Moon Dollars

(Speculative Fiction) "On their way out of the shop, Jane and Bob paused to gaze over the cliffside at the full moon, its light reflected on the surface of the water."

“Moon at Night” by Jon Sullivan

Stan’s repair shop occupied the far south corner of Main Street in the small coastal town of Shore Cliff. The other storefronts were empty, abandoned one by one as the cliffside crumbled slowly into the Pacific.

The sign above the awning on Stan’s shop said “Sew & Vac,” but the locals knew Stan was handy and brought him all sorts of failures of mechanical engineering. There were no curtains, but the windows were completely blocked by piles of hoarded appliances and scrap. On this evening, Bob Hill had brought in his busted leaf blower for evaluation.

“What would you do if you had all the money in the world Bob?” Stan located his screwdriver among the mess of tools on the counter and began refastening the plastic housing of Bob’s leaf blower.

Bob crossed his arms. “I’d probably buy property. Somewhere far away from the cliffs.”

“I don’t mean what would you buy, Bob. I mean what would you do? What would you do with all that time the money would buy you?”

Bob sighed. “You know you got to give this place up soon. Forget about money. Come stay with your family. Please?”

Stan ignored him. “If I had the money, I’d give this place wings, Bob! Then I’d go to the moon. If I only had the money!”

Stan finished tightening the last screw, then looked up at Bob. “I can fix the leaf blower, but it’s going to cost you more than it would cost to get a new one,” Stan removed his glasses and rubbed his eyes, dry and red from the hours he spent soldering.

At the other end of the shop, the door opened as the bell chimed and a strong gust of wind blew Jane inside. She squeezed through the narrow aisle, holding her arms in tight to her body to avoid catching her coat on the rusty hoard.

“Jane!” Stan put his arm on Bob’s shoulder and grinned a matchmaker’s grin. “Sweetheart, have you met Bob Hill? Bob, this is my daughter.”

“Yes, Dad.” Jane put her arm around Bob and kissed him on the cheek. “Bob and I have been married for three years, remember?” Jane frowned.

Stan squinted at the pair of them, his eyes cloudy and dark.“Yes, of course I remember.” he put his glasses back on and cleared his throat. “Well, I’ll fix the leaf blower for free, then.”

“Don’t worry about it, Stan. I’ll just throw it away,” said Bob.

“If you aren’t going to use it, I’ll hold on to it. For parts.”

“Dad, you can’t,” Jane gestured to the hoarded appliances engulfing the room.

“Of course, I can,” he raised his bushy grey eyebrows “How else do you expect me to give this place wings?”

“Not this again,” Bob rubbed his temples with his thumb and forefinger.

“If I only had the money,” said Stan, “I could get this place off the ground, and I’d be on my way straight to the moon!” he laughed.

Jane and Bob looked at each other. Outside, lightening flashed. They waited for the sound of thunder.

“Dad, they say there’s a risk of another landslide. I don’t want anything to happen to you.”

“I’m not leaving.”

“Dad—”

“I’m not leaving,” repeated Stan, “without my shop.”

On their way out, Jane and Bob paused to gaze over the cliffside at the full moon, its light reflected on the surface of the water. Dark, fast moving storm clouds passed over the glowing orb. Below, the roaring waves crashed against the crumbling rock, and at the very edge of the peninsula a stream of sand descended the cliffside like a waterfall.

Three days later, Jane peered out the rain speckled window of the Aurora Hotel, past the lush green lawn, and over the rows of multi-colored Victorian homes on the hillside. She could see the first row of shops in Old Shore Cliff, but she couldn’t see Main Street.

“I’m going to call the shop.”

Bob handed Jane a cup of hot coffee. “Good idea,” he said.

Jane dialed the number on the hotel phone and waited. “It just keeps ringing,” she said.

“Maybe he’s not there,” Bob wrapped his arms around Jane and kissed her forehead.

“Doesn’t he understand he could die? Why won’t he just come home with us?” Jane hung up the phone and began to cry quietly. “Why won’t he let us help him?”

“Hey, it’s okay. Listen, he’ll come around. I bet you anything he’s at the bank.”

“Why do you think that?”

“I wrote him a check for $25,000.”

“You did what?”

“He won’t leave the shop because that’s his livelihood, Jane, and he won’t stop working because he owes the bank money on that property whether it falls into the ocean or not.”

“You drained our emergency fund?”

“Isn’t this an emergency?”

Harsh rain battered Stan’s shop as he worked. The power lines were down, but the fresh batteries in his headlamp provided plenty of light to work by. The roar of the waves penetrated the poorly insulated windows, and the heavy rain made its way through the cracks in the ceiling. A low rumble broke his concentration, and he watched through the small window in the shop door as the ground beneath a large boulder on the cliffside fell away and the giant rock tumbled down the ravine into the sea. A bolt of lightning flashed, and the thunder clapped quickly after.

Jane heard the rumble and the clap from the hotel on the hill. “Maybe we should go down there,” she said.

A siren wailed at the town center.

“What does that mean?” asked Bob.

“Flash flood.”

“Maybe we should call the police.”

The power went out.

Jane took out her mobile phone and called the non-emergency line.

“We’re sorry. The number you have dialed is not in service,” a recording said.

She called 911.

“We’re sorry. The number you have dialed is not in service.”

“The phone lines are down.”

“I’m going to look for Dad.” Jane opened the armoire and grabbed her rain jacket.

Bob grabbed her hand and pulled her in close to him. “Wait,” he said. He ran his hand over her forehead and brushed her hair out of her eyes. “It’s stupid I didn’t ask about the money.” He tried to kiss her, but she turned away. “I didn’t know what else to do.”

“Money can’t fix everything,” Jane broke away, picked up Bob’s raincoat and handed it to him, "but if he’s at the bank right now I’m going to kiss you.”

Water poured down the streets, washing the town in mud. Tree branches nested around parked cars. As the pair descended toward main street, onlookers waved them in the opposite direction.

“Go to the community center!” they shouted. But Jane and Bob didn’t listen. As they approached Main Street and held Stan’s Sew & Vac in their sight, a deep rumble rocked the ground.

“Dad!” Jane shrieked and watched in horror as the concrete surrounding the Sew & Vac cracked and the land rapidly eroded and tumbled piece by piece off the ledge and into the waves.

Then a flickering light illuminated the window.

“It’s going up in flames!” Bob shouted.

But as they looked on, an enormous balloon rose from behind the Sew & Vac and floated into the sky above, buoying the shop as the ground below fell away. The surrounding buildings disappeared down the cliffside and revealed the outer walls of the Sew & Vac had been mounted wall to wall with leaf blowers and vacuums at various angles.

Stan peaked his head out of the rooftop and waved. “Jane!” he shouted, “thanks for the loan! Bought me a little time to finish this thing! I’ll pay you back, I promise!” and he pulled a lever that tripped a network of recoil starters on the army of gas-powered leaf blowers before ducking his head back into the vessel.

The fire within the widows roared and Jane and Bob watched in shock as the Sew & Vac discarded its foundation and ascended, revealing a large propeller attached to the underside of the shop.

“Where do you think he’s going to land that thing?” asked Bob.

Jane gawked as the Sew & Vac took wing. “I don’t know,” she whispered. “Maybe the moon.”

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