The Gravity of Us (22 page)
Authors: Phil Stamper
I’m a firm believer in not counting chickens before they hatch. So having to attend an astronaut party right now is not what I need.
I fully recognize that the families throw a party almost weekly for one reason or another, but a party tonight, of all nights, seems like a bad idea. The vote’s still delayed; the board meeting is happening as we speak. Soon, we’ll learn whether the Orpheus V mission has been shelved or saved, and we can only guess what will happen.
Questions spin around my mind as my parents and I walk into the party and pass a few snacks—a crudit
é
s platter and hummus dip—to Grace, who’s hosting this party. The signature stock of two dozen plus bottles of champagne is as impressive as always. Grace leans over as I admire it and whispers: “I’ll be keeping track of those bottles, so don’t try anything.”
I turn to meet her gaze and see she’s smiling. She winks at me and walks away. A joke—one that shows she has no idea about the bottles we’ve stolen in the past. I don’t see Leon around, or Kat, and before I can go find them, I’m thrust into conversations with everyone.
Mom and Dad want me to hang around, mostly because they can’t answer any of the questions about my Flash profile, because they’re old and have no idea what anything is.
But I allow it, just this once.
Someone places a firm grip on my shoulder, and I spin around to see Mara Bannon beaming down at me before bringing me into a bone-crushing hug. She looks at me in one of those ways perfect movie moms look at their kids. Head tilted, barely contained smile.
“Cal, your videos made me so happy I had to drive all the way back here and tell you myself. Do you know how long it had been since I smiled—really smiled? Seeing your hopeful, powerful message … Mark would have been absolutely crushed if the mission got canceled in part because of him. I thank you so much for helping.”
“Thanks, Mrs. Bannon,” I say, letting her give me another hug.
“Oh, and I was furious when I saw how StarWatch started treating you. I watched their coverage, and I swear—those two were just about the worst humans on the planet, if you ask me.”
“Of course,” I say. “And not like it matters or anything, but the one producer, the girl, wasn’t all bad. She helped me
expose Josh Farrow when he tried to make you, you know, get back on the floor.”
I think of Kiara—both sides of Kiara—and hope the good side wins out in her. There’s a way to be a journo, even for a gossip blog or show, and still be a good person. She may be jaded, and I may be naive, but it has to be true.
“Well, anyway,” she says. “I shared your videos with all my friends, and they were so pleased to see something positive come out of NASA. It’s all been trashy lately, but it’ll only get better. That’s what I keep telling them.”
“I hope so,” I say in agreement, and get a third bone-crushing hug before I can slip away.
I return to my mom and dad. Dad’s deep into a conversation with one of the Orpheus V astronauts, and Mom’s just standing by with a glass of champagne, smiling and listening in.
“Thanks for suggesting I go to NASA,” I say. “They were really helpful. They followed up on all my media hits and took over the interviews and everything.”
“Well, honey, that’s their job. They’re professionals at it. You’re a professional at doing the reporting. Let everyone play to their own strengths.”
“And thanks for helping Kat with that site. I don’t know how you two did it, but so many senators and members of Congress officially announced their support of the mission today. Doesn’t mean the House won’t vote to cut funding, but at least we’ve shaken them up.”
“Don’t look at me.” Mom shrugs. “It was almost all Kat.”
I’m about to say something, but I completely forget what it
is. Because, standing in the doorway are Donna and Todd, and they look like they know something.
Every face slowly turns toward them.
It’s time.
“Can I say it?” Donna asks Todd as Grace lifts the needle from the record player. Everything is frozen for a minute when he gives a slight nod and Donna clears her throat. “We’ve just come from the board meeting. Every director in attendance was in agreement, and each gave their own spiel for why Orpheus V should be kept on. We even showed clips from Cal’s video, which just passed twenty-five million views in less than twenty-four hours.”
She takes a deep, cleansing breath in and hisses it out. Just like I do when I’m meditating.
“And after hours of discussion and analysis, we’re proud to say that the board’s approved the continuation of the Orpheus project.”
