The Moon's Boy

Chapter Three

His dreams were haunted by Eden's face and her words, then she appeared. She was significantly younger, about eleven years old, and holding his hand, taking him somewhere. He struggled against her, tried to make her let go, but her grip was ridiculously strong. She dragged him towards all-consuming darkness, despite his protests and she flashed him that wicked grin. "Don't worry, Kaddie. We'll have lots of fun where we're going."

He shot awake as his alarm went off, his heartbeat like horses galloping. Aloe was in the corner of the attic slope where it met the bed and looked at him lazily. He gave her a feeble smile as he climbed out of bed. He clutched his chest and tried to breathe through the pain. It didn't work - his breath didn't properly reach his lungs and he began to feel light-headed as he hyperventilated. He scrambled to get his inhaler and took a couple puffs. He sighed with relief as the medicine began to work.

Kadir checked the time. Six-thirty. He was wide-awake and staggered into the bathroom to wash up. He was up on time but his brain was swimming. His nerves were strained. He tiptoed downstairs as to not disturb his sleeping family and made himself a bacon sandwich, caramelised onions and everything. "Mum would kill me if she found out I wasn't eating cereal."

He wrapped it in tin foil and left it on the counter. Walking back to his room, he heard the faint sounds of a city at the edges of slumber, about to wake up. He heard the engines of cars speeding past and the sound of drunken chatter. He fabricated his own stories for each of the sounds he'd heard: the drunks were coming back from a bachelor party, the car he heard whizzing past was a man returning home from his mistress's place. Imagining made him feel like the wide world was a little less empty, a little less pointless.

Kadir climbed into the shower and let the cold water rush over him. Another day with more things he had to do. He hated it but there wasn't much he could do about it. Nothing much anyone could do about it. He put his blazer over his uniform black trousers, tie and white shirt and combed out his hair before draping his school ID around his neck. He checked his pocket watch as he headed downstairs.

Grabbing his sandwich, he stepped out the door into the early morning sunlight and locked the door behind him. Kadir walked in silence, taking small bites and kept an eye out for anyone interesting. He saw an old lady feeding pigeons from a park bench, chatting at them and watched a little girl skip between two grown men with the sweetest smiles on their faces. Everyone was too happy for his liking.

When he walked into the school, he greeted the janitors as he passed them in the hallway. He approached his locker, not even bothering to wait for Jonathan, but there he was, leaning against the locker next to his. Kadir stiffened.

"Hey." Kadir pretended he hadn't heard, walked round him and got into his locker. "Kadir, I get why you wouldn't want to talk to me but I need to say something."

Kadir swapped the books in his bag for the ones he needed, avoiding all eye contact with the boy next to him. "Kadir."

Finally he looked at his friend, or at least the boy he considered his friend, and blinked slowly. "Can I help you with something?"

"I need to talk to you."

"Eden's not here to talk for you today?"

Jonathan slumped. "Look, about yesterday, I'm sorry. I should've given you some kind of heads-up, sent you a text or something so that you'd be okay - "

"You think?" Kadir closed his locker door and glared up at him. "I almost had a panic attack because of you. You didn't pause to think about what something like that might do to me? How pulling a disappearing act might affect me?" Jonathan fell silent. "I understand that life happens but please be more considerate in the future."