Luna Rising

by Selene Castrovilla

  She said, “Thank you for my kids, and my books, and my friends.”

  She stared at the unhurried, deliberate bird. In the daylight she’d observed that he walked slower than she typed. “But I’m also in pain. I don’t know why or what to do. Will you help me?”

  Did the bird just glance at her?

  She took another breath and exhaled. She hadn’t breathed like that since Lamaze. She said, “I surrender.”

  The bird was so serene. Almost mystical—a beaked maharishi.

  She said, “Just let me know what you want me to do. I’m listening.”

  The egret took off. Whoa! All these years, and she’d never known he could fly. Why didn’t he ever do it before? She watched him stretching his white wings through the air. Grace.

  She wanted to soar.

  She said, “Amen.”

  TWENTY-THREE

  Luna and Alex were in a midtown hotel. Not a cheap place—and she’d paid for it.

  It was either that, or never have sex.

  He couldn’t afford the hotel. He could barely pay for dinner. If she’d waited for him to save up, it would’ve been months.

  He’d lied to the halfway house people about where he was staying. He was allowed to sleep out on weekends, as long as it was with family or a close friend. Apparently sex in a hotel room—or anywhere—was frowned upon. His friend Juan was covering for him.

  Luna’s emotions spanned a broad spectrum. Nervous – she was going to have sex! Thrilled – she was going to have sex! Curious – was she going to have good sex?

  She sat behind Alex on the bed, raising his Marilyn Manson T-shirt over his head and off of him. He had a great body—so muscular, so young.

  Then she noticed a tattoo over his left shoulder blade that said “N.A.”

  He sighed and said, “We need to talk.”

  “Do you want to tell me who ‘N.A.’ is?” she asked.

  “What?”

  “Right here, on your back.” She traced the letters with her finger.

  “Oh—no. That’s not a person.” He laughed.

  “What is it?”

  “It stands for Narcotics Anonymous.”

  Now she laughed. “Wow. I didn’t see that one coming.” Talk about devotion. Luna didn’t understand the compulsion to indelibly inscribe things into one’s skin. She rubbed his shoulders and asked, “So what do you want to talk about?”

  He sighed again and said, “I’m not ready to be monogamous.”

  He slumped his head, looking down at his Conversed feet and the burgundy carpet.

  He said, “I haven’t really had a chance to date since I’ve been clean. I want to explore my options.”

  They sat quiet for a moment, him staring at leather and fibers, her staring at blue ink and skin.

  Maybe “N.A.” really stood for “not available.”

  Jiminy was right.

  As always, said Jiminy. Things would go a lot better if you’d just accept that.

  “Is that okay?” Alex asked.

  What could she say? The room was nonrefundable.

  It would’ve been nice to know this beforehand.

  You can still walk away, Luna, Jiminy said. You could wait for someone whole.

  I can’t, Jiminy. I’m in too deep. And besides, what whole person would want me?

  If you feel that way, make yourself whole.

  Yeah, right.

  “I guess it’ll have to be okay,” she told Alex.

  The foreplay was incredible. Alex touched and kissed her all over, trying so hard to please. He brought her up to the edge so many times… Then he entered her.

  I’m having sex!

  It felt so amazing… She’d never known it could be like this.

  She was sooo close to climaxing…

  But then an image jumped into her head: She pictured Alex inside another woman.

  “Oh, God,” she cried out—but not in a good way.

  She burst into tears.

  He pulled out of her. “What is it? Did I hurt you?” He grabbed her up in his arms.

  “No…” It was all she could say at the moment.

  She breathed in and out, trying to calm down, focusing on his safe, strong scent.

  And then she fell asleep.

  The next morning they were lying in bed. Alex had found The Game Show Network and put on an old episode of The Price Is Right, which was filling in all the silence Luna and Alex couldn’t. Contestant number one was spinning the wheel in the showcase showdown. Beep, beep, beep, beep. The wheel went round and round, finally halting at five cents. “I take it you’ll spin again,” said Bob Barker.

