The Comet Seekers

by Helen Sedgwick

  But under all that, there is perhaps a part of her that knows we are too small to matter. Nothing happened, that’s the thing. The universe carried on, the comets kept coming – it made no difference. A life and a death made no difference. Perhaps that is why she’s frozen.

  Planets are not born. What a clear-cut word that is – to imagine something is not and then, a moment later, it is. No, that is not how planets come about.

  It starts with a death. A violent supernova somewhere as a star collapses under its own weight, becoming denser until it can no longer support its existence. The burst of radiation it emits can eclipse an entire galaxy, that’s how loud it screams. And as it does, all those elements of iron and silicon and oxygen and carbon, the building blocks of planets and life, are thrown out into the universe to drift and search and become molecular clouds where new stars begin to burn.

  But that is not the formation of a planet, that’s just how to create the components that make planets possible. Now fast-forward.

  Out of that debris, eventually, a star begins to burn, and under its gravity collects the leftover debris of the supernova; that which was expelled, that has been floating, meaningless, through a universe composed almost entirely of empty space. And the debris comes together, forming rocks and swirling angry gas, distant ice planets and, occasionally, an ideally placed one that is not too light and not too dark. But at the heart of it, she knows, there can be a stellar black hole where once there was a star, a nothingness from which no light can escape; the remnants of a scream at the instant of death from a star that had taken in too much, and had to let it all go.

  At the doctor’s she watches, passive, as the red of her blood travels, unexpectedly slowly, down the thin tube connected to a vial that will be sent away for tests. She doesn’t cringe as the needle slips into her arm, as injection after injection immunise her against diphtheria, meningitis, yellow fever, tuberculosis, hepatitis A and B. So many ways to be saved against what might hurt you, but no way to be saved from what has already happened.

  The conference is held at a large red sandstone country house, arched windows and a pillared courtyard and landscaped gardens – it feels as far from Antarctica as the human race gets. It is beautiful though, the sunlight striking off the tones of rose and maroon in the bricks, the windows glinting like rock pools.

  Inside they watch black-and-white films of a continent a world and half a century away. Sled-dog training videos that seem to creak and slip with the ice itself, presentations about the scientific research that takes place – meteorology and biology and chemistry, atmospheric sciences and geophysics. As she listens she thinks of the comet approaching, brightening, speeding through the sky. It will be dimming when she begins her journey but another will be on its way, coming to meet it. They’ll catch each other’s eyes for a moment of understanding, of completeness, before PanSTARRS flees to the outer reaches of the solar system and Comet Tuttle–Giacobini–Kresák is left behind, orbiting a sun whose brightness makes its eyes sting and burn.

  SEVERINE WAKES JUST BEFORE DAWN, frost creeping over her goosebumped skin as her curtains billow in the wind. It is snowing, it must be. She gets up to close the window but it is shut, the sky is clear with only a hint at the sunrise to the east. Her granny comes to stand beside her, places a hand on her temple. Severine’s head has been aching badly; she always suffered from migraines but these days it seems more determined, the pain will not fade, nor will the thoughts of all the possible lives she did not lead.

  What now, Granny? What happens now?

  She shivers, and her granny disappears.

  Where have you gone?

  She knows her voice sounds desperate, that she would look desperate if anyone could see her, with her pale blue nightdress blowing in a breeze that does not exist.

  She doesn’t hear the door open, even though it creaks, even though to François the creak is so loud it sounds like the house is sighing.

  I’m here, Mama.

  What?

  I heard you shouting.

  She wants to say she’s sorry, but he is not the family she was calling out to.

  I’m here, he says, again.

  He puts his arm around her and sits next to her on the bed.

  I’ll always be here.

  It is a promise made out of kindness and it scares Severine to her core. Suddenly she is not afraid of losing her son any more, she is afraid of what he might lose.

  She looks up to see her granny has returned and is smiling at her, sadly, from the end of the bed.

  Shall I make you some chocolat chaud? says François, and Severine looks at him with the kind of gratitude that mingles with surprise. That is something the ghosts never do, she thinks, and she is flooded with guilt for all the ways she has been absent in all the years she has refused to leave.

  François has rented out the spare room in his apartment in Paris. He has to go back on Monday, but this weekend he’s decided to stay with Severine, to make sure she’s OK.

  He has been at Hélène’s new place, though he doesn’t tell Severine that. Hélène listens without offering advice; there is something about that that he finds more helpful than all the advice in the world. She’s renting a two-bed over in the west of Paris, a small top-floor apartment that feels more like home than his own. Hélène could always do that, make a place feel like somewhere you’d want to spend your life. From the kitchen window, if you look hard, you can see the Seine dancing in the moonlight, flickers of silver as the stars catch the fleeting waves on an otherwise still river.

