by Shannon Hale
“Um … I guess I’m fine. And you?”
“Bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. How’s that cute little space camp of yours?”
“Campy, spacey, what you’d expect.”
“You have a good time now. Good-bye, sweetie pie!” I hung up my pretend phone.
A faint smile was inching across his lips. “And that was for …?”
“On your call day, someone should speak those words to you. You know—hello, how are you. The ones besides just good-bye.”
“I think you skipped one.”
“I did?”
“Yeah, you’d promised an I-miss-you.”
“Right.” I dutifully returned my phone hand to my ear, and I looked up to meet his eyes as I said, “I miss you.”
My heart revved like a lawn mower. It was supposed to be a joke. But speaking those words made me feel them, believe them. I missed him, as if he were Luther or my family, someone I cared for who was far away.
He held my gaze, and his smile tipped up, full of suggestion. He said quietly, “I miss you too.”
When faced with danger, our bodies experience the Primary Threat Response. Muscles contract, ready for flight or fight. Blood drains from extremities, making feet and hands feel cold, and from less-essential systems like the stomach, causing that butterflies sensation. The blood swarms into the head and organs, creating heat (and sweat). Heart pumps faster, blood pressure rises, and breathing turns rapid. All this to prepare the body for possible injury.
But there was no saber-toothed tiger, crouched and hissing. Just Wilder, smiling. I tried to smile back as if my heart weren’t thumping and my breaths weren’t shallow gasps.
Had he noticed that I watched him in the cafeteria? Had he guessed that I reread his file? That some nights when I closed my eyes, I saw his?
I’d thought I wanted to live free of my mundane little cage, but the world outside was feeling more and more hazardous.
“Why did you keep my folder?” I asked.
“Because I noticed you, Peligrosa. And I liked it.”
Actually my nickname is la Peligrosa, or “Danger Girl.” Peligrosa just means “dangerous.” But I didn’t correct him.
I left Wilder to go kick some butt in our fireteam’s fourth mission.
“Cry havoc!” Jacques shouted as we charged into a room featuring a model spacecraft. I got to wear a harness that simulated the weightlessness of space and pretend-fix a satellite.
After that was aerospace engineering and the day wrapped up with medical exams. The doctors put us through the same physicals and brain scans and so on that they did on actual astronauts.
Only late that night in bed, when it was so quiet my thoughts were louder than my breathing, did I allow my mind to return to Wilder.
1. He kept my folder.
2. He remembered my nickname (more or less).
3. He noticed me.
I wanted to list these things, examine them under a microscope, order them into their proper family, genus, and species. Understand them. Were Wilder and I friends? Did I have a crush? Did he?
I rejected the temptation to daydream about Wilder, and so I was completely unprepared.
Chapter 5
The night before Howell would announce the winning fireteam, I was lying in bed awake when our dorm door opened and a paper airplane flew through the crack. “Maisie Danger Brown” was written across the top in thick black marker. I picked it off the floor and unfolded it.
Peligrosa,
I hear there’s a comet tonight.
Come out and play?
W.
Curse the curiosity of the scientific mind, but I went out.
In the hall, Wilder was reading notices on a bulletin board, his hands in his pockets. I examined him objectively; he didn’t have the kind of face you’d see on a magazine cover, yet his confidence made him seem especially attractive. I told myself I was unaffected.
“You rang?” I said.
He turned, taking in my T-shirt and sweats. He’d changed into jeans and a gray shirt. It was nice not to be glaring orange at each other.
“What good is a comet overhead when no one admires it?” He inclined his head upward toward the roof.
I’d been complaining about missing the comet earlier to Mi-sun, but I shook my head. “If we’re caught, they might send us home early.”
“They’re not going to kick out a sweepstakes winner. Bad publicity. That’s why I want you with me, Danger Girl.”
“I don’t know if your logic is sound,” I said, though I took two steps toward him.
