Read Online Envious Moon by Thomas Christopher Greene - Free Book Online Page B

or her eyes. And to betruthful it was her eyes I wanted to see because it was a woman’s eyes I loved the most.
    But I was so happy just to watch her face, the high cheekbones and the full lips, the way the thin moonlight illumined her pale skin.
    I shifted my weight from one foot to the other. Otherwise, I did not move. At one point the breeze picked up off the water and she turned her face into it and the wind lifted her hair off her shoulders before settling it back down again. Was it only the truly romantic that fell in love with someone they had never met? For looking at her, I’m not ashamed to say that that was what I felt. Love. Inexpressible but as real as this great house in front of me. And there was also this: I felt present watching her, more present than I had ever felt before. It was like I had just woken up; it was like blood for the first time decided to pulse through my arteries and spill down my veins. I did not care about anything that came before and I did not care about anything that was yet to happen. I only wanted to watch this girl until she closed the window and turned off the light.
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    L ater that night I sat on the rocky beach and I finished the last of the wine. The breeze coming off the sound was cool and I wanted a fire. But I could not have a fire since it might attract attention. Instead I pulled my coat tight around myself and I smoked until I grew tired.
    I laid my bedroll out under the shadow of the large rock and climbed onto it and pulled the open sleeping bag on top of me. I looked up at the stars, clusters ancient and endless. I traced Cassiopeia and Andromeda and Pegasus, constellations that for as long as men took to the sea, they have used to find their way home. Home for me had always been Galilee but now it was this camp, this beach, this water rolling in toward my feet. And when I thought this, I also suddenly felt displaced, like I didn’t belong anywhere. The truth was, I was not fully of this beach, and I was not fully of Galilee and I was not part of the Lorrie Anne. I had left all that behind. Somewhere out on the Grand Banks my old boat was scouring the fishing grounds for swordfish. And I wondered if the men missed me but then I decided that they did not. Someone had taken my place and fishermen only dealt with the living. Berta missed me, I’m sure,and Victor probably did, too, though he would never admit it.
    Once, when I was just a small boy, I was out on the skiff with my father. It was a warm summer night and a clear sky. We were fishing, as we often did, and during a break while my father leaned against the gunwale and rolled one of his cigarettes, he looked up at the full moon, and he said, “The moon is jealous of the sun.”
    He talked like this to me a lot and he usually had a sly twinkle in his eye and I did not think anything of it. “Why?” I asked.
    â€œBecause the sun is always full,” he said. “Always fat. The moon only gets to be full once a month. The rest of the time it’s hungry. And as soon as it gets full, it has to start all over again.” He chuckled. “Kind of like the life of a fisherman.”
    I remember that I looked up at the moon then, pale and yellow against the black. “It doesn’t look jealous,” I said.
    â€œTrust me, Anthony,” he said. “It is. It’s envious. It’s an envious moon.”
    And years later, lying on the beach on Cross Island, looking up at the same moon, I thought that my father probably had it wrong. The moon had the stars. The sun had nothing. The sun was all alone. And no one, I decided, should be all alone.
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    W hen I finally fell asleep, I dreamed again about the girl. She was on the stairs and then she was in the window. She told me she was afraid and I said that everyone was afraid. I told her that if she gave me a chance, I could help. Then she lay down next to me and she slung her arms lazily over my chest. I felt the beat of