Read Online Man in the Moon by Dotti Enderle - Free Book Online Page A

window. It was Buddy. He was laying in the dirt beside the house. “Good boy,” I said, patting on the window screen.
    He looked up in the dark, his brown eyes drooping. Everyone was sad, even Buddy. I thought about dogs being smarter than humans and figured he must know about Ricky too. I flinched when I caught a glimpse of Mr. Lunas leaning against a tree not too far from my window. He looked more like a rail propped against it, and I wondered if his gizzard was in backwards too. I don’t think he saw me, because he was too busy staring off at a half-moon, barely risen in the sky.
    I went to Ricky’s bedroom and put my ear to the door. It was quiet. I wanted to peek in. I hadn’t seen him in two days, and I missed him something fierce. I needed to see him sitting up, laughing and joking. I turned the knob in slow motion and opened the door without making the least bit of noise. The minute I stuck my head in, the hot air clutched me like a fist. The room smelled of blood and vomit. I had to back away quick and catch my breath. Then it hit me: Ricky was alone. All alone. Where was Mama?
    I stuck my head in again, and this time I wasn’t so quiet about it. I walked over to the bed and looked down. Ricky was just a glob of jelly, piled on top of the sheets. His pajamas were soaked from sweat, and his skin was as slick and white as one of my porcelain dolls.
    When I sat down next to him, he opened his eyes. His lids fluttered; then a teeny crease of a smile appeared. “You came to see me.”
    “I wanted to come sooner, but you know Mama.”
    I thought he nodded, but it was hard to tell. He had no strength at all.
    “Janine,” he said, his voice sounding like an old man’s. “Looks like I’m going to die.”
    “That’s bullcorn! Stop that dumb talk.”
    “It’s okay,” he continued. “I’m not scared. Probably ’cause I’m too tired to be scared. Everything hurts. Even when I talk.”
    “Then don’t talk. Problem is, you just don’t feel good right now.” I tried to sound courageous, hoping it would rub off on him. “You’ll feel great in a day or two. Then you’ll build your go-cart and go sailing down the hill.”
    His eyes rolled over dark. “Yeah. I really wanted to ride that go-cart.”
    “You will,” I said. I tried to put as much meaning behind it as I could, but another minute in this stinking hot room, I thought even I might die.
    He laid there, quiet, then strained to raise his head and look at me. “I’ll miss you something awful.”
    Those words opened the floodgates again. Tears poured out of me like rain from the sky. “I’ll miss you too . . . even more.”
    I hugged him close, his body clammy and cool, even in that heat. I could feel his heart beating against me, and I prayed it wouldn’t stop. I just held him tight, not caring if Mama came in and caught me. Not caring if she gave me the switching of my life. Not caring about anything but holding my little brother next to me. And no matter what, I wasn’t ever going to let him go.

Phase Eight—Waning Crescent
    W hen I woke up the next morning the house felt empty, and so did I. My eyes were just puffy pink bubbles from crying the night before. They ached and burned, and I rubbed them hard with my fists. I heard the rooster crow, then Daddy snore, and I looked out the window at the smears of cotton-candy clouds. It was a lot earlier than my usual wake-up time. Mr. Lunas was curled up on a lawn chair out back. He was shrinking each day and starting to look more like the old scarecrow he’d been that first evening I met him. But why? Why had he stopped eating? Maybe later I’d take some buttered toast out to him for breakfast. His withering got me to thinking about Ricky . . . Ricky! That empty feeling inside me began to fill up.
    It started with a trembling in my hands, then it moved to my arms, then my shoulders. It sprouted through my body like a wild dewberry vine. Before I knew it, I was ready to scream. But instead, I