by Neal Jones
She turned, facing him in the dark. "Yes," she said through her tears. "Yes, I know what you felt, and I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Marc, for all of that, and if I could go back and do it all again, I would stay."
"I told you that I was leaving EarthCorps. I showed you the shuttle tickets. We stayed up half the night talking about our future together, and you never once said you were pregnant!"
Laura was too choked to respond, and Marc sighed again as he listened to her. She waited for him to storm out, but he never moved. She needed a tissue, and she finally walked into the house to get one. When she came back to the patio she expected to find Marc gone, but he was still there, sipping his beer. She sat on the edge of her chair so she could reach out to him.
"Marc, say something."
"Why? What else is left to say?"
"Keith and I broke up. The engagement's off. You know that, right?"
"I heard something about that today."
"The other night at the club you asked me to stay. You said we could be a couple again. Is that still true?"
He finished his beer and hurled the empty bottle over the railing onto the beach. "Does it matter now if it is?"
"Yes, if you don't mind a long distance relationship. I'll be on K'Ssala for the next several months."
"And after that?"
She swallowed. "I could talk to my director. I might be able to relocate my office here. But there's more to my job than just sitting in an office all day. There's a few projects at FCE headquarters that I would have to be present full time to oversee."
"With your new position, you mean. The one you were just promoted to."
She hesitated. "Yes."
"So it's more likely that you won't be able to relocate your office to Exxar-One, unless you were to refuse this promotion and accept a lesser position in the company; one that would allow you to man a desk all day."
Laura gave a weary nod. "Yes, that's true."
Marc finally turned to face her, reaching out a hand to trace the line of her cheek in the dark. "We both know that you'll never do that, Laur. Just as we both know that I can't leave my position for at least three years."
The sound of the waves upon the sand breached the silence between them. He could feel her cheek getting wet again and he wiped her eyes.
"What about then?" she asked. "If you didn't re-up, would you retire and come back to Mars with me? I've waited twenty-three years, I can wait three more. You and I could share this house in the real world."
Marc swallowed the lump in his throat. "Yes," he murmured. "I think I could do that."
Laura had started to lean forward but Marc was already pulling her towards him, and their kiss was as desperate and passionate and as full of lust as the first one they had shared at that hotel after the funeral of Laura's father.
They finally broke for air, and Marc seized her hand as they leaped to their feet. They charged through the house and up the stairs to the bedroom with the awful blue-and-cream color coordinated bedspread and wallpaper. His shirt was already off and so was her pants. She undid his belt while he unbuttoned her blouse and unfastened her bra. In a matter of seconds they were both naked and on the bed, and he was mounting her.
Just as that night in the hotel twenty-four years earlier, nothing else was said. The only sound was their panting in time to his thrusts, and the music of the tide upon the beach as it drifted through the nearby open window.
Chapter 27
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( 1 )
MARC GROGGILY BLINKED AND RUBBED a hand over his face. He turned away from the sunlight and pulled the sheet over his head before it occurred to him that this wasn't his sheet. He raised his head and squinted at the room, trying to recall the night before.
"Morning," Laura said, emerging from the bathroom with only a white towel wrapped around her torso. She was drying her hair with a blue one, and it matched the comforter that was crumpled on the floor at the foot of the bed.
"We're in the Hiver," he murmured.
"Yes, and you look hungover. How many beers did you have before I arrived last night?"
Marc sighed and tried to bury himself beneath the covers again. "I lost count."
"Marc, you have to get up. This simulation has been running for at least twelve hours, right?"
"It can go for a couple more. I don't have anywhere else to be."
Laura had removed her towel and was searching the floor for her underwear. "All right, fine. But I'd like to say a proper goodbye before I leave. My team arrives today, and we're probably leaving for K'Ssala first thing tomorrow." She fastened her bra.
"So?" Marc's voice was muffled beneath the pillow.
