Crossing the River Styx

In tides and rhythms, the Sun makes its tempers known. It’s angry tempers; holy tempers. Reaching in storms and furies toward the singular blue eye. A faithful eye filled to bursting with love. But love was betrayed, and blue turned to a dead grey.

Arlene’s blue eyes were closed. Closed and searching; as though by lying perfectly still, memories of spring and breezes and birds could somehow be coaxed into the living world. In her dream, she was back. Songbirds made their home in the live oak outside her window. Their joy at life and breath and freedom made the passage from sleep to waking a sort of pleasant relief.

In real life, there had been a cemetery across the street, but that did not make its way into her vision. In the vision, the field was lush with sweet peas and redwoods. A hand touched her shoulder, heavy and warm. She closed her eyes tighter, and felt the variable pressure of each finger on her skin. A head of soft curls nuzzled in her arms. Her breath became shallow as she clung desperately to the dream, conscious that if she moved or breathed or allowed her eyes to flutter open, the phantoms would disappear. Stay. Stay. Stay. She thought.

Grating machine noise pulled her, at last, from sleep. She was alone in the cold, uncomfortable bunk. The reliable alarm read: 0400 hours. Like the farmer who rises before dawn to tend the pigs and cows and make his living, Arlene rose before dawn to tend the ugly machines that now supported life. She rose before dawn, so the washroom was clear and the hot water wasn't scarce, and no one shoved her for space in the locker. She was washed and fed and sharp before the first of them fought free of the loving arms of sleep.

Over the past three years, Arlene had grown used to the humid air of the habitat. The constant dampness along her forehead and shoulder blades. She had learned not to be bothered by the nest of matted frizz at the nape of her neck. She knew how to weave and duck around the soggy, sour-smelling laundry; how to avoid disturbing the sleepers. She moved quickly and silently through the forest of beds. The path was familiar to her feet, even in the black before dawn. Then she found the handle along the wall. The causeway was kept dark at this hour, so the lights didn’t flood the bunkroom when the door opened. Dark and cold and full of the gushing sound of wind. Her work was waiting for her outside.

Even in the growing morning light, the Aurora danced in energetic green and yellow above the habitat. An awe-inspiring sight that once had graced only northern skies, it was now a melancholy reminder of their failing magnetic field. The radiation permeating their atmosphere. Radiation that had already killed nearly every living thing on Old Planet Earth. Nearly, but not quite.

The air outside the habitat was too cold to breath. Inside her suit, Arlene couldn’t feel the cold, and looking out over the landscape's arid rises and falls, she could see no sign of the cold, either. Not a single plant to wither and brown. Not one drop of frozen, sparkling water. Only rocks of grey, forming endless valleys and hills, any one of which could’ve harbored the foaming heads of Cerberus.

Arlene reached, instinctually, for the ghost hand hovering somewhere just out of reach. The strong arm that had always steadied her descent into the valley where the transformer waited for repairs. Her hand hit empty air and a tear threatened to form in the smooth indentation between her eye and her nose. That small basin where she could feel the beat of her pulse. That place where aching pain too often struck her. She closed her eyes for a moment, steadying her breath. The strong arm hadn't been there in weeks. It was time to get used to that. Suddenly, she was overwhelmed with the desire to return to the base. She didn’t want to be here anymore. The transformer could wait.

Back in the locker, Arlene struggled to hang the heavy suit on its hook. Up on her tip-toes, she slid the helmet onto the shelf and was hit, unexpectedly, with the painful pressure of exhaustion. She collapsed on the bench, and reached for a heart-shaped locket around her neck. She turned it over and over, and ran the edge of her fingernail along the tiny etched flowers. The motion was familiar, but not as comforting as she expected.

She wished, more than anything, to savor this moment of aloneness. To dwell, peacefully, on the empty calm of the locker. She knew this quiet would not come again for days and days. But her mind wouldn't settle. A child crouched behind the storage bins. He poked his curly head around, grinning as if she couldn’t see him.

“What are you doing here?” She asked. He didn’t answer.

She sighed, and rose from her seat, and prayed the weary would wash away once her stomach was full.

“Fix the transformer?” A voice called. Matthew Holmes towered over her. Arlene craned her neck to meet his beady eyes. The overhead lights glared at her from behind his massive head.

“Sit down, Holmer,” she replied irritably.

Breakfast was a bleak point in every day. No pancakes or sausages. No muffins or coffee. Just tepid oatmeal. The first shift got a bowl that was only a little over-cooked. The second shift got mush. The third shift got something very near to paste.

“Fix the transformer?” Holmes asked again, plopping down across from her. Arlene stared at her paste guiltily and focused on fighting her pharyngeal reflex. “He’s better today, you know. Clearer,” Holmes added in a softer tone. Arlene shot a grimace at him and tried to think of what to say. Clearer was fine, but they’d been here before. “Maybe a visit would be good. Maybe—”

“Thanks for looking in on him,” she interrupted, standing and awkwardly balancing the chair as she shimmied away from the table.

