Indigo Moon
She gathers the star-speckled indigo folds of her sparkling night quilt and pulls them slowly up. Surrounding herself in their rich, umbral velvet, all that remains is the luminous glow of her face, peeking out of the darkness like a sliver of pearl.
Beneath her soft and glorious bed lies a voluptuous green carpet, a mottled and shaded bas-relief of dips and waves. Within these undulating curves and curls stand lush forests: tall, canopied and proud, they stand beside the sweeping grasslands that flow along the bounds of shimmering ponds and lakes and streams, as these ooze and sweep into flickering rivers that wind swiftly to the farthest edge of everything, where the silken paleness of sand stretches into the sparkling, starlit fractures of midnight’s ocean as it sways all the way through the distance to the invisible walls of the horizon.
She sleeps for a time, unconcerned by the night-cries of birds beneath the slipping wisps of cloud and cool air. The sky drifts, slowly spinning through the night. Rising from below, the scent of things growing casts off the after-touch of sunlight and gently fades until there is only a thick, permeating residue of night blooms. She rests her face on her hands at the edge of her bed, and gazes down upon the land. Farms, spread and silent with their waiting barns and smoking chimneys, lie scattered among patchwork fields edged by woods. She hears the hooting of an owl, the whicker of strong wings and the chittered squeak of an ending, speaking out of fathomless shadows.
Climbing down from her lofty sleeping place, she tugs the quilt with her. Slender feet touch black, fecund earth, soft and cool and soothing, and she sighs and wiggles her toes, their pale incandescence emanating from beneath her gown of night clouds. The blanket billows in the early Spring wind, and she shimmers lightly across the fields as stars tremble their release and slip to the ground behind her, winking against the darkness of the land.
The fields extend in all directions. She walks them a while, away from a deep black river that winds steadily toward the sea. Everything looks different from here. Things do not wear the same familiar shades. Her long legs take her over a hill, the twinkling of stardust glimmering in her wake, and there at the bottom is a white house and a barn, standing in an earthen yard and nestled up against the great trees that recede up the hills and into the mountains. She has seen this house before, looking down while nestled in her bed. The windows shine back under her gaze. One of them opens and a man climbs out to stand on the porch roof. He waves at her, his arms gesturing broadly.
Intrigued, she steps closer, gathering up the trailing quilt. It dims her, filters her through smoky purple-black folds, but still, the world is brightly lit, for she is what she is, and now is standing on the earth.
The man waits, silently, until she carefully steps over the fence, leaving her speckled trail behind her. As she nears him, he shields his eyes and turns away. The shimmer of her reflection in the windows hurts even her own eyes. She pulls the cover over her head and shines at him from within the darkening indigo.
“Hello!” He lowers his hands, stark and work-scarred even in the muted glow. His eyes are a fierce, brilliant blue, rimmed with beautiful dark lashes. An incredulous smile erupts over his stoic features, and she laughs to see it.
“I thought you were angry.” She says, the voice of mischief.
“Well.” He moves his shoulders slightly. “You woke me up.”
“Did I?” She asks. She reaches toward him, thinks better of it, and pulls back.
“Yes. You were shining off the mirror. You’re very bright.”
“Oh,” she says. She slowly twirls, wanting to see everything. “It seems different down here.”
“I bet it does.” He grins widely. “You’re standing here shining instead of up there in the sky.”
A low, roaring hiss tickles her ears, and she looks around. “What is that? Do you hear it?”
He squints past her, then shakes and tilts his head, closing his eyes.
“That sounds like the ocean.” He says after a moment, a look of surprise written on his face.
“The ocean? But isn’t that very…”
She stops speaking as she understands.
“Oh,” she says, “I see.” She begins to turn, to grow, to walk away.
“Are you going?” he asks, almost wistfully. “You’ve only just got here.”
She looks up at her dark bed, and then to the top of the hill. She motions toward the little waves, creeping eagerly toward her. “I have to, I think.”
“Oh.” he is silent for a moment. “I’ll be watching you,” he tells her.
And she laughs, holding out her hands toward him, larger now, and too bright to see past at all. His cool fingers rest briefly within the soft glow of her grasp before she turns away.
She walks back the way she came, growing again, stretching, until she climbs up to the side of her bed. She turns her face toward him, still on the tiny roof of the farmhouse porch. Her pale light casts shadow and darkness while her glow shines back faintly from the window glass.
“I’ll be watching you,” she says, and smiles.
And she gathers the star-speckled indigo folds and pulls them, surrounding herself, until all that remains is the luminous pearl of her face, shining down.
Special thanks to Christopher Iacono and D Gestalt for the prompts which inspired this story.
