Life on Mars

by Jennifer Brown

  I was bored. Tripp was missing again, and Priya was doing something girly with some of her girlfriends. Mom and Dad were busy filling out house paperwork. I’d rather be bored than hang out with Vega or Cassi. And there was nothing on TV.

  But I was curious. I couldn’t help myself. Mr. Death hadn’t killed me yet. He hadn’t even maimed me. And he’d given me the tip about the Perseids shower. Clearly he liked space, and I wasn’t sure if many zombies were astrology buffs.

  I wondered if he’d gotten my note.

  I knocked on his door, and this time he opened it right away, as if he’d been expecting me. You know, like the witch in “Hansel and Gretel.” Not a good thing to think about when you’re standing on Mr. Death’s front porch, by the way.

  “Yeah?”

  “Um.”

  “Um?”

  “Um.” Just because I was curious didn’t mean he didn’t still scare the power of speech out of me. “Um, I was just wondering if you got my note,” I said. “About Neptune.”

  “I thought the purpose of leaving a note was so you didn’t have to actually have a conversation,” he said.

  “Right. Okay. I’ll just be going, then.” I started off the porch.

  “You won’t be able to see it through those piece-of-junk binoculars you’ve got, you know,” he said.

  “I know. I’ll just …”

  I had started to say, I’ll just ask my dad to take me to the observatory to see it through the big telescope, but then I remembered that my dad didn’t work there anymore.

  “I have a good lens,” Mr. Death said. “If you’re gonna pester me about it.”

  “I wasn’t pestering you,” I argued.

  He shook his head and waved me off as if he was disgusted with me, and then turned and went back into his house. I started to head home but realized he’d left his front door open.

  I hesitated. Was this an invitation or was he just forgetful? Granny forgot to do things like close doors all the time. But Mr. Death wasn’t quite as old as Granny. Or was he? It was kind of hard to judge the age of a zombie. But he seemed to really enjoy slamming his door on a regular basis, so I didn’t think he’d simply forget an opportunity like that.

  Besides, he said he had something that could see Neptune. I couldn’t pass that up.

  I raced into his house and shut the door, then wandered a bit until I found him in the space room, messing with a camera with a giant telephoto lens.

  “Trespassing now, are you?” he said without looking up to see me.

  “You left the door open.”

  “Snoop.”

  I ignored him. “You took those photos?” I said, gesturing toward a framed picture of a particularly bright orange nebula, curling around itself like a sea creature.

  “What of it?” he said. “It’s none of your business.”

  “I think they’re really cool,” I said. “I like space.”

  “I know. I see you out there every night, sitting on your roof, watching me with your binoculars. Your parents ever tell you it’s rude to spy on people?”

  I frowned at him. “I’m not spying on you,” I said. “I’m spying on space. Well, and sometimes I’m spying on you, too, but only since you moved in.” I realized how dumb that sounded—like he was worried I was some secret agent who’d spent a whole lifetime following him around or something. “And only because you might eat my face.”

  He stopped fiddling with the camera and gazed at me curiously. “You don’t make sense, kid,” he said. “What’s your name, anyway?”

  “Ar—Arty,” I said.

  “Arty,” he said with a sniff, overenunciating.

  I stood up straighter and crossed my arms. “It’s short for Arcturus. The alpha star in the—”

  “Boötes constellation. I know where Arcturus is.” He squinted his eyes at me and huffed a few slow breaths in and out, like he was sniffing me. Like Comet does right before he eats something.

  “Are you a zombie?” I blurted out.

  To my surprise, Mr. Death laughed. Threw his head back and howled. It was the strangest thing. I wasn’t sure if I’d actually said something funny and I should join in the hilarity, or if it was one of those demonic laughs and I should make a run for it.

  “A zombie? Where did you get an idea like that, kid?”

  “A serial killer, then?” I asked.

  He pulled himself up straight to match me. “No,” he said. “I am not a serial killer.”

  We looked each other up and down. He may not be a zombie or a serial killer, but he was still scary. But he also had so much cool stuff in his space room, scary seemed like a reasonable trade-off at the moment. “Where did you get all this stuff?” I asked. “Did you really take those pictures?”

