Page 35 of Supernova

“Noted,” Bill says, leaning his elbows on his knees and lacing his hands together. “I am proud of you, Jojo. You’re embarking on something new and putting in the effort, and I think that’s great. I just don’t want you spinning your wheels and wasting time on little stories that earn you ten dollars here and ten dollars there, when you have the talent and the ability to write a real book and get it out there.”

Jo tilts her head to one side. “But how do you know that, Bill? How do you know I have the talent it takes to write a book?”

He scoots closer to her, putting an arm around her waist and pulling her closer. “Because you’re my wife,” he says, kissing her with a sudden burst of enthusiasm that makes Jo smile. “And I knew when I married you that you were something special.”

His words are the right ones, and Jo softens, letting her arms float up and wrap around his neck to hug him back. “Thanks, Bill.”

When he gets up to turn on the TV, Jo kicks off her shoes and pulls her feet up under her on the couch, but she’s not completely mollified. She felt the way Bill looked down—even just slightly—on her being published in a romance magazine, and she wishes that she could go back and un-see it. Not to mention the fact that he didn’t even read the whole letter, which had a post-script at the bottom asking for the next part of Maxine and Winston’s love story to be forwarded to the magazine’s head office, post haste.

Bill is quickly engrossed in the show on the TV screen, but Jo’s mind wanders as she leans up next to her husband, arms folded over her torso. She needs the next part of the love story between her characters and she needs it fast; being published in a supermarket magazine might not make all her dreams come true, but seeing her words in print and knowing that people are clamoring for more of her story is incredibly exciting

In bed that night, she waits until Bill falls asleep before slipping from between the blankets and tiptoeing back to the kitchen. There, by the soft glow of the overhead light, she sets up her typewriter, makes a cup of tea, and starts to write again.

“I have something for you,” Jo says, almost shyly. She’s sitting in the chair next to Mr. D’s hospital bed, and he’s looking frailer than ever.

Douglas Dandridge turns his head slightly and looks at Jo from hollowed-out eye sockets. He reaches a hand out. “Is it your writing?” he asks with a rasp in his voice. His ability to speak has not gone, but like everything he does now, Jo can sense that it’s becoming more difficult. Much more difficult. To that end, she keeps up a steady stream of conversation whenever she visits him, trying to keep the need for him to speak at all to a bare minimum.

Jo stands and walks over to her cart, where she’s stashed the pages she wrote forTrue Romancethe night before. “I was working on a full novel, and it wasn’t going well. So I decided to send a short story into a magazine, and they’ve paid me to publish it.”

She turns back to Mr. D with the pages from her second installment in her hand. Jo’s face is hopeful—she’s never felt so nervous to present anything to anyone.

“Oh, Jo,” he whispers. There are tears of pride in his eyes. “A story?”

She nods. “Yes, it’s about a couple named Winston and Maxine, and he’s dying.” She waits for a flicker of disapproval to wash across Mr. Dandridge’s face, but he still looks full of interest and pride. “Anyway, it wasn’t flowing correctly, so I decided to change it a bit and make it about Winston being an astronaut, and Maxine’s worries about him going into space.”

Mr. D takes a moment to process this, and it looks to Jo that even thinking is causing him a certain amount of pain. “Hits rather close to home, doesn’t it?” he asks in a near whisper.

Jo shrugs. “Well, they always say, ‘write what you know.’ And I know what that feels like.”

“How does Mr. Booker feel about having you explore the realities of your lives and relationships in print?”

Jo makes a little face. “He actually never asked what it was about. And I used my maiden name instead of Booker.”

“Which is?”

“White. Josephine White.”

Mr. D appears to consider this. “Wouldn’t be hard to uncover your real identity, but I suppose it might soften the blow if he finds out that you’ve written about him and his career.”

Jo’s nerves are activated; she’d hoped that Mr. D would think it was totally fine. “They already asked me for the next installment in Maxine and Winston’s story, and I wrote it last night,” she says, thrusting the pages at him. “I don’t have a copy of the first story, since I sent the pages in to the magazine, but I wanted to let you read these ones before I send them. I’m curious to hear what you think.”

Jo knows that his reading has slowed down markedly in the past few weeks, and that his zeal for romance novels isn’t even enough to keep him turning pages. As she watches him hold the papers in his shaking hand, tears threaten to fall from her eyes. Sweet, kind, funny Douglas Dandridge has been the best part of working at Stardust General as a volunteer these past six or seven months, and watching him wither away is killing her. Of course, Mr. D is about ninety years old and, by his own admission, ready to go and be with his late wife, but it’s still hard for Jo to lose a friend.

“I will admit that I’m having a harder time reading,” Mr. D says. “I’ll try to read after my nap this afternoon, because—andI’m being honest here, Jo—I don’t have a lot of time left.” His eyes search her face. “I’ve wanted to see for myself what you’re working on, and I’m so happy that I get the chance.” He sets the typewritten pages on top of his chest, letting them rest there. “Actually, do you think you might read them to me? It would be so much easier.”

“Oh,” Jo says, blinking. “Read them out loud?” She stands up, wringing her hands together. Performing and public speaking have never been her thing, but this is Mr. Dandridge; surely she can read her own words to a man whose approval she both needs and wants. “Okay,” she says decisively, reaching for the papers. “Shall I start now?”

A wry smile cracks the old man’s face. “No time like the present.”

Jo walks over to the window that looks out on the midday sun, pacing back and forth as she skims the first page and gets ready to read. She always spends more time in Mr. D’s room than in any other patient’s, and she’s not even sorry that the majority of her shift will be spent with him today. There will be plenty of time after he’s gone to spend with other patients, but thinking that thought is almost overwhelming, so Jo pushes it to the side and begins to read:

“Maxine was lonely most of the time. The more frequently Winston talked about what it might be like to walk on the moon, the more time Maxine spent wondering what it would be like if he went there and simply never returned. She was still young—only twenty-four!—and she wanted children. She wanted a family. A life on Earth. But what Winston wanted was adventure, infamy, a life that would be remembered. The only thing she could think to do that might keep her husband with her was to make living with her more interesting than anything he might encounter in space…”

Jo feels the strength of the conviction in her words as she reads, and she paces in front of the window, back and forth, back and forth, as she reads, using different voices and inflections for Maxine and Winston as they debate his decision to join NASA. Soon she is lost in the story entirely, and when she finishes reading, she looks at Mr. D expectantly. But he doesn’t need to say a word: his face says it all.

“It’s okay?” Jo asks, holding the pages to her chest and pressing them against her rapidly-beating heart. “You liked it?”

Mr. D holds out one hand for her to take, so she crosses over to the side of his bed and holds it as she looks down into the face of the man she’s grown to love like a grandfather. “I loved it, Josephine. I’m so proud of you. You’re arealwriter.”

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