Lunar Love Letters - 1. Chapter 1

Mike was sitting on a crate, full of his personal belongings, still unpacked. It was the last crate he had to empty, but he was having a hard time getting it done. Unpacking that last, final, box meant he was done moving. It would be 'official', he would truly be a 'Loony', a Lunar Colonist. He had hated having to leave earth, like any sixteen-year-old would. He had his friends, the school he was so familiar with, heck, he even liked most of his teachers!

But then, his mother just had to take a job that meant they'd have to move to the moon. At first, he had tried making a case for her moving there by herself, but his father wouldn't have it. He said it was not right to split up the family. What would he do without his mother? With her thousands of miles away, on a rock orbiting the Earth!?

Of course, he knew his dad was right. It was just his frustration and anger speaking. Why did he have to leave everything behind? Couldn't they wait two years until he had turned eighteen? Then he'd be able to get a place of his own.

Naturally, his rock-solid arguments had fallen on deaf ears. His mother was going to take her position as a Lunar botanist, and that was it. His dad was already looking for a new job on the moon as well. They had also urged him to start looking, he had had a delivery job back on earth. It had earned him a nice bit of pocket money. However, just like unpacking that final crate, actually looking for a job on the moon felt like giving up. Admitting there would be no going back.

Now, you'd think that the crate Mike was sitting on had been sitting there for perhaps one, or two days. Actually, that last crated had been stood in the corner of his small room for well over three weeks already. His parents had been getting more and more insistent on him unpacking. Something to do with having to return the empty crate to the shipping company, as if he cared!

Speaking of his room, it was also much smaller than his bedroom back on Earth. Which kind of made sense, as real estate was a premium commodity on the Moon. Even with three big colonies already established, them being in the oldest and largest one, in the rim of the Peary Crater close to the Northern Hemisphere. Each square meter was hard-earned and had to be used as efficient as possible. Which meant his room was only just small enough to house a fold up bunk bed attached to the wall, a small desk with a beanbag on the opposite side and a screen above his desk. The screen usually showed either a live stream from the just outside the colony, overlooking the wide and empty expanse of the Moon. Kind of like a window. You'd see moon-buggies or exo-suited people out there every once in a while. There wasn't much else to see. Oh, and something else he'd had to get used to, the Sun was always shining here. There wasn't a real night. The colony dimmed their indoor lights during what they considered to be the evening or night hours, but outside, the Sun was always shining. Providing the necessary solar power to ensure the colony could continue to function.

Looking at his screen, he instructed the screen to switch to mirror mode, "Screen, mirror on." That would switch his screen temporarily to mirror mode, using the built-in camera to stream back his image.

Looking back at him was a lanky guy, he always felt his arms were much too long. Having long black hair didn't help much, but he refused to get it cut. They did emphasize the whole perception of everything about Mike being elongated. It wasn't a happy face that was looking back at him. In fact, he thought he looked exhausted. And he had not really been doing much for the entire day. Even on the Moon they adhered to the Earth school holidays, so he was having even less to do than normal. Which had let to him brooding here, inside his room. Thinking about all the things he was not being able to do. He couldn't meet with anyone on the beach, or catch some waves. There was no way he could spend the day with his friends cruising all across town using the public transport flyers. No going out for coffee with Wendy, his long-time best friend, who had even been a bit more for two wild months. He had had a very difficult time after finding out he was incredibly attracted to one of the guys from his swim team. He had worried about it for weeks, before finally telling Wendy.

Wendy had told him not worry about everything, like he always did. On a joke, she suggested that he'd at the very least check out all of his options, and she had kissed him right there and then!

To Mike's surprise, he had actually really enjoyed Wendy's kiss. And it had quickly led to a lot more kissing. He figured hormones were pretty much blind when it came to whom they got you attracted to. And he and Wendy had found a whole new side to their relationship. They had officially 'gone steady', but after two months, the spark had died. Not just for Mike, but for Wendy as well. Both had never intended there to be any sparks in the first place, they had just got caught up in the moment. So, one afternoon, over one of the cups of coffee they loved to get at this tiny place downtown, they had put an end to their amorous relationship, choosing to just remain friends. Best friends, like before.

