The Astronaut's Wife (17 page)

In the middle of the desk was a videotape with a Post-it note stuck to it. It read: “For Jillian.” Just as she picked it up the lights in the storage facility clicked off.
There was utter darkness for a second or two, then the dim yellow security lights kicked in. Jillian was spooked and dashed out of the storage locker, running through the maze of corridors until she found the welcoming light in front of the elevator. She punched the call button and stood in the dim light listening to her breathing, silently begging the elevator to arrive.
The elevator slid open and Jillian started to throw herself into it, but instead found herself face-to-face with a young couple pushing a large pallet piled high with storage boxes.
“Getting off,” said the man.
Jillian stepped back. “Sorry,” she mumbled.
They pushed-their burden out on to the floor, the woman hitting the button that turned on all the lights. Trying to calm herself down, Jillian stepped into the elevator and the door closed. The panic did not sink. She was alone in the big metal box and she clutched the videotape, her arms wrapped around her belly. She was deathly afraid and she did not have the slightest idea of what.

She knew she was afraid of the videotape—but she also knew that she had to see what was on it. But Jillian steeled herself, pushed the videotape into the VCR, took the remote control, sat on the couch, and hit the play button.

There was a flash of static then an image. Sherman Reese’s hotel room. Sherman stepped in front of the camera. It was plain that he was very nervous. His laptop computer was open on the bed next to him and he glanced
at
it from moment to moment.

Sherman spoke directly into the camera. “It’s a joke, right... But if you’re watching this tape, then I never got to that meeting with you. If you are watching this tape, Mrs. Armacost, then I am probably flicking dead. This is the backup. That’s what they always taught us at NASA,” he said. “Always make sure you have a backup. This is mine..
_.“
He paused a moment, as if thinking about his own mortality. Then he gazed steadily into the camera lens. “I’m not crazy,” Reese said. “I wish I were. I prayed I was, but I’m not.” He paused again. “I’ve been thinking
you
might be thinking that you’re crazy, too. How could you not? I mean, after all that’s happened..
_.“

It was as if that speech was a little prologue, an introduction to what happened next. From the pocket of his suit coat he pulled another small tape recorder, one identical to the one she had carried away from him and smashed.

It was as if Reese knew what she was thinking. He smiled crookedly. “I told you... always have a backup.” He plugged the recorder into his laptop and hit the play button. The first voice she heard was Reese’s own.

