On The Moon

So here we were, after our all night adventure, resting now on a blanket in the grass, sitting up, side-by-side, gazing at the sun as it rose above the horizon. The night we had was amazing and I felt something in my chest, a fluttering sensation. Was it love? I wasn't sure, for I hadn't had much experience in that department. When I saw his smile however, the sunrise in front of us felt meaningless and I could almost get lost in those silver-blue eyes.

Starting my new job as assistant intern at NASA, was a dream coming true. I had one goal most of my life, and that was going to the moon. Ever since I was little, I had those astronaut dreams. My mother thought it would be a phase, but my father was just so happy to see his little girl with aspiration, that he fed into it and took me on so many adventures, staring up at the stars. We used to drive outside of city limits, away from the city lights, just so he could show me the wide sky above and all it's beauty. For what felt like eternity, stretched the sky with magnificent glowing crystals, some stationary and some that twinkle. He also made sure that he kept track of the meteor showers, so that I could witness those as well. I lived my life loving the stars and having that dream of touching space and it led me through many hard working years of school and college, until I landed the sweet spot of my new job.

Filled with a nervous excitement, I stepped through the front doors at my designated meeting time and ran into my first NASA encounter. I was so distracted by the huge life-like Earth poster in the front lobby, that I ran right into someone. When we collided, his papers went everywhere and I fell on my butt to the floor. I immediately knew that I just blew my chances here and would have to recoil under the weight of embarrassment.

"Oh gosh! I'm so sorry!" I scrambled to my knees to help with the papers, the man I ran into already had his back to me and was picking up some papers that had flown away. The desk receptionist just kept at her keyboard strokes, ignoring the chaos. I gathered up as many papers as I could and when I looked back up, I saw such a handsome face that I almost dropped them again. This younger guy with light brown hair and silver-blue eyes was very handsome and even his glasses complimented his face shape. He already had on a nervous smile. "It's no big deal. I've ran into people myself here. First day?" I stood up with his papers and nodded, holding out the papers to him. He took them and I could see him relax a little in his shoulders. This made me relax too. "Do you know where I can find Dr. Stone? He's the one I'm working with as his new assistant." Those eyes brightened instantly. "Of course. I also work with Dr. Stone. He might seem kind of blunt when he talks, but he's a great guy. I was about to go meet with him right now." I smiled back at this handsome guy and started following him. My embarrassment still nagging at me, I tried to put it behind me. Well, at least this guy seemed forgiving.

We walked through a few corridors and one elevator ride and ended up in an office, where an older man sat at his desk writing something quickly in a small notebook. He didn't stop when we entered and me and this other guy just stood there waiting. I figured that the handsome guy would talk to him, but he just waited. I guess this guy didn't like to be interrupted. He wrote for another 30 seconds or so, before closing the book and dropping the pen on his desk. He looked at the handsome guy and then me. He held out his hand for the papers and the handsome guy handed them over, no words exchanged. This atmosphere made me nervous. The older man looked confused at the papers and then his eyes cut to us.

"So I'm guessing it's because of you two that these are out of order?" We sat in an awkward 3 second silence before I spoke out. "I'm so sorry sir! It's all my fault! I wasn't paying attention when I walked in and ran right into this man and knocked his papers everywhere!" The older man, who I could guess was in fact Dr. Stone, just stared at us and stood up with the papers in hand. He stepped over to a smaller desk and plopped them there. "Well... Ms. Adams, your first job here is to organize those papers. There's dates at the top and I need them in order within the next 30 minutes. Your recommendation said you were very fast at organizing things, so hop to it." I nodded and said "yes sir!" and sat at the table immediately and started organizing the papers by date. God I felt so stupid just then. There goes my reputation here. When I looked back up, Dr. Stone put a hand on handsome guy's shoulder and started talking to him about something and when he looked away, those silver-blue eyes looked to me and he smirked. Was he laughing at me getting in trouble? They both then walked out of the room. I finished sorting the papers and as I stood up, Dr. Stone walked back in. It only took me 5 minutes. I handed the papers to him. He looked over it nodding. "Very good Ms. Adams. I will set you up with your next assignment.

The rest of the day was mostly just paperwork. This Dr. Stone guy was so unorganized, my OCD brain was going nuts in here. At least by the time I finished clearing and calculating everything in his office the place was nice and tidy now, with his filing cabinets neatly tucked away. It was time for us to leave for the day and I felt a little defeated so far. I mean it was an easy first day, but nothing was learned about being an astronaut. I knew it was a long ways away, but I thought that maybe things would be a little more proactive about space, not so much just papers. As I was leaving, a familiar voice called out to me before I left the front lobby. It was the handsome guy from before, those eyes shining. "Hey, I didn't get to introduce myself earlier." He held out his hand. "Steven Stone. And yes, Dr. Stone is my grandfather, but I swear I'm here because I worked for it. Trust me. He'll work you like a dog." He said this with a laugh. I shook his hand, very soft and clean, but still firm and strong feeling. "Emily Adams. I'm sorry about the papers still. But, did you laugh at me?" Steven looked away and smirked a little. When he looked back he was holding a laugh but stopped when I had a serious look. "Sorry. I figured he would make you do paperwork on your first day. I had to do the same crap, but don't worry. You'll be learning more about how these things work in no time." As he said this, he gazed at another one of the lobby posters, but this one had one of their newer model space crafts on it and it was beautiful. The way that Steven looked at it however, reminded me of myself somewhat. That look in his eyes just screamed desire and hope. It was then that I had a feeling that me and this silver-blue eyed guy would become very close.

