Title: If We Were Stars
Author: Eule Grey
Publisher: NineStar Press
Release Date: 04/02/2024
Heat Level: 2 – Fade to Black Sex
Pairing: NB/NB
Length: 26600
Genre: Fantasy, fantasy, YA, British, non-binary, pansexual, interracial, coming of age, coming out, friends to lovers, autism, ableism, neurodiversity, aliens, unlikely heroes
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Description
The final countdown begins in three hours.
…
Blimey. The last thing Kurt wants is to wear a space helmet, and, no, they didn’t plan on saving the world either—Not before their eighteenth birthday anyway. Who’d have thought friending a lonely alien would lead to the Cape Canaveral launch pad.
Best friends since they were ten years old, Kurt O’Hara and Beast Harris tackle the typical teenage challenges together: pronouns, AWOL bodies, not to mention snogging. A long-distance relationship with an alien named Iuvenis is the least of their troubles.
Kurt loves programming, people-pleasing, and yellow dresses. Most of all, Kurt loves Beast.
Beast adores elephants, protest marches, and Kurt. Rules?—Nah. Humanity’s way down on Beast’s list of to-dos.
Beast and Kurt, Kurt and Beast. The end. Exactly how their love turns into a scene from Red Dwarf is anyone’s guess. Spaceships? NASA at the doorstep? No biggie. As long as they’re together, Kurt and Beast can survive anything.
Except, apparently, lift-off. Because nobody considered sensory issues, did they? Nope. NASA never made adjustments for neurodivergent astronauts. Unbelievable.
Will science be enough to blast Kurt and Beast—unlikely superheroes—into space to save the planet? Or will it take something much more extraordinary?
If We Were Stars
Eule Grey © 2024
All Rights Reserved
At midnight, we text.
Now?
Yeah.
I’m on tiptoes, creeping past my parent’s room and down to the front door. By now, I’ve learned how to unlock silently, leaving the door open a notch.
Beast waits for me by the lamp post at the corner. Naughty, as if we’ve broken the law, we leg it down to the river, wearing slippers and pyjamas. Beast’s slippers are shaped like ducks, with little beaks where her toes sit.
Once on the river path, we trip on ragged twigs and slip on uneven ground. Beast catches my arm and swears.
At the riverside, we sit with feet submerged in cold water, surrounded by ducks and noisy geese. Beast brought crisps and a bottle of fizzy pop. I brought sour sweets.
I’m careful to hide every inch of my skin with my pyjamas and dressing gown. I’m just fourteen, sprouting hair and hormones, hating every bodily change I never asked for. My mother keeps cornering me with strange questions about deodorant. If she makes me do the sex talk, I’ll vomit.
Away from parents, school, and other people, at fourteen, we are still us: Beast and Kurt, free of penises, breasts, wombs, and other faraway galaxies.
She pulls me down flat so we can count the stars above.
Ten mutual taps.
Ten mutual taps.
Ten mutual taps.
“See them, Kurt?”
“Yeah. Which one is ours?”
We have a favourite star we insist shines brighter than the others. My dad told me its name, but I covered my ears because I already knew: Our Star.
Beast tickles my palm. “Ready? You got static?”
I tickle hers. “Yeah.”
She takes out the powerful torch she got for her last birthday. We told our parents we use it to look at the stars, but it’s only half the truth. We roll onto our tummies and shake our hands. We both experience static when we talk with the alien, who has become our friend and will only answer questions if we don’t look directly up into the sky during our ‘chats’. Makes sense to us—Beast avoids eye contact too.
We both know the simple language we created at ten by heart, though we’ve begun experimenting with more complex forms of communication, such as symbols, numbers, and coding. The alien is super clever and interested in everything we try. Sometimes, they get giddy and flash lights repeatedly as if they can’t help themself—even following us when we walk home, despite the risks to their anonymity.
They’re also unreliable—going months without answering our calls, forgetting what we previously discussed, and appearing childlike, preferring to talk more about sweets than science. Their stubbornness makes us laugh.
W.H.A.T. Y.O.U. C.H.E.W.I.N.G?
—Bubblegum. Where is your planet?
B.U.B.B.L.E.G.U.M.
T.E.L.L. M.E!
B.U.B.B.L.E.G.U.M?
They can’t always find the right words and become frustrated, which resonates with us.
One night in the depths of winter, the alien repeatedly flashes lights into Beast’s bedroom window until she wakes up.
I..M. G.R.O.U.N.D.E.D.
Me too! Parents are nuisances.
Y.E.A.H.
For obvious reasons, we don’t consider telling our parents. Beast and I assume the alien is the same age as us, though we can’t be sure. Although our ‘chats’ are brief, we consider the alien our best friend. When we explain this, they appear to cry.
N.E.V.E.R. B.E.S.T. B.E.F.O.R.E.
Tonight is an important stage of our relationship. If they agree to email—and we’re sure they’re able—the conversations between us will take a whole new turn. We figure emails will lead to proper discussion, and maybe we’ll be able to work out where their home is.
Eyes glued to the ground, we wait for the answering flashes, which appear as circles of light with no attached beam.
Beast flashes out the letters which form the question we discussed during the walk home from school and which we initiated during our last chat with the alien.
Are you ready to email?
There’s no answering flash. After the agreed time—ten minutes—Beast sighs and switches off the torch. “Rude.”
We turn back around and gaze up at the stars.
“Mm,” I say. “Maybe they’re grounded tonight? Like us.”
My hands tingle from static. I’m certain the alien can see us and is present even though they don’t want to chat. “Do you think they’re not allowed to email and that’s why they won’t flash? They don’t want to let us down.”
Beast shakes her hands to indicate she too can sense the alien. “Yeah, maybe. It’s difficult to say no when you want someone to like you.”
“No, it’s not,” I say, deliberately contrary. “No, no, no.”
We giggle and breathe into the rhythms we established four years ago. Tension in my muscles relax. The inner forces quieten.
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Eule Grey has settled, for now, in the north UK. She’s worked in education, justice, youth work, and even tried her hand at butter-spreading in a sandwich factory. Sadly, she wasn’t much good at any of them!
She writes novels, novellas, poetry, and a messy combination of all three. Nothing about Eule is tidy but she rocks a boogie on a Saturday night!
For now, Eule is she/her or they/them. Eule has not yet arrived at a pronoun that feels right.
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