Moonlight Magic: Moon Songs, #1

By Judy Lunsford

Mr. Dowd disapproved of the girl who moved in across the street. But he knew she was his responsibility.

Annabel Lee, the black cat, took on Oscar, sweet little dog from across the street to teach him to become a familiar.

In this magical fantasy, one wonders who's teaching who? And why?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Judy Lunsford
• Release date: Feb 1, 2021
• ISBN: 9781393651482

Judy Lunsford

Born and raised in California, Judy now lives in Arizona with her husband and Giant Schnoodle. Judy writes with dyslexia and a chronic illness & is a breast cancer survivor. She writes mostly fantasy, but delves into suspense, horror, romance, and poetry. She has written books and short stories for all ages. You can find her books and short stories at your favorite online retailers.

Book preview

Chapter 1, Mr. Dowd

Stewart Dowd opened his eyes and immediately squinted at the morning light that was already streaming in through his window. He had forgotten to close the shade again last night.

He shut his eyes, hoping for a few more minutes of sleep. He hunkered down beneath the warm blankets and tried to return to the dream he had been having.

It was a nice dream. His wife was still with him. Still alive. And he was still happy. She had been cooking him breakfast, and the smell of coffee and bacon had been so real and pleasant and comforting. She had been softly singing a song that he couldn’t quite remember anymore. Her voice drifted off in his memory and the dream slowly faded like mist in the sunlight.

He opened his eyes again. There was no smell of bacon. No coffee. Just the smell of the stale icy hot gel he had applied to his sore shoulder the night before.

There was a loud roar of an engine out front. The grind and bang of a trash can being emptied into the large brown garbage truck, and the bang of the plastic can being dropped out of the monstrous arms of the truck to the ground. Then the annoying beeping of the truck as it had to back up to get out of his tiny cul de sac, tires crunching loudly on the gravel road, in order to move on to the next street.

He groaned and pushed himself to a sitting position. He slowly let his sore joints start to move and creak. Each joint told him it was awake with a sharp pain as he swung his feet over the side of the bed.

He slipped his old brown slippers onto his feet. They were tattered and frayed. He knew he would need them replaced, but they had been a gift from his wife. She gave them to him years ago, when he had been complaining about the cold floors beneath his bare feet in the mornings.

She had gone grocery shopping one day and had stopped along the way to buy him new slippers to keep his feet warm. When they were new, they were soft, supple brown leather. With faux beige colored fur, fluffy and warm on the inside. He had put them on for the first time, with her watching. He behaved totally ungrateful for her effort, and told her that they weren’t his style. Too fluffy for a man’s slipper.

But oh, how soft they had been as he slipped them on that first time. It felt like he was walking on clouds. His feet felt warm and protected against the cold floors that covered most of their little house.

He wore them, grumping the whole day about how she had wasted money on them.

She had just smiled her wry smile. She knew he liked them, despite his grumping, and was happy that his feet were now warm against the cold winter floors.

The next morning, he had worn them out to the kitchen, as she had been making breakfast, and he gave her a kiss on the cheek as he passed. His way of saying thank you, without having to use the actual words.

But now, years later, the slippers were old and worn. The once soft fluff had been flattened down into nothing but a packed solid mass that could no longer be discerned as fluff at all. The leather was worn and the slippers smelled like old feet. But he wore them nonetheless. They were a gift from her.

He reached over to his bedside table and grabbed his glasses. The lenses were smudged and desperately needed a good cleaning, but he had more important things on his mind. He put his glasses on and padded out to the kitchen.

He put a filter in the old coffee maker and opened the top of the coffee container. He frowned at how little was still in there and checked his cupboard for a new one. There was none to be found.

He walked over to the refrigerator to the magnetic pad that said Shopping List in a pretty script across the top and scrawled coffee at the top of the list.

He went back over to the coffee maker and poured the last of the coffee into the filter and then filled the pot with water.

