SpaceCorp (8 page)

“That’s over. He’s just another astronaut. Besides, he’s seeing someone else.”

“Yeah, I knew that, some tall skinny girl, red hair… I forget her name.”

“Rebecca Válek and it’s auburn. She’s the one gave me the shiner.”

“That was her?”

“She was cool about it. She knew I was bothered about something and after she tagged me, she didn’t start waling on me.”

“And that’s your idea of
cool
?”

“Yeah, when you score on your opponent, you’re supposed to take advantage of the opening and really start pounding on them—that’s how you win in mixed martial arts…” She let go of his hand to bob and weave and fist the air a couple of times. “You never got into sports much, did you?” She sent him an impish, half-mocking smile.

“Not really. Everybody thinks I should have because I’m big. I mean I like to ride motorcycles, but that’s not much of a sport I guess.”

“More of a skill,” she said.

“Yeah, that’s it… more of a… ah hell, who am I kidding? I ride to think, to feel the wind in my hair, watch the sun set. There’s not much skill in it… not the way I do it anyway.”

A moment passed in silence. “Look, I don’t have a lot of stuff—being a yo-yo and all. I could move what little I have into your place. You know—change my address.”

He smiled, then frowned. “What if they wanted to draft you to be on the crew? Maybe be captain?”

“Captains come up through the
crew
ranks, Logan. You don’t go from yo-yo to captain.”

“Okay, but what if they offered it to you? I could put in a good word… I know some people. They might like the idea of someone like you skippering a whole new class of space station.”

“Make up your mind. Do you want me to move in with you or be a space station captain?”

“I want you to be happy with your decision,” Mack said. “I’d talk to the right people if you wanted me to.”

“I don’t want you to.”

“I know some people, Monica. I have some pull around here.”

“I know you do, Logan, but don’t.” She turned her head toward the sunset. The fading light gave her Mediterranean skin a nice golden glow. She reached behind her head and undid the giant knot she’d worn her thick black hair in all day. She combed it out with her fingers and arranged it to cascade down in front of her right shoulder. A breaker whumped on the beach below. “I’m old, Logan.”

“Thirty-one? Get serious!”

“That’s old for a woman in this business.”

“There are women older than you up there.”

“I know. They love space and so do I. They made a conscious choice to stay up there till they rem out, or if they fudge their dosimeter records, they sometimes stay longer than they should, and then they get to face the big C down here on the ground. I don’t want to be like them. I mean I got eggs on ice just like every other woman up there.”

“You want to have children?”

“Yeah… you okay with that?”

“Yeah… of course,” Mack said. “What I meant was you shouldn’t have to worry about… well, you know.”

“
Deformities
. You can say it. But it’s not my eggs I’m worrying about. It’s the rest of me. I need all my organs intact if I’m going to carry a healthy baby to term.”

Mack didn’t say anything.

“So anyway,” Monica said. “I want to have my high adventure, then come back down here and be an old lady someday… bounce little astronauts on my knee and tell them about how I helped us get to the stars… Pretty corny, huh?”

He smiled. “You up for meeting my folks this weekend?”

That weekend

Mack’s parent’s house in Agoura, California

They’d left Friday after work, he on his restored Harley, she on some kind of tricked out Japanese 6-cylinder crotch-rocket. He thrilled to the throaty
‘potato-potato’
sound that came from his Harley’s big V-twin at idle. When she rolled on the throttle, only dogs could hear it. You could only tell her engine was running by the warpage in local space-time that made everything blurry. He hadn’t known she could ride, but now that he did, it seemed only logical that she would ride a race bike. She was big on full-face helmets and skin-tight leathers that made her ass look like the Eighth Wonder of the World. He spent the whole trip following as close behind as he dared, motivated by fantasies that were as unstoppable as they were unseemly.
Maybe something new tonight. She might go for it.

They’d gotten in after midnight. The house had gone to bed hours ago. The front door to the gatehouse had a note taped to the door and cryptic instructions in his mother’s handwriting to look for the key under the same damn flower pot they’d been using for twenty-five years.

