Space Hostages

For Gemma

Y
ou can't cry in space.

You can give it a good try, though.

Tears won't
fall
, without gravity
.
They collect on the surface of your eyes and you can't wipe them away, so on top of being thrown out of a spaceship, you can't see.

I mean, I hope this doesn't happen to people generally, but it was happening to me.

I kept struggling. It was stupid, because there was nothing to fight, nothing to grab hold of.
Nothing.
Nothing so huge and total I was going to drown in it. But I still kicked and flailed. All that did was spin me over in helpless cartwheels. I saw the planet swing around as I tumbled, a blur of
green and gold through my tears.

I tried to stop moving, to stop breathing so hard. Need to save oxygen, I thought.

But save it for
what
?

I screwed my eyes shut and tried to shake the tears free. It didn't really work, but when I opened them, I could make out a frantic scribble of movement against the dark sky. One other human out here with me, no more than the length of a room away, but unreachable; we could flail all we wanted, but we'd never be able to touch.

And then I somersaulted over again, and there was too much water in my eyes; I couldn't see him anymore.

The planet rolled past again, slower this time, a bright disc of light carving through the black. I saw the dim outlines of continents. I wondered if they had names. I wondered if anyone down there would ever know I was there, drifting past above their heads, forever.

We weren't supposed to be here.

No one was supposed to be here.