Which had meant that, as his best friend, Wendy had tried her hardest to get Mike to go out with that stud he had been smitten with, the guy from his swim team. To his surprise, and somewhat to Wendy's dismay, Neal had actually been very open to the idea of going on a date with Mike. So, before he knew it, he was hooked up, and out catching a movie with Neal. He had no idea what the movie had been about, at all. But he did find out that Neal was an astonishing kisser. He had left the movie all weak in the knees, and he realized that making out with Neal in the back row was something on a whole different level than how he had felt with Wendy. Even though he'd never dream of telling her!

Unfortunately, even though Neal was such an amazing kisser, he was not very good at being boyfriend material. It was only a week later that Wendy had sent him a DM with a photo, showing some guy who could be no one else but Neal, sticking his tongue down some other guy's throat somewhere downtown. Angry, Mike had confronted Neal, and he had admitted that that had indeed been him.

That left him with both a broken heart, and a confused head. He was now pretty much sure which team he was swinging for, despite Wendy's valiant attempts at introducing him to the more or less straight side of society. The only people who knew were Wendy, and his now-ex, Neal. Who he tried very hard not to give another thought!

That was still the case. His parents knew he'd been on dates, but apart from Wendy, they had not actually seen any of his dates. So, he figured they didn't know any better.

He was still in contact with Wendy. But, with the timezone they adhered to at Peary Colony, they had a hard time getting in touch with each other as it'd be nighttime at Wendy's when Mike woke up on the Moon.

Checking the clock, and doing the math in his head, he figured she might be just about done with dinner around now.

"Screen, contact Wendy," he instructed his wall-mounted screen.

Most people gave their PA system, their Personal Assistant, a fancy name. He had not yet bothered. His wristband was linked to all the facilities in the moon, but he couldn't be bothered to personalize it. He was still using the default female AI voice, and just told each device what he wanted to be done. This morning, breakfast had been a matter of telling the toaster to 'get me a freaking piece of toast!'.

His screen was still showing that it was trying to connect him to Wendy. A system message in the bottom told him that a successful connection had already been made to the Earth Relay System and that the current communication delay was 1.9 seconds. Talking with someone on a delay took some getting used to. He was constantly trying to say something just as the other started talking as well. He felt most of his communications with Earth consisted of discussing who was going to go first.

A square popped up on his screen, and, after approximately 1.9 seconds, the image of his friend Wendy appeared. He looked more closely, there was something odd with her mouth. A large slurping sound came through his bedroom speakers, he had forgotten to turn the volume down. Suddenly, he realized what he was seeing, Wendy was slurping on some spaghetti. He loved spaghetti! But it was one of those things you could hardly get on the moon. Too messy to prepare in low gravity.

Seeing the last bit of spaghetti disappear, he decided he'd better say hi, as Wendy was still stuck with a full mouth. He waved for the camera, and gave it a meager "Hi!".

The delay meant he didn't just have to wait for two seconds, that was just the time it took for his response to be beamed 'down' to Earth. It took just as long for her reply to return. So, Mike was sitting and waiting for he to finish chewing, and replying.

"Hiya, handsome!" she returned, ever the cheerful one. Mike knew very well he was not exactly what you'd call 'handsome', at least that's what he kept telling himself. And looking all glum and brooding was probably not helping his case. Just as he was about to respond, Wendy continued, "You literally got me at the tail end of this spaghetti, I've just finished eating."

Mike waited for a bit longer and felt it was now safe to reply, "You're doing that on purpose, aren't you? You know, I can't get any pasta here. It's like, they forgot the whole country of Italy when people migrated here!"

After a while, Wendy shrugged and answered, "It's 'Aunty Donna's', you know, that pasta place around the corner from where I live? They told me that the parents of the 'real' Aunty Donna actually came from Italy, from before the whole Vesuvius disaster. They have some astonishing family recipes!"

Mike was salivating now, he could just imagine the taste. The tangy sourness of the fresh tomatoes, the warmth of the basil. And the cheese! Oh, the cheese! Another thing that had been banned on the Moon, cheese. After a rather fateful experiment with cows on the Moon, and a rather disastrous miscalculation in how to handle the methane production from a good herd, cheese had become an import-only product. So, for a while, you could still get cheese imported from Earth. Then, someone had left a shipping crate of cheese unrefrigerated in a cargo bay, close to an air intake. After a sudden spike in airway infections, the cause had been quickly determined to be the cheese. Fungus and bacteria had taken over the cheese, and what might have resulted in a very nice, strong, Camembert in France, had turned out to be a huge health risk in the enclosed environment of the moon. Cheese had been banned. And, as you might have guessed, Mike had loved cheese!

