“Flight 17 to Mars, departing in three minutes. Please proceed to your boarding gate.”
The announcement hit just as I cleared the turnstile. Trunk in one hand, half-warm hot sandwich in the other. I ran.
Moving walkway to the platform: ninety seconds. I’d make it. Probably.
“Seriously, who schedules a meeting right before launch?”
Muttering to myself, I glanced sideways at the departure board. Flight 17 — propellant loading complete — boarding door 3B. Same spot as always. I knew it cold.
I burst onto the platform and there it was: the white giant, its nose nearly brushing the ceiling. Cryogenic vapor rolled off its hull and swept low across the floor in pale drifting clouds.
“Ticket, please.”
The gate agent thrust the reader toward me. I held up my QR code. Beep.
“There you go. Seat 2B-14. Your transfer will be at—”
“The Gateway, right?”
“That’s it. You’ll disembark at the lunar-orbit station and connect to the next departure.”
Behind me, footsteps. Someone sprinting. The agent turned.
“Fifteen seconds — you can still make it!”
A man in a suit burst through, gasping, fumbling for a ticket in his breast pocket. The agent took it with one hand and pressed the man’s back with the other.
“You made it. Go ahead.”
“Thank you… so much…”
He half-crouched through the door and dropped into the seat right next to mine.
The doors sealed. A calm voice counted down from ten. The seat tilted gently and reshaped itself around me.
The man beside me sank deep into his headrest and said, almost to himself:
“God, so glad I caught it. Three hours until the next one.”
“Business trip?”
“My daughter’s birthday. She teaches school on Mars.”
Huh. I was actually surprised.
“What’s it like — school on Mars?”
“Pretty normal, really. Math, language arts. The main difference is you can see Earth through the classroom window.”
Right. Normal. For the people who live there, a view is just a view.
The liftoff vibration hummed through my ribs. The launch tower slid smoothly downward and disappeared.
“How often do you make this trip?”
“About four times a year. To see her.”
“Wow. You’re a pro.”
He laughed.
“You get used to it. Feels like the bullet train now.”
I took a bite of my hot sandwich. The acceleration shifted the filling toward the back — different texture, different resistance. That’s the one thing that sets a Mars flight apart from the subway.
The man beside me rested against his seat, eyes half-closed, a quiet smile on his face, turning his phone over and over in his hands.
”…She’s probably napping by the window right now.”
Like he was just thinking out loud.
“Your daughter?”
“Yeah. She loves sunbathing. But the colony light’s too weak, so they set up an LED window spot just for her.”
An LED window spot.
I didn’t quite know what to say. A Mars classroom that goes that far for one teacher — artificial sunlight, a dedicated sunny corner. Work-life balance had apparently come a long way.
“That’s a wonderful school.”
“It really is. Everyone dotes on her. The kids always want her in their laps, so lessons apparently never get started.”
In their laps.
I stopped. The last bite of hot sandwich paused halfway to my mouth.
The man — whether he hadn’t noticed or was playing it perfectly straight — turned his phone screen toward me. His lock screen photo.
A magnificently self-possessed calico cat stared back at me. Chubby. A small ribbon around her neck. Behind her: unfamiliar metal shelving. On the wall at the back of the shelves, a crayon drawing of Earth, taped up by small hands.
“This is my daughter. Fifth year teaching at Colony Third Primary.”
He said it with the purest pride.
Four times a year. Twenty-seven hours each way. A layover on the moon. All for her.
I offered a carefully neutral “oh, wow,” and turned toward the window. I was fighting very hard to keep the corner of my mouth under control.
Then his phone buzzed softly.
“Your reserved order — ‘Mars Colony Limited: Blue Donuts, 10 boxes’ — is available for pickup at the counter near the arrivals gate. Please collect within 30 minutes of landing. Orders unclaimed after this window will be held until your next flight.”
Ten boxes.
I’d told my coworkers it was a business trip. The exact right number to go around the office on the way back. The blue ones, salt-glazed, impossible to find on Earth. Twenty-seven hours via the moon. Thirty minutes to the pickup counter.
The man glanced over at me and looked at the screen.
”…I hear those are good.”
“Oh — yeah, they are.”
“My daughter loves the smell of them.”
I stopped trying to hold my expression together.