  “Yes, I will, Bob,” contestant number one squeaked out excitedly.

  “So how many people are you sleeping with, anyway?” Luna asked Alex.

  He said, “Uh… one.”

  He laughed. He did that a lot.

  “You,” he said, in case clarification was needed. Or perhaps to clarify that what they’d done the night before counted as sex, even though neither of them had climaxed.

  That’s something, she thought.

  What, she didn’t know.

  She said, “That’s good.”

  The woman on TV spun again. Beep, beep, beep, beep. She got one dollar. What were the odds? The audience moaned, the music even groaned, she covered her eyes in dismay… she was over. “I’m sorry,” Bob said in his sad voice. He hugged her. “Buh-Bye.”

  It did make Luna feel better, being Alex’s only lover.

  Luna started to touch him, then lumped up a handful of the lime green comforter in her palm instead. She wanted to have sex with him—good, complete sex—but first she had her own clarifying to do. “Listen, I gotta tell you…”

  The room smelled of some cheesy air freshener, on top of PineSol, and it was a bit nauseating. Then again, she was overdue for coffee. Everything seemed sickening when she needed caffeine.

  He was waiting. She forced herself to continue. “If you start sleeping with other women besides me, eventually I’m not going to be able to take it. I’ll probably hang in for a little while, but then… no.”

  Beep, beep, beep, beep. Lots of wild cheers! Someone else hit one dollar and won a cash bonus!

  “What about just one other woman?” he asked.

  “Still no.”

  The curtains were brown and thick, double-layered to block out the sun. As if the sun’s beams could manage to find their way through all the tall buildings and billboards. There were so many signs outside! They were near the entrance to the Midtown Tunnel, where advertisers had a captive audience every rush hour.

  It was a pretty dismal scene inside and out of this $300-a-night hotel, and the room was small too.

  That was Manhattan for you.

  Next time they’d try Queens.

  He asked, “What about if we found someone to join us, like a permanent ménage à trois?”

  “This isn’t a movie, Alex. It’s hard enough for two people to get along.” She didn’t know if she could share him, even in those circumstances.

  The bed was pretty ugly. Some kind of Formica. With the requisite ugly lamps perched on matching Formica nightstands on either side. God, hotels suck.

  The no-flavor pseudo-coffee packets they put in the rooms in those pre-measured filters sucked the most. No way could she drink that brownish water.

  She had to go seek her fix soon.

  “We could try,” he said. He touched her cheek. It felt good, despite her withdrawal symptoms.

  “You’d stay then, right?” he asked.

  She said, “I guess.” But she wasn’t sure at all.

  He kissed her neck.

  On the TV, Bob congratulated the woman who had won the showcase showdown spot. Upbeat music played. He said, “Now stay tuned for the next half of our show, where lots more prizes are up for grabs… if the price is right!”

  Alex kissed lower… and lower.

  I’m his only lover… I’m his only lover… Luna recited to herself.


  Her mantra was working, blocking those sad thoughts.

  Alex straddled her. “Do you want to take up where we…”

  “Yes!”

  It didn’t take long to reach the edge again.

  “Come on, baby,” said Alex. “I know you’re close.”

  “Oh, God!” she screamed—this time, in the good way.

  She was there.

  “I feel like a stud,” Alex said afterwards.

  “You are a stud,” Luna said. “That was incredible.” There was so much more Luna could’ve said, but one thing far outweighed the rest. “I need coffee so bad.”

  Alex went out and got her a large Styrofoam cup from a diner on the corner.

  After she’d drunk it, they made love again in a heated hurry because check-out time had come.

  New Year’s Eve arrived. Luna, Ben and Dylan were onboard the barge.

  Aunt Zelda had long ago accepted that Ben and Dylan were too fidgety to sit in the audience, so she assigned them to refreshment duties. Ben cut chunks of havarti for intermission, while Dylan laid out neat rows of crackers and artfully layered Oreos into a basket. It always startled Luna to see Dylan do something neatly, when his half of the bedroom looked like an homage to Oscar Madison. The first time she’d asked him: How was it that he could be so ordered here, while at home he dropped everything he owned, wore and finished eating straight onto the floor?

