My mother had always fantasized about a grandchild named 'Earth'. I fantasized with her. The First Earth died long ago in the middle of the Retrograde, nowadays tales of the Planet resembled legends but I knew better. My mother new Earth as a little girl. She said it's beauty could never be remade and threw distaste at the technology around her. I grew up with a constant nostalgia of a place I never knew and vowed to myself that my firstborn would be called Earth.
Earth never saw the light, the child was swallowed in the darkness of hospital lights and a pool of blood, dissolved in my disappointment and self hate. He had seemed beautiful. My husband laid the blame. "You name our child after a dead thing, what did you expect?"
I never told her.
"When am I going to get my grandkids, eh? especially Earth," She always chuckled after that last part.
"Earth's a stupid name, Mom, why would I name a healthy child after something dead?" I said that the week after what was to be Earth's first birthday.
Mommy grew silent and thin.
Her death surprised no one. Yet I felt sick to the bone. I couldn't cry at the funeral, but when I got home, a dam burst open within me and a cried until I was weak. I cried for my hopeful mother and the Earth she knew and Earth I wish I had known.
