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The Butterfly Accident

Sometimes things just happen. We all learned about the butterfly effect in school, but most of us would have never expected it to be real. It just sounds incredible, how one little butterfly can start something terrible. Like his small little act of flapping his wings can result in large differences later on.

It all started with a party I didn't even want to attend. There was beer, booze and hookahs everywhere. Next to them couples were kissing and in the shadows the drunk people were doing crazy things. My best friend Lisa had ditched me hours earlier in order to make out with some random guy she just met hours earlier. The keg was almost emptied by all those thirsty teenagers and their rambling hormones. The cat, which lived in this house had already escaped the whole scenario and slept someone's wardrobe.

While all this was happening I was talking to John, who used to be in my class, but skipped one year. He was really nice and I hadn't seen him in what seemed to be forever. He had just graduated high school and he was about to go to Brown University. We were talking about the Butterfly Effect and I told him about all those stories my classmates and I had to write. We talked about life and about god, when some couple suddenly started shouting at each other. 

"You promised to drive me home tonight and now you are drinking absinthe", she practically screamed at him in disgust, "you know Brad? I am going home now. Have fun sleeping on this particular couch!" Without even letting him finish she left the house. The guy, whose name apparently was Brad, just sighed, took a small sip of his very alcoholic drink and took out a cigarette. There was a ashtray next to his drink, which justified his smoking inside the house. 

John and I looked at each other. The cat, which seemed to be curious left her hideout space and went on to check out her kingdom. While the red colored cat looked after her kingdom, a moth flew around in the room. Moths, which look like the butterflies of the night, are beautiful. At least if you look at them in the right way and forget about their bad traits. The cat seemed to dislike the sudden appearance of said moth and tried to catch her. John and I started to laugh because it looked extremely funny. That was until the cat stumbled against Brad, who was still smoking his cigarette. Brad who was really drunk at this time let his cigarette fall and it fell exactly into his absinthe. 

Everybody knows not to mix absinthe, which practically pure alcohol, and fire. His cup started to burn and since it was made out of plastic, it was impossible to touch it now. Nevertheless, Brad tried his best and dropped the cup on the floor. 

The floor wasn't made out of wood, but out of carpet. It took less than five seconds for it to start burning. Suddenly, the whole room started to burn. John screamed at me, that we had to rescue those who were still in the dark corners of the house, and we ran around, frantically screaming at everyone to get the hell out of there. 

When we didn't find any more people we went outside as well. Somebody had already called the local fire station. Everything was a mess, and the whole house was lit up by flames. The cat looked terrified. Even though she was one of the first ones to escape this mess. 

Finally, we heard firemen arriving. It felt like an eternity and we were all standing on the street watching and waiting terrified. 

I'd never expected something like that to happen, and it made me realize, how this so called butterfly effect might not only just be a theory. 

If Brad's girlfriend hadn't screamed at him and left him, he would not have smoked and the cat would not have come down from her hideout.

If the moth hadn't been around, the cat would have gone back to her hideout space.

If Brad hadn't had a smoking problem, the absinthe would have never caught fire. 

And if there had been water instead of absinthe in that cup, everything would have been fine.