“This one’s special,” he said, adjusting the telescope again. “The Andromeda Galaxy. The closest major galaxy to our own.”
I looked through the eyepiece at what seemed like another fuzzy blob, though bigger than the others. “How far?”
“About 2.5 million light years. The light you’re seeing right now left those stars before humans existed. Before our species even evolved.”
The concept made me dizzy. “So we’re literally looking back in time?”
“Always. Even the light from the sun takes eight minutes to reach us. We never see anything as it is right now, only as it was.”
“That’s…” I straightened up to look at him. “Kind of beautiful and sad at the same time.”
“How so?”
“Like, those stars could be gone already and we wouldn’t know. We’re seeing ghosts.”
His expression softened. “I never thought of it that way. Though some of these stars will outlive our sun by billions of years.”
“Still. It’s like being in a relationship with the past.”
Something flickered across his face at that, gone before I could identify it. “The past has its place. But I prefer to focus on the present.”
We stayed out for another half-hour, Nils showing me constellations and teaching me to find Polaris, the North Star. His grandfather had taught him, he said, on dark winter nights in Sweden. The reverence in his voice when he talked about those memories made me want to know everything about his childhood, his family, the life he’d lived before coming here.
Finally, the cold won. My fingers were numb inside the thick gloves, and I could barely feel my toes. We packed up the telescope and retreated inside, the warmth of the cabin hitting like a wall.
“Okay,” I admitted, stripping off layers as fast as my cold fingers would allow. “I get why you love this. That was amazing.”
“I’m glad you enjoyed it.” He was unwrapping his own scarf, cheeks pink from the cold. “I’ve wanted to share it with you for a while.”
“Since that first bus ride?”
“Since then, yes. You seemed so surprised that anyone would care about astronomy.”
“Because I was. Hockey players don’t usually have hobbies that require that much thinking.”
“That’s not true. You think constantly: about plays, positioning, strategy.”
“That’s different.”
“Is it? Understanding the ice and understanding the sky both require pattern recognition, spatial reasoning, patience.”
I finished pulling off my snow pants and moved closer to the fire. Nils joined me, and we stood side by side, hands extended toward the flames.
“Your fingers are freezing,” he said, taking my hands between his.
“Yours aren’t much better.”
But he rubbed my hands anyway, the friction and his touch slowly bringing feeling back. The intimacy of the gesture, standing together in the firelight while he warmed my hands, made my chest tight with emotion.
“Thank you,” I said quietly. “For all of this. The cabin, the stars, everything.”
“You don’t need to thank me.”
“Yeah, I do. No one’s ever done anything like this for me before.”
He was quiet for a moment, still holding my hands. “You deserve good things, Adan. You deserve someone who pays attention to what you want.”
“Is that what you are? Someone who pays attention?”
