The Moon Rises

The Circle was full of magic and monsters. Gigi
Monroe awoke with this fact forefront in her thoughts. She also woke with the
intention of avoiding all those monsters, yet she needed to work at The Moon
Rises – a club for monsters. Maybe cooking for the monsters would allow her to
hide in the kitchen. This was the plan anyway.

The interview that morning went all wrong though.
Silas, the club owner, didn’t want her to be a cook, but he offered her a deal.
She could work in the kitchen on the slow shifts, if she agreed to work as a
waitress on his busy nights.

No hiding from the monsters, no keeping her head
down. Maybe Gigi should have said no, but the rule in her mind commanded she
work at The Moon Rises. With no contingency plan for Silas’s offer, Gigi had to
guess the correct answer. Gigi wanted to cook like Mamma Celeste cooked. Most
of Gigi’s memories were lies, but the one about Mamma was most definitely real.
With this in mind, Gigi agreed to Silas’s deal.

With two hours before her first shift, Gigi sat
in her pretty apartment on the top floor of a pretty building called Sunset
Courts. Standing at the third story window, she stared down at the courtyard
below and noticed her neighbor reading a book while a dog chased butterflies
nearby. The witch must have felt Gigi’s eyes on her because she looked up and
waved. Gigi waved in return, knowing the witch’s name was Bethany and the dog
was Fred.

This information was real, unlike the memory of
Gigi moving into the apartment a few days earlier. This morning she had remembered
moving boxes into the apartment and placing pictures on the walls. Those
memories were gone though. Once her mind rejected the memories as lies, it
erased them.

The memory of her painting the walls a pretty
lavender was erased earlier in the day too. Gigi now just stared at the
relaxing color and wondered if the walls were always this color. Moving around
her apartment, Gigi noticed a checkbook, wallet, and keys on the kitchen
counter. Yesterday she remembered opening her bank account, remembered parking
her car, and remembered using the credit cards to buy her new furnishings.
Before her interview, Gigi was unable to remember if she had a car, so she
walked to the club. Also her checkbook showed an account with money, but she
didn’t know how to retrieve the money or where the bank was located.

Walking home from her interview, Gigi found a
pizza restaurant with an arcade inside. While waiting for her order, she
watched a boy play a game called Pac-Man. The yellow thing ate little glowing
balls and Gigi thought of her mind as a Pac-Man too. Gobbling up all the false
memories, her mind struggled to learn the truth, but instead left her with only
the real memories of the last two days. Too many important details were missing
because of her mind’s overzealous attempt to scrub away the lies.

The rules remained though.
Live in the Circle.
Work at The Moon Rises. Don’t get angry.
Hide.
Those were the four
big rules, the ones she remembered all the time, but others were hidden.
Triggers were hiding in her mind, just waiting to be activated.

Gigi stopped in front of a mirror and felt relief
to be correct about how she looked. Her appearance was a new memory and it was
real. She was still blonde, brown eyed, light skinned. Whether she was considered
tall or pretty or fat, Gigi couldn’t be sure. She didn’t have enough
information to compare with what she found in the mirror.

With an hour left before she needed to be at the
club, Gigi wanted to think about Mamma Celeste. She didn’t remember much, maybe
just the one memory, but the memory was vivid. Gigi suspected she was very
young in the memory which explained why, though vivid, it lacked context. Like
a snapshot, the memory remained detached from the rest of her life, but it
soothed nonetheless. Most importantly, unlike the memories of her blonde
mother, the one about Mamma Celeste could be remembered again and again without
her mind deleting it.

Gigi played a CD already in the stereo and smiled
as Nina Simone began to sing. Mamma Celeste loved Nina Simone. This was a fact,
as much as Gigi’s blonde hair or the dog’s name being Fred. Listening to the
music, she remembered shopping for the CDs. Then her mind latched onto the lie
and gobbled until it was gone.

Returning to the couch, Gigi closed her eyes and
let the music mold her thoughts. Mamma Celeste stood over Gigi. With a head
full of afro hair against flawless mocha skin and rich black eyes which smiled
when she sang, Celeste was beautiful and bright. Oh, how Mamma Celeste loved to
sing in the kitchen, her lean body shifting from foot to foot to the rhythm of
the music.

In the memory, Gigi sat on the floor and watched
as Mamma Celeste cut onions and many colors of peppers and fragrant tomatoes
from her garden. Once the food plopped into the big pot, Mamma Celeste smiled
down at Gigi. Wagging a finger, she said, “Don’t scratch, sunshine. Scratching
only makes it worse.”

Gigi opened her eyes, not remembering anything
more than she remembered this morning or yesterday. With less than hour left
before she had to serve food and drinks to monsters, Gigi moved to the bedroom
and again eyed her reflection.

Considering her new job, Gigi suspected Silas
wanted her to smile and shake her butt for the male monsters. She stood in
front of the mirror and smiled. The first smile was too happy - almost crazy
happy. She tried to smile softer, but the second one made her look cranky.
Turning around, she shook her butt at the mirror, not understanding why anyone
would want to see such a thing. Oh well, good thing she didn’t need the tips.

Gigi decided to leave on the jeans and pink shirt
she was wearing. The club provided uniforms and Gigi didn’t want to dirty too
many clothes. When she remembered doing laundry at her family’s home, her mind
descended upon the lie and devoured it. Gobble, gobble, and gone. Now she
couldn’t remember how to wash her clothes, but maybe she would ask Bethany for help.

The Moon Rises was located fifteen blocks from
Gigi’s apartment. This was something she learned from the driving directions
left on her counter next to the keys belonging to a car she couldn’t remember.
Gigi originally thought she printed out the directions from the computer in the
second bedroom, but her mind deleted the fake memory. Gobble, gobble, and gone
again.

Fifteen blocks wasn’t far and the weather was
nice. She thought maybe it was July, only because the calendar on the wall was
open to July. The day of her interview was circled and
Interview with Silas
at Nine AM
was written in a handwriting which might be hers. The memory of
writing the information was destroyed when she glanced at the calendar before
the interview though.

Leaving her apartment, Gigi didn’t lock the door
until she heard Bethany down the hall, locking hers from the inside. Yes,
locking the door was the right thing to do, Gigi realized. After a few minutes
trying to figure out how to lock her door, she pushed the keys into her pocket
and started downstairs.

Two blocks from the apartment was a small park
and Gigi stopped to look around on her way to the club. Several people were in
the park, reading and walking their pets. Gigi wasn’t sure if they were really
people though. Monsters were in the Circle, but she didn’t know how to spot
them. She also knew the place was full of magic, but she sensed nothing. Maybe
she couldn’t spot the magic any better than the monsters?

A man walking his dog stared at her while his big
dog yanked at the leash, trying to get to Gigi. Watching the dog, Gigi
remembered how her family owned a yellow lab too. The dog’s name was Butch and
he was a good dog who…gobble, gobble, gone. Suddenly Gigi was just staring at
the dog, wondering why she was staring at the dog.

Walking again, Gigi realized many of the people
she passed were staring at her. She wondered if she was dressed inappropriately
or doing something wrong. By the time she arrived at the club, Gigi wondered
why she wasn’t more nervous.

She didn’t know how to waitress, didn’t want to be
around monsters, and was pretty sure Silas wasn’t human. Maybe her brain
deleted too much information because she couldn’t scare herself over the
prospect of an evening surrounded by dangerous creatures.

Approaching her, Silas looked relieved to see Gigi.
A large foreboding male with wide shoulders, thick muscles, a head full of
brown hair, and eyes dark like the night, he was scary until he smiled.