Man in the Moon (9 page)

Mr. Lunas held his trembling hand just above Ricky’s face. A small ball of light shone right out of his palm, faint at first, then glowing bright as a lantern. The light poured over Ricky like moonbeams over a field, brilliant and luminous. Buddy threw his head back and howled.

I looked close to see if Mr. Lunas was holding some kind of tiny flashlight, but beyond the blinding light, all I could see was his hand. A moment later, the light dimmed and went out.

Ricky rolled his head over and opened his eyes. He sat up, scratched his nose, looked around, and smiled.

I sat stiff and scared, trying like the dickens to believe what I’d just seen. When my mouth found the words, I finally asked, “Mr. Lunas? Uh—Uh—are you Jesus?”

He grinned, and in a strained voice he answered, “No, sweetheart, I’m not Jesus.”

“Of course he’s not Jesus,” Ricky said, as perky as a pup. “His words aren’t red!”

He and Mr. Lunas both chuckled at that, but I was still too stunned to move.

Ricky hopped up, adjusting his filthy pajamas. “Help me get my go-cart loose from the fence.” He rushed over, tugging and pulling the stuck contraption. Buddy wagged his tail and barked as Ricky got the go-cart untangled. I didn’t help. My mind was too full.

Mr. Lunas managed to stand up, but I imagined that any minute he might topple over like a row of dominoes. He was as weak as water. I wondered if he’d been this wilted to begin with, or if saving Ricky had zapped even more out of him.

Ricky tugged the go-cart behind him as he linked his arm through Mr. Lunas’s to help him get up the hill. I found my feet and stood, then linked my arm on the other side, and together we managed to get Mr. Lunas back up to the house.

Ricky snuck back in the window. He promised to wait until I was safely inside to wake Mama up and show her his new strength. Still being Mr. Lunas’s crutch, I helped him around to the porch.

“I’m not going in,” he said as we got near the steps. “I’ve got to go.”

His words swelled in my heart. “You can’t go now! Not yet. I have a hundred million questions to ask you.”

“I know you do, but it’s impossible for me to stay any longer. I should’ve already been gone.”

“But I don’t understand,” I said, rushing my words. “If you could use your hand like a magic wand, then why didn’t you help Ricky before now? It sure would have saved us a lot of hoo-haw.”

“Life is continually filled with hoo-haw,” he said. “It’s how we deal with it that defines who we are.”

“But it don’t make sense.”
Would it ever?
“You could’ve shined that healing light on him the first night you came here. Why’d you put us through this?”

He rubbed his forehead, then faced me full-on. “It’s hard to explain. Things come in cycles, like the seasons and the moon. I needed that cycle. Now my time is up.”

He wobbled a little, and I clutched his arm tighter to hold him up.

“You’re too sick to go anywhere,” I said. “You just need to eat something. Let me go in and get you an apple.”

He waved a hand to shush me. “An apple is not what I need.”

“Then what
do
you need? I’ll get it.”

“I need to go home.”

I didn’t see how he’d get beyond the backyard, much less somewhere up north. “You can go home tomorrow . . . after we celebrate Ricky not dying.”

He shook his head. “I’ve done what I came to do, and I’ve plumb near overstayed.”

What he came to do? To save Ricky? I leaned toward him and glared into his eyes. “Mr. Lunas . . . who
are
you?”

A grin replaced the grimace on his face. “I’m the soldier who saved your father in the war.”

“And now you came to save my little brother.”

His expression eased and he looked me in the eyes. “Who said it was your brother I came to save?”

I stared at his wilting gray face for a moment, trying to make sense of what he was saying. Then he looked beyond me toward the tall stalks of corn. “Tell your mama and daddy goodbye for me.”

I nodded, still confused and trying to keep my tears at bay.

He tweaked my nose. “And tell Ricky I expect some great things from him.”

“I’ll tell him.” I reached over and wrapped my arms around Mr. Lunas, giving him a hug so tight I might never let go. It was the biggest hug I’d ever given, and yet it didn’t seem like enough. “Thank you. Thank you so much.”

“No, thank
you,
” he said, a slight twinkle making a glint in his eyes.

“For what? I didn’t do anything.”

“Oh yes, you did.”

I must have looked as puzzled as I felt.

“Ricky was locked away, and getting past your mother was going to take more strength than I had. You were my only hope. I may have saved Ricky’s life, but you’re the one who actually saved the day.”

Although it was the dead of night, I must’ve been beaming brighter than the sun. I’d saved the day!

Mr. Lunas struggled with a few steps, then turned back one more time. “And by the way, I left you a little something.”

“Really?” I said, truly beaming now. “What is it?”

“Something. Take good care of it.”

“I will,” I said, even though I hadn’t a clue whether that was a promise I could keep.

“You know, Janine, I expect great things from you, too.” He looked up at the sky, then back at me. “I’ll be watching.”

I couldn’t help grinning inside and out. I just knew he was right. I would do great things too . . . one day.

Dark of the Moon

I
t’d been about a month since Ricky’s recovery. Dr. Littlefield called it a miracle. Mama hugged her Bible and cried. Letting her believe her healing verses had cured Ricky seemed like the best thing to do. And besides, would she have believed me anyway?

Daddy parked right square in the middle of the drive-in movie lot, and Ricky and I stretched out on the hood of the car. With the sun sinking into pink ribbons behind the screen, it was just a matter of minutes before the movie started.

“Hey, knucklehead,” I said, nudging Ricky and nearly making him spill his popcorn. “Don’t you think it’s weird?”

“What?” he answered, shaking the kernels off the side of the box.

