Heart Music
This story is a contribution to SDG Lemaître’s “Christmas at Selene City” collaboration project.
“I feel neglected,” Cecilia blurted. “I feel like you don’t love me anymore.”
James stopped and looked up from his tablet. He’d been glued to it all through breakfast and even as he had walked toward the door to go to work.
“What are you talking about?” he asked.
Cecilia took a deep breath. She’d rehearsed her lines, choosing each word with care, but all of them had vanished. “I hardly see you. You spend long hours in the lab, and when we’re together, you’re constantly checking your messages. James, we’ve been married only three months, but you already feel like a stranger to me.”
He stared at her, mouth moving slightly as if searching for the words to respond. The comm in his pocket chimed.
“Don’t answer that,” Cecilia said. “I want us to talk.”
“We’ll talk about this later,” he replied and slapped the button by the door. It slid open. At the threshold, he paused. “Cecilia?”
She swallowed hard, tears burning the edges of her eyes. “What?”
“Don’t go out today, okay? I promise we’ll talk when I come home. But please stay in for the day.”
And then he was gone before she could ask why.
She stared at the closed door for a long moment before walking over to the series of small windows overlooking the cold lunar landscape. A tangle of emotions she could only half-name rioted in her chest. Eventually, one fought to the top of the pile, and it was deep disappointment, accompanied by a lost feeling of loneliness.
She closed her eyes, wrapping her arms around her waist. Selene City, nestled into Mare Serenitatis, was supposed to be an exciting place to live. A place of discovery and wonder. Not a place for her to regret her hasty decision to marry a handsome microbiologist she’d met in the latter half of her senior year of college.
Luckily, today the daycare where Cecilia worked was closed. Tomorrow was New Year’s Eve and the 50th anniversary of Founding Day, so everyone was taking time to prepare. She didn’t have to suck it up and pretend she was fine.
Cecilia looked back at the kitchenette where the breakfast dishes waited. She remembered their first night there. They’d lit the place with electric candles and cuddled on a mattress on the floor, watching the alien world outside for hours while they talked about the future.
She wiped away a tear, mentally dismissing the images. For the next little while, Cecilia refused to think about anything as she ruthlessly attacked the dirty dishes and surfaces. When everything sparkled again, she started toward the bag of New Year’s decorations still waiting to go up.
Why bother? The question struck her deeply. James had barely been home for Christmas. Would New Years be any different?
Turning on her heel, she stalked over to the communications corner. They had only so many credits for calls, but she felt it was worth it. She punched in the requisite codes and waited.
The Selene City logo vanished, replaced with a familiar, smiling face.
“Hey, space girl!” Angie said. “How’s the weather on the moon?” Her smile slipped. “What’s wrong?”
Tears slid, large and warm, down Cecilia’s face. “I tried talking to him like you suggested.”
“And?”
“He tabled the discussion for later.” She scrubbed the tears away.
“Well.” Angie sighed. “You could always tell him you need to visit your folks and board the next transport back to Earth. Maybe once you’ve been gone a while, he’ll know what he’s missing.”
“That feels a little harsh.”
“Sometimes, you gotta be a little harsh to wake people up.” She shrugged. “And maybe I just want to see you in person.”
Cecilia laughed. “I miss you, too.”
“And I did try to warn you that maybe you were rushing into things. Five months ain’t much of a courtship.”
“I remember.” She took a deep breath. “James promised we would talk. I’m going to hold him to it, even if I have to march to the science lab and drag him out of his cubicle.”
“That’s the spirit! Now, slight change of subject.” Angie leaned forward slightly. “Have you heard anything about Shijie Heping?”
Cecilia rolled her eyes. “Really?”
“It’s almost the fiftieth anniversary of the man vanishing. His daughter and grandkid are going to be at the celebration. I thought maybe there’d be a breakthrough in the case or something.”
“If there was, you’d hear about it at the same time I would. It would be the biggest news both on the moon and in the world.”
Shijie Heping was the eccentric billionaire behind the creation of Selene City. Nearly fifty years ago, on New Year’s Day, he laid the foundation stone for the site. Then, that night, he vanished. No one knew why and no one ever found his body. It wasn’t the best beginning for the base, but nothing like that had happened since.
“The going theory around here,” Cecilia continued, “is that Heping decided to go on a walk by himself and fell down a hole and died. The end.”
“That’s boring. Sad, but boring.”
“What else could’ve happened? Aliens?”
“Maybe!”
They laughed and the conversation turned to more pleasant things, like Angie’s husky being absolutely determined to sleep in a snowstorm.
The call cheered Cecilia to the point that she hung the New Year’s decorations, right beside the Christmas ones. By the time she finished, the combination of black, gold, silver, red, and green gave the quarters an aura of an identity crisis. She spent the rest of the day catching up on reading and chores.
