Sadly enough, Miller seemed to be right about having no one at home who cared about her. I wrote a letter to her sister informing her of Jenifer's passing, but there has yet to be a response after several days. It is as if she was truly alone, or at least that's how she must have felt.
There is something haunting about how a woman could live an entire life and almost no one could care when she was gone. As hard as it had been to inform the families of Richard and Adam's deaths, coordinating funeral plans with the families was touching. You got to see another side of the person from the family, the person they were before this mission. You got to see how their legacy would be remembered and honored. For Miller there was nothing. All she had was up here on Europa.
I hope she knew she had me. I think she did know. Not only had she helped mentor me, but she had been my friend, and I don't know how I'm going to accept that she took her own life. I understand that this wasn't about me, but I still can't help but wonder if there were any things I could have handled differently.
There were signs that Jenifer was troubled. Everyone in the crew could see that she was struggling, and yet without hindsight I could have never predicted those struggles would lead to this. You can never truly know what is going on in someone else's head.
I wish I had met Miller before this mission. I had always lacked friends in my adult life, and I truly believe that even if we hadn't been forced to train together, we were meant to be friends. When we got back home, I intended to keep this relationship and hopefully allow it to grow until we were old and shriveled.
Now, like Miller, that dream is dead. All she's left behind is a legacy of becoming the first Astronaut to kill themself in space. To most on earth she will be nothing but an empty fact you google when you're bored.
For me however, she'll always be the woman and friend who pushed me to make it this far. It's a bit more of an incentive to make it home alive, so I can tell my part of her story.
YOU ARE READING
Europa
Ciencia FicciónIn order to embark on a mission to discover alien life on the icy moon of Jupiter Maria must leave her life on Earth behind, including her father and her seven-year-old son Diego. She thought the hardest part of the mission would be saying goodbye...
