“the mother is quiet today” grandfather muttered from his threadbare recliner.

  grandfather turned his gaze from the picture window and back to the tv. his grandson on the adjacent couch ignored him.

  “the clouds will come soon and then the rain, we should take the trash to the road” grandfather quietly stated without looking away from the tv.

  this was grandfather’s way of saying “Moon, you (not we) should take the trash out soon”.

  Moon knew that grandfather had no way of knowing what the weather would be in a few minutes or hours, he only watched the Discovery channel on tv and read nothing, and had no devices with apps. it was irritating to Moon to hear grandfather’s frequent predictions.

  “i’ll get to it soon” Moon stopped ignoring and decided to reply to grandfather as a courtesy. he was a teenager like any other, but he did love grandfather, and worked hard to forgive grandfather’s transgressions, which to Moon mostly referred to grandfather’s “forgetful old man nonsense”.

  occasionally, grandfather would embarrass Moon in front of his friends. or rather, Moon would allow himself to be embarrassed. particularly in the presence of his white friends from school who lived in the rich neighborhoods?—?-rich to Moon, but in reality, middle-middle class at best. none of these white friends had old people lingering in their houses rambling on about the weather and predicting when the next squirrel would make an appearance on the front porch.

  as much as Moon did love and respect grandfather, it was difficult to not roll his eyes to his friends and tell them to ignore his grandfather?—?— although he made sure that grandfather neither saw nor heard him do these things.

  a half hour passed, and Moon half napped on the couch, half watched grandfather’s nature show on Discovery. he more fully awoke to grandfather muttering “this is not true, how are they so ignorant about this?”

  “what’s wrong grandfather?” Moon said as he slowly sat up from his nap and glanced out the window. clouds had rolled in and the first droplets had hit the front sidewalk, turning it a darker gray than the concrete porch.

  “this fox, he did not say that” grandfather replied

  “say what?” moon caught a side glance of a fox sitting near a hole in the ground on tv.

  “he (the fox) did not say what the man on the show said that he did. the man said that the fox came out of his burrow because he was hungry. he was not hungry. you could see on his face that the worms awakened him from his nap. they made noise and moved dirt in his burrow which upset him. he came outside to leave the worm noise”

  “worms don’t make noise, grandfather” Moon said as he got off the couch and hurried to get the trash can in front of the garage door to the end of the dirt path and alongside the road where it would be collected later.

  grandfather did not reply. he also did not say what Moon knew that he could have said, but knew that grandfather never would say?—?— that he had been right about the clouds and the rain coming soon. grandfather was almost always right about these things?—?90% of the time, anyway— but it always irritated Moon.

  Moon knew that grandfather hedged his bets with words like “soon” or “today” , which could mean in a few minutes or a few hours or even at night?—?anyone could be right about that or about anything that way. grandfather would also look outside on a cloudy day and predict rain?—?-who couldn’t do that? but it all gave grandfather something to feel important about in his unimportant world.

  so while grandfather was most often an excellent prognosticator, it was in the same vein as a psychic being a good psychic. it was not science or intelligence, it was a carnival act. a con. it was an act that grandfather had seen his grandfather perform, and so he learned it from that, Moon surmised. Moon swore that he would never be that same silly old man, much as Moon’s father had often belligerently sworn out loud to Moon’s grandfather. that was before moon’s father had left several years earlier, never to be heard from.

  Moon was now outside and taking the trash to the road, dragging the large wheeled bin and being careful not to let dust splatter up from the dirt path between the road and garage where he carted the trashcan, and onto his shoes. the rain was getting heavier now, and he didnt want to get wet, and particularly didnt want dirty shoes. his ride would be at the house soon to take him to his interview. second interview this week. he wanted to look professional for that. or at least he didnt want to look dirty and poor. they were paying him.

  —?—?—?—?—?—?—?—?—?—?—?— -

  back inside and wet but not soaked, moon put a slice of lunchmeat ham on a single slice of bread, mustard, folded in half, and ate. he saw his ride pull up. Bill Long Tree, who on his way to work had agreed to pick up Moon and drop him off for his semi-weekly interviews at the Center.

  Moon grabbed his jacket from the back of a kitchen chair and was pissed that he hadnt put it on to keep his shirt dry earlier, but now he decided to carry his jacket out to Bill’s truck, tucked under his crossed arms, to keep it dry. his shirt was already wet, but his jacket could stay dry this way, and he imagined that people at the Center would think he had just gotten into a car in his garage without going outside. this made his feel like he was “rich” like some of his white friends. and most of the people at the Center were white, which made a difference in his mind.

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  the people at the Center didnt know what his house looked like, but if he had clean shoes and a dry jacket, they would think?—?or at least Moon thought that they would think?—?— that he had a garage that his family parked their car in, as opposed to using their 1 car garage for needed storage space. Bill would drop him off under the Center’s front entrnace awning, so he would be able to avoid the rain at that end of the short drive from his house.

  Moon sprinted from the front door to Bill’s truck, around to the passenger side, and jumped in (no goodbye to grandfather). it was impossible to avoid getting wetter, but his jacket was dry.

