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The lock clicked and the door to Grace’s small apartment opened with a faint creak. Stratt pulled the key out the lock and stepped into the entrance of Grace’s San Fransisco apartment home. She expected the air to be stale after being undisturbed for years but it was surprisingly fresh. The room even smelled faintly of rose cleaning detergent. Had Grace recently hired someone to clean his house expecting to return to it? It would make sense. By all accounts he should have been returning to his home now.
Stratt closed the door behind her and took a glance around the rooms she could see from the entrance. Directly ahead of her was a living room with a small dining table pushed against a wall and two small couches pointing toward a television. On her right was a small kitchen. On her left was a short hall that ended at a bedroom with a closed door that was supposedly a connecting bathroom. A small house. The house of someone who spent his life alone.
Stratt walked to the kitchen first to flip through the cupboards and see if she could find anything of sentimental value to pack for Grace. A mug or a plate or anything that would comfort him. Grace had not been the first option in the plan and had therefore not chosen what times he wanted to take with him. So Stratt would have to do her best to find something that he would want.
She supposed she could have sent Carl to do this menial task, but the thought of someone else standing at his doorstep and looking at all of Grace’s most personal things made her unreasonably angry. Then the shame rolled in. Grace was lying on a hospital bed in a coma. He was ready to be shipped 11.9 light years away and it was by her command that he was in that situation. She was the last person who should be in his personal living space.
A white ceramic mug with the words Best Teacher In The World! stood at the front of the line of mugs. Stratt picked it up. She ran a finger along the rim and felt the small chip on one corner. Stratt put the mug away. Grace would likely have wanted to bring it with him but it was a safety risk with a chip, no matter how small.
Stratt turned to the hall and walked to the bedroom. She needed for find a few articles of clothing to pack for Grace. She entered the room and paused. The bedroom walls were lined floor to ceiling with posters and photographs of various planets and stars and wildlife. A long poster of the periodic table stretched across the wall directly behind his bed. Charts and diagrams containing random information took up the entire room. Small glow-in-the-dark stars were arranged in an intentional pattern on his ceiling. Stratt went to the head of his bed and looked up. The stars formed actual constellations. She imagined Grace lying in bed and looking up to the stars in his room. The constant San Fransisco fog would not have allowed him to see the real stars at night on most occasions so he had hung up his own stars in his room. Stratt thought of the nights on the ship when Grace had stepped outside to clear his mind and stare at the wide expanse of stars in the middle of the ocean.
Stratt found the North Star, gently pulled it off the ceiling and slid it into the leather bag on her shoulder.
A short wide bookshelf across from his bed was crammed with stacks of books of various subjects. Stratt read the titles of several of the books and traced the spines. A few nonfiction books were tucked between the academic books. Stratt found one and pulled it out. The cover was worn and the pages yellowed with age. She opened the book at random and flipped through the pages. Grace had underlined sections and written in the margins of this book with the same concentration of someone contemplating a scientific paper. One of the pages had a coffee ring where Grace had carelessly placed a mug onto the book. Stratt closed the book and added it to her bag.
Stratt glanced at the posters again. Several of the smaller pages were amateur drawings of various planets and animals. Stratt traced one of the drawings with a finger and felt the textured surface. Crayon. She stepped back to take in all the drawings. Each one was colored with varying levels of care and style. They must have been done by his students. Stratt felt a pang in her chest. Very carefully, she removed the sticky tabs that held the pages to the walls. She removed the pages one by one and stacked them on his bed. She pulled out a folder from her bag and gently slid the pages into the folder so they would not crumble in her bag.
With the papers secure, Stratt moved next to the small dresser. She pulled open the doors and searched through the hanging shirts and sweaters. Grace already had a few articles of clothing from his years of work on the ship, but what if he wanted some variety? Some sentimental comforts to cling onto in the last days of his life. The hanging shirts were all carefully ironed button up shirts or business clothing. Even while teaching a class of middle school children, Grace had dressed as if addressing a conference room of fellow scientists. He had dressed up for his class and dressed down for her lab.
Stratt found a neat pile of T-shirts stacked on a shelf in the dresser, each with a terrible science pun. Stratt found the worst of the shirts and stacked them onto his bed. A drawer in his dresser contained his underclothes. Stratt carefully lifted a few pairs of underwear and socks and added them to the pile on the bed. The drawer under that contained pants. Stratt pulled out a few of the more sensible looking ones and stacked them as well. Would he need shoes? Stratt had never seen him wearing any other pair besides the white Converse. Those were already packed.
Stratt reached into her leather bag and pulled out a small folded gym bag. She systematically rolled up and packed all the clothing on his bed and zipped the bag.
A faint scratching sound reached her ears. Stratt tilted her head and looked around to find the source of the sound. The scratching came from the door connected to the bedroom, supposedly the bathroom. Stratt opened the door and a small black creature dashed across the room. A cat. Since when did Grace have a cat? Stratt glanced back into the bathroom and found a note that had been placed onto the sink counter. She skimmed through the note. It had been written by someone named Marissa who had apparently been looking after this cat, Pluto, in Grace’s absence.
