"I wanna be a butterfly."
"What?" Taylor almost ignored Jessie's comment and continued separating the red from the blonde in her hair. He was fascinated with the colors and how there could be two completely different colors on the same head. He was in love with the girl since the moment he saw her.
"Haven't you ever thought of what you want to be? Like when somebody asks you if you could be one animal, what would it be? I wanna be a butterfly."
"What made you think of that?"
"Well, Blake was asking me and I told him that. Cause all those things that happened to me when I was so little, I could just fly away from them. Or, I could start out as a caterpiller and hide away for a while and change so that I could be good again. And then come out as a good, beautiful thing and just fly away from everything bad that there ever was. And then I can be good from the inside out."
"I bet you could do that."
"Be good again?"
"And be beautiful like you always wanted to be. Even though you really don't even have to try. Just grow a couple more inches and you'll be fine."
Jessie laughed and smacked him playfully. "What would you want to be?"
"If I was an animal? Probably a bird. That way when you're good again, I can be up in the trees with you. And we can fly all over the place together."
Jessie smiled. "I like that idea. Let's do that ok?" She held out her pinkie to him. He took it in his own and smiled.
"Deal."
That was four years ago when Taylor still knew who Jess was. And when she knew who she was. When they were 12 years old. She may have had an attidude, and a bad side which included some things that he wasn't ready to tell her yet, but he still missed her. Even now, sitting in her living room, watching her watch tv.
"Hey Jess?"
"What?"
"If you could pick one animal to be? What would you wanna be?"
Jessica shrugged. "I dunno."
"Just answer me, please."
"I dunno. A squirrel I guess."
Taylor frowned. "Why a squirrel?"
"Obvious reasons. I get as many nuts as I want." She grinned deviously.
"Funny." Taylor moved a little closer to her on the couch and took a strand of red hair in between his fingers. He flipped it over to the other side of her head.
"What are you doing?"
"Just... separating."
"Well don't. It's annoying." Jessica shivered and pushed his hand away.
"Well, you know what I wanna be?"
"No. What?"
"A bird."
Jessica stared off into space for a few seconds. "Why a bird?"
"I dunno. I like birds."
Jess shook her head.
"You remember don't you? You remember."
She shook her head again. "Remember what?"
"You do remember. I can tell by your face. You remember about the butterfly don't you?"
"What butterfly?!"
"Knock it off Jessie! I know you remember!"
"Don't call me that! I told you I'm Jess now! I hate when people call me Jessie, they mistake me for your sister!"
Taylor's eyes widened. "You remember that too! How do you know that if you told me that right before your accident?"
Jessica looked to the ground.
"SEE! YOU REMEMBER! What all do you remember?"
She threw her pillow at the coffee table and knocked over his can of Pepsi. "EVERYTHING! I REMEMBER IT ALL DAMMIT! I remember stealing the damn punch bug when I was ten and crashing it into a fruit stand down town. I remember banging your brother when I was 11. And I remember having a baby and giving her away to people I didn't even know because HE DIDN'T WANT HIS MOM TO KNOW WHAT HE DID! And I remember beating the shit out of you when you told her! There! I remember everything. Are you happy now?!"
Taylor stared at her wide eyed. "You were nine."
"What?"
"When you crashed the bug. You were nine. You don't remember."
"Yes I do."
"You do not Jess." He looked almost disappointed at he slouched back down on the couch. "You read your fucking diaries. That's all you did. I remember you letting me read them when we were 12. You wrote that you were ten when you stole the car because you were afraid your daughter would grow up and somehow find your journals and think you were a bad kid. That's all you did. You read your damn journals, and now you know everything."
Jessica sat back down on the couch and burried her face in her hands. She started to cry loudly. Then she stopped for a second before she hit Taylor in the arm as hard as she could. "WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME WHO I WAS AND WHAT I WAS LIKE?! WHY?? YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO BE MY BEST FRIEND!" She quieted down. "The diary said you were my best friend. That you wanted me to be good and you were gonna help me. Why didn't you stay here instead of going away to make music? You were supposed to help me and you didn't."
