A Boy Named Moon
Moon, a name chosen by his two older sisters, but that’s a story for another time, isn’t fully convinced that he is real, and will, at odd moments, stand in front of a mirror and stare at his reflection. He thinks that he probably is real, but wouldn’t bet the farm on it. He is ten years old, the son of a single Mom who spends her time, as she puts it, “Working my butt off” or, as her children put it, “Watching the soaps.” He doesn’t know his Dad, has never met him and probably never will. As family legend has it, his Dad walked out the front door when Moon was a four month old foetus and has never returned. No-one in Moon’s household seems to miss him, or care that he isn’t around and probably never will be.
Moon has two older sisters, Phoebe, Feebs, who is seventeen going on thirty, and Jemma, Gem, who is fifteen and knows everything that there is to know about everything. Both are extraordinarily beautiful and have legs that, according to popular opinion, “Go on forever.” Collectively they are known as “The Bereford sisters.” Moon is known as “The Bereford sister’s kid brother.”
Since entering this world Moon’s upbringing and welfare, to all intents and purposes, have been the responsibilities of his two “big sisters,” who, fortunately for Moon, have taken to the task with love and enthusiasm, but not always with their full attention. Moon’s Mom and Dad did not plan for and did not want another child. His Dad, a distant and distracted man, had simply decided “I’m outta here.” His Mom is too physically and emotionally drained to be a full-time Mom for the third time, and believes, at some conscience appeasing level, that she provides for Moon’s well-being, by way of his two “big sisters,” whom she conceived, carried, gave birth to and raised. In her estimation they are more than up to the task of attending to Moon’s daily needs and wants. She will always be there for the “big stuff.”
With a name like Moon one can be forgiven for assuming that he was destined for an unusual, possibly challenging childhood, particularly during those early school years. However, nary a soul, including the meanest of bullies and the most vindictive of teasers, dares mess with “The Bereford sister’s kid brother.” Moon, like his sisters, is very good looking, and, according to popular opinion, when older is going to be “A real heart-breaker.”
The Bereford children’s stunning good looks is somewhat of a mystery. Their Mom is a pretty, well put together woman, who, when she makes the effort is very attractive, but she is not “the stunner” that her daughters are. Their Dad was, and probably still is, a lanky and stooped man with a deeply lined face, a lump of a nose and the look of someone who has just had a rather unpleasant thought. He believes, notwithstanding the fact that he fathered two extraordinarily beautiful daughters, that the world is out to get him and won’t stop until it has succeeded. He was, and probably still is, a very depressing man to be around.
Moon feels safe, secure and loved, but absent in some fundamental way. He feels like one of his sister’s many dolls, cared for, fussed over, valued and protected, but existing only as an extension of his sister’s awareness and needs. He that is Moon does not exist; he has no identity of his own. He dearly loves his Mom and his two sisters, but they do not know who he is. Moon often wonders who he is.
Moon is somewhat puzzled and a little amused by the power that the female body has over boys, all boys, both young and old. He has witnessed this power many times, seeing how it addles their brains and causes them to say and do all manner of crazy and stupid things. Moon sees the female body as being a little bit different in certain areas, but basically the same. Since he was a baby, in his presence, naturally and unselfconsciously, his sisters have taken a bath, had a shower, dressed and undressed, tried on, taken off and swopped tops, bottoms and underwear, jiggled, hopped, prodded and pushed, lifted, examined, compared and exclaimed. All boys, both young and old, would willingly sacrifice one of their limbs for a seconds fleeting glimpse at what Moon has seen and continues to see. He is both revered and envied. He is jealously considered to be “One lucky son of a bee.”
Moon has his own smart-phone, lap-top computer, uncapped data and is left to his own devices when it comes to whom he can talk to and what he can watch, stream or download. He is an avid reader and was given an “electronic book” by Gem, which was given to her by one of her many suitors. Being one of the many alarmingly tech-savvy youngsters who inhabit our vastly changed world, Moon can download virtually any book that takes his fancy via one of the many freely available “back door” web-sites. As a result of this unrestricted, uncensored and unsupervised freedom, Moon has access to virtually anything that exists in both the digital and written world, a previously unprecedented and inconceivable treasure-trove, a tantalising smorgasbord of all that is good and all that is bad.