  The last time he was there he stayed till past eleven, and they listened to Coeur de Pirate as they smoked and he felt the worry drain out of him. When he leant his head back he thought, for a moment, that she might do the same; that a peaceful break-up and a lasting friendship might actually be the way to find someone who loves you. But she didn’t copy his gesture, just smiled kindly and offered him some peppermint tea – she never told him it was getting late but somehow he knew that it was time to be leaving. As he stood in the door she asked about his flatmate: How is it working out?

  She knew him from university, their student days that already seem far away.

  It’s good, François said, easy, no bother.

  And he kissed her cheeks, one by one, before turning to walk home across the sleepy city.

  How is work? asks Severine during Sunday lunch.

  His work is fine, is always fine. He is a good chef, although he’d like to change the menu more often. He feels like he is grilling sea bass in his sleep.

  And Paris? Are you happy in Paris?

  Why are you asking, Mama?

  I don’t know why you stay here, in France, she says. There’s no need. When you were little you always wanted to travel. Why haven’t you gone?

  We’ll see what happens on Tuesday, he says, and for once Severine looks him straight in the eye.

  Tuesday is about why I haven’t gone, she says, and my regrets are mine to deal with. The question I was asking was about you.

  When she sleeps, he stays up, lights a cigarette in her living room even though she doesn’t like smoking, pulls open the back door to the garden to let some fresh air in. He wonders what happened to that old suitcase he found in the shed as a boy, so full of another life that never was.

  He’s not sure why he’s so nostalgic these days.

  But he finds himself outside, faced with a locked padlock, a cheap thing more suited to children’s toy suitcases than a shed built by his great-great-grandfather. When he pulls it comes off easily in his hand.

  He holds the torch in front of him, minding his step; it is dark tonight, the clouds are dense. The case is easy to spot, lying on its side in the far corner of the shed. Pulling it to the middle of the floor he undoes the zip, noting the fabric of the case is damp, the smell slightly musty. Inside are some old clothes of his mama’s, some of his from when he was a boy, and on top – though he doesn’t know how it got there – is his favourite toy: a t
iger, its wide eyes unblinking and shiny like buttons, parts of its fur threadbare from where he used to carry it everywhere, before the day when they had gone to the airport and the night when they had come silently back; before he had thrown it away, along with his belief they would go on an adventure, and Severine had rescued it again, in the hope that one day he still would.

  Severine chats to the doctor while he takes her blood pressure, asks her to stand on some scales, checks her age; I’m not fifty-five yet, she exclaims. Asks her questions about family history – that makes her smile. She knows it’s silly that she’s here but François was so insistent. Maybe once she’s been cleared of any mental or physical instability he’ll stop worrying about her and go see the world.

  You know I’ve only once left France, she tells him – imagine that!

  He says he is going to test for pupil reaction, and that means shining a light into her eyes.

  I used to want to travel, she says, when I was younger. I even tried to run away, when François was little, but you see, I would have missed them too much.

  He tells her that she seems to be in excellent health, but he’s going to check her reflexes, her muscle strength.

  My family are all here, she says, and I was just talking to my granny and she says – you’re not going to like this – she says the only times she had to see a doctor were when she was born and when she died.

  The doctor has turned away from her and is making notes on a computer screen. Can you follow my finger with your eyes? he says, and so she does.

  I would like to take a blood sample as well – would that be OK?

  And she nods, but as the red of her blood moves, surprisingly slowly, from inside her elbow along the thin plastic tube and into the glass vial waiting to be sealed and labelled and sent away for some kind of check-up, she imagines a different version of the world. A world where blood is so thick it cannot travel, a world so desolate that a mirage can become a family. A world where she made the wrong choice.

  Mrs Oquidon?

  Severine.

  Severine, I’m finished. You can pull your sleeve down now.

  Having avoided doctors for most of my life, she tells him with a smile, though her legs are shaking, I must say you weren’t too bad after all.

  François calls his mama on Tuesday evening, but the phone goes to answerphone and he doesn’t leave a message. If there was something to say, she would answer – she would say it to him. She doesn’t keep secrets from him, he tells himself; she hasn’t done that since he was a child. And even then she was no good at it.

  His flatmate doesn’t come home that night. François supposes he must have met a girl. He can imagine that happening; Stefan is charming and good company, more chatty than François these days.

  He is feeling strange tonight because Severine has seen the doctor, but that is not a bad thing; it was the right thing to do. If there’s something wrong, it can be fixed. If there is nothing wrong, he can stop worrying.

  He tells himself he has no reason to fear loneliness, but it doesn’t stop him from feeling suddenly, terribly alone.

  François finds Severine in a pensive mood; she opens the door as if she is resigned to a fate he doesn’t know about.

  Is something wrong, Mama?

  I know there is, when you call me that.

  It is only the absence of music that makes him realise how often it is playing.

  Why is the house so quiet, Mama?

  She passes him the letter from the doctors.