"So we won't have a chance to talk again before I leave. I have a lot of material to cover with my research team." Laura buttoned her blouse and pulled on her pants. She sat on the edge of the bed and poked Marc in the ribs. "Just come out for a few minutes, please, and then I will let you get back to sleep."
He sighed as he pulled his head out from beneath the pillow. Laura giggled at the sight of his hair in such disarray. "You should get this trimmed," she said as she passed her fingers through the mess.
He smiled and pulled her down beside him. "Stay with me for a little longer. Please?"
"Does this mean you've forgiven me?" Her tone was lighthearted, but his expression soured, and she instantly regretted her words. "I'm sorry."
"No, it's all right." He smiled wanly and kissed her. "Three years. I'll retire, and I'll join you on Mars. That was our deal, right?"
She nodded. "Yes." She ran her finger along the stubble of his jaw line. "I'll be waiting."
"What about Jeanette? Is she still going to stay on Exxar-One?"
"As far as I know, yes. Maybe you could talk her into finishing school. She really should go back, you know."
"Yes, I know."
"Marc, I really have to go."
"How many time did we do it last night? Was it three or four?"
She laughed. "I counted five."
He kissed her, and she closed her eyes. When it was over she reluctantly got up. "Goodbye."
"Bye. Have a safe trip."
Laura nodded and then left the room. Marc buried himself back under the pillow but found it hard to get back to sleep. After a minute or two he resigned himself to facing the day and rose to take a shower.
( 2 )
Laura wasn't surprised to find her daughter waiting for her. "Good morning," she said cheerfully.
"I knew it," Jeanette sighed. "You slept with him, didn't you?"
"Yes, I did." Laura plopped down on the couch beside Jeanette. "But that was after we had a long talk, and we agreed to wait for one another for three years. Well, actually, it's two-and-a-half now. When his current contract expires he's going to leave EarthCorps and come live with me on Mars."
Jeanette grinned. "Really?? Oh, mom, that's so exciting!" They embraced.
"I know," Laura sighed.
Jeanette pulled back. "But wait, does that mean that you two aren't going to see anyone else during those three years? That's a long time."
"Well...yes, I don't think either of us is going to want to date anyone else during that time. That would be a little weird and awkward, don't you think?"
Jeanette shrugged. "Maybe. But I don't think it's reasonable for you two to expect each other to go that long without sex."
"Jeanette!"
"I'm just saying..." The girl rose and started for the kitchen. "I was going to make myself a snack. Do you want something?"
Laura trailed her daughter, frowning. "Well, we never said exactly, but I assumed that the fact that we're saving ourselves for each other from this point on precludes any casual dating or sex with anyone else."
"So why didn't you just agree to start your relationship now? It's not like you'll be on the other side of the quadrant. You can come back to Exxar-One anytime for a visit, or he can come to you."
Laura's frown deepened. "Well...yes, that's true. But
I'm not going to be on K'Ssala for three years. It's only going to be nine months, maybe a year at the most, and then I'm returning to Mars. With this new promotion I can't be away from the home office for three years."
"Ah, I see. Well, congratulations again. I'm glad you two finally got together." Jeanette glanced up when there was no immediate reply. "Mom?"
"What?"
"Do you want a sandwich?"
"Oh, no thanks, sweetheart." Laura glanced at her commlink. "My team is arriving in an hour, and I need to get changed. Did Keith leave a message for me?"
"Oh, yeah, he called last night. He said he'll meet you at the docking port at eleven hundred."
"Okay, good." Laura turned to leave.
"So you two are still working together on this project?"
"Apparently so."
Before Jeanette could press further, Laura left the kitchen.
"Well that should be fun," Jeanette quipped to the empty room.
( 3 )
Doctor Rosenberg stepped back from the computer screen and rubbed his eyes.
Lieutenant Hardinger glanced up from his own screen nearby. "Doctor, go to lunch. I can take over from here."
"Thanks. I'll be back in an hour."
