My crew was scared away by the same thing as my sanity, by something lurking on the moon.

 

Now that I’ve been accidentally abandoned here, stuck in a crater I fell into, I’m not sure what haunted us. Or if what I’m seeing at this moment is real.

 

A little old man peers down at me from the top of the crater. He has a bundle of sticks tied to his back.

 

“Can I help you, sunshine?” His voice cracks, revealing his gruff British accent. It reminds me of my British great-uncle Ian. The Moonman is bald, with a long thin beard.

 

“I’m not sure.”

 

“Oh. Ok. Onwards you go.”

 

“Wait,” I say, and get up, bounding out of the crater with a few leaps.

 

On the flatter surface, I watch the strange man trundle away, without a care on the moon.

 

“Who are you? How are you able to breathe without a suit?”

 

He looks back at me with a scowl. “Never liked a suit. They’re for toffs.”

 

I nod, rapidly blinking.

 

He hobbles on. I follow. “What are you doing?”

 

“Oh, just going on my walk,” he says, “Although I may need one of these.” He takes a stick and then walks with it.

 

“Have I gone mad?”

 

The man stops again. He narrows his eyes. He looks at me, with a slithery slip of a smile.

 

“Now why would you say that?”

 

“Because you can’t be real.”

 

“That’s just cruel.”

 

“How is that cruel?”

 

“Well squire, do I reject your reality? I could be more real than you, and you wouldn’t even know.”

 

“Sorry sir, I didn’t think.”

 

“No, you Astro-nuts don’t. That’s why you keep shooting your rubbish in here. In my home. In my face. Ruddy nuisance.” he says, shaking his stick above his head.

 

“Your home?”

 

“Yeah.”

 

“How long have you been here?” I ask as I feel myself sweat.

 

“Oh, a while.”

 

“A while?”

 

“Long enough...” The old man grew wistful. “...to begin to tire of my own company.”

 

“I don’t follow.”

 

“You wouldn’t.”

 

“Well, I’ll let you off.” He holds out his hand. “My name, lad, is Mr. Cane.”

 

I shook it. “Bob. Bob Lewis.”

 

“You. When you were down there, did you admire the moon much?”

 

I pause before I answer. “Ever since I was a kid.”

 

“I bet you saw it. Silver and blinking. Made you want to reach out and taste it.”

 

“Something like that.”

 

“And what after? When you return? Do you think you will ever be the same?”

 

I think about it. I knew of ex-astronauts who had never lost the spectre of the moon. It had eaten up the rest of their lives. Some became celebrities. Some created art. Some had even turned to religion. But nothing could eclipse the moonlight from their eyes.

“No.” I say quietly, “No, I wouldn’t say so, sir.”

 

Mr Cane nods, and then he says, “You know, I don’t show myself for just anyone. But don’t think that makes you special. It just means you’re lucky.”

 

“I don’t understand.”

 

“I use this incarnation to wander. And sometimes I extend my light on the Earth to whisper in folks’ dreams. Lift their hearts. So I can one day lead them here. Maybe it’s because I’m lonely. Maybe it’s because I want their minds.”

 

“What?”

 

“You will never be free of me. No one ever is. After this day, there will always be me. My mind has gone. By taking other minds, I may reclaim mine. By taking people’s sanity, I may finally be sane. But once I have taken my fill of sanity and replaced theirs with madness, they leave. But you won’t go, will you? You won’t leave me?”

 

I don’t reply, avoiding eye contact.

 

“Tell me you’ll stay?” His eyes shine silver.

 

Suddenly, impossibly, I knew. I don’t know how. This is not the Man in the Moon. This is the moon.

 

With deep breaths, I say, “The form you take now. It’s a projection, isn’t it? Inspired by folklore. And all these people whose minds you steal to regain your sanity, will it ever end?”

 

But to that, the man only laughs maliciously.

 

“But why show yourself to me at all?”

 

The Moonman’s smile makes me shiver, “It’s good to meet my prey. Like reading a menu before the meal. Also, food is often not so close, walking on my surface. Good to make the most of it, I reckon.”

 

I tell him, “If I can’t stop you, others will. No more lunar lunacy. And maybe we could mend you.”

 

“Impossible!” the man spat.

 

I look at him, heart racing, lump in my throat. “You will let me leave, won’t you?”

 

The man scowls at me. He drops his sticks. He grabs my arms. He growls and throws me into space.

 

I float in space, staring at the moon. The moon now turns, and I see its face, angry, craggy and hungry. I fall into it like a rocket, into its eye.

 

* * *

 

“Bob. I say, Bob,” a woman's voice summons me from the dark.

 

I open my eyes. I sit up, cans clinking around me on the deckchair.

 

It is night, and the moon shines wildly.

 

I look up into my wife's eyes, croaking one word in horror. “Moon.”

 

“You’re not going on about that moon flight again, are you? That was decades ago. Now come inside, it’s time for your head pills.”

 

I nod dumbly, and my wife goes inside the house.

I stare up at the moon. I try to sit up, but I can’t. It doesn’t help that as I look up I see him wink.