite book, and I said no, because my favorite is Stellaluna, but I like it because it is about a caterpillar and in the end the caterpillar becomes a butterfly.

6/3

My nose is red and I am even more tired than usual. Katie the nurse told me I have a cold and I have to get better fast and then she gave me chicken soup for lunch, which was nice because she knows that it is my favorite.

6/5

I have a very very bad cold, and everyone who comes into my room has a scared room on their face until they see I’m looking at them. Then they get too- big smiles on their lips that don’t go to their eyes. It makes me a little scared.

6/6

I feel even yuckier than usual, even after I drink my medicine and get the needle in my arm. Zane, the doctor, who has black hair that is messy and crooked teeth, took my daddy outside my room yesterday and made him cry, only I was too tired and had another needle in my arm, so I couldn’t hug him or make his face smiley.

6/7

I asked Daddy if I’m going to be a butterfly soon, and he started to cry. So I asked Auntie Cinnamon and Grandpa and Jamie when he came in to give me a special cookie with frosting he got just for me but nobody would answer me.

6/9

Yesterday after Zane saw the pieces of paper that come back after the nurses stick a needle in my arm and take out blood, he smiled. Then he did all sorts of funny things to me and told me I am almost all better from my cold now. I am glad that Daddy and Jamie and Grandpa and Auntie and Zane and Julia are glad, but I think it would be nice to be a butterfly like Mommy.

6/10

I remember when I was little, before I was in the hospital and my white and green room, I didn’t have little purple- red –blue spots all over my chest and tummy and back and sometimes on my head. The other day Jamie came up to see me and we counted them together. There are three on my tummy and two on my chest and four on my back and shoulders and one behind my left ear and eight on my arms and legs, and I told Jamie there are four more, but I didn’t want to show him where they were. He said okay and helped me do maths like Miss Angelina showed me;

3 tummy

2 chest

4 back and shoulders

1 behind ear

8 arms and legs

4 mysterious places

--

22 purply- blue spots.

Then Jamie told me the spots are called lee-shuns and we giggled ‘cause it’s a funny name. Then I asked Jamie why Daddy doesn’t like him and gives him his hairy eyeballs whenever he is in the room, and Jamie got real quiet for a few minutes.

Then he said that some boys didn’t like girls, and I said I thought girls were icky. He laughed and told me like like the way a daddy likes a mommy, like love. I said oh and went quiet so he could finish.

Jaime said that there are some girls who fall in love with girls and some boys who fall in love with boys. He said that it’s okay, that’s just how those people are, but some people think there’s something wrong with that because of their religion or something that happened to them or they just think it’s not natural. So those people act mean to people who like other people of the same gender- Jamie says this is if you’re a boy or a girl. He said my mum did a bad thing with a boy who liked boys and girls before I was born, and got this disease, and she gave it to me. So now my daddy is letting out his anger and sadness about Mommy dying and me being sick on Jamie.

I was quiet for a minute, then I asked if Jamie likes boys, and he smiled and told me he could tell me some other time.

Daddy, I know you’re going to listen to this after I am a butterfly, so please don’t hate Jamie if he likes boys, because I like boys better than girls too. Girls are icky.

6/13

I asked Daddy if he wants to listen to the tape recording yet, and he said not until I am gone. But I’m not going anywhere, I’m just turning into a butterfly.

6/15

Today Tommy and my other friend Zachary came to visit me in the hospital and my green and white room, and I was excited because they haven’t come to see me in a long long time. They wanted to ride around on the wheely thingies that I told them are called gurneys, but Julia said no and why didn’t I get in my wheelchair and we could go visit Jamie all the way in the waiting room. So we went to visit Jamie and he gave us all lollipops that were mystery flavored and we met a man who delivers packages named Nathaniel who smiled a lot at Jamie and had very curly blond hair.

Zachary and Tommy and Nathaniel and Jamie and me all went and had a wheelchair race in the hallway, and Julia tried very very hard to look stern but I could see she was happy and her eyes were smiling even if her mouth wasn’t.

Then later, after Nathaniel and Tommy and Zachary left, I asked Jamie if Nathaniel liked boys and if maybe he liked Jamie, but Jamie just smiled.

6/19

I asked Julia the nurse to bring me some picture books with caterpillars and butterflies that we can read together. She said why, and I said because I am going to be a butterfly soon.

AN: Well? Well? Review!