The Calculating Stars (Lady Astronaut, #1)(30)

“I was counseling a young couple, newly engaged, who were facing all the joys of their upcoming marriage. My secretary knocked on the door—she never does this. She opened the door and she was weeping. You all know Mrs. Schwab. Have you ever seen her even without a smile? ‘The radio,’ she said.”

Rabbi Neuberger shrugged, but somehow still conveyed all the grief that followed. “I will always think about that moment as the threshold between Before and After.” He held up a finger. “If that young couple had not been in my office, I would have given way to grief. But they asked me if they should still get married. It seemed as if the world were ending. Should they marry?”

He leaned forward, and you could hear the held breath of every person in the tense silence around us.

“Yes. Marriage, too, is a threshold between Before and After. We have many of these, every day, which we do not recognize. The threshold is not the question. There will always be Befores and Afters. The question is: what do you do after you cross that threshold?”

I wiped under my eyes with the thumb of my glove, and it came away dark with mascara.

“You live. You remember. This is what our people have always done.”

Outside the synagogue, bells began to sound across the city. Probably across the country, and maybe across the planet. I didn’t have to look at my watch. 9:53 a.m.

I closed my eyes, and even in the darkness, even four year later, I could still see the light. Yes. I remembered where I was when the Meteor struck.

*

I did not even make the first cut.

I was consoling myself with a piece of carrot cake at the IAC cafeteria—and, as a sidenote, let me say that the best thing about the International part of the International Aerospace Coalition was that it meant the cafeteria had a French pastry chef. But I digress. So the carrot cake and I were sitting at a table with Helen, Basira, and Myrtle. When we’d been living with Myrtle, I’d had no idea she had worked as a computer during the war until she signed on with the IAC two years ago.

Basira, who had come to us from Algiers, made a face. “So, then he tried to show me how to use a slide rule!”

“No—for a differential equation?” Myrtle, the only other American in our group, covered her mouth and laughed until her cheeks turned red. “What a buffoon.”

“I know!” Basira put on a terrible American accent. “Weyaaaaahll, liddle lady, this here iz ah mighdy fine instrumen.”

Helen had her hands clapped over her mouth and was cackling like a Taiwanese banshee—if there were such a thing. “Tell them where he hold it!”

With a snort, Basira glanced around the cafeteria, but it was the end of the day shift, so it was largely empty. I lowered my fork, making a guess and—yep. She placed her hand in her lap, as if the slide rule were … well. Prepared for liftoff. “I ken show ya how ta uze it.”

I laughed, picturing Leroy Pluckett, with his wispy sideburns and loud ties, trying to come on to Basira. With her height and dark, smooth complexion, she had easily won Miss Outer Space at the company holiday party last winter. Plus, her accent was to die for.

The company of these women was a newfound joy to me. The NACA computing department had been all women, yes, but due to segregation laws in D.C., they had all been white women. If you told me four years ago that I was going to be one of only two white women in my group of closest friends, I would have laughed. I’m ashamed of that now.

The International Aerospace Coalition, which President Brannan had convinced the UN to form, changed everything. Well … the Meteor had changed everything. But having a Quaker for president did a lot to alter hiring practices all the way down the line. And I couldn’t be luckier to have these friends as a result.

Helen wiped her eyes and looked over my shoulder. “Hello, Dr. York.”

“Good evening, ladies.” He rested his hand on my shoulder briefly, in lieu of a public kiss. “What are you laughing about?”

“Slide rules.” Helen folded her hands demurely in her lap. “And their uses.”

Which set us off again. Poor