Earth Bound (19 page)

Wait, she was silently staring at him. That itself was odd.

“You asked me to keep you apprised of industry developments,” she said quickly.

He picked up the first article and leafed through it. “We need faster processors?”

“We will. If not for the Perseid missions, then for Antares.”

He flipped through the pages. “Hmm.” He started skimming them in earnest.

She was charmed by his reluctance, then by his interest. He didn’t truly understand computers enough to understand what she’d given him, at least not with only a few seconds to peruse it, but he was trying to learn something.

Because she’d given it to him, and he assumed it was important. She swallowed whatever was rising in her throat.

“They’re making great advances,” she told him.

“And the cost?”

“Well, it’s coming down. Slowly. The mass production of transistors is helping.”

He turned to the second article. “I’ll defer to your judgment, but I suspect this isn’t a move we’ll be ready for anytime soon.”

She smiled at the crown of his head. They didn’t need to discuss the pages any further. Everything was fine. Last night had only been a bit of awkwardness brought on by his words with Gerhardt at the meeting. It had passed. It hadn’t been about her at all, but his brother. They would continue on as before, both here and at Mulligan’s.

She half-wanted to snatch her pages back so she could stuff them back into her filing cabinet where they belonged. “Oh, I… well, if you think so.”

He finished his read-through, and he gave her an intense look. “I’m sorry we can’t move on it now, but I don’t think it’s possible. Not yet.”

She swallowed hard and tried to view that through a work-only lens. “Of course, but these articles might come in handy with our attempts to soften Stan and Hal up for a transition to digital. I’ll just hold onto them until—”

She reached for the articles, but Parsons pulled them back.

“They’re never going to agree to this. You’re going to have to wait for an opening, a wedge, and then exploit it to the hilt.”

“Yes, but I want what I want when I want it.”

Oh hell. That was entirely the wrong thing to say. She was supposed to make sure everything was all right, not draw attention to the tension between them.

Parsons watched her, his expression suddenly guarded. “I know.”

That ultimately was true. She could only offer him what they had: She cared about his opinion, more perhaps than that of anyone else she’d ever known. She thought he was a brilliant manager and engineer. Work was quite simply better and more fun when she shared it with him. And she’d never been so satisfied by a lover.

But she was giving him everything she had.

She’d thought he was satisfied. She knew she was.

He smiled at her the tiniest bit, just with his eyes, and then he repeated, “I know.”

She leaned forward and pulled the pages from him. For just an instant, he pressed his fingers against the desk, holding them in place.

“It’s a good idea,” he said gently.

“Another time, then.”

He released the pages and she returned to her office convinced they were fine, but anxious about the future.

The future of the mission, of course.

Parsons checked that no one was behind him in the aisle at the aquarium supply shop before he hauled a sack of sea salt off the shelf and onto his shoulder. He grunted hard when the sack settled against him.

Damn, he was getting old. The sacks seemed to get a fraction heavier every time he came in for supplies.

He made his way to the front counter, the sight of a gorgeous marbled angelfish stopping him for a moment. He didn’t need any more fish, but he could take a second to appreciate this one. The plants swayed as if being rocked to sleep by the artificial current.

So beautiful, so serene. His life was consumed with work—when he wasn’t working, he was worrying about work—but when he watched his fish—

“Sir, do you need help?”

Parsons swung around at the familiar voice. “Jefferies? What are you doing here?”

Jefferies lifted his hands—or were those bear paws?—toward the sack on Parsons’ shoulder. “Sir…”

“I can do it.” Parsons moved the sack out of his reach, even though his back was beginning to ache. “And I told you, you don’t have to call me that. Especially when we’re not at ASD.”

Not that they ever met outside of work. Although it would be hard for Parsons to meet anyone anywhere, considering he went to work, here, and home. Grocery delivery made it easy to avoid the mundanities of life.

And Mulligan’s. He went there pretty often, and pray to God he never saw Jefferies there. That would take some explaining on both their parts.

“If you say so…” Jefferies swallowed what certainly was a stillborn
sir
. “I’m here to look for a present for my niece. She loves the ocean, so I thought maybe a goldfish and a bowl would be nice.”

Parsons pulled a face. “A goldfish? And how big of a bowl?”

Jefferies made a circle of his hands, marking off the size of a two-gallon bowl. “About that big, I was thinking.”

“No.”

The other man flinched, and Parsons sighed. He didn’t mean to set people off all the time, to push them away with his brusqueness. Perhaps he didn’t know any other way to be anymore.

“Goldfish produce massive amounts of nitrates,” Parsons explained. “A fish like that will poison itself with its own waste in a bowl that small. And goldfish are…” He searched for the best way to say it. “They’re boring.”

Really, they were terrible, but boring would do.

“Oh.” Jefferies’s face fell even further. “I don’t know anything about fish.”

Clearly not. But Jefferies had admitted his error, so Parsons kept that to himself. He slid the sack to the floor, rolling his shoulder to get the aches out. “I’ll help you find something better. How old is she?” He gestured for Jefferies to follow him.

“Seven. She loves all kinds of animals, but she’s especially fascinated with the ocean.”

“Don’t most seven-year-old girls play with dolls or something?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know many seven-year-old girls.”