Taylor didn't know what to do. He never read in her diary after they were 13. After he went away. He was never there to read it. He had no idea. He leaned over and put his arms around her shoulders and pulled her to him. She didn't pull away, all she did was sob into his shoulder. For the first time in his life he saw her cry. She was always too tough to cry, always holding back her pain and letting out her grief in strange ways. He was the only one that understood that. He felt so bad that he wasn't there for her when she needed him.
"Why weren't you there for me?"
Taylor started to cry himself. "I don't know Jessie. I don't know. I was wrong. All of music, I'm gonna stop doing it until you get better. I'll tell the fans we're on a break after our tour and that we're working on a new album. I wanna stay here for you."
Jessica looked up at him and wiped her eyes. "Will you dedicate the new album to me?"
"How did you remember the butterfly thing? You never wrote that in your journal."
"What butterfly thing?"
"When we were eleven you told me that you wanted to be a butterfly. You said you wanted to go away and come back as something beautiful and good. And then you'd fly away and start all over."
Jessica smiled. "I was pretty smart then wasn't I?"
Taylor nodded and then remembered distinctly something that Jessica had let him read. Something about the real truth. Something about what happened when she was six years old. "You... know about Blake's dad don't you?"
"Yeah." Jess sighed and stared ahead. "I understand why you didn't tell me though. Why add murder to my list of crimes?" She shrugged.
"It wasn't murder Jessie, it was self defence. He had that gun on you and your mom. You know that Blake had nothing to do with it. He was too little. I just went along with the whole story. They told me too."
"I killed his dad though. No wonder my half brothers and sisters hate me."
"Jess you shot him in the leg. You just slowed him down. He didn't die from that. When the cops came, he grabbed the gun and shot at them. They didn't have a choice."
"But if I wouldn't have shot him in the first place..."
"YOU WOULD HAVE BEEN DEAD! He would have killed you. And your mom. And Blake for taking your mom's side even when he was 4. He didn't understand and neither did you. All you knew was that he was hurting your mom. So you saved her!"
Jessica sniffled and stared at the ground.
"Nothing you've done is your fault at all. After everything that man put you through I hope he's rotting in hell. And you don't deserve to be punished like this." Tears streamed down Taylor's cheeks.
"Tay..."
"No! Why'd you have to get hit by a car Jess?! I could blame myself for that!"
"But you're not going too."
"Maybe I do blame myself. Maybe if I would have made you stay at my house. Or if I wouldn't have abandoned you to make other people happy, maybe you never would have been there at that time."
"But I was."
"I know. You were there when Blake's dad beat you in the middle of the night for having a nightmare and waking him up. You were there when he hit your mom every single day for sleeping with that 17 year old. You were there when he pulled the gun on you. And you were there when Blake's dad was shot by the police. But nobody blames you for that!"
"In my diary, I kept saying how much awful my mom was for what she did. When she had me and tore apart the family. But... I'm kind of glad I'm here. Or else I wouldn't have known you. And I wouldn't have a brother like Blake."
"One good thing came out of your mom's little one night stand with the neighbor. And anybody who really knows you thanks God for that man next door. I know I do."
"Tay don't cry." Jessica hugged Taylor as tight as she could and wouldn't let go.
"I'm so sorry for what I did to you Jessie. I don't wanna be just another person that hurt you."
"You're not. You've helped me more than you know today. I actually have something to look forward too now. I know that before my accident all I wanted was to be good and to have you back as a friend. I have one of those things now. I just have to work on the other."
Taylor kissed Jessica on the cheek and smiled. "Can I help you with it?"
"You better. You promised me you would."
When Jessica woke up the next morning, she knew that everything was ok. She remembered everything out of the blue. The pain, the crying, and the emptiness. But she knew that before she could get that pain of remembrance to go away, she'd have to change herself first. She grabbed all of her old diaries and a lighter, and went to the backyard to burn them.