Black Moonlight by Amy Patricia Meade

as the face of her overnight guest was revealed.
    Noonan sat up, blinked his eyes, and shook his head several times.
    She placed her cup of tea and newspaper on an enameled outdoor table and hurried across the porch to check on him. “Are you okay?”
    “I’m fine,” Noonan replied as he stiffly rose to his feet.
    “Are you sure?”
    “Oh yeah, it takes more than a fall from a porch swing to keep ol’ Noonan down.” He placed a hand on his lower back and grimaced.
    “What are you doing here?” Mrs. Patterson questioned. “Were you on that swing all night?”
    “Not all night,” he answered and moved his hand from his lower back to his neck. “But long enough.”
    “Oh, my! Let me get you some tea, Officer. And some of my homemade scones with fresh strawberry preserves. You must be starving!”
    Tea was a beverage Noonan typically reserved for when he was getting over the grippe. However, he smiled graciously. “Thanks Mrs. P, that’s awfully kind of you.”
    “Nonsense,” Emily Patterson dismissed as she opened the screen door and stepped inside. Within moments she peeked her head around the door: “And please, call me ‘Emily.’ Just because we’re not drinking martinis at Kensington House, doesn’t mean we have to go back to calling each other by our last names.”
    Noonan laughed. “Well, I didn’t want to say nothing. Just in case it was the vermouth talking that night. But okay … Emily.”
    She flashed a satisfied grin and went back into the house.
    In the meantime, Noonan plumped the porch swing cushions, removed his suit jacket, laid it over the back of the swing, and had a seat. There, in the sun-soaked serenity of Mrs. Patterson’s front porch, he could forget about the events of the previous evening and his miserable failure.
    He stretched his legs out, placed his arms behind his head and closed his eyes. The breeze that whispered across his skin was warm, but dry—a welcome respite from the New England humidity, and each breath he took was fragrant with the scent of the wild roses that grew in Mrs. Patterson’s side yard.
    Yep, he thought, today was going to be a good day. After tea and scones with Emily, he would stop by the drugstore and pick up a few licorice twists for the kids and that face powder Mrs. Noonan had been talking about for months (she’d heard it would make her skin look like Claudette Colbert’s) but still couldn’t justify purchasing. Then he’d head home, play some ball with Patrick Jr., take his daughter, Nora, for a ride in her red wagon, and then—if the chicken was big enough—Mrs. Patterson could join them for dinner.
    If the chicken was big enough? Noonan nearly laughed out loud, for according to Mrs. Noonan, the chicken was always big enough. Sometimes she added an extra potato. Other times, she baked an extra loaf of bread. On a few occasions, when Noonan was between paychecks or she wasn’t given sufficient notice, Mrs. Noonan simply did without, supplying her guests with the simple, yet gracious, explanation that she “wasn’t very hungry” after partaking of a large lunch. Noonan, however, knew that there were no such lunches; the only lunches his wife ever had the opportunity to enjoy were the crusts from their children’s sandwiches.
    Whatever the case, Patrick Noonan never ceased to marvel at his great fortune. An Irish Southie who dropped out of school after the sixth grade, he had a job with the Hartford County Police, two beautiful children, and he’d married a smart, pretty woman who was a good mother and never turned a hungry guest away from her doorstep.
    The sound of singing birds adding to his happiness, Noonan sighed contentedly—until he spied something moving in the shrubs just outside the porch.
    That “something” quickly jumped upon the porch railing with a loud “meow” and glared at Noonan with bright yellow eyes.
    Noonan leapt to his feet. “You!” he shouted threateningly. “You—you—you—”
    Mrs. Patterson