PART 19

Butterfly Effect:
The butterfly effect is a phrase that encapsulates the more technical notion of sensitive dependence on initial conditions in chaos theory. Small variations of the initial condition of a nonlinear dynamical system may produce large variations in the long term behavior of the system. So this is sometimes presented as esoteric behavior, but can be exhibited by very simple systems: for example, a ball placed at the crest of a hill might roll into any of several valleys depending on slight differences in initial position.
The phrase refers to the idea that a butterfly’s wings might create tiny changes in the atmosphere that ultimately cause a tornado to appear (or prevent a tornado from appearing). The flapping wing represents a small change in the initial condition of the system, which causes a chain of events leading to large-scale phenomena. Had the butterfly not flapped its wings, the trajectory of the system might have been vastly different.
Recurrence, the approximate return of a system towards its initial conditions, together with sensitive dependence on initial conditions are the two main ingredients for chaotic motion. They have the practical consequence of making complex systems, such as the weather, difficult to predict past a certain time range (approximately a week in the case of weather).
See also: Causality – Chain reaction – Domino effect – Chaos theory – Determinism – Dynamical systems – Fractal – Rube Goldberg machine.

Day 61 after the accident – Bette Porter/Tina Kennard’s house – h. 3.52 p.m.

Alice dips her feet in the pool and sips her cocktail.
“I’m so in love with your pool, Bette…”, she says with a smirk.
Bette Porter raises an eyebrow, amused.
“Of course you are. It’s free and you can swim naked. Not now, obviously…”.
Carmen lays on a deckchair and chuckles. Her brown, soulful eyes express a regained peace, a brand new stillness of heart, and she looks stunning in her white bikini.
I have the feeling she’s not fine as she seems, though. She’s a bit pale, and sometimes she frowns, like she is physically in pain.
But no words from her.
If you ask her how she is, the only answer you’ll receive is a reassuring smile.
Carmen is brave. Which is good.
Carmen is also reckless. Which is not so good at this point.
I’m sitting on the porch, my laptop open over my legs. I try hard to focus on this new novel I’ve been working on during the last couple of weeks, but I just can’t.
The truth is that I am only here to check Carmen. And Shane. I was sure she would be here, but she’s not.
“Carm…” I call her.
“…Yes, Jen?”.
“Where did you say Shane go?”.
She raises her sunglasses.
“Uhm, she told me she had to meet Chase”.
“At WAX?”.
She shrugs.
“Probably”.
“I see…” I murmur, turning my eyes back on my laptop.
My fingers are motionless over the keyboard and my mind is blank.
Tabula rasa.
I rub the bridge of my nose and sigh.