Over the next several weeks we did get closer and became very good friends. Dr. Stone had us both learning under him and working on information and data gathering from the newer craft models, for the company had the dream of launching this baby to the moon. As soon as I heard this goal I wanted to faint, but I kept my cool. I knew it wouldn't be me going first, but maybe one day I would be a part of it. It was 3 months in, when we had lunch together and Steven asked me something I didn't expect. "Hey Emily, did you want to um... bust out some telescopes and check out the stars later? God that sounds so lame when it's said out loud." He laughed nervously but I was nervous for another reason. To me, that was a dream date. "Sure. Did you want to go tonight? Maybe we could pack some dinner or something." He swallowed his nervous laugh and looked sincere. "I love to cook, maybe I could make us something if that would be ok?" I nodded and smiled before burying my face back into my food. I didn't want him to see me blushing.

We met later in the evening after work, both had telescopes in tow and he had packed a cooler with something homemade. I let him know my allergies and preferences and he surprised me with a sweet red wine and fettuccine alfredo, 2 of my favorite things. We ate and talked about our childhoods and were pleasantly surprised to learn that we loved the same thing. We both also had the same dream. We wanted to get that touch of space, to go to the moon. What I didn't know was, that tonight was actually a full moon as well, and we both sat and stared at it and the stars together. He loved astrology and zodiac stuff, so he pointed out so many constellations. The night was awesome and fun and we decided that we wanted to see the sunrise together too. We sat there on the grass, leaning to each other for warmth, with the shyness of school children, and watched the sunrise. I didn't want to think that I could already love someone this much in so little time, but... I really felt like I found my soul mate. Little did I know, that while staring into those silver-blue eyes, that something dark was looming on the horizon as well.

A week later, we had a very bad storm that caused massive amounts of rainfall and there were flood warnings. We agreed to meet at work anyways, but I was biting at my finger nails. I hated thinking about people driving in the rain and Steven was 10 minutes late. I thought to myself that it was no big deal, traffic was probably backed up and I did live closer than he did. I sat with Dr. Stone and we waited patiently for Steven to arrive. "I shouldn't have said to come in today. Maybe I should cancel, but I don't want to call his cellphone while he's driving." Dr. Stone didn't seem any more comfortable than I did, but he kept his image cooler than me. He looked to me and smiled a little, something I hadn't seen him do, except when he pranked someone. "Steven likes you, you realize that right?" I immediately blush. "Yep, I thought so. Technically you shouldn't date your coworkers, but you kids both seem to have good heads on your shoulders. I figure it wouldn't hurt if you guys were a thing." Having his grandfather's approval was nice and it made me feel a little better. After another few minutes however, Dr. Stone's phone rang. He answered it and I saw the color drain from his face. He immediately grabbed his coat. "What's wrong? Dr. Stone?" I followed him outside to his car. "Get in! Steven had an accident!" We got into Dr. Stone's car and he drove like a maniac, but within 9 minutes we got to the hospital and was asking questions at the front desk. The nurse tried to say that she would tell us when there was an update, but Dr. Stone wasn't having it. He barged past the nurse and further into the hospital and I stayed on his tail. We both looked hard for Steven and finally saw something that will be tied into my memory for the rest of my life. Steven was on a gurney that was moved onto another table, where a doctor and some nurses were working him over. A nurse tried to make us move, but I stayed with Dr. Stone and he shifted away from the nurse's hand and towards Steven's room. The doctor looked and told a nurse to get us out, but Dr. Stone was done with it. "I'm Not Going Anywhere Without My Grandson!" The doctor kept working and Steven was suddenly awake. He was bleeding so badly though, that the doctor's lap pads weren't doing much to help. The doctor looked defeated and there was blood filling the floor little by little. What it seemed to me, is that Steven was impaled during the accident and it hit some pretty important stuff, probably even an artery. My eyes were already filling with tears and Dr. Stone was in a worried rage. He stood there fuming, but the doctor and nurses started backing off and gave us a grim look. Steven was still awake, but barely and was calling out to us, almost like he knew we were there. We approached him and both took one of his hands. Steven looked at me and smiled.

"That sunrise...." "What?" I managed to answer in between tears. "That sunrise.... still lingers in your hair." He barely escaped a laugh and a cough, with blood coming from his mouth. "Don't talk, it's ok."

Steven shook his head barely. I knew what he meant by the sunrise, considering I had red hair. He started talking again. "Promise me something.... Emily." "Anything Steven! Anything you want."

He smiled one last time while he asked me, "Meet me on the moon ok? You meet me there." I barely managed to speak between sobs. "I promise, I'll meet you on the moon." Steven gave one last smile, before the silver-blue light in his eyes faded out and that that dreadful heart monitor made it's creepy still tone. Dr. Stone and I both sobbed at Steven's side, clinging to what was left of his warmth before he was completely cold.

A few weeks had passed along with a funeral and I still couldn't sleep. I found myself outside at night again and I often sat at the spot where we watched the sunset. I made it to one of the lakes nearby, one that we wanted to visit together for a date. I sat on the grass near the water's edge and looked up at the moon. I watched how it reflected beautifully on the water, the reflection dancing in the waves. "I'll meet you there Steven. On the moon."