“Look, these are probably the last minutes of my life. I know you didn’t ask to spend them with me, and I sure as hell didn’t think I’d be spending them with you, but this is where we are, so can you please just humor me?”
The weird thing was that while I would have liked for my mom or Becca to have been on the other end of the comms, I wasn’t upset that it was DJ instead. I barely knew anything about him—I didn’t even know what he looked like—but, so far, he was the only thing about space I didn’t hate.
“It’s just me, my dad, and my older brothers,” DJ said. “My mom died when I was born.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Thanks, but it’s tough for me to miss someone I never met, you know?”
“Kind of,” I said. “It’s just me and my mom at home. My dad took off when I was three. Drugs, though my mom said he had some mental problems and that I shouldn’t hold it against him.”
“Couldn’t he have gotten help?”
I shrugged even though DJ couldn’t see it over the comms. “There was a homeless guy I used to see everywhere in my neighborhood. He was always sitting at one of the bus stops I had to pass on my way to and from school. For a while when I was in sixth grade, I got it into my head that he was my dad, which was silly, seeing as we didn’t look anything alike. It was just… it made me feel better to think he was there, even if he wasn’t.”
I didn’t give a lot of brain space to my dad. Most of the time he was little more than a ghost who haunted me and my mom around the holidays. There was a small part of me that thought I’d find him one day. I never expected us to have some big reunion where he apologized for leaving, but I thought, at least, I might get the chance to know him.
Now I never would.
“Hey, DJ?”
“Yeah, Noa?”
“Do me a favor,” I said. “Figure out who did this to us, find them, and kill them for me.”
“Can’t do it,” DJ said. “I’m a pacifist.”
I balled my hands into fists. “You’re a pacifist? Like, you won’t even fight to defend yourself?”
“To defend myself, yeah, but I’m not just going to walk up to a person and murder them, no matter how much I think they deserve it.”
This was a ridiculous conversation, and it was even more ludicrous that it was pissing me off. “I’m dying here, DJ. Are you seriously going to deny me my dying wish? Can’t you at least lie to me?”
“I could,” DJ said, “but what would be the point? You’re not going to die.”
I was sure that I’d misheard DJ. That he’d said something entirely different from what my brain thought he had. “Say that again.”
DJ’s laugh was as bright as a supernova. “You’re not dying today, Noa. Now hold on tight. I’m bringing you in.”
Before I could process what was happening, the back of my suit began to vibrate. Soon, my entire body was shaking, and I seemed to be slowing down. I didn’t know how far I’d traveled, but Qriosity was little more than a tiny dark blob in the starfield.
“What the hell is going on?” I asked, equal parts terrified and exhilarated.
I came to a complete stop, and the vibration in my back ceased for a moment before starting up again, only this time it was pushing me forward. I felt a gentle nudge against the inside of my suit as I sped toward Qriosity. “How… ? DJ? Did you… ?” I was having difficulty forming words and organizing them into coherent sentences.
“When I was digging through the computer’s operating system, I remembered seeing controls for the spacesuits. Turns out those controls allowed me to remotely activate your thrusters. Once I figured that out, all I had to do was program in a firing pattern that would stop your flight away from Qriosity and put you on a trajectory back to the ship. Nothing to it.” DJ really did make it sound simple. Like my life had never actually been in danger.
I barked out a laugh. “Oh yeah, sounds super easy.”
“I’m good with math,” he said. “Math and computers.”
“I’m good at using a calculator.” I had convinced myself that I was going to die in space, and now that I wasn’t, I could hardly believe it. I didn’t know what to do or say. “How am I ever going to thank you?”
“There was some mention of cake?” DJ said.
“As many cakes as you can eat,” I said. “I’ll stuff cakes in you until you beg me to stop.”
DJ’s gentle laugh filled my helmet. “Suddenly this is sounding less and less like a reward.”
Now that I was returning to the ship, a small ember of hope flared within me, and I nursed it into a flame. “How long will it take to reach the ship?” I asked. “I can’t wait to get out of this suit and to meet you, and I have to pee so bad I can taste it.”
“Let me see,” DJ said. “You’re moving at a speed of…” His voice faded in and out as he talked himself through the problem, and I wasn’t paying attention because… math. “Twenty-three minutes and forty-seven seconds.”
I hesitated, glancing at my hud. “Can you fire my thrusters again and speed the trip up a little?”
“If you really have to go, I bet you can go in the suit.”
The flame flickered. “That’s not it. I mean, yes, I am almost definitely going to pee in this suit, but DJ, I only have sixteen minutes of oxygen left.” I checked the readout on my hud twice to make sure.
Nothing from the comms.
“DJ?”
“I… Noa, I used the last of your propellant to set your course back. There’s nothing left.”
The flame died.
I began to laugh. A full-throated belly laugh that filled the suit. I laughed so hard that I absolutely peed a little. I hoped DJ was right about the suit being equipped to handle it. I didn’t want to die drowning in my own urine.
“Noa, don’t. I’ll work something out. Breathe shallowly, okay? We’ve still got time.”
I laughed because, if I didn’t, I was going to cry, and I had no idea what would happen to tears in zero-G. “This is perfect,” I said. “I’m going to make it back to the ship; I’ll just be dead before it happens.”
“Stop talking,” DJ said. “Talking uses oxygen.”
“This figures, you know?” I said, ignoring DJ. “My entire life has been one disaster after another.”
A bang echoed through the comms, followed by DJ’s choked voice. “You’re not going to die, Noa. I won’t let you!”
“It’s fine,” I told him. “It’s not your fault. You don’t even know me, okay? For all you know, this is exactly what I deserve. Don’t waste any more energy trying to save me. Save yourself, okay?”
“Noa—”
“Just…”
“What?” DJ said.
“Don’t leave me alone out here?”
I could hear DJ breathing, so I knew he was still there, but he didn’t speak for what felt like forever. A second is a second no matter what, right? It’s a measurement, and those are kind of absolute even if they’re made up. But time is also relative to the person experiencing it. That’s why the last minute hugging your best friend before they leave for LA to spend the summer with their grandparents feels shorter than a heartbeat, and why the last minute before the last bell rings on the last day of school feels like an hour.