Lost and Wanted(44)

I couldn’t pretend that a book about kilonova explosions wasn’t motivated at least in part by my excitement about LIGO; just like Arty’s student Jason, I wanted in on the action. I knew I would have to rely on Neel for some of the inside information—although, when I’d first conceived of the idea, I’d never imagined that we would do more than exchange a few emails about it. I’d assumed that Neel would remain at Caltech, working on an exciting project that hadn’t yet come to fruition. Instead, Neel would be arriving in the department of the university where I occupied a chair just as the LIGO team had its moment in the international spotlight. I was envious in a way I knew Neel hadn’t been when I’d been awarded the Blumhagen professorship—he had always preferred pure research to teaching—or when my second book made the New York Times best-seller list. Like most of my colleagues, Neel considers writing about physics for non-physicists too boring to contemplate.

    If we hadn’t been communicating about his engagement, I would have called Neel as soon as I heard the first rumors. The science was exciting enough that I wouldn’t have let professional rivalry get in the way under any other circumstances. It even occurred to me that Neel might be offended that he hadn’t heard from me. The fact that it wasn’t official, and that everyone at LIGO was trying their best not to spread information before they actually published their results, gave me an alibi, but it wasn’t the reason for my silence. He would arrive in Cambridge just before the holidays, with Roxy, and I would let him tell me then.





24.


Jack and I went trick-or-treating with my friend Vicky, whose son Dylan is on Jack’s soccer team. Halloween is a big deal in our neighborhood, and by the time we got home, Jack had substantial loot. I made him a grilled cheese to soak up some of the sugar, and then we sat on the blue rug in the living room while he sorted it into piles by color.

“Dylan said he’s going to wear his costume every day now.”

“He was the Flash, right?”

Jack nodded. “In case there are bad guys.”

    “I don’t think there will be bad guys.”

“But bad guys are real.”

“Well, yeah—I mean, there are bad people out there. They don’t turn into giant lizards, or climb up the sides of buildings like they do in your comic books.”

Jack had stopped listening. “Who started Halloween?”

“I think it was the Irish.”

“Why?”

I hesitated for a moment, thinking how to put it. “They believed in—spirits back then, and so people chose a night to go out in costumes and scare them away.”

“You mean, ghosts?”

“Right.”

Jack was examining a package of gummy worms. He looked up in surprise. “Grown-ups did?”

“I think so.”

“But not anymore.”

“That’s right,” I said. I thought this was mostly true, at least among the grown-ups I knew.

“Then why—”

“Have you heard of wishful thinking?”

Jack shook his head.

“People want to believe in ghosts because they miss people after they die. They’re something we imagine to make us feel better.”

Jack had taken off his hood, but he was still wearing the black ninja costume. He traced the curved plastic blade of the sword on the rug next to him. “What’s your favorite candy?”

“Peanut butter cups.”

“Not Milky Way?”

“I like the name of that one, but you know peanut butter’s my favorite.”

Jack examined his orange pile. I could see him counting. Then he carefully pushed a peanut butter cup across the rug.

“Hey, thanks.”

He nodded and chose one for himself. There was a pause, in which I thought I was doing a good job hiding what were suddenly strong feelings. Jack peeled off the wrapper, a little at a time.

“Are you going to be sad forever?” he said.



* * *



—

    It was several weeks before we saw Terrence and Simmi again. At MIT the campus had the frantic energy typical of November, as if everyone, students and faculty, were competing to see who was the busiest, who had the most to get done before the holidays. It wasn’t yet truly cold, but wind coming off the river made you glad for the warmth of the labs and lecture halls, especially as the afternoons bled earlier and earlier into night.

On one of those short fall afternoons I was sitting in my office when I got another message.

Are you writing a book?



It felt eerie, but it was three o’clock on a Friday, and so it was reasonable to guess that I’d be at work. I tried not to overthink my response. The point was to keep a channel of communication open:

I’m busy these days with my students, and with a paper I’m co-authoring, but I do have an idea for another book. Not sure if you read the earlier ones? Are you interested in physics?



Along with the article on scientists to watch, these messages seemed to confirm that their author was someone interested in me specifically, perhaps someone who’d read my books. If that were true, it only reinforced my instinct not to upset Terrence further by telling him about the messages—at least not yet. Under these circumstances, I would be much better at convincing the thief to return the device than Terrence would, or indeed even than the police. What police department was going to spend time on mysterious (but ultimately nonthreatening) messages sent from a phone stolen in another state?