The Place Between the Snow and Stars

Icy wind nipped at my cheeks as my boots crunched over the fresh snow, still falling. At the right angle, in the heavily steeped darkness, the flakes could be bits of glittering stardust instead of frozen fractals of water. “Here I am,” I whispered into the endless night.

No one whispered back.

Behind me, the lights strung up around the huddled buildings of Esperanza Base gave off a faint golden glow, and the comforting hum of music, conversation and laughter spilled out from the community hall. The Midwinter party was in full swing, everyone celebrating the shortest day of the year and the coming return of the sun. But before me all was quiet. I would only have to venture a few more steps into the vast, white expanse, for the muffled sounds of revelry to be completely snuffed out.

I stepped forward, the crunch beneath my boots already sounding far away. “Here I am,” I said again, the words turning to wisps as they left my lips. “In the place between the snow and stars.”

Again, there was no one there to respond. As I closed my eyes, though, I heard my father’s voice echo in my memory. It’s the end of the Earth, where the cosmos meets the crust. The place between the snow and stars. That was how he’d always described it to me, this bastion of utter isolation where he spent so much time, with a romantic kind of reverence, almost poetic. One day you’ll see for yourself, Espe. You’ll see why we named you after that place.

There were tears dampening my lashes when I opened my eyes again. I blinked them away and let out a long, slow breath, watching as a few snowflakes swirled through the gust of disrupted air. Beyond them, even though clouds blocked it from view, I knew the tail end of the Milky Way swirled, too. I’d spent just as many nights staring up in awe at the celestial landscape as I had like this. No matter the sight, snow or stars or both, it was every bit as beautiful and desolate, every bit as strange and special as he always made it out to be.

I don’t know exactly how long I stood there. Long enough for a shiver to burrow into my bones. That happened every now and then, when I lost track of time and wandered outside the halo of light surrounding the base. It was easy to do, though. The quiet was a peaceful invitation, beckoning me forward until the sounds of celebration were devoured by the voracious silence of the glacial plains. Where even the wind howled inaudibly.

Another shiver ran down my spine, and I was about to turn around and head back when I heard the soft sound of another set of boots scraping through the crystalline snow. Despite the cold that was seeping in, a warm jolt shot through my chest. There was only one person those footsteps could belong to, only one person who I’d want to follow me into the snow at this hour. I smiled, swallowing back the remnants of my tears, as I waited for him to reach my side.

“Knew I’d find you here.” Ian’s familiar voice was calm and steady as it sliced through the stillness. He leaned over to press a kiss to my cheek, lips lingering long enough to melt some of the chill from my skin.

Before I could respond or even turn to look at him, I felt him drape a thick blanket around my shoulders like a cloak. He rubbed his hands up and down my biceps, then moved to stand behind me, his arms wrapping me in another layer of protection against the steely cold of the Antarctic air. I leaned back into his bed-warmed body, letting out a hum.

“Thanks for checking on me,” I murmured, still facing forward as the clouds began to drift beyond the mountains and pinpricks of silver began to pierce the sky.

“Always.” His resolute response came with a light squeeze. He didn’t bother asking what had gotten me out of bed and into the snow. He already knew what was on my mind and why I was awake. No one understood me better than Ian. “You want to stay here a little longer?”

“Just a few more minutes,” I said, more stars blinking into view with every word. Ian nodded, and we fell back into the silence he found me in, waiting until the snow covered ground glittered with cosmic light.

That was what I’d come to see, the sight my father loved so well that he returned to this harsh but magnificent place year after year. The sight he always hoped to share with me one day. The sight that was now no more than a memory.

With a sigh, I turned in Ian’s arms, his hold loosening but not letting go yet. He tilted his head and offered a small smile. “Hey, you.”

“Hey back,” I whispered, gripping the blanket he’d bestowed upon me and shrugging deeper into it.

He finally pulled away, putting some distance between us. Bringing his hands to the sides of his head, he mimed the motion of lifting something, like taking off a hat. I nodded in answer to his wordless question, and then we both reached up and removed the VR goggles we wore.

Esperanza Base, and the entire Antarctic Peninsula, vanished, taking with it the chill and the deafening quiet. We were left standing not in the snow but in the small living space of our cabin aboard Urania Station. As Ian set his pair of goggles on the charging base, the automatic window shades lifted to reveal the velvety black sea of space, dotted with brilliant points of light. Amidst them sat the frozen planet Tethyn, where we were set to drop in a matter of hours along with several other members of Urania’s research team.

Here I am, I thought again, looking out the window at the foreign planet which we hoped held the answers to reversing the catastrophic melting of Earth’s polar regions. In the place between the snow and stars.

Still holding my headset in one arm, I stepped over to the window and pressed my free hand against the glass, spreading my fingers so wide it looked like all of Tethyn could fit into my palm. It would be quiet down there. Quiet and cold, like my father’s recorded memory of his years in Antarctica, but without the golden glow and the cheerful hum of the Midwinter celebration at our backs. The nights would be long, and until we established a habitable base, we would be entirely on our own on Tethyn, more isolated than even the most remote places on Earth were when my father was alive.

When we still called the blue dot home.

The blanket Ian brought me was still firmly in place around my shoulders, but another shiver passed through me at the thought of what awaited us down there, this one driven more by anticipation than temperature.

“He’d be proud of you, Esperanza.” Ian’s words came out in the form of a statement, not a question, as he relieved me of the goggles and set them beside his own. “So proud.”

I nodded. “I know.” Turning, I held out my hand to him and waited for him to take it. “He’d be proud of you, too.” I tightened my grip and used it to tug him over to join me by the window, then laced our fingers together.

Ian pressed his empty hand to the window like I had, gazing through his fingers at the new frontier in the form of the stark white and crystal blue marble in the distance. “Yeah,” he said, swallowing a knot of emotion. “I know.”

We stood there, losing track of time the same way that I did when I was standing in my father’s memory, and then it was my turn to yank us back to the present. Giving another slight tug on Ian’s hand, I looked up at him and smiled. “C’mon, let’s get back to bed.” I sighed. “Can’t be too tired for the drop tomorrow.” Rising on my toes, I pressed a kiss to Ian’s bearded cheek. “We’ve got work to do down there.”

“We do,” he agreed.

I slept the rest of the night warmed by his arms and by the golden glow of the thing that settled in both of our chests. Hope. Hope for a future that could be more than someone else’s memory of the past.