Butterfly

by Sylvester Stephens

  Jeremy, who was used to signing autographs at that time, reached into his front pocket and pulled out an ink pen. “Who do I sign it to?”

  “Oh, I’m sorry, I meant Ms. Butterfly.”

  “What?” I looked at Jeremy and then back at the girl. “Excuse me?”

  “Can I please have your autograph, Ms. Butterfly?”

  “You want my autograph?”

  “Yes ma’am! You were terrific on America the Beautiful!”

  “Thank you.” Jeremy handed me the pen and smiled. “Who do I make this out to?”

  “Keisha.”

  “Keisha?” I stopped writing and looked the girl in the face. “That’s a very pretty name, Keisha.”

  “Thank you, Ms. Butterfly.”

  “You’re very welcome, Keisha.”

  “I want to be a model when I grow up. Do you have any advice for me?”

  “Yes.” I held her face in my hand. “I want you to repeat after me, okay?”

  “Yes.”

  “I want you to say, ‘I am beautiful!’”

  “I am beautiful!”

  “You see beauty is not just a pretty face, or a slim body; it’s a state of being. If you feel beautiful, then you are beautiful. Now I want you to keep those words, ‘I am beautiful,’ inside of you, and remember this precious face that you wake up to every day. Okay?”

  “Okay, Ms. Butterfly.”

  Her friend handed me a piece of paper and then I signed an autograph for her. I stared at them when they walked away. Jeremy knew I was trapped in my thought and that it was about Keisha.

  “Hey, you okay, Butterfly?”

  “Yes, I’m fine.”

  “Sure?”

  “Yeah, I’m fine.”

  “Okay.” Jeremy held my hand and we began to walk toward his car. “I can’t believe I’m holding the hand of Butterfly, the supermodel, superstar!”

  “I’m not a superstar.”

  “You are in my book. And I’m quite sure that little girl feels the same way.”

  “You’re the superstar. You have women, grown women, eating out of your hands.”

  “And you have me eating out of yours.” Jeremy kissed me on the hand.

  “Okay, Romeo, dial it down.”

  “Butterfly.” Jeremy kissed me passionately. “I love you.”

  “I love you, too.”

  “If we love each other, then why can’t we be together?”

  “You know why, Jeremy.”

  “Because of my mistake?”

  “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “I do.”

  “I love you, Jeremy, and I probably always will. But I can’t forget what happened. I’ve tried, but I can’t. I wanted you to be the first boy to make love to me. I really, really wanted that. I know I was naïve, but I thought that’s what you wanted, too.”

  “That woman seduced me and manipulated me, Butterfly.”

  “That may work with your mama and with your friends, but it doesn’t work on me, Jeremy. You were twice as big as Ms. Jamerson. If you didn’t want to have sex with her, you didn’t have to have sex with her. But you did.”

  “So are you going to hold this over my head forever?”

  “I’m not holding anything over your head, but you know how I feel about it, yet you keep putting yourself in the position to be rejected. Like I said, I love you, but after what happened, I can’t be with you.”

  “What about in a year or two?”

  “There’s no telling how many girls you will have by then.”

  “If I’m with another girl, it’s because I can’t have you.”

  I kissed Jeremy on the cheek. “Have fun, baby.”

  Jeremy drove me home, and of course, Pa-Pa was waiting up for me. He told me Toya had stopped by to see me. She never came over unannounced, so I knew exactly what she wanted. She wanted to nag me about our California trip. She was anxious and ready to go. I was looking forward to having my girls out there in L.A. with me. Toya was a little hustler, so she was just trying to solidify that job of being my assistant while it was still on my mind.

  It was my last night. Bri and Pa-Pa were waiting for me to come home. Pa-Pa talked to me about the dangers of living in a big city. When he finished, Bri and I stayed up talking about the show and my modeling career. That nagging Toya blew my phone up all night long. I did not answer because there was no such thing as a short phone call with Toya. I was with my family, and no matter how excited she was, I was not going to answer. The next morning, I woke up to my phone vibrating next to my head. It was Toya.

