Taking Off (13 page)

CHAPTER 28

C
rowds, dark, fear, stars, alone, Tommy touching my hair—

Then we were off. Our space shuttle whirled to the right. We entered a long tunnel with flashing blue lights. I laughed.

“You okay up there?” asked Tommy, patting my head from his seat behind me in our space shuttle.

“Yeah,” I told him.

His hands were on my shoulders. “This is going to be fun, Annie.”

A sweet rush of excitement flipped my stomach over. I thought of the astronauts and the giddy anticipation they must feel twenty-four hours before launching into space. A girl in front of me screamed, and I laughed. The ride hadn’t really started—

“Whoooooa,” I shouted as our rocket flew down the track, pushing and pulling us through turns, and dropping, dropping. I could see little—the person in front of me, other space rockets in the distance, the dark sky filled with stars and comets. I was flying.

“Oh man!” yelled Tommy in a voice filled with amazement. “So coooool!”

It was cool, so cool, and I wanted it to go on and on, just riding this rocket, alone, but not, in the dark, but not, with this sweet feeling soaring through me. I was happy, so happy.

And then I was screaming along with the girl in front of me as our space shuttle barreled down the last steep incline. I could feel the smile on my face as we went down and down, and the wind rushed by my cheeks.

When we reached the red wormhole at the end of the ride, I was so let down that it was coming to an end.

“Liked that, did you?” asked Tommy, throwing an arm around my shoulder when we got off the ride.

“Oh
yeah
.”

He laughed. “
Oh yeah
is right.”

“Wanna go again?” I asked.

He grinned and grabbed my hand, pulling me past the people taking their time on the way out.

“The line will be long,” I called out as we jogged.

He just grinned again, and I grinned back. That smile stayed on my face for two more long waits in line and flights through the dark.

It was late when we got back to the motel.

I plopped into an uncomfortable chair in the lobby while Tommy stood in line to pick up a new key. Next to me, a couple of men with beers in their hands were talking. When I heard one of them mention the shuttle, my ears perked up.

“They think it’s going to be too cold,” one of the men said.

“Isn’t this the fourth delay?”

“More than that. We’re never getting this one off the ground.”

“Excuse me?” I asked.

The men looked at me expectantly.

“Are you talking about the shuttle launch? Has it been rescheduled again?”

The first man nodded while the other took a sip of his drink. “Slipped until Monday.”

“Thanks,” I said, feeling enormously let down. And I remembered the lines from May Swenson’s poem “August 19, Pad 19”:

All my system’s go, but oh,

an anger of the air won’t let me go.

On the screen the blip is MISSION SCRUBBED …

Tommy was also disappointed. “Aw, man. You got me really excited about this.”

“I thought you wanted to come all along,” I said, on the way back to the room.

“I did. But your talking about Christa and the flight all the way here has gotten me jazzed.”

I wondered how this was going to affect my plans. I wasn’t going home. A day ago, I would’ve thought Mom would have forced me to come home, would have driven over here to get me. But after talking to her today, I didn’t think Mom would care that I wasn’t coming home tomorrow. Of course, she didn’t know about my being here alone with Tommy.

But it was a relief too, wasn’t it? In a way, it was. But something else nagged at me.

Oh, forget it,
I thought, sitting in the chair in a corner.

I picked up my knitting, studying my work. I was so close to being done. I got back to it.

Tommy flipped through the channels on the television, settling on
Magnum, P.I
. I realized, with a start, that this was the first time I’d felt really relaxed with Tommy since I’d met him.

He lay back against the headboard with the pillows propping him up, grinning with that impossibly infectious grin. And in a second, I went from relaxed to anxious. I shouldn’t be looking at him all the time.

I’d only known him for three days, but it seemed like so much longer.

He glanced at me. “You want to go to the beach tomorrow?”

I grinned. “It’s too cold for a launch, but we can still go.”

“We’ll bundle up.”

“Let’s get up early again, Tommy. I’d really like to see the sunrise over the Atlantic. I bet it’s beautiful.”

“You have the best ideas,” he said.

“Not really.”

“Are you kidding me? This whole trip was your idea.”

“I guess it was,” I said. Somehow I’d gotten myself off my couch. I knew if I hadn’t met Christa, I wouldn’t be here, in Florida, with Tommy. It was amazing how one person could make you see things differently and change what you did. But it wasn’t Christa making the changes: it was me. She’d just been the inspiration.

Maybe I
would
see the world, starting with France. I could follow the footsteps of Van Gogh’s life.

“Done,” I said, jumping up.

“With your scarf?” Tommy asked.

“No, silly,” I said, reaching over and wrapping it around his neck. “With
your
scarf.”

He looked so touched it made me smile.

“I
was
making it for me,” I said. “But you looked so cold when we were camping on the beach, I decided you needed one.” I pulled at the bottom of it. “There, I made it longer.”

He took my hand, startling me, and pulled me down beside him. He grabbed both my hands. “Thank you, Annie.”

I felt shy. “You’re welcome.”

But he kept looking at me. And suddenly, I remembered how very alone we were in this room. He kept looking. I could see in his eyes he wanted to kiss me. That scared me. What scared me more was how much I wanted him to kiss me. And that he saw it.

He drew closer, but I looked off.

I stood quickly. “You’re welcome,” I said. “You’re welcome.” I had to keep saying it, so I didn’t sit back down with him.

He didn’t say anything, but looked thoughtful. “Thanks for the scarf, Annie.”

I curled under the covers in my bed, feeling excited, hopeful, sad, and frightened out of my damn mind.

