Page 32 of Space Oddities

Thinking of all the paperwork and secret things I had to do on the side just to enroll under Audrey Cole’s name, I can sympathize with him. I have so many questions. Why would a newspaper article keep his father from stopping him? Is his relationship with his father so strained? Is that why he needs me to go as his date?

Instead, I settle for something less personal. Safer.

“Are you happy with your decision to go to MIT and not the Olympics?”

“Oh yeah.” He smiles. “Because now I can apply those same principles to spacewalks. If you think about it, astronauts are swimming in space, but instead of factoring in drag, it is theabsenceof drag we have to worry about.” His eyes light up. “And no walk is the same. Just because you figured out the math for one spacewalk doesn’t mean all others follow the same principles. It’s not the same lane you’re swimming in, back and forth. Each spacewalk has a different objective. It’s changing all the time. New puzzles to figure out.” The excitement in his voice makes me smile, his dimples a sign that he thrives with all the challenges he faces at NASA.

If I spill all my secrets, if he knows everything there is to know about me, would he consider me solved and move on too?

Nine

Platform Launch

Ian

After the talkabout my past as an Olympic hopeful and my work at NASA, I click on another episode.

I’m not about to start bookmarking Korean dramas anytime soon, but I will admit that this one is definitely good. Romance, humor, drama. There’s something for everyone.

When the music swells with the credits, I mute the TV, determined to ask what I didn’t before.

“And what about you?”

She blinks up at me sleepily. “Hmm?”

“Why did you want to become a romance writer?”

“Oh.” She looks surprised at the question, but not wary, so that’s a start. Though she might be too tired at the moment to think straight.

She stays snuggled into her blanket, closing her eyes. “I always liked to make up stories. It started with me imagining where my mother went after she left. I’d imagine that she was an FBI agent, undercover, waiting to catch her man. Only then would she come back and claim me. Or she was living somewhere with amnesia after a car accident, and one day she’d see me walking down the street and all her memories would come flooding back.”

My chest tightens, thinking of Trish as a child, making up stories to heal her heart. She swallows hard and takes a deep breath.

“Then I graduated totellingstories.” Her eyes open, looking a little glassy. “My grandmother used to cluck her tongue at me all the time because I’d come home from school telling the most dramatic whoppers about what happened during my day.” She laughs, the soft sound easing the pinch in my chest. “Once I told her my teacher was actually a secret agent for the KGB, trying to pry secrets from the minds of America’s youth. She just smacked me upside the head and told me if the KGB was dumb enough to listen to Georgia teenagers’ tall tales, they were welcome to them.” She plucks at the blanket tucked around her. “To this day, my Nana is the most no-nonsense woman I’ve ever met.”

Reaching out, I tuck a strand of hair behind her ear. “Where she is now?”

“She passed away a month after I graduated high school.”

“I’m sorry.” The words seem inadequate.

She nods. “But at least before she passed I was all signed up for community college. So she left knowing I had a plan. That probably eased her mind. Even if the plan didn’t work out in the end.” Her brows pinch close for a moment before she smooths them again, forcing a smile to her face.

I have so many questions, but I’m more afraid of scaring her off than not getting answers.

“So I like to think that both Nana and my grandfather left this Earth happy, knowing I was on the right track.”

My heart hurts for her. “Your grandfather passed away too?”

“Oh, yes. They both died within a week of each other. It would be romantic if it wasn’t so sad.”

Jesus, no wonder she doesn’t like talking about her past. Her mother left, then her grandparents died, all when she was a kid.

“What about the rest of your family?”

“Don’t have any. At least not that I know of. Mom never did tell Nana who my dad was.” She blanches, as if she hadn’t meant to admit that. Her eyes focus on the blanket.

I place one finger under her chin, tilting her head up until she’s forced to meet my eyes. “You’re pretty damn strong, you know that?”

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