Free Magic Moon by Paisley Grey

Magic Moon

    My mother always told me I was conceived under a blood-red moon, a magic moon. I don’t know what that means, and she never explained it other than to say it was something that happened every few years. What I really think is that she had sex with a man she didn’t know and I was the result of that blessed union. I think she always felt bad that I was a girl without a daddy, but if I’d had a daddy, he most likely would have been some drunken, unemployed lout lying in front of the television, shouting for another beer.
    You can’t miss what you never had, that’s what I always say. And I grew up all fine and dandy, thank you very much. In this part of southern Georgia, I went barefoot most of my life, and if I didn’t feel like goin’ to school, I didn’t. But now that I’m a young woman working at Winn-Dixie for minimum wage, I sometimes wonder if I should have paid more attention to my schoolwork. But I’m a free spirit just like my ma and gram, and I don’t take work home with me like some people do. And whenever I need to make a little extra cash, I tell fortunes. Not like regular fortunes. Not with cards or leaves. I hold the person’s hands and look deep into their eyes, and I can see stuff there. Like what they’ve done, and what they will do. So maybe my ma was right. Maybe I was born under a magic moon. But a magic moon doesn’t keep me from working minimum wage at Winn-Dixie.
    I’d just finished the late shift and was walking home to my trailer on the edge of town when a peculiar and unexplainable unease settled over me. The night was oddly dark, with hardly a star in the sky, and the air felt so heavy it was almost like being underwater. Cicadas sang, and the fireflies… I’d never seen so many, and they seemed to hover on both sides of the road, almost like they were leading me home. I rounded a bend and saw lights in the distance, and heard music. And as I got closer, I saw a Ferris wheel turning.
    A carnival had come to town and nobody had told me. I didn’t recall anybody talking about it, and didn’t recall seeing any signs near the automatic doors at the grocery store. But here it was, in all its glory.
    I stepped through the gates, and kind of floated past the lights, all colors, shiny and swirling. I’m good with a gun, so I put down money to shoot targets of smiling clowns. I missed, and I knew the sights had to be set wrong because I would never have missed a shot like that.
    “Here. Let me try.” I looked to my left, and there was a young man with curly blond hair. He was the handsomest guy I’d ever seen in my life, and something about him looked familiar. He took the gun from my hands, aimed at the clowns, and hit all three dead center. He won a big stuffed elephant. “Here.” He handed it to me, and I took it. I don’t know why, because normally I wouldn’t have accepted a gift from a complete stranger. But he didn’t seem like a stranger.
    “Would you like to ride the Ferris wheel?” he asked.
    I looked past him, to where the enclosed cages were turning against the black sky. I put my hand in his. We left the elephant with the carnie who pulled the lever that made the Ferris wheel turn, and once we were locked in the cage, the beautiful young man produced a flower from his pocket and handed it to me. A red daisy.
    I took a sniff, and my head seemed to expand and I felt liquid heat run through my veins, all the way to my toes and fingertips. The cage moved skyward, up and up, finally coming to a stop at the peak. I continued to hold the flower to my nose, inhaling as if I’d never get enough.
    The boy knelt in front of me, the cage rocking. He reached under my work dress and pulled down my panties. I spread my legs for him, and he slipped his hands under my buttocks, and lowered his head…
    I moaned and had an orgasm right there with him between my knees. He stood, and while the cage rocked, I unbuttoned and unzipped his pants, pulling his jeans to his