“Gonna finish this?” Holmes called after her, already reaching across the table for her bowl of paste.

Arlene made her way back to the locker, which was surely crammed and raucous by now. Even the causeway was bright and bustling. Like those colorful canvas tubes that toddlers liked to run through, the tunnel's flimsy walls shook and shivered as the stream of impatient scientists shuffled through it. Lights swayed on their strings, and shadows swayed with them. They made the floor dance a little, and brought on the familiar headache. Arlene pressed her middle finger to the top of her nose and breathed through her teeth.

Two yards ahead, a baby peaked over a strong shoulder. His chubby hand grasped at his father’s shirt. Just then, an equally chubby hand pulled lightly at Arlene's coat hem. Brown curls bobbed below.

The words kept coming back to her: He’s better today. Clearer. But another voice filled her head, too. Flashes of fevered pacing and angry words still bothered her like broad sunlight after a dark room. Stop telling me what to do. The voice snapped. I’m over it. She flinched, even at the memory. His words reverberated in her head. Then another thought. The stuffy locker, the heavy suit. The dead planet. Those horrible, finicky transformers.

Holmes was right. A visit would be good.

Her sudden about-face surprised the troupe of scientists behind her. She shouldered her way upstream, back to the mess hall. They kept it too warm in there. Too cold in the causeway. The contrast made her nauseous, and she quickly stepped across the room to the other door.

Her pace slowed as she made her way to the hospital. The slower her pace, the faster her mind worked. She mouthed her thoughts into the air, searching for the right words. Her first words to him in weeks. It’s good to see you, she thought. No, that wasn’t it. How are you feeling? No, that wasn’t it, either. He hated coddling. He hated pity. I heard you’re feeling better. Yes, that was it. Hopeful. Positive. Not too intrusive.

“I heard you’re feeling better,” she whispered to herself, practicing a smile as hydraulics whooshed and the hospital door slid open.

Like the rest of the habitat, the hospital was hot and crowded. Shoddy and over-taxed systems meant accidents. Accidents meant more workers out of commission. Labor shortages meant standard maintenance didn’t get done. No maintenance meant more accidents, and the cycle continued.

“Arlene,” a voice called. A woman’s voice, high and comforting. Dr. Reese smiled and nodded at a wall of white curtains. “He’ll be glad you’re here,” she said, tossing a thick, golden braid over her shoulder.

Arlene took two deep breathes, willing the lump in her throat back down into her stomach where it belonged. I heard you’re feeling better, she thought. I heard you’re feeling better.

She stepped around the curtain and saw his dark, curly head. He was sitting, stooped over, on the edge of the bed; his back was to her. “I heard you’re—” she began. The words didn’t feel right.

He turned, and her eyes locked on his weathered face. He hadn’t shaved in days. The dark patches under his eyes had turned a deep purple. He wasn’t sleeping.

“Hello,” she said. Almost shy. Almost as though they hadn’t been married for five years.

“Hi,” he answered.

Her chest flooded with guilt. She couldn’t remember why she’d stayed away so long. “I’m sorry,” she said. Then her words caught in her throat and left her feeling dizzy and unsure.

“Nah,” he answered, turning back around.

She came to his side of the bed and hopped up beside him, choosing to ignore a faint urge to put her hand on his strong arm. He was balancing a book on his knees. Treasure Island. Her favorite. A wedding gift she’d given him five years earlier. It had sat, unread, in his locker ever since.

“Enjoying it?” she asked.

“Passes the time,” he replied. He ran his tongue over his teeth, gingerly, as if one of them were filled with cyanide. “Ten days sober,” he winced. She nodded in a way she hoped was reassuring.

“Worst is behind you, then?” She asked.

“Guess so,” he answered.

From the corner of her eye she caught a glimpse of movement. The child was playing hide-and-seek in the corner behind the medicine coolers. She told herself not to stare, but her eyes refused to obey. Then a warm hand covered her own. She felt the variable pressure of each finger on her skin.

“I see him, too, you know,” he murmured.

Then the room became too warm to bare. Nausea hit her like a swirling windstorm, and she jumped from the bed.

“I can’t… I don’t want…” She stammered, but couldn’t speak.

Suddenly he was beside her, his arms wrapped around her, his face buried in her hair. They stood there, swaying silently for a minute. The child was gone, and the dark emptiness was overpowering enough to hear. It reverberated through her skull.

Then she felt his hand on the locket. His calloused fingers brushed the surface and softly grazed her collarbone. Without asking, he pulled the locket up and gently opened the tiny door. A round and dimpled face smiled up at them from beneath a mop of brown curls.

“I miss him,” she whispered.

“So do I,” he answered.

After another minute, he loosened his hold on her and began to turn away.

“Stay,” she breathed. Without hesitation, he pulled her close to him, his hands on her waist, his comforting scent surrounding her until the vision came back. Spring and breezes and birds. “Stay, stay, stay,” she murmured.

“I’m right here,” he answered. “I’m right here.”