The Moon Is Made of Ice Cream

Adeline Zielke

Whenever anyone asked Francessca what she wanted to be when she grew up, the answer was always the same.

"I want to be an astronaut, to prove once and for all that the moon is made out of ice cream."

This topic always brought an amused chuckle from her parents, a raised eyebrow or two from concerned adults, who frankly had no patience for childhood dreams, and laughter from the other children around her.

"You can’t be an astronaut, you’re a girl!" This was beside the point because women were already astronauts, and Francessca was always quick to point that out. She started on her exhaustive list of female astronauts: Sally Ride, Mae Jemison, Eileen Collins, Peggy Whitson. The second she took a breath to continue this list, the kids would run off, joining a game of tag. Of course, Francessca would join in, abandoning this extensive list of female astronauts in order to play, because everyone should know that staying in shape is what astronauts do.

Every day, as soon as Francessca got home, she would throw her backpack through the doorway, sprinting up to her room. As soon as she entered, there in front of her were dozens of pictures of space. A model of the solar system sitting on her dresser, including Pluto, added to this model with a surprisingly sturdy straw and a marble. Francessca did not want to exclude any planets. Please note that her second wish is to bring Pluto back as a planet. Her parents taught her to include everyone, which apparently includes planets as well.

Next to the space model sat a hand-painted mason jar, labeled ‘Moon Fund’ Francessca’s little piggy bank, using it to save up for MIT, because astronaut school is expensive. She chose to sell lemonade on the weekends, doing extra chores, and even picking up the stray lucky penny on the street to help save up for school.

Various other posters lay against her bright purple walls. A poster of the moon’s phases, a poster of Ellen Ochoa, which was her favorite astronaut; second to her future self, of course. Ellen Ochoa was the first woman in space who looked like Francessca. A rich and darker skin tone than the handful of white, male astronauts that were sent before her. Brown hair with texture and style, rather than the pin-straight, or bald astronauts of the past.

Along the wall with her drawing corner were dozens of hand-drawn portraits of Francessca herself, sporting a big, bulky, orange suit, and a helmet on top of her head. Many of these photos included a landscape of the moon, with the craters holding hot fudge and the rocks being made out of Oreo.

Around that time, Francessca’s mother would call the starstruck child downstairs to work on her homework. She always had to remind Francessca that astronauts had to do homework every day before they went to space. That detail always sent Francessca into hyperspeed and she finished her homework with plenty of time to help her mother with dinner.

After homework was completed and a good meal sat in her stomach, Francessca retreated back into her room, grabbing one of her many library books on the solar system, continuing her studies for that day.

Diagrams of the Milky Way fluttered beneath her eyes, the International Space Station capturing a black background, faintly showing dark matter, gas, and dust, turning the black abyss into this celestial sight. Foggy grays and browns, swirling, blending, and phasing into each other, creating this mass of materials. Thousands of stars were captured in this single image, though made out of the same combination of stardust and hydrogen, each managed to be unique in their own right, ending up in different stages of their star lives, the ones at the end of their lives tend to burn the brightest.

In her dreams, Francessca would strap down in her seat, in front of all the control panels and sensors. The radio squawks in her ear, linking her communication back to home base.

"Eagle, do you copy?"

"Yes, Houston, we can hear you."

"All systems go, takeoff in ten, nine, eight..."

The sensors go off, lights flashing and blinking at her, pressure gauges, fuel is full, O2 levels stable.

"Three, two, one." The entire ship rattles as take off is initiated. The spaceship lifts into the air, a hundred tons of metal and fuel pushing against the weight of gravity and towards the stars. Pieces of the ship break off as Francessca passes into the orbit of space. She unbuckles her straps, floating weightlessly in the air. She pushes to the back of the ship, nodding briefly to her fellow astronauts. She grabs at the bars, propelling herself forward--backward? Francessca decides that direction doesn’t matter when it comes to space. She peers into the window, the Earth wrapped in white cotton candy, a pale blue base with bits of green and brown, a trail of smoke following the ship.

Most astronauts when they return to Earth would say how beautiful the world looks from up there, and Francessca can’t agree more. The big blue ball, slowly rotating, storms emerging and dispersing within the clouds, lights from the other side of the world twinkling like stars.

Of course, not all dreams last forever. Francessca, the once joyous and sometimes rebellious child, had to grow up.

After years of studying, late nights hunched over a desk, writing essays, and proving herself once and for all. Francessca is accepted into MIT, and given an academic scholarship, allowing her nearly a full ride to college along with it. Francessca doesn’t let the opportunity go to waste. She majors in engineering and biology, putting her name at the top of the list for internships at NASA. Calling attention to this ambitious student.

To celebrate, Francessca sits down in a tattoo parlor, with a stencil she sketched herself. The constellation of Ursa Major is now permanently inked into her left forearm. A collection of stars, each purposefully and carefully placed, with the North Star inked in a rich golden color, slightly bigger than the rest. That is where she wishes to go; to find the stars.

As Francessca finishes her senior year of college, she meets a man, who looks at her like she looks at the moon, the two of them get close, and though a man was never in her plan, after a few months of convincing, she agrees to get married.

"We need someone to support us." He holds her hand tightly. A wedding band on his finger. “You can be that person. You’re so strong. You can be strong for our family.”

