Watching and waiting, the Malthusian visitors from the Moon orbit the planet. Their mission: Conquer Earth. Of course, that’s the easy part…
Malthusians are supposed to be happy. But especially happy in old age. One celebrates a life well-lived, and the great, looming, joyous reunion with the Unknowable.
At ninety-six, Paul Hussenian should have been very happy. Instead, Spaceship One’s chief engineer spent his days working extra hard. He didn’t want to think too much. He wasn’t at all convinced his life was well-lived. And as for the Unknowable? First and foremost, he was an engineer. He didn’t have time for all that hocus-pocus.
At seven pm Paul put his tools away. He stood in the gleaming engine room. Everyone else had left. Finally he washed his hands and walked to his room, picking up an avocado sandwich from the vending machine. He ate without enthusiasm. He didn’t feel like himself, the old pleasures were fading. Doubtless the end was near.
A physics book lay on his nightstand. He liked to occupy his mind by reading, but lately could barely stand to open a book. Once, he had dreamed of writing his own book. He developed an elegant theory on propulsion, but after a half-dozen false starts, finally gave it up.
He knew why: Love.
He had been profoundly involved with his wives. Next to their smiles, their laughter, their exquisite bodies and undefinable essence, he was helpless. Why go any further? What else did life possess?
At sixty his second wife divorced him. She had enough. He didn’t want to go line dancing, or play bridge, or take a trip to one of the resort cities orbiting Venus. Like some twenty-five year old newlywed, he wanted to stay home with her in his arms.
Since then he found himself alone. It was a bitter exile. He guessed no woman would want an aging, romantic fool, and he was right.
Hopelessly depressed, he lay in his bunk. Now he would die. And right when the two-year overhaul of the anti-gravity engines was due. That figured.
There was a soft knock at his door. When he opened it Megan Bremer stood with two cups of tea. She must have seen something in his face. “Oh, Paul!”
Megan occasionally visited the old man. She felt a kinship she could not define. As an Earthling, she didn’t always buy into Malthusia’s hearty and hale good fellowship, and found his carefully concealed, brooding spirit appealing.
“Are you afraid to go to the stars?” she asked. This was their euphemism for death.
They sat in his small room. “Absolutely not,” said Hussenian.
At no point would a Moon person admit fear. Megan leaned closer. “Then what is it?”
“I miss my wives.”
“I’m sorry, Paul.”
“I’d rather not talk about it. Can we talk about something else?”
“Of course.”
The single lamp on the nightstand was pale. It cast more shadow than light. They spoke of the seasons, good food, dogs, friends on the ship and back home. Megan was young and beautiful, as complicated and conflicted and possibly as unhappy as himself. Most of all she was a woman. He didn’t so much drink his tea as drink her presence.
“Ms. Bremer,” he said. “May I ask you something?”
“Whatever you like.”
“Will you come to my bunk and lie down with me?” Hussenian had once been a dark and handsome man. He was still a dark and handsome man.
Megan swallowed. “It wouldn’t be right.”
“I didn’t mean it like that. Just lie next to me, for a little while?”
She might have loved him a little, just then. “I will, Paul.”
Megan turned off the light and lay down by the old man. She held his hand, sinewy and strong from ninety-six years of work. Good work, honest work, the work of helping others, of helping his children, and loving his women. His life’s work.
Some time that night Paul Hussenian went to the stars. She never told anyone she was there, and knew she never would.
Richard Donnelly lives in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Classic flyover land. Which makes us feel just a little… superior. He publishes a weekly column of essays on the writing life at richarddonnelly.substack.com