I told her not to hang the moon on our wall. But Mabel never listened. Screesh scrak, screesh scrak. That’s all I heard for days and nights, making the hours longer than cat tails, as she whittled it down, scraped it with her hair pins. The flakes of moon went everywhere. I shook them from my hair like pearly dandruff. Of course, she didn’t bother sweeping them up. That was left to yours truly. Made deep piles of the stuff, I did. Scooped them up and shook them out the window and the winds became all sparkly like, and you saw them whipping the moors. Got lost in the scene, I could’ve, but then that screesh scrak brought me back down to earth. 

“You sure this is wise, Mabel?” I’d asked. But she hadn’t even looked up at me. 

“It’s Marabella the Magnificent,” she’d said. Used a sliced crab apple to polish the moon, she did. Not one, lots of ‘em. Shoved me out in the mizzle to pick ‘em. I filled my apron and filled it and filled it. And all the time she polished, she hummed. Not that she can hold a tune, anymore. Not like she did in the music hall. Not like Marabella the Magnificent did. And now she sings. Looks at herself in the moon and there’s her old self, from yonks ago, Marabella, looking back. Same sin red lips. Same kiss curls. Same smudged beauty spot. She didn’t think the moon would bring the tide to our door. She doesn’t notice the waves at our windows. She doesn’t hear the sea leaning on our walls.

Rebecca Harrison sneezes like Donald Duck and her best friend is a dog who can count.