Inside, the room was fresh and cool since his mother had the staff leave the windows open. There were clean towels on the bed and there was a fruit and cheese basket on the coffee table. Next to it was a pair of glasses and an ice bucket with a bottle of the local Chardonnay. His mother had stuck a note in the fruit basket. She grabbed it before he could. “‘
Is this it?’
Your mother thinks I’m an
‘it?’
” He grabbed the note and crumpled it up and stuffed it into his pocket. “Don’t throw that away!” she said. “I’m going to want it for my scrapbook.”

“You’re a scrapbooker? I thought you said you didn’t have much.”

“I don’t, but I might start one.”

He figured after the ride she’d be tired. A glass of wine, a bite of Brie, fall asleep with their clothes on… He figured wrong. She threw her bag on the couch and spent the next five minutes wriggling out of her leathers. She wasn’t trying to be a tease, but the suit did not leave any margin for error… or room for extra pounds for that matter. He sat on the couch watching unashamedly while he popped the cork and filled each glass.

When she finished, he stood and offered her a glass. She took it and ran toward the bathroom, then popped her head out the door. “Shower’s a two-header,” she said. Then she disappeared inside the bathroom.

After Mack heard the shower turn on, he took a long sip of wine and slipped out of the black leather vest and chaps he wore on summertime road trips. He hopped toward the shower trying without success to kick off a steel-toed motorcycle boot. He gave up and sat on a chair to wrestle both boots off. He threw his socks and jeans in a pile on the couch and walked into the bathroom as she walked out with her hair wrapped in a towel.

“Hurry up,” she said as she dripped past.

An hour later, he was lying on top of her back while she white-knuckled the wooden bars of the bedstead. His arms were under hers with his hands clutching the tops of her shoulders. A final thrust flattening her buttocks against his pelvis, a pause, then he rolled onto his back beside her. “Well?” he asked a moment later when he’d recovered enough to speak.

She had been resting her chin on her forearms crossed in front of her. She tilted her head toward him. “Umm… well… it was different than I expected.”

“Different
good
?”

“Different like I thought it would hurt.”

His face fell. “You didn’t like it.”

“I didn’t say that.”

He closed his eyes and slung his arm across his forehead.

“Hey, don’t get sleepy on me, cowboy!” she slapped him several times on his stomach with the flat of her hand. “You owe me big time after that ride!”

*   *   *

The next morning they awoke to the smell of something spicy coming in through the open window.

“C’mon,” he said, leading her out of the gatehouse down the walkway to the main house. “You don’t want to miss Mom’s breakfast enchiladas.”

“You’re right, I don’t, but I think my
leathers
think otherwise. I thought your family was Scottish?”

“On dad’s side... distantly. Mom’s from Guadalajara... recently.”

“What’s she like?”

“Hmm… how do you describe your mom to your girlfriend? I dunno, she’s… down to earth… sort of. Well, pretty down to earth for a gal who grew up in a house full of servants and matriculated in Madrid studying art history.”

“Is she going to like me?”

“Depends. You like art?”

“Not any more. He was an asshole.”

He paused, gave her a sideways look. “Dad’s going to
love
you.”

“But take it easy on Mom?”

“She’s a big girl. Just ask for seconds on the enchiladas and you’ll be fine.”

He held the door for her as they both entered the kitchen where his mother was busy at the stove top. It was a big room with a butcher block island in the middle of the work area and a huge table at one end where everyone took meals family style. At the far wall, a buffet style breakfast line had been set up on the sidebar. Except for formal occasions, everyone ate together in the MacGregor house, family and servants alike.

“Madre de Dios!” his mother said. “You didn’t tell me she was so beautiful!”

“Figured I’d surprise you. Hi, Pop. This is Monica.”

His father feigned rubbing his eyes. “Boy, I’ll say!” He strode over to Monica and gave her a kiss on her offered cheek. “Tell me,” he said, “what’s a gorgeous girl like you doing with a meathead like him?”

She smiled. “Just lucky.” Then turning to Logan’s Mom, she offered her hand and said, “
O prazer de conhecê-lo, Sehnora
MacGregor.”

“Oh, my! That’s—”

“Portuguese,
Sehnora
. My family is Portuguese.”

“Logan, why didn’t you tell me she was
una Portuguesa
?”

Logan smiled and shrugged, knowing he had no worthy excuse.