  He stuck the end of the cigar into his mouth and chewed on it thoughtfully, then took it out. “Yes,” he said.

  “They’re amazing,” I said. “You can see Saturn’s rings in that one. Did you know that Saturn is so light it could float on water?”

  “Of course I knew that,” he said.

  I turned in a slow circle, studying everything. He’d taped the hole in the map and gotten a new glass box for the moon rock. His rocket model was still in pieces, though, a tube of model glue on the table next to it. I gestured to the flight suit. “Is that real?”

  He nodded.

  “Who is Maddux?” I asked.

  He clenched his jaw, then tipped it in the direction of an article clipped from a newspaper so long ago the paper was yellow. The headline read, “Local Space Enthusiast Most Recent Graduate of NASA Astronaut Training Program,” and below that, “Meet Cash Maddux, the Young Man Who Plans to Be the First to Walk on Mars!” Next to the text was a photo of a young man proudly holding up a certificate and beaming, squinting into the sun. He had a crew cut and squared shoulders, but his eyes were definitely familiar looking. I looked from the photo to Mr. Death and back again, my mouth making an O of surprise.

  “You? You’re Cash Maddux?”

  He gave a slight nod, almost too tiny to see.

  I gasped.

  Mr. Death wasn’t a zombie. He was Cash Maddux. The astronaut, Cash Maddux.

  I had been living right next door to a real astronaut all this time.

  Wait. That should go in all capital letters.

  I HAD BEEN LIVING NEXT DOOR TO A REAL ASTRONAUT ALL THIS TIME!

  19

  Total Eclipse of the Mom

  By the time Mom figured out where I’d disappeared to, Cash and I were sitting at his kitchen table, eating egg-salad sandwiches and talking about exoplanets.

  “So we really know for sure that there are planets orbiting other stars out there, like Earth does with the sun?” I asked, a dollop of mayonnaise and egg dropping down onto my chin.

  “Tons of them. I’ve seen them myself,” he said. “We’re finding new stuff out there all the time.”

  “Like what?”

  “They found an exoplanet thirteen times bigger than Jupiter. It’s so big, they’re not sure what it even is,” he said.

  “Could it have life on it?” I asked, suddenly too excited to eat egg salad. Who could eat egg salad when aliens were a possibility? Come to think of it … who could eat egg salad, period? It was gloppy and smelly and left a weird texture on the roof of your mouth. “Could any of these exoplanets have life on them?”

  He leaned forward. “You ever hear of Gliese five eighty-one?” he asked. I shook my head. “It’s a star. A few years ago they discovered a couple of exoplanets around it. And some scientists believe there is life there. One professor said he’s one hundred percent certain.”

  I gasped, unable to swallow the bits of egg left in my mouth. “One hundred percent? Intelligent life?” This was huge. To me, this seemed like the hugest thing in the world, and I couldn’t figure out why everybody on Earth wasn’t talking about it.

  He leaned even closer. “There has been a mysterious radio signal detected,” he whispered in his gravelly voice. “The planet
is in a sweet spot, not too far and not too close to its sun. There could be water, and anytime there’s water …”

  We nodded in unison, our faces just inches apart. “… There is potential for life,” I finished for him.

  “No,” Cash said, his voice so low I had to lean in even farther to hear him. “Where there is water …” I leaned in even closer. “… There … are …” Closer still. “Zombies!” he yelled, and lunged toward me.

  I’d like to say I giggled and played it cool. But I didn’t. I screamed like a four-year-old girl and flung my hands in the air, my egg-salad sandwich flying out of my hand and thwacking against Cash’s wallpaper, where it stuck.

  He, on the other hand, laughed like crazy.

  And that’s when Mom did her knock-and-enter thing again. Only this time I didn’t want her to save me.

  “Hello? Mr. uh … it’s Amy!” she called.

  “In the kitchen,” Cash called back.

