The Long Dark

Time has become a soft, useless thing. You measure it in cups of melted snow, in the slow rotation of the auroras smearing green and violet across the skylight above your bunk. The generator hums like a second heartbeat. You have stopped checking the calendar; the calendar has stopped meaning anything.

You speak aloud now. Lectures to no one. Arguments with your sister, who is twelve thousand kilometers away and may not remember your voice. Good morning, Mara. Good evening, Mara. Sometimes, in the quiet that follows, you think you hear the reply land a half-second too late, as if your own voice is being repeated from somewhere just behind the wall.

You haven't looked outside in nineteen days. The skylight is enough. The skylight has to be enough. But tonight the aurora is brighter than you have ever seen it, and something in your chest leans toward the door like a compass needle finding north.