Atmosphere

by Taylor Jenkins Reid

But I think it is also the relief I feel that those stars are immovable. Nothing you or I could do will ever alter them. They are so much bigger than us. And they will not change within our lifetime. We can succeed or fail, get it right or get it wrong, love and lose the ones we love, and still the Summer Triangle will point south. And in that way, I know everything will be some type of okay—as impossible as that can seem sometimes.

Human intelligence and curiosity, our persistence and resilience, our capacity for long-term planning, and our ability to collaborate have led the human race here.

‘You have to have something on the line, for it to be called character.’ ”

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.

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

“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.”

“I’ve always felt like, when I look at the stars, I am reminded that I am never alone,”

“Well, we are the stars,” Joan said. “And the stars are us. Every

Because the world had decided that to be soft was to be weak, even though in Joan’s experience being soft and flexible was always more durable than being hard and brittle. 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.

Of course men were uninteresting to her. They were fundamentally uninteresting. We are interesting.

She was overwhelmed with love for him. Love in the sense that she trusted him, and saw all the good in his heart, and cared about him and wanted only good things to ever happen to him. Love in the sense that she would always be on his side, even if he was wrong, in the sense that he was one of the people on this Earth she believed in. And in that moment, the swelling in her heart was unbearable. Absolutely unbearable.

“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.”

“The whole sky makes sense to me now,” Vanessa said. “Because of you.” And Joan thought, Oh no. Oh no. Oh no. Oh no.

“Flight, Surgeon. John Griffin is dead.”

“I’m begging you to tell me not to,” Vanessa said. “Please. Tell me I’m wasting my time. Tell me I’m crazy. Put me out of my misery, Joan. Can you do that?” Joan looked at her. “I can’t tell you that.” Vanessa stared at her. “And I don’t want to tell you that.” Vanessa held her gaze a moment longer and then pushed Joan up against the door and kissed her. Joan put her hands on Vanessa’s face and kissed her back.

“I love you, you know.”

“I love you, too.” “You do, huh?” Vanessa said with her lopsided smile. “Wow. Imagine being so lucky as to be the girl Joan Goodwin loves.” “Imagine that,” Joan said,

“I haven’t had a dream about my funeral in months.” “Really?” Joan said. “I wonder why.” And Vanessa, as she buried her head in Joan’s neck, said, “You.”

“Vanessa,” Joan said. “I want to do this forever.” Vanessa turned to Joan and smiled. And then kissed her temple and said, “Wouldn’t that be something?”

But to love Frances was to be always saying goodbye to the girl Frances used to be and falling in love again with the girl Frances was becoming.

Barbara inhaled sharply. And then she held out her hand for Joan to see. “I’m surprised you haven’t congratulated me yet,” she said. Joan looked at the ring and pretended to see it for the first time. “Oh, my God, Barb, it’s gorgeous.” “Thanks—it’s five carats.”

She’d done it. She’d been assigned a mission. The first mission of her group. She was going to space.

Joan simply stood there, staring at her, wondering how it was so easy for Barbara to stick a knife in someone and then carry on with the mundanity of her day.

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

“I don’t think you had any say over whether or not I loved you,” Joan said. “I don’t even think I had any say in it. It happened without me even giving myself permission.”

“Because today, at the wedding, I realized I would marry you,” Vanessa said. Joan turned to her. My God, who could care about the stars when there was her to look at? “I would marry you in a second,” Vanessa went on. “I’ve never felt that way about anyone. In my entire life. What am I even doing here? At your sister’s wedding? Meeting your parents? This was a stupid thing to do. To come here. But I…want to be a part of your life in every way I can.”

“I would give you anything,” Vanessa said, “if it wasn’t going to cost us everything.”

“I can wake up every single day and choose you, over and over and over again. If you’re in bed next to me, I will take your hand. If you are not, I will go find you. I will spend the rest of my life, if I get that lucky, seeking you out. Not because I promised you or because you’re there. But because I will want to. I will want to be beside you. Every day. Forever.”

“Every morning, I wake up and I think, ‘God, yes, her.’ ”

“STS-LR9. Steve’s my commander. It’s him, Hank, Griff, Lydia, and me. Right after Christmas ’84, six weeks after you.”

“Do you think maybe she’s just feeling left out? Of your new life?” Barbara was silent for such a long pause that Joan thought the line had disconnected. “Hello?” “She’s ten years old,” Barbara said. “She’s not part of my adult life.”

“How is Vanessa like Atreyu?” Joan asked. “Because,” Frances said, looking at Vanessa, “you are the sort of person who would do anything to save the kingdom.” And then: “Don’t you think, Joanie?”

Donna stared at them. When they snapped out of it—when Joan finally saw Donna’s face—she could see that Donna was holding back a smile. Donna had a brightness in her eyes that Joan interpreted immediately. Donna knew. Donna knew and she had, perhaps, long known. And she didn’t care.

“But she can’t see that. All she can see is that he showed up and you suddenly stopped paying attention to her.” “I swear, sometimes you act just like a child,” Barbara said.

The world was full of Barbaras. That was the whole problem.

But Joan would never be able to forgive Barbara for not loving Joan as Joan had loved her. For not knowing how to love Frances as Joan loved her.

“Hard to believe any one person has any significance,” he said. “I knew that before, but I never knew it, until now. Human life is…meaningless.”

“Listen to me,” Joan said. “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, what am I supposed to do? Daniel has never wanted kids, but he said he was happy to try to be a stepdad. And he tried. He really tried. She made it impossible!” “Why would you marry a man who doesn’t want kids? You have a kid!”

“I mean it!” Barbara said. “She has never liked me as much as she likes you. The two of you, with your special bond. You can have each other, as far as I’m concerned. You can go be happy together, without me to look down on.”

“Write a letter to the school giving me the power to make decisions for her and take her from the school,” Joan said. “Do it now.”

“You will call her tomorrow to wish her a happy Thanksgiving from the airport. If you don’t, I will call your hotel every hour on the hour until you get on the phone. Do you hear me? I think we both know Daniel won’t be happy with you if this gets messy. So if I were you, I’d call before noon and I’d stay on the phone for ten minutes and I’d make it count.”

Thanks for treating me like I wouldn’t call my own daughter on Thanksgiving. Wow, I’m such a monster.” “I think that maybe you are a monster,”

“Thank you.” “Don’t thank me, babe. I should be thanking you, for the gift it is to be around you.”

“Listen, Frances Emerson Goodwin,” Joan said, holding Frances by the chin and making her look at her. “I will love you until the day I die, do you hear me? There is nothing you could do or say or think or feel that would change that. I am yours to fall back on, forever. “You make my life worth something. And I can promise you with my entire body that you will never be alone. Every day, you can wake up and go to bed knowing there is someone whose heart is bursting, barely able to contain how much they love you. I know you’re my niece, Frances. But you have always, too, been mine.”

“They know,” Joan said, finally. “What?” “They know. NASA knows.”

“I listened to you. And you wouldn’t let me talk. But now it’s my turn. And you don’t get to talk. My answer is no. Absolutely not. I don’t care what Antonio said. I don’t care what they can take from me. I don’t care if they never let me set foot in the fucking space shuttle ever again. No. I will not leave you and Frances. I will not. And you don’t get to tell me what to do.”

“But you might lose everything you dreamed of.” “Then I’ll lose it,” Vanessa said. “Let them take it. Just don’t let them take you.”

“I don’t know what’s going to happen,” Vanessa said. “But if it’s you or the space shuttle…fuck the space shuttle.”