Eventually, the clock on the wall said it was evening, though it didn’t look like that outside. For a moment, she longed for real evenings, with an orange and indigo horizon and crisp air. James was supposed to have been home an hour ago.
Cecilia paced from the tiny living room, to kitchenette, back to the windows, and then along the same path to the stove. She drummed her fingers on the glass cover.
James’ request that she remain home had been a little strange. But another long evening by herself felt too dark and cold. It wouldn’t hurt to visit the Dome for a little while. Cecilia slipped on her shoes and left the quarters.
The hallway was empty. She hadn’t heard anyone walk by for hours. No doubt, everyone was either down in the Dome or at home for last-minute prep. Almost everyone, anyway.
She thought about making good on her earlier threat and marching down to the labs. Her stomach curdled. And if she got down there and discovered he wasn’t experimenting with bok choy or soil samples or whatever it was? What if something—someone—else entirely had his attention?
Shaking her head, Cecilia strode down the hallway and boarded the moving sidewalk. In the distance, music played. She shoved her hands in her pockets, tapping a foot to the beat of the song. The idea that something other than science kept James captivated was one that lurked on the fringes of her thoughts. She tried not to give it fuel, but it was becoming harder to ignore.
She hummed along with the music. It was familiar. A half-remembered melody from another, simpler time. It had a happy, quick beat. Something to dance and sing along to. It certainly wasn’t holiday-type music. What was the title? She could almost think of it…
The sidewalk ended, dumping her in the Dome, the central hub of Selene City’s “+” shape.
The domed ceiling was transparent, showing the endless space above them, pockmarked with the flames of stars. This was the communal gathering space, ringed with shops and restaurants.
An enormous, artificial evergreen tree decked in ornaments and multicolored lights dominated the center. Every resident of Selene City was welcomed to add their own ornament. The tree’s branches shimmered with the memories and personalities of those who lived there. Cecilia had wanted to hang an ornament with James. The ornament was still in their quarters, snug in its box.
Orange and yellow Diwali flowers shared space with blue and silver Hanukah menorahs. Scarlet and gold Chinese New Year’s lanterns hung suspended from wires.
An elaborate nativity scene in the Neapolitan style rambled along a long, curved table. There was a big debate, she remembered, about whether to put the wisemen out straightaway. It appeared the Epiphany advocates won, as Cecilia didn’t see a camel or gift-bearing magi.
People swarmed the space, sitting at circular tables scattered around or going from shop to restaurant to shop. The scents of cinnamon, clove, and ginger overlaid the sterile, recycled air. A few families from the daycare center where Cecilia worked recognized her and waved hello. One enthusiastic girl ran up for a hug.
Cecilia hugged back, smiled, and waved at her parents as the girl raced back to join them. However, as soon as the families turned away, the smile evaporated. She wove through the crowd.
The music she had heard earlier was louder, now, but it became obvious that it didn’t originate in the Dome. It wove in and out over the sounds of chatter, footsteps, laughter, and Bing Crosby’s “Let’s Start the New Year Right”. Was this music from someone else’s party? The half-remembered, peppy melody tugged on her, lured her to an exit leading into another arm of the city.
She hesitated at the edge of the moving sidewalk. This one led to the science wing. Though she was in pursuit of the music, Cecilia knew that she wouldn’t resist trying to look in on James. Would he think she was crazy and suspicious?
But the music tugged hard at her. Almost without conscious thought, she stepped onto the moving sidewalk.
Each arm of Selene City was three levels. There was a subterranean level, where all the wires and conduits and mechanical stuff lived that made the base habitable. The two levels above that were for living, business, or science, depending on the use of the wing.
James’ lab was on the top level. The music, louder and almost insistent, swirled around Cecilia. It tugged her along, beckoning her. The lyrics were nearly discernable, remaining a faint murmur in her ears.
Shadows swathed the long hallway. She passed darkened offices. Ahead of her, she could see one set of lights cutting through the dimness.
She stepped off the moving sidewalk and approached a large window.
James busily worked at his station, peering through a microscope. She looked around, searching for anyone else. She’d met some of his fellow scientists. None of them, though, were there. James worked all alone.
Cecilia’s stomach dropped. Would it have been better if there’d been a woman with him? One with a low-cut blouse and a teasing smile? It would be easier to understand, certainly, than this. How did microbes become more important than her?
James looked up. Their eyes met. Surprise filled his face, and he stood.
The music hit strident chords, like violins screeching, in Cecilia’s ears. The urge to flee filled her. Did she really want to be told that work was more important than her or the future they were supposed to be building together? As James rounded the table, Cecilia bolted, running down the hall.