“Also,” Todd cuts in, “we had a chat with House Rep Halima Ali, who’s willing to work with us to make sure funds are used properly. She made it clear that her bill would not have the votes to pass, and that they’ve canceled the vote entirely. Which means …”
Donna interrupts him by shouting, “Orpheus V is, without a doubt, back on!”
I get lost in the cheers and the shouting and the splashes of champagne. Mom hands me her glass to take a celebratory sip, and I almost laugh at her cluelessness. But I drink it anyway, and I start to understand why people celebrate with champagne. It
lifts me up, it celebrates my own energy, and soon enough, I’m shouting along with the other astronauts.
One thing I don’t do is get out my phone. No one else gets to see this moment. It’ll never be in a history book. It’ll never be on the news, or in an issue of
Time
for future kids to point at and imagine what it was like to live in this moment, this time when—for one bright moment—everything was perfect.
Leon’s gaze meets mine from across the room. Kat’s squeezing her dad so tightly with joy I think he might pass out, but they’re all jumping up and down. Grace has tears streaming down her face—I would be crying too if I just heard that I was, for sure, going to Mars. She clutches at her son’s shirt and pulls him close. She presses her cheek into his, and my heart melts.
Mom comes to me and lets out a yelp of glee, and she pulls me and Dad into a close hug.
“I can’t believe it,” I say.
Mom pulls back to look at me and nudges Dad with her shoulder. “
We
can.”
My eyes are back on Leon’s, and our smiles just keep getting bigger, and I realize that there’s one thing left. That things aren’t quite perfect yet. That one little puzzle piece is missing, and I’m going to make it fit.
The din of the celebration is muted when I make my way to him. My vision narrows, the crowd parts, and I narrowly escape being hit with the spray from a few popping bottles of champagne. But I don’t care about any of that right now.
All I care about is him.
In the steps between us, I feel a warmth building in my stomach. My senses feel dampened, yet heightened all at the same time, and the surrealness of the situation makes me feel so perfectly all right that I march up to him, place my hand behind his neck, and pull him in for a light kiss.
It’s the simplest feeling in the world. Two sets of lips, barely touching, but my body nearly convulses with chills. His hands wrap lightly around me and pull me closer. People are still shouting, talking loudly, the music is pumping, and I realize how very public this make-out session is, but I can’t stop it.
Once the emotions die down in the room, and I’m able to
pry my face from his, I stare right into those beautiful brown eyes and physically restrain myself from letting my love for him take over.
“Can we talk?” I ask.
“Sure. Out back?”
I shake my head. “Let’s take a walk.”
We file through the crowd, and I lead him out the door, down the steps, and into the deserted street. The clouds are out tonight, giving the night a soft feel, a cool light that glazes over trees and houses. I lace my fingers through his and squeeze.
We head down a side road that leads to a dead end, with a few houses on either side obscured by bushes. There’s only one streetlight on this road, but it’s enough to cast its glow over the pavement. I take a cross-legged seat on the strip of yellow on the road, and he does the same.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “I know I’ve been shitty to you.”
“I’m sorry too. I was so freaked about you leaving that I made things worse. I was really down, and just kept thinking: I was in love with someone I couldn’t ever end up with.”
“But I mean, even if I moved to New York, we could have stayed together. I emailed you—”
“That’s exactly it,” he cuts in. “You wanted to stay together on
your
terms. I could go to New York for college. I could study one of your ten quote, unquote, “ideal” majors for me. It’s so great that you have it all figured out, but I couldn’t lock myself into that. I still can’t.”
“The thought of someone not knowing what they want to
do with their life makes my palms sweat. It literally gets hard to breathe when I think of you not knowing anything about your future, and not having any urge to find out. And I recognize that’s so not chill, and probably not very enlightened,” I say. “Okay, definitely not enlightened. But I’m a planner. Plans can change, I’m cool with that, but not having a plan at all? It terrifies me.”
“I’ve been going back to the open gyms. Every week, sometimes twice a week. And for once, I’m doing what I want to do. I just kept thinking about what you said, how I needed to channel that kid doing somersaults, and I have.”