  His face got very serious. “This is my job, Mommy,” he told her.

  And so it was, because Aunt Zelda paid each boy twenty dollars—a small fortune!

  Luna also pitched in (though she worked gratis), filling up glasses of champagne. She wouldn’t let Aunt Zelda help, because Zelda deserved to sit and enjoy the fruits of her labor. Not only the task of building the barge, but the painstaking effort she made at every concert including this one, greeting each of her guests with a resounding, “Welcome home!” as they checked in for their seats.

  Luna and the kids worked all through the first half of the program, trying to make sure they were prepared for the intermission rush. The sold-out crowd was especially demanding on nights like this, when the higher admission cost included refreshments.

  The champagne was the most challenging. It took so long for the bubbles to subside! If Luna tried to rush the process, the cups invariably ran over. So she had to make sure plenty were already poured. This required tiptoeing to the deck with her bottles to pop their corks, so the bursts wouldn’t disturb the concert.

  Luna thought about Alex. But the work kept her so busy that she couldn’t obsess too much about him.

  Intermission came, and the clamoring crowd was served. Many of the patrons found Ben and Dylan cute enough to tip, which made her children even happier. When the music started up for the second half, they cleaned up as much as they could without making noise. Then they sat in the galley, scarfing Oreos and playing tic-tac-toe on the back of a program.

  Luna sat next to Aunt Zelda in the rear of the room, which was only twenty rows from the stage. She tried to concentrate. Again her mind roamed to Alex. Was he safely stowed at the halfway house like he’d told her? Or was he seeing someone else?

  She pushed these destructive thoughts from her mind and let the music in. Bach’s Brandenburg concertos. Favorites of hers. Twelve musicians vigorously performed their parts—an unusually large group for the stage, which sagged a bit under the extra weight. There was a harpsichord—a rare treat. Luna loved that special, unmistakable tinny pitch. It was welcoming, like an instrumental version of Aunt Zelda.

  At the end of the concert the musicians played Auld Lang Syne. The song sounded so sad, especially when the whole audience chimed in. For a moment Luna felt like crying, even though she had no idea what “auld lang syne” even meant. Then Aunt Zelda sashayed up the aisle, jumped on the stage, raised her glass and toasted her audience. “Thanks for another great year of sharing in the music with us!” she proclaimed. “I built this barge for you, and I’m so very pleased you like it!” She blew the audience kisses and they cheered. Aunt Zelda sure could work a crowd.

  Afterwards, everyone climbed the metal stairs to the roof.

  The countdown began. Everyone chanted: “Five, four, three, two, one… Happy New Year!!!”

  Luna hugged her children fiercely and kissed them as fireworks lit up the Manhattan skyline.

  “Oh, dearhearts, it makes my heart sing that you are all here!” Aunt Zelda told them.

  The kids were looking ragged. It was late, and they were coming down from their Oreo high.

  Luna’s cell rang. Was it Alex?

  No.

  It was Nick.

  The call was for the boys, she knew, and she passed her phone to Ben.

  Why hadn’t she heard from Alex?

  He could easily have lied to the people at the halfway house and spent the night with someone else.

  She’d told him she didn’t want to know, and she didn’t.

  But just the possibility hurt.

  The kids finished wishing their dad a happy new year, and Dylan handed Luna the phone. The fireworks were over and the sky was dark except for a few random stars, but Manhattan still shone bright. The building lights never went out.

  “Can we go home, Mommy?” Dylan asked.

  “Sure, Baby,” she answered. “Just give me a minute.”

  She dialed Alex.

  “All circuits are busy. Please try your call again later,” a computerized voice said. Yeesh. So much for technology.

  Then her phone rang. It was Alex!

  “Hey,” he said. “I know you’re with your kids, and I’m supposed to be in bed already, but I wanted to wish you a happy new year.”