After a few steps, she heard, “Ceci! Wait!”
She kept running, the music calling her away.
Back on ground level, Cecilia hesitated. The music had lessened, becoming a murmur again in her ears. Her head ached. Why had she run like that? The memory of being outside that window, looking at James, was already becoming strangely distant.
Maybe she should return to their quarters; to wait or open the bottle of wine she’d been saving for New Year’s toasting. She could lose herself in the throng of humanity in the Dome. Or…
The music. It curled in her ears, wrapping her in a warm hug. The deep desire to see where it led welled in her. She could almost make out the words. Cecilia hummed along, hoping that would help her remember the title and lyrics.
Both stayed just out of reach, begging to be found.
Turning on her heel, she walked along the moving sidewalk, hurrying her progress.
The melody--teasing, hopeful, longing—-pulled her along until her path reached a dead end. An airlock loomed before her. Beside it stood a locked glass case of suits, meant only for designated personnel.
Cecilia hesitated. A part of her whispered that she needed to turn around and report to the medical division. Because something was wrong. She was seriously considering going out of the airlock because of music coming from an impossible place.
She turned, intending on listening to that small part of herself. Instead, she tapped her husband’s code into the case’s lock. She’d seen him do it often enough when he checked sensitive messages.
The case popped open with a hiss. It felt like the most natural thing to do to pick out a suit in her size.
Everyone on base was educated on how to put on a suit in the event Selene City lost atmosphere. And that would only happen if all other failsafe measures, well, failed.
She pulled it on and checked the seals and gauges. The helmet clicked into place with a hiss. Then, using James’ code again, she entered the airlock and initiated the opening sequence.
As the sequence cycled through, Cecilia spotted movement in the hall. James hurtled toward her, waving his arms. She waved back, smiling.
Behind her, the door opened. She walked out into the bright, sterile moonscape.
The music drew Cecilia away from the colony, out into Mare Serenitatis. Here, underneath the black abyss and glittering stars, the music swelled and drowned her, pulling her forward like a wave drawing a swimmer into deep ocean.
She looked around, trying to remember the last time she’d been on a moonwalk. A vague memory surfaced of bumping along in a moon-mobile. James taking her picture. Other new residents hitting golf balls into the distance. The last fun outing for her and James before he…did something. At a lab?
Lab. She was supposed to be upset about that, or something in relation to that. But the music drowned it out, washing away the memories. Her eyes focused on the source of the music: a shadowy outcropping, jutting up into sky like a rocky, pitted finger.
She’d gone a few dozen yards when the comms in her helmet crackled.
“Ceci? Ceci, it’s James. I need you to stop. Please.”
She halted. Turned. James, in his own suit, was moving toward her. Where she had taken careful steps, he was launching himself forward in long strides to cover the distance between them. That was dangerous. She didn’t know how she knew that, but she felt certain James could fall and hurt himself.
“I have to go,” she said. “Please stop doing that.”
“Go where?”
“To where the music is coming from.”
“Ceci, there’s no music.”
“You can’t hear it?” She tilted her head, letting the sound spill over her again. “It’s so beautiful. And I think I recognize it, too. When I reach the source, I’ll ask for the title.”
He was closing in on her. “Ceci, honey, there’s no music. I don’t hear anything.”
“I’m not surprised. You don’t ever hear anything.” She walked on, her back resolutely to him.
He landed just in front of her. Lurching forward, he grasped her arms. “Ceci, I’m sorry about this morning. Really. You blindsided me.”
Cecilia’s brows rose. All thoughts of the music stopped as her anger solidified, snapping her back into herself. “Blindsided you? I open my heart and that blindsides you?”
“Well, you didn’t really lead up to it.”
“How was I supposed to do that?”
He sighed. “You need to listen to me.”
“This isn’t about you!”
“There is no music!”
She dragged a breath into her lungs. The melody was so insistent now, it took everything in her not to wrench out of James’ grasp. “Just because you can’t hear it doesn’t mean it isn’t there.”
He regarded her for a long moment, his dark blue eyes reflecting the glow of the monitors in his helmet. The first part of him that she loved was the color of his eyes.
“Ever since we got to Selene City,” she said, “you’ve been busy. So busy that we never speak, or do anything together, or just be a couple at home. I half-hoped you were having an affair because that I could understand. What I don’t understand is how science is more important than me.” Her voice caught. Tears stung her eyes.
“It’s not that it is, Ceci—”
“Cecilia! You know I hate that nickname!”
He grimaced. “My work is very vital right now.”
“And that’s wonderful and I’m so proud of you. But what about us? If all you want to do is your work, then why even bother marrying me?”