“There are two voices on the tape you are going
to hear, Mrs. Armacost. Your husband’s and that of Captain Streck.”
The sonic response lines of the noise on the tape showed on the laptop screen.
Spencer spoke first: “I’m going to rotate the main panel forty-eight degrees. You got me, Alex?”
Alex Streck’s voice replied. “That’s good to go, Spencer. I’ll need the 9c spanner as soon as... Spencer? You feel that?”
Reese pointed to his laptop screen. “Now, you see, this line here is your husband’s voice. This line here is Captain Streck’s,” he said professorially.
Spencer’s voice came next. It was high and panicky. She knew it was her husband, but she had never heard him like that before. “Alex? Jesus.
Alex?
What the—”
Reese pointed to the third line. “Two voices but there are three lines. There’s something else on this tape. Something we can’t hear. Something out of our range. But... I translated it. I had to hear it.. This is what it sounds like.”
As she listened the squalor and disappointment that had become Sherman Reese’s life vanished. Instead, he was his old self, the precise, NASA-trained scientist.
Reese typed a code into the laptop, and from the speakers came that sound, the insect screaming, the horrible. shrieking. The terrible noise hit Jillian like a hot bullet.
Reese killed the sound and then turned back to face the camera. “Now, NASA said it was static.
They said it was caused by the exploding satellite.” Jillian had reached her own conclusion. “It’s
not
static,” she whispered.
“NASA said it was a static buildup in their suits,” said Reese. “But it’s not static. I tracked it. It didn’t come from the satellite. It didn’t come from the suits. It didn’t come from the shuttle.” Reese’s cool seemed to ebb.
“It didn’t come from earth either,” he said nervously. “Two minutes. That’s all there is. That’s all it took. It’s a transmission, Mrs. Armacost. If you wanted to come here, to earth. I mean, from very far away... maybe you wouldn’t have to travel in a ship... maybe you could travel in a transmission. Travel at the speed of light. Like a thought. You wait for two humans to be up there...two of us in orbit, near a target. With something to aim at, like a satellite...”
Jillian was hanging on every word, staring hard at the screen. The story he was telling was so much worse than she ever imagined, she could hardly believe it.
“Two of us who are beyond suspicion,” Reese continued. “Heroes. All-Americans. You wait for a pair like them then
_{. .}
.erase them like a tape and record your own message.”
Jillian didn’t think she could hear any more. The truth was too awful to bear.
“Natalie Streck knew it,” said Reese. “And you know it, too, don’t you? He is not your husband anymore. He’s not. You know he’s not.” He looked square ‘into the camera lens. “Don’t you?”
Reese seemed pleased that he had proven his case. He went back to his professorial mode. “That satellite they were supposed to be repairing—they weren’t repairing it, they were deploying it—you know what that was for? It was designed to listen for transmissions from deep space. It was supposed to look for anything, anything coming from there at all. It was just supposed to listen.” Reese laughed a little and shook his head ruefully.
“NASA thinks it failed. They .think it didn’t work. We know it worked. Don’t we?”
Suddenly. Reese stopped talking. He appeared to listen to something beyond the view of the lens, then, without warning he jumped up, and ran from the frame. There was the sound of fumbling and static as the camera was shut down and the screen of Jillian’s television set went blank. She did not move, staring at the gray snow, even though the disturbing, hair-raising “show” appeared to have come to an end.
But it hadn’t ended. Abruptly the static cleared and Reese re-entered the frame. It looked as if some time had passed and Sherman looked a little worse for wear. He was holding a blueprint in his hand and he waved it at the camera.
“There’s no computer to run that plane,” Reese said. “It hasn’t been designed yet.” He unrolled the blueprint and held it close to the lens. “Once it’s designed it’s going to go right here, in the cockpit. Right here where the pilots should be.”
Jillian moved closer to the television screen squinting at the blueprint, trying to see the point that Reese indicated with a poorly manicured
fingernail
.
“It’s going to be a binary computer,” Reese said. “Binary. That’s twin, Mrs. Armacost. Twin. What do you think you have inside you? What do you think he put there?”
She couldn’t take any more. She turned off the VCR and leaned back on the sofa, her head reeling. She could see herself in the bathtub, Spencer kneeling next to her, washing her, attending to her. She heard Spencer’s voice. “What will they be? Pilots?”
Jillian lay on the couch, the television remote control in one hand and remembered well what she had said that night. “Pilots...just like their father.” She sat there still for a moment, the silence in the apartment was overwhelming. It made Spencer’ s voice sound that much louder.
‘‘Jillian?”
She jumped and dropped the VCR remote as she turned to face her husband. “I didn’t hear you come in,” she said, doing her best to recover from her obvious surprise. “You’re home early.”
Spencer sat down next to her on the couch. Jillian watched anxiously as Spencer toyed absently with the VCR remote control. He tossed it lightly from hand to hand.
“I felt bad for you, getting into that fight with Nan.”
“How do you know about that?”
“She called.”
“And she didn’t tell you what it was about?”
Spencer shook his head. “She said, ‘None of your business, Spaceman.”
“That’s right,” Jillian answered. “It was just sister stuff. She’ll get over it and so will I.”
Spencer ran his thumb up the remote, his finger playing on the play button.
“You haven’t heard from her?”
Jillian shook her head and watched his fingers play around the buttons.
“Well,” said Spencer, “I wouldn’t worry
_{. . .}
I’m sure she’ll call soon enough.”
Jillian could not stand it any longer. She reached out and placed her hand on her husband’s. He stopped fiddling with the buttons. He touched her fingers.
“Jillian, you are trembling.”
“Am I?” Jillian said as lightly as she could. “I guess I’m just a little cold.”
Spencer put his arms around her as if to warm her. “I have something here to cheer you up.”
Spencer reached into his briefcase and pulled out
a videocassette and waved it at her.
• “Follow the Fleet,”
he said. “Fred, Ginger, me,
you. What do you say? How about it?”
Spencer went to the VCR and tried to load the tape. but he found the bay occupied. “You watching something?” he asked, looking over his shoulder at her.
He popped out the tape of Sherman Reese’s expose. “No label,” he said. There was the faintest sound of suspicion in his voice. “What is this thing?”
The lie came so easily, Jillian was astonished by herself. “It’s a pregnancy video,” she said. “Denise gave it to me. She thought it would make me feel better.”
Spencer loaded
Follow the Fleet.
The he joined her on the couch, taking her in his arms. “You worry too much, Jilly.” He hit the play button and they waited while the feeder tape spooled through the VCR.
“Why are you building that plane?” Jillian asked, trying to keep her voice light and casual.
Spencer laughed. “What? What are you talking about, Jillian? I don’t get it.”
_-
“That plane
_{. . .}
that terrible plane that you and Jackson and McLaren are so proud of
_{. . .}
Why do you have to build it? Why does it have to exist at all?”
Spencer shrugged. “It’s a contract, Jilly. And I didn’t add as much as Jackson said I did
_{. . .}
They have a bunch of real smart engineers over there. They’re behind most of it,”
The first notes of
Follow the Fleet
began to flow from the VCR, but neither of them were paying attention.
“I know what you’re thinking,” said Spencer. “You’re worried about what kind of world we’ll be bringing the twins into. I think about it, too, believe me
_{. . .}

They settled down to watch the movie. “Don’t worry,” he said reassuringly. “We won’t let anything happen to them. Will we? I know you won’t and you know I won’t.
Follow the Fleet
played on the television, but it played to no conscious audience. Both Jillian and Spencer had fallen asleep, entwined in each other’s arms.

