Butterfly Effect

The intricate details on the leaf of a fern and life — their unlikely common denominator, unfortunately, is the chaos theory. It’s how everything, no matter how small it seems to be, plays its part in the orchestra of consequences.

They say when a butterfly flaps its wings in Africa, it causes a storm to churn in the Pacific. So I keep this silly proverbial at the back of my head — in smoking rooms, while strobe lights dance to the thumping of some obscure techno music nobody (really) understands, until it creeps in underneath our veins and channels reverberations to the heart. People fisting their alcohol on one hand and the other trying to palm the landscape of someone else’s anatomy; saving mental polaroids for some other solitary day when their petty skirmishes fail. Everyone worshipping the stars like a cultish ritual to barter memories of the night for their youth’s immortality — in digital cameras, tomorrow’s wall posts and stained black dresses.

And then, zoom in to you, in that corner, with that coy smile, silently breaking a million hearts amidst the thundering of this mob — hormonally high and hungry for skin.

And then, zoom in to me, in proximity to you, hoping that if I buy my drink right when you do, or tilt my head by a few degrees to your direction, you’d have the epiphany of your life. Or at least, I find you in my bed in the morning.

Here I am, stealing glances from the corner of your eyes, in vain attempts that it will be the butterfly’s flap in my own churning serendipity. Here I am, hoping that somehow, like the intricate details on the leaf of a fern, the chaos of my own life will make eventually make sense, and you’re woven into it. Here I am, on a Saturday night, among the mindless and the drunk, mentally scanning the book of New Age philosophy, looking for whatever Buddhist corollary I can use to even just know your name.

It’s the least I could hope for. That, or my pathetic attempts to merely get your attention concocts a storm in Cambodia to save their people from a famine.

But we both know neither is gonna happen.