Moon recently came across a book titled “The After” He did not know what the book was about but he liked the title. Driven by his innate curiosity, and not being restricted by any form of adult supervision or censorship, Moon downloaded the book. Much to his delight it was a work of fiction about a serial killer.
The serial killer, the protagonist, targeted beautiful young girls. His hunting grounds were the many malls that dot our landscape. He always “hunted” on a Saturday morning and his targets never varied. He always targeted two young girls out together on a Saturday morning, cruising the mall, seeing and being seen, a teenage ritual as entrenched as selfies and brand-name sneakers; two beautiful, carefree young souls without a care in the world, both vibrantly alive and very much present. On any Saturday morning at any mall in any town there is always a plentiful supply of these beautiful young duos, two besties, walking side by side, heads together, giggling, perfumed, made up to the hilt and hooked up to the web.
Following them is easy; they are always blissfully unaware of anything outside of their own inwardly focused and carefree worlds. Once he knows where they live, which he discovers simply by following them, and he generally knows this by early Saturday evening, he goes home and gets a good night’s sleep. He spends Sunday preparing for and eagerly anticipating what lies ahead. By Tuesday or Wednesday of the following week he usually knows enough about their movements and routines to know where and when he can get them into his car. On Thursday he plans, on Friday he executes. If he does not know enough by this strict self-imposed deadline, he considers it to be an omen and aborts. Two young girls will go on to live their lives without ever knowing anything about him, or how close he came to forever changing their lives and the lives of their loved ones. He has only aborted twice, and will often wonder what those four young girls, now woman, possibly wives and mothers, are up to, completely unaware of what so easily could have been.
Thursday evening, when all his planning is done, is very special to him. All the prep work is done, all the details are covered and all eventualities considered. He is as ready as he will ever be. He will lie in bed waiting for sleep to take him to ground zero, to action stations, wondering what those two young girls are thinking and doing on this their last night before being sent to the after. As he drifts off to sleep he sings softly to himself in a lilting, sing-song nursery rhyme voice, repeating the same verse over and over, “I’m gonna send ‘em to the after, the after, the after, I’m gonna send ‘em to the after.”
He has already sent three sets of two young girls to the after, and it was ridiculously easy. Who has ever taken two young girls at the same time? “Always walk in pairs!!” He disguises himself as an old man, grey hair, a little stooped, slightly deaf and as tech-savvy as a lump of coal. He positions himself so that they walk past him, muttering to himself as they draw near, looking up, bewildered and helpless, when they are a few steps away. They always slow down as they reach him and ask him if he is alright. The rest is as easy as pie.
He asks them for help with his cell phone. He purposefully ran the battery flat the night before. The girls are always only too happy to help him and will quickly point out that his battery is flat. “Oh dear” he says, “I have a charger in my car that my grandson gave me, will that help?” He drives a big “old man’s” car with tinted back windows. The next step hangs in the balance. Will these two young girls disregard the warning that is drummed into the head of every child ever born, “Never get into a stranger’s car!!” He always opens the back door of his car, leaving it open, before getting into the driver’s seat, which somehow feels safe to the girls, who, without hesitation, jump into the big back seat and lean over the front passenger seat to help ole gramps with his charger. A quick spray of a potent knock-out gas from a nozzle concealed in the dashboard, a gentle push on each forehead, and ole gramps has his grand-daughter and her “bestie” sitting together on the back seat of his big old car, heads down, probably texting. If anyone asks he is taking them for ice-cream.
He then drives home, “old man” sedately, parks in the garage and closes the garage door. It is a two car garage so he has bags of room to do what he has so carefully planned to do. He gently and carefully takes the unconscious girls out of the back seat of his car and lies them side by side on a double-bed mattress that he has placed there for this very purpose. He considers himself to be a compassionate man, a caring and considerate man.