Stratt placed the note back onto the counter and turned to the room. The cat sat on the bed with his ears warily pinned back. Stratt stepped closer. The cat pressed its body down onto the bed.
Four years. Grace had been away from his cat for nearly four years. Marissa had taken good care of the cat, if the shiny black coat was any indication of the cat’s health. She had stopped by often enough that the cat was getting the necessary food it needed to stay in decent shape, if still small for a grown cat.
You don’t even have a dog, Stratt remembered herself saying just the other day, pictured the hurt on his face as he processed her words. As if the value of his life could only be measured by it’s impact on someone or something else. As if his life was inherently valueless on its own. Why had he not mentioned a cat? It would not have mattered, would only have made her feel even more guilty about having to send him away.
Stratt leaned closer to the cat and reached a hand out for the cat to smell. Pluto swiped a paw at her fingers and hissed. Stratt pulled back.
She glanced at the bedside table and found a small framed photograph of Grace beaming as he held up a tiny malnourished and dirty kitten. It was dated a few weeks before Stratt had stepped into Grace’s life. A few weeks. Grace had found a kitten and brought it home to look after. They only had a few weeks together before Grace was whisked away into a life he never asked for.
It had been nearly four years since then. It would take Grace about eleven years to reach Tau Ceti. Taking into account the average lifespan of a cat, Pluto would most likely die before Grace even awoke from his coma. Why had Marissa not taken the cat? Was she allergic? Was Grace hoping every week that he could come home to his cat without thinking about the fact that years had passed? Was Grace clinging desperately onto the only creature in the world that loved and cherished his existence?
Stratt thought of the days when Grace had slumped over his laboratory desk. He hid his face but Stratt had caught a faint sob from him a few times. She never asked. Why would she? Was he sobbing over his cat? Was he thinking about the tiny black kitten he had just rescued sitting quietly on his bed, waiting for his return? Stratt cleared the lump in her throat. It would do no good to think of that now.
Grace had no immediate family. But he had his classroom of children. Grace didn’t have a dog. But he had a cat. One that eyed her and hissed once more. A cat that had grown up in solitude waiting for Grace to return. A street cat tamed and now feral once more from isolation.
She could make a phone call and have the cat taken to a shelter. She should do that. Who knew how long she had before she was tried and imprisoned for her crimes to save humanity? Yet as Stratt looked at the growling animal on the bed, she could not bear the thought of parting with the remaining link to Grace.
Stratt searched the cupboards in the kitchen until she found a stack of containers of cat food. Grabbing one, she returned to the room and placed the opened container into the cat carrier she found tucked under Grace’s bed. Stratt sat against the wall and waited. She hoped the cat would enter the carrier willingly, that she would not have to tackle it to the ground and force it into the cage. She had already done that to Grace. Maybe the cat would be brave where Grace had not been.
The cat stared at Stratt with unblinking eyes. Long minutes passed in an uneasy silence between the two of them. The seconds on Stratt’s watch ticked loudly in the silent room.
Her phone rang and she answered it on autopilot. Somebody said something about whatever. It really did not matter. Their job was just to pile everything onto her so she could sign off on it and carry the burden of the fallout. The world would punish her and wipe their hands clean of the unavoidable evils necessary for saving humanity. Stratt gave her approval to the person on the phone and ended the call. Her time was up.
Stratt went to the closet and found a lightweight sweater. She carefully approached the cat and held the sweater out for the cat to smell. Was Grace’s scent still on the clothing after four years of unuse? The cat leaned forward and gave the clothes a hesitant sniff. Stratt threw the sweater onto the cat and picked the feline up in a yowling bundle of hisses and growls. She swept the cat into the carrier and quickly snapped the door shut. Going to the bedside table, she removed the photo from the frame and slipped it into her pocket. She would have to write a note for Grace onto the back of the photo, something about how well she would look after his cat. Would he appreciate it or would he be furious that she had kidnapped his cat? It did not matter. She would care for the cat for as long as she could.
The cat yowled in the carrier as Stratt gathered the gym bag and closed the front door. She turned the key to lock the door for the final time. Would his house be preserved after the launch and if the mission was a success? Would important people stand on this doorstep to peer into the house of the man that died to save the world? She pressed her forehead to the door and took a deep breath.
This is where he is supposed to be.
This is where he would be if it weren’t for me.
This is where he should have lived a happy life.
The pure lamb, taken to slaughter for the salvation of the world.
Stratt released her breath and walked back to her car.
The cat hissed and scratched at the door of the carrier. Stratt would have time to gain his trust later. Or she would set him free in her home and they would stare at each other until someone came to take Stratt away. Until someone locked her away like she locked Grace away.
Both of them would serve a life sentence. Only one of them would grow old.