Pack Up the Moon by Anna McPartlin Page A

they’re
    called lunatics.”
    I was pleased with my argument but he laughed. “I’m serious, Noel. Do you ever worry that you’re
    wasting your life on someone who doesn’t even exist?” He stopped smiling and became pensive. I wished he
    would just pick a fight, but he wouldn’t.
    “My job is to help people. How can that be a waste of my life? God’s in all of us, Em.”
    Was he trying to convince himself or me? I thought about it for a minute.
    “You’re such a sap, Noel.”
    “Indeed,” he agreed.
    “I better go.”
    He waved while I attempted to stand on brokens knees.
    I sat in the empty church for a while, looking around
    me. Religious statues lined the walls, the Virgin and
    Child being the most prominent. I looked towards the
    marble altar surrounded by golden gates. The stained glass
    window depicted Jesus, bloody and dying, his mother at
    his torn feet, looking desperately toward heaven, and I
     
    took a moment to appreciate its macabre beauty
    A long time after that, Noel reminded me of that day and admitted that while I was enjoying the view he was
    inside his little box crying.

Chapter 11
    Ron the Ride
     
    Sean was staying over in the spare room a lot, especially since Christmas.
    Anne noticed.
    “So what’s going on?” she asked casually over coffee in a packed coffee shop.
    “Nothing,” I replied.
    She didn’t accept “nothing”, believing Sein’s visits were more to do with me than with transport difficulties. I didn’t want to talk about it.
    “How long has it been, Em?”
    I was confused. “How long has what been?” I asked, pissed off. I really just wanted to have a cup of coffee.
    “How long has it been since you’ve had sex?” She whispered the “sex” bit.
    I thought to myself, I’ll pretend not to hear her, but I knew she’d scream the word if she had to.
    “Does it matter?” I asked.
     
    “Yes,” she replied.
    I sighed at her the way I sighed at my students. She was aware but didn’t care, as she felt the matter had to be addressed. It was just over ten months since John had gone, so therefore it seemed to me that it was obvious I hadn’t slept with someone in over ten months.
    “Since John, of course,” I answered, irritated that I had to state it. “Ten months!’
    “Ten months, Ern!”
     
    “So?”
    “Em,” she said seriously, “you turned twenty-seven years old in October.”
    “You promised you would ignore my birthday,” I moaned, trying to change the subject. I had spent my birthday pretty much the same way I had spent Christmas, under my duvet. I began to wish I was still there.
    “And I did ignore it,” she said, shaking her head from side to side.
    “That includes not mentioning it and besides you sent
    flowers,” I argued.
    “You’re changing the subject:’
    “So, what are you saying?” came my weary reply.
    “So, he’s not coming back.” She sounded a little sad, as though saying it made John’s disappearance a little more
    real.
    “I know,” I agreed.
     
    “Maybe you should try to get out there.” She was smiling
    at me, like that would make her advice easier to take. “Get out there! You think just because it’s a new year
    I should forget him?” I said in disbelief.
    “No, of course not — nobody is forgetting what you
    and John had. But — I know this sounds harsh — he’s gone and he’s not coming back and you are twenty-seven and
    alone and we all —”
    “Who are ‘we’?” I asked, annoyed.
    She didn’t answer quickly enough.
    “You were talking about this behind my back!” I said. Her smile faded. I almost heard her think, Oh shit! “Who’s ‘we’, Anne?”
    She thought for a minute before answering. “Richard, Clo and Sean,” she blurted out.
    My mouth fell open. “Oh my God! You had a fucking conference.”
    She was fumbling for words now. “That is not the case and you know it. We’re just worried!’
    It was obvious to me that these people had fuck all to
    worry about if the big