The Halloween Project 2025 – Story 6: Wings of a Butterfly

Quinton Alsop bought 10 scratch-off tickets, a copy of the New York Post, and three Snickers bars at the 24-hour convenience. His bill came to $10 bucks for the lottery tix, $4.75 for the paper, candy, and tax. The clerk, speaking on his phone the entire time, gave Quinton a quarter, which he stuffed in his front pocket with the candy bars. 

At one point on his walk to the park, reaching into that pocket, Quinton dropped the quarter onto the walkway. He never paused or heard the quarter make a tiny little clink sound on the pavement. An ordinary quarter, not old, not young; 2014, as it rolled leisurely into the grass. 

The quarter waited, abandoned and forgotten, for three days until Jasper Rich almost passed by on his skateboard. He was just making a slight turn toward school when a sharp reflection caught his eye. He slowed in an instant, flipped and grabbed his board, and looked over. There just a few inches off the path was a quarter. Just one single quarter, heads up, peering back at Jasper open-eyed. Jasper leaned down, grasped the quarter, and tossed it into his pocket. 

Nancy Palmieri liked Jasper quite a bit. They were in 8th grade at Meadowdale Middle School, and they had two classes together, English and gym. Nancy was very good at English, being a reader and all, and Jasper was good too, but he didn’t like to show it. Gym was another story. Jasper was awesome at everything, and Nancy kind of hung in the background. She was always a little embarrassed to change into shorts and gym top and then run around. She kind of thought that maybe Jasper liked her just a bit. He always said hello, and if there was ever a time when sides had to be chosen, he always chose her. 

That day when they were waiting in the hallway for the locker room door to open, Jasper reached into his pocket, pulled out a pen, and a quarter squirted out. It fell, did a crazy little dance, and rolled off, plopping right in front of Nancy. She picked it up, looked at Jasper, and said, “Hey, Jasper, you dropped this.” 

”You can have it. I found it on the sidewalk. Maybe it's good luck,” he replied. 

Then he did it. He smiled. 

Nancy thought, “Breathe, you ninny,” said, “Thanks,” and smiled back. The rest of the day, Nancy felt like she was walking on air. 

Until the quarter found another home. 

Their school was only a block from the beach, and on nice sunny June days, only a couple of weeks before school got out, some of the girls, and even a few guys, would head down to the beach. Take off their shoes and socks and wade in Long Island Sound. That day, Nancy joined her girls, and Jasper showed up with a couple of guys. They all hung out until Nancy said, “Thanks for the quarter.” 

”Show it to me,” Jasper asked, and she did. “I have an idea,” he suggested. “Since I found it, and it's good luck, why don’t we make a wish, and we’ll throw it into the Sound?” 

It was the most romantic thing anyone had ever said to Nancy, and she nodded her head, handing the quarter to Jasper. 

”Now make your wish, but don’t tell me, OK?” he said. She nodded again. Nancy thought about her wish. Something about Jasper? That just seemed too goofy. The quarter was good luck, so she simply imagined, “I hope this coin brings someone good luck,” and left it at that. 

”Ready?” Jasper said. They rose, walked into the small waves, and with a good throwing arm, he tossed it far into the surf. It glistened in the afternoon sun and plunked out of sight. 

An extremely large bluefish caught the quarter’s sparkle as it descended. A bluefish blitz was in action as the water churned feverishly. With a voracious appetite and leaping in a feeding frenzy as a school of silverfish passed, it ate and ate with its razor-sharp teeth and swallowed the quarter. For a month, it swam and ate, and the quarter settled in, stuck. 

Until a fishing net pulled up with several bluefish and one hidden quarter. 

Late that afternoon, the quarter and the bluefish ended up on the cutting board at SeaSalt Surf and Turf in Madison. Dockside offered steaks but highlighted plated seafood as fresh as the sea itself. Mason Carton, a surly, short-tempered prep cook, was preparing two bluefish for an early dining couple. His swift knife handling filleted the first fish in short order, and when he opened the second, a quarter fell out onto the block. Carton looked at the quarter, unbelieving. “Holy shit,” he muttered, “one more goddamn thing.” He slid the quarter into his fist and placed it on the stainless steel counter. Carton was miserable today and almost every day. 

His wife had left him a month ago, finally acting on her longstanding threat. His son, now 19, refused to speak to him. He believed he should have owned the restaurant by this time in his life, but he remained just a worker low down on the kitchen hierarchy. His bad temper and worse mouth bounced him from restaurant to restaurant up and down Long Island Sound. 

After preparing the bluefish and offering “Plates up!” he moved to his next station. Glancing at the order dangling on a wafting paper above his head, Booth 18 had ordered the ½ pound Gigantor burger. Mason grabbed a huge handful of Wagyu red meat, seasoned it, and added minced garlic, salt, and pepper. 

Then he reached back across the counter and grasped the quarter. 

And added it to the burger. 

Mason shaped the meat into a large, dense, roundish pancake and tossed it into the skillet. “Thirty-two dollars for a hamburger. People are shit-ass crazy,” he whispered to himself. “Fuck them. Fuck them all.” 

In eight minutes, it was ready. He dinged the countertop bell and shouted out another, “Plate up!” A waitress promptly grasped the huge plate replete with burger and a mountain of fries and moved to the dining room. 

Mason actually smiled. 

Quinton Alsop, sitting alone in a booth, eating enthusiastically, was halfway through a most enjoyable burger when his throat clenched. He couldn’t breathe, couldn’t speak, couldn’t cough. He grabbed at his throat, rising suddenly, then plopping back down when his thighs crashed into the booth’s table. His face turned red, then scarlet. Tears streamed from his eyes. He was trying to make sounds and started to thrash violently. His head tossed right, left, up, and down. Both hands crashed to the table, then clenched at his throat again. His vision began to blacken. 

Someone at a nearby table screamed while another patron yelled, 

”Oh my God!!!! Someone help him!!! He’s choking!!!”