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The Butterfly in a Bottle

By Sanyukta Chaudhuri ; Illustration by Sudheer Nath

Poltu was wide awake in his bed. He had had a marvellous dream in which he had won the football match in the inter-school competition. He was getting ready to receive the trophy when the alarm rang. So loudly that it jarred him awake.

But Poltu wasn't too unhappy at the intrusion. He ran straight to his study table. There, in an empty jam bottle, was the treasure. A colourful little butterfly. How difficult it had been to catch it. It had kept flying away from his grasp. But catch it he did. Without a net, too. And now it was going to be part of his biology project in school.

The biology project required Poltu to submit the study of a living creature every month. Most of his classmates drew diagrams from their books as part of this exercise. But Poltu was going to do something different. He was going to present a live creature - this butterfly.

Poltu loved the different colours on the wings of the butterfly. Red, green and blue. How beautiful it looked when it fluttered the wings. Poltu had made a few holes on the cap of the bottle to let air pass through, and added tender leaves for the butterfly to nibble on. He might have trapped the creature, but he cared for it.

Excited about displaying his exhibit to the biology teacher, Poltu dressed hurriedly, and left for school. His school was walking distance from his house. He took a short cut through the backyard of Sinha aunty's house, a stretch he loved walking through. The breeze was very pleasant as it had rained slightly the previous night. The garden smelt of sweet-smelling flowers, jasmine and 'mogra'. Poltu glanced at his bottle every now and then and smiled at the butterfly fluttering its wings.

When he reached school, gate wasn't wholly open yet. For once Poltu was early to school. A few boys were playing football in the field. Any other day would have seen Poltu joining them without a second thought. But today, he walked straight into his class. He opened the bench window and placed the bottle on the windowsill.