The powerful wind that pulled him from the security of his room now acted to prevent poor Jeff from making an immediate return. Despite his attempts, his lack of practical flight experience and the unusually violent nature of the wind buffeted his butterfly body like a feather caught on the breeze. He struggled, but each gust of air seemed to have its own plan for where to carry the winged insect.
By the time the wind lessened in intensity, Jeff's new compound eyes detected a change in the light as the brightness of the afternoon sun shifted into a darker gloom. "It can't be night already," the struggling butterfly thought correctly.
Jeff hovered near his mother's prize azalea shrubs. He wanted time – time to adopt a plan and implement it.
Time ran out when a raindrop plummeting to the ground crashed onto him with the force of a dropping bowling ball. Jeff careened toward the ground as more wet bowling balls smashed into his fragile wings and delicate body. "Oh! Ouch!" The boy-turned-butterfly screamed. Hundreds, thousands of the deadly raindrops pelted the yard, garden, and one unlucky flying insect. "That hurts!"
Realizing, finally, that he was caught in a rainstorm, he realized he needed shelter. "If I stay out here much longer, I'll be pulverized!"
He took a few more direct hits, and his butterfly body wobbled and wavered, but he finally saw shelter in the form of the underside of a large leaf attached to a branch of one of the azalea shrubs. His tiny legs grasped perfectly at the underside of the leaf. Raindrops continued to hit the ground, exploding like bombs dropped on an enemy. A couple of drops hit the leaf beneath which Jeff clung in terror, but he retained his grip and hoped the storm would prove fleeting.