When I was twelve, Dad had showed me scans and charts, proof that a teenager’s brain is underdeveloped. We’re missing connections and parts adults have that help them analyze situations and take appropriate caution. That’s why teens need rules and guidance, he told me. We’re not biologically capable of being fully rational. I swore right then that I’d be a smart, cautious teenager.
Now those underdeveloped parts of my brain were perking up and looking around.
I kept my head down as we hurried through the corridor, aware of the security camera’s gaze. We took a dark staircase up, the butterflies awake in my belly. Wilder picked a lock and opened a door.
The air on the roof was cool yet humid enough to feel cozy, the stars splashed out and sizzling on a Teflon sky. He’d already spread a blanket on the roof’s gravel top, left a pair of binoculars waiting.
I could see one of the guard turrets from here. Its windows were black. I hoped no one was inside looking out.
Wilder and I sat about ten centimeters apart and took turns gazing at the bright dot blazing through the constellation Cassiopeia. I loved comets, engines of nearly endless motion and reminders that the sky wasn’t a flat, static surface but a window into vastness.
Afraid of the silence, I blurted the first thing on my mind. “You know, the Lyra comet was born beyond our solar system, which makes it an alien here, the nearest exotic thing.”
“Besides the foxy Latina on my right,” Wilder said.
“Do girls usually respond to that kind of talk?” I asked.
He frowned. “You’d be easier to woo if you were dumb.”
“Then don’t woo me,” I said.
I didn’t mean it.
I sort of meant it.
I didn’t know what I meant.
We were quiet, two tiny specks glued down by gravity, peering at a universe that didn’t notice us back. The quiet and dark made me feel mysterious and stilled, a thing that glints in the dark, an object that can only be understood by careful study. Something like a poem.
I said, “‘All that we see or seem / Is but a dream within a dream.’”
I had a bunch of poems memorized, and whenever something reminded me of one, out it came. Spewing dead poets at my parents was one thing, but I knew immediately I’d made a mistake with Wilder.
Hide your geekiness, Maisie.
But Wilder asked, “What does that mean?”
If Luther didn’t know, he’d pretend he did.
“It’s Poe,” I said. “I think of it whenever the world seems especially mysterious.”
“Memorizing poets doesn’t seem a practical hobby for the first one-handed freak in space.”
I know it sounds odd, but from Wilder that seemed like a compliment. I honestly considered blushing.
“Poets seem to know things that scientists don’t. And vice versa. Maybe they balance each other out somehow. If I’m going to get to space, I’ll need all the help I can get,” I said, lifting Ms. Pincher. “Poe included.”
“What do you want up there anyway?”
“To learn things you can only study in a weightless environment. And besides that, space is the place. Nebulas and novas and galaxies and massive expanses of endlessness. My brain can’t think about it without having a heart attack.”
“Your brain has a heart?”
I laughed because I was sounding ridiculous, and for some reason, I was loving it. “Sure, and it
suffers a massive coronary any time I try to comprehend the hugeness and possibilities of space. I mean, just think about Jupiter’s moon Europa. With its oxygen-based atmosphere and liquid ocean beneath a sea of ice, it’s very likely a home to extraterrestrial life, which would be the biggest discovery since … since … ever.”
“Someday we’ll spend trillions to get to Europa only to discover very expensive bacteria,” he said.
“By examining what’s different from us, we understand ourselves better.” Why wouldn’t I shut up already? “Um, what lured you to astronaut boot camp?”
“I have a crush on Cassiopeia.”
“Cassiopeia.”
Wilder nodded, eyes wide, eyebrows raised. “She is stacked. Have you seen the size of her stars?”
“Right. And besides the bodacious and boastful Cassiopeia, anything else drawing your attention to the big black yonder?”
Wilder’s teasing tone weakened. “I get bored easily. But I can’t know space, so it keeps me wondering. Maybe there’s something worth finding out there, something that’s missing down here. Life feels like half of itself.”
“‘A dream within a dream.’”
“And I want to wake up.”
For the first time, I felt like Wilder was saying something he really believed. But I couldn’t think of anything to say back that wouldn’t sound nerdy.
