have you ever tried to spend the stars Claire VanDerLaan

have you ever tried to spend the stars

CLAIRE VANDERLAAN

i. i do not allow myself to think too much of the fact that she is the moon, sitting here with me. regardless of her celestial existence, she is a lady first and foremost, so i allow her to swill red wine and recline on the white linen couch. she is not the kind to make a mess, although she does always leave a fine glitter behind. it coats my palms when i try to swipe it away. i cannot afford cleaners. the glitter stays.

ii. she is always cold. it makes her miss the sun, her torrid affair, but that was when she was young and still lovely, fresh, unspeckled. her marriage to the sea is so new that it stings at my skin when she talks about it. i am not here to make any judgments. i would regret it severely if i did. she makes sure that i know this.

iii. the sea is an alcoholic, no longer as beautiful as the moon remembers. she wonders why her wife cannot remain as pristine as she does, how she allows acid and humanity into the bite of her waves. i am paid to keep my mouth shut, so i do not tell her what is coming for her. she will know soon enough.

iv. she pays me in the stars, the most splendid and useless currency. i devote an entire desk drawer to their light, whisper that i am sorry when i have to shut them in. they have so much faith in her. they do not know what she does when she plucks them from the sky. they think that she will take them to a better place. i do my best to remember which is the drawer where i store the stars and which is the drawer where i store the staples. i am not perfect.

v. the moon is perfect. she spouts about the claustrophobia of grocery stores

and elevators and saturn’s rings. she wants me to relate to her. she wants me to feel that she is enough. she believes that i do. it’s what makes me so good at my job.

vi. she notices that i am extra humane to the water in my glass. she tells me i don’t have to be, that it is the dead kind, that i do not know the true insides of the clouds or the depths of the ocean, that i do not want to. i still sip at it carefully.

vii. the moon is not perfect. sometimes, flecks of spit leave her mouth, forming silvery insects that crawl along the walls of my office. if i had any other patients, they would be concerned. she makes sure i don’t have any other patients.

viii. she hates the scratching of my pen, tells me that i might as well get her words tattooed on my arm. i flinch to think about the way the ink would poison me if i did that, the way she would laugh at me in the next session.

ix. by the end of each appointment, i am greasy, slicked with the nasty guts of the sky. she tells me that by the time she is done with me, the night will eat from the palm of my hand. i believe her. i do not tell her that i am not certain that she is in charge of something like that.

x. i cross my fingers behind my back at every appointment. she does not notice, the narcissist, the moon. she flakes red lipstick on the edges of the wine glass, tells me the stories as if i do not create them. i do not tell her that she is not in charge.