As he waited, he walked over to the little stainless-steel bowl that sat on the floor in the corner of the kitchen. He picked it up and put it in the dishwasher. Chiding himself as he did so about the fact that he forgot to turn on the machine the night before. He had obviously thought about it because the overloaded machine already had a little packet of dishwashing soap tucked into the pocket on the door with the lid flipped shut.

He shut the dishwasher and turned it on.

He heard the bang of the flap of the doggie door and the tiny click-click-click of toenails on the tile behind him as he reached into the cupboard for a clean stainless-steel bowl.

So, you finally decided to grace me with your presence, Mr. Dowd said.

He turned and looked behind him. A small Cairn terrier sat behind him on the floor, licking his mouth and giving a sleepy yawn.

Mr. Dowd filled the little steel bowl with fresh water and set it back down on the floor for the little dog.

He watched as the dog click-clicked his way over to the bowl and drank heartily.

He remembered when his wife had come home with the dog. A little brindle wiggling mass of fur that yipped noisily and licked everything it came in contact with. The dog had fallen in love with his wife the moment she had laid eyes on him. 

Mr. Dowd couldn’t blame the little dog, for he had done the same thing. Her sweet smile and gentle demeanor charmed everyone she came across.

She had fallen in love with the little dog too. She had gotten him from a man in front of a grocery store who had been selling puppies out of the back of his car. He was loading his car with his folding chair as Mrs. Dowd approached. He had one puppy left, it was the runt of the litter. The man, convinced he couldn’t sell the runt, gave her the pup for free. He left the empty cardboard box on the ground in front of the store and jumped into his car and drove off before she really had a chance to think about it. So, she brought the little dog home with her.

Mr. Dowd hadn’t wanted a dog, but he could see that it would have broken his wife’s heart if he had continued to insist that she take it to the pound.

And Mr. Dowd relented. He conceded to share his living space with Sir Felix Snugglekins Licky-Lick. He refused to use the name his wife had given the dog, and just started calling him Oscar, because the little puppy left a mess behind him wherever he went.

Oscar had since grown out of his messy ways, for the most part. The dog was aging himself, and the two had grudgingly become best friends since Mrs. Dowd had passed. 

Mr. Dowd walked over to the pantry and pulled out a small bag of dog food. He got a second steel bowl and poured some kibble into it and put it on the floor for the small dog.

Oscar sniffed at the food and then sat down next to the bowl and stared at Mr. Dowd.

I keep telling you, I am not going to cook for you like she did, Mr. Dowd said to the little dog.

He went over to the pantry to replace the dog food bag on its shelf and then went back over to the coffee maker. He cursed quietly to himself as he realized that he had forgotten to turn the coffee maker on. He pressed the button to start it up and walked over to the front window to look outside.

Oscar gave up waiting and proceeded to eat his kibble since he had lost his owner’s attention.

Mr. Dowd peered out the front window and frowned. A young woman had bought the house across the street about six months prior and Mr. Dowd did not approve of the changes she had been making to the front of her house.

Mr. Dowd did not approve of her.

She was one of those weird girls, as he called them. The ones who wear all black and wear black lipstick. He couldn’t understand why anyone would think that black lipstick was good for anything but Halloween. And he didn’t even care for Halloween. If he had his way, he would keep the lights off and not answer the door when the children came knocking. But Mrs. Dowd had always decorated the front porch and left the lights blazing, in hopes of children arriving to Trick or Treat. The neighborhood children steered clear of Mr. Dowd as much as they could, and Mr. Dowd liked it that way. He didn’t care for children. They were noisy and sticky and asked far too many questions for his taste. But Mrs. Dowd always had a soft spot for children and they came to see her by the dozens.

He knew that this year, it would be quiet at his house for Halloween.

He squinted out the window and saw that she had added what looked like cauldrons to her front porch and had jasmine climbing up out of them and was training them to wrap around the posts for the cover above her porch. 