"As long as I can keep working." Francessca smiles briefly, taking his free hand. His gaze flickers, but he nods in response.

The two move out to a little farm away from the city, so Francessca can go out at night and look at the stars in all their glory, glowing bright and unapologetically into the sky. With a ring on her finger and a mission in her heart, Francessca works, day in, day out. Assisting NASA in errands, studying under other scientists, understanding the intricacies of what it means to be an astronaut and going to the moon, and after a few months, Francessca is officially offered a job to be an astronaut for a new program.

Long days are what follows, Francessca spends from sunrise to sunset, studying, planning, training with scientists, being hooked up to machines and tested on how her body reacts to the simulations, conditioning her body to be ready to handle the pressures of space. Often returning home too exhausted to eat. Not that dinner would be ready for when she got home. Before showering, she would stumble through the kitchen, preparing dinner for her husband, placing it on his work desk before shuffling into the shower, taking a breath and spending a moment alone.

Many nights the two of them go out to the edge of their land, and stare up at the stars. He listens as she talks on and on about her training, the studying that she has to do for the week, the progress she has made so far, and every so often will be able to report that the supervisors are nearly ready to send her to the moon. Many nights, he changes the subject, asking her about baby names and parenting plans to distract her from the stress of her job.

"How about William for a boy, it’s a strong male name."

"I was just telling you about work. Can tonight be about work?" Francessca places her hands over her eyes, hiding her view of the stars.

"I know, I know. But we’ve talked about having a family, when will you be ready?"

"You’ve talked about having a family, and I’ve told you after my mission." Francessca uncovers her eyes, looking back up at the stars, and changing the subject, telling the man who looks at her like she looks at the moon which of the stars are actually planets, and hinting to him that if she gets a telescope for her birthday, she would be able to show him the planets himself.

The long days at NASA turn into long weeks, which turn into even longer years, even though promises were made and plans had already begun their next steps, the money was running out, being pulled from her project to various unmanned projects; no need to explore the moon when it had already been explored. Those last few months, Francessca finally realizes that everything is going up in smoke around her. She clings onto whatever worth she has left in the program, until she moves to the International Space Station Program, a step down from what she dreamed of, however, this program gives her the opportunity to go to the stars, to research, and to gain insight of what it is like in space. Francessca pushes to prove her work, attempting to show the supervisors that she is the best candidate.

The same night she lost her project, the man who looks at her like she looks at the moon, stopped looking at her. His voice changed from hesitant to flat, his hands no longer holding the kindness she was used to. His words are now sharp, demanding rather than asking.

After two months of training for the ISS, she was granted permission to be a part of the next crew to live in space for six months. She goes through her routine drug test.

"There’s no easy way to say this." The doctor steps into the room, looking at her through thick glasses. "You’re pregnant, you are no longer eligible to go to space."

The ground under Francessca tilts, the work that she had put her entire life into, the past two years at NASA, the loss of her program, the long nights, the early mornings. All of it for nothing.

Francessca gives birth to a daughter, her maternity leave starting at six weeks, then pushed back to six months, until she never goes back to NASA. Her job was taken by a younger, male prospect, who took her seat on the ship that would have taken her to space.

Though Francessca loved her job, and missed working, she loves her daughter too. When she looks at her daughter, she wishes to name each of the stars after her, to go to space just so she can have the chance to tell her what the stars look like from up there. However, the man who once looked at Francessca the way she looks at the moon, makes the decision that it was best for Francessca to stay at home with her daughter.

Now, Francessca’s job was to do all the cooking and the cleaning, to take care of her daughter, to stay up late at night, waiting for her husband to come home. When waiting for him stretches a little too late, Francessca grabs her daughter and walks out into the backyard, looking up at the world that a lifetime ago she thought she was going to visit. The place she wanted to call her second home.

Some nights, the man who once looked at Francessca the way she looks at the moon, finds the two lying down on the grass, looking up at the stars and clouds shifting in the sky, staring at the moon above. He turns back around, going back inside and waits for Francessca to come in, grass in her hair. He waits for her to wash the baby and put her back to bed. He waits for her to serve him dinner.

"This is where you are meant to be." His eyes don’t meet hers.

Francessca’s hand clenches ever so slightly against her pants, instead of fighting back or changing the subject, she attempts a new approach, she smiles, closes her eyes. "You’re right. If you would excuse me for the night, I need to take care of the baby."

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Francessca sits with her two daughters, supervising as the two of them draw with crayons, laughing and scribbling down on the pieces of paper in front of them. Francessca joins, doodling the planets as she once did as a child, carefully shading the red spot in Jupiter, creating the rings of Saturn. Only this time, the order of the planets is accurate, not just scattered in a blank spot in the paper she is able to fit in it. Pluto sits in its rightful place on the page, still not named a planet, but still a part of Francessca’s solar system.

"Nova, what do you want to be when you grow up?" Francessca says casually, not even looking up from her paper. Nova places her crayon down, looking carefully at her mother. She sees the deep bags under her dark brown eyes, the hands that take care in drawing, the small constellation tattoo that Nova asks the story of every night. The golden star is now faded and difficult to see without a careful eye. She thinks back to when her mother’s diploma and accolades were once on the mantle, and now in its place sit family photos, while her awards sit in a box collecting dust.

"I want to be an astronaut."

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