though she could never be sure, lore felt pretty confident that each time she and august met up, she taught him something new. was he fully absorbing it? maybe not. but he kept showing up, and seemed eager enough to hear a new space fact each time, so that was enough for her to keep sharing them.
"i'm sure," she gracefully allowed, letting him pretend to know the nineteenth brightest star in the sky fact as she fully settled in beside him. but it didn't take long before her eyes were trained upwards again.
though she was focused on the constellation of which she spoke, she did take a peek over at august the moment the words angus cylinder left his mouth, surprise evident in her expression. "do you mean the o'neill cylinder?" she asked, before she realized that they'd not yet discussed theoretical space habitats. and he probably wouldn't know that there was a comic artist named angus mckie who had incorporated the o'neill cylinder into some of his work.
oh. wait. a smile crept onto her face as she realized what he actually meant.
"alpha cygni," she reiterated, encouraging him to look up at where she was now pointing. "alpha because it's the brightest one in the constellation, cyngi, for cygnus, the name of the constellation - the swan. if it helps you to remember, baby swans are cygnets."
she traced the shape of the constellation then, pointing out each star and the way in which they all connected.
"there's a pretty straightforward cross in the middle, and then the arms of the swan get a little wonky on the end. one of the stars in the cygnus constellation is pretty high up on the list of largest currently known stars."
it was only after she let her hand fall and a beat of silence ensue that she moved them away from space facts and towards a conversation about what was going on in their lives. and yet, her eyes didn't move. not at first. it was easier to shift topics if she kept looking at the sky. it made things feel more casual, somehow, even though she was asking questions she really wanted the answer to.
"how are you feeling about your mashup duet thing in glee club this week? would you say it's... keeping you up at night?"