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CHAPTER TEN

“Call me Callie.” Doctor Hadfield coos through the door at us. Chelenko is awake, barely, but still, it’s something, and at this point I’ll take any good news.

“You still with us, comrade?” I ask.

He makes a disgruntled noise followed by a sharp nod.

His left pupil is still blown as big as a saucer, but his head wound has stabilised, the plasma-y blood has begun to congeal over.

He keeps complaining that it feels itchy and tight, but Dr Hadfield assures me that’s quite normal. A sign of healing.

You’d think the big guy has never been injured before, something I know to be false considering all the silvery scars I saw traversing and interlacing across his skin - and those were just the parts I could see.

“Alex.” I turn to the doctor, spotting Matthias behind her. “You need to keep the wire cutters where they are.” She reiterates for the fifth time, like I’m not trying. “Don’t let him move about too much.”

“Keeping him still is like herding cats.”

Chelenko groans. “Can’t we just pull out? Like bad tooth.”

Callie laughs, it's gentle and tender, like her, and I completely understand why she went into medicine.

“We can’t. Right now, you’re stable. If we dislodge it, you could bleed out.”

“Like the least fun birthday party, complete with a Chelenko Pinata,” I say, as I pull a strip of velcro from the storage wall.

I wrap some velcro around the pliers, securing them to his vest. “There.” I give his shoulder a little pat. “Now stop moving.”

Chelenko grunts.

“ Hallo . Can I talk to Alex for a moment?” Matthias asks the Doc.

“Sure, I need to go grab something anyway.” She turns back to the window. “I’ll be right back.”

He waits until she's a few metres down the hallway and out of earshot before turning back to me.

For a moment, I am presented with nothing but the black of his t-shirt and my reflection in the glass. My brown hair is loose and lank as it floats up around my head. Blood and sweat plaster loose hairs to my forehead. My skin is pale, blotchy, with an accompanying bloodshot eye.

My eyelids feel heavy. Everything feels so heavy. I am exhausted, bone-weary so, and by Matthias’ concerned expression, he agrees with my assessments. And that makes me feel all the more helpless .

“Alex.” He lowers himself next to the glass, his side against the wall. “I’m here.”

“Matthias.” I give him a small smile, all I can muster with my current level of exhaustion. My energy stores are depleted. The initial adrenaline rush has definitely come and gone, leaving me ready and waiting for a ten-hour nap. “What did the crew decide?”

“It doesn’t matter. I’m going to get you out of there.”

“Luca–”

“Wants to risk ripping a hole in the hull. I won’t let you die.”

“I’m not dying in here,” I say, my voice quivers, summoning all the integrity of a wet paper bag.

“I’m not going back to Earth without you.” He replies easily.

I believe him.

He's giving me the same look he did in the past. When he was fully, completely, and irrevocably committed to seeing something through to the end.

We fall into a comfortable silence.

Nothing but the hum of the station and the gentle tapping of fingers against a datapad. Chelenko falls back into a light sleep, I nudge him lightly to check if he’s still breathing. He inhales deeply.

I slide myself closer to the glass, my shoulder resting against Matthias’ with just a few inches of reinforced glass separating us. “Matthias..? ”

“Hmm?”

“Matze?”

His eyes raise from the datapad clutched in his hand, to meet mine.

“You haven’t called me that in a long time.” He smiles.

“Why didn’t you sign the papers?” I ask.

“Alex, don’t–”

“I need to know. Before I…”

He looks up from his datapad, frowning at me, “You are not going anywhere. I forbid it.”

“Matze. Please, I need to know.” I beg. I am so bloody tired of begging him. That’s all I ever did in our previous life. I begged him to come home, to be on time. To invest even half into us as he did into his work.

He sighs. “I wasn’t ready.”

“We’ve been separated for three years.”

He nods slowly, agreeing. “You’ve been gone for three years.”

“If I was gone, where were you?”

“Waiting.” He admits. His gaze meets mine, a deep sadness lurking in his moss-green eyes.

“Oh, Matze.” Tears prick at my eyes at the thought of him all alone, waiting for me to come back, despite feeling as though I had run dry of tears hours ago. “You know, we were both unhappy.”

He shakes his head. “I wasn’t. ”

“You were. You were always working.” I sigh. “And so was I.” I offer him a small smile. “It was my fault as well. I was making you unhappy.”

“ Nein . You are the only happiness in my life. Only you . Nothing else.”

I frown at him. “Is that why you're here?”

He nods slowly. “I told myself that if you were happy, I would leave you alone.”

“And now?”

