Page 7 of See the Stars

‘Then it will be even louder,’ said Zelda. ‘I’ll take it off when Dr Boxley arrives and everyone stops shouting.’

‘It is loud in here,’ said Callum, turning back to Alice. ‘How about we grab a hot chocolate in the union after?’ Alice looked at him in surprise. Was that a date? She’d heard the other girls talking about them, but no one had ever asked her before.

‘Great idea,’ said Zelda, before Alice had a chance to answer. ‘I’ve not met many people who know about habitable zones. I’d like to discuss it further.’

‘So you heard that well enough?’ muttered Callum.

‘Yes, thank you,’ said Zelda. ‘Luckily, there was a dip in the general noise level just as you suggested it.’ She glanced at Alice. ‘You haven’t answered yet,’ she told her. ‘Do you want a hot chocolate?’

Alice looked at Zelda and then at Callum, then she grinned.

She was not only sitting here ready for her very first lecture, but she also had social plans with two people afterwards, including a boy who potentially wanted to go on a date with her, and the first girl she’d ever met who had purple hair and loved the stars.

‘Three hot chocolates,’ said Callum. ‘With extra whipped cream.’ He turned back to the girls and smiled at them. ‘Best on campus,’ he told them, and Alice wondered how he seemed to know his way around so well already.

‘Cally!’ A gaggle of boys appeared and one of them punched Callum in the arm.

‘Stevo!’ he replied, unperturbed by the violence.

‘We’re signing up for canoeing,’ said the boy, miming an oar in his hand. ‘You in?’

‘Of course.’

‘Come now or it might fill up.’

Callum looked at Alice. ‘You don’t mind, do you?’ he asked. ‘I’ll be right back.’

‘No problem,’ said Alice. Three hot chocolates appeared on the counter as soon as he left.

‘Six pounds thirty,’ said the girl at the bar. ‘Together or separate?’

‘I’ll get these,’ said Alice, trying to sound like she could afford them.

‘We could split it and cover the cost of Callum’s drink between us?’ offered Zelda. ‘And then he could pay each of us one pound five pence when he comes back.’

‘It’s fine,’ said Alice. She picked up two of the drinks uncertainly.

They were in tall glasses on china saucers that didn’t quite fit them and it made the whole operation unsteady.

She looked around and saw an empty table, and started to make her way towards it, relieved when she put the glasses down with minimal spillage.

She smiled at Zelda, grateful that Callum’s desertion had not left her alone.

A noisy group of students sat down nearby and starting debating something about Dickens and magic realism.

Zelda picked up her long-handled spoon and started tapping it on the table, marking out a syncopated rhythm.

For a moment, Alice wondered if it was Morse code.

She tried to think of something to say. ‘I like your purple hair,’ she said. ‘I’ve never seen anyone with hair like that.’

Zelda didn’t reply. They sat in awkward silence as Alice tried to think of a better topic for conversation. ‘What did you think of the lecture?’ she ventured, her voice loud to be heard over the conversation next door.

‘Professor Boxley was fantastic,’ said Zelda. ‘But much of what he said was also in his book.’

Good. This was going better. Alice had read his book, several times. ‘I already knew everything he said about interstellar gravitational pulls,’ she said, allowing herself to show off a little. ‘Maybe next time he’ll talk about what he’s researching now.’

‘I hope so,’ said Zelda.

‘I want to specialise in astrophysics,’ Alice volunteered, to break the pause that followed. Zelda didn’t respond. She looked at the spoon and put it down, placing her hands in her lap instead. Alice could feel the vibrations from her tapping the bottom of the table. ‘What do you want to do?’

‘Geology,’ said Zelda.

‘What?’ Alice leaned forward to make sure she’d heard correctly.

‘Rocks.’

‘Not space?’ she queried, just to make sure. ‘I thought that since you knew about Gliese 581, you’d be—’

‘Rocks are the basis of everything,’ interrupted Zelda, stirring her hot chocolate with the spoon but not drinking any.

‘If we really want to understand the universe, why guess at what’s millions of light years away?

Materials are the same, spreading out from the Big Bang to the far corners of everywhere.

We have all the proof of everything right here, waiting for us to understand it. ’

‘I’ve never thought about rocks like that before,’ said Alice, fascinated.

‘Not many people have.’

Alice took a sip of her own hot chocolate, trying to process Zelda’s words.

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘But we need to get further to know more. How can we assume that what’s true here will be true everywhere?

Different rules might apply in different conditions.

Conditions we can’t even comprehend here on earth.

’ She took a breath. That was the first time she’d vocalised her theories to anyone other than her grandfather.

He’d been sitting in his chair and had looked at her as if he understood, then called her Sheila and asked her for a bacon sandwich.

‘Interesting,’ said Zelda. She paused. ‘It’s noisy in here, too,’ she said. ‘Do you want my hot chocolate?’

‘Don’t you?’ asked Alice.

‘I’m vegan.’

‘You should have said.’ Alice looked guiltily at her empty glass. ‘I think they have herbal tea here.’

‘But Callum said hot chocolate, not herbal tea, when he invited me. And I wanted to come.’

Alice nodded. She understood, even though, strictly speaking, Callum hadn’t invited Zelda.

But now she was so pleased that Zelda had come.

She’d never met anyone so interesting. ‘Let’s ditch the drinks,’ she said.

‘How about we hit the library? There’s an article on Betelgeuse in the Astrophysical Journal that I’ve been wanting to read. And it’s much quieter.’

Zelda put down the spoon. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I’d like that.’ Alice smiled at her. A kindred spirit was a million times better than a date.