Alan Lindsay
One night, on the way home from Grandpa’s, we drove through this huge cloud of moths. Dad reckoned it went on for about ten kilometres. The air was thick with them. They were pale brown and glowed in the headlights, like the snowflakes that time we went skiing. It looked as though they were flying towards the headlights and then suddenly the air would push them aside as we zoomed past.
Or splat!
Dad had the wipers going double speed. When a moth hit the windscreen, the wipers spread this yellow goo in a big arc. Dad used the washers a lot, but after a while we had to stop and he got out and wiped the windscreen clean with an old T-shirt.
When we got home, Dad drove into the garage. I got out of the car and I could smell burning. Some of the moths had got caught up on the hot bits of the engine and been burned to death.
The front of the car was covered in them too: even the headlights. I looked at the grill and there was one of them had its wing caught, but it was still alive. It kept flapping, trying to fly, but it couldn’t. I pulled its other wing off, so its body just twitched back and forward. I watched it for about half an hour. Mum came through and asked what I was doing. I didn’t tell her, but she said it was time for bed anyway. And the moth still hadn’t died when I left.
Awesome.
Butterflies always die much quicker. Once you’ve pulled their wings off, they’re no fun at all. That’s why I like moths better than butterflies.
*
I told Miss Murray all that but she says I can’t have my scissors back.
Still, I don’t care if she keeps me in over lunch; I’m not colouring in my butterfly. Not unless I can do it brown.
Stupid art class anyway.