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when her father’s tires screeched in the driveway, when his boots
stamping on the front porch gave advance notice that he’d been
let go from yet another cookie-cutter factory job. Ellen didn’t
have much to work with: tube-squeezed vegetables formed a
border for chicken drained from a can. Not the stuff monthsin-advance
reservations are made of by any means, but she’d
compensated through attention to detail. The table was laid out
perfectly, everything arranged so precisely it looked as though
she’d measured out the proportions with a ruler. The silverware
was centered on napkins folded at protractor-sharp angles, while
water glasses orbited the plates at such symmetrical distances
they might have controlled tides. Ellen felt no pull towards humility
regarding her work. These things were difficult to accomplish
this far out in the cosmos.
And yet, he wasn’t home.
The first night after launch, he’d sat her down in the tiny
living room, belts cinched tightly around their waists lest they
go floating off the couch, and explained how difficult it would be
for him to support the two of them, working contract labor in a
market unbound by the old restrictions of the upper atmosphere.
Some nights I won’t make it home, he’d said, but you don’t
have to worry. She’d nodded and believed herself when she told
him that it would be fine.
As the following night wore on, hours since he’d disembarked
from the rear bay to inquire after a job somewhere in the
Virgo Stellar Stream, Ellen hadn’t been able to sleep. She sat up in
the living room, reading one of the few books they’d been able to
bring along.
Susan, who occupied the other half of the ship with her
husband, was walking along the hallway outside the living room,
which served as an invisible divider between the two halves of the
ship. She stopped and watched Ellen silently for a few moments,
then cleared her throat. Ellen looked up at her.
He not back yet Susan had asked.
No, Ellen said, and grinned a grin that disappeared quickly,
like a half-moon not quite luminous enough to break through
February 2014 37