“About Mr. Lunas. No one made the connection of him being there when Daddy got saved, and again when you were saved. You’d think they would have figured it out.”

Ricky shrugged. “So?”

“You don’t think Mr. Lunas had anything to do with you getting better?”

He shrugged again. “I don’t know.”

It struck me then that he
didn’t
know. He didn’t see what I saw, or know what I knew. It was going to be a secret I had to carry around all by myself.

Mama hopped up onto the car hood and bumped her hip against mine. “Scoot your butt over.”

I let out a giggle while Ricky slapped his hand over his mouth. “Mmmmm . . . !” he snickered. “Mama said
butt
!”

I have to admit, it shocked me, too. This from a woman who got mad if I said words like
golly
or
bullcorn
.
Butt
was downright unforgivable!

“Shush, Ricky,” she said, grinning toward the screen. “I didn’t give
you
permission to say it.” She was grinning a lot more now.

“Why’d you come out here?” I asked Mama.

She squirmed a little closer. “It’s too hot inside the car. And besides, that loose spring keeps poking my bu . . . behind.”

There was a nice breeze sweeping the movie lot, and it cooled us down even though the hood was still warm from the drive over.

“Hey, Janine, catch!” Ricky tossed a piece of popcorn in the air and I caught it in my mouth. “My turn,” he said, mouth wide.

I held one kernel between my fingers. He didn’t see the others tucked into my palm.

“Hey!” he shouted when they all flew toward his face.

“Stop wasting that popcorn,” Daddy called out. “Money don’t grow on trees.”

Nope, it didn’t. It came from his new job at the warehouse.

About then, Daddy climbed out of the driver’s-side door. “I can’t see a thing. You’re all blocking the windshield.”

He scootched Ricky over, and we were jammed together like sardines.

“Ouch,” Ricky whined. “You’re crushing me.” He crawled onto the car roof and laid down flat on his belly.

I stayed right where I was, in between Mama and Daddy. It felt nice. And we stayed that way all through the movie—from beginning to end.

The nights became moonless and pitch dark again. I sat at my window, listening to the rustling in the cornfield. Was it the wind? Buddy sometimes went into the stalks for a while, but he always came out whining and sad. He’d lay in the dirt by my window and sulk. I’d seen some strange goings-on there this past month. Once I saw a dust devil spiraling up, and for several nights the lightning bugs swarmed with an endless, eerie glow. Tonight I could have sworn I heard the cornfield calling my name. Somehow I wasn’t afraid. I grabbed a flashlight and headed out. I had to see what was going on.

Buddy trailed behind me for a bit, then pushed in front to lead the way. We squeezed between stalks and leaves and yellow corn until we got to a clearing—a perfect bald circle of dirt. I shined the flashlight down for a better look. The circle was outlined with yellow pictures and stick figures that looked like the Indian drawings found inside caves. I studied them for a minute like a child looking at a picture book. Some of them looked like the phases of the moon. A moon that slowly turned into a man, then circled back into the moon. Odd.

I also noticed a coffee can lying nearby, surrounded by broken eggshells and some dried corncobs. The person who drew this used egg yolks as paint and the cobs as a brush.
Art supplies?

I stepped into the middle of the circle and closed my eyes, suddenly aware of the blood flowing through every vein in my body, from the large ones in my neck to the teeny ones in my toes. It rolled like a tide, rising and falling. Buddy curled up at my feet, and we stayed that way for a long time . . . until an owl called from a nearby tree, reminding me how late it was.

I passed Ricky’s new and improved go-cart as I walked back to the house. He’d really worked hard, getting it fixed up. He finally admitted that I hadn’t done such a bad job putting it together. I even took some turns riding it down the hill, cutting through the southern breeze. That go-cart really could zoom!

As I crawled into bed, I thought about Mr. Lunas and the cornfield, and my heart swelled a bit. I’d never see him again. Not the way he’d been this summer. Then I remembered a nursery rhyme that Mama used to recite to me when I was younger.

The August heat was too much, so I drew just a thin sheet up over me for covers. I closed my eyes and steadied my breathing. Being so tired, I figured sleep would come right away, but my mind kept going back to that cornfield. I tossed and turned, a small light aggravating my eyes. I reached over to switch off the lamp, but it was already out.

I shot up quickly, looking around. Where was that dang light coming from? Then I found it . . . up under the sheet! It was just a small glow, about the size of a walnut, shining from the palm of my hand. I gasped and flinched, one heartbeat away from fear. Then I squeezed it a few times, watching the beams seep through my fingers. It didn’t hurt a bit. Actually, it felt pretty natural. The biggest smile ever busted out across my face.

I scrunched back down onto my pillow, hugging my hand close to my heart. Mr. Lunas had said he’d left me something. He had. He had indeed.

Moon Facts

                  The moon is about 225,745 miles from Earth.

                  It takes the moon twenty-nine and a half days to orbit Earth.

                  The new moon always rises at sunrise, the first quarter moon at noon. The full moon rises at sunset, the last quarter moon at midnight.

                  “Blood around the moon” is an atmospheric condition produced by high, thin clouds.

                  The moon affects the ocean tides (because of its magnetic pull) and the hunting habits of nocturnal animals.

                  
Luna
is the Latin word for
moon
.

                  The August moon is called the full corn moon.

                  A blue moon is a second full moon in a calendar month.

                  During an address to Congress on May 25, 1961, President John F. Kennedy stated: “First, I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the earth.” On July 20, 1969,
Apollo 11,
with astronauts Michael Collins, Neil Armstrong, and Buzz Aldrin, successfully landed on the moon.

                  The Man in the Moon does exist. Look up on a moonlit night and make a wish.