Ben left the medlab, lost in thought as he headed for the nearest PTL. He didn't hear Doctor McMullen approaching until the man spoke at his shoulder.
"Ben?"
The CMO glanced up, startled. "Kade, hi."
"You look a little worried. Mind if I walk with you?"
"Not at all. I was just headed to lunch. In fact, you're the one I was hoping to speak to this afternoon."
They stepped into a PTL, and McMullen said, "Promenade, level two." He turned to Ben. "What about?"
"I'd like you to take over the project in medlab two."
"The one where you're trying to find a cure to Iverson's disease using Ilkara's blood samples?"
"Yeah. I'll give you the choice of part time or full time. I'm sure Doctor Eppler wouldn't mind a couple days a week in there to fulfill his research requirement for his residency."
"Sounds good. I'll talk to him if you want."
"Naw, I'll track him down this afternoon. Thanks."
"So...you're not going to be in there at all?"
"No. I've decided to step back from all of that for awhile."
"Does this have anything to do with what's going on between you and Jen?"
"Yeah, a little." Ben sighed. "I think I've been losing myself in this project, Kade. I've been trying for over ten years now to find a cure, and I actually convinced myself that I could do it using a standard medical lab." He shook his head, smiling ruefully. "There are specialists like the team on Pelray, the hospital that Amy and her mother went to, that have been working on this disease for decades, and they haven't come anywhere close to a cure. How foolish of me to think that I could accomplish in a two-bit medlab what they haven't accomplished with an entire university hospital at their disposal?"
"So you're just giving up?"
"No, but I'm going to stop obsessing about this and allowing it to take up all my spare time. Jen was right about that. It's as if I've never really said goodbye to Chloe."
The lift came to a stop and the door opened, interrupting Ben's reverie. "Thanks again. I'll get with Sam and work up a schedule. Is next week all right?"
McMullen nodded. "Ben, if you ever want to talk you know where to find me."
The CMO smiled and nodded. "I do. See you later."
( 4 )
"Mariah?"
"Hhmmm?"
"You've been staring at your sandwich for five minutes. Are you all right?"
The science officer nodded, smiling a little. "Sorry. I was just...lost in thought, I guess."
"You've been distracted ever since we got here." Jennifer reached for her soda. "Is everything okay?"
"I'm sorry. I guess I haven't been much of a lunch date."
"Oh, it's all right. I've been entertaining myself by watching Lieutenant Navarr and her date." She nodded to a table on the other side of the café.
Mariah turned to look. "That's Doctor Eppler. I didn't know those two were seeing each other."
Jennifer chuckled as she munched on her pickle. "Are you going to finish your sandwich?"
"No, you can have it." Mariah sighed as she pushed the plate away. "I'm not very hungry."
"Thanks. So...what's bothering you?"
Mariah stared at her soda for a minute or two and then said, "I can't stop thinking about Marc."
"Commodore Gabriel?"
Mariah nodded. "I -" She glanced around. "You want to take a walk?"
"Sure." Jennifer summoned the waiter and asked for a to-go bag.
Ten minutes later the two of them were in an empty stretch of corridor three levels beneath the observation dome.
"So..." Jennifer said, pausing in her tracks long enough to unwrap the sandwich. "You can't stop thinking about Marc."
Mariah nodded. "Has Ben told you anything about my past with Marc?"
"Only that you two served together on the Tokyo towards the end of the war, and that he and Paul were close friends."
Mariah nodded again. "Paul and Marc hit it off the moment they met, and they both enjoyed the poker tournaments that Lieutenant Owens held every week in his quarters for the senior staff. And Marc was often at our quarters for dinner every other night, so he and I became good friends as well. But since I was an ensign only two years out of the academy, I was a little intimidated by Marc at first. Junior officers like me don't typically associate with the ship's second-in-command while off duty."
"Wait a second," Jennifer interrupted. "Ben said that Paul was the Tokyo's chief engineer. What was his rank?"