  She came into the kitchen, waving her hand in front of her face. “There you are. I’ve been looking all over for you. You’re supposed to tell me where you are, Arty.” She said it in that polite company voice, but I knew that was just for Cash’s sake. When we got home she was going to rip into me for making her worry.

  “Sorry, Mom, I forgot.”

  “Well, I hope he hasn’t been bothering you,” she said to Cash.

  “No more than expected,” Cash grumbled.

  “Mom, Cash is an astronaut!” I said, hoping it would soften her some. “And there’s an exoplanet out there, it’s called—what’s it called again, Cash?—and it probably has life on it! That’s what some professor said, right, Cash?”

  Cash shrugged and took another bite of his sandwich. “That is if you can believe professors.”

  But Mom wasn’t even listening. She was doing that uh-huh thing moms do when they want you to think they’re listening, but they’re really thinking about something totally different from what you’re talking about, like onions or how a ketchup stain got on the living room ceiling. “Uh-huh, I see, that’s very interesting, now come on, Arty, it’s time to go.”

  I stood and came around the table. “But I don’t want to go home. You heard me, right? About the exoplanet? There was this radio transmission and they think there could be water and you know what Dad says about anytime there’s water on a planet. Cash has a real-life astronaut suit back there. A whole secret room. Remember where Widow Feldman used to keep her ferns? He’s got moon rocks back there, Mom!”

  Mom put her hands on my shoulders to steady me, because apparently it’s possible to be so excited about something that you can be jumping up and down without even knowing it. “Arcturus,” she said sternly, “we need to go now.”

  Dejected, I gave in and followed Mom out.

  “Thank you again, Mr., er, Cash, for having Arty over,” Mom said as she led me away.

  Cash grunted in reply. I turned and looked just in time to see my sandwich slide a couple of inches down the wall and fall onto the table. Cash reached over, picked it up, and took a bite.

  It was weird how just days ago I was scared to death about having to go to Cash’s house, and now … I didn’t want to be anywhere else in the world.

  “That man …,” Mom muttered as we walked across the lawn that separated our house from his. “He’s such a rude old cuss, I honestly don’t know why you would even want to go back there, Arcturus. And to leave me wondering where you were like that. I have a mind to—”

  “Oh! I forgot something,” I interrupted. “I’ll be right back.”

  “Arty,” she complained, but I had already sprinted back into Cash’s house.

  I raced into Cash’s kitchen. “Can I come back tomorrow?” I asked, breathless.

  Cash looked up from his (my) sandwich and chewed slowly. Finally, he swallowed, picked up his stubby cigar, took a puff, and nodded.

  “Just don’t bring any water in with you,” he said. “Unless you have a death wish.” Again, he threw his head back and laughed.

  20

  Tripp’s Atmosphere is Starting to Look Weightless

  This time Priya got to the rocket ship first. She was sitting cross-legged on top of the tires, though, instead of crawling inside of them.

  “You were just disintegrated upon reentry, astronaut,” I said.

  She made a face. “I can’t stay long. My mom is making me go to some sleepover at my cousin’s tonight. Where’s Tripp?”

  “He said he’d be here,” I said.

  Just then we saw something moving toward us in the distance. Priya shaded her eyes with her hand. “Is that …?”

  “Tripp? On a bike?” I finished.

  Sure enough, the object got closer to us, wobbling and weaving but miraculously staying upright, Tripp balanced on the seat as if this was no big deal.

  Priya jumped off the tires. “This is a big deal,” she said.

  Exactly. Tripp hadn’t ridden a bike in years. His mom said the health insurance wouldn’t cover him anymore if he went anywhere near a wheel again. Or a bonfire. Or most swimming pools and some sidewalks.

  “Hey, guys!” Tripp called, waving grandly. The bike trembled from the motion. Priya made a small noise and clapped her palm over her eyes.

  “I can’t watch,” she said. “Let me know when the funeral is.”

  But he stayed up, pedaled over to us, and eased to a stop.

  “What’s new?” he asked. He climbed off the bike and stood, his posture so upright he looked like someone had hung his shirt on a hook with him still in it.

