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Before putting on Rocky (1976) (the best one), we had to spend 30 minutes or so loading up the translator with relevant vocabulary and a bit of cultural context. It turned out Eridians have a fairly close cultural equivalent to the job of "debt collector for a loan shark", though he was surprised to hear that it would be treated so neutrally by the story.
Even still, there were some things I didn't think to cover. Rocky had a LOT of questions about the meat locker scene. I tried my best to explain that it was supposed to be gross to humans too, and that the filth and the poor training conditions was part of the point. He was utterly unmoved.
"Disguuust statement. Human food disgust human sport disgust. Disgust disgust disgust-"
"Look, do you want to keep watching the movie or not?"
In contrast, Rocky was enchanted by the ice skating. It turned out that because even the very coldest parts of Erid were so much warmer than Earth, the solid state of water had been theorized by physicists for generations but only observed (under controlled laboratory conditions) fairly recently. The fact that ice occurs naturally and abundantly on Earth came as a delightful surprise to Rocky.
I promised him there were entire movies we could watch on the subject of ice-based human recreation.
When we got to the scene where they go back to movie-Rocky's apartment after their date, Rocky asked a few more of his rapid-fire, half-cut-off questions, then fell silent for the rest of the movie. I wondered if he was missing his own Adrian. Poor guy.
The climactic fight seemed to upset him too. It's a pretty brutal scene even if you are already familiar with how violence looks for humans. The fluids leaking everywhere in response to injury must have looked even more disguuust to Rocky. He drew himself down further and further against the floor and occasionally shuddered in place.
He seemed to perk up a bit for the triumph at the end. As the credits rolled he shook himself and slowly went back to what he'd been working on before. I grinned, pleased that his first Earth movie had apparently been exciting enough to keep his full attention. "So what did you think of the movie, buddy?"
He hummed noncommittally. "Earth culture strange."
I laughed. "The lesson about going the distance against impossible odds has to translate, right?"
"Agree."
We sat for a while in comfortable silence, listening to the soundtrack.
"Popular movie when Grace grow up, question?"
"Oh, yeah, there's been like 15 sequels or something. This one is definitely the best though. It's a classic. We can watch the other ones if you want."
"Don't want." Rocky hummed. "Grace box question?"
"Ha, not me buddy. It wasn't that big anymore by the time I was in school. Wrestling was the big thing back then, and these days MMA is more popular," I paused to think of how on earth I could describe that. "MMA means 'mixed martial arts' which is a sport combining different styles of fighting that people around the world used to use in wars."
"Used to, why used to question?"
"Earth wars are mostly about explosive weapons these days. The goal is to use explosions to destroy all the infrastructure people need to live and directly kill as many people as possible as quickly as you can. Individual people fighting hand-to-hand can't really keep up."
Well, I assumed that was still true. I guess I couldn't be sure exactly what all the resource wars going on on Earth would be like now. If Leclerc's models were wrong and things were deteriorating faster than we expected, maybe everyone has already gone back to martial arts and edged weapons.
I cleared my throat. "We still value the old styles for entertainment though."
One day I was streaking plates in the fume hood with a new method. I'd been trying a new protocol for this task to preserve our remaining supply of disposable gloves. I'd sanitized two pairs of autoclave gloves in as many ways as I could think of, and from now on I would leave both pairs in the hood. One set would be used for working with astrophage and the other for E. coli and anything else that wasn't explosive. Something about the combination of clumsy fumbling with thick rubber gloves and roar of the fume hood suddenly reminded me of the first time I worked with astrophage. It's kinda sad, but whenever my memory works as easily as it should I get excited. Something reminds me of something! And it's something that I already know! Gee, at this rate maybe one of these days I won't feel like a jigsaw puzzle someone is putting together.
Pleased to have additional evidence that my brain is functioning, I set the wire down and leaned back on my stool to tell my alien roommate about it. "Y'know Rocky, this really takes me back. We've come so far since astrophage and I first met."
Rocky hums. "Yes, Grace come 11.9 lightyears."
"The first time I saw it we didn't know what environmental conditions it needed, or even whether it was dangerous. They had me work on it by myself just in case it was. When they sent me in there I asked Stratt whether it was because they didn't care if I died. It took her long enough to answer that I was worried! Finally she said,'The consensus here is that it is preferable if you do not die.' Classic Stratt."
"Stratt not care if Grace die, question?"
"Well, if I'd died then she couldn't have sent me here, so I guess she must have been joking... Well, not joking exactly. Jokes weren't her thing."
"Not-joking humor, question?"
"Ok, time for some more explanation about humor. Besides making someone laugh, you can also use humor just to cut down on social discomfort. 'Lighten the mood' is what we'd say. We were both uncomfortable because she was forcing me to do something dangerous, so she used humor to acknowledge that so that we would feel better."
"Understand."
"But yeah, we worked together for years after that and I don't think I ever once saw Stratt give anyone the warm-and-fuzzies."
"Last word new word."
"That one is kind of a nonsense word. I just mean that she wasn't pleasant because she was really focused on the mission. Nothing else mattered to her but that. And I do mean nothing."
"Mission scientist die so Earth live."
"Exactly, buddy. I guess all of us working on the mission felt the same way she did, when it came down to it."
He hummed in agreement. I picked up my wire again, thoughtful.
"You know, space travel has always been pretty dangerous for us humans. We don't have anything like your space elevator, so 'massive explosions launching you all the way through the atmosphere' was our only option. Before the first successful launch into space from my part of the world- the Apollo missions- there was a training exercise that ended in disaster when their capsule caught fire." Hmm, something about that idea, of a ball of fire killing a group of astronauts, seemed to hit a nerve. I sure hoped there wasn't a memory like THAT waiting around for me somewhere. "And there have been deadly explosions during reentry too."