"Earth to Mike… Earth to Mike!" Wendy was calling through his speakers. This quickly brought Mike out of his pasta induced revelry.

"Sorry for zoning out on you… it's just… pasta," He sighed deeply.

"Having a hard time again?" Wendy asked, quickly seeing how her friend was doing.

Mike nodded his head, "I'm missing you. I'm missing the guys from the swim team, my old class," he felt a tear appearing, "I'm all alone here. I hardly know anyone here at school." He wiped the tear away on the sleeve of his sweater. He hated crying on the Moon as well. His tears would drip down, all slow and dramatic due to the lower gravity. He was wearing clothes that had a special kind of nanofibre run through it, which was being attracted to some kind of magnetic force in the floor panels. That gave the impression of walking around in normal gravity, as the clothing compensated for the lack of downforce. But anything that didn't have the nanofibre in it, was stuck in lunar gravity. That also meant that when you were not wearing any clothing, or at least, not anything using nanotech, you'd be just as weightless as anything else on the Moon. In gym class, they actually had competitions with a new kind of ball game, Lunarball, which looked a bit like a mix between basketball and squash. They used the floor and all four of the walls, big jumps and running up a wall was easy after a bit of practice. The ball was often slung straight across the entire field, as it wouldn't have much time to fall down, like it would have on Earth.

Mike felt he was getting distracted again, his mind went all over the place, "I'm supposed to get my last box unpacked, but I still can't."

Wendy had to wait a moment, but she knew to wait, reading Mike well enough to see he had had more to say.

"You know it's probably just stupid stuff like underwear or teddy bears, right?" she said, joking.

Mike shrugged, "I know, but when I'm done, I'm settled, I'm here."

Of course Wendy knew, but she was trying her hardest to cheer up her struggling besty.

"Have you tried checking out the Metaweb on the Moon? Isn't there anyone interesting on there? I've seen a couple of groups that might be interesting, including that Loonyball you mentioned," she suggested. The Metaweb was the social platform of the time. The Earth, Moon, and Mars Metawebs were technically separate environments, but they did interconnect. Which was also how he was calling Wendy right now, he was contacting her through the Earth relay of the Metaweb, connecting him to her account back on Earth.

"It's LUNARBALL, and you know it!" he chided and corrected her. He knew everyone on Earth called the Lunar colonists 'Loonies', and he had to admit he had done the same. To be honest, he still thought of most of the people here as Loonies, and hated having to admit he was now a Loony as well. Earth side, Lunarball had quickly been nicknamed Loonyball.

"It's all the same people. This colony is like living in a small town. Everyone knows everyone. I don't even know why we even have a Metaweb here," he complained.

Wendy's response took longer than normal, she had been thinking this over. "Well, why don't you look outside the Loony web? See if you can find someone interesting to talk to here on Earth, or, better yet, all the way over on Mars! You know my friend, Liz?" she appeared to be waiting for an answer, but knowing that would take forever, she already continued as Mike was saying yes. "Well, she's writing with this guy on Mars, and she let me read some of his messages. It's like reading Romeo and Juliet, you know, the play." She was laughing now, "I know it's corny, but she described it as writing old-fashioned love letters. It's far too expensive to set up a video or voice connection to Mars, you have to wait like ages for a response. So, they just stick to writing letters and sending photos. It's so cute!" she was almost squealing now.

Mike was anxiously waiting to get a word in, no way was he going to be writing love letters like some lovesick girl to someone at the other end of the solar system! And he told her in as many words!

"Well, of course, but you COULD give it a try and see if there's anyone out there who has some similar interests, right?" she argued.

"There's even fewer people on Mars than on the Moon!" he retorted.

Wendy harrumphed, she was now fully invested in her own idea. She was convinced that what Mike needed right now, was having someone else to talk with, besides herself, naturally.

Mike saw her tapping her wristband, and a few seconds later, a message popped up in the corner of his screen. It had a link in it.

"There you go, there's this group here on our Metaweb that'll set anyone up with a 'pen pal' from Mars. It's how Liz got to know her Martian as well," she said, after forwarding the link. "Take a look, later."

