The Cries of the Butterfly - A LOVE STORY (76 page)

Savannah swallowed once. She knew her face was pinched and try as she may she hadn’t been able to do anything about it. But for the rest, although her heart bled, and wept inconsolably, although every cell in her body was in the throes of unbearable agony, she had kept her exterior as normal as she could. She had to, for Robin’s sake.

“You know that I am your real mother, don’t you?”

“Yes, Mom.”

“You also know that Wolf is
not
your real dad, yes?”

“But he is! He has always been my daddy!” Robin cried.

“But not your…I mean…he was not responsible for you birth.”
Mary, this is so hard!

Robin was silent. A pain had come to her face.

“You want to know who your
real
dad is?” Savannah said.

She didn’t. She kept quiet. She was afraid...very frightened. She had been suddenly reminded of that horrible evening at the Home when Savannah, not her mom yet, had tried to dissuade her from associating with Wolf anymore. How very painful that episode had been. She didn’t want a repeat of that all over again…she wouldn’t be able to handle it this time.

Savannah sighed. “Your real dad…the one that was responsible for your birth is Wolf’s brother Art.”

Robin’s eyes went wide.

“Even I didn’t know this until now. Like I’d told you before, I was sick at the time and forgot most things. Some of those things came back to me sometime back, some I’ve just realized,” Savannah added.

She regarded Robin and hated herself. Hated putting this girl through all this…again and again and again. It never ended…just didn’t. She hauled in a labored breath.
Make it quick.

“Now, I want you to go and live with your new father, alright?”

“Not with Wolfy-Dad?”

“Of course, he’ll be there too.”

“But he won’t be my daddy anymore?”

Savannah looked away for a second.
Blessed Mary, make it go away…please!

“Of course, he’ll be your dad too,” she said.

“So I’ll have two daddies? Daddy and Art uncle?”

“Yes.”

Panic leapt into the little girl’s eyes. “But I don’t want two daddies! I want only my real dad, not Art uncle.”

Oh, Mary, help me!
“Wolf shall always be your real dad,” she said weakly. “He’ll always be around you.”

“So Daddy shall be my only daddy then?”

Savannah swallowed. She nodded. What else could she do?

The girl relaxed now. The storm had passed.

“So when shall we be going?”

“In two days. But…but I shall not be going with you for now.”

“WHY?” The panic was back.

Savannah’s mind stuttered. “I…I…have to take care of certain things here before I can come to stay with you at the Garden. Like…like selling off this apartment, and other such things.” She knew it was pathetic. Tears began choking her throat and she cursed herself.

“But you can always do that from there!” Robin cried.

“No, I need to stay here. People interested in buying this place would want to see it. It would be so much better if I were here all the time. That way I wouldn’t have to keep rushing over from Butcher Garden every time. As you know, the two places are so far apart.”

Robin thought for a moment. Then she nodded sagely, like indicating she understood.

“Yes,” she said. “So when will you come to stay with Daddy then?”

“In about a month,” she lied.

The distress returned. “Why so long?!”

“These things take time, honey. I want you to be understanding. Yes?”

Robin moaned under her breath.
No, NOT yes…not at all!
But she nodded.
Okay, yes…whatever.

Savannah ran her fingers through the girl’s hair.
Good kid.
She bit her lip hard, pushing back another assault from within. She tried to say something, but her voice cracked now.

“Mom, are you fine?” There was genuine concern on her daughter’s face. Savannah looked at her helplessly. Robin put out her hand and placed it over Savannah’s arm.

“Mom, it will be fine. You don’t worry about anything. Everything will be good.”

The emotion that rose in her this time was so violent, Savannah couldn’t hold back anymore. She lunged and took her daughter in her arms and mashed her to her chest. She wanted to howl out and weep wildly. But yet again, she somehow just could not express herself unreservedly.

Later, after Robin had fallen asleep, Savannah went out to the living room and called Rochelle.

“Tell Art I shall be bringing my daughter tomorrow evening, around eight,” she said. Her voice was a low rasp.

“Savannah, are you okay? Do you want me to be with you tonight? I can be there in a wink.”

Oh, how I’d love that.
Yes, she badly needed someone to be with her tonight. And all other nights after Robin had left her. She didn’t think she could trust herself with herself. Yet, weirdly, she didn’t think she could handle company tonight—she also needed to be alone.

“Rochelle, thanks, but I’ll manage,” she said flatly.

She now went to the kitchen and swallowed four sleeping pills.

.

A
round the same time, Grant called on Art.

The middle-aged man’s face was haggard, his eyes tired, his bearing limp.

Tonight he was going to do what he had never done before—he was going to beg his son for mercy. For compassion. For a little kindness. He would crawl on all fours if he had to.

“Father,” Art said, answering the door. He stood aside.

Grant stepped in uncertainly. Art showed him to a chair.

For a while there was a hush, as the two men sat before each other awkwardly. Two of the most important and powerful men in the nation.

Art was the first to break the chill. “Is there something I can do for you, Father?”

Grant looked at his son. “Yes,” he said. “A good turn. Please do not refuse me today.” There was a pleading look in his eyes.

“You shouldn’t have done it,” Art said quietly.

Grant was startled. “What?”

“You shouldn’t have sided with that woman. I can understand Rochelle backing her. I can understand the Press woman siding with her. But from you, I expected different,” he said. “And to be by that woman’s side you even relinquished your duties as President? Such a big step over a non-issue? It was very irresponsible on your part, and most inappropriate. Even cowardly, if I may be totally honest.”

Grant gaped at his son, stunned.