CHAPTER 29

T
he pink sunrise leisurely stretched along the horizon. We were drinking hot coffee and sitting on a concrete table on the beach, quietly watching.

“I can’t believe they didn’t launch,” Tommy said, opening the sack of doughnuts. “It’s a beautiful morning.”

“Beautiful.”

And the rich colors in the sky, the soothing rush of the waves, the fine sand, was only part of it. Tommy was the other part. I swung my feet back and forth and munched on doughnuts. I watched a crab crawl by and remembered how Mark and I used to capture them and try to keep them in castles of sand.

I hadn’t called Mark yet. I knew he was probably mad about it. In the last two years, I’d never gone three days without talking to him. I rarely left Clear Lake, but Mark did, to go surfing or to see his mother’s family in west Texas. And he’d call me every day.

Tommy and I sat on the table, just enjoying the morning as it warmed up. Like Tommy, I couldn’t believe they didn’t launch. It was so nice out. Christa must be anxious, ready to go, tired of the emotional roller coaster of delays.

Some tourists walked by wearing Teacher-in-Space T-shirts.

“Hey, I want one of those!” I said, knowing I didn’t have the money.

“Really?”

“Too dorky?” I asked.

“Not if you want it,” he said, jiggling my arm.

I lost my words. If every time he touched me I forgot how to talk, it was going to get really weird between us.

More people were out now, moms and dads, kids and teenagers, young couples and older people. Some dared to venture out into the waves, but most were walking, throwing Frisbees, enjoying the day—waiting for the launch. Christa flying was like one of us flying. The newspaper said the renewed interest in NASA and the space program was all because of her.

The seagulls squawked overhead, taking dives to snatch up something from the water or the junk food on the shore. I laughed when one swooped down to steal a cinnamon roll from a nearby table. The owner of the breakfast threw his arms up in the air, but was laughing in disbelief.

Seagulls, hunger, desire, white wings, blue sky, soar, Christa, soar.

“That guy looks like my dad,” Tommy said, pointing to the man who’d been ripped off by a seagull, “except for the part where he’s laughing.”

“Your dad never laughs?”

“He doesn’t stay still long enough. No vacations. No hobbies. No interests but business. Not like your dad. My dad works all the time. He didn’t go on one summer trip or spring vacation with my mom and sister and me. Can you imagine that? Not wanting to go anywhere.”

“Maybe he likes where he is,” I said.

“All he cares about is work. Not a surprise he thinks I’m a total washout.”

“Tommy,” I said, “he can’t think that.”

“Oh yes, he does. We have the traditional father-son relationship, where the son disappoints the father for not living up to his potential. It’s an old story.”

“He thinks that because you want to be a teacher?” I asked.

“Yes, among other things.” He looked at me. “You look so concerned.” He tweaked my hand. “Don’t worry. I’m used to it.”

“But you’re not really, are you?” I asked. “It bothers you.”

“Not enough to get a business degree like he wants me to,” he said. “The thing is, I admire my dad. I wouldn’t want his life, but he’s very smart, motivated. He thinks for himself. I like that about him.”

“You want him,” I said softly, “to see something in you that he admires.”

“Yeah, I do.” He was gazing at me. “You are such a surprise, Annie.”

“Why do you say that?” I asked, thinking of jumping off the bench to throw my trash away.

He reached over and tucked my flying hair behind my ear. It was his touch that stopped me. He quickly dropped his hand, but was still looking at me. “It’s going to be hard to go back to my life in Texas after meeting you. It’ll feel empty without you there.”

I didn’t move. I couldn’t seem to move.

He leaned in, his face close to mine, his eyes looking into mine. I still didn’t move away. And then I closed my eyes, not wanting to worry or to think, and I let his lips touch mine, and his kiss was sweet and tentative, which I didn’t expect. So I kissed him back.

We drew apart, looking at one another, and I was surprised to find my hands were touching his face. I dropped them and pulled away.

He reached for me, taking my hand. “Annie.”

“I can’t do this.”

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have.” And now our only touch was his hand holding on to my fingers.

But I let go and slid off the table.

We started walking along the water’s edge.

“I have a boyfriend, Tommy,” I said, not able to look at him, my eyes burning. “And not just a casual boyfriend. A guy I’ve been with a long time.”

“Do you love him?”

“Do I love him?” I asked.

“Yeah, that guy who punches at doors.”

“He doesn’t normally do that.”

“Just sometimes?”

“I’ve never seen him do that before,” I said. “Only when some hot guy …” I glanced at him, embarrassed.

He laughed like he couldn’t stop. “You should see your face.”

I touched my cheeks. “Am I hot?”

He laughed even harder.

“Not that funny,” I said, knowing my face was bright red. And the more I thought about it, the hotter my face became. But then I started laughing too. And we couldn’t stop for a while. I held on to his arm and covered my mouth trying—and failing—to stop the guffaws from coming out. Which made him laugh even more.

“Enough,” I said. “Enough.”

“I’m sorry,” he said, stopping, but still grinning. I hit his arm playfully, and started walking again, with him beside me. I was still embarrassed, but I felt closer to him suddenly, with the kiss and shared laughter.

“So do you, Annie?” he asked again. “Do you love him?”

I thought of Mark, the way he would place his hand lightly on the small of my back when we walked through the halls at school. How he’d stroll through cemeteries and read old gravestones with me. How he’d taught me to shoot a rubber band when we were in fifth grade. And how I hit him in the nose accidentally with one as I practiced. I could still see his little fifth-grade face with the red mark on his little fifth-grade nose.

Did I love him? I just didn’t know anymore.