The Comet Who Forgot the Way Home

Once, far past the last planet, where the sky is so quiet you can hear your own thinking, there lived a small comet named Pip.

Pip was made of ice and dust and one tiny pocket of stardust right in her middle, which made her glow blue when she was happy.

Every hundred years, Pip flew past the Sun. The Sun was warm and yellow and always a little bit talkative. "There you are, Pip! Right on time! Where are you off to next?"

"Home," Pip would say. And she would swing around the Sun and head back out into the dark, her tail streaming behind her like a long silver scarf.

But one hundred years, something happened.

Pip swung around the Sun, said goodbye, and flew out into the dark — and then she stopped.

She had forgotten the way home.

She turned left. The stars looked unfamiliar. She turned right. They looked unfamiliar there too. She drifted for a long time, and the dark got darker, and her tail got shorter, and her blue glow got dimmer.

"Hello?" said a small voice.

Pip looked around. There, floating beside her, was a little chunk of rock. Not even a comet — just a rock. With a face.

"Are you lost?" said the rock.

"I forgot the way home," said Pip. "I always knew it. And now I don't."

The rock thought for a moment. "I've never had a home," it said. "I just float around. Maybe we could float together for a while. And if we find your home, you'll be home. And if we don't, at least neither of us is alone."

Pip thought this was a very good idea. So they floated.

They floated past a planet with three moons. They floated past a star that was just being born — bright and surprised. They floated past a cloud of dust that turned out to be a million tiny comets all sleeping in a heap, like puppies.

And then, after a long time, Pip saw something familiar. A faint patch of dark with a particular shape. A bend. A curve. A little kink in the night.

"That's it," she whispered. "That's the way home."

She turned to the rock. "How did you know?"

"I didn't," said the rock. "But you weren't lost. You just couldn't see it from where you were standing."

Pip glowed bright blue.

And she took the rock with her. Because rocks should have homes too.

— Whet