At night, the city seemed to literally come alive. As he stood at the window and watched the lights of the vehicles on the road far below him move with apparent purpose along predefined routes, the mental image of blood flowing through veins came to him.
Blood that would spurt in all directions when the veins burst, rendered aimless now that the course it was programmed to follow was destroyed. Just like the careless manner in which his parents’ blood was spilled, on one ordinary but unfortunate night.
******
“Interesting birthmark,” she commented, glancing at the slightly darkened patch of skin on his arm, no larger than a quarter. He gave a small smile in response; it wasn’t the first time someone commented on the unusual mark on his arm, and it would not be the last. This little critter should have its own fan club, he thought with amusement.
“I say ‘interesting’ not because of its shape,” she continued, her eyes fixed on the butterfly, “but because my sister also had a butterfly-shaped birthmark on her ankle. She was my twin.”
Was. Her use of the past tense did not escape him. He raised his eyebrows questioningly, but said nothing of it lest he disrupt her private moment.
“You know something?” she lifted her head suddenly, looking straight into his eyes and interrupting his thoughts. She leaned over and whispered conspiratorially, “We are surrounded by butterflies. You can’t see them, but they’re there. They’re everywhere,” she paused. “We must take extra care not to disturb the wrong ones.” She punctuated her last sentence with a small wink.
This conversation is getting more peculiar by the minute. He wondered if he had unsuspectingly entered some kind of twilight zone straddled somewhere between fantasy and reality. He searched her face, looking for clues or signs that he was either talking to a madwoman or she was just pulling his leg. But other than the blink-and-you-will-miss-it twinkle in her eye, she seemed to be completely serious. Right. She’s mad, then, he concluded.
“What do you mean, invisible butterflies? And the wrong ones at that? And if we can’t see them, how do we know if they are the right ones or the wrong ones?” I can’t believe I’m talking about invisible butterflies to a person I met barely ten minutes ago. I must be going mad too, he sighed inwardly. Up to this point he hadn’t said a word, and he was about to steer the conversation to more conventional topics when curiosity got the better of him. After all, she did seem harmless enough, even if she were not entirely there up there. At the very least, she wasn’t a raving lunatic.
“Ah…” she smiled at him. “You’ve heard of the ‘butterfly effect’, haven’t you?”
He nodded. “When a butterfly flaps its wings, it could cause a storm at the other end of the world.”
“Yes,” she continued slowly, as if trying to gather her thoughts. “We are surrounded by these unseen butterflies, but they are not moving. They do not move until we disturb them, and cause them to flap their wings, which in turn could lead to a storm in our lives.”
“Mmmm…” he said thoughtfully.
“Everyone of us has a personal tragedy which, regardless of the weight we place on it, would undoubtedly impact our lives in some way or other. A butterfly flaps its wings and sets in motion a sequence of events that could culminate in one such tragedy.”
“So what made those butterflies flap their wings in the first place?”
“You,” she replied simply. “Every decision you make disturbs a butterfly, no matter how inconsequential that decision may seem. From the most trivial of decisions such as choosing a cheeseburger over a sandwich for lunch, to life-changing resolutions like getting married; every one of them is the flutter of a butterfly’s wings.”
She looked at him intently. “Just fifteen minutes ago, I disturbed a butterfly when I decided to talk to you.”
He leaned back in his chair, not taking his eyes off hers. “Wow. That sounds so… so depressing. That every decision we make could lead to a tragedy.”
“Yes,” she agreed. “It could. But what they didn’t mention is that while the butterfly could cause a storm, it could just as likely be the source of a cool summer breeze, or rainfall in the desert. You have to remember that there are two sides to everything. The universe will always seek to balance itself. Le Châtelier’s principle and all that.”
She fell quiet. He tried to say something to break the silence, but at that moment, the right words just eluded him. Maybe it simply wasn’t a time for words.
He thought of all the wrong butterflies he had touched, and then wondered which butterfly it was exactly that took his parents’ lives. He had never been able to completely forgive himself for his parents’ death.
He was a creature of habit and had a reputation for being dependable and reliable–predictable, even–and he prided himself on that, even if he did sometimes feel trapped. His iPod playlist was set to “shuffle”; a trivial but necessary act that allowed him to deliberately introduce some form of unpredictability into his life: he could not know what song would play next. He had over 20,000 songs in his music library and it could take up to more than a week before his iPod plays the same song again. Yet ever so often, a song that most befits his current mood would come up. This never ceased to amaze him; it was like his iPod was in sync with his emotions.
That night, sitting on the subway, he was just thinking of his girlfriend–ex-girlfriend, he reminded himself–with whom he had broken up a few days earlier. He was tempted to call her, to hear her voice once more, but he managed to fight back the urge.
That is until, through some warped coincidence, his iPod started to play The Beatles’ I Want to Hold Your Hand.
Our song, he thought. Of course. I should have known. The iPod’s doing it again. Damn.
He could bear it no longer. He whipped out his cellphone and dialled the first number on his speed-dial. I should really get down to removing it; I doubt I’ll be calling this number much in future…
In the train, a girl was thinking about the events that transpired over the past few months, and how she had inadvertently landed herself in this messy situation.
She didn’t want to disappoint her family; she knew she wouldn’t be able to bear seeing the hurt on her mother’s face if she broke the news. She wanted to end it all, to make her way to where there wasn’t any hurt or disappointment. She already had in mind the place where she would finally seek closure. There was a bridge she could go to. But a sliver of doubt lingered at the back of her mind… What if she was doing the wrong thing?
Her thoughts were interrupted by the guy sitting beside her. He seemed to be arguing, no, apologising, to someone. His girlfriend, probably. His tone was desperate; he seemed to be on the verge of tears. She turned to look at him, taking in the grief and hopelessness that were written quite clearly on his face.
Damn this world, she thought. Damn this stupid world and its troubles.
The guy now seemed to be making another call.
“Yes, mum. No… Yes, I know I promised to go over two weeks ago. Look, I’m sorry, all right? I’m just not in the mood right now. I’m going straight home… No… No you don’t have to come over, I can fix something up myself… No… No, don’t bother really… Fine. Suit yourself. I’ll leave the door unlocked.”
There. Another promise broken, she thought wryly. Why is it that we so easily break the promises that we make to people we really care about?
She was now convinced that she had made the right decision. She would end it all tonight. No more broken promises.
******
Thirty minutes later, a lorry crashed into the car that carried two passengers on the way to see their son.
At about the same time, halfway across the city, at the bottom of the river lay a girl with a birthmark on her ankle: a butterfly poised for flight.
sourcewhat a story..
What are our feelings after reading it?
there are consequences in every action you take.
the consequences may or may not be know to us.
our actions that we take might have impacted someone's else life.
be it a good or a bad impact.
actions are governed by of decisions.
the right or wrong decisions?
even a right decision may have a negative impact on others?
and how would you know if it is a right decision?
very often, we come to a decision without putting too much thought into things.
Why do we do that?
character and principles have an important role to play in decision making processes.
make a wise decision, and not always the right decision.
Don't ask how.
It is your choice - Let your brain or your heart lead you.
Decision making again.
this is life.
Have you ever thought of how Chemistry can be inspirational?
Personally i have never till reading the above story.
Le Châtelier’s principle.
A simple definition would be that whenever a change is introduced to a system that is in equilibrium, the system will try to counteract the change by creating an opposing effect to the change.
Another familiar analogy is cause and effect or karma.The same goes for many things in life.
Be it on the individual level, or even on a universal level.
It is a cycle.
Whether or not it will be a vicious cycle?
all depends on us.
If you have decided to get a tattoo done after reading this post, do drop by
