The Wanderer

“Ok what’s on your bucket list then? Something you’ve always wanted to do.”

“Oh, I’ve always wanted to skydive.”

“No way absolutely not! You’re literally falling out of the sky!”

“I’m not saying you need to do it too; just stay in the plane you get a free flight!”

“Yea and watch you plummet to your death no thank you.”

“Excuse me I’ll be attached to a guy, a professional even, it’s completely safe.”

“Nothing’s completely safe.”

Once you’ve been to a place more than a few times you start to notice little details about it. The moose head with a party hat hung on the wall above the men’s bathroom, the picture of a past president standing next to the bar’s owner, the way she plays with the pair of straws in her vodka tonic. This was my 3rd date with Mrida and somehow, we managed to go to the same bar all 3 times. I’m starting to feel like a regular.

“Ok fine if you’re not skydiving then what?” I lean forward, taking my scotch and soda in both hands.

“You know I’ve always wanted to see the Earth from space.” She leans forward too, resting her head on her hand and matching my gaze.

“Oh man that’s a good one.”

“Do you ever get far enough to see the whole planet?”

“Well last time I went up we were in lower earth orbit, so you could see whole countries but not the whole planet.”

“See that’s the dream. I look out from my desk and find more desks, you look through the window and see the entire world.”

“Yea it can be distracting, to be honest I’m not even sure what I’m doing up there half the time.”

She laughs, her eyes moving down towards my hands playing with my glass.

“How’d you start working there anyways? Did you always know you wanted to be an astronaut?”

I sit back a moment, wondering if I should give the short answer or take her down the rabbit hole. We got time I’m not going anywhere soon I think to myself.

“Well growing up my dad was an engineer, and my mom was a dentist, so really I had two options.”

“Yea same here, that’s an Indian thing for sure, my dad was a doctor, and my mom did software, so I did software.”

“Wow good choice I couldn’t imagine you as a doctor.”

“Excuse me! I would be a great doctor!” Her eyes staring me down with a look I could fall in love with.

“So why didn’t you do it then?” I say with a smirk.

“Well you have to pick your whole career trajectory when you’re 17! At 17 all I knew was that I wanted my braces off and for Mike from math class to ask me to prom. It was a coin flip honestly, and I ended up here.”

“Wow this Mike guy, should I be jealous?”

“Are you?!” She says, her words spilling out of her laughter.

“Maybe a little” I say looking down at my glass, a smile finding its way onto my face.

We stop talking for a moment to sip our drinks. I look up towards her to figure out what’s on her mind, thinking I might have said too much too fast. We’d been here for hours, and I could stay hours more. Her cheeks start glowing red as the alcohol enters her bloodstream. I find that I can’t get this smile off my face.

“So, if you don’t like your job what would you do instead?” I say, breaking the silence.

“I don’t know, I like writing but there’s not much money there. Software pays the bills and it’s interesting enough, steady too, honestly a solid gig when you really think about it.”

“I mean in a way you’re still writing right? Instead of books or articles it’s code. If anything, its cooler.”

“You would be the one person to try and romanticize software engineering.”

“What can I say I’m a hopeless romantic.”

“Yea you really are” she says, her words melting a little.

“Fuck money for a moment, there’s more to life than numbers in your bank account, right? What would you write about?”

“Ok rich boy, most of life is dictated by numbers in your bank account.”

“Just answer the question” I say shaking my head and taking a sip of my nearly empty glass, the ice cold on my upper lip.

“I don’t know, I’d write about true crime or something, like real stories with real people.”

“Are you going to murder me by any chance?” I say backing away playfully.

“The jury’s still out on that” she says rolling her eyes.

“So why space then? Money’s no object apparently, so what would you do instead?” she says.

I look around the bar, taking a sip of my drink. The bar’s packed tonight, filled with people laughing, watching the big game on any television they could find, drinks in every one’s hand. A bar tender makes small talk with the girl who just sat down, smiling like he really means it. The juke box switches songs and rocket man starts playing. How fitting.

I look back to Mrida, her eyes lighting up as mine finds hers.

“Honestly, I’ve been looking up to the stars for as long as I can remember. I mean every kid dreams of being an astronaut when they’re young, and when I got an offer from NASA after college it just made sense. I never thought I’d actually get a chance to go up there. And when I finally made it up… Looking back, I don’t know if I’d choose anything else.”

Mrida leans forward, her right hand gently finding her chin. The laughter of those around us almost fades away as her eyes lock onto mine.

“What does it feel like up there?”

I sit back in my seat, finishing my drink before returning to meet her gaze.

“It’s hard to describe. It’s … overwhelming. You see in one moment everyone who has ever lived. Every experience, every action, the totality of humanity. From up there, the politics fades away, you see the petty differences we hold onto are meaningless. That in the end, this is all we got.”

She pauses before speaking again, taking a moment to imagine that feeling. She’s staring right at me, as if my eyes were the Earth and she was floating above it. After a beat, she laughs, her dimples peeking out from under her cheeks.

“Jesus how do you get any work done? I’d stare out the window all day long.”

“Who says I’m getting work done? I go outside every day and float.”

“Now that’s a bucket list entry right there, floating in space.”

“Oh so sky diving is off the table but floating in space is fine?”

“They’re different! You’re ridiculous”

“I’ll take you up one day, sneak you on board with the fruit roll-ups.”

She giggles and looks up at me, grinning in that goofy way she does. She grabs her drink and holds it up in front of her, her other hand finding mine.

“To floating in space!”

My eyes locked in on hers, I match her grin and raise my glass.

“To floating in space.”