Relativity (44 page)

The taxi pulled up at the curb.

Absently, Mark took her hand. “I'm so sorry, Claire. I'm sorry for all of it.”

She nodded but her mind went blank. She couldn't think of anything to say.

He pointed at the sky. “You'll always be my constant.”

His smile was bright and hopeful; Claire saw a glimpse of the man she once loved. A recollection of love, rather than love itself.

Mark quickly got into the taxi; the door slammed behind him. As the car made a U-turn in front of the hospital, she wiped away a tear. She could just identify the outline of his head through the tinted window. He looked directly at her but she couldn't see his face. The air was dry; she inhaled sharply. Then Claire watched the car recede into the distance before it turned the corner, driving away from her sight.

Ω

CLAIRE WALKED BACK
upstairs to the ward. Ethan was snoring, lost in a painkiller-induced deep sleep. Her eyes fell on the skin below his bandages, an arch of stitches that swept around the back of his head: an embroidered rainbow. Rain pelted against the window. Passing cars splashed water into the air.

During the night, Ethan kept crying out in pain. Claire had held his hands to stop him from scratching his stitches. Once he'd calmed down, she drifted off on the armchair by his bed. Claire dreamed she was dancing en pointe. In her dream, her body floated effortlessly through the air, surfacing from the chrysalis of skin and bone. When she woke up early the following morning, she suddenly felt lighter than she had in a very long time.

Later, Ethan stirred. He wriggled his legs out of the sheets and stretched his arms before noticing the look on his mum's face. “Mum, what's wrong? Are you sad because of Quark?” Ethan was silent for a moment. “Are you still sad because of Dad?”

She shook her head, then nodded.

“I think maybe I'm still sad about Dad too.”

“Pumpkin, of course you are. It's okay to feel sad. But you know what? It gets better, I promise you. I know how sad you feel, because I've felt that sad too. The worst pain you've felt in your life feels the same as the worst pain I've felt. Relativity isn't just about space or time.”

Ethan propped himself up and rested his chin on his mum's shoulder. He smelled of bandage adhesive and disinfectant. “According to that theory, it works for the best thing too.” He started to play with her hair. “Mum, I'm sorry about the time machine.”

Claire collected his limbs into her arms, pulling his weight toward her own. He looked so funny without his hair. “It's okay. Although we don't have a vacuum cleaner or a toaster anymore.” She kissed her son's forehead. “Doesn't matter, I'm just happy you're okay. I love you.”

“I love you more.” Ethan scratched his nose. “Mum, I'm hungry. Can we get pizza?”

She laughed. “Maybe later.”

As Claire hugged him, she felt his heart beating. She was reminded of her first ultrasound, the moment she'd first heard the flurry of his heartbeat—that rapid booming song of life growing inside her uterus. Her baby was only as big as a pear then, a lump, but at that moment, everything else fell away. Nothing was ever going to be as important as that lump. She'd never quite be able to tell Ethan that he was the real love of her life.

The hospital seemed brighter now—its walls relaxed, the ceiling rose, the ward looked fresh and airy instead of antiseptic and stale. Clarity charged through Claire's head. She didn't feel worried anymore; this was only a temporary pit stop. Soon she'd be able to take her son home. She tucked him back into bed.

Outside, the sun was blinding; white light fell on her lap. Rush-hour traffic clogged the road. To Claire, High Street in Randwick had always been stained by the past that she'd never seen it properly. Trees along the pavement grew taller, sunlight kept glinting through leaves. Walls were revitalized by fresh coats of paint—cheery greens, buoyant blues, blazing yellows. Shiny new wings were built; new patrons donated their money and time. This place didn't just hold bad news, trauma, and pain. It offered people hope. Cured them, fixed them, performed miracles. Brought families closer together.

Because even if Ethan had built a time machine, Claire wouldn't take any of it back. She didn't want to change history or tie her loose ends. Because the past was just a measurement of the person she'd become. Because love—even the most dangerous and volatile love—could become the solid foundation for something else. The most difficult steps in the choreography were always the most memorable of the dance. Sometimes the wake of a broken heart was just the winding path we needed to follow to get to where we ultimately needed to be: somewhere bigger, massive, thrust forward by the tiniest smashed-up pieces of the building blocks of the universe.