“Leon, that’s actually amazing.”
“And I met a trainer there, who—”
I cut in. “But you just said you were only doing it for fun?”
“… who offered me a job teaching their five- to seven-year-olds early gymnastics skills. And I realized that every day I work there would be somersault day. I’m sure I’ll have to deal with the intense parents—like mine—but it’s the perfect side job. And without StarWatch around, I feel like I can just be myself.”
“I’m so happy for you.” I throw my arms around him. “And … what about college?”
“Look, you have to trust that I’ll figure it out,” Leon says. “Maybe not today, maybe not when I graduate high school, but someday I will.”
“Okay,” I say, and I mean it. “I’ll support you, in whatever you choose to do and whenever you choose to do it.”
“I need you to support me
now
. I need you to be okay with
how I am now, and not think of me as someone who is broken.”
I grab his hands and nod. Not to fix him, or to make him feel better, but to show him that I can support him. That I’m trying, and learning, and will do whatever I can to be there for him.
“I told my parents,” he says. “How they made me feel. I tried to help them understand my depression, and they seemed to be listening. We talked about you a lot. They really like you, and … and us.”
A smile comes over his face, and it’s so perfect I subconsciously reach out and hold his cheek. My eyes scan his face—his chin, his hair, his ears. He looks so beautiful in this moment, and I never want to forget this. How he looks. How I feel.
“I love you,” I say. Not because he needs to hear it, but because I need to say it. “I love you so much, Leon.”
He leans in to kiss me so fast that suddenly my back is flat against the pavement. I pull him close, and we kiss. We kiss. We kiss like we never have before—an ebb and flow of tender and rough, heavy and light, deep and shallow. My hands are all over his body, and his mine, and there’s a small part of me that never wants this to end, but an even larger part of me that can’t wait for what comes next.
I, Calvin Lewis Jr., have no idea what is coming next. And I couldn’t be happier.
As it turns out, I should have kept my visitor’s badge. NASA’s doing their best to fix their mess of a communications and social media campaign, but they asked me to keep covering the launches and keep interviewing scientists. Sure, it’ll give my r
é
sum
é
some credibility to be so connected to NASA, but I won’t be doing this for long. It’s time for me to chase new stories, and interview different people—find my voice again while sticking to my FlashFame roots.
Slowly but surely, Brendan’s gaining the following that NASA can use to take my place after I’m gone. His daily check-ins and weekly updates with different scientists on the mission have started to get some massive views. At least I’m not leaving them high and dry.
I’m sitting on my dad’s desk in the open work space the alternates share, and I’ve got my feet propped up on a chair. As I wait until they’re ready for me to start the video, I scroll
through my feed, smiling when Deb’s video pops up. I click it and watch as she walks backward through the West Village.
“I’m Deb Meister—
the Debmeister
, if you will
.
You won’t? Okay. Never mind. Anyway, welcome to my NYC update. I know what you’re thinking: New York’s all murders and Amber Alerts, and none of this shit is changing. WRONG. I’m here to show you ten fantastic, fun, and freaky things you could be doing with your Saturday, starting with number one—”
She makes me laugh so hard throughout her bastardized version of my update that I almost choke. I text her after and remind her that she has a lot of journalistic integrity to uphold, and she replies with a middle finger emoji. Nice. But she’s on her way to ten thousand followers, and her updates are fantastic, fun, and, yes, they’re freaky too. She’s getting donations to help her make rent, and her parents have started sending her some money to fill in the gaps, to make up for all the money they had to take over the past year.
I couldn’t imagine how painful it would be to take your kid’s money, even if she was the only one with a steady income. But since her mom and dad are back on their feet, they don’t let money ruin everything anymore.
She’s really happy. I can see it in the videos, and I can hear it in her voice. And maybe one day we’ll actually get to be roommates in a shitty Coney Island apartment, bitching about how long it takes to get to Manhattan. I comment, saying I love her videos almost as much as I love her—because I’m feeling extra cheesy right now—when my dad waves me over.
