It Came from the Sky

by Chelsea Sedoti

  Interview

  Subject #9, Chief Lisa Kaufman: I suppose they thought no one would notice that Arden came into the station wearing a myTality shirt.

  Event: Stargazing—Again

  Date: Oct. 25 (Wed.)

  There was a time when an evening wouldn’t pass without me looking at the sky. But with the recent chaos in Lansburg, I’d spent more time dwelling on what was happening on Earth. Certainly, that added to my tension. Stargazing had always been a way for me to decompress.

  So on Wednesday night, I went to the edge of the field, near the crater Ishmael and I created. The spot where the strange whirlwind began. Kepler followed, twisting around my feet.

  Already, weeds sprouted from the crater. Wind was beginning to erode the sides. One day soon, all evidence of the initial explosion would be gone.

  I sat down, pulled Kepler onto my lap, and looked up at the sky.

  I located the stars that made up Orion’s Belt (Alnilam, Alnitak, Mintaka), and from there was able to pick out the rest of the constellation. Orion was the hunter of the night sky, and more than ever, I wished I had his mythical strength.

  Two days had passed since Ishmael and I rescued Arden and took her to the police station. Chief Kaufman questioned us for a long time. Arden was like steel. She claimed she’d been at a friend’s house and swore I hadn’t known where she was until she called me to pick her up. Ishmael and I stayed silent, as promised.

  Later, after Arden was reunited with her tearful mother, I asked Ishmael if he thought Kaufman believed the story.

  “Not a chance, dude.”

  An article about Arden’s disappearance appeared in the online version of the Lansburg Daily Press the next evening. The Seekers still insisted she’d been abducted by aliens. Arden hadn’t returned to school yet, and I hoped people would be kind when she did, not treat her like a sideshow.

  I’d been honest with Cass about Arden’s whereabouts—with Arden’s permission—and she was less shocked than I’d been.

  “I should’ve considered she was with Oz,” Cass said.

  “Why in the world would you have considered that?”

  Cass shrugged. “I saw the way she looked at him at his rally.”

  “She needs to go to the police.”

  “Obviously. We’ll keep trying to convince her.”

  Not that Cass had much time for anything. The opening night of Hamelin! was on Thursday and she was busy preparing.

  Overhead, Aldebaran glowed red, the brightest star in Taurus. As always when looking at the night sky, I felt insignificant. Earth was only a speck in the Milky Way. The Milky Way galaxy was only a speck in the universe. And who knew how many other universes there might be.

  But for once, my own insignificance didn’t scare me. Maybe I was more of a starfish than a god. Maybe nothing I did would ever matter on a cosmic scale. But my life didn’t play out on a cosmic scale. And though it might be humble and meaningless, it meant something to me.

  I thought back to a few nights before, when Frykowski had stirred something in me. He was so willing to accept failure. I wasn’t. That night, I’d acted. Yes, I’d set out to confront Oswald and it turned into something much different than expected. But that didn’t change that I’d stepped up and refused to be pushed around. And in the end, I got Arden out of it.

  Maybe sometimes, if you did the right thing, you achieved something even better than your intended result.

  It was time to think about the other areas of my life as well. Like making things right with Owen. Was I really going to give up and assume Alex had more to offer than I did? Maybe I owed it to myself to try one more time. And even if Owen and I were over for good, he at least deserved an apology.

  If astronauts could hurtle into space at thirty thousand kilometers per hour, facing incalculable risks along the way, certainly I could tell a boy how I felt about him.

  Event: Hamelin!

  Date: Oct. 26 (Thurs.)

  People stared as I walked into Irving High School’s auditorium. Not because it was surprising for me to attend a play—I attended all the shows to support Cass, despite theater not being a favorite pastime of mine. The difference was that I didn’t normally arrive with an enormous bouquet of roses.

  “You sure you won’t carry these for me?” I pleaded to Maggie.

  “No way,” she said. “Isn’t stepping out of your comfort zone kind of the point?”

  It was, of course.

  I’d resorted to asking Maggie to see the play with me when no one else could. Ishmael was working, Arden was still holed up in her house, and everyone else I would’ve gone with was in the play.

  Gram had dropped Maggie and me off at the school. During our harrowing car ride (A total of three red lights were run), I asked if we could pick up flowers on the way. Gram scowled and said, “Flowers make silly gifts. Who wants a present that’s gonna die?” But she drove me to the florist.

  “People are staring,” I said as Maggie and I sat near the front of the theater.

  “You’re overreacting. They probably think the flowers are for Cass.”

  Maybe I should have brought Cass flowers. After all, she’d been my best friend for a long time, and I’d never given her flowers at the end of a performance. On the other hand, if I brought flowers for Cass and Owen, wouldn’t Owen take the gesture less seriously?

  How did anyone ever manage to navigate social situations? There were so many rules I couldn’t figure out.

  While we waited for the play to begin, I adjusted the bouquet and tried to distract myself from my discomfort.

  “So, how’s your cult?” I asked Maggie.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Liar.”