Ω

STORM FRONTS
delayed Mark's flight. He sat at the airport bar. Announcements boomed over loudspeakers: all flights were grounded until the front had passed. On flat-screen televisions behind the bar, the evening news was showing without sound. He watched the muted faces of reporters, wondering what they were saying about the prime minister now. Same shit on every channel: same stories, same faces, same exclusive breaking news.

A woman sitting beside Mark at the bar looked across at him. “Where are you off to?” she asked. She closed her book. Quite an attractive woman, with olive skin and dark hair. Mark noticed her lips were wet from her drink.

“Home,” he said.

The woman smiled. “And where's that?”

“Kalgoorlie.”

“Long way.”

Mark nodded. “What about you?”

She took a sip of her drink. “Brisbane. Was just here visiting some family.”

“Yeah, me too.”

The woman examined her boarding pass. “Not easy, is it? Leaving the people you love behind.”

“Nope.” Mark didn't want to continue this conversation; it wouldn't lead anywhere he wanted it to go. What could he say about the people he loved? “Not easy” was an understatement. He ordered another drink, hoping it would take him further and further away from his thoughts. Drown them out in a pool of shimmering liquor.

“Well,” said the woman as she gathered her things. “Have a safe flight.”

Mark held up his glass. “You too.”

Eventually, his flight boarded. He took his seat, over the wing. As they prepared to take off, Mark closed his eyes and listened to the engines roar. Wheels turned; they reversed out of the gate and headed down the runway. Picking up speed, the plane accelerated toward the tip of the port. Mark worried they weren't going fast enough, but remembered bad weather meant takeoff speeds were relative to the motion of the air.

Suddenly, they lifted off the ground. Takeoff always made Mark feel triumphant, how this heavy machine could defy fundamental physics—like gravity didn't apply. He shut the blind, blocking out the shrinking view of Sydney as they climbed above the city.

He thought of his father, wondered if coming back home had been a mistake. Had it made any difference? Maybe he should've ignored Tom's call. Dad hadn't wanted Mark, he'd wanted his grandson, he'd wanted Ethan. And Mark just let him down again; John had died without getting his final wish. They'd never resolved their differences or repaired their relationship. Unsettling feelings gnawed at him. Closure was fiction, it didn't exist.

Inside the plane's hull, it was quiet now. Mark wished the cabin crew would make an announcement, or other passengers would wander noisily down the aisle. There were too many thoughts inside his head, too much rarefied air in his lungs. He needed another drink. Cabin lights dimmed but the seat belt sign was still illuminated. Nose to the sky, they continued their ascent.

Mark pulled the blind open. A red light flashed on the tip of the wing. Below them, Sydney's lights had condensed into a neon dot; the wide harbor was now just a puddle. But the city looked different somehow, full of sparkle and life.

The voice of the captain crackled through the cabin. “Ladies and gentlemen, we're about to fly into an area of unexpected turbulence. Please remain in your seats and keep your seat belt fastened.”

Through the bumps and drops of turbulence, Mark pictured the mechanics of the plane failing. Something inside him craved emergency; he deserved disaster. He imagined shrieks of terror from other passengers ringing in his ears. Beeps and pings, lights on the floor, oxygen masks tumbling down. Flight attendants stumbling through the swaying ribbons of decompressing air, staggering backward to the safety of their seats. Mark braced for impact.

Who would miss him if he died? What regrets would he list, looking death in the face? Mark immediately thought of Ethan, of the irreverent helix of DNA. Stomachs plunged, propellers halted, engines powered down—now they were dropping out of the atmosphere. Gravity was winning. Bathed in darkness, Mark would disappear into the infinite roar of the sky, where the unforgiving altitude swallowed him alive.

A bell chimed. “The captain has now turned off the seat belt sign. You're free to move around the cabin.”

Hundreds of belts unclicked. Mark opened his eyes. The aircraft stabilized, its engine hummed, holding it in the air. Turbulence had passed. He switched his cell phone back on.

