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The bike stays frozen in time.
At first, it’s because everyone believes he’s coming back. They know he’s coming back, actually. Why wouldn’t he? His students endure substitute after substitute, but even as days turn into weeks, they still don’t lose hope. All they know is that he’s working on a project with NASA, but it doesn’t matter to them. They know that Mr. Grace wouldn’t abandon them.
But then spring fades into summer, and the students start to hear the other teachers whispering among themselves. Should we move it? What if someone steals it? Does he have anyone we can drop it off to?
What if he doesn’t come back?
The teachers, as the kids quickly find out, know as much about Mr. Grace’s absence as they do. It starts to feel like he just vanished into thin air, like NASA grabbed him straight out of the parking lot and weren’t planning on giving him back. Every call goes to voicemail; every attempt to reach NASA yields the same curt response from an anonymous person—Dr. Grace is grateful for the concern, and he will reach out with an update soon. We appreciate your patience as the project continues.
The update never comes.
The students know they weren’t meant to hear any of this, but their hope still doesn’t waver. He’ll come back because he has to. He’ll come back because his bike is still here.
So the last day of class comes and instead of Mr. Grace’s infectious joy and overwhelming pride sending them off, they can only glance at his classroom, exactly how he left it, but missing the thing that made it special for everyone, and hope that when they come back in three months, he’s standing in the hallway to welcome them back.
When the first day of class comes, all of Mr. Grace’s students, old and new, spot the bike perfectly in place and they can’t help the swell of relief that fills them, for only a brief moment. They’d heard the teachers talk about moving it, of course; if it’s still here, it means he is, too. Because of course he is - he wouldn’t leave them, but especially without saying goodbye. He wouldn’t just up and vanish, secret NASA project or not. He’s still Mr. Grace; he still cares about them.
They step into the building, but Mr. Grace’s voice is missing from the chorus of teachers embracing all their students. That’s okay; maybe he’s in his classroom, finalizing everything just minutes before the bell rings.
His old students find their new classrooms, waiting patiently for the yearly “welcome back” speech from the principal, which they know will include news of Mr. Grace’s return, while his new students file into the classroom only to find an empty desk. That’s fine; the bell hasn’t rung yet. Maybe he’s using the bathroom.
The bell rings, and no one comes in. The students start whispering.
Why is he late? His bike is here. They would’ve told us if he wasn’t coming back, right? Why isn’t he coming back? Shut up, he’s here somewhere, his bike is here—
The old speaker crackles to life.
“Welcome back, students, we hope this year is another fantastic one for you. Um, before we begin, we’d like to make an announcement: Mr. Grace is still on his assignment with NASA, and we’ve been informed it’ll take longer than we previously expected, but he is still going to return, we just ask that everyone be patient and understanding—“
A substitute walks in, flustered, and tries to start teaching a room of students suddenly filled with dread. It doesn’t make sense. Mr. Grace was supposed to be back by now, he had to be back by now.
Why was his bike still outside?
Months pass again. Some of the students get bold and ask the principal over and over where Mr. Grace is, demanding to know why their favorite teacher just vanished and why no one seems to know where or why. Every time they’re met with a stoic face and a manufactured response -we don’t know, we are simply repeating what NASA told us, the project he’s working on is very secretive, but we trust them, and they said he will return when it’s over.
When they press for when he’ll return, the principal just sighs and asks them to return to class.
The weather gets colder, and news breaks of an explosion.
Dr. Martin DuBois and Dr. Annie Shapiro were tragically killed—
Project Hail Mary is still expected to launch on schedule—
Breaking: Dr. Ryland Grace has bravely stepped forward to be the lead scientist on the Hail Mary after the passing of Dr. DuBois and Dr. Shapiro according to project lead Eva Stratt, we honor his sacrifice to this planet along with Commander Yào Li-Jie and Olesya Ilyukhina as we are just hours away from takeoff—
“He’s dead?”
“Why would he do that?”
“Why didn’t he tell us, why wouldn’t he say goodbye?”
“Students,” the principal tries, but he’s drowned out by the echo of screaming kids packed into the auditorium, in horror and indignation and confusion. “Students, please understand we knew as much as you did—“
“He wouldn’t do that! He wouldn’t kill himself!”
“Silence,” the principal snaps. “That is not what Mr. Grace did, what he did was sacrifice himself to save your future, it’s something he will be honored for, here and everywhere else in the world—“
“What about his bike?” someone calls, a soft voice in the sea of screams. Somehow, it gets everyone’s attention. It’s the least important question, but it’s one that needs to be asked. They see it every day. It’s been their small beacon of hope for all these months. As stupid as the question may be, especially when they’re still reeling from the news of their beloved teacher’s death, it’s one they need answered.
The principal blinks, clearly caught off guard. “Well, we—we’ll move it soon, I’m sure, once everything is a little more—calm, we’ll figure it out—“
Everyone seems to explode all at once, every possible emotion bubbling to the surface, but someone manages to slip out undetected. She’s young, a few years away from getting to know Mr. Grace herself, and she goes outside, around the corner and up the stairs, until she’s standing at the bike rack.
