Beyond Our Stars

by Marie Langager

  I wasn’t really solitary anymore, even though that felt kind of strange. I had Chance. We’d met only days after we left Earth behind because the orphans were all housed in the same area. We’d been kids then, we didn’t start dating until last year. But it felt like we’d known each other our whole lives. Everything now revolved around ship life and Chance had been there for all of that. No one wanted to think of the past.

  I hadn’t wanted a relationship with anyone. I had no interest in the matching, pairing off process that everyone else our age accepted as normal, now. But Chance won me over. He’d known from the first day he met me, that’s what he said. Me, I was a good deal more standoffish than that. I’d grown used to my independence and I didn’t like the idea of needing anyone. But Chance…he was a natural fit. His laugh, the witty comments he made hoping to impress me, the light in his eyes. That look of complete and total infatuation he had when we kissed. Somehow, I felt like he couldn’t be denied. I starting feeling as though he belonged by my side.

  I went to class and sat through a lecture on seeds and fertilizer and growing conditions for pumpkins, of all things. Like of every choice I had, all the plant life we’d brought along with us, I would someday think, yes, I want to eat a pumpkin today.

  After that was my last class, Repopulation, one that I was so grateful Chance wasn’t in. Having an adult talk to you about the necessity of procreation, managing your fertility, and the compensation that would be provided for each child you had, it was too much. And not something I intended to follow through with. After years of watching my parents chastise anyone who had more than one child, the thought of helping society by having baby after baby was a foreign one.

  Finally, Pregnancy-for-teens ended and I made my way to the cafeteria for dinner before I went over to Chance’s quarters. He had one more class to go. I piled my tray high from the self-serve buffet they laid out three times a day and went to find Houston. She got one of the names after big cities that people wanted to commemorate in case Earth…well, in case what happened, happened. New York, Brooklyn, Angeles, or any city or landmark, really, became one of the top names in 2058.

  The cafeteria wasn’t fancy. It had about as much ambience as a sterile hospital. Bare bones, only what was necessary. We had tables with black plastic tops and metal chairs. Our usual table had been taken over by some seniors. Not like high school, the gray-haired kind. Seriously, the elderly that had made it onto the ships had gotten crankier and ruder than I’d ever known them to be on Earth. Like there was some unspoken agreement between all of them that this was all our fault, the young people were to blame, that they deserved better in their twilight years. Lectures from some grouchy, pissed off old-erly hunched over on a cane were not uncommon. ‘Respect your Elders,’ they said. Like they wanted to teach us, to impart their wisdom before it was too late. But in my book it already was too late.

  I felt bad for thinking that as I ran into Chief Engineer Upton on my way to go find wherever Houston had found a place to sit. Chief Up was an old guy, but not like the rest. He was old in a way I did respect. He paid attention to people, and he counseled sometimes, but not lectured. He was really smart, and thoughtful, and he’d told me once that the best trait a person could ever have was resolve. I’d liked him from that moment on.

  He nodded at my tray, “Gonna’ grow today?” he asked me. I had gotten way more than my share of food. It wasn’t policed or anything, but we were supposed to take only as much as we needed.

  “T.D. is almost here, feels pretty good doesn’t it?” I said, partially to distract him from my shame of giving in to hunger in front of him. T.D. was Touchdown Day.

  He smiled at me knowingly, but answered, “I couldn’t be more relieved. It’s been no easy feat, keeping this girl up, you know. Unbelievable. Cost cutting on materials the one time they shouldn’t have been doing that.” He shook his head reproachfully, but I knew he was losing some of his bitterness now that we were almost there. Several of the ships hadn’t been built the way they should’ve been. They fell apart slowly during the journey and the people who built them had neglected to equip us with the necessary technology to transfer people from ship to ship. There was one vessel, the Retrospect, that had one section ripped off by an asteroid and everyone and everything on board had frozen. I pictured the Retrospect still floating somewhere, an icy tomb for someone to find some day. A few of the ships had simply gone missing, lost somewhere out there.

