When the earthling comes to visit, the other martians roll all four of their eyes.
They see his banged-up space capsule landing on the red soil and call out to me with exasperation in their buzzy voices. "Here comes the human," they say with wide smirks, unhidden from the astronaut's gaze. They can't see him under his reflective space suit, can't see the fear in his eyes. I brush off their derision as I take his five-fingered hand and lead him into the biopod; the air in here is humid, stickier than he's used to on his iridescent planet, which glimmers in the distant sky behind us. When it's safe, he'll take off his helmet and gulp in the martian air as if it tastes better than any he's ever breathed before on his home planet.
I'm fascinated with his eyes. They are curious and brown, among humans unremarkable, but I have never seen whites in eyes before this. Martian eyes, they're entirely black, insectoid and inscrutable. This human is always watching his own reflection when he stares at me. I wonder if that's all he finds so fascinating, sometimes. A human mind- well, now that is an enigma.
When he kisses me my mouth does not move the way he's used to. My lips are acidic, they sting him, and the sweat on his brow feels oddly cold to me, sends shivers through my exoskeleton when it drips down my membranes. Our bodies shouldn't fit together. He feels big and clumsy, mishappen and wrong. The other martians would say I am abusing the poor thing, letting an earthling think he could be with an alien. When he comes, I don't tell him to leave. I don't tell him that earth is his home, and that nothing good ever comes from venturing too far from home.
Between his trips, I watch the earth from my window and I wonder when he will next set off. It costs a lot of fuel, to send a human spacecraft- it must be worth a lot, the feeling of my tentacles drawing him in, bringing that alien shape so close into mine that the lines blur, that the line of species seems not to matter. We wake up to the same sun, do we not? He may not know how to say my true name, but he calls me something I like the sound of. It rolls off his human tongue a little silly. But I like it a little silly. I like it a lot.
I dream of earth sometimes. Of mountains behind which the sky is azure blue, of seas, of houses built from brick and wood. The dirt on his hands is brown, the same colour as his eyes, but brown is rare on Mars. Everything here is red, and he brushes red tears from my eyes, red tears I didn't know I was crying. Sometimes I don't understand the words he says, but I'm pretty sure he told me something nice. I wonder if he told me I was beautiful. I wonder if he thinks that.
When the earthling comes to visit, I wonder if this is what it's like down there. If, when he touches the other humans, they shiver under his fingers like I do. I wonder if it feels this good for earthlings when a hand carresses their antennae. I wonder if this aching weight in my gizzard is normal for the people on that planet, if it's supposed to get this strong when human lips brush over your gills. I study the man like I've abducted him for this purpose. I need to know.
I fight the urge to leave crop circles in his yard, to descend upon his civilisation and demand to see their leader. The curiosity for his planet is an instinct I bury. If I come to Earth, then he might stop coming to Mars. If I come to Earth, I might become one of them, and then there will be nothing to visit me for.
I fear nothing more than the day that we interlock, that the knot tied between us can't be undone. Some day, if I'm not careful, planets could crash together, and the devastation won't be survivable. I would give a lot for a pretty good feeling. The apocalypse might be a bit much. For Mars, or for Earth, perhaps the two are best left apart.
But let's not pretend the thought doesn't cross my mind. I sure would love an alien invasion. If only to keep an earthling as a pet. I happen to know one I'd quite like on a leash.
For now, I wait for the earthling to come visit. There's nothing wrong with a little space travel every now and then.
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Assorted Poetry
PoesiaI had a vent account on Poetizer, but it went paid, so I had to save the poems here. They're not particularly effortful, just vomited prose, but I had nothing else to do with them. They may be added to, or not. Largely not too graphic, but there is...