  “Same here,” she told him. The kids were eyeing her, and she couldn’t say more. Inside, she bubbled. Her wish had come true! Her prince had called!

  “I can’t wait to see you this weekend,” he said. She heard a grin in his voice.

  “Same here,” she said again. Maybe he could sense her grin, too.

  She drove home with her foot light on the gas, because inside she was floating.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  January was traditionally bleak.

  No more lights, no more mistletoe, certainly no more presents. The first month of the year was one long hangover.

  It was almost unanimously agreed: All January offered was cold weather and gray. On line at the post office, pushing carts through Stop and Shop, on the ellipticals at the gym: Everywhere, voices complained.

  Luna was perhaps the one person who didn’t succumb to January’s dreariness. While others trudged, scowled and moped, she glowed.

  Her life was coming together.

  True, Alex lived in a half-way house, was practically broke and recovering from crack addiction, and wanted to find a third party to join them in bed. But he’d move out of Spanish Harlem eventually and find his own place, and then she could stop shelling out for hotels. He’d graduate from his computer school and earn better money, and then he’d be able to pay for more than cheap dinners at Dojo. He’d stay clean; his one year anniversary at N.A. had just passed. And as for that third party joining them, he hadn’t mentioned it since that first night together.

  Maybe he’d forgotten or changed his mind.

  Maybe she was enough for him.

  She drove into Manhattan to pick Alex up at the Empire State Building. She was bearing gifts: two Star Wars toy figures from Burger King and a jar of Ba-Tampte Half Sour Pickles, which he’d mentioned he loved.

  Traffic slowed as soon as Luna hit the light at the end of the Midtown Tunnel. Horns blared around her, but Luna didn’t care about a little vehicular congestion. She had an afternoon tryst with Alex ahead of her.

  Her mini-van crawled to Thirty-Fourth and Fifth. She spotted Alex in his brown trench coat standing by the curb. He climbed in, sticking his briefcase against the bag with the figurines and the pickles. The paper made a crumpling sound. He slammed the door a little too hard. “Hey,” he said. No smil
e, no kiss hello.

  She leaned over to kiss him, but he pulled back.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked.

  He said, “We need to talk.”

  “Did I do something?”

  “No, no, not at all. Can you just find some place to park?”

  She couldn’t.

  They were sandwiched in a honking, practically standing-still jam.

  They had to stay on Thirty-Fourth for several blocks because no turns were allowed.

  This might be hell on earth, thought Luna. The bus in front of them farted blasts of black exhaust at her windshield. The cabdriver behind blasted his horn long and hatefully, as though she’d chosen to plant herself in front of him. Beeeeeep!

  Staring at the bus, she asked, “Do you not want to sleep with me anymore?”

  There was a beaming, extraordinarily busty woman pictured in the ad for Georgi vodka on the back of the bus. She wouldn’t be so happy if she had to breathe all this bus soot seeping through the crevices in her van. Or if her boyfriend was about to break up with her.

  Alex wouldn’t let Luna kiss him. Could it be any clearer? “Do you not want to sleep with me anymore?” she questioned him.

  “I wouldn’t say that,” he replied.

  She asked, “Then what would you say?”

  He would say nothing. He pursed his lips and shifted his feet uncomfortably on the floor. They inched their way to Eighth Avenue, panic and sadness swelling in her because she knew it was over.

  Finally she turned on Eighth and pulled over in front of a Dunkin’ Donuts.

  This hadn’t been worth the trip.

  Couldn’t Alex have just called her to end it?

  She killed the engine and waited for the kill. He was having a hard time making eye contact with her. “Of course I want to keep sleeping with you… But… .”

  She hated buts.

  Buts sucked ass.

  Behind him, Dunkin’ Donuts beckoned. But she didn’t want coffee. She felt so queasy, she might throw up from one sip.

  “But what?” she asked.

  He stared out the windshield, straight ahead. He couldn’t glance at her, not even peripherally. “But I promised someone else that I wouldn’t.”