  “Girl, what is your malfunction?” I had my eyes closed while I was talking.

  “They killed her!” Toya screamed into the phone.

  “What?” I sat straight up and put the phone closer to my ear.

  “They killed Janae, Butterfly! They killed her!”

  “Who killed her?” I screamed back.

  “Those boys! They set her up! They killed Janae!”

  “Toya! Are you trying to tell me that Janae is dead, girl?”

  “Yeah! She’s dead!” Toya’s voice was so high, I could barely understand what she was saying.

  I paced back and forth in my room. It finally hit me and I screamed loud and long. “Noooooooooooooooooooooo!”

  I fell to my knees and pounded my phone on the floor.

  “What’s the matter?” Bri kneeled beside me and rubbed my back.

  Pa-Pa rushed into the room and stood me up. “What’s wrong with you?”

  I collapsed in Pa-Pa’s arms with what was left of my phone, still in my hand. “They killed Janae, Pa-Pa!”

  “Your friend Janae?”

  “Yeah, Pa-Pa!” I sobbed.

  Ms. Alicia ran into the room. “What’s the matter with you?”

  “Her friend was killed.” Pa-Pa held me in arms.

  “Who? What friend? Keisha?” Ms. Alicia thought I was releasing pent-up grief from Keisha’s death.

  “No, the big girl.”

  “Janae?” Ms. Alicia ran to me. “Sweetheart? Something happened to Janae?”

  “She’s dead, Mom.”

  “Come here.” Ms. Alicia took me out of Pa-Pa’s arms and sat me on the bed next to her. “It’s going to be all right, sweetheart.”

  Dr. Forrester stood in the doorway but did not say a word. Bri sat on the other side of me and cried just as hard. She knew Janae well. Janae had spent time in the juvie for the both of us. My life was too good! It was only a matter of time before fate evened the score with me. But I had no idea it was going to come back so damn hard! How many more people in my life were going to die before fate left me the hell alone? I knew the answer before I asked the question, but I asked it just the same. What had I done to bring so much tragedy into my life? I was born!

  I met with Toya the next day, and she told me the girl Janae was supposed to be hooking up with that night, was actually setting her up. She was the baby’s mama of the boy that had threatened Janae.

  Apparently, the girl had flirted with Janae to get her to come over. When Janae knocked on the girl’s door, that boy and two of his friends opened the door and aimed their guns in Janae’s face. They were only trying to scare her, but one of the guns accidently went off. They were locked up. Three sons, three brothers, three friends, three nephews, three fathers, three lives...gone! And my girl, oh, what I would have given to hear her use the n-word one more time. R.I.P. Janae!

  I had to delay returning to L.A. until after Janae’s funeral. Ms. Erin had set up some photo shoots and a few fashion shows to keep me active. She was afraid that I may be too emotionally distraught after Janae’s murder and did not trust me returning on my own, so she came to Atlanta to get me. She visited me at our house, and although Ms. Alicia sat in the room with us, she promised me she would not get involved.

  Everything was going fine until we had a conversation about Toya moving to L.A. with me and becoming my assistant. Ms. Erin felt that it was in my best interest to leave Toya back in Atlanta.


  “I realize you’re grieving right now, Butterfly, but it’s a huge responsibility to have someone depend on you for everything when they move to a new city.”

  “I know that, Ms. Erin, but she cannot stay here in Atlanta.”

  “I understand that, but your career is taking off and you don’t need any setbacks.”

  “My friend is not a setback.”

  “What happens if you bring her out to California and you have to fly away to Milan, or Amsterdam?”

  “She’ll be fine.”

  “I’m going to have to insist that you leave her behind, Butterfly.”

  “I can’t do that.” I sighed, and thought about what I was about to say. I wanted to say the right thing, the right way. “Ms. Erin, I have done everything you’ve asked me to do. I haven’t questioned you. I haven’t resisted you. I have done nothing but trusted you. Now I’m asking you this one time to trust me, please.”

  “I can empathize with you Butterfly, but...”

  “I hate to interrupt.” Ms. Alicia looked at Ms. Erin. “But I would like to say one quick thing if I may?”