  “It’s not a cult. It’s a group of people who happen to believe in the same thing.”

  “Right,” I agreed. “Whatever thing you tell them to believe.”

  Maggie couldn’t suppress a satisfied smile. “Maybe it’s what they wanted to believe anyway.”

  “And what belief is this? What are your little meetings about?”

  “Aliens, obviously.”

  “What makes your cult different from the Seekers? Or Oswald’s followers?” I asked.

  “We agree the aliens are here to give us a message. But it doesn’t have anything to do with the fountain of youth or government conspiracies. The aliens are here with a message of love. If we open our hearts to them, we’ll achieve true harmony.”

  “I know you don’t believe a word of that.”

  Maggie shrugged.

  “Why are you doing this?” I asked.

  Maggie thought for a long moment. “Honestly? I just wanted to see if I could.”

  “You wanted to see if you could manipulate people?”

  “How is it different than what you and Ishmael are doing?”

  I opened my mouth to respond, but realized I had no answer. Thankfully, before I had to admit that, the lights dimmed and Hamelin! began.

  Interview

  Subject #2, Magdalene (Maggie) Hofstadt: Another thing about cults is, you have to keep the members isolated. They should feel like no one outside the group understands them. Which is basically how people my age feel anyway.

  Event: Hamelin! (Cont.)

  Hamelin! was everything I feared. The writing was cringeworthy, the story was diluted into nothing but a romance, and Cass’s character, as she’d complained, was subpar. She did her best to liven Greta up, but it only helped so much.

  Owen was fantastic as the Pied Piper, though, spirited and magnetic, while still bringing a touch of darkness the story needed. Even Sofia Russo, as leader of the rats and antagonist to the Piper and people of Hamelin, performed well.

  As the kiss scene approached, I prepared myself for pangs of jealousy. But as I watched Cass and Owen deliver their ridiculous dialo
gue before sharing an equally over-the-top kiss, I realized I’d been a fool. It was just pretend. There was never any reason to be upset.

  When the play ended, after the actors had taken their final bows, the audience slowly moved toward the lobby. It was tradition after a performance for the actors, still in costume, to greet people, take pictures, and soak up praise.

  “That was painful,” Maggie said as we moved with the crowd. “I could teach the Pied Piper a few things about being a leader.”

  I was too focused on the crush of people around me to respond. I couldn’t be in crowds without feeling like the air was being sucked out of my lungs. A man bumped into me. I felt the hot breath of the woman behind me on my neck.

  I hated crowds.

  Trying to juggle an enormous bouquet of roses—while keeping them from getting crushed—made the situation much worse.

  In the lobby, the crowd thinned. I made my way to a corner and waited for the cast to emerge.

  I checked my phone and saw Arden had texted during the play.

  A: Good luck tonight!!!

  Good luck, indeed. I needed it.

  When I looked back up, the rats had infiltrated the lobby, moving through the crowd in their gray leotards and rat-eared headbands, drawn-on whiskers beginning to smear. Cass appeared and was immediately swept up by her parents. She caught my eye from across the room, tilted her head to the right, and gave me a thumbs-up.

  I looked in the direction she’d indicated.

  Owen.

  Dressed in pied, yet somehow not looking absurd. Instead, he looked confident. And handsome. And utterly unapproachable. It didn’t help that he was among a group of guys from the baseball team.

  “There’s Owen,” Maggie said.

  “I see.”

  “Are you going over?”

  “In a minute,” I replied.

  “Coward.”

  She was right. I was a coward. When it came to Owen, I’d been a coward from the very start.

  It was time for me to be something else.

  I took a deep breath and marched over to Owen.

  For a moment neither he, nor his friends, noticed me. I hovered awkwardly at the edge of the group, wondering how to break in. Clear my throat? Say something to announce myself?

  In the end, it didn’t matter. One of Owen’s friends looked over. Another followed suit. Soon the whole group stared at me.

  “Gideon,” Owen said.

  “These are for you,” I blurted out, thrusting the flowers into his arms.

  “Thank you.”

  Was he surprised? Happy? Embarrassed?

  “They’re for doing a good job in the play. I mean, not that I knew you’d do a good job when I got them. Not that I thought you’d do a bad job either. I assumed you’d be great, and you were. So.”

  Everyone continued to stare.

  “I also wanted to apologize,” I went on haltingly. “For, you know, for being an asshole. You deserve better than that, and…yeah.”

  I began to feel like I’d done the absolute wrong thing. Maybe Owen never meant for this to happen. Maybe his friends weren’t as comfortable with his sexuality as he thought. Maybe Owen was still furious and enjoyed watching me embarrass myself.

  I said the last part before I could convince myself not to. “I also want to say, you mean a lot to me. Not just as an acquaintance or coworker, but romantically.”

  I cringed as soon as the words were out of my mouth. Not just as an acquaintance or coworker… Had a less-passionate phrase been uttered in the history of the universe?

  “Do you want to take a walk?” Owen asked finally.

  “Yes,” I said, relieved. “That would be good.”

  Event: The Talk

  Date: Oct. 26 (Thurs.)

