I go out walkin’ after midnight
Out in the starlight
Just hopin’ you may be
Somewhere a walkin’ after midnight
Searchin' for me
Patsy Cline songs pop into my head at opportune moments. Apparently the soundtrack to my life is sung by an old country singer from the 1950s. I’m not sure what to think about that.
The subconscious mind had noted it was about an hour and a half past midnight, and the song came to me, as though to announce it. I shined the flashlight onto the path to the water spigot. It was obscenely bright, like someone that shows up at the farmers market wearing Christmas red lipstick, while all the nude-faced hippies look on with their reed shopping bags handmade in Kenya on their arms. The full moon overhead managed that red lipstick far better. It was bright, yet diffused all over, so that the fat clouds blowing swiftly by it were gleaming silver, rather than blinding white.
I turned off the sprinklers and then the flashlight. The moon was elegant as can be, politely burning through the wisps of cloud washing across it. The fat but lovely cumulus clouds—the hallmark of summer—were across the way, letting the handle of the big dipper peak out. There was an almost eerie, but mostly calm moment where I was actually quite alone.
All the other humans were fast asleep inside their houses with their windows shut and their air conditioning on. It was just me and my two huntresses—the lab/pit mix and the plott hound/greyhound mix—and about 200 frogs.
My imagination began to run away with me. The black shadow of the black lab was at my feet, but I felt a larger shadow rising behind me. I felt it moving closer, silently. It was about a foot taller than me, and wider than me maybe—a commanding presence, with large capable arms. I stood there, waiting, with a silent agreement between us: If I do not move, the shadow does not pounce.
Without warning the black dog at my side zoomed off into the darkness. I heard both dogs wiz around the chicken coop. The chickens responded with a soft clucking for a few moments.
Now I am truly alone, I thought. Just me and the shadow.
So who makes the first move? Who breaks the treaty?
I stared at the moon, and it stared at me. There would be no shadows tonight without it.
I stepped forward. One step at a time, back to the light of the porch, and then cast a glance over my shoulder. Nothing was there. Moonlight makes a shadow, and it destroys it just as easily.
I win again, I said under my breath to all the creatures lurking in the darkness of my imagination. My huntresses zoomed up to the porch, pressing cold damp noses against my thighs.
I locked the door behind us and closed the shadows out.