He didn’t mind the jasmine, in fact, he thought the jasmine smelled quite pleasant when the wind blew his direction. But he thought the cauldrons were ridiculous. It wasn’t even Halloween yet. It wasn’t even quite October yet. He frowned as he squinted his eyes to see the cauldrons better. But they were too far away to see what they were made of.

Mr. Dowd grumbled to himself and shuffled in his slippers back into the kitchen. He looked at the mugs in the cupboard. His favorite mug was in the dishwasher. He loved to use his wife’s mug. The sky blue one with bright, smiling sunflowers on it. It had a small chip in the handle from when he accidentally knocked it against the counter one day while emptying the dishwasher.

He remembered her humming as she went about her mornings, always with her sunflower mug in one hand. It had been her favorite, so he used it every morning to keep a part of her in his day. At least on the mornings when it was clean.

He stared at the mugs that remained in the cupboard. The mugs he didn’t use very often. He grabbed the one that said World’s Greatest Dad in blue scrawl with painted pictures of rainbows and a hammer on it. His son had painted it at camp one summer when he was young. It sat in the back of the cupboard, mostly unused. But Mr. Dowd used the mug more often than his son came to visit or called.

He poured coffee into the mug and wandered back over to the front window and sat down in his chair that faced looking out. His wife’s chair sat across from his. They had sat in those two chairs every morning to look out the front window and would talk about the upcoming day. 

Oscar ran over and hopped up into his wife’s chair and laid down, curled up in a ball with his tail tucked. He settled in for his morning nap. He used to nap in his wife’s lap when they sat there. She sipped her coffee and absently pet the dog while she talked.

He sighed and took a sip of his coffee in the silence. 

What do you think of the new neighbor? he asked Oscar.

Oscar opened one eye to look at him and then closed it again and sighed.

I agree, Mr. Dowd nodded. She’s going to be a problem. She and those cauldrons.

Chapter 2, Annabel Lee

Annabel Lee slinked out the cat door and stretched in the morning sunrise. She had gone in to check on the girl, but she was still asleep.

Normally, Annabel Lee would make her way up onto the bed and wake the girl up with a swat to the face, or just a cuddle that was a bit too close. But this morning, it was early and the cat wanted a few moments to enjoy the breaking of the new day in silence.

She jumped up onto her favorite bench that sat in front of the dark window up on the porch. The girl had put some comfy cushions and pillows on the bench, for Annabel Lee’s comfort of course. She stretched out across her favorite one. Annabel Lee flicked her tail and watched the garden shift from the moon garden, which was alive and talkative at night, to the sleepy day garden that was peaceful and bathed their days away in the sun.

The small dog across the street was out front and barking at her. She could see the dog fairly well from her vantage point, despite the two fences and all of the plants in each garden.

The yappy thing ran back and forth across the grass to let her know in his toughest tone that he was the master of his domain.

Annabel Lee blinked at him and swished her tail. She was unconcerned with his threats and wished he would go inside so she could enjoy the silence of the morning.

As if he heard her thoughts, the little dog ran inside through his little dog door around the back of the house, and left her in peace.

Up in the bat house in the corner of the yard, Annabel Lee heard movement as Elvira shifted a bit in her sleep. She wouldn’t see her bat friend until tonight. Which was fine with her, because as much as she enjoyed Elvira’s company, she was a bit annoying. Especially in the quiet moments that Annabel Lee liked to enjoy.

The cat’s attention was turned to the bright red trumpet creepers that were at one end of the yard. Little green hummingbirds were zipping in and out of the nectar filled flowers. Normally this would pique Annabel Lee’s curiosity, but today, she was content to lay in the golden morning light and take in the garden as a whole. And watch for the annoying little dog to come back outside.

She and the dog had a developing relationship. He would bark, and she would ignore him. This seemed to irritate him more. So, Annabel Lee had been working on moving