I was lying here, during my last long stay in Mahebourg, mezmerised by the view. I was reading a Paulo Coelho novel and inspired by his metaphors, the name ‘The Lion and the Butterfly’ settled in my heart. I am a motivational visual blogger on a Facebook page, ‘The Butterfly Project’. I’ve created and posted collages with inspirational shout-outs for more than six years. I realised that I have many stories in my heart, having lived through my own metamorphoses. There is much more in Mahebourg that inspires me than this view! The people and the reef mostly, but I have struck gold there, with treasures to be found everywhere I step! My long stays in my beloved Mahebourg is interrupted by having to return home. This landlocked state of slow living, is the ideal cacoon to birth stories. As this is a travel blog, I’ve decided to take you back to Mahebourg. This time, on a journey with Yara, in ‘The Lion and the Butterfly’.

The Lion & the Butterfly

Dances with Time

Yara stood in the bare reception room of the Victorian house. As a little girl she saw faded photographs of the once magnificent mansion, fantasizing about ‘Stella Maris’, as a retreat for mermaids and pirates on an island far, far away. She made a childish twirl as she remembered dreaming of dancing in the spacious salon, shimmering in a dress the colour of the crest of a wave. The late afternoon sun shadow-painted sash windows on the parquet floor, dust dancing in the rays.

Images of Aunt Mary’s recollections of ‘Stella Maris’ was imprinted on her heart and her sudden passing, leaving Yara the title deed, smashed their reverie of a shared holiday on the island. Aunt Mary loved her like her very own daughter. Papa was usually off on an exotic biological expedition. He was working in Brazil when she was born and her mother died. Aunt Mary said, he sent a telegram that he was delayed, but to call the little girl, Yara. As fragile as a small butterfly, was exactly how she felt walking through the many empty rooms, up the dusty staircase, opening door after creaking door of the neglected house, until she discovered a small library with a sea view and a fireplace.

“What crazy colonist built fireplaces into a house on a tropical island?” she wondered out loud.

She wiped dust from the mantelpiece with her hand and cleaned her palm on the butt of her jean. She remembered a house she lived in, years ago, an old clock on the fireplace mantelpiece chiming every fifteen minutes. It felt like the heartbeat of the house and resonated with hers at the time. Her heart not having a beat of its own that she could claim to be the one she wanted to dance to. She was self-conscious and tried to dance to the beat Aunt Mary set, or that of her friends and partners. Always aware that should she let her hair down and dance her very own spirited dance, she would be judged, criticised or worse. So she tried to copy the dancers around her and ended up not dancing at all.

Back home they had a fire place too. The clock on the mantelpiece was a work of art. She discovered it on one of her antique shop treasure hunts. The clockwork didn’t work anymore, so it didn’t tell the time or chime. It was, however, a beautiful reminder of a bygone era when quality, art and the handwork of artisans who painstakingly created everlasting beauty, was valued. She would sit in her sitting room surrounded by her collection of art, books and antiques, enjoying the warmth of her fireplace on cold winters afternoons or evenings, admiring the old Victorian clock, a symbol of stability and endurance.

The clock was one of the selected items she packed for the move to ‘Stella Maris’. Yara was anxious. It didn’t start with her divorce or Aunt Mary’s sudden passing, it was probably there for longer than she cared to remember. However, lately she felt her heart racing with an irregular beat while constantly feeling a need for more oxygen. It was this persistent sense of suffocation that made her not think twice, when the attorney handed her the keys to the house and asked if she needed his help in finding a new tenant or whether she was going to sell the property.

In a spontaneous reactive moment, much like a move in a warrior dance, she smiled confidently, clasping the large bunch of keys with both hands.  

“No, thank you. I’ll be moving there.”

“Oh? In that case, let me know if there is anything else.” He paused, looking confused, “Uhm, am I right, you are moving into the property? By yourself?  You know it needs a lot of work?”

“Yes, you’re right” Yara smiled again, but decided not to try to explain, as she was more surprised than he was by her announcement. She greeted and turned around, feeling the attorney still staring at her. She walked faster and almost ran down the stairs outside.  

Here she was and indeed her ‘Star of the Sea’ needed a lot of work.

“Cleaning is probably senseless with painters, plumbers and such coming. The roof needs to be checked before the cyclone season starts,” she thought out loud, “but this view and that mountain across the lagoon.”

“Madame?”

“Oh, you’re still here? I thought you left. Did I give you the wrong amount? I’m sorry.”

“But no, Madame. You paid right. I was just thinking. C’est impossible. You cannot stay here tonight. The house is not … “, with that the taxi driver stretched out his arms demonstratively and turned in all directions, looking genuinely concerned.

“It isn’t. But tomorrow I’ll move into this room! I just need to get a few things.”

