Atmosphere

by Taylor Jenkins Reid

The human body—intelligent as it is—was formed in response to the atmosphere of Earth.

So it came as a huge shock to the men in the department, many of whom fancied themselves secretly destined for victory, to see that the woman they’d overlooked was lapping them in a race they did not know had started.

To do something so few people have ever done? No one will ever be able to take that away from us. If we do it, if we leave the planet, we will carry that with us into every room we enter for the rest of our lives.”

Astronomy was history. Because space was time. And that was the thing she loved most about the universe itself. When you look at the red star Antares in the southern sky, you are looking over thirty-three hundred trillion miles away. But you are also looking more than five hundred and fifty years into the past. Antares is so far away that its light takes five hundred and fifty years to reach your eye on Earth. Five hundred and fifty light-years away. So when you look out at the sky, the farther you can see, the further back you are looking in time. The space between you and the star is time.

To look up at the nighttime sky is to become a part of a long line of people throughout human history who looked above at that same set of stars. It is to witness time unfolding.

“Don’t thank me for doing the bare minimum,” he said. “It does a disservice to us both.”

Bravery is being unafraid of something other people are afraid of. Courage is being afraid, but strong enough to do it anyway.”

My God, she thought, what else can I do?

That’s part of what I love about astronomy. When we learn about the constellations, we also learn how earlier generations made sense of the world. The stars are connected to so many other elements of our life.

“That’s what made me fall in love with astronomy as a kid,” she said. “That the night sky is a map, and once you know how to read it, it will always be there. You’ll never be lost.”

“Sometimes I don’t know if I knew my dad or I just created a man out of thin air, as a god to pray to.”

Admitting you were afraid always took more guts than pretending you weren’t. Being willing to make a mistake got you further than never trying. The world had decided that to be fallible was weak. But we are all fallible. The strong ones are the ones who accept it.

Waiting at home and making dinner every night? My mom is so good at that stuff, but I never looked at her and saw myself. I know that hurt her feelings. I know that me choosing a different life didn’t quite make sense to her at first. But I think choosing that other life, her life, would have been very hard. I think it would have been one of the hardest things I’d had to do. I chose the only life I knew how to choose.”

you are so curious about everything. Not just about the planets and galaxies and the stars. But Earth. About the people on it. That’s what I admire.” “My curiosity?” “Your commitment to the world around you. How much you care. You are so thoughtful. About everything.”

“It’s 1981, and I’m done pretending sexist jokes are funny just so men will give me a chance at something I’m probably better at than they are.”

“I want to take you everywhere. And do everything with you. And ask you every single question that’s been on my mind for months. And I want to know when you knew what was happening between us and I want to tell you when I knew. And I want to hold your hand in a quiet corner and I want to lie in bed and hear your heartbeat through your chest. I want to bring you coffee in bed. And I want to hear you tell me anything you’ve always wanted to tell someone. Because you know that you’ve met someone who desperately wants to listen.”

smile. In all of her time spent watching others, she hadn’t picked up on this part of falling in love, that someone could look at you as if you were the very center of everything. And even though you knew better, you’d allow yourself a moment to believe you were worthy of being revolved around, too.

it had shocked Joan just how much physical pain there was in loving someone like this.

How was it, exactly, that two people could scar each other like that and keep going? In fact, go deeper?

the incurable problem with life was that nothing was ever in balance.

“Happiness is so hard to come by. I don’t understand why anyone would begrudge anyone else for managing to find some of it.”

“If that can be enough for you,” Vanessa said, “it’s yours until the day I die.”

was like being handed a gift you had wanted desperately five years ago.

“I was circling two hundred miles above the Earth, and all I wanted was to get home and see you. Do you understand that? Do you understand that I don’t care how big or small this world is, that you are the center of mine? Do you understand that, to someone, you are everything that matters on this entire planet?”

Joan understands that God gave her something spectacular. A love, and a life, beyond the confines of her imagination.