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“Oh my God,” I say. “You mean you were the backup too?
“You ask if I am what, question?” Rocky asks.
“Backup. It means that you’re not the person who was chosen to do something, but you were the person who was chosen to do it if the person who was actually chosen couldn’t do it. I was a backup for this mission. Actually, I was the second backup. The first two people who were chosen to go died in an explosion just before we left.”
“Sad sad sad. Erid engineer not die, only surprise lay eggs. Need stay home for baby Eridians.”
How does someone lay eggs without meaning to?
I’m about to ask Rocky when he continues talking. “Eridian word for other person chosen is backup. I was backup. Yes.”
“You and I are more alike than I realized.”
“Yes, Grace, question?”
“Yes?”
“Other word. Before you ask if I am backup, you say ‘my something.’ What is word after ‘my,’ question? You say this thing many times.”
“What, you mean ‘Oh my God?’”
“Yes.”
“Well, it means I’m surprised.”
“Thing that is yours means surprise, question?”
“Well, actually it means the person in charge of the whole universe. But when we say, ‘Oh my God,’ we just mean we’re surprised.”
“There is king of whole universe, question?”
Well, this is a sensitive subject. “Maybe. Some people believe in God. Others don’t. There are stories about God speaking to people, or helping people, or punishing people, but maybe those stories aren’t true. Do any Eridians believe in God?”
“Not believe king of whole universe. Believe in kings of some things in universe. King of water. King of stars.”
“Some humans believe in that too. We call them ‘gods,’ if we believe there’s more than one. If we just say ‘God’ though, then we believe there’s only one.”
“You believe one universe king, question?”
“I don’t know. I think there could be a god, but if there is, he doesn’t seem to do much. He seems to just let things happen the way they’re going to happen, without changing things. A lot of people where I’m from believe in God though. Actually, my name, Grace, is from a story about God.”
“Tell story.”
Oh boy. This will be hard to explain.
“They have a story where God had a son, who was sort of also God.” (Okay, not really sort of, but you try explaining the trinity to an alien, and see if you do any better.) “And the son was born so he could die. You see, people believe there are places where people exist after they die. There are two places, the good place and the bad place. If God didn’t die, no one could go to the good place, only the bad place, forever. But because God died, some people go to the good place.”
“Universe king die to give hope, question?”
“Yes.”
“Universe king is good person.”
“Yes. So anyway, my name comes from this story. Grace doesn’t only mean ‘moves well.’ It also means a gift that someone needs, but they can’t give anything back to the giver that’s of equal value. There’s nothing we can give God in exchange for his death, so we call that gift grace.”
“Other meaning of Grace is good name for you.”
“Oh, why?”
“Because you willing to die for Earth. You are like universe king.”
“Oh, well…” Rocky doesn’t know I didn’t volunteer, and I don’t want to tell him. “Thanks.”
I want to look good to Rocky. He’s the person I wasn’t, someone who will give up his life for other people. He’s like the only good thing that showed up in the middle of a nightmare… Hey! I know how I can distract Rocky from this conversation. Music.
Sigh. Explaining the lyrics to “I Miss You,” by Blink-182 is harder than I thought it would be. All I wanted to do was tell Rocky how much he means to me as a friend, and the next thing I know I have to explain what it means to “have Halloween on Christmas.”
“It’s about the couple in the story,” I say. “Jack and Sally. On Earth, there are special days where humans celebrate, called holidays. There’s one to celebrate when God’s son was born, and that’s called Christmas. Then there’s another one where people try to scare each other, or be scared, and that’s called Halloween.”
“Why humans want be scared, question?”
“Because sometimes it’s fun to be a little bit scared. Not very scared. Just a little.”
“No understand.”
“Maybe it’s just a human thing. Anyway, Jack and Sally lived in a town where all people did was celebrate Halloween, then wait for the next Halloween. But then Jack found out about Christmas and wanted to celebrate that too. He wasn’t very good at it though, so he made Christmas scary for everyone, which kind of goes against the whole point of Christmas, since people are supposed to be happy on that day.”
“Why song say we celebrate scary day during universe king day, question? Is very bad be scared when should be happy.”
“Well, it’s not saying we should be scared,” I say. “For me, I think it means that we don’t have any choice but to be scared, even when everyone else is just happy, because we don’t know if things will turn out alright or not. It’s like me, when I think about God. I don’t know if there’s a god. I don’t know whether I’ll go to a good place after I die. I might not exist after I die, and that scares me.”
I don’t tell Rocky this, but the trouble is that even if the Christians are right, I probably won’t go to heaven anyway, because I don’t really believe in Christ. So I have to hope that there’s a real god, or something like God, who’ll give me a good afterlife even though I don’t know if he exists, which is a long shot.
“Humans life is very short. Humans want to live longer.”
“Yes, exactly. Anyway, the thing about Christmas is that most of the people who celebrate it are pretty sure God and his son are real and will take them to the good place when they die. I’m not like those people. I don’t know. So I can’t help being scared when everyone else is happy.”
“Sad sad sad.”
“Well, yes, a little sad. But it’s not the end of the world, because you can’t be scared of something unless you also think it might not happen. I’m scared of not existing, but I also hope I will exist, and that’s better than knowing I won’t. It’s like saving our worlds. We don’t know for sure if we can do it, but we have hope that we can, and that’s better than no hope at all.”
“Understand. Scary day is celebrating fear, but cannot celebrate fear without celebrate hope.”
“Exactly. And that’s what the next part of the song is about. When it says, 'We’ll wish this never ends.' Normally people don’t say that. They either say, 'We’ll wish this wouldn’t ever end,' which means, 'It would be good if it didn’t end, but we know it will,' or they say, 'We’ll hope this never ends,' which means we have hope that it won’t end. So to me it means that maybe we have hope and maybe we don’t.”
“Confuse.”
“Yes, but in a good way.”
“Grace, you are one who bring hope that Erid not end. Without you I no find solution to Astrophage. Am very grateful.”
“I’m very grateful to you too. You saved my life. Without you, I probably wouldn’t exist anymore, and Earth would die, and Erid would die too.”
“Yes. Thank. Now we have hope together.”
I smile. “Yeah.” It’s nice to know that I’m the reason Rocky has hope. I’m no savior, but I did something good by showing up where Rocky could find me, even if I didn’t mean to. Whether I live or die, my life was worth something to Rocky. And that’s worth celebrating.