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About a week has passed since you woke up on the Mary.
At first you were convinced that you were incredibly ill, and that you’d woken up in some sort of futuristic hospital bed.
It was the easiest conclusion. The room you woke up in had sterile lighting and a white tiled floor to match. The constant low hum triggered a deep memory that you couldn’t quite place, but you were certain it came from the room of a hospital, with walls complex machinery that beeped and buzzed at all hours.
Once you’d gotten on your feet, and opened the door to the rest of the ship, you were more than certain that you were actually the test subject of some sort of fucked up science experiment.
It was only when Grace found you and explained everything that you found out what was really going on.
Now, a few days later, the two of you were spending the bulk of your time trying to remember who you were and why you were here, on a spaceship light years away from Earth.
The two of you were sitting opposite from one another in a little nook underneath one of the big windows that led out to space. Here, the lighting wasn’t as harsh as it was in the main lab, which had started to give the both of you a headache.
“Okay, so we’ve got age, occupation, state of residenceeee…” Grace trailed off while he scribbled information onto his whiteboard.
You stared down at your own whiteboard, with notes written in blue expo marker.
Mid to late 20s
From Houston? NASA?
Alone?
You thought to yourself about what other things you could try to identify.
“What about pets?” You looked up to Grace, whose glasses were slowly falling down the arch of his nose.
“Hmmm. Don’t think so,” He hummed and looked up at you, “I’ve had this strange, nagging feeling that I don’t like dogs.” He scrunched his nose and narrowed his eyes for a moment before returning to his neutral expression.
You met his eyes and chuckled at the face he made for a moment before looking back down at your own notes.
“Well maybe you had a cat?”
He pushed his glasses back up and shook his head, “Nope, no cats either, I’m sure of it.”
You silently wrote No pets in the corner of your whiteboard along a few other secret notes.
“I don’t think I had any either, can’t imagine I had the time to keep any company around if I was working overtime at NASA.” You added another note to your list.
It was strange, honestly. How a coma could cause you so much memory loss. It almost felt like whoever you were before you left was another person, a past life.
In a way it kind of was.
Grace looked up again, “No company? You don’t think so?” He frowned a bit and tapped his marker against the edge of his board.
You shook your head, “I think I lived alone, the only other people in my photos were from family gatherings.” If they weren’t with family, then it was just selfies you’d taken, or photos of places. It made sense, you probably didn’t have a lot to lose if you decided to do… whatever this was.
“Alone, huh? Well that makes two of us, probably.” He took a photo out of his pocket and reached over his whiteboard to pass it to you.
Your fingers grazed his own lightly for a moment before you were fully able to take the photo from his hand.
It was a polaroid. Grace stood in the middle of the photo with one hand on his face and the other one down at his side. He was in what seemed to be some sort of lab? Facility?
Really, the most pressing thing on your mind was how cute the photo was–-how cute Grace looked in it.
“Awwww.” You said quietly as you studied the photo.
“Aw? Really?” Grace feigned annoyance but chuckled. “That’s the only photo that came with me, funny thing.”
Although he said it was funny, his melancholy tone seemed to imply otherwise. He straightened up against the wall and held a hand out to take the photo back, to which you obliged.
“It’s how I know for a fact that I was alone before all of this.” He fidgeted with the polaroid for a moment before slipping it back into his pocket.
“Just… like you.” His voice lowered, and he cleared his throat. He looked down at the cold tile floor and tapped his feet.
Alone, together.
Not the worst situation to be in, you decided.
You laid your head back against the wall and rocked it slowly from side to side. It was what you’d deemed your most effective method for recalling memories (despite what Grace had to say about it).
“I don’t think I’ve ever been with someone… ever. Nothing comes to mind, not even a blip of a memory.”
Grace perked up, and tilted his head. “No one, ever?”
You shook your head silently. Just as the realization came to you you felt a wave of embarrassment wash over you. Earth you must’ve felt a lot of shame for this.
“Not once…” You were quick to turn this conversation away from yourself. “What about you?”
Grace squinted and looked up for a moment.
“I don’t know, I mean- I think I have but, it’s been so long… I can vaguely remember my first kiss and my-”
“First kiss?” You looked over to him again, more timid this time.
