Interesting Facts About Space (eBook)

CHAPTER TWO

I punch my curtains. I brace myself to hit an intruder behind the fabric, standing flush to the wall. I find no one. I slam the window shut. A corner of my towel snags where the pane meets the sill. I yank until the window unclutches my terry cloth. I get down on my knees and inspect beneath my bed. I prepare myself mentally to confront a face staring back at me, but instead discover nothing but a half-empty Gatorade bottle, a graphic T-shirt I thought I lost, gross masses of dust and hair, and a condom.

What the fuck? Why is there a condom? I reach for it.

Never mind. It was a discarded sucker. I didn’t see the stick.

Polly is searching with me. She says, “Do you really think someone came in here?”

“Maybe not, but why take the chance?”

I tear the wrapper off the old sucker and put it in my mouth. It’s lemon.

Polly has my closet door open. She is rooting around inside, searching for a trespasser among my button-downs and sweaters.

“Do you knit?” she asks.

“No, my mom does.” I glare around my apartment, expecting to spot a lampshade placed over a man standing stiff and still, trying to be inconspicuous.

“Did she make you all these sweaters? Wow. There’s a little solar system knitted into this one! I love these. Did she make you all of—”

I shush her.

We stand silently while I keep my pointer finger in the “shh” position before my lips. I cup my other hand around my good ear, listening intently for rustling or breathing. I hear nothing but my refrigerator hum.

After about eighty seconds of silence, Polly whispers, “I should go.”

Cold drops from my wet hair are soaking the shoulders of my T-shirt. I shudder. The air outside is brisk. It’s the end of August, and the sun is setting. The sky is orange and there are no stars visible yet—just Venus and the moon.

Polly and I are saying goodbye on the sidewalk. She’s hugging me. I did not realize until we had already been hugging for a while that my arms were hanging limp at my sides. I hold her quickly for the end of the embrace. As we release each other, she locks eyes with me. I look at the streetlights reflected in her irises, rather than truly at her, while she says, “Thank you,” in a tone so sincere it almost makes me flinch.

As she drives away, I sit down on the concrete step at the front of my building. I put my headphones in. I always put both headphones in, despite my deaf ear. Headphones serve more than one purpose. I don’t just wear them to listen to my murder podcast. I also wear them to prevent people from talking to me. Having one headphone in signals that I am open to small talk, or to having my shoulder tapped on. I am not, so I put in both.

I click play on the next episode. I feel all my muscles unclench. Nothing puts me at ease more than hearing someone calmly discuss homicide. They don’t scream, cry, or retch while they detail the worst horrors humans are capable of. Instead, they say, “Ralph decapitated his wife, and this episode is sponsored by GOOD LUNCH, a weekly delivery box of preportioned ingredients for your tasty lunches.” It makes me feel safe, like there’s no reason to panic. Sure, women get their heads chopped off by men who vowed to love them forever, but we can still plan to eat Atlantic salmon on basmati rice next week.

This episode is the first in a series about Ted Bundy. I’m already well acquainted with Ted, but I don’t mind hearing the same story over and over. In fact, I prefer it. I like knowing what happens. I feel more control over it. As the host reintroduces me to Ted, I copy a block of writing I keep saved in my Notes app and text it to Joan.

Hey, this has nothing to do with you, but I need a little space, so I am no longer dating. Sorry if this is weird, or coming out of the blue, I just wanted to let you know. Again, nothing to do with you. I really like you, and I would love to stay friends if you would.

Almost immediately, she replies,

k.

I read her text twice before standing up and putting my phone in my back pocket. I trudge to the front door of my building, swing it open, and gasp.

I unexpectedly unveiled a woman and her child standing in the doorframe. The woman is reaching for the doorknob that I got to first. After gathering myself, I hold the door open for them. I smile as they exit, flustered.

I hate being startled. I prefer controlled forms of fear. I like my podcasts, horror movies, and ghost stories that I can pause and rewind. I handle fear sort of like a warhorse. I could charge bravely into a planned battle, take in the sights of bombs and corpses, but I would still be spooked by an unanticipated barn rat.