  “Sure.”

  I prepared myself for the “you have to do what you have to do” speech from Ms. Alicia, but she was not a teacher that day. She was a mother.

  “I understand what you’re saying, Erin. But Shante has been through an awful lot this past year. And I am proud of what she has accomplished and I appreciate what you have done for her. However, right now, what she needs more than a modeling tiara, is a friend. A friend who understands the pain she’s suffering. If her friend moving to Los Angeles means that she can no longer pursue her modeling career with you, I’m afraid it is time for Shante to find her a new representative because her sanity is much more important than her vanity.”

  “I think my point is being taken out of context here. I want what’s best for Butterfly as well. If that means her friend coming to Los Angeles, I’ll buy the damn ticket. You know the situation better than I do. She’s your child, Alicia. If you like the idea, I love it!”

  “So Toya can come?” I asked.

  “If that’s what you want,” Ms. Erin said.

  “Can she be my assistant?”

  “If you’re the one paying her, she can be whatever you want her to be.”

  “Thank you, Ms. Erin.”

  “So we’re all good here?” Ms. Erin asked.

  “Yes,” Ms. Alicia answered.

  Ms. Alicia walked Ms. Erin to the door and they said good-bye. Ms. Alicia came back into the den to give me some advice.

  “Butterfly?”

  “Yes ma’am?”

  “Sit!” Ms. Alicia waited for me to sit down and gave me some advice. “In this business, you are the commodity, not your agent, nor your agency. You! You are not an up-and-coming model anymore. There’s a demand for you. Erin knows this. And so does everyone else.”

  “Okay.”

  “Now, in Erin’s defense, she was right.”

  “How was she right?”

  “I commend you for being loyal to your friend. But you can’t bring yourself down trying to bring someone else up. It won’t benefit either one of you. And, no matter where Toya is, until she decides to get her life together, she’s going to always have problems. And I don’t want her problems to become your problems.”

  “I won’t let that happen.”

  “I’m sure you won’t.”

  “Thanks for having my back, Mom.”

  “That’s what a mother is for.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  We flew back the same day as Janae’s funeral. The first time Toya saw my apartment was the first time I saw my apartment. It was huge and spacious. It had three bedrooms downstairs and four-and-a-half baths. It had an upstairs with a one-bedroom suite and a gigantic bathroom. We were like children running around that apartment. I stopped running and almost cried when I found out how much it was going to cost me.

  Ms. Erin wasted no time getting back to work. I had two important photo shoots the very next morning. Over the next couple of days, I was in two more commercials, but I had no dialogue in either one of them.

  As soon as I finished the second commercial, Ms. Erin, Tara and I flew to San Francisco for a show where there were going to be big-time international designers. Two other girls from the agency flew ahead of us for fitting. Since I was new, Ms. Erin wanted to coach me through every step of the process. The three of us were in first-class. I paid for Toya’s ticket, so she had to fly in coach. That’s my girl, but first-class?

  I was still nervous about flying but not as much as I was on my first two flights. Maybe it had something to do with flying first-class, or maybe it had something to do with Tara running her mouth so much I did not have time to think about being in the air. At one point she was getting on my nerves so bad, I almost asked the pilot to fly the damn plane into a mountain just to shut her ass up!

  “You are going to be a star in this business, Butterfly.”

  “Thank you, Tara.”

  “Like, how old are you again?”

  “Eighteen.”

  “That’s close to my age, I’m twenty-one.”

  “Really?”

  “People tell me I look younger than that, but it’s true. I’m only twenty-one.”

  “Oh, okay.”

  “And where are you from again?”

  “Georgia.”

  “Is that near Atlanta?”

  I wanted to scream, Yeah you ignorant heffa, now shut the hell up! But instead, I smiled and said sarcastically, “Yes, Georgia is near Atlanta.”

  “I’ve never been to the South before. I want to go someday.”

  “Okay.”

  “I’ve been to New York, though.”