  It’d been really hard on Chief Upton and the Chief Engineers on every ship that had made it, but now he would be a hero. Chief Up was basically our captain and he was regarded as the leader of all the vessels. There were Gov people who had tried to take titles in the beginning, but off of Earth and away from any kind of system we’d ever known, the Government had lost power in favor of trained people who could get things done.

  I nodded to Chief Up and balanced my tray so I could pinch his arm affectionately. “Gotta go, found Houston,” I said, looking at the raven-haired, overly made-up girl waving effusively at me. He glanced at her, but didn’t walk away so I stayed where I was.

  “When we get down there I want you to find me when it’s convenient. I want to make sure you have every opportunity on Haven.”

  He knew I didn’t want to get down there and start pumping out babies. I had so much that I wanted to do in our new home before that happened.

  I did want children one day. The thought of being able to do that with someone, to make a family, it wasn’t wholly out of my comprehension as something I might enjoy.

  Someday.

  “I will,” I said evasively, turning away.

  “Let me help,” Chief said, shaking his head at me. “Occasionally, you have to let people help you.”

  “Okay,” I gave him a half smile. Then I hollered so everyone could hear, “Chiiiieeeef Up!!”

  “Biiiig Chief!” a chorus of voices answered loudly. This was the usual salutation for him, our way of showing our gratitude and respect. He nodded at the crowd and narrowed his eyes at me with a playful glint, then walked out through one of the sliding doors.

  I hurried over to where Houston was waiting for me, her fingers drumming impatiently. She was sitting with a smallish, skinny blonde whose cheeks got rosy as I approached. I didn’t know this girl. Though with only so many of us aboard, I’d likely seen or bumped into her at some point. She was sitting sort of hunched over with her head down. “You meeting up with Chance tonight?” Houston asked before my butt was even in my seat.

  I gave her a weary look. “Yes,” I answered slowly. She grinned at me. “It’s not gonna’ be that… I mean, we haven’t talked anymore about that.” She was always impatiently awaiting the loss of my virginity. She’d lost hers a few months back and couldn’t wait for me to join her. Especially since I had a full-time boyfriend and all.

  Chance and I did a lot of things, but that wasn’t one of them, yet. There was still birth control provided on the ship since there wasn’t much room for new additions, but I had an uneasy feeling it might be harder to come by after we landed. This meant that a lot of the girls were taking their opportunity now. Probably not what the ship’s medics had intended.

  “Okay. But I say, get it while the getting’s good, Hope.” She gave me an authoritative stare down.

  “Yeah, thanks for the advice. Are you going to keep being rude or introduce me to your new friend?” I nodded warmly at the new girl, who looked back at me with wide, slightly crazy looking eyes.

  “This is Marseille,” Houston announced. “She’s American, but she’s helping me learn French! Her mother was from France isn’t that cool!”

  “Yes, very cool,” I answered, giving Marseille a smile she didn’t return. Learning languages was a hobby for some of us. When we landed it would be nice to be able to communicate with every survivor.

  “And in return I’m helping her learn how to attract the right kind of boy.” Houston wiggled her eyebrows at me.

  “And what kind is the righ
t kind?” I asked with a sigh.

  Houston paused dramatically, dipping her large heart-shaped face to the side, “The kind that makes you happy that you have no one to answer to, cause you can stay out all night long,” she finished with a sultry look that seemed more like sleepy than anything else. I groaned. Only Houston would claim the deaths of our parents were some kind of a blessing for getting it on. Marseille remained silent and fiddled with her hands under the table, and I wondered what possible reason this girl could have for hanging out with my hormonally irresponsible friend.

  “There are so many other things to think about besides boys,” I said to Houston.

  “Yeah, but how can you think of other things when you haven’t managed to have any boys yet?” she retorted.