“Maybe this is stupid, but do you ever feel like you’re doomed?” He laughed. “Never mind. Anytime the word ‘doomed’ is involved, it’s definitely stupid. But it’s like I’m chasing nothing, and I can’t stop until …”
“Until what?” I said.
His gaze was up, almost as if he’d forgotten I was there. “‘Till the stars run away, and the shadows eat the moon.’”
I knew that line. He was quoting William Butler Yeats.
“‘Ah, penny, brown penny, brown penny,’” I finished the poem, “‘One cannot begin it too soon.’”
He looked at me. His lips parted. Then he studied my face as he quoted, “‘Oh, love is the crooked thing.’”
For the barest moment, I became aware of every part of my body. Not only the pressure of my legs on the roof, the wishy breeze tickling the hairs on my arm, the rise of my chest as I inhaled, the click of my eyelids as I blinked. Not just those places of touch and motion, but all of it. Everything. Everywhere. I thrilled with life. And I looked at Wilder.
“I said I didn’t want you to woo me.” My voice sounded foreign to my own ears.
“I wasn’t.”
“Oh. So … what does that mean, ‘love is the crooked thing’?”
“I don’t know.” He was still looking at me. “I just like the way it sounds.”
I looked down, twisting a loose thread on my T-shirt.
“Poetry kind of reminds me of looking at things through a microscope.” I didn’t know what I was saying—I just started to talk. “I got a microscope when I turned six. You know, physicist mom, biologist dad. I examined things I thought I knew—a strand of my hair, a feather, an onion peel. Seeing them up close, they changed. I started to guess how, you know, things are more complicated than they seem, but that they have patterns, and the patterns are beautiful. Space has all those patterns and intricacies and mysteries, but not tiny under a microscope. So big, so expansive, when I think about it, I feel like the solid parts of me are dissolving and I’m out there in the blackness and light, moving with the whole universe.”
I glanced up to see if he was bored. Instead I felt his hand on my cheek and his lips on mine. Just a touch, a softness, a greeting. One kiss that lasted seven rapid heartbeats. His other hand lifted, both holding my face. A second kiss—one, two, three, four, five beats. It was easy to count by my heart. I could feel it thud through my whole body. My left hand clutched my right arm, afraid to touch him or to not. His lips moved again (how did mine know how to move with his?). A third kiss—one, two, three, four. Only four beats before the fourth kiss. Either the kisses were speeding up or my heart was. A fifth kiss, a sixth, and I counted each beat. It seemed the only way to keep from drowning. Numbers were solid things I could grip, a buoy in a flood.
Seventh, eighth, one beat, two beats, three—
He pulled back (or I did?) but his right thumb stayed on my cheek, his fingers on my jaw. His eyes were still closed.
“You’d better not talk about microscopes anymore,” he whispered, “or I don’t know if I can control myself.”
I laughed. It was good to end a kiss (my first kiss—my first eight kisses) with a laugh, because I didn’t know what I was supposed to say. Thanks for the kiss? Um, nice lips? Did you know there are over seven hundred species of bacteria living in the human mouth?
So I laughed again. “I’m pretty sure there are rules against this sort of thing at astronaut boot camp.”
“I sure hope so,” said Wilder, “or it wouldn’t be nearly as fun.” He’s dangerous, I reminded myself. And this is not the experience you left home for. You should run away.
I didn’t move.
Chapter 6
Would he have kissed me again?
I lay in my bunk staring at the tiny black dents in the white ceiling tiles, wondering how anyone can sleep after her first kiss. Or first eight.
It might have been more, but we’d heard a noise (a security guard?), and I hurried back to the dorm. Though once the risk of capture was past, I wondered what wouldn’t be worth another kiss. I rolled over, pressing my fingers against a smile, and that was the kiss. My bare feet searching for cool, untouched spots at the bottom of the bed, my hand full of blanket, the press of my collarbone into the pillow. Every touch, every motion was a reminder of Wilder’s kiss.