  It pissed me off when people from New York and Los Angeles talked like they were the only two cities in the entire United States. I was born in Raleigh, North Carolina, and I was raised in Atlanta, Georgia, and I did not give a damn where anybody else came from.

  “I’d never left Georgia until I came here.”

  “Wow! This is like a true American rags-to-riches story.”

  “Not exactly. I’m not coming from rags.”

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to offend you.”

  “I’m sorry, but you did. Every black girl in this business is not modeling because we’re looking for a meal ticket. Some of us do it because we know that we’re beautiful.”

  “That’s beautiful.”

  Tara stared at me and then turned around and talked to Ms. Erin. After that, I was able to get a power nap before we landed.

  Once we arrived at the arena, Ms. Erin asked Toya to come with her, while Tara took me backstage. Ms. Erin made sure I did not eat any bread or pastries from the time we arrived in Los Angeles until after the show. She wanted me to look thin and shapely without any bulges. In my mind I was already paper thin. Why in the hell did I need to be thinner than that?

  I found out as soon as I stepped backstage. I was four hours early just for the rehearsals and there were already five models preparing for the show. They were as tall as me, or taller, and thin as hell. Even their feet and hands were thin. Two of them were the girls from Philpot’s Modeling Agency. I knew I was going to have to step my game up when I found out they flew all the way in from Paris. They had arrived a full day before me and I was only flying in from Los Angeles. Tara introduced me to them and they welcomed me to the team. Their French accent was very apparent.

  “Hi, Sophia, this is Butterfly. She is now a part of our Philpot family.”

  “Hi, Butterfly.” Sophia hugged me and then kissed me on the cheek. “What an unusual name.”

  “Hi, Butterfly.” Bridgette kissed me on both cheeks. “I am Bridgette.”

  “Nice to meet both of you.”

  I had grown another inch my senior year, bringing my height to a statuesque six feet one. Sophia was about an inch or two taller than me, perhaps six feet two, or three inches tall. She wore short, jet-black hair that was cut
evenly at one ear, and then longer all the way to the back of the neck, and then all around to her other ear. She had broad shoulders which led to a V-shaped, slender waistline. Her hips were almost even with her waistline and they barely spread as they met with her thighs. The woman had no hips. But she was wearing the hell out of that tight mini-dress.

  Bridgette was about the same height, with red hair. It was pinned up. She was thin, but she had slightly more hips than Sophia. She was wearing an elegant, long dress that went all the way to her ankles. Her four-inch heels were skimpy, but cute.

  “Nice shoes,” I said. “I hope a designer fits me in a pair of shoes like that.”

  “Oh no.” Bridgette chuckled. “These are not the designers’ clothes. These are mine.”

  “What?” I felt like a fool. “You dress like that every day?”

  “But of course.” Bridgette pulled me close to her and whispered in my ear. “Do you know whose clothes are in this show?”

  “No.”

  “Jean-Claude Francois.”

  “Who?”

  “You are such a baby into this business.”

  “Okay, but who is this Jean-Claude Francois again?”

  “He is only the most fantastic designer in all of the world. That is why we arrived so early. We want to convince him that we are best for his work.”

  “You do not know who Jean-Claude Francois is?” Sophia asked.

  “No! I just found out who Jean-Claude Van Damme is.”

  “Jean-Claude Van Damme? Yum-Yum!”

  “Maybe back in the day, he was yum-yum, but now he is more like, oh-noooo!” Neither Sophia nor Bridgette understood my joke. “My bad, it was a bad joke; forgot he was one of your native Frenchmen.”

  “No, he is not from France at all. He is Belgian.”

  “Belgian?”

  “Enough of this talk!” Bridgette interrupted. “Have you been fitted for your designer?”

  “Not yet, I just got here.”

  “You better get that fanny moving.”

  “Moving where?”

  “To be fitted, of course.”

  “Come!” Sophia snapped her fingers at me. “Follow me.”

  I was like, wait a minute, chick. Do not snap your fingers at me like I am a dog. I was going to say something out loud, but she walked away so fast, I had to shut up to try to keep up. We went to a room where there were naked bodies all over the place. Women were scurrying from one person to another.