  I gave her an impassive look back and she threw her napkin at me. It was gross, she’d used it and it was slimy with her chewed food. I tossed it off my lap with the tips of my fingers.

  “How are things with Delhi?” I asked.

  Delhi was the Indian boy she was currently messing around with. Delhi had migrated to our country when he was a small child. A lot of people had moved somewhere, not realizing that no matter what any theories said about where might be safer, it was a global problem. Asking about Delhi was a ploy to get her off my back and leave me be, and she knew it, but she happily commenced giving me and Marseille every dirty detail.

  “So, are you gonna’ pair with him?” Marseille asked Houston in a voice so quiet I could barely hear her.

  “Yeah, maybe. He seems like a good match for me, but I think I might have to fight off Virginia, she’s been eyeing him, too.”

  “You don’t have to pair off, none of us do,” I said, irritation filling my voice as I found myself repeating something I’d said so many times that nobody seemed to hear.

  “Who are you to talk? You’re already paired off and all set for your future,” Houston said dryly.

  “I’m with Chance because I love him. I’d be with him even if they weren’t telling us all to pair off, because I want him with me. Not because I’m supposed to or because we’re getting married. You can choose not to…” I didn’t bother to finish because I could see plainly that neither of them was interested.

  This was how it was now, the human race needed to replenish itself and very few people were questioning it. But I didn’t like how Houston romanticized it. Having kids and making a life on our new planet was going to be hard, not some dreamy scenario where we all got married off and then our future was ‘all set’.

  After dinner I went back to my room, taking my time. I liked to walk the corridors and the people in this area had gotten to know me enough that no one stopped me to chitchat. I wasn’t much for small talk but I liked to get lost in my thoughts with people walking past, going about their day. It made me feel like I was being social without actually having to have conversation. I kept my eyes down because the lighting hurt if you looked at it too long.

  I let my fingers trail over the smooth sheets of metal that lined the walls and the bumps that were bracketing them together. Often the gray panels didn’t match since they were hastily taken from different sources, and sometimes they had flecks of other colors. I moved my hand up and down in a roller-coaster motion, letting my fingertips graze some of the pipes that made their way around the ship transporting one thing or another to its destination. The ships weren’t very beautiful to most people, but they were to me. They weren’t built to be an impressive thing to look at, they were built quickly out of necessity, to perform a function. Even if I was worried about how long they’d hold together I liked their utility, the fact that you could see the guts of the machine right in front of your eyes.

  Before I knew it, it was close to eight, so I made my way back to my quarters to get ready. Really, nothing out of the ordinary was going to happen tonight but I liked to look good. Before Chance, I hadn’t given much thought to my appearance, but his reactions made me care. The way he took me in with his eyes, it made me want to live up to the image of me I was sure he had in his mind.

  I pressed my code into the pad that slid the door to my quarters shut behind me and took the three steps to my bed. It was a luxury, having my own room. Even if it was the size of a walk-in closet. Most other people shared quarters but they were siblings or parent and child, or at least relatives. The orphans had been given the quarters intended for couples. So the eight-by-six metal room was all mine.

  I had about fifteen minutes to get ready so I ransacked my drawers which were tucked neatly under my black plastic bed. We’d been allowed to bring one backpack of personal belongings on board with us, so I didn’t have much for clothes besides the navy blue uniform provided to everyone. They also gave us a long sleeve shirt made of warm, durable material, a short sleeve of lighter material, and two pairs of pants. There wasn’t much of a need to contend with environment because that was controlled on the ship. Uniforms were washed twice a month. Group showers once a week. Communal toilets in the hallway. That was all the water treatment system could handle. I wistfully remembered pajamas. Now, it was sleep naked for everyone. Things like pajamas aren’t a luxury until you don’t have them anymore.