Grace smiled slightly before speaking again, “Yeah, it was when I was a teen… it’s starting to come back to me, I think.” He drummed his fingers along his whiteboard before laying it on the ground, you did the same.
“You had to have at least experienced that, right?” He looked at you with curious eyes.
“No.” You moved your attention towards the floor.
“Oh.”
Intimacy was clearly not your strong suit. This, you knew even when you didn’t know much about yourself at all. There was something very familiar about the way you felt when you thought you were alone in the ship. When Grace found you, everything felt different. Not just because you knew you’d never lived with someone else before, but also something about Grace. He made you feel a way you’d never felt before.
You were certain of this even when you were still relearning your own name.
“Hey.” Grace's voice shook you out of your thoughts.
“Hey.” You responded back, quieter.
The two of you looked at each other for a moment in silence. His eyes seemed fixed on your own, which quickly made your focus move elsewhere.
Out the window into space, you could make out a galaxy that seemed to be a brilliant shade of blue, and just to the right of it was a star that was pulsing at a slow rate, and then right over by Tau-Ceti was what seemed to be a planet orbiting it, and then right over there was a-
Grace cleared his throat.
“What’s that?” You looked back over to him about 3 shades redder than you were before.
“Wellllll…” He sat up slightly and scooted across the floor over to you, keeping about a foot's distance between the two of you as he laid back against the wall. From this distance you could admire his jawline, the way his hair fell over his eyes, his arms…
“I was thinking.” Grace continued, unaware of your staring.
You looked back up at him and laughed nervously, “That’s new.”
“Hey now.” Grace narrowed his eyes down at you but chuckled all the same. “A- Anyways. As I was saying.”
“You were thinking…”
“I was thinking, yes… thinking…” Grace readjusted himself to face you, “I just can’t wrap my head around the fact that you think you’ve never been with anyone before. I mean, look at you I just-”
“Grace.”
“Yes… yeah?”
He suddenly seemed a shade redder than he was before.
You slowly brought a hand up to his fluffy, blonde hair. It was incredibly soft. Not that you were expecting anything else. Your fingers lightly smoothed through a messy spot on his hair.
Grace leaned into your touch, letting out a small exhale. His eyes fluttered closed for a moment. He must’ve not been touched this way in a very long time.
When he opened his eyes back up, he met your own.
“Hey.” You spoke first this time.
“Hey.” His voice cracked. He no longer knew what he was doing.
You let your hand fall from the side of Grace’s head onto his shoulder, which he seemed hyper aware of based on the way he tensed at the touch. God he was so cute.
His hand made its way to you now. He gently ran his fingers through your hair, playing with it for a moment before tucking it behind your ear. The sensation was like sparks. There was a warmth that radiated from his hand as it hovered over the side of your face, eventually settling on your cheek. Grace smiled shyly, and looked back down to you, so close you could feel his cool breath hit your collarbone.
You opened your mouth to speak, but Grace beat you to it.
“So uh- I….” He started, but when he met your eyes again he looked away and sputtered, mumbling to himself.
“...I- I can’t think straight when you’re this close to me.” Was what he could finally muster.
“I thought you were the experienced one.” You spoke at a low whisper, and brushed his shoulder with your thumb.
Grace didn’t respond.
Gently, you reached out with your free hand and removed his glasses from his pretty face. You could sense his breath catch slightly as you reached out for his collar, and hooked his glasses onto his shirt.
“You’re so handsome, Grace…” You hummed.
Grace’s cheeks flushed a bright shade of red. He wasn’t capable of words anymore, which was fine. He spoke enough with his eyes, which flicked from your eyes to your lips, longingly. He moved his hand to properly cup your cheek, and gently pulled your face closer to his.
You eagerly moved with him, until the two of you had just an inch of space to breathe.
“Is- Is this okay?” Grace finally managed to whisper, his breathing already heavy.
You nodded, no longer interested in speaking.
Slowly, the two of you tilted your heads, and the small distance between you closed into a deep, warm kiss, lit only by the distant rays of Tau-Ceti’s light that came through the window.