Moonface Read Online Free PDF

punished for your sins.
    Throughout high school, there were times when I struggled with insomnia. I turned over and over again in my bed, paced the floor, and sometimes went downstairs to watch TV for hours before finally dozing off on the couch. I even tried praying. When I told my mother about it, she said that a deep-rooted guilt could keep someone awake for days.
    â€œSomething is on your conscience, isn’t it?” she asked me, squinting her eyes and trying to find the answer in my face. I flinched, and then I turned away. “You cannot sleep because you feel guilty. Am I right? Maybe you should go to confession,” she whispered, her cold stare like that of a witch casting a spell.
    I believed her. I told the priest everything I’d done. Everything: my secret crushes, my secret wish that the ceiling fan at church would fall down into the pews in the middle of Mass (just to make things interesting). I told him how, once, a friend dared me to steal purple mascara from the local mall. During the week, I kept a running tab of my offenses so I could confess them by week’s end. I prayed every night; I listened to the gospels during Mass. My brother and I both did.
    Every Sunday in church, I sat next to my brother, who sat next to my mother, who sat next my father, who sat by the aisle. Every Sunday, we stood, we knelt, we sang, and we prayed. Every Sunday since my First Communion, we all got up, stood in line, and took the Eucharist.
    But one time it was different. I remember the loud dramatic sounds coming from the organ. They made our pews vibrate and made my bones shake. My brother was a high school senior, and between the weekly sermons, all he talked about was where he was going to college. I looked at his outfit. He had started wearing jeans to church, sweatshirts instead of button-down shirts. Lately, he had stopped singing the hymns, and he had started slouching in his pew while the priest was talking. My mother nudged him with her elbow and he shook her off.
    When it came time for communion, everyone stood up and got in line. My brother, who didn’t stand, held up this usually orderly process. He remained seated, leaving me stuck on the inside of the pew.
    â€œGo!” I whispered.
    â€œI’m not going,” he said. He shook his head, put his feet up on the kneeler. I must have stood there with my mouth open, frozen by his protest. “No, I don’t think I’m into it this week. You go.” He moved his feet to allow me to pass.
    I kept my eyes on him as I moved up the communion line. He slouched and looked around. He was confident in his decision. I was unsure of what was going on. I watched the other parishioners kneeling and praying. I wanted to yell at my brother right there from the communion line, “What are you doing? He’s watching, you know!” But his body language was deliberately hostile, clearly stubborn. I took the Eucharist in my mouth, and prayed for my brother’s salvation.
    The morning of our surgery, I woke up early to find my mother yet again hunched over my bed. This time it was comforting to have her there. As the nurse wheeled me out of my room on a gurney and toward the O.R., my mother walked alongside, her hand trying to keep in constant contact with my arm, or my shoulder, anything.
    â€œYou pray!” my mother commanded, pulling a blanket over me before she left me with the nurse. I had been praying for weeks before the transplant. I asked God to make it work, to let me finally be okay, be done with the dialysis treatments, and get back to my life at school. Sometimes I sank to the ground on my knees and begged that the transplant would work.
    Back in the room, balloons had filled the ceiling, and cards from well-wishers were stuck to every available surface of the wall. “Your courage is an inspiration,” said one card with a cartoon lion drawn on it. Fraud, fraud, fraud , I thought to myself. Give me a choice, and