That’s how Yara arrived in Mahébourg and found herself living in a library without books, with a fireplace she didn’t need, but with a view that mesmerised her.

~*~

Workers were coming and going for weeks. Weeks became months. Back home the relaxed attitude of the workers would have made her impatient, time was money and all that. In Mahébourg however, she found that she slipped into the island style attitude towards time quickly and with great ease. They had a saying: “We’re not made for tomorrow. We only live now.” Unlike her cultural reference where time was fixed and absolute, here the outlook was flexible and people lived with an attitude of dealing with matters in a metaphysically appointed time. Nothing was forced into an objective routine.

Life was a dance with a changing beat. They lived with a joie de vivre and this relaxed manner of stepping through their days restored her trust in humanity. Their generous gifts of time, patience, assistance, kindness and smiles touched her heart, slowing it down and allowing her to breathe the high concentration of oxygen that arrived from the south and made first landfall on the waterfront of Mahébourg.

It was with this new found sense of comfort and the change in her heart rate that Yara decided that the clock on the library mantelpiece needed to be fixed. “Stella Maris” needed a heartbeat of her very own. She found the name of a horologist with relative ease, but finding his shop was a different matter. She walked carrying the clock, carefully wrapped in an Indian shawl and stowed in her backpack. After almost two hours of walking through the narrow streets of old Mahébourg, tightly packed with an array of small colourful shops and having asked for direction three times, she found it, l’Horloger Léo. The entrance was a faded red door at street level, almost not visible between a street food vender and a second hand furniture store. She opened the door and climbed the steep staircase to the first floor shop of the clockmaker.

“Bonjour, Madam.” Léo was an elderly oriental looking gentleman, with a distinguished thinning, grey beard sweeping his chest as he turned his head. His narrow eyes were set in a gentle smile behind his spectacles. The tiny workshop was cluttered with zillions of clocks of all kinds. 

Yara drew a chair closer and sat down uninvited, breathing heavily. “Bonjour. Monsieur.” She wiped sweat from her forehead with her palm, drying it on her shorts. “You’re busy!” she exclaimed indicating towards the many clocks while catching her breath.

“Oui, busy. But always time for a, what you call it, ‘chat’?” he brimmed with eyes completely closed now.

“You are very kind, Monsieur. Très gentille. I have a clock.” She started unpacking and unwrapping. “It has never worked. But of course I haven’t had it since the clockmaker made it. Perhaps it did work in the beginning? Right? Can you fix it?”   She smiled handing him the clock. He looked at it, turning it around, caressing it and then tilted it carefully, while holding it to his ear.

“It doesn’t have a heartbeat” Yara broke the silence.

“You’re looking for that? A heartbeat?” His eyes opened wider than before and seemed like dark pools of empathy, the clock still at his ear, he lowered it slowly and gently placed it on the table between them. He took off his spectacles, not averting his gaze, waiting for her to respond.

Yara felt tears burning behind her eyes and tried to contain them as her heart skipped a beat or more. “Why are there so many clocks?” she moved her gaze to the back of the shop.

“Some clocks can’t be fixed. Some parts that need to be replaced are very difficult to find and sometimes people just don’t come back for them. Time is a very curious thing, yes?”

“Yes, it is indeed. Sometimes dragging on and sometimes slipping through your fingers.” She was fighting back tears again. Why was she suddenly so damn emotional? Where was this coming from? “But I have this now” she showed him the bright pink Fitbit-type watch on her wrist. “It counts my heartbeats and my steps too” she laughed awkwardly.

He smiled gently, his eyes closing again not unlike that of a happy cat. “You leave it here and I will have a look.” He caressed the clock between them. “You come back, same time next week?”

~*~

In the week that followed ‘Stella Maris’ celebrated the last of the painters finishing the final essential renovations, which Yara could afford. She was ready to start another clean up with Adya’s help. She met Adya in the grocery store on the very first day that she shopped for cleaning products – a bucket, a broom, a mop and more. Their connection was spontaneous and clearly for a purpose as Adya helped her carry the shopping home, continuing their light conversation marked by Yara’s laughter and Adya’s sweet voice. In the days that followed they transformed ‘Stella Maris’ into a refuge, long before the first renovations were finished.

Yara never had a sister, but Adya was an instant soul mate. It was quite impossible to imagine a time when Adya was not part of her life. As the last workers left, they decided that it was time to dress the large sitting room on the ground floor to receive the many expected guests. Rajveer, the taxi driver, was a hero on more than the occasion of her arrival and was visiting already. The workers were family now and promised visits with their wives and girlfriends and children. It was time to carefully spend the rupees Yara kept aside for this very occasion and setting out with the creative energy of Adya at her side, was a grand occasion indeed.

The week was filled with inspired activity. At times Yara could imagine Adya having four arms and hands like the goddess Adya Kali, as her energy was endless. ‘Stella Maris’ shined in her new transformation and at night the light in the once dark windows were noticed by many.