Carmela is directing Dad into the cockpit, and Grace has me
set up the camera somewhere where I can easily pan between the simulation chamber and the open desks. I hit record.
“This one’s new,” I say to her. “You’ve got two simulation chambers now?”
“This one’s for six,” she says.
I lower the camera. “What do you mean?”
“Orpheus VI. It comes after V, dear?”
A smile is plastered on my face as I watch my dad get into the cockpit.
His
cockpit. He tests out a few of the levers and buttons, probably noting the differences between the two spacecraft. Grace puts her hand on my shoulder and leans in.
“I think she’s taking out one of the thrusters this time,” she says. “Calvin will flip, just watch.”
The simulation starts. It’s a landing sim, where he’s staring at a screen that resembles the patch of Martian soil Orpheus VI will land on. The site’s been triangulated and is meant to have the perfect conditions for landing. Smooth, level, with firm dirt. It’s clear that everyone in the room is waiting for something to go wrong in the simulation. But the ground is coming up closer and closer in the view.
I zoom in and catch a bead of sweat dripping down Dad’s brow. He’s jamming the control to the right, harder than the craft would normally take. His breaths become pants; his gaze becomes a laser. He’s in a state of total concentration.
“We’re pitching,” he says. “Left thruster is dead, bringing up backup.”
A few moments pass.
“Backup is dead—prepare for a rough landing.”
His voice is calm and even, and he reaches for buttons I didn’t even know existed. His motions are fluid.
And it really hits me, after all this time: my dad’s a fucking astronaut.
Touchdown.
“We have a touchdown,” Dad says. “How many oxen did I lose in the river?”
“Brilliant, Calvin, just brilliant. Your crew might have a few bumps on the head, but that’s all. Bravo!” Carmela says. “See, what did I tell you? Your dad is impossible to stump. He’s going to keep everyone very safe in a couple years.”
“And you’re going to keep trying to kill me until then.”
“Sir, that is my job,” she says, and we all laugh.
I end the video and watch it get shared and viewed thousands of times within minutes. News sites instantly pick up my videos now, and the hunger for information about the Orpheus program is insatiable. StarWatch is long gone, and everyone’s trying to be the news source to replace it.
I spend the rest of the day taking video of more scientists and astronauts in their natural habitat, and I save those videos for later. My follower count is almost at real celebrity levels, but people have started to leave me alone. All my press inquiries go right to NASA, and on principle, I don’t give any interviews. “I’m the interviewer,” I usually say. “Not the other way around.”
While Leon still hasn’t made a decision about college or the real world—I’m really okay with it, really I am (really I’m not, but I am
trying
)—I’ve got a list of ten schools with programs to apply to. At the top of my list are New York University,
obviously, Columbia University, and Ohio University. But I’ll be applying to schools in Texas, California, and all over the East Coast. Leon’s helping me be more impulsive, and it’s making me keep my options open. I’m flexible. Cool and breezy.
Okay, maybe not.
Maybe I’ll never be breezy, but that’s just me. Most important, I’m starting to realize when it holds me back. To be so laser focused on one city, or one specific future, could hurt me in the end. So I’ll leave the breeziness to someone else.
After we’re done, around five thirty, Dad and I get into the car and he takes the country roads back. He hasn’t gotten off this early in weeks, basically since NASA decided to keep the launch on schedule. I roll down the windows, and the cool air floods the cabin. Fall is just around the corner, and I’m mostly excited to be able to use my sweater collection. I’ve made peace with the fact that I’ll never have to bring my peacoat out because of the ever-present heat, but it’s almost sixty today, which in my book is cause for a celebratory sweater party.
“Cal,” my dad says, “thanks for everything. I know I made a lot of this about me—I mean, I got overwhelmed with the new job and didn’t really have time to think about how everyone was taking it. I didn’t even ask if you would be willing to move down here.”
“I would’ve said no if you gave me the choice. If you gave me any other option than coming here, I’d have taken it immediately.” I scratch the back of my neck. “But it would’ve been the worst mistake I’d ever made.”