  I was wearing the short sleeve and I ripped it off and grabbed the one shirt I’d brought. It said Modern Electric on it. It was a band I’d loved when I was twelve years old, thinking I was so cool for loving them. It still fit after all these years, if it was a bit snug. But it gave me a feeling of being a carefree girl and I knew Chance liked it when I wore it. In my backpack I’d also brought my journal from when I was a kid, and two of my favorite books. That’s it. When I’d left my house with my parents in the car, we’d headed away from the coast because a tsunami was supposed to hit San Fran. We had no idea we were driving into a volcanic eruption. So those things were all I had from my house. I hadn’t known any better.

  There was a small mirror above my little twin bed, a tiny six-inch by six-inch square. So I had to hover and move up and down seeing bits of myself but not the picture as a whole. I brushed my teeth, swishing fresh water from a jar I kept by my bed, and spitting it out into another, grosser jar. I combed my long brown hair back away from my face. It fell in messy, natural waves down my back and I let it hang loose. Chance loved to run his fingers through it. I never had to wonder if he thought I was beautiful, it was in his eyes all the time.

  I supposed I was pretty-ish. Somehow, I’d grown into a girl that some boys might like to look at. But it didn’t matter, not for anyone but Chance. Back on Earth before the end a nice appearance might have meant something, might have given you advantages. But now it was all about work. About training, about what you could accomplish with your own two hands. A pretty face meant nothing unless all a girl wanted to do was attract a husband. And that wasn’t me. The way some of the boys acted like the girls were on display for their choosing made me a little ill.

  As soon as we landed it would be time to start thinking of what work I’d enjoy doing for the rest of my life, what I’d be best at. Only I wasn’t the best at anything I’d tried yet. I only knew a little about a whole lot of things. But I was sure once everything settled and everyone was happy after T.D., I’d figure it out. Maybe there was something worth doing on Haven.

  I finished up and made it to Chance’s quarters a few minutes past eight. I entered his code into his keypad to open the door. It slid open and I frowned, squinting into the dull light in the tiny room.

  “Are you going to come in?” I heard him ask. My eyes adjusted and I realized he had the lights off but a solitary candle flickered across the small space.

  I smiled. He really was a big ole softy at heart. I stepped inside and keyed in the code to shut the doors. It got even darker and suddenly I wondered if he did think tonight was about more than it usually was. Something felt different. The dim light illuminated the very serious expression on his face.

  “Ready for the movie?” I asked, testing the waters.

  “First, I want to talk to you ab
out something. Sit down next to me.” Still with the serious face, and an earnest tone in his voice.

  I shook back and forth on my legs a couple times, not wanting to sit. Wanting things to be the usual, same as they always were. But I had a hard time believing this was about sex. Chance was not the kind of guy to pressure. I sat.

  He let out a long breath. “So listen, we’re gonna be landing in a little bit, and so I think this is the right time.” I gulped. This was about sex?

  He paused, like he was waiting for something. I opened my mouth but realized I had no idea what to say. Then, strangely, he slid down off the bed and onto his knees.

  He reached into one of the drawers underneath me and pulled out a small paper box. He opened it and placed the ring that was inside into the palm of my hand. I opened my fingers and looked at it, confused.

  A plain metal circle, probably molded from some ship scrap metal. I turned it over and inside someone had scratched in a rough representation of an eternity symbol.

  I stared at it, trying to make my mind work but it refused. I looked up at Chance’s face. His eyes held mine with an intensity I found distracting. What was this?

  And then I knew. I knew what it was. And before I could stop myself what came out was, “Oh, Chance, no. No.”

  It was the first thing that came into my mind. But my next thought was regret as I watched his eyes go blank and then cold.

  Chapter Three

  ONE WEEK BEFORE T.D.

  “Maybe we could go do some work in the tanks together later? Get you ready for the final?” I was hovering near Chance, having to talk to his back because he constantly turned it on me or walked in front of me.

  “I’m set, don’t worry,” he said without emotion. He picked up his pace and went to class as I turned a hallway to go to mine. No goodbye.