From the Moon I Watched Her

by Emily English Medley

because he was my favorite, I whipped him hardest of all.

She was saying something very important. She was saving me.

I closed my eyes right then and there and took a snapshot in my mind of my parents being friends and decided to treasure up the memory of their hands touching and put it in my heart for later if I needed a memory to wrap myself up in, in case these good times didn’t last.

She also carried loneliness behind her brown doe eyes, but it wasn’t enough to spoil her beauty.

Katherine’s face was flat. Her eyes were dark, like an empty house. “Get out of here, Stephanie,” she said, almost whispering.

I fell off a horse and my baby died. Your father and sister have a special kind of love, but it’s not appropriate.

From the moon I watched her and it was what she wanted; her innocence floated away, up into the room, and then it seeped into the walls and cracks of the ceiling of The Rent House.

I felt the haunting window eyes as they eerily followed me home just a few houses away. They weren’t sad or even hopeful or vulnerable anymore. They were sinister and mean.