After the Astronaut and the North Star Kiss

AFTER THE ASTRONAUT AND THE NORTH STAR KISS

by Stefan Alcalá Slater

(Content warning: military)

Mission Control will go silent.

Someone will drop a cup of coffee, but no one will clean it up, no one will turn away from the live feed coming from the lunar lander. But it will all begin to fall apart when one flight controller takes off his headset, turns to everybody else and says, “She took her helmet off. How is she still alive?”

Then another flight controller will stare at the first controller and blink a few times. “Who cares about that,” he’ll say. “Who did she just kiss?”

NASA will call the other space agencies, and the whole world will get to arguing—both online and within shoving distance—about whether or not a kiss means anything at all, especially when it happens impossibly. But everyone will agree that all the rules that govern space travel and physics and common sense have gone shockingly fuzzy.

And the astronaut should definitely come home now.

•••

Catherine grew up sailing and loves the endlessness of the ocean.

But she prefers the thrill of going supersonic, when the world clings to you in a panic to remind your body that you’re mortally anchored. But then afterburners howl with viciously impartial heat, and nothing can contain her as she slices through the stratosphere, chasing the retreating sun, orange-red fading into an inviting, all-encompassing darkness that comfortably holds every ounce of dust, every breath, every dream of exploration and creation and destruction that there will ever be. 

Her father was an astronomer, so when Catherine flies into the cosmos, she sees glittering constellations dancing, sees archers and bulls and scorpions twisting forever, reassuring her that she could never be lost up here, not with these forever roadmaps gently lighting the way. 

Her mother flew combat sorties and taught her how to breathe calmly and slip out of a tailspin—even when the world riddles your heart with smoldering flak, broken glass, and too much regret. So Catherine is most at ease when she is far from home. When her wings begin to rattle and warning alarms begin to cry, when the golden cities below are a faint flicker and the only loving brightness is that one tiny star to the north, far above this little planet—the only light she’s ever needed, ever wanted. The only light that ever brought quiet among the roaring. 

Catherine, even when she was part of a squadron, had a habit of taking her meals alone in the mess hall; she never went out for drinks after a hard day. During training flights, when she hit bingo fuel, she never turned around promptly—she always pushed it a little harder, a little faster, until someone screamed over the comms for her to come back down in one piece.

One of her squadmates spread a rumour: Catherine wanted to be the fastest person alive.

There was another rumour too, always whispered behind her back: Catherine wanted to burn up upon re-entry.

Neither rumour was true, of course.

The truth was that she wanted to live, but she felt half-asleep down here.

Up there, though, she was awake, and she made the jump from aerial dogfighting to collecting moon rocks because she felt pulled towards that shining to the north, and she never, ever, wanted to let go, even when she didn’t have the fuel to keep going.

•••

Jets will be scrambled, and soldiers will march, because they need to look busy, because none of this was expected. Governments will assume the worst, even though more than one general will sit in silence in a stuffy bunker and wonder—not of coordinating missile strikes and troop movements—but of what a star’s kiss might taste like, and if the heat from that embrace might melt the heart like a good slow dance. But the world will, in that moment before buttons are pressed and triggers are pulled, watch the feed coming from the moon, and they’ll wait to see what rules might come undone next. 

•••

Polaris knows that there isn’t a South Star.

So on cloudy days, when the world isn’t looking for that northern brightness, Polaris goes for a walk to clear their head. 

Sometimes among the comets, sometimes skipping among crumbly asteroids, and sometimes scorching through the atmosphere and coming to a soft landing on a beach, frigid forest, or corn field. Polaris wears morning brightness or a sleepy afternoon sunset, a little fog, a dash of midday summer blue, and they find their way to the edges of this world.

Where sailors work on the rigging of their ships, keen for another voyage.

Where mountain climbers trudge up icy trails, eager to touch the sun.

Where pilots perform one final pre-check, eying the horizon.