I didn’t want to fall asleep and miss a single hour of remembering. But once I did, sleep was lively with dreams.
Wilder wasn’t at breakfast. I’m positive about that, since I checked a few times. (Maybe forty-eight.) He came to the tail end of calibration looking sleepy, his hair wet. He winked at the instructor and took the chair beside me.
“Hey,” he whispered to the guy sitting on my other side. “Are you checking out my girl?”
“Wha-what?” the kid stuttered.
“Not that I blame you,” Wilder said, “but have some respect for the lady.”
I hid my face with my hand.
When the bell rang for lunch, I hurried off so Wilder wouldn’t think I expected to eat with him. But then he was walking beside me.
“May I escort you to lunch, Danger Girl? I noticed you have a penchant for cheese—”
Wilder stopped, staring at a man in the atrium wearing flip-flops, long cargo shorts, and a washed-out Hawaiian shirt, his hair a little long, his beard a little bushy. He was juxtaposed by three large suited men, buds in their ears.
Dr. Howell approached the Hawaiian-shirt guy. “Hello, GT. Shall we talk in my office?”
He nodded at Wilder before following Dr. Howell.
“Who was that?” I asked.
“My dad,” said Wilder.
Dr. Howell had called him GT. I remembered the name George Theodore Wilder from Wilder’s papers.
“Does he always dress like that?” GT was not what I imagined when I thought billionaire.
“Yeah, it’s a power play. Come on,” he whispered, taking my hand.
Another first. It felt like a surrender to let someone take charge of my one hand, but the surrender came with a thrill.
He walked quickly away from the cafeteria. “I need out of all this for an hour, and I want you with me, okay?”
“Okay,” I said.
We ran into the parking lot. Wilder opened the driver-side door of an expensive-looking red convertible. He gestured me in, and I scooted down the bench.
“And this car is …”
“Dad’s.” Wilder reached under the dash for a magnetic box, pulled out a spare key, and started the engine.
“I don’t do stuff like this, you know.”
“That’s what makes you so enticing. One of t
he things anyway. There’s also your black magic eyes.”
“And my cunning mind and rapier wit, right?”
“Hey, baby,” he said, chucking my chin, “all the guys want you for your mind. Isn’t it refreshing to be with someone who only cares about your body?”
I laughed. It was becoming my default response. “You know, I’m not going to be that girl who gets pulled in by your cheap lines.”
“My lines? You’re the one who gets things steamy discussing microscopes.”
“Are you only capable of talking to me as if an audience were listening?”
“Okay, Peligrosa. Okay.”
I felt him relax as he put his arm around my shoulder, looking back as he reversed.
“So what do you usually do to escape?” he asked.
“Escape? I … I guess I ride my bike to Luther’s.” Man, that sounded pathetic to me now.
“And Luther is?”
“A guy. A friend. My best friend.”
Wilder glared as we zipped out of the parking lot, and I suspected he wasn’t just squinting against the sunlight.
The gate was open. I could see a guard in a turret. I lowered my head, gripping the seat. Wilder waved and drove on. No one stopped us.
“Why’d you come with me?” he asked. The honesty of the question startled me.
“I don’t know. You have a certain gravity about you.”
“You be Europa, and I’ll be your Jupiter.”
“If you’re comfortable with that,” I said. “You know Jupiter is one of the gas giants.”
“Now stop trying to woo me with all your sexy talk.”
We drove to the nearest town and found a drive-through, filling the front seat with cheeseburgers, fried zucchini, onion rings, sodas with straws, strawberry and chocolate shakes with spoons. Wilder paid. Did this count as a date?
We drove and ate, music booming and the road going straight, straight, straight, no signs, no stops, just fields and hills forever. Sometimes he looked away from the road just to smile at me. Maybe he was feeling like I was—that the day was enough under the candy-blue sky, the wind swooping into the car and taking parts of us away with it, swirling me and Wilder into the whole big moving world.