The Moonlight Boy | Ferry's Tale # 1

The encounter

It had been over a month since school started. The weather was still fine, although the sun was shier now, choosing to remain hidden. It wasn't Ferry's favorite time of the year.

One of those days, Miss Summer decided it was the perfect time for the annual class photo. It was a school's custom—the photos of all the students had to be on the big panel at the school's entrance which grew larger each year.

That being settled, the old photographer who'd been taking pictures ever since the school was founded finally arrived, dragging his feet.

He mounted his camera, polished the lens for long, interminable minutes, then he placed the children in three rows. Ferry was placed on the last row in the back since he was the tallest in class.

The old photographer did his work as usual. So slow, that even the most patient children began to lose their patience. He eventually took the picture and then muttered something about the children these days.

But his amazement was to come in his little darkroom in the attic. He studied for hours the thin, tall boy at the end of the last row. His figure looked fuzzy in every single photo. He hadn't caught so much as a single, clear photo of him. A strange glow, like a cloud, surrounded him in every picture.

Thus, the old photographer returned the next week to take other pictures. But no matter how fine the weather, or in any place Ferry sat, he was blurry in every single photo. So the old man eventually gave up and chose a picture randomly to be proudly placed on the panel at the school's entrance.

But the photographer was not the only one to wonder about Ferry. Miss Summer was constantly intrigued by the boy's behavior. She was a young teacher, so she had only been teaching for a few years. But Ferry was by far the most unusual child she had ever met.

At school, he was very good at Biology, Drawing, Music, and Sports. He knew things about animals and plants that even she wasn't aware of. He sang beautifully, reaching the highest notes and his voice sounded like it came from another world. He drew the most wonderful, strangest creatures. If Miss Summer asked the children to draw a house, Ferry would draw an entire, magical world around that house. He ran faster than any child his age, even faster than the older ones. Nevertheless, he didn't seem to show much interest in Math. Even the simplest calculation seemed too hard for him to understand. And the concept of time was just as difficult.

"Ferry, would you tell me what time is it?"

Ferry looked at the clock on the back wall of the class.

"Do you mean the time of humans?"

"What do you mean?" she wondered.

"I mean... Here, we measure time in hours, minutes, and seconds while elsewhere, what we call a second might be shorter or longer..."

Then he stopped as if saying too much. And he could hear the laughter and giggles in the class. But Miss Summer firmly asked the children to be quiet. "What Ferry means to say is that time is a relative concept. It is not the same for everyone. The time might seem longer when you do your homework and shorter when you are playing. Haven't you ever felt that it is never enough time for playing?"

The children nodded. But she knew Ferry had meant something else. She knew the boy's parents. But how could a laundry lady and a worker at the sawmill teach him such complicated things? Ferry was definitely thinking more maturely than any other nine-year-old she'd ever met.

 She also observed him during break times. The weather was still warm, and the children were playing in the schoolyard. Ferry didn't have many friends. In fact, he had only one friend─Matilda Harper, the tomboy. The two always spent time together playing with the ball, climbing the trees, rolling over, hopping, and jumping. And sometimes she even had to make Ferry come down from a tree because he was climbing too high. Higher than she thought it was possible for a human being to climb.