There were three photographs of Ethan on his phone. In the first picture, the boy stood inside the rotunda at Observatory Hill Park; in another, he leaned against the trunk of an old fig tree. The Moreton Bay fig reminded Mark of his mother; she was obsessed with their majestic buttress roots. She loved their darkness, how strangler figs planted their seeds in the canopy of another tree. Once their roots were deep in the ground, they asphyxiated their host. It saddened him to think she'd never met Ethan. Like a Moreton Bay fig, her cancer strangled its host too.

Ethan took the last photo himself. A selfie, whatever the kids these days called it. He'd quickly grabbed Mark's phone and taken a candid shot of the two of them. Mark looked surprised, caught off guard. Ethan's grin was so wide he squinted. The sides of their faces were touching.

Looking at that photograph, nobody would know how much damage had unfolded between them. But Mark knew. He couldn't undo it. He'd shaken that baby—his son, his flesh and blood. No matter how much he suppressed the memory, altered his version of events, buried the truth, the damage would always be there. He didn't deserve Ethan's wide smile.

Carts blocked the aisles. A flight attendant handed Mark some whiskey and a green can of ginger ale. Clicking open the aluminum can—its hiss of carbonation—suddenly reminded Mark of Kate Levy sitting in the prison visitors' room, sipping vending-machine soft drinks through a straw. It confused him at first, but if he was honest with himself, Mark knew exactly why that investigative reporter never came back to see him. Why she never finished writing the story. It was the evidence: somehow she'd gotten her hands on it. Even the most opinionated shaken baby syndrome critics, champions of wrongful incarcerations and diagnostic flaws, couldn't deny his case's evidence. His baby's injuries were too atrocious to be accidental. No vitamin deficiency or congenital disease caused that sort of harm.

He carefully studied the three pictures of Ethan on his phone. Such a good kid, smart. Mark already missed his voice, his face, his curiosity. He took a deep swig of liquor from the plastic cup. His son's smile made his heart leap from his chest but it also made Mark feel like he couldn't breathe. If he erased Ethan's face, that smile would never haunt him. For a few seconds, his finger hovered over the trash icon. But Mark couldn't delete the pictures. Those pixels were more precious than anything he'd ever owned. He returned the phone to his pocket.

Mark rested his face against the window. Above the blanket of clouds, tinted blue by a scattering of moonlight, thousands of crisp stars decorated the night. Pinpricks of light fell through the sky. East to west, the horizon was dotted with hundreds of stories: the cooking fires of two celestial brothers, Achernar and Canopus; the male crow Wah, bringing flames to the indigenous people; the flying horse Pegasus; Aphrodite and Eros in the constellation Pisces. Irregular galaxies, blue dust clouds. Somewhere in that sky was another ancient myth: the star he'd given Claire.

Mark knew he'd had—and lost—some inconceivable thing. Like grasping for a scientific breakthrough just out of his reach, he'd touched it. Grazed it with his fingertip. But it didn't belong to him. He recentered himself in the chair. Perhaps circumstances had thwarted him; he'd never discovered an original idea, made his mark. Mark decided he'd failed and had shrunk his ambitions accordingly. But he'd never held himself accountable either; he'd just stopped trying. He chose to fail. Ethan reminded him of the importance of curiosity, of ideas, of exploration, of the allure of unfinished problems. To step back and wonder. To ask questions and make mistakes, fearlessly, like a child.

He took his phone out again and stared at Ethan's face. To look at something was to change it, and be changed by it. As the plane tilted in the sky, his universe realigned. Mark wasn't actually at its center, his hardwired orientation was wrong. Something had shifted. Everywhere around him, protons, neutrons, and electrons were spinning and fusing, but most of the universe was made of dark energy and dark matter—stuff he couldn't see. He'd forgotten why he fell in love with physics in the first place: its certainty didn't make it interesting; it was the discovery. The beauty of the unknown.

In scientific law, variables were always relative. Mark pulled up his sleeve and rubbed the faded tattoo on his arm, looking at each element in the formula.

E for Ethan. M for Mark. C for Claire.

Mark and Ethan were bound together by a constant; they were elegantly linked by the speed of light. Mass equals energy equivalence. Affect one, change the other. Even if they lived on opposites sides of the country, didn't see each other again for another twelve years, father and son would be connected forever. Mark remembered that he wasn't absolute: he was still part of a single entity. Ethan would always be the product of his parents—E=mc
²
—and Mark could never stop being one piece of that equation.