“I don’t know that it’s all bad. The private channel I call you on doesn’t come cheap. And a year ago I would have fainted at the cost of three last-minute tickets on a cross-country shuttle. Now I can travel wherever I want.” There was a twinkle in her tone.
Rafa snorted. “I’m glad one of us can. There’s not even a spare skimmer around here so I can get away from the crowd. About all I do is mark off days on the calendar and answer the door and drink lemonade with reporters who come to visit. They made me cut the ribbon when they turned on the force field around the perimeter of the settlement.”
“I thought you didn’t like being alone.”
“I miss Palomita and Mariposa.”
“They miss you. And they need you. My mom’s going to spoil them rotten.”
“Mom, my foot! You’re dad’s the one they’ve got wrapped around their fingers.”
Julie laughed. “And you. They’ve got you in their pocket too.”
The lines around Rafa’s eyes deepened. “Ever since the delivery room. And I’m even crazier about their mother.”
“I never could understand the connection between love and lunacy.”
“Much madness is divinest sense, so they say. Anyway, I’m head-over-heels for all three of you. If I had you, I wouldn’t care about the rest of the world.”
“I’ll have the girls call when they get up. It’s hard for them to sit in on our calls with these staggered schedules. It’s the middle of the night for them right now.”
“How about for you? You’ve missed a lot of sleep yourself.”
“No more than I used to miss before. You were always ready to trade a few winks for other activities.” There was a wistful tenderness behind the cracking in Julie’s voice.
The sun was well above the horizon now, its light bright and radiant. Rafa lay back on the sand and closed his eyes, a deep sigh escaping from his throat. “I miss you so much, Estrellita. Sometimes I wake up at nights and the dreams are so real I can almost feel you next to me. But the bed’s empty, so I come out here and close my eyes and pretend I’m back at the beach with you the night I proposed. Remember that?”
“I remember.”
There was a long silence.
“I heard someone call this place Rafa’s World the other day. I’m glad to own it, I suppose, but that’s a foolish name. If there’s one thing this whole mess taught me, it’s that my life revolves around you; no world could be mine without you in it.”
“Me siento igual,” she murmured, almost too faint to be heard.
“The minute Disease Control gives me a clean bill of health, I’m going to be on the first ship out of here. Don’t bother meeting me at the spaceport; I’ll buy out the block around our house and have them land right next door. It’ll demolish everything, I suppose, but who cares? If I pay the Rutledges enough, do you suppose they’ll let me squish that hot tub they’re so proud of?”
Julie laughed tearfully at her husband’s fantasy. Rafa’s eyes were still closed, his lips curved in a mischievous grin. “And Julie—you better get lots of sleep the week before; once I’m home I’ve got plans for your nocturnal hours. An eighteen-month separation means lots of pent-up energy.”
“This is sounding pretty good, Rafa. But I can’t wait that long. Eight months is plenty,” said Julie softly. Then Rafa felt the delicate brush of fingers, trembling as they ran hesitantly down his arm and across the back of his hand.
For a minute he held his breath, afraid to look, too stunned to speak. Finally he cracked an eyelid. Backlit by the rising sun and framed by a soaring ring of gold, she settled gracefully beside him. Her hair glowed. Her eyes were red and misty; he could see that she’d been crying as they talked. She was wearing a rumpled denim jumpsuit that still smelled faintly of dust and petroleum from the transport.
Her lips were trembling.
She had never looked more ravishing.
About the Author
Daniel Hardman was born in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, and grew up along the shores of Lake Winnebago. As a teenager, he lived in Indiana and Kentucky, where he consumed a steady diet of Jules Verne, H. G. Wells, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Ray Bradbury, Arthur C. Clarke, Isaac Asimov, Lloyd Alexander, J. R. R. Tolkien, and C. S. Lewis.
Daniel served as a missionary in New Mexico and Texas, where he came to love the Spanish language and Latin and Native American cultures. He completed graduate studies in computational linguistics and holds an MBA from Brigham Young University. He works as a software architect, designing apps that manage supercomputers and private clouds. He blogs about professional topics at http://codecraft.co, and tweets as @dhh1128.
Learn more about Daniel's fiction at http://sivanea.com.
Daniel and his wife Linda live in Utah with their seven children and their dog, Tilly.
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