Challenge 4: Miracle

Nadine ran off the bus, her hair bouncing as she rushed up the stairs of P.S 118. Today was going to be the best day in the history of P.S 118, at least to Nadine. She had waited day by day for this event, almost babying her project until it finally was ready.

Today was the day their science projects were due. And today was the day Nadine would finally show off her butterfly. She hoped that she would get an A for her notes and presentation, plus maybe show something pretty cool to class for once.

Cradling her jar, she entered the building and walked the halls to find Rhonda. She knew she could tell Rhonda all about her amazing butterfly, since butterflies weren't gross, disgusting, slimy, creepy, or anything else that Rhonda hated about bugs.

And this butterfly was a special one, not even seen by Nadine until a few months ago.

It was a beautiful Talicada nyseus, or Red Pierrot butterfly. It was not native to Hillwood, or even the United States. It only lived in Asia and the Himalayas, feeding off of a plant called the Kalanchoe, a native garden plant in Asia. Nadine had specifically ordered one from Mrs. Vitelo, and when her plant arrived a week later, the larvae of the butterfly were growing and eating the leaves.

Instead of being upset however, Nadine was amazed and delighted. She immediately knew what caterpillars they were, and was excited to study them as they grew. The weeks passed, and occasionally she saw a caterpillar change leaves, amazed at its yellow color and the white bristles along its body before it disappeared into another leaf.

When her caterpillars came to the surface and wove their cocoons, Nadine almost squealed with delight. Rhonda had not enjoyed seeing the cocoons, but Nadine loved them and coveted them. Then she had an idea. The science projects was coming up soon. She could use one of the butterflies as a study. With her research of their life cycle, she might be able to get an A. With this idea, she took her measurements and observations of the caterpillars to Mr. Simmons. He had praised her special eye and spirit of raising the bugs, and had agreed that she could use them in her science project.

And today was finally the day. Her beautiful butterfly had come out of its cocoon just last night, and Nadine had caught it in the morning flying close to the ground around her room. Now, all she needed to do was keep it safe until the science fair.

That shouldn't be too difficult, right?

Nadine entered Mr. Simmons' classroom and saw Rhonda brushing her hair at her desk.

Nadine jogged to her side and said, "Look Rhonda," she put the jar on the desk in front of her friend; "it's my science project. The Talicada nyseus butterfly. Isn't it beautiful?"

Rhonda glanced at the butterfly, it's wings closed to reveal the white with black polka dot pattern on the wing and black with white polka dots along the rim of the wings. A small area on the bottom of each wing was a dark red.

Rhonda stopped brushing for a second to scoff.

"Who cares about a butterfly, Nadine? Silly thing," she waved at the butterfly. "It's just a bug. No one cares about such disgusting creatures."

Nadine was hurt that Rhonda would say that. Rhonda continued brushing her hair, oblivious to the pain she had caused to Nadine. She took her jar back into her hands and sat down in her seat, staring at the butterfly, watching it open and close it's wings as class began.

The hours flew by as lunch time came. All the students rushed out of the class to go grab lunch and play at recess. Nadine became the star of the playground as everyone gathered around her to take a glance at her butterfly. It flew around from hand to hand, landing gracefully on the fingers of the excited kids. Everyone giggled when the butterfly crawled along their fingers and palms, only to fly away to another student.

When the bell rang, Nadine collected the butterfly and set the cap on top of the jar. Rhonda called for her to come inside for class. As Nadine ran inside, she came beside Eugene and they entered the building. Suddenly, maybe by accident or by his jinxed luck, Eugene tripped and fell, grabbing onto Nadine for support. She was dragged down with him, the jar slipping from her hands and rolling down the hallway.

Nadine shouted for the jar to stop and for someone to grab it, but neither was possible. The hallway was empty of students except for her, Eugene, and Rhonda; and the jar rolled further away. Nadine jumped up and chased after the jar, hoping to catch up to it before class started.

She reached the jar at the end of the hallway and picked it up. But the cap was gone, and so was the butterfly. Nadine frantically shook her head left and right, looking for her butterfly in the hallway. She crawled along the floor under the water fountains and near every door and crevice, but it was nowhere to be found.

Sulking, she returned to the class, the jar tucked under her arm as tears came out of her eyes. Eugene asked her where the butterfly was, but Nadine could only shake her head. She plopped into her seat and put her head down, crying over the misplacement of the best insect she had ever seen or owned.

Eugene patted her shoulder, saying he was sorry about it and that maybe they could still find it before the science fair. Nadine wasn't so sure, but she appreciated his effort. Arnold piped up to her that he and everyone else could look for it before they started. Nadine cheered up a little as the class nodded in agreement. Well, everyone but Rhonda.

Mr. Simmons quickly went through the day's English and Math lessons. When it came to Science, he called the students one by one to present their projects to the class. Nadine raised her hand and Mr. Simmons called on her.

"Mr. Simmons, could we go out in the hall to look for my Red Pierrot butterfly? It escaped during recess and I couldn't find it on my own. It's my project, so would that be alright if we searched for it?"

Mr. Simmons nodded. "Yes Nadine, I'm sure we could do that. All right class," he announced to everyone; "let's all form a line and search the hallway for Nadine's butterfly. If you find it, please notify myself or Nadine and we will capture it."

Everyone got up, eager for any delay to the presentations they were supposed to give. Nadine led the way into the hallway, and the search began.

Everyone searched and searched, but no butterfly was found by any of the students. Mr. Simmons had to call off the search, or else risk missing the entire session and all the presentations. Everyone groaned in dismay, but no one was as disheartened as Nadine.

She volunteered to go first, and stood before the class with her notebook of observations and notes about the Red Pierrot.

"Well, my project was about the Talicada nyseus, or the Red Pierrot butterfly. It only lives in Asia, and it's food is the Kalanchoe plant. The mother butterfly lays it's eggs inside of the leaves," she showed a diagram she had drawn of the plant and a mother landing on top of a leaf; "and the eggs remain in the leaves until they hatch. Once they do, they eat the leaves and grow, never coming up except to crawl to another leaf." She turned the page and described the caterpillar to the class and it's life cycle.

Quite a bit of the class paid attention to her presentation. It might have been because they felt sorry for her, or maybe they wanted to learn a little more about the butterfly. The only one who wasn't paying attention was Eugene, who curiously was looking around the floor for his pencil he had dropped. As he bent back up, he saw the butterfly sitting on Helga's shoe.

He stood and said, "NADINE! NADINE! The butterfly is on Helga's foot." Everyone looked at Helga, and Nadine stopped speaking. Helga looked down and saw that Eugene was right.

Nadine was suddenly really quiet and serious. "Helga. Don't. Move." She grabbed her jar off of her desk and held out her hand. The butterfly shifted on Helga's foot and then flew onto Nadine's hand. She placed the butterfly inside the jar and closed the lid.

Everyone cheered, and Nadine held up the jar, displaying the Red Pierrot for everyone to see.

"It's a miracle it's not hurt," thought Nadine. Her face was shining with a smile as she passed the jar around the class and finished her presentation.

It was the best experience for Nadine, and she ended up having the best presentation of the class. She walked home with her head up high, excited to know her butterfly was all right and proud that they had found it again.