Mike was determined he was not going to bother checking out the link. He didn't need a freaking 'pen pal', all he needed was to be back on Earth.

He pretended as if he were hearing something outside his bedroom, "Sorry, Wendy, I gotta go, mom's calling!" he yelled, and he closed the connection before Wendy even had a chance to answer. His mother was still at work, but he hoped Wendy wouldn't think of doing the quick calculation to figure out it was still in the afternoon at his place, and his mom would still be out for work.

Mike didn't have much else to do. Nothing else besides finish unpacking, like his mom and dad kept nagging him about. That was just something he really wasn't ready for yet. He set his screen to flip between different entertainment channels. They even got most of the Earth channels here.

In the end, he had crawled into bed, and lying on his side, he had continued watching some kind of old sci-fi movie. He loved seeing the old ones and comparing what they had thought of the future back then, with how things turned out now. They were still waiting on proper anti-grav plating, force shields or warp drives. Though, deep space exploration was gaining some traction now, with the latest space drives getting explorers closer and closer to the speed of light.

Somewhere during the evening, he must have fallen asleep. As he opened his eyes, he noticed the lights were dimmed and a digital sticky note was highlighted on his screen from his mother.

'Hi honey, you were sleeping. If you wake up hungry, there's a meal in the fridge, ready for heating. Your dad and I are out tonight, love you!'

Well, at least his parents were having a social life. He glanced over at the clock in the bottom right of his screen. It was already past one o'clock at night. Well, for whatever went for night here in the perpetual daylight. He didn't feel very hungry. Still grumpy, he turned over on his other side and went back to sleep, not even bothering to get undressed.

He woke up early the next morning, his screen was still set to wake him up as if it were a regular school day. It had slowly increased its brightness, simulating a fake sunrise over the Moon's surface. By now, brightly lit moon craters were glaring from the screen, extra bright to convince Mike to get up. Sometimes, he thought his PA's AI system hated him for not finishing the setup and was taking its revenge by making his alarm extra annoying, or burning his toast all the time. That couldn't be the case, of course, but he couldn't help but wonder. Especially not with all the old sci-fi movies he had been watching, declaring doom and disaster as AI systems took control of the Earth or mankind.

His PA system detected he was awake and scrolled the latest news over his screen, including the message he had refused to open yesterday, the link Wendy had sent him.

He knew he'd either have to open or delete it, and Wendy would give him an earful if she noticed he hadn't bothered to read her message.

"Open link," he instructed the screen.

A browser window opened and showed how the browser was attempting to connect him to the Earth Metaweb. A warning message on top of the browser warned him that he was now browsing outside the local web and that extra costs could be incurred. With his mother being a lunar botanist, which was basically a government job, they had free access to any of the webs, be it on the Moon, Earth, or Mars. One of the perks, he guessed. Otherwise, he'd never be able to have as many video chats with Wendy either, his allowance wouldn't cover that by a long shot!

Finally, the browser connected and the group that Wendy had forwarded was loaded. It quickly detailed the group's mission statement. Some bla bla about keeping humankind connected, to fight loneliness, etcetera.

He scrolled down and read a few statements from people who had been successfully linked by the people behind the group and who had become pen pals. He had a bit of a chuckle as he read a small piece by someone named Liz. Checking her profile photo, he found it was indeed the Liz both he and Wendy knew. The guy she had been linked to had a profile pic as well, and, as he opened it, he could understand the whole Romeo and Julia vibe; that was one hot dude!

Down at the bottom, there was an invitation to join the group and get matched. Absentmindedly, he clicked on it and accepted the request if the group could access his personal details to make sure they'd make a good match. Then, with a shock, he realized he had not yet set up his PA system with his own personal preferences and limitations. Meaning, it would share just about 'anything' with the Pen Pal group!

Of course, there was no undo button. Just his luck. He should have used his brains, instead of just clicking on everything. Like his mom was always telling him, especially after a specific incident where he had 'accidentally' bought some in game perks, on his parent's credit.

A few seconds later, he received confirmation of his registration and that his details had been received. He'd be contacted within 24 hours if and when a match had been found!

He sighed, it was out of his hands now. He'd just have to wait and see if there would be some kind of 'pen pal' out there for him. Actually, he noticed he was already wondering if he'd be matched with a guy or a girl. Oh wait, what if he got matched to some weird old guy!! The horror! What mess had Wendy gotten him into!?