It was time to consult the clockmaker about the clock, which would now be displayed on the fireplace mantelpiece in the sitting room. Yara found herself climbing the steep staircase to his workshop again and as she sat down the clockmaker greeted her and said:

“Madame, I have not opened your clock yet. I want to tell you. It appears that here”, he turned the clock around and pointed to the door on the back of the clock “it is stuck. I tried to open it, but I need to warn you, that if I try harder I may damage it. Perhaps even break it. So I need your permission?” he looked at her with his head tilted to one side, while caressing the clock.

“Oh”, Yara was disappointed. She considered taking the clock home with her, but then strangely enough, she found herself wondering why one would keep something that doesn’t do what it was created to do. So she sat without saying anything.

“Madame, I can see you want the heartbeat, yes?”

“Yes, but”, she sighed heavily, “I do have this.” She lifted her wrist with the pink watch.

“Counting your heartbeats is not the same thing as feeling your heart beating, yes?” Yara frowned, realising they weren’t talking about clocks anymore. “And steps? Not dancing, yes?” he continued.

“No, it’s not.” She sighed again.

“You want me to open it?” She nodded and the clockmaker started working on opening the little door in earnest.

Yara sat fiddling with her pink watch, remembering the evening she received it. She was sitting on the beach, a fire burning nearby. She joined Adya and her family for a picnic earlier and they stayed to watch the sunset. The turquoise bay turned darker, until it was black, the flames suddenly danced brighter and the fire appeared larger. One of Adya’s cousins started playing his guitar again, joining the rhythmic swooshing of the waves while Adya was softly humming the melody. She remembers this as one of the most perfect moments in her life. She was completely relaxed and feeling safe, connected, happy and more alive than ever before.

Rajveer, who joined them late, sat down next to her. He handed her the watch. “A tourist dropped this in my taxi a while back. I sent her a WhatsApp message, but she says I should keep it. She already claimed it from her insurance. I want you to have it.”

She took the watch from him. He leaned in and softly touched his lips to hers, before switching his attention to fastening the watch strap. Her heart was beating almost audibly, her mind was spinning as a rush of chemicals pumped through her body. She didn’t react or say anything. Not only because she didn’t know what to say, but because she didn’t trust her tongue to form any word at that moment. He got up and left. It was almost an hour before she felt confident enough to join in the light conversation around her. Her whole body tingled with chemicals, long after. When she saw him next, there was no reference to the watch or the kiss. As though she dreamt it. Yet, here she was, fiddling with the watch strap.

“Madame?”

She looked up and saw the clock maker looking at her in a concerned manner. He pointed to the clock and only then did she hear the ticking.

“Only oil and…” he made a winding gesture behind the clock “it has a heartbeat again” he smiled with his eyes closed looking extremely pleased.

~*~

The clock was standing on the mantelpiece in the sitting room, ticking the minutes, chiming ever fifteen minutes and striking the hour after playing its melody. Like clockwork! Life at ‘Stella Maris’ remained busy after the workers left. There were friends dropping in unannounced. There was Adya singing love songs from Hindi films. Yara was swimming or snorkelling on the reef almost daily. Spontaneous evenings happened, with a fire burning outside where Yara still planned to someday have a tropical garden. Someone would grab the guitar, she picked up at a second hand store, and play it. Sometimes someone played their Sega or Reggae playlist through her Bluetooth speaker. There was music, people were dancing and life had a changing beat, like a very unpredictable dance.

On an oddly quiet rainy afternoon, Yara was sitting in the sitting room by herself. She was reading a book on diving, considering doing a course. The snorkelling she did on the coral reef in the bay opened up a fantastical new world to her. She was visualising the reef and how everything underwater seemed to slow down. For some species it seemed to slow down to a standstill, however that was merely an illusion. The reef was alive with creatures all moving at their own pace. Dancing to their very unique rhythm.

The clock started playing its melody and started striking four o’clock. Yara looked up at the clock. She remembered Aunt Mary’s voice saying to her, many years ago, in what felt like a previous life in a different dimension.

“My dear child, there is a time and a season for everything. The Greeks spoke of chronos, the time you are watching and are crying about now, but then there is chairos. That is a special time, my darling. It is God’s time. Come here. Come and sit next to me.” Aunt Mary put her plump arm around Yara’s shoulders and hugged her close. “Shall we wait for that?”

Yara decided that she was not going to wind the clock the next morning. She preferred it to be a silent reminder of a bygone era.

THE END

By Lynette Gerber-Lochenkov

Thank you for reading my story ! It is truly IN TIME ~ not our own time, but the right time, that we find the answers to our questions. Some questions we live with for years before we receive an answer, others come to us overnight. Time truly is a curious thing!

Lynette Gerber-Lochenkov