They were all close, but none were right, because each explorer always returned to dry ground, a safe landing, a gentle descent. Back to a home with a roof that blocks out moonlight, to a bed safe from meteorite showers, and into the arms of someone who never dreams of calling the vastness home, to a someone who never wishes to race comets or witness planets being born or discover the bottomless secrets of black holes. These explorers fell in love with the idea of spending a millennium or two saying little, just holding hands in the void and watching the building blocks of galaxies falling neatly together into place, as if this was just destiny at work—but they always got cold feet, even though Polaris promised to keep them warm. They turned away from the stars, went back to the finite and discovered, and they offered the explanation that hurt the most. 

“It’s not you, it’s me.”

So Polaris returns to the sky when the clouds clear, and they feel entirely invisible despite being so seen, because they haven’t found anyone bright and fast like a shooting star, burning for more beyond the confines of gravity. 

And when they get to wondering if they will always be alone, if anyone will remember them when they finally flicker and grow cold and dim, they decide to take a walk on the moon. A quick escape to a barren place without distractions, where they can think on who they are without friendship, without love. 

•••

The world doesn’t hear Catherine’s words when she steps off the lunar lander. She takes a few steps and sees Polaris standing on that grey, dusty sea. Catherine switches her comms off, as if she wants this conversation to be private. As if, despite this being their first meeting, she somehow knows this shimmering person with skin like spiral galaxies, eyes flashing like atoms splitting eternally, gentle hands pulling her close, spinning her like the sweetest orbit. And Polaris will smile like the start of existence, and they will step closer, because the astronaut and the North Star are both surprised that they aren’t alone for once. Polaris will take off Catherine’s helmet and everything will be fine, despite the distant shrieking that fills the Control Center back home, and they will look to one another and laugh, because despite being on the moon, they will both feel as if home is so close. 

Closer than it has ever been before.

•••

The world will wait and watch—eyes burning from crying, from shouting, from forgetting to blink—and their fingers will drift away from those doomsday switches and automatic weapons, because they are so damn eager in a way that no one has been since the first time anyone ever decided to go for a walk on the moon, just a quick jaunt outside a capsule. 

And they will believe. 

If only for a moment.

•••

After the astronaut and the North Star kiss, it’s easy, because they’re no longer alone. 

And then it’s hard, because they are no longer alone. 

Now there’s someone else to consider.

Kisses aren’t forever—they both know this—so they take a breather after that first embrace, their hands falling to their sides, smiling, and looking away towards the other silent stars, the Earth, that crater over there. Polaris will squint at Mars, and Catherine will fiddle with one of the countless pockets she has on her spacesuit, and they will both wonder privately, well, what comes next?

Catherine will consider her helmet, which rests at her feet, and she will think, half-jokingly, about completing her mission of collecting moon rocks. It did cost a lot of money to send me up here, she thinks. She almost asks Polaris for help filling her pockets.

And Polaris will glance at their old spot among the stars and recall the comforting purpose of aiding the lost. It’s honest work, really, they think. Someone has to do it. 

But then their eyes will meet. 

It’s very much like when life first crawled out of that soupy, primordial sea—when that scaly thing gasped and stood on wobbly legs and decided to look up, way up, and they saw the sky, the moon, and the stars for the very first time. 

And it was love at first sight. 

Catherine has taken every step alone. Now, she considers, maybe it’s time to take the next step with someone else—someone who understands the need to fly faster, and further, than anyone ever thought possible. 

And Polaris hopes that maybe this time, just maybe, they’ve found a guiding light that will shine just for them. 

Catherine gambles—it’s why she’s here. And Polaris has seen every beginning and ending on Earth. They know how this started, and they want to see how it ends.

So, together, they take that leap.

•••

Down here, we’ll look up. 

We’ll stick our heads out the windows of our cars, stand on the balconies of our apartments, take a walk around the block while holding someone’s hand, and we’ll glance up and see something new. 

We’ll see two celestial bodies orbiting one another. Orbiting us. And they’ll stay up there, together. 

Until the very end.

STEFAN ALCALÁ SLATER is a speculative fiction writer from Los Angeles. His work has appeared in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Daily Science Fiction, and Mermaids Monthly. He is a graduate of the Clarion West Writers Workshop. Check out his website stefanaslater.com to read more of his work.

After the Astronaut and the North Star Kiss was edited by Louise Koren. It can be found in Tales & Feathers Volume 3.