The bike isn’t locked up. The wheels are starting to rust from disuse, and some of the paint has chipped off. It seems fragile, somehow, like anyone coming close could shatter it, but still it stands, the same as it has every day for almost a year, whether or not they were there to see it.
The girl stares at it for a second, unsure, before she takes her bracelet off her arm, an orange, blue and white braided cord. She doesn’t remember where she got it; it doesn’t matter now. She ties it to the handle.
She tells Mr. Grace’s bike thank you, hopes somehow he can hear her, and goes back inside.
When the school day ends and people start leaving, the air is heavy with devastation. Some kids are sobbing, running into their parent’s open arms in the parking lot; some just stand there, numb. But a few notice it, the spot of unusual color on Mr. Grace’s bike. They come closer to see the bracelet wrapped tightly around the handle, an anonymous goodbye, and wordlessly, the idea spreads.
Soon, his bike is barely visible beneath the memorial that has been formed around it. People leave letters, art, stuffed animals all around. When spring comes, people put flowers in the wheel. Bracelets and ribbons and crochet are wrapped around every part of the bike, candles are lit when the sun sets and people come to stand silently. Every year, it gets more and more crowded. Nothing is ever thrown out. The flowers wilt and fall off on their own, but are immediately replaced the next season. The stuffed animals are very carefully collected, cleaned and donated to the local hospital in Mr. Grace’s name. The art is taken to be displayed in the memorial room the school sets up; the letters stay in a memory box, preserved for only the writer and Mr. Grace, wherever he may be.
More memorials are created all over the globe, decades later, when the beetles return. Grover Cleveland Middle School is renamed in his honor. His alma mater has a whole statue erected of him, standing tall and proud in the center of the campus. Scholarships and charities are set up in his name, the videos of him and the alien Rocky are given to museums to show the victory they achieved to everyone who walks in. Dr. Ryland Grace’s name reverberates far outside his small classroom in San Francisco, his impact being felt by every human alive.
But the bike still stays. And every year, less and less students remember Mr. Grace the science teacher, and every year, the memorial stays just as crowded with everyone paying their respects. The statues and scholarships and science museums remain incredible for Dr. Grave, Savior of Earth, but for his students, those who knew him and those who didn’t, the bike remains the most important memorial they could ever have.
He might not have returned, but he never abandoned them. He left his bike for them, after all.
–
On Savior Grace’s beach, there’s a statue.
Perched right on the edge of the ocean is a giant xenonite replica. He’s cross legged, looking down at an empty spot on his lap with a soft smile. He has his glasses, cardigan and sneakers on, same as always, and right in front is a plaque, carved in the highest quality gold you can find on Erid: To our Star Savior Grace, may you guide the future you helped save.
His biodome remains open permanently, artificial sun still rising and setting, waves gently crashing up on shore, wind lightly brushing against everyone’s suits, for anyone who wants or needs it. Educators wait for their chance to teach in his classroom or take their students on a field trip to the beach; families come from all over to let their kids play in the water; Eridians who lost their loved ones in the mission come to mourn and pay their respects; and right in the center of the statue, in Grace’s open lap, they come to sleep.
Every Eridian knows the story - how, after the crew on Blip-A died, Rocky was alone for 46 Earth years with no one to watch him sleep - a fact unfathomable to everyone who hears it - until he met Grace, who, before he even understood fully what it meant to their species, before he knew how long Rocky had been alone and unprotected, stayed to watch over him. A gift, one of millions, that Rocky would never be able to fully repay.
They find out later that Savior Grace had asked for a memorial before he died, but he hasn’t specified what. It was Rocky who ended up designing it and Adrian who built it, crafted with the same attention and love that Grace had given Rocky that quickly spread through the entire planet. As Rocky would explain later, every time someone asks to hear the story of his Grace again, he wanted the entire planet to feel the same comfort and security Grace had brought him when he needed it the most. According to him, there’s no other way that Grace would want to be remembered; not as a miracle, with statues built to the heavens all over Erid, but simply a reminder that he was just a man, a brave man, who wanted to help.
Everyone comes to sleep in his arms. It’s not only meant for Eridians who don’t have their family or a mate to watch over them, but anyone who finds their way to him, and over the years, it feels like everyone finds their way to him, for one reason or another. Whether or not they knew him when he was alive, everyone knows instinctively that Grace is safe.
So the years pass, with someone curled up on his statue every single artificial day and night. At some point the xenonite starts to wear down from the weight, but no one dares to change it. The xenonite will last long beyond them; the changes just prove how much Grace is loved, even by the Eridians who just know him as a story from long ago.
Jewelry piles up on his arms; art stacks up on the base of the statue. Every piece is treated as carefully as Grace himself, preserved in a memorial box they set up later, right in front of his house, which remains locked to everyone besides Rocky, Adrian and their family. Even the words whispered are protected, for Grace’s ears only, for those who believe he still exists somehow around them.
Rocky watches with a heaviness in his core that he knows will never leave him, but also a sense of comfort that wraps around him like Grace’s Earth blanket used to, knowing that his Grace continues to save every Eridian, through their future or the comfort he continues to provide; exactly as he’d done for Rocky. He hopes that the statue provides even a fraction of the love his Grace gave him. He hopes, more than anything, that that’s what he left behind.
It’s the perfect memorial for him.