Jillian dreamed. A dream so real that even in her sleep she hated it. Those familiar words. “I’m going to rotate the panel forty-eight degrees. You got me, Alex?”
“That’s good to go. I’ll need the 9c spanner as soon as
_{. . .}
Spencer? You feel that?” “Alex? Jesus.
Alex?
What the—”
Jillian awoke with a start, waking Spencer at the same time.
Follow the Fleet
was still on the

television set.
Spencer pulled Jillian into an embrace. “Must have dozed off,” he said.
“Were you dreaming?” Jillian asked.

“You weren’t dreaming?” Jillian pressed. “No, Jillian. I wasn’t dreaming,” he said. Jillian looked into his eyes. They were not loving, but black and cold.
“Were you?” Spencer asked.
Jillian looked down at the coffee table where Sherman Reese’s video cassette had been before they fell asleep. The tape was gone. Jillian felt her stomach lurch.
“Were you?” Spencer repeated.
Jillian looked over at the radio and closed her eyes. “No,” she said. “No dreams for me.”

There were any number of restaurants on Madison Avenue that catered to the rich women who constituted the New York corps known as “The Ladies who Lunch.” Shelley McLaren was known at all of them, but she favored one of them above all others. She was sure to get the best table no matter how late she called for a reservation, she was always welcome to order “off the menu”—asking for things not listed on the menu, that is—and for these privileges she was mercilessly overcharged, but because she was one of the few who had a house charge at the restaurant she had no idea how much money she actually paid for her microscopic lunches or how astronomically she tipped.
_.

Not that she would have cared all that much, but like all rich people she did not like being taken advantage of. Nevertheless, when Jillian Armacost called with a special request, Shelley had insisted that she treat to lunch at “her” place at Madison and Seventy-seventh. Jillian was on time and shown
to the table immediately. Shelley walked through the door fewer than three minutes later, but it took her a full thirty minutes to make it to the table.

Finally she plunked herself down in front of Jillian. “Sorry about that,” she said. “One knows so many people in places like this and you have to chitchat with all of them or the next thing you know they won’t support your charity and your tickets to the Costume Institute Reception at the Metropolitan suddenly go to some woman from Minneapolis that you’ve never heard of.
_{. .“}

“I never knew lunch could be so complicated,.” said Jillian. “What if you just stayed home and had a sandwich?”
“Social death,” said Shelly McLaren. She popped open her Judith Lieber purse and worked around in there for a moment. “Lunch may be complicated,” she said as she searched. “But strangely enough the most complicated things can be surprisingly simple.” She pulled a brown plastic vial filled with prescription pills from her purse and showed them to Jillian, passing them quickly across the table as a waiter glided up to them, smiling unctuously.
“Good afternoon, Mrs. McLaren,” he said. “It is so nice to see you again.”
“Two glasses of muscadet, Charlie,” Shelly ordered. “Two of those nice salads and leave us alone.”
“Very good, ma’am.” Charlie withdrew quickly. Shelley leaned forward and smiled at Jillian. Jillian was fingering the pill bottle under the table.
“Now, about these things,” said Shelley. “My caterer gets them from someone in the French Caribbean. Martinique, I think. The French are so advanced in this sort of thing, don’t you think? RU486 was supposed to have been legal here years
_‘
ago, but it will never happen
_{. . .}
The waiter named Charlie returned with the wine and Shelley clammed up as he placed the glasses in front of Them. They waited a couple of seconds before speaking again.
“Are they safe?” Jillian asked.
“Yes,” Shelley replied. “But there’s really something you should know before you—” She was silent again as the salads were delivered and Charlie withdrew.
“What should I know?” Jillian asked. This was not a meeting she had relished, but she has thought about it hard and long and now she was determined to go through with it.
“With these things, Jillian,” said Shelley, “all sales are final. You take them and you’ll abort. You have to ask yourself, do you want to go through with this?”
Jillian nodded. “Yes. Absolutely.
_“
“Okay,” said Shelley. “Take both pills when you get home. Then go lie down for a while. Then there will be quite a bit of vile cramping, then once you start spotting it goes pretty fast.” Shelley took a slug of her wine. “Believe me, if I can get through it, anyone can.
_“
“You?” said Jillian.
Shelley had to stop herself from rolling her eyes.
“Jillian, we all have. It’s like there’s a secret club. There’s ‘the Pill’ and then, just in case, there’s ‘the Pills.’
_‘‘
“And Spencer won’t know?”
Shelley picked up her wine glass again and waved off an imaginary Spencer. “If he’s anything like the rest of them
_{. . .}
he’ll think it was a miscarriage and fly down to Van Cleefs to buy you a bracelet. If he feels really bad he’d go to Harry Winston’s.” Shelley extended her wrist and rattled a thick diamond bracelet on her wrist.
“Unless he’s looking for it,” Shelley continued, “there will be no way to tell. And why should he be looking for it?”
Neither of them had touched their salads and Jillian had not had her wine, but Shelley signaled for the check. Charlie brought it and Shelley signed it. The she looked over at Jillian who appeared to be on the verge of tears.
Shelley put her hand on Jillian’s. “Don’t beat yourself up about this, sweetheart,” she said. “It’s not as if any of this means anything, you know. It’sall nonsense...”