  “hey bill”.. he said, upon entering the truck.

  “moon” bill nodded and replied.

  Moon was already wiping his shoes off with a paper towel that he had grabbed from the kitchen. Bill’s floormats were fortunately clean. Moon also strategically placed his blue-jeaned legs near bill’s truck’s floor vents, in an effort to dry off the jeans a bit, even though the jeans were dark enough that they really didnt look wet, but Moon was self conscious and wanted to do all he could to look dry for the people at the Center.

  the ride to the Center was silent. Bill was a quiet guy for the most part, and his job was stocking shelves at Wolf Cave Co-op, the grocery store that most of the People frequented, located halfway between the Center and the Pueblo. Moon was grateful that he was able to get Bill to take him to his meetings, and that the Center scheduled Moon such that his interviews synched with Bill’s schedule, for the most part.

  If it weren’t for Bill, Moon would have had to ride his bike 8 miles one way to the center, and this wouldn’t have worked out with Taos weather year round, let alone the image he wanted to project to the people who worked at the Center. Moon secretly hoped that one day he could maybe work at the Center as a liaison to the People, similar to what Jacob Green Water did.

  Bill sped along the dirt and gravel road for several miles, eventually reaching the paved state highway, which they would take for the remainder of the drive. a few minutes later, they were pulling under the awning of the Center’s entrance.

  “thanks Bill, see you later” as he hopped out of the truck and made his way up the 10 stone steps to the Center for Understanding’s double doors. Inside was an unnecessarily large lobby with a single security area that one had to pass through before entering the windowless double doors at the far side of the entrance lobby.

  The security area consisted of an airport security setup. or at least what Moon had been told an airport security area looked like, he had never been to an airport. But this area included a walk through scanner and a conveyor belt on which Moon had to place his personal items from his emptied pockets, as well as his belt and shoes. The 2 security guards knew Moon and waved to him as he approached the security area.

  it was strange to Moon that the security area looked the way that it did. it was such a small area, but it looked much larger, as it was centered in a glass wall that bi-sected the entire entrance lobby. From the 2 front doors to this long glass wall with a single opening for the security scanner and the conveyor belt scanner where he would place his personal items, it was probably 30 feet. it felt an enormous distance to cross for a self-conscious teen. and once passing through the security area, it was another thirty feet to the windowless entrance doors to the inner sanctum of the Center.

  The glass wall, which spanned the width of the entrance lobby, was about 50 feet across. again, it was an abnormally large lobby for only 2 guards and a security scanning area, Moon felt. Oh, and there was a windowless metal door that had to be opened before one could get to the security scanner and conveyor. the gray metal door looked out of place in the middle of the glass wall.

  the glass wall apparently served the purpose of keeping anyone from going around the security scanner area. But unless the guards were sound asleep, there would be no way to get past them without being seen, as the remainder of the entrance lobby was barren

  for a “Center of Understanding”, Moon thought that they certainly didnt “understand” how to make more efficient use of their space, based on the lobby. He imagined what an amazing front room this lobby would make for his house. the entire lobby was actually twice as large as his entire 3 bedroom 1 1/2 bathroom house, garage included. but Moon knew that the COU wasnt the original inhabitant of the building, according to his Dad anyway (Moon didnt know what or who was the original occupant) so he assumed they were making due with the space they inherited or bought or whatever. The overkill of the glass wall must have been a necessity, not a design feature.

  Security now passed, belongings back in pockets, Moon proceeded to the windowless double doors another 30 feet away on the far side of the lobby. these double doors were the only accouterment on the far wall. the entire lobby was an off white, save for the glass wall and the painted black ceiling, 15 feet or so above. Moon had never seen a room with a black ceiling, and he found this one to be somehow calming. it was like the night sky to him, and it was dotted with recessed electric LED ‘stars’ spaced some 10 feet or so apart in any direction in a grid pattern.

  the double doors closed behind Moon and he was now out of the lobby and in a much smaller room, maybe 20 feet by 20 feet, looking at a large granite reception desk area in front of him, with 2 ladies seated behind the desk. countertop, really. Mary and Catelyn.

  they both waved at Moon as he entered the room. Moon was given a badge to wear, one with his picture on it, which made him proud?—?or at least made him feel important, and either Mary or Catelyn pressed a button to buzz him through the only other door in the room, which was on the far right wall.

  Once through this door, he was in a hallway maybe 10 feet across that funneled him 20 feet straight ahead, and then around a corner and another 20 feet to a 4-way hallway intersection. At this intersection were signs that indicated room numbers that were either straight ahead, to the left, or the right. Moon went straight ahead 50 feet or so, until just before the hallway dead ended, where he stood in front of room 403. Moon positioned himself in front of the recessed camera on the wall to the right of the windowless door labeled 403, pushed the green lit button, waited for the clicking sound, pulled the door open, walked in and sat down in the waiting couch.

  Moon liked the waiting room, it was painted with symbols of his tribe, of the People, and in large deep blue letters painted across the wall and near the ceiling, the words “Center of Understanding”. here he waited.