“From Lisbon?” his mother asked, turning back to Monica.

“North of there,
Sehnora
. I was born in Braga, but we came over here when I was a baby. I’ve never been back.”

“Well, for starters,” she said taking Monica’s arm, “you can drop the ‘
Sehnora’
and call me Marie. Come sit next to me so we can talk. The men will want to go on and on about rocket ships.”

“Hey, rocket ships need love too!” Monica said, her eyebrows gabled.

“Oh yes, that’s right, Logan said you are an astronaut. How exciting that must be!”

“Yes, it’s exciting sometimes… and beautiful… awesomely beautiful… so beautiful it hurts.”

“Logan, you did not tell me she has the eye of an artist!” She turned her eyes back to Monica. “Tell me about it. I want to know everything!”

“Well, the best times are the space walks. You have to do those inside the ring… so you don’t get hit by passing debris. But when I’m not too busy with work, I stop and float with my back toward Earth. It’s best when you’re in Earth’s shadow—the heavens are brightest then. It only lasts a few minutes because we circle the Earth so fast—a whole orbit every ninety minutes. But in those few minutes you look up at heaven and the stars are brighter than they ever are on Earth. There’s very little Earthshine and no atmosphere so the stars don’t twinkle like they do down here. But they are huge! So big you’d think they might drip on you. And they seem so close, like you need to be extra careful not to bump into one of them. They bring me to tears—not such a good idea in a space suit...” Suddenly noticing the silence, she looked about the breakfast table. Everyone was frozen in time, hanging onto her every word. Even wizened old Matilda, whose hair had been in the same tight bun since Father Junipero Serra first arrived in California, had stopped setting the coffee service on the sidebar.

Mack’s mother finally broke the silence. “Logan, Logan! What’s the matter with you?” She Dutch-rubbed the top of his head playfully with her knuckles. “You go up there all the time but you never told it like that!”

“Easy, Mom,” he said, gently smoothing back his hair. “Every time you do that, a few more come out.”

“So you still have your two eyes—what, you don’t see anything?” his mother asked.

“Monica is the spacewalk artist. When I go up I’m mostly stuck inside the station watching dials, talking to robots. But sometimes I get to look around. Most of the stations have observation domes. But I have to say the views I’ve gotten through an observation dome are nothing like what Monica just described looking out the bubble of her space helmet. Monica, did you ever take pictures—you know, with your helmet cam?”

“Actually I did. The videos where I zoom in and out in slo-mo are the best. I’ll send you some.”

“So, what would you like to do after breakfast?” Mack’s father asked. “I was thinking you might enjoy going for a ride around the property.”

“Ride?” Monica asked. “You mean on motorcycles?”

“Yes, only these motorcycles have four legs and long wispy tails.”

“I haven’t been on a horse in years. Do you have one that is not too energetic?”

*   *   *

After supper, Mack and Monica sat in the swing chair up on the widow’s walk. The seats and back had soft cushions and the chain made squeaky sounds as they rocked back and forth. The sky was clear and the evening breeze wafting up from the valley floor was unusually balmy.

“Have a good time today?”

“Yeah, my butt’s sore though.”

“You mean from—”

“The saddle!” she said, elbowing him in the ribs.

He smiled. “They seem quite taken with you.”

“Mutual. I wonder what turn my life would have taken had I grown up here instead of in some picker’s shack on a vineyard.”

“What kind of turn?”

“A better education for starters. You went to a nice school where everyone had been told what a phenom you were
before
you walked in the door.”

“You’re no dummy. Surely they spotted that straight away.”

“So you’d think. But where
your
teachers were told in advance you were brilliant and to stay out of your way, my teachers thought I was just a mouthy little bitch. You know how you started university when you were twelve? Well, I dropped out of grammar school when I was twelve, and then I ran away.”

“Ran away? You never told me that.”

“A girl has to preserve some mystery about herself. Anyway, it was that or juvee. So I moved in with my aunt over in Napa. I matured early so I was able to get a job picking. Then I moved into the lab to do quality control. Started as a lab assistant. Ran the place by the time I was sixteen which was good because I made enough money to get a place of my own which was even better because my aunt’s boyfriend may have been dumber than dirt but not so dumb that he failed to notice I had matured early.”