Drifting Red Line

I decide that if I speak to Anders again before midnight, I will start a fight just to have something to do with my hands. It is a petty deadline, born of six hours of silence and the specific, quiet way he has been dismantling my concentration since March.

The instrument hut is a cube of glass and steel sitting in the center of the ice shelf. Outside, the Antarctic winter is a white void that swallows sound. Inside, the air is thick with the smell of hot dust and diesel. The heater rattles in the corner, a rhythmic, metallic heartbeat that fills the small space. We are on the six-hour watch, the only two souls left on the station while the other seven crew members are two buildings away, drunk on cheap whiskey and celebrating the solstice.

Anders is three feet away, kneeling by the backup generator. He is wearing a heavy canvas jacket that strains across his shoulders, his sleeves rolled up to reveal forearms corded with muscle and stained with grease. He does not look at me. He never does when he is working. He pulls a wrench from his belt, the metal glinting in the low light, and tightens a fuel line with a smooth, practiced motion. His hands are large, scarred, and incredibly steady. He fixes things without complaint, without explanation, and without ever making me feel small for not knowing how.