  “You’re riding a bike, that’s what’s new,” Priya said.

  “This old thing?” Tripp said nonchalantly.

  I gave his shoulder a poke. “Why are you standing like that?” I asked.

  “Like what?”

  “Like you’re having your height measured.” I poked again. He barely moved.

  “I’m not standing any different than I normally stand. Sheesh.” He climbed up on a tire and immediately slid off backward, landing in the pea gravel on the other side.

  “Never mind,” I said.

  “So what’s the scoop on the zombie next door?” Tripp asked, trying again to get on the tire.

  “You’re not going to believe this, but his name is Cash Maddux. The Cash Maddux.”

  They looked at me blankly.

  “Cash Maddux, the astronaut.”

  “No way!” Tripp breathed. “A real space man? Like Luke Skywalker?”

  “Well, I don’t actually know if he’s ever gone to space,” I said. “The flight suit looks pretty clean.”

  Priya made a face. “So was he, like, mission control or something?”

  “I don’t know,” I said, and it occurred to me right then that I really wanted to find out.

  “Can I just point out,” Priya said, sticking her finger up into the air, “that, one, he is not a zombie, and, two, I told you so.”

  “Just because he’s an astronaut doesn’t mean he’s not also a zombie,” Tripp responded, and, for once, he seemed to have a point because Priya didn’t argue.

  “So he’s normal?” Tripp asked.

  “I told you so,” Priya said.

  I thought about how hard Cash laughed when he scared the egg salad out of me … and then picked it up and ate it. “I don’t know if I would say normal.”

  “I want to see it,” Tripp said. “The space room, I mean.”

  “Yeah, me too,” Priya said. “Ask him if we can come sometime, too.”

  I was torn. On one hand, Tripp and Priya were my best friends, and I wanted to share my amazing discovery with them. But on the other hand, I was afraid to tell Cash when his shoe was untied, much less ask him to let my friends in his house. Cash didn’t strike me as someone who would love a seventh-grade dance party invading his space.

  But I would be moving away soon, and I wanted to spend every moment I could with my friends.

  “Okay, I’ll ask him,” I said. “Sometime soon.”

 
Tripp and Priya cheered, and we all raced to the tornado slide where we had rock races until it was time for Priya to go home.

  After she left, I got out my bike and Tripp and I rode around the neighborhood until it got too dark to see.

  21

  The Deep Space Immersion

  The dwarf planet Ceres. Vesta, Iris, and Flora—bright asteroids. The spiral galaxy M81. The Mundrabilla meteorite. Laika, the 1957 Russian space dog.

  These were just some of the things Cash and I talked about as I sat on the floor of his space room. He was bent into a folding chair next to me, guiding me through books and magazine articles, photos from his days at NASA.

  He told me stories about astronauts he knew and the discoveries they made. He told me the jokes they told. He told me about the fights they had, the findings they disagreed on, the achievements they celebrated.

  I could envision it all. It was like being inside one of my dreams, only it was Cash’s real life. I could picture a young Cash strutting through endless rows of beeping NASA computers. I could imagine myself standing next to him at the eyepiece of a giant telescope, the kind that made Dad’s telescope at the university look like Chase’s Mickey Mouse binoculars. I could feel the excitement of getting ready to hop into a space shuttle and launch into the stars. It made me anxious to grow up so I could just get going already.

  I was spending every day with Cash while Cassi cheered with the Brielle Brigade and Vega and the Bacteria spent every waking moment with their palms fused together and Dad painted and fixed things to get ready to sell our house.

  Meanwhile, Mom worried about “cleaning out” and “getting rid of things.”

  Arty’s version of “cleaning out” and “getting rid of things”: Pick up the obvious stuff, like your wadded-up Easter Sunday suit from kindergarten and the bucket of broken things you and Tripp spent an entire summer collecting. Kick everything else under your bed. Put the Easter Sunday suit and bucket of broken things back where you found them. The end.

  Mom’s version of “cleaning out” and “getting rid of things”: Actually cleaning out and getting rid of things, with the help of your son.