"Lieutenant Commander. He and I met on my first posting two years earlier, the Jamestown. And yes, there was a bit of an age difference between us, eight years in fact."
"You were a science officer, right?"
"Uh-huh."
"So how did you end up dating the chief engineer?"
"Well, Paul wasn't the chief engineer of the Jamestown. He didn't assume that position until we were transferred to the Tokyo."
"So you two were married by then."
"Yeah. In fact, it was only a year after we met that we were married. And the only reason we ended up dating in the first place was because I was assigned to assist one of the junior engineering officers on a project that would enhance the ship's long range sensors. We were on patrol in the Chasnir sector at that time, and there had been a lot of heavy raids of Federation supply depots by Kauramide lightships. Those types of ships were hard to detect with standard tactical sensors until they were right on top of you, and by then it was usually too late. So the captain had assigned me to work with...what was his name?" Mariah paused, frowning, and then snapped her fingers. "Brexler! Short guy, about five-two, dry sense of humor. His crewmates had nicknamed him Stumpy, and he was usually the one assigned to crawl inside the maintenance shafts whenever there was repairs needed on an EPS conduit. In fact, he was trapped inside one of those conduits a few months later when we were caught in a surprise attack by Kauramide raiders. The whole power grid in that section of the ship overloaded and he never made it out alive."
Mariah blinked and shook her head, surprised by the vividness of the unexpected memory. "Anyways, the reason Paul and I met was because Stumpy introduced us. Paul had this hobby of building models of old sailing ships from scratch, and it was something my father used to do as well. I had built a couple ships when I was a teenager, and I picked up the hobby again while I was at the academy. My father would mail me parts and pieces every now and then, and I was telling Stumpy about it one day. He said I should get with Paul to look at some of the ships in his collection. But there was no way I was going to ask out a lieutenant, much less a guy who was eight years older than me, so Stumpy called him over right then and there. I was so embarrassed, but Paul thought it was cute, and he got really excited when he heard that I was also into
shipbuilding, and he invited me to his quarters that evening to look at his collection. I don't remember my exact response, but it was something to the effect of yes."
Mariah paused again, smiling wanly, and she wasn't aware she had stopped walking as well until Jennifer spoke up.
"And?"
"What? Oh, well, let's just say that Paul and I had a good first date, and there was a second a week later, and then a third, and then were married a few months later."
Jennifer crumpled her empty sack and tossed it into a nearby reclamator. They were next to a viewport, and she motioned to the bench beneath it. "Do you mind if we sit?"
"No." Mariah was still thinking about her first date with Paul and about his collection of model ships. She suddenly wondered what had become of them. Surely they were in a box in storage somewhere back on Earth, probably at her parents' place.
"Mariah?"
"Huh? Oh, sorry. Where was I?"
"You married Paul, and then it was a year later that you both transferred to the Tokyo."
"Yes. And I was also eight months pregnant with Joshua by then, and Paul and Marc struck up their friendship via the poker tournaments every week at Owens' quarters. I had met Marc once when Paul and I first came aboard the Tokyo. Protocol requires that all transferring officers check in with the ship's captain or first officer within twenty four hours of arrival. I was in the infirmary getting a standard pregnancy checkup from Doctor Headman when Marc strode in and introduced himself.
"I didn't think much of him at first. He seemed nice. But it was a few weeks later that Paul invited him to our cabin for dinner, and that's when I realized I didn't like him."
Jennifer laughed. "Really?"
"Oh yes. He was so arrogant, so sure of himself, so...cocky and opinionated. He and Paul were debating something that had been in the news recently, something about the war effort I think. Marc acted like he was the foremost authority on the subject, and he kept insisting that Paul had no idea what he was talking about. Paul felt sorry for me and changed the subject, but I could tell that if I hadn't been there those two would have stayed up all night arguing. That was something else they had in common. They enjoyed a good debate. And then Marc started talking about one of the officers he was dating, a lieutenant in astrometrics, and that's when Paul filled me in on Marc's history with the female junior officers."