Towards The Moon

Full moon, caught up in the trees behind the houses, lodged in the topmost branches, a perfect circle with a silver halo. René Magritte could not have painted a moon more perfect.

She is lying naked on the bed, staring out of the window at the moon. Her hair is loose and blown by the breeze from the fan which is skimming along her body. She is stretched out and milky in the half light from the moon and the lights in the street outside the window.

Moonbathing at midnight. I would have her naked in the grass in front of the house for everyone to see. She lies there on the bed, close enough to touch but beyond my reach. In love with the moon; in thrall to it. She lies, with a look to the side, her hand pressed to her lips, or maybe her lips pressed to her hand. I can’t see her face but I know that her eyes will be large and round. They will match the moon in their perfection. Lee Miller could not have photographed a nude more lovely.

The air from the fan ripples across her body. Its curves are like desert dunes, sculpted by the wind, smooth and feminine. Her skin is pale; I know its softness; I know its taste; I know its scent at different points.

I move my hand and let it brush the curve of her lower back, and she sighs. Her eyes never leave the moon, but she sighs.

We have spent the whole day in the garden, the six of us. Franny wanted a barbecue. The street was filled with the smell of burning, of indiscriminate meat products combusting gently. Michael said it was carcinogenic. Funny how we’re concerned with our own personal causes of death. The potential ones, anyway.

She said it was risky, being outside to plan things. Suburbia is small; we encroach on each other daily. She has a point, but we have spent the day in the garden all the same, and now we know what it is that we have to do. Every step, every action has been planned and reviewed and revised and gone over until we know the sequence inside out. We know that the plan is watertight. She would say if she wasn’t happy, and all this revolves around her. I trust her judgement.

Terry has questioned her repeatedly, but, languid in the heat, she has said nothing all day to suggest that this is anything less than perfect, and now she lies in the moonlight, looking at that perfect circle with its halo of silver light.

She is finalising details in her head. She is running through scenarios; all the things that could go wrong, and all the solutions to resolve them. She carries everything in her head.

I withdraw my hand and carry on writing. I’m drawing the scene repeatedly, positioning people and equipment and calculating angles and trajectories. The floor beside the bed is littered with paper, balled up and flung aside each time I think I’m struck by a new configuration.

Unball those sheets, though, and place them side by side and you will see that none of them differs in any material detail from any other. I’m drawing the same scene over and again. I’m marking our positions with pinpoint accuracy. She is doing the same in her head. Mine is a freeze frame photographic still; a stop-motion animation that would only make sense if all the pictures were run together. Hers is the entire thing played out in glorious Technicolor inside her mind.

I can see that her breathing has changed. She is flat on her stomach now, her head still turned to the side, away from me, towards the moon. Her breathing is deep and resting. I put the pen and paper down and pull the bedsheet over us.

In a week, this will be over. In a week, this will be done. Neither of us knows it yet, but it will be ten years before we’ll see each other again. Once the dust has settled, I will be gone. Terry will see she’s alright.

I wrap an arm around her, underneath the bedsheet. The air from the fan blows gently across us both. She sleeps, stirring only slightly. I feel the softness of her skin, and start to miss it already.

© J R Hargreaves 12 June 2006