This is just a short story idea that came to me while having a walk today thinking about "stuff". Sorry not my "normal" stuff.

"Houston, approaching orbital point alpha in 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Orbit optimum. We are looking good."

"Roger that Captain Adams." You will be out of radio contact in 5 minutes. How are your instrument readings?"

"There are A-OK Dave. I have more than enough fuel for 10 more orbits, a landing, and then some."

"No, once around and home Peter. We will wait until we have a full crew before we fully test the RLL. See you on the other side."

Peter knew that of course. The Reusable Lunar Lander was designed to take a crew of up to 6 people to a moonbase and return them to Earth. If it all worked out it would be a glorified shuttle bus. It launched from a modified 747 and used reusable booster pods to achieve escape velocity. The project was privately funded and NASA had let them use Houston as mission control.

He stared out of the cockpit window and wondered why he was there. He knew fully well why his life led him here. He was justifying himself to his father. His father had caught him when he was seven years old. He screamed at him and dragged him through the house. He remembered his mother screaming "Don't hurt him!".

His father never took any notice of his mother. His word was law. He remembered being dragged out to the barn, his father words.

"I ain't no father to a goddamned fucking sissy faggot. You'll never be a real man. Still, I'm going to try to beat the sissy out of you."

His father never swore. He knew how much trouble he was in. He remembered being beaten with a belt until he passed out.

His relationship with his father was never the same after that. He had feared but loved his father. After that, there was just fear. He stuffed down deep inside himself all the odd feelings that he had. He had to man up and be like his brother John. He was a real man.

He got into fights at school and joined as many sports teams as he could because that's what real men do. Still, he could see that look in his father's eye. No matter what he did he still heard his father's voice saying.

"You'll never be a real man. "

Perhaps that was why he wanted this mission. Flying a prototype was dangerous after all. Was he trying to prove he was a real man, or was he trying to put the moon between his dead father's disapproving voice?

His brother was a real man. He was killed in action in Afghanistan. After the loss of his wife to cancer and then the loss of his favorite son, Peter hoped they could have gotten closer. No, there was still that looking in his eye and the unspoken.

"You'll never be a real man."

It had remained that way until his father's death 3 months before.

Peter checked the instruments. No radio signals. He was on the "dark side of the moon". He knew that the moon never actually had a dark side. It just had a side that permanently faced away from the Earth.

He was isolated from the rest of humanity now. Perhaps the voice in his head would be finally silent. He had never felt so alone. He listened, and there it was.

"You'll never be a real man."

Peter let out a long anguished scream that could go nowhere in the vacuum of space. Then he started ranting.

"Fuck you Dad, fuck the fucking lot of you. Real fucking man. Fucking airforce, fucking captain, fucking astronaut. It means fuckin nothing."

This had been locked inside of him for so long. He felt like he was a balloon that had been filled to near bursting for years and someone had popped him. Feelings came flooding in. Feelings he had repressed for so long pretending they never existed. He had lived his life to the expectations of others. Never for himself.

Why do I have to be a "real man"? Who am I doing all this for? Why shouldn't my happiness matter?

In a moment of clarity, he knew what he had to do. He knew what he always should have done.

"Captain Adams, do you read me?"

"Peter, are you there?"

"Yes, Houston I'm here."

"Is everything OK?"

"Everything is fine Dave. Never been better. Starting re-entry maneuvers."

Peter successfully landed the RLL and was paid handsomely for proving the concept. Modifications were made and NASA authorised funding for a fully manned landing test one year later. They approached Peter to fly it. He could not be found.

The company Ecospace, where Peter worked, hired a detective agency to track him down. They needed his advice even if he would not be the pilot.

The detectives found a middle-aged woman named Pamela, living in a quiet mountain town.

She claimed to be Peter's sister. She told them Peter had moved to Alaska and she had lost touch with him.

The agency could find no record of a sister but started making inquiries in Alaska.