Work Text:
When Cara was thirteen years old, her science teacher went to space. What she didn’t know, or indeed what any of Mr. Grace’s students at Grover Cleveland Middle School didn’t know, was that it would be a one way trip for him. They became suspicious when the next fall, Mr. Grace’s cool and weird classroom had been transformed into Ms. Hargrove’s more studious and boring classroom. She was a fan of charts- she called them visual learning displays- and had posted them over every inch of the classroom walls. She’d taken down Mr. Grace’s model of the solar system, complete with its ominous Petrova line made of red tape, and arranged the desks in pods to better facilitate what she called “group learning.” Calling that semester an “adjustment period” would have been generous. The students were in open rebellion against Ms. Hargrove by week two, and things took a long time to improve from there. Cara admired her new teacher’s tenacity, her determination to win the students over. She didn’t accomplish it until the week before Christmas break, when she finally sat every class down for what she called a “class conversation” about what she could do to better earn their respect.
And that’s when it came out. They didn’t know Mr. Grace wasn’t coming back to them. It hadn’t been explicitly told to the adults, but everyone above the age of eighteen had figured it out pretty quick, especially when memorials to the brave Dr. Ryland Grace started popping up all over the world. But the students weren’t connected like that. To them, and to Cara, Mr. Grace was their teacher, and they were confused and sad about why he didn’t seem to want to be their teacher anymore. It had slipped out by accident. Billy had said something about how Mr. Grace would be mad about the changes to his classroom when he came back, and Ms. Hargrove’s response had silenced the whole class, who had been clamoring to agree with Billy.
“Mr. Grace isn’t coming back. He’s on a one way trip to Tau Ceti to save humanity.”
To her credit, Ms. Hargrove seemed to realize her mistake immediately, but there was no taking the words back. She had said the ugly truth out loud, and now her students were going to have to process it, whether they liked it or not. Some of them did not take it well. In fact, most of them did not take it well. Many of the girls cried, and a few of the boys looked teary, too. It was a lot for a bunch of thirteen and fourteen year olds to accept, so naturally they didn’t accept it at first.
For her part, Cara went home and asked her parents about Mr. Grace’s space outing being a one way trip. She started to believe it when her father looked at her with his “I’m sorry, darling” face and proceeded to say exactly those words. She burst into tears and her father embraced her and let her tears soak into his nice work shirt.
Back at school the next day, Cara was dreading science class in fourth period. She doubted they would get anything done, and she was sure other students would have more questions and emotions about the revelations from yesterday’s class. When she walked in the door, Ms. Hargrove seemed to have similar thoughts and was attempting to get ahead of the questions by giving out an assignment. On the whiteboard she had written “Dear Mr. Grace.” Once everyone was seated, she explained that they were to each write a letter of any length to Mr. Grace and tell him anything they wanted him to know. For the first time since she had become their teacher, not one student complained. Instead, they all got out their notebooks or laptops and started writing.
Cara chewed the end of her pencil as she thought about what to write. There was so much that had happened, both in the world at large and in her smaller insular world that relaying all of it seemed too large a task for one letter, no matter the word length. She thought about what she would want to say to him, if he was really there in front of her. If he could really read her letter. Not a fun path of thinking, but she walked down it all the same. In the end, she landed on the following:
Dear Mr. Grace,
It’s Cara, from your seventh period science class. I sat in the second row and did pretty well in your class, especially when you were still there to teach it. I never got a hold of the whole bean bag thing, but I’ve always been a bit of a slow thinker so it’s okay. It has been strange not having you here at school. Ms. Hargrove is nice, but she doesn’t do things like you did them. She’s a bit boring, honestly. (Sorry if you are reading this, Ms. Hargrove, it’s just occurred to me that you might be).
Anyways, Ms. Hargrove says you’re on a one way trip and that means you’re not coming back, ever. Some of the other kids are mad that you didn’t tell us about the not-coming-back-ever thing, but I understand. You didn’t want us to worry, or for us to go home and make our parents worry. Still, I wish you would have said goodbye. You just left us with those rock bins and we never saw you again. Now everyone gets jumpy when other teachers so much as have an afternoon off for a doctor’s appointment.
I’m glad you are going to save humanity. Who wouldn’t be happy about being saved? But I do miss you. I think everyone does. Mr. Miller tried to do one of your fun sketches at the pep assembly but it wasn’t the same. No one can pull off a chicken nugget costume like you can. Did they let you bring the chicken nugget costume to space? I hope they did. It would make me smile to think about you out there, just another nugget floating through the cosmos. (I say another because, come on, there’s got to be at least one chicken nugget that has made it to space).
Well. I don’t really know how to end this. I guess I’ll just say good luck out there, and I hope you are a good day, wherever you are.
Love, your student Cara
When Cara looked up from signing her name, the hour was almost over. Most of the students were still working diligently on their letters, and she could hear the occasional sniffle that suggested some kids were crying. When there were five minutes left in class, Ms. Hargrove collected everyone’s letters.
“I’m not sure if there is a way to get these to Mr. Grace, but I will be reaching out to the people running Project Hail Mary to see if there is any way he could receive these. It might be a long time until they reach him, but just know that you can talk to him whenever you want to. Just look out at the stars at night and speak to him. I know it sounds silly, but I believe that the people we love can always hear us when we talk to them like that.”
It did sound silly to Cara, the idea that she could talk to the stars and Mr. Grace could somehow hear her, wherever he was. But it didn’t stop her from sitting at her bedroom window, late that night, and trying anyway.
“Dear Mr. Grace…”
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Far away, on a ship called the Hail Mary, Ryland Grace shifted in his slumber and, somewhere in the back of his consciousness, knew himself to be very very loved.