"Why so many scientists go space if so dangerous question?"
"Y'know, that's actually a funny story. Most of the people we've sent into space have been military- former test pilots for war planes, jobs like that."
"Humans fight wars in space, question?" he trilled, tilting his carapace in shock.
"No. Eh, well... not as of when I left. But we'd been using space technology to fight wars on the ground for a long, long time. At any rate, most of the astronauts came up through the military, but there were a couple who were pure scientists. And there actually was one other schoolteacher who went to space before I did!" Probably not the time to tell him what happened to her.
"Why humans not in military go space if so dangerous, question?"
I shrugged as well as I could while still up to my elbows under the sash of the fume hood. "Knowledge? Glory? Beating our enemies? Those were pretty good reasons even before we got drafted to save the world."
Another day, another endless set of xenonite chain links to assemble. Every so often one of us would come up with something to talk about to pass the time. This time it was Rocky's turn. “After ex leave, Grace not find new mate. Grace lonely question?”
“I was lonely sometimes. But I also didn’t want to have to, uh... mate... anymore, so I never really looked for a new one after her."
“Rocky understand. Human mating bad.”
“Human mating is bad?" I leaned back in my chair to look at him, surprised. “What do you mean buddy?”
“Eridian mating, is different,” Rocky was suddenly agitated. His notes were higher than usual and he'd started climbing partway up the wall and then down, dragging his chain with him.
Oh, this was going to be like seeing each other eat all over again. But I was pretty curious about how Eridian reproduction worked, so I decided to bite. I set aside the link I had just opened and flexed my sore hands. "Ok, different how?”
“Rocky not force Adrian mate like movie. Bad bad bad.”
“Oh!” I felt suddenly wrong-footed. This wasn't the kind of conversation I'd been expecting at all. "Ok, that was admittedly kind of a weird movie to start you off with for explaining human courtship-“
"Human sport hurt, human science hurt, human mating hurt!" His notes were stumbling over each other now. He set down his tools to gesture more emphatically. “Adrian gentle. Rocky gentle. Rocky need need Grace understand! Eridian love gentle, safe."
“No, I know, buddy, I know that," I said quickly. Jeez O'Pete's, no wonder he was upset! He thought I've been accusing him of- of raping Adrian, or something. "It's not supposed to be a bad thing in the movie. He's not really forcing her. Movie Adrian is just really shy."
"New word."
"Shy," I stood and walked over to the laptop. "Scared around other people, scared of messing up in front of them, scared of attention."
Rocky dutifully supplied a translation. I was happy to have the break in the tension and moment to think while finishing up with the translator.
"Movie-Adrian is acting like she doesn't want to mate with Movie-Rocky because she’s scared and can’t make herself do it. He pushes her to help her."
"Understand." A beat while he clicked his claws uncertainly. "On Erid, some animals force mate."
"Some animals on Earth are like that too. Dolphins, ducks, some insects... "
"Eridian crime statement. Never never Rocky Adrian."
"It's a crime for humans too," I quickly reassured. "I wasn't thinking that was you."
Hopefully he wasn't thinking that was me, either. I racked my brain to try to figure out whether there was a polite way to explain that any and all sexual contact with Linda had occurred with her enthusiastic (and very persistent) consent. I figured I'd have to circle back to explain that most human sports don't actually involve beating the crap out of each other some other time.
"But Grace say have to mate. Why have to question?”
“No, yeah, that’s not what I meant. On Earth it’s gentle too- you’re supposed to, uh-" How did we get here? This was feeling uncomfortably similar to the times I'd had to cover teaching health classes when one of my old colleagues was sick. "You're supposed to wait until you’re both ready and excited to do it.”
“Grace not ready, question?”
“Well, yeah, that’s the problem, pal, I never seem to be ready," I tapped my fingers along the side of the laptop trying to figure out how to explain myself.
Linda and I had been friends before we started dating, and she'd always been the type to forget she had friends whenever she started talking to a new guy. One time when she was between boyfriends a couple of our other friends convinced me to ask her out so she would stop searching for the man of her dreams ("She won't wait for you forever, man"), and for a long time it had seemed like they were onto something. We were really happy at the beginning. I got to treat her the way I'd always wished her ex-boyfriends had done and she put everything she had into making my first relationship feel magical.
"But the thing was that I loved her- my ex- a lot and didn’t want her to replace me with someone who did want to mate, so once she was ready-“
“Grace push self."
“Right. And like the movie, it worked out for us. At least for a while." Eventually I got busy with grad school, and then when Mark came along she'd forgotten about me just like every other time before. But it had hurt so much worse because I hadn't been ready for it anymore. Our two years as a couple had let me get used to her putting me first. To make matters worse, she cut me out of her life for good once we broke up. So I pretty much lost my sense of stability and my best friend in one big swoop.
"Understand. Push make Grace ready question?"
"Uh, sort of. I told you about how humans use humor on purpose - it feels good to us to make someone laugh?"
"Eridians same, even if not do on purpose."
"Right. So it felt good to make her feel good, even if it didn't make me feel good."
"Make Grace feel bad, question?"
"It wasn’t- that bad. I was used to her," Heck, if I'd known back then that it was that or the breakup I could have probably kept doing it. "But after she left, I didn’t want to do it anymore. So I’ve been alone since then.”
“Not alone now. Until go home, Grace Rocky team!" Seemingly satisfied, he went back to working on his part of the chain.
I swallowed. “That's right."