Hi Irene:

I hope you are well. I know that you left a message wanting to know when we arranged tour guides. I’m answering you late because one guide has not yet gotten back to us. So, here’s the best information I can give you, at this point.

Quimby and I would like to pay for two days of touring. One has already been scheduled and paid for. It’s for our boys to go to Vallis Bohr and the Bohr Crater. The tour guide will pick them up at your cube and drop them back off very late in the day. He will make sure they hydrate at appropriate times and will otherwise take good care of them.

Quimby used him when he and Jasper, four summers ago, toured some of the moon’s seas; Mare Frigoris, Mare Anguis, Mare Imbrium, and Mare Tanquilitatis. Please reserve that date for the boys.

We would also very much like to arrange another day of touring. We want a guide to take the boys among some of the smaller basaltic plains, including, but not limited to: Lacus Spei, Lacus Veris, and Lacus Oblivianis. To wit, we have been messaging a second company, daily, and asking them to commit to a date. So far, we haven’t gotten a direct answer.

As far as your friend, the tour guide, goes, I tried to reach her several times and finally talked to her husband, who told me she’d call back. I haven’t heard from her. I doubt it maters if we hire her or a different lunar denizen.

Anyway, I’ll get those two trips arranged. I think that’s sufficient.

I hope the dates I picked out are OK for you. If not, please let us know immediately. Lunar tour guides are extremely expensive.

I am sorry if we’ve inconvenienced you at all. I’ll send you those things you requested on one of the shuttles lifting before the eclipse.

Please see to it that the boys tour Lunar City during some of the less structured days of Reese’s visit. I want him to have as full of an experience of the moon as possible.

I will contact you as soon as we hear the second tour’s date. Please buzz me if there is any part of this communication that you don’t understand. Earth memos can be a bit confusing.

Ta. We’re off to Key Largo for the weekend.

Be Well,

Cathy

***

Cathy:

I marked off the tour dates. I prefer that our boys, if possible, journey during the day as the nights here get pretty cold. Also, that way, Justin can take care of his solar panel responsibilities on schedule.

We are looking forward to Reese’s visit. His ship should land soon. I hope you packed plenty of sun screen, a helmet, star charts, and a canteen. All of that equipment is necessary when tourists get lost. He was always a very “enterprising” boy during Earth-based excursions.

Irene

***

Hi Irene:

Nice to receive your message!

OK-so the basaltic basin tour is set. I sent Reese a message that wandering off from the group, on the moon, can be lethal. He might listen to reason if sufficiently drugged. Do you still have your emergency supply of benzodiazepines?

I am sure that he won’t need them, except for when he and Justin are checking out Lunar City’s tourist attractions.

Bye for Now,

Cathy

***

Cathy:

The basaltic basins tour sounds great! Please keep in mind that our insurance does NOT cover kids who separate themselves from their tour guides. Space radiation is the least of his worries if he gets “misplaced.” Did you reserve an extra cemetery plot, just in case, or do you want us to inter him, here, should the need arise? If the latter, please wire funds and we’ll put them in escrow.

Also, please send me the guides’ contact info. Was the first guide the one that Quimby used?

Regardless, do both guides know that Reese holds by the Aztec pantheon and as such requires daily human sacrifices?

Irene

***

Hi Irene:

I asked Quimby to get their contact data for you. They have been told of Reese’s spiritual practices. Each of them has already sent an invoice to us for their acquiring and preparing the necessary sacrifices. They refuse, though, to be responsible for cleanup. Might you guys do us that favor?

I’m glad you recommended touring by daylight. I always forget that Reese surges under the sun, but shrinks in the dark. Surely, he’d get lost if he was on tour during his miniaturized phase.

Cathy

***

Cathy:

Reese ought to be authorized to buy two heavy duty spacesuits. The boys will be traveling over rough terrain. Asphyxiation, due to spacesuit leaks, is a horrible death.

Irene

***

Hi Irene:

OK, thanks, I’ll take care of that. Please discourage him from buying mummified alien remains. We have no more room for any new collections.

Anyway, are you sure you want me to ship earthworms? They’re unlikely to help you improve lunar soil. As for the marshmallow fluff, I can send it, but I can’t believe you bothered to take your pet hedgehogs with you.

Was there anything else you wanted?

Quimby and I are packing for our next freshening. We’re headed to the Bahamas.

Thanks, again, for watching Reese.

Love,

Cathy

***

Cathy:

How was your trip?

We are looking forward to hosting Reese. Please send me, stat, the names and contact information of the guides you hired-we still haven’t received them and Reese’s rocket is due here within a fortnight. You know, there are malicious pedophiles among the lunar population.