Before either of the girls regain consciousness he smothers them, one at a time, with an embroided cushion bought for this very purpose at a local flea-market. The cushion is embroided in greens, browns and blues, depicting the pastoral scene of a small arched wooden bridge spanning a narrow stream, along whose banks is an avenue of weeping willows. Neither girl undergoes any trauma, feels any pain, experiences any fear or has to beg for her life.
One minute they are vibrantly present, the next they are not. Two promising young lives, innocent and joyous, without a care in the world, their futures stretching out before them, and then, by his hand, that vibrant potential is gone, leaving behind just meat, sinew and bone. It is this incredible change from so much potential to no potential at all, from that thrumming vibrancy to a silent nothingness that gives him his high.
What was there before cannot be restored, brought back or rekindled. It is gone forever. He is in awe of what he has achieved, of the sheer enormity of the change that he has wrought, of the almost impossible to grasp before and after that he, and he alone is responsible for.
In the early hours of the following morning he returns the two still beautiful girls, now forever young, to the back seat of his car. Taking a well-known route he drives to a hiking path that meanders through a thick grove of trees. The path leads to a popular picnic site next to a small stream, spanning which is a small arched wooden bridge. He lays them along the path, side by side and in plain view. He chooses a different spot each time, but always along that same path. He considers this to be an act of kindness and respect. The bodies are always found within hours, ensuring that no damage is done by animals, insects or decay. They are all still beautiful, intact and undamaged, but no longer vibrant, no longer thrumming with potential. That awe-inspiring change from before to after plainly visible for all to see, the result of his craftsmanship, a craftsman who is proud of and takes great care with his craft, a craftsman who has engineered a cosmic transformation, but has left absolutely no visible signs of what he has so successfully achieved . The perfection and finality of what he has achieved fills him with an enormous sense of pride and accomplishment. It cannot be improved upon and it cannot be undone.
Being a caring and compassionate man he always leaves the girl’s possessions on the path next to them, ensuring that identification of the bodies is swift and sure. Their next of kin will not be subjected to hours, in similar cases sometimes days or weeks, wondering where they are and what has happened to them. To all intents and purposes all he did was borrow the girls for a few hours, send them to the after and return them, intact, undamaged and still beautiful, but now forever young.
He decided to stop at ten, five sets of two beautiful young girls. He cannot give a reason for stopping at ten, other than it is “a nice round number.” He will often think back to those ten young lives that he so dramatically impacted, of the awe-inspiring journey to the after that he sent them on. He has neither the need nor the desire to do it again. It’s a done deal, mission accomplished.
Moon found the ending of this story to be wonderfully “right.” The serial killer was never caught. He was never a suspect or a “person of interest.” The profilers, psychiatrists, psychologists, mediums, psychics, experts and talking heads all had a field day, all having an opinion as to why he did what he did, some even claiming to know why he stopped when he did, assigning all manner of meaning and significance to the number ten. He died peacefully in his sleep at the age of eighty four. His family and friends never knew that he was the “The Beauty Killer,” the name assigned to him by a reporter in the print media. A name that, as the closing pages of the novel reveals, is studied by profilers and referred to as bona fide source material by those both fascinated and repulsed by the mesmerising world of the serial killer.
Moon was profoundly affected by this book. He knows that it is a work of fiction, that it didn’t really happen, but he understands, at a very deep and fundamental level, the high that the killer experienced when he sent those young girls to the after. It resonates within Moon, that irreversible change, the total absence of something that seconds before was so vibrantly present, so alive, so full of potential, all gone, never to return.