“Neither do I.” When Parsons’s niece had been seven, she’d wanted a lamb to raise and show at the county fair. So that had been her birthday present from him, and she’d ended up repaying him when she’d auctioned the lamb off.

He didn’t think Jefferies’s niece would be interested in that, though.

“Guppies.” Parsons stopped before the tank and gestured to the fish. “She’d probably like some guppies. They’re pretty, on the smaller side, and easy to care for.”

Their silver bodies flashed as they moved through the water, their colorful tails trailing like silken scarves. Much better than goldfish.

Jefferies folded himself almost in half in order to peer at them. “Ooh. They are pretty. What supplies will I need?”

“Let me show you.”

Parsons took him through the store, picking out a tank, a filter, lights, gravel, and plants. It was almost enjoyable, giving Jefferies this lesson on how to set up a tank. And since he was an engineer himself, Parsons knew Jefferies would follow his instructions to the letter—Parsons wasn’t wasting his efforts here. So few people took fish-keeping seriously.

When they were done and Jefferies had a pile of supplies in his arms and at his feet, Parsons looked the other man over before meeting his gaze. An awkward beat passed and Jefferies shuffled his feet.

Now the supplies had been selected, Parsons had no idea how to end this interaction. They’d done something rather personal together, and a more involved farewell than simply turning on his heel seemed to be called for.

“Well…” Parsons began at the same time Jefferies said, “Thank you, sir.”

Again with the
sir
. Chiding Jefferies wasn’t working, so instead, Parsons said, “You know, you don’t have to be afraid of me.”

A flash of horror stitched through him as that hung in the air. Jesus, what was he doing? They were having a
moment
, in an aquarium supply store. Parsons didn’t do
moments,
and he definitely didn’t do them here.

Jefferies cleared his throat. “It’s not that I’m afraid. But sometimes you yell, and I’m naturally jumpy.”

The words made Parsons’s joints lock.
Sometimes you yell.
Had Parsons ever said that to his father? Likely not, but he could have.
Sometimes you yell and it frightens me.

No, this was definitely not the place to be having these kinds of reflections.

“I know I get… heated sometimes. But…” There were no good words for how he truly felt when he yelled. English was so damned imprecise. “I am angry, but there’s so much riding on what we do. It’s… I’m not being mean.”
 

His face burned as he explained, but suddenly he needed someone to understand—someone other than Charlie—that yes, he was an asshole, but it was because he cared so damn much. Maybe too damn much. But nothing less than that was going to get them to the moon.
 

“I need everyone’s best efforts,” he went on. “I need everyone to go above and beyond their best efforts. Otherwise, we can pack up ASD right now, since we’re not landing on the moon otherwise.”

Jefferies blinked at him, his expression open. “I agree.”

“You do?” Of course, Jefferies probably did, in theory, but if he did, what the hell were they discussing here?

“You intimidate me,” the other man went on, “but that’s because you work so hard. You expect perfection even from yourself. And you scare people because you demand more from them.”

“Oh.” Well, wasn’t that… heartwarming? The pressure in his chest was more of an ache than warmth, though.

“The yelling probably doesn’t help, though,” Jefferies finished.

“Oh.” That wasn’t so heartwarming. But Parsons wasn’t at ASD to hold hands and have a sing-along. He cleared his throat. “Well, now we understand each other about the yelling”—the pressure in his chest told him to end the conversation here, before things went any more sideways than they already had—“I’ll see you at work on Monday.”

“Yes, s—I will. And thank you for the advice. I’m sure my niece will love the guppies.”

“Don’t mention it.” Parsons gave the smallest of waves, and turned back to find his abandoned sack of salt, intending to pretend to browse the aisles until Jefferies had left. He’d hit his limit of meaningful interactions for the day.

September 1962

Charlie watched the photographer from
Life
corral the women in the front lobby of ASD and tried not to let her sour attitude seep into her expression.

The clump of women was gathered in the atrium, at the base of the main stairway. It opened onto the mural of stars decorating the entrance to the second floor. The stairway curved around and over them as it marched toward a field of stars they couldn’t touch.

The photo was meant to show off the “Ladies of ASD,” which didn’t include any of the secretaries—or Beverly.

Charlie had spent another Labor Day holiday—her second at ASD—working, this time on the rendezvous mission, and still she was behind. She had better things to do than smile like an idiot at a photographer.

“Now, Charlie, sweetheart,” the photographer said, gesturing her forward. “Move up a bit. We all want to see your pretty face.”

She bit her tongue to keep from snapping at the photographer. She knew exactly why he wanted to see more of her—
Look how beautiful, how feminine these girls are! Nothing to fear here, America!

The Virgo Three—the clever name ASD had given the women chosen to train as astronauts—shuffled aside to make room for Charlie.

Dot gave her a darkly amused look as she went past. The two women who worked in the wind tunnel made space for her in front of them, although they didn’t look too happy about it.

“All right, that’s perfect right there,” the photographer said. “Lift your chin a hair, Charlie. Nice, wide smile.”

It’s Dr. Eason
. She hated this. Yes, she used her looks to gain the advantage in certain situations. But they were
her
looks and
her
advantage. She was furious that her face was going to be used to sell ASD to the public. Why couldn’t they discuss the mission, the technology, and the sheer wonder of what they were trying to do? Why did it have to be the surface, the glamour, the stuff that meant nothing?