What’s more, some of our friends expressed concern that some of the places on the guides’ itineraries are on the dark side. I think we should postpone the touring of certain of the basaltic depths until Reese acclimates and until Justin receives his license to carry.

Perhaps, instead, they could visit some massifs. Given their altitudes, peaks are almost always illuminated.

Yes, cheap-o marshmallow fluff is really lacking here. Please send it. I don’t like it that our hedgehogs are eating indigenous creepy crawlies. I worry about their digestive systems.

Keep in touch. Pass my regards around the old community.

Irene

***

Hi Irene:

I can ask the guides to wait half of a year. After all, you will have Reese with you for nearly twenty-four months. I will forward you those guides’ names.

Take Care,

Cathy

***

Cathy:

I can’t sleep (it’s the middle of the night, here). Yesterday, when I got my hair cut, the stylist discovered that I was infected with Lunar Phthiraptera :{

Just a warning-obviously, as Reese is a boy, I wouldn’t hug him or otherwise get close to him, but all of the kids will have to be checked, today. Two of mine had it a few months ago. It’s common, here. Fortunately, neither of them died.

Also, please check Reese’s medical interstellar medical insurance. He’ll need it if he catches the contagion.

Speaking of which, you failed to prepare all of the papers that the lunar authorities require. We went to great expense and effort to arrange for your child to disembark. You owe us big time!

At your first convenience, please send Reese’s documents. Hubby and I especially need that paper that shows us to be his de facto guardians. Without such pages, Child Services will take him from us. These matters are far more important than even the hedgehogs’ direly needed marshmallow fluff.

Irene

***

Hi Irene:

Sure, I’ll take care of that business as soon as we return from Nantucket Island. I haven’t gotten the earthworms, yet. Are you sure you want them? Quimby says you’ll probably breed them and then feed them to the hedgehogs. Is there anything you won’t do for your pets?

Cathy

***

Cathy:

Hubby had to bribe a Family Services representative not to remove Reese from our cube. My man’s annoyed, though, and said to tell you that he’s making no more payouts for your kid. He said to remind you, too, that the lunar agencies don’t look kindly on Aztec practices and will likely prohibit Reese from following his faith should Reese be placed in government custody.

Thank-you for the earthworms and for the marshmallow fluff. At the moment, I’m disinclined to discuss my views on pet maintenance with you. I believe you’re still holding that pregnant barracuda in your postage-sized swimming pool.

What’s more, those gifts you sent from the Cape Town sailing store were amazing. I’m not sure how to thank you. Those anchors must have been very costly to ship. We needed them at least as much as we needed those colorful buoys you also sent.

Sorry I haven’t communicated sooner. I have been fairly ill, bed-ridden, actually. The docs blame the lunar lice. My primary care provider changed my meds today, so hopefully my healing will progress. I did tell you those bugs are highly contagious, right?

Irene

***

Hi Irene:

I’m very sorry to hear that you have not been feeling well. Speedy recovery from the bottom of my heart! Quimby and I are switching things up; we’re letting someone else be the skipper this time. We’re on our way to an Italian river cruise!

I hope it isn’t too much extra trouble having Reese around while you’re fighting a potentially lethal disease. Take good care of yourself.

Of course, I paid the extra charge to send you anchors and buoys. That’s what friends are for.

Cathy

***

Cathy:

You never supplied Reese with interstellar insurance or us with guardianship papers. This morning, Family Services removed Reese from our cube. While he was being processed, he tried to sacrifice another child. Immediately, Family Services sent him to juvie. Note: on the moon, the juvenile correction facility is on the dark side.

We were told that Reese shrank to the size of a cockroach and that the kid he had tried to slay stepped on him. He completely and irrevocably splatted.

Additionally, I couldn’t cancel the tours for which you prepaid since you never gave me the guides’ contact info. I suppose they’re enjoying your money.

Meanwhile, I suffered only two damaged vertebrae from the lice attack. Speaking of which, because Reese caught the infection before he was removed from our cube, the authorities cremated him.

Irene

***

Hi Irene:

I’m sorry you nearly lost your life, sustained paralysis, and paid umpteen fines to the lunar government on Reese’s behalf.

I should have made it clear to Reese, before his rocket lifted, that you guys had just moved to Lunar City. I guess I was so busy sailing that I forgot. Oops!

Please send me pictures of the cremation. Quimby and I are so glad that Reese had had a phenomenal visit!

Cathy

————

Playfully quaint KJ Hannah Greenberg gets high on adverbs, mixes more metaphors than a platypus has pockets, and attempts to matchmake words like “balderdash” and “xylophone.” Her newest collection of short fiction is Friends and Rabid Hedgehogs (Bards & Sages Publishing, June, 2016).