Moon tried it out with a moth that flew into his bedroom one night. He caught it and cupped it in his hands. He could feel the moth fluttering its wings mightily inside his cupped hands, vibrant and very much present. He gently squeezed his palms together until all movement stopped, until all that vibrancy ceased. What was so present before was now completely absent, never to return. He looked at the dead moth nestled in his now open palms, remembering how it had fluttered so mightily, so vibrantly within his cupped hands, but was now so still. Moon had sent the moth to the after and it altered something deep inside him. He had a new understanding of life, a vastly different take on what it meant to be alive and what it meant to be dead. He marvels at the profound difference between the two, the before, being alive, and the after, being dead, a difference that can never be reversed, a rung bell that can never be unrung. Is it sorcery, where does all that before go, is it hovering in plain sight unseen and unfelt, like a magic trick, or has it gone as if it never was? And, where and what is the after?
He kept the dead moth on a saucer on his bedside table. It very often was the last thing that he looked at before going to sleep and the first thing that he looked at when he woke up in the morning. He knew that it wouldn’t change, that it wouldn’t come back to life, but a small part of him, way down deep, was hoping that it might, that all that before would magically return from the after. In time the dead moth became feather-light, losing all substance, becoming more of a colour on the saucer than an object. He eventually threw it away but left the empty saucer where it was. That empty saucer became a very real presence in Moon’s world, reminding him, questioning him, challenging him.
Three weeks after he threw the dead moth away Moon gently smothered Twitch, Gem’s pet guinea-pig, leaving the dead body in the cage. It was assumed that Twitch had died of natural causes. With the whole family in attendance, amid hugs, condolences and tears, Twitch, wrapped in a pillow-case, was buried in the back garden, interned under a rock on which Gem had painted the name Twitch, neatly spelled out in big twirly letters of different colours, with a heart taking the place of the dot above the i.
Moon did feel a little guilty about Twitch, not by what he had done to Twitch but by the effect that it had on Gem. However, that feeling that was ignited within him when he sent Twitch to the after does not, in his estimation, carry a price-tag. That feeling is priceless, beyond measure.
Moon has become consumed with the after, that complete absence of what seconds before was so vibrantly present. He will spend hours sitting on a park bench just watching all that before parading past him. He watches the many grandmas, grandpas, moms, dads, brothers, sisters, aunts, uncles, cousins, friends, dogs, cats, birds and squirrels, all of them, every single one of them, carrying within them that mysterious after that they are all one day destined to experience. As he watches this parade he sees the before, clearly evident, but, no matter how hard he looks he cannot see the after, which he finds fascinating, because he has seen it, he knows that it’s there, and he has the powwer to send any one of them straight there. Moon, a little boy sitting alone on a park bench, unseen and unnoticed, can feel it coursing through him, that immense power, the power to “Send ‘em to the after, the after, the after, send ‘em to the after.”
As his eleventh birthday draws near Moon tells his sisters that he wants a big embroided cushion for his birthday present, which must depict a forest scene and which must be stitched in greens, browns and blues. His sisters are bemused and a little curious. But hey, Moon is Moon. His sisters duly buy him an embroided cushion that depicts the weathered trunk of a big old tree with peeling bark, its branches and leaves spread wide and hanging down, creating a cool shady spot at its base. A blue blanket is spread out in the dappled shade at the base of the tree. The cushion is beautifully stitched in greens, browns and blues, with the blue blanket creating an oasis of calm and tranquillity that draws the eye and pleases the soul. Moon thinks that it is absolutely beautiful, perfect in every way.
Moon’s sisters have noticed that the cushion has taken pride of place on his bed, his pillows relegated to a spot under the window, and that he has spread a blue blanket over his duvet. They have also noticed a subtle change in Moon. Sometimes he will look at them with a strange expression on his face, which they find a little unsettling. But hey, Moon is Moon.
Moon spends quite a bit of time lying on his bed, stretched out on the blue blanket with his head comfortably nestled in the embroided cushion. When lying on his bed Moon can smell the leaves and the grass and he can feel the coolness of the shade as he drops down deep within himself. With his hands laced across his chest and his eyes closed, he can sometimes be heard singing softly to himself in a lilting, sing-song nursery rhyme voice, repeating the same verse over and over, “I’m gonna send ‘em to the after, the after, the after, I’m gonna send ‘em to the after.”
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