  I knew those doctors were bad news, she says, with a smile that turns into a shrug.

  François feels the world dissolving.

  I thought, if anything, it was my stomach, she says, I used to get these pains, occasionally . . .

  She shakes her head, not wanting to tell him of the pain she felt when she missed the ghosts.

  But they tell me I am wrong.

  She takes his hand, wanting to comfort him.

  I am sorry, François. They think it’s in my brain.

  THERE’S A MAN IN THE advanced first-aid course who seems to love it – getting to dress wounds, splint broken bones, imagine unconsciousness from carbon-monoxide poisoning and know just how to deal with it all. Róisín thinks he’s been here before, and she’s right; this will be his third trip to Antarctica. She wonders why he has come for the training course at all, but doesn’t ask because the answer becomes clear soon enough.

  Isn’t it great, he addresses the room, knowing exactly what to do and when to do it?

  Róisín’s not the only one who finds him obnoxious; she can see others keeping quiet, balancing rolled eyes with polite smiles as they bandage a healthy arm, prepare a stretcher.

  But he walks over to her, as if singling her out.

  How was the psych eval? he asks.

  She replies with a smile like the ones she’s seen people giving him all day. The psychological evaluation was straightforward enough; she will not go crazy being alone, isolated. She is used to that now.

  I’m Zach – he holds out his hand – looks like we’ll be on Halley together.

  She notices his badge, the same as hers. They are coded in different colours for the different research stations and durations.

  You’re quiet, he says. That’s good – I’m loud. Anyone would think someone had planned this.

  His humour is jovially delivered, and she warms to him, a little. She wouldn’t want to spend time with him in life but, she thinks, perhaps he would be a good person to have around when avoiding death.

  It’s not just the science team at the conference, it is all base personnel. There are engineers and photographers and chefs and radio technicians; such a range of people brought together by the promise of snow.

  After meeting Zach she starts checking badges more closely, wanting to know who will be at the station with her, whose faces will be the only ones she sees during the months of darkness that are the Antarctic winter.

  One of the chefs for Halley finds her, joins her in the queue for coffee at the break.

  You’ve been before? she asks Róisín.

  No. No, what makes you say that?

  You seem confident, and less, erm, giddy than the others.

  Róisín laughs – some of the younger members of the group do seem a little overexcited. I’ll take that as a compliment, she says.

  Oh good! That’s what I meant. I’m Tylissa – it’ll be my first time too.

  Róisín offers milk, pours two sugars into her coffee. Apparently we’ll be out on the moors when the weather gets worse, she says, for the survival training.

  Yes, I’ve been reading the blogs, says Tylissa. Last year’s lot had to wear white-out goggles. And she grins, two coffee cups held up to her eyes to mimic them, pretending to stumble around, searching for what cannot be seen.

  Róisín drives north every weekend, from the cottage she’s renting to the mountains of the Lake District. She climbs to the peak with a heavy rucksack on her back and a camera, hand-held and portable, durable – like the one she will have in the snow.

  She doesn’t fear the dark, although mountaineers are supposed to. What does it matter, really, if the sun’s rays are blocked by the shadow of half a world? It is not sinister. It’s just the way it is.

  Róisín knows that she has seen much of the world, so many places filled with people, and now she is going to see the remotest land on Earth. But she still wonders what would she have had, if she had chosen differently, if she had stayed on the farm. Would they have had a child of their own, as she always suspected Liam wanted? Two cousins with a child – would that have been so wrong? She did look it up once, although she never told him that. She never felt she needed children. But it would have been possible. A risk that they could have taken. If you look closely, we are all related to one another. You don’t have to go back far to find it – that connection that joins every human being to another.

  On the moors, they are joined by ropes as they stumble, searching for a pret
end-lost member of their team in conditions meant to mimic the hostility of a snowstorm: they are wearing the white-out goggles Tylissa mentioned and filled rucksacks on their backs, and they’ve chosen the right day for it. The wind is howling over the land with no prospect of shelter and the rain, thrashing against their faces, is sharp enough to sting. It is brutal, thinks Róisín, as she stumbles over a rock, almost trips as her foot slides into what might have been a rabbit hole, but the snow – if this were snow it would be biting into their lips, making their fingertips too numb to hold the ropes that are supposed to lead them.

  Róisín feels the rope tug but doesn’t understand what has happened, the pull comes before the shout, and then she realises: Tylissa has fallen. The lack of vision means she can’t tell, immediately, if it is serious – should they take off their goggles, forget the training and help now, when it is needed? Another pull on the rope, and this time the cry of pain is deeper, as Tylissa must have tried to stand up and fallen again.

  She pulls off her goggles.

  I fell, says Tylissa helplessly, eyes bloated with tears, the hole . . . my foot twisted. I think . . .

  The first-aid team comes running as Róisín is kneeling beside her, feeling useless despite her training.