“It’s still not too late,” Art said. “Please return, Father. We need to remain united for the sake of the family. And it’s not just about us—it’s about the people too. The public. They look up to us. We owe it to society.”

“That…that is exactly what I want to say—it is not too late,” Grant blurted. Somehow he’d found his voice again. “Do not do it, son, please do not commit this gruesome sin! Let the girl be with her mother.”

Art’s face turned sad. “I’ve always been proud of you, Father, for what you’ve stood for, your principles and ethics. But today I shall be truthful with you. You have lost your way. You have completely lost your sense of right and wrong. Your values have become twisted.”

Grant was shocked. “Me…mine? Mine or yours?!” he cried. “Goodness gracious, look at you! Look at what you have become! Blinded by image and persona and status and what not, you are out to commit the ultimate sin. But you do not see it! What use is the Butcher name if we do not have a trace of humanity left in us? What use is all this money if its only purpose is to proliferate our egos? Look what you have done to that boy! Wolf was never like this before. Whatever failings he had, he always had a heart that was in the right place. But you have even snatched that from him. You have turned him into a demon…” Grant’s lips were trembling.

“Wolf came to me of his own accord, Father. And please do not blame him. Precisely because he had his heart in the right place did he finally see the light and mend his ways.” His voice was calm and reassured, as usual. “I only wish you would similarly abandon the darkness.”

Grant’s eyes were unbelieving.
Is this what I bred?
He was looking at a monster—a fiend with no feelings whatsoever. Stunned and grief-stricken, he got to his feet and left the room.

.

G
rant stared at the dark waters of the pool. It was three am. The images kept ravaging him over and over. He had followed Savannah to the restroom. She had begun shaking like a leaf in the wind, although her face remained blank. He had helped steady her and the look he had seen in her eyes had made him shudder. It was a look of a woman who had lost everything. And then for a brief minute, she had clung to his arm despairingly in a silent entreaty for help.

Deeply tormented, Grant knew he had to stop Art. Someway. But he didn’t know how—there seemed no way. A vague thought had germinated somewhere in the backwaters of his mind a while ago…and now it began to increasingly assert itself. He became very still. He looked blinklessly into the distance. The thought swelled with every second. Grant tensed and stood up.
No!
he thought.

But it was the only way out. He again saw the image of Savannah and Robin—mother and child. And he saw Art—a son he did not recognize anymore. The images kept flashing to and fro, to and fro, like a movie-screen gone wild, until his head began to swivel.

He had always thought of himself as a man of values—a principled man, a decent man. He had taken great pride in it—even allowing himself a little private vanity now and then. Endlessly he had lectured, from every forum, about the value of doing the right things in life, of eschewing evil, and he had walked the talk. He had never allowed anything—any temptation, any influence, to deflect him from his chosen path. Now, he was faced with the ultimate trial a moral man could ever face.

It was the most painful decision of his life.

He turned around and went back to his bedroom. He was careful to be quiet—his wife was fast asleep. He watched her silhouette for a while and noted how well she slept amidst all this turmoil. She seemed curiously detached from it all. Her only true love was the sprawling house and its care, and a darn good job she did of it too. She couldn’t care less about anything else…as if the inhabitants of the house, its soul, didn’t really matter.

From under a pile of towels in his cupboard, Grant fished out the keys to the cupboard safe. The safe door released smoothly, noiselessly. He stared into the dark for a long instant. Then, very tentatively, he extended his right arm into the safe.

The cold steel made him recoil fiercely, as if he had touched a live electric cable. He shut his eyes and remained still, murmuring a prayer. He had always abhorred guns and violence—any form of violence. But he forced himself now.

The Smith and Wesson .357 felt ugly and pitiless in his palm. It felt so heavy, he almost dropped it. It was his late brother Eric’s gun, and Grant had retained it merely as an item of remembrance, one of many articles. He himself had never owned a gun.

He hadn’t touched the .357 since depositing it in his safe two years ago, and he could feel himself trembling. Somehow he kept holding the weapon, although every strand in his body revolted. When he had steadied down a bit, he slowly raised his hand upward. A violent shudder went up his arm and the gun dropped heavily to the rug.

For a very long time, Grant stood there, his knees clattering brutally. Somehow he remained standing. He glanced at his wife and felt some relief that the thump of the fallen weapon hadn’t raised her.

He swallowed once, bent low, and picked the gun up, then hastily dumped it back into the safe.

He returned to the back porch and flopped down heavily into the chair, hiding his face in his hands. He was barely breathing and felt ill…and ashamed.

The right thing,
he told himself, and felt more ill, and more ashamed.
But I must do it nevertheless.
For everything that was good in this world. He had to rise above himself—there lay the true test of his character. His heart began to ache. Then the pain ballooned swiftly and he clutched his chest with both hands. He thought he was having an attack. He bent forward, his face a deep grimace.

He remained motionless until the pain began to slowly subside.

He badly needed someone by his side right now. For once,
he
needed someone’s shoulder to rest his head on. His first thought automatically went to Wolf. And the ache in his chest returned.
Why, Wolf, oh, why?
…
Come back, son…return to me.
But he knew that wasn’t going to happen—the look Grant had seen in Wolf’s eyes the other day, of complete apathy, the mercenary look… Grant knew there was no turning back from that. Wolf had leapt the fence…irretrievably.

He thought of Rochelle. What a partner she had been through it all. She had been his front-woman…his very alter ego. Then Grant thought of his wife. But they were all fast asleep and he didn’t have the heart, or the strength, to wake them up.

So he sat there on the easy chair overlooking the swimming pool, a wretched, forlorn man—a man who would soon be committing an unthinkable murder.