He releases his datapad leaving it to float in his lap, his eyes like two deep emerald lagoons, moisture giving them a light sheen. “Alex, you almost… died. You still could die. I’m never leaving you again.”

“You should know Luca and I–”

“I don’t care. I just want you. I need you.”

“I think he cares for me.”

Matthias makes a strained noise in the back of his throat, tortured by my words. I feel as though I ripped his heart clean from his chest as his face contorts.

“Do you… care for him?” he asks, so quietly I almost miss it, his eyes dropping to the data pad in his lap.

It’s on the tip of my tongue to say, ‘Yes.’ But the words catch in my throat, leaving me silent. My mind searches for something to say, but like clutching at smoke, it comes up empty. What we had wasn’t love. Not for me. It was fun, and I felt wanted .

I shake my head. “No. It’s not that simple.”

“How long?”

“Recent. We met in pre-mission training, but nothing happened until we were already up here.”

He nods slowly, thinking, and then he frowns.

“Wait here.”

I laugh, “Where would I even go?”

He dashes out of sight. I can hear the thumps of his feet against the handholds, slowly drifting away until the noise is swallowed up by the station's background noise.

Within moments, he’s back again with a satchel in hand, the brown leather worn and a monogrammed ‘MM’.

“You still have that?” I ask.

“Of course,” he says. “It was a gift.”

“I’m surprised you haven’t thrown it out. Look how old it is now.” I’d recognise the satchel anywhere, but age has not been kind. The leather is worn, the monogrammed ‘MM’ no more of a VN now. But I remember it.

“I got you that.”

“Graduation gift.” He smiles, that's the second now in the past ten minutes.

“When you finally finished that awful PhD.” I snort-laugh.

He frowns through the glass at me. “Particle Theory is not awful. ”

“Maybe to you.” I laugh, “I thought it would add to the whole professor aesthetic you had going on when you started at CERN.” More quietly, I add, “I didn’t know that place would be the beginning of the end.”

The death of us.

He clears his throat as he thrusts open the flap on the sachet and roots about inside.

I guess we’re done reminiscing about the past. Bloody typical. Shut down once the conversation broaches more difficult topics.

Peer reviewed proposals, and he can talk until the cows come home, the slightest mention of emotional turmoil and he hides behind his work.

“Is that…?” I start.

“ Mutti sends her love,” he says as he flashes me the goods - a tin of delicious home-baked Lebkuchen. If my throat wasn’t so dry I bet my mouth would be watering in anticipation, saliva pooling over my tongue.

“Thank God for Gerda, and for buttery chocolatey goodness,” I sigh. Closing my eyes as I imagine the crunch of the chocolatey outside and the light, fluffy centre. Images flick through my mind as I imagine the rich gingerbread flavour bursting across my tastebuds.

Matthias chuckles.

“If only you’d look at me the way you look at baked goods,” he sighs, quickly extracting another package from his satchel. “Here it is.”

He holds it up for me to see .

I feel my face light up, a wide smile stretching my dry lips. “A book?”

“How do you… It’s a gift. I wanted to surprise you, but, well, you know how well that went.”

He turns over the beautifully wrapped parcel, showcasing the pretty green paper fastened with a red satin ribbon tied in a bow. It's rectangular and slim. Definitely book-shaped.

I instinctively reach forward, my hand resting on the glass.

I hate this damn barrier between us .

“Open it for me.”

He pauses a moment.

“Please, Matze. I want to see it. This could be the last book I …” The words catch in my throat.

“Ok.” He pulls the bow with one hand, sliding the ribbon off before tucking it in his pocket. Carefully unwrapping the green paper, a slip of paper escapes its confines, floating just in front of the door.

He clears his throat, grabbing the note and scrunching it in his hand.

“Wait, what was that?”

“Nothing of importance.” He holds up the book for me. It's gorgeous.

A hardback with a pretty cover of a couple embracing. As he rotates it slowly, I see the prettiest pattern of atomic structures of molecules and mathematical equations painted along the page's edges. The spine reads ‘ The space between us ’ in delicate gold foiling.

“Wow.”

“It reminded me of you . Of us .”

“ Danke schon .”

“ Gern geschehen .”

I smile sadly, a small tear escaping. I might never be able to read it, and it was such a thoughtful gift.

He opens to the first page and chuckles to himself.

“What?” I lean forward, trying to read the first line.

“I am really happy I’m here with you. I wasn’t sure I’d ever see you again.”

I smile. “I am glad you’re here too, Matze.”

He clears his throat and begins to read aloud. I settle back against the hatch, close my eyes, and listen.