“There’s a great red spot on Jupiter,” I tell my mom. We’re on the phone. About five minutes ago, I got a push notification reminding me that tomorrow is my half sister’s party. I tend to call my mom when I’m reminded of my sisters. I feel guilty interacting with them. I consider their existence a great red spot on my mom’s life.

“It’s an enormous storm,” I explain. “It’s a vortex big enough to engulf Earth. It’s been raging for centuries. There are records of it being seen over three hundred and fifty years ago. On Earth, hurricanes slow down when they reach solid land, but there is no solid surface on Jupiter.”

“There isn’t? What’s Jupiter made of?”

“Mostly hydrogen and helium. It’s a cloud.”

“So is the spot permanent?”

“That’s hard to say. It shrinks and grows. Sometimes it changes color. It gets intensely red. It might go away someday, but yes. It could last as long as the planet.”

“Fascinating,” she says. “Space is so interesting, isn’t it?”

“Yeah,” I say while I tap ignore on another reminder about the party tomorrow. “Did you know light travels 186,000 miles a second?”

“Does it really?”

“Yes. The moon is 238,855 miles away, so it takes 1.3 seconds for light to travel from it to us. That means when we look at the moon, we don’t really see it as it is. We see it as it was 1.3 seconds ago.”

“Boy, that’s neat, isn’t it?” she says.

“Because of how far away the sun is, we see it eight minutes ago. Depending on the orbit, we see Mars as it was three minutes ago, or twenty when it’s further away. Saturn is an hour. Our nearest star is four years. The Andromeda galaxy is 2.5 million years.”

“Wow,” she says. “That is hard to wrap your head around, isn’t it?”

“It is possible that some life force light-years away is watching us now but seeing us in the past. Or they could see us now in the future, millions of years from now, depending on where they are, and their technology.”

“Shall we wave?”

“They shouldn’t be able to see us wave,” I say. “Because we’re inside. Are you inside?”

“Yes, I’m inside, and oh, that’s a relief. So, it’s safe to say that no one could be watching us when we are inside our homes?”

I look at my window.

“Enid?”

“Yes?”

“What else do you know about space?”

I clear my throat. “Well, space is how we could see back in time. If we could travel faster than light, and if Earth gave off enough of it, and we had some innovative telescope, that is how we could see our past. We could look back and see the dinosaurs. We could watch the meteor hit.”

“That’s incredible, wow. Though I think I would rather watch the time when you were a little girl. I’d prefer not to see the dinosaurs die.”

The comforting lull of my murder podcast is rocking me to sleep. I am lying on my side, clutching my knees to my chest, heeding the familiar tale of Ted Bundy. I feel myself drift in and out of sleep. I dream of my mom reading me a bedtime story.

In a green, green room there was a telephone. And a red balloon. And a picture of Ted Bundy with his unibrow. There were three little bears, sitting on chairs, and at least twenty victims. And a little toy house, and a young mouse, and a comb and a brush and corpse made of mush. And a bald man whispering “hush.” Goodnight moon, goodnight tomb.

I have frequent nightmares. It’s been an ongoing issue since I was a kid. Once, I dreamed the sun exploded. I saw it fill the sky, turn red, and boil the oceans. I held a Barbie in my hands and watched her face melt. I woke up in tears, beside myself. Rather than shout “Mom!” or run to her room, I yanked my blankets over my head and thrust my face into my pillows so she wouldn’t hear me cry.

“When the sun explodes,” I tell my mom over the phone in the morning, “it’ll take eight minutes for Earth to know. Because of what I said last night about space and time.”

I called her again. I woke up to another reminder in my phone about my half sister’s party.

“When can we expect that to happen?” she asks.

“In about five to seven billion years.”

My coffee maker is percolating.

“Have you had your coffee yet?” I ask.

“No, I think I’m out of beans.”

“Do you have...