James drew back, dropping his hands away from her. His brows knit into a pained line across his face. “Because I love you.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“I don’t how to make you believe me.”
“Perhaps by acting like it. There was no one else in that lab with you, James. Everyone else had places they would rather be. Everyone except you. You were right where you wanted to be.” She turned her head slightly and looked beyond him to the outcropping. The music beat along her veins. Her thoughts grew fuzzy again. “I have to go.”
Cecilia stepped forward, pushing past him.
James caught her by the arm again. “I did have somewhere else I wanted to be. Home with you.”
“What?” She blinked, focusing on his face. What was happening?
“But I couldn’t. Because—” He took a deep breath. “Because there is something very wrong here. Remember Shijie Heping?”
The name was familiar. It took a few seconds too long for her to remember the billionaire Angie had been asking about. That conversation felt so long ago.
“What about him?” she asked.
“We’re close, I think, to finding out what happened to him. There’s something in the soil. I was ordered to keep it under wraps but—”
“I’m not listening to this. I need to go.” She shoved against him.
He held fast, pulling her. The combination of push and pull sent them both down into the dust.
“Let me go!” Cecilia screamed.
“No.” James’ eyes were wide. “I love you too much to let you go.”
She tried to wrench away, gain her footing, but her vision swam. Darkness flowed in. The music reached a fevered pitch.
Her comms crackled and a new voice came on, barely cutting through: “James, we’re almost there. Hang onto her.”
James said something in reply, but the darkness and the music swallowed Cecilia whole.
James stood on the other side of the observation window. His hair was still damp from the decon shower. He watched doctors in full-body suits tend to a sleeping Cecilia. White restraints strapped her to the bed.
A small ding and then a voice: “Hey, James, how you feeling, mate?”
He turned toward the other end of the small isolation room, looking through another window, and tried to smile. “I’m trying to feel all right, Hamish.”
“It was a good thing she thought to have gone for that suit. Otherwise…” Hamish grimaced.
“I don’t want to think about it.” An alert on James’ pad had told him someone used his code to access the suits. He’d never run so quickly in his entire life.
“You should know that three other people also tried to go on a moonwalk. All of them claimed to hear music.” Hamish crossed his arms. “All of them were on that moonwalk three months ago. The one for new residents.”
“Fifty years, the organisms in the soil have been quiet. Why awaken now?”
“Who knows? Kaleb is taking over your work.”
“He’s a good pick.” James looked back at Cecilia. “I can’t help but wonder, you know.”
“Wonder what?”
“If I had been more present, maybe I would have noticed the signs sooner.”
“Don’t do that to yourself.”
“I wish I had also disobeyed your orders. If Cecilia was aware—”
“We have no way of knowing that.” Hamish sighed. “Did you hear or see anything, while you were out there? You were on that moonwalk, too.”
James didn’t answer at first, continuing to watch Cecilia sleep. He hummed softly to himself.
“James?”
“Huh?” He jerked his head around, raising his brows.
“I asked if you heard any music?”
“Yes. Toward the end.”
“And now?”
“It’s…it’s soft. Distant. I’m sure it will go away.”
Hamish nodded slowly. “I’m sure it will. I’ll let you rest.”
James looked back at his wife and hummed.
Hamish tapped his code into the panel and entered the sterile work room. Kaleb looked up from his microscope.
“How are they?” Kaleb asked.
“James is infected, too.”
“I know.”
“That’s his blood sample you’re looking at?”
“No. Cecilia’s. Hers contains more of the organism than James.” Kaleb sat back in his chair. “Can’t figure out why, though. Everyone stayed together. No one went touching things they shouldn’t. And not everyone is showing signs of infection. That leaves two very interesting questions.”
“Why the varying levels of infection? Why some people are infected, and some aren’t? And it’s three if you factor in the dormancy period. What woke the organisms?”
Silence fell as the two men mused over the strangeness of it all.
“When Heping disappeared,” Hamish said, “it was suggested that he was infected with something. But after the last War, everyone wanted this symbol of peace to endure. Maybe we should have abandoned the project.”
Hamish grimaced. “Wondering what if isn’t helpful. You have all of James’ notes, starting from his discovery?”
“Yeah. His research will be helpful. I’m going to share it with Sarah in the morning.”
Sarah was an epidemiologist that was new to the team and was supposed to be working on hypothetical situations. Hamish doubted very seriously she expected to encounter a real-life scenario.
“Go catch some sleep,” Hamish said. “You look like shit.”
“Sure thing.” Kaleb began carefully putting away the samples.
Hamish started toward the door.
“You’ll turn it off on your way out, right?” Kaleb asked.
Hamish stopped. “Turn off what?”
“The music.”
Love it!
😳 “The music.” Holy sh— Brava!