  The halls of Irving High School were deserted. I always liked seeing the school that way—devoid of the hustle and bustle of the average school day. It was the only time I felt truly comfortable there.

  Owen and I walked side by side, him still in costume and carrying the roses. Though they’d annoyed me all evening, I wished I had the flowers back. They’d been a shield. Without them, I didn’t know what to do with my hands.

  “When I said I wanted our relationship to be public,” Owen said after a while, “I didn’t mean I needed some grand romantic gesture.”

  My face burned. “I shouldn’t have brought the flowers.”

  “I love the flowers. I’m happy you brought them. I just hope you know I never expected you to make big scenes. I just wanted to, like, see a movie with you.”

  “I hate movies.”

  “You know what I mean.”

  I stopped walking and turned to Owen. “You know what I told you, about not dating publicly because people tried to force it on us?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Well, it’s not true. I mean… It is true. But it’s not the main reason.”

  “I figured.”

  I took a deep breath and braced myself. “Owen, you must realize being with me is…beneath you.”

  “What?”

  “Don’t act confused. You’re handsome and popular and excel at everything and I’m…just me. I spend ninety-seven percent of my free time in my lab. With my cat. And that’s not going to change, because I don’t want it to change. I don’t want to be popular or social or anything other than what I am. But the fact remains that guys like you don’t end up with guys like me.”

  “Gideon—”

  “Let me finish,” I said. “When you go to college next year, what happens? You’ll find someone else and move on. And I’ll…still be in my lab. I’ll still be me. What’s the point of getting attached when it’s just going to end?”

  “You’re an idiot,” Owen said.

  “I… What?”

  “That’s a risk with every relationship. The only way to avoid it is to never date at all. And personally, I’m a little insulted you think I’m just with you while I wait for something better to come along.”

  “You never felt that way?” I asked meekly.

  Owen sighed. “Your pride gets in the way of everything, you know that? No, I never felt that way. I never considered you temporary. I like you.”

  “I like you too,” I said. And then, after a pause, “I want to be your boyfriend. Officially.”

  “Even though, in your words, romance is ‘a concept designed by greeting card companies, when human mating is just biology.’ Or something like that.” (My exact words had been: an artificial emotion created by advertisers to make a biological necessity marketable as greeting cards.)

  I winced. “I did say that, didn’t I?”

  “You did.”

  “I was wrong. That happens sometimes.”

  Owen smiled slightly, but there was sadness in it. “I’ve waited a long time for you to say all this.”

  “Am I too late?” I asked, a catch in my voice. The world seemed to still, like even Earth stopped rotating on its axis in anticipation of his response.

  “I’m still mad at you.”

  “You should be.”

  “And I’ll never go back to the way things were,” he said firmly.

  “I wouldn’t ask you to.”

  “But I’m willing to give this a chance. On the condition that we start over. And hang out in public, like a normal couple.”

  My heart soared. The Earth resumed its normal operations. “Are we a couple then?”

  “I don’t think we should decide that yet.”

  “Okay,” I agreed.

  We stood in the hallway and stared at each other. Maybe we’d work things out. Maybe we’d start a relationship—a real relationship, not like before. Or maybe I’d end up with a broken heart. But the risk was a part of it. A part of life.

  “Can I kiss you now?” I asked.

 
“Out in the open, where anyone might walk by?” Owen gasped in mock surprise.

  In response, I leaned forward and kissed him, awkwardly maneuvering around the bouquet of roses crushed between us.

  It wasn’t the most graceful kiss of my life. But it felt the most honest.

  Event: Oswald’s Plan

  Date: Oct. 28 (Sat.)

  According to their website, MIT had received 20,247 freshman applications the previous year. Of those, they admitted 1,452 students to the freshman class.

  I sat in my lab with my laptop open, looking over the steps of the application process and wondering how I’d possibly been so cavalier about my acceptance. Even with all the effort I’d put in, my odds weren’t great.

  It hit me that I needed to think about backup schools. I needed options.

  I sat back in my chair and tried to imagine a life where I didn’t attend MIT. It wasn’t as devastating as I would’ve once thought. I’d be upset about being rejected, but it wouldn’t kill me. If nothing else, in recent months I’d learned that not everything needed to be exactly what I’d envisioned. There were many different ways life could turn out favorably.

  A knock on the lab door jarred me from my reverie. I shut my laptop, opened the door, and froze.

  It was J. Quincy Oswald.

  At my lab.

  “Oswald,” I said.

  He grinned. “You ever gonna call me Oz?”

  “No,” I replied flatly.

  Oswald wasn’t deterred. He pushed into the lab and settled in my desk chair, casually crossing his legs.

  “What do you want?” I asked.

  I felt at odds. How dare he waltz into my space like he belonged here? How dare he even speak to me after what happened the last time we saw each other? Yet, at the same time, I was curious. What did he want? Did he intend to discuss Arden, try to convince me not to go to the police?

  “You and I gotta talk,” he said.

  I didn’t move from where I stood by the door. “I’m listening.”

  “The time has come.”