Chapter Text
Here we go - ten, nine, eight, seven, RS25 engines startup, four, three, two, one. Booster ignition. And, liftoff! The crew of Artemis II now bound for the moon. Humanity’s next great voyage begins.
Ryland Grace was glancing at the TV in the bar that showed news footage of the Artemis II lifting off only two days ago interspersed with new footage of the crew in space. He had hosted a live stream space party in his classroom at the end of the school day, having planned it weeks, months in advance. It was a momentous occasion, there was no way he was letting his kids miss that.
It was the hottest topic on his lips. He felt he had told every single person around him facts about the mission as though he were the one on the ship itself. Eva was victim to a few fun facts just then as she drank from her beer bottle silently, allowing her friend to ramble on about space travel. It was nothing new. Ryland had always been a huge nerd since they met in college. But then again, she was a big history nerd so it all balanced out in the end.
“Did you know as well, we as a species haven’t been beyond low Earth orbit since Apollo 17 in 1972. Isn’t that incredible? We’re witnessing history.”
“Technically, everything is history.” Eva stated matter-of-factly.
“Yeah, but space history.” Ryland’s finger was in the air for emphasis.
“You’re going to be space history if you do not move that finger from my face.” A brow raised, face stern, though Ryland always knew it was in jest.
They didn’t spend as enough time as he would have liked after they had both graduated. They both studied and stayed on in San Francisco, sometimes heading to other places for work but it was their base, their home. They both had differing jobs though, Ryland was a school teacher and Eva worked in some kind of statistics and predictions job in the government. Truth be told he really should have known Eva’s job but she was always quite vague about it (he was convinced she was part of the secret service sometimes). It meant they worked hours that sometimes didn’t match, but they made it work, like that evening. They were at a venue they frequented in their college days. It used to be a pretty rough dive bar back in their day, but it had a change of hands a few times and had finally become a cosy pub. They were there for nostalgic reasons more than the numerous IPAs and stouts on offer.
They were catching up, glad to spend what precious time they could together, sharing a plate of fries when they saw somebody setting up a mic on the small stage below the TV screen. One of the bartenders announced karaoke was about to begin and if anybody wanted to sing, they just needed to put their name on the list.
Ryland’s eyes widened and he turned over to Eva with a mischievous grin on his face.
“No. Absolutely not. You have heard me singing for the last time many years ago, Ryland Grace.” She shook her head, though Ryland was already out of his seat.
Eva slid off hers as well and cantered behind him as he walked towards the clipboard upon the bar, reaching for the pen. She reached for it a second too late and Ryland had just grasped it out of her reach, though she was putting up a fight. She was practically wrestling him to try and get it, hands grappling without restraint when they both lost their footing and he nudged into somebody standing at the bar.
“Oh, god, I am so so sorry.” Ryland put his hands up in the air apologetically.
“Apologies for my friend, he is an adult child.” Eva added, giving him a disapproving look.
“No worries, you’re both crazy about karaoke, huh?” The stranger grinned.
“Oh now, she is incredible. She sings as if Celine Dion and Adele’s voices made sweet love in a jazz bar.” He teased, turning to look up at the stranger as Eva protested.
He paused.
That face. Brown eyes. Wide nose. Those dimples as he smiled.
“Rocky?”
The man’s eyes furrowed for a moment before his eyes widened in recognition.
“Grace?”
Ryland’s mouth dropped as he let out a breath of disbelief. That was Rocky, his absolute best friend when he was a child. The memories came flooding back.
He couldn’t specifically recall their first meeting. They were only four years old when they met in pre-school. He remembered being firm friends though. Always spending time together no matter what they were doing. Building in the sandbox. Chasing each other on the grass. Sitting criss-cross applesauce while reading.
Rocky wasn’t his real name, of course. His real name was Ricardo Gracia but Ryland had trouble with saying his name properly at that age, instead always calling him ‘Rocky’ from the very start. Meanwhile, it had tickled little Rocky that he and his friend shared a very similar family name and had always called him ‘Grace’.
They went to the same elementary school together too. Sometimes being kept apart for the chaos they would cause as a duo, but more often being given a pass for being two of the smartest kids in class. Grace remembered playing astronauts together at his request and Rocky insisted on building things with big lego bricks and toy toolsets.
Rocky had to leave just before they started middle school. His grandma had gotten sick and his mama wanted to move to the other side of the country to be with her. There was a very clear memory of Rocky’s family car driving away, and he recalled feeling a great loss for the very first time in his ten years of life.
But then, somehow, in their thirties - they found each other again in a little pub on a very steep corner of San Francisco.
Both men grinned from ear to ear at one another and Grace wasted no time in throwing his arms around Rocky - Rocky reciprocating enthusiastically. They both laughed, squeezing each other. Rocky even started swaying the both of them, Grace giggling.
They finally loosened their embrace, though hands remained on one another’s arms as they smiled in disbelief at the serendipitous meeting.
“I can’t believe it’s you.” Grace breathed, soaking in the presence of his beloved friend. He had always wondered on occasion how he was doing. They had lost touch since Rocky had left, and he had always hoped for the best for him. For all intents and purposes, he looked really, really well.
“Yeah, god, nobody’s called me Rocky in years.”
“Nobody’s called me just Grace in years.”
They were both taking each other in, joy radiating off the two of them when Eva cleared her throat gently.
“Yeah, sorry - Eva.” Grace turned, with one hand still on the other man as he presented him with the other. “This is my friend Rocky - sorry, Ricardo. We were friends when we were kids and we haven’t seen each other since we were…what? Ten, eleven years old?”
“I just turned eleven, but I think you were ten.” Rocky nodded contemplatively. “Great to meet you, Eva. You can call me Rocky too if you want. Only seems right.” He chuckled as he squeezed Grace’s shoulder.
“Nice to meet you, Rocky.” Eva took on the name quite naturally. Grace didn’t have a huge circle of friends, so seeing him so brightly lit with another person was heart-warming.
Rocky then turned to introduce Grace and Eva to three of his colleagues who had brought him to this pub. It turned out he had moved back to San Francisco only a few weeks ago and he was settling into a new engineering job. Grace smiled, so content in knowing he had put his dextrous skills to good use.
Eva was a smart woman. It wasn’t just that she knew to give the two men some time to catch up, but that she was able to slip away from karaoke duties as she settled into a casual conversation with Rocky’s colleagues. She kept an eye on the two of them though, catching a little something that made her lips upturn.
And so, the two old friends caught up.
Grandma unfortunately passed about a year after the Gracia family moved back to New York but they had found a house and they didn’t want to uproot Rocky again. They had a good life together there. He did well in high school and attended Cornell University (he expected nothing less of his brilliant friend). He had worked in engineering jobs for most of his adult life apart from a part-time bartending job in college. The move to San Francisco felt right, the opportunity was presented to him as a promotion in his current job and it made sense. It was a kind of homecoming for him.
Grace told Rocky about his own misfortunes and blessings. He sadly lost both of his parents in a car accident a couple years after Rocky left and lived with his grandparents up until he went to college himself. Rocky looked at him with sympathetic eyes and extended his condolences, but Grace assured him he had made peace with it (even if he hadn’t, especially late at night when the memories haunted him). He told Rocky about Eva who he had met in college when she had interrupted him during his studies because he had overstayed his time in the private library room. She allowed him to stay and they had been friends since. He finished college and worked hard to achieve his doctorate in molecular biology. He even told Rocky about his time in Denmark when he insulted a fellow scientist, thus changing the trajectory of his career, but also how content and happy he was teaching his kids.
Neither of them were quite sure when they had gotten so close sitting on those bar stools, a toe or heel on the footrest of each other’s seats. Criss-cross applesauce. It all felt right, the conversation flowed so naturally; it was as though no time had passed.
“Soooo…” Rocky drawled, “what about your love life?”
Grace shook his head, a sharp exhale leaving him. “Tragic.”
“C’mon, that bad? You’re a good looking guy, Grace. I’m surprised I don’t see a ring on your finger. Nothing going on with Eva?”
Grace shook his head harder. “Absolutely not. She says I’m basically her pet since she has to make sure I’m fed, watered and alive. I really don’t see her that way either. She’s a beautiful and intelligent woman, but she scares me sometimes, y’know?” He chuckled. “Last time I was in a relationship was about a year ago now - Linda. She said I had my head in the clouds and proceeded to leave me for some guy called Mark.” He shrugged. Thankfully, that, he had actually made peace with.
“I hate Mark.” Rocky immediately punctuated with a deadpan voice.
“Thanks, buddy.” Grace tittered as he took another sip of his beer. How many had it been then? Three, four? He truly wasn’t counting as they were buying each other beers. “What about you? Love in the air?”
“Nah. I had a partner, Adrian, back in New York. We’d been together for…god, years. But somehow I don’t think I was ever enough for them.” He shrugged. “I think accepting this job over here was just the nail in the coffin. I loved them at one point but we were just going through the motions for the past year. We lived together so it was kinda hard to not just carry on if nothing was specifically wrong.” He looked down at his bottle, peeling away at the label absent-mindedly. “We hadn’t slept with each other in that year, y’know? Not really a good sign, especially when you don’t talk about it either. Every time I tried to talk about it, they said nothing was wrong so I just stopped trying. They were really bad at communicating.” He took a long swig from his bottle. “Now I’m just on Grindr trying to satiate my needs.” He chuckled. That was his coming out to Grace, he supposed. He hadn’t done that in years, not that he was ashamed in any way, he got that out of his system when he was a teenager.
“San Francisco is a great place for Grindr, I hear.” Grace said casually. Rocky met his gaze again and smiled. There was no hesitation on either of their parts. As if either of them had any doubt they would still love each other in any circumstances.
They talked for hours.
Not just about their lives but about what seemed like everything. They talked movies, TV shows, books. Celebrity crushes. (Rocky had a thing for Ryan Gosling. Grace really liked Margot Robbie. They decided they had to watch Barbie together at some point.) They also talked about Artemis II. Grace told him about his space party with his kids and Rocky told him about the equipment he had a hand in making for the ship itself. (Why didn’t he tell him that earlier??)
Time had passed so quickly that before they knew it, the bartenders were announcing the last call.
Damn it, Grace didn’t get Eva to sing. He glanced over to her and it looked like she was getting on swimmingly with one of Rocky’s colleagues so he didn’t want to interrupt.
They had bought their final beers and were both a little fuzzy-headed as they leaned against the bartop facing one another. They made plans to have dinner at some point next week once Rocky had checked his schedule. They exchanged numbers saving themselves as ‘Grace’ and ‘Rocky’ in each other’s phones. What else?
The night drew to a close and the security guy ushered everybody out. Didn’t Grace and Eva say they were just going out for ‘a couple’ of drinks? He looked around for her, but found her missing. He glanced down at his phone and a message read, ‘Got lucky. Talk later.’ Grace giggled, he hadn’t realised there was a step at the exit and stumbled forwards. Thankfully Rocky was right there to catch him, laughing at his friend’s clumsiness. They both teetered into the middle of the sidewalk in each other’s arms. They steadied themselves and found themselves in a close embrace. Rocky smelled like booze and home.
“I really missed you, Rock.” He buried his face into his friend’s shoulder, tears welling in his eyes as Rocky gave him a squeeze.
“I missed you too, Grace.” He turned, face in his friend’s bedraggled blond hair.
And they stayed like that for a while, revelling in one another. Finding a safe place, their childhood, everything that had passed, and everything that would be, in one another’s arms.