la luna

How big is the moon? Alethea asked her mother.

The moon is so big, her mother replied, that it takes two hands to hold it. Even then you can’t really hold it all— it leaks out all over you and makes your forearms sticky. Like when you eat cantaloupe.

Alethea looked at her mother. She loved cantaloupe.

Can you swim in the stars? she asked.

Yes, you can swim; it’s best to keep your eyes open.

Alethea shut her eyes and then opened them again, as wide as she could. I can keep my eyes open.

Will you walk around the earth with me, on all the land parts? she asked.

I will walk with you, wherever you want to go, her mother told her.

Alethea walked down the hall without her mother and into the library where her grandfather sat in an old leather chair, smoking his pipe.

What are these? Alethea asked, pointing to the seeds he’d scraped out of the half-cantaloupe sitting on a plate on his desk.

Those seeds make baby melons that grow and grow until they are ready to be eaten.

Do people have seeds? She asked.

People have half a seed, her grandfather answered, they spend many years trying to find the other half. It takes sex to make a whole person seed.

Alethea wrinkled her nose, disappointed to find out that she only had half a seed. She decided to count the cantaloupe’s seeds.

How many people would it take to make 3-4-5-3-2 seeds? she asked grandfather.

They spent the afternoon talking about multiplication and division.