The irony

What you stupid humans call "an essential and beautiful process of nature" sucks. It hurt like crap coming out that cocoon. I kicked and kicked, but that shell wouldn't budge. And God had blessed me with an ugly pair of wings too! Getting those out the shell without rupturing them was going to be a task in itself and I hadn't even managed to get my body out yet.

Besides, a bunch of kids looking down upon you like you're porn is not conducive when pupating. It's annoying and makes us moths feel very conscious, especially since we are very fat right after we come out of our cocoon. Have you heard the story of the boy who killed a butterfly by helping it come out its cocoon by cutting the shell? Well, you know what? It's not true, help doesn't kill us and we could REALLY use some. But no, those morons just continued to drool at my struggle. I tried to give them the finger, but that's hard considering the fact that with 6 limbs and multiple fingers, you don't really know which is the middle finger. So I just held up both my middle limbs, like how you humans would give the finger using both your hands, but somehow they didn't seem to mind it. Either they were really stupid and couldn't decipher my obviously moth code, or they just thought that it was a part of the pupation process so they let it slide. Then I thought about it using my human intelligence. Of course, one doesn't hold up both his arms in the air with all his fingers sticking out. That's not giving the finger, that's giving a limb. Yeah, I was being stupid.

Either way, I managed to crawl out my cocoon and went and hung upside down on the nearest twig. Why? I don't know. Just had a hunch that that's what I'm supposed to be doing. Its odd. We insects are born fully aware of our purpose of life. Which is simply to maintain the balance of our ecosystem by existing. The fact that we just know what we are to do from day we hatch out our eggs without our mommies teaching us rhymes like "Caterpillars molt and feed on leaves, and when they are too full they go to sleep" is amazing. Honestly, I have never even met my mommy, and yet, I knew everything. I knew that my first meal was the egg I hatched out of, I knew that the next thing I had to do was feed on the leaves of this plant, and then I knew when and how to molt, how to make my cocoon out of my saliva( disgusting experience, by the way.) and how I'm supposed to hang on this twig until my wings grow to its full size. (No, we don't pop out fully grown and ready to fly.) We mature completely only after coming out the cocoon. In this respect, we insect are certainly smarter than you humans, because you guys usually have no idea what to do with your lives.

So I waited for half an hour, watching my fat body gradually deflate and my wings grow bigger. Finally, I could fly to anyplace I want! I had awaited this day for over 9 months! Now, I could go visit Brad.

Oh, I'm sorry, where are my manners? Gotta introduce myself first. I'm Ashton. My moth mom didn't name me that but well that's what my human mom named me so Id like to stick with it. I'm a Cecropia moth, and even though I have nothing to do in life except eat, fly like a neurotic behind bright white light, copulating with walls for hours together in vain, copulate with a real moth to keep my species alive and then die, my life sucks. It boring when you know exactly what to do next.

But my life was not just that. It had much more purpose. I had the memories of my previous life.

I was a human girl named Ashton. I had committed suicide because my adopted younger brother hogged way too much attention from my parents and made them hate me by blaming me for everything that went wrong with him. And they believed him like his words were a prophecy from the sky. That, and I wanted some attention from my classmates. C'mon, aren't you curious to know how many of your classmates give a shit to you? The thing is, I wasn't really going to kill myself, I was trying to make it seem like a failed attempt, but then I really died. Oh, the irony.

Best part? I was reborn as a moth. And I had retained all the memories of my former life. Why a moth? I think it's because I hated moths as Ashton. They just buzzed and pseudocopulated with every white thing. I think this was all a deliberate joke on me and my memories had not been extracted for a good reason. Why, dear god, why?

But as Ashton, I couldn't fulfill my last wish: To confess to Brad, the guy I had been in love with since my 1st grade. We were close friends, quite literally, because he lived right next to me. We were childhood friends and had made false promises of marriage to each other when we were just 5. I don't think he took them seriously, but I did. And I didn't want him to marry anyone but me. Just because I'm a moth now, doesn't mean he can't marry me. "True love is beyond all physical barriers like age, sex, religion, genus, and species" quoth a wise Cecropian moth. Hence, the purpose of my life was to get married to Brad. I guess God knew this, and thus made sure that I don't

Though I was fully ready to fly out and start looking for my love, getting out of here was going to be tricky. All these kids had formed a tight circle around me and didn't seem to realize that the show's over. So I quickly flew to the narrow gap amidst the heads of all these creeps and flew right up to the ceiling so that they couldn't reach me. Good god, flying felt amazing. I hadn't felt this lithe and free all my human life. All that struggle, from the day I was a caterpillar till now seemed to be totally worth it. I wanted to fly around the room a bit more, bit I decided against it cause I saw a kid holding an insect net. Since I refused to come down, the class went on. Moths have superb hearing, so I could hear the lessons very clearly. I remember, back when I was in 4th grade, I used to sit in the same bench the kid with the net was sitting in. Brad would sit diagonal to me and throughout the classes we'd exchange notes. We even got caught once, but the punishment wasn't too severe.

Oh, did I mention that I was reborn in the same town in the premises of the school I used to study in? Probably not, but here I was.... God and his enigmatic intentions, no one could fathom...

On the onset of dusk, I flew out the open window of the class and made my way to Brad's. I knew his address like it was my own. I flew to his place, again marveling at my marvelous wings. And after about half an hour, I reached his place and began to bash myself again this glass window like all stupid moths do. I used to find moths really dumb when they'd try to budge through the glass windows to source of white light, their one and not love, and here I was doing it myself.

That's when it hit me... Maybe all dead humans who couldn't fulfill their last wishes are reborn as moths and all the annoying moths are our dead friends and relatives who are trying to brag about afterlife to us imbeciles. I decided from that moment onwards to never judge moths again. You never know, that's probably you grandad trying to tell you to bridge the generation gap.

Eventually, Brad opened the window, and I flew in.
"Hey there, baby. Those are some beautiful wings you got." He mutte Ed as I perched on his finger. I knew that from the second he saw me, he knew it was me. He wasn't shocked and did not falter. That was another thing I loved about him... He was always so calm. And he liked bugs.

I reluctantly took off from his fingers and flew about his room in a pet tern that said "I love you". "Cool stunts, I guess?" He replied, clearly confused.
After trying 3 more times, I gave up hope. I never realized that Brad was this dense. I perched upon his shoulders again.

"You're pretty fearless, you know?" He said, gently stroking my wings. It felt wonderful and I began to wonder if this is all I'm going to get in the name of pleasure of any sort.

Suddenly, I heard a knock on his door. Clare, another one of my classmates entered. What the hell is she doing here? I went and perched upon the nearest wall. In no time, I realized that she belonged here much more than I did, for now, that's who Brad was dating.

This time, I really didn't want to live anymore, so I flew out his window in distraught, out to the main road and sat on the road, waiting for some vehicle to come by. At last, a bus came. I was honestly delighted to see it, because I did start getting bored waiting. Well, I guess some thing are the same, regardless of what you are.

But to my The furthest tyre of the bus damaged only half my wing. The other half was intact. Now, I was rendered flightless, and I lived to tell this stupid tale. Life doesn't stop playing practical jokes on you, regardless of whatever the hell you are, now does it?