A chill spreads over me as I realize: not only is there no answer, but there are no missed calls in our log, either. According to the history of my entire life—the faithfully recurring calls my mother took every first day of the month, foreverymonth in the station’s entire existence—they should’ve attempted to get in touch a few days ago, at the very least.
Not that anyone would’ve been around to answer. Zesi spent that day down in the crematory. Just in case, I tap out a text:You haven’t picked up any calls from Nashville recently, have you?The log is likely confirmation enough—it would be listed here if Zesi had picked up a call—but maybe I’m missing something. Maybe it’s possible for things to slip through the cracks.
He replies almost immediately, a simpleno, ellipsis, that somehow makes me feel even worse than before.
The virus was swift; the virus was deadly.
The virus came from Earth, Dr. Safran theorized. From our supply delivery pilot.
If it caught Nashville off guard like it did with us—
If it spread like wildfire—
If we are more alone out here than any of us realized—
If, if, if.
I’ll try again in the morning, I resolve. Perhaps their comm lines are simply unmanned, like ours have been while we’ve dealt with all the death. Perhaps tomorrow will be better.
Perhaps.
14
LIKE FOREVER, ONLY NEVER AGAIN
ALL I WANT is a single day where I can walk to my cabin in peace. One day where I don’t feel pressured to stand up straight, keep my shoulders back. A day where I can slow down. Smile. Answer their questions instead of doing that thing I do, the eyes-trained-straight-ahead, on-a-mission, don’t-have-time-to-hear-you thing I’ve developed as of late.
Today is not that day.
I feel their eyes on me. Hear their questions bubble up, then evaporate, as I walk past without so much as a glance.
If there’s anything I’m learning, it’s this: when there is no peace, when there is no silence, you simply have to carve some out. You have to, or you’ll crumble.
As soon as I’m inside my cabin, doors closed, alone, it’s like the weight of the universe falls off my shoulders. It’s like I’m myself again, the Lindley I used to be before I started trying to be everything to everyone. I’d spend whole hours near the fireplace, the blaze swiped up to the perfect heat, sketchingwhile curled up in my mother’s soft leather chair. The chair was one of her two luxury items from Earth, inherited from her great-grandfather. I’ve taken to sleeping in it every night. Makes me feel like I still have family.
It isn’t the same. Even when I swipe the blaze up as high as it will go, I’m always cold. Now when I sit, I spend my time untangling the station’s problems until I’m so exhausted I succumb to an hour or two of restless sleep.
I don’t sit there now. I stay right where I am, back pressed up against the inside of my front door, and sit down on the cold concrete floor. Lean my head against the smooth steel, close my eyes. Breathe.
My head pounds. I do my best to turn off my worry—about Mila, about Yuki and Grace, about the look Akello gave me, about Natalin and the food, about the unanswered call I just attempted to put through and what it might mean, about all the questions I probably should have answered on my walk home. I try to tune it all out, just for a few minutes, focus on my own thoughts. But where a swarm of inspiration and hope used to be, now all I hear is the swish of rushing blood.
None of this was ever in the plan. Life has flipped so drastically as of late that it’s hard to even remember what it was like before—it’s as if the past and the present have been equally eclipsed by the blinding need to... not die. Does everyone feel this way? Or do I simply feel consumed by it because it’s on me to keepeveryonealive and not just myself?
The six of us asked for this by stepping up, I realize this. We were the obvious choice to do it—we are the oldest and the most experienced, the ones who took apprenticeships and inherited all the codes—but still. None of that makes anything easier.
Beyond the life and death at stake in our present situation, I feel a subtle pressure to beflawlessin how I handle things. If I ever want a real shot at my dreams—for the space program to take me seriously as a contender for commander, especially since the need for a replacement came years sooner than it should have—I absolutely cannot screw this up.
Assuming the space program hasn’t been completely obliterated by the virus, that is.
Assuming the virus has left anyone alive to care.
I’m getting a call on my buzz screen—it’s Natalin. The part of myself I’ll never be able to turn off, the curiosity, it nags at me to answer. I don’t, though. I’m sort of dreading our next conversation, am not exactly eager to tell her how no one picked up when I attempted to reach out. She’s verging on panic as it is. And besides: rest is important, my mother always used to say, and as our former commander she knew that better than anyone. She made it a priority to tune out, to spend time with me no matter how busy she was with station demands. Whatever Natalin needs, it can wait ten minutes.
I hope.
So I sit. Rest. Try to summon the calm my mother was known for.
I still think of this cabin suite asours. Mom’s and mine. It’sthe largest residential space on the station by far, and every inch of it was full ofus. Now, though, it’s just me living alone with the larger-than-life memory of her, a lingering presence that feels thicker by the day. Her earrings, still in the silver dish beside her bed. Her favorite blanket, still sprawled out and waiting for her to return to it. Her stash of dark chocolate and exquisite coffee, the secret privilege of her position: in her monthly updates to Shapiro, based down in Nashville, she’d occasionally mention she missed certain things, only to find them hidden in the next SpaceLove delivery, tucked discreetly between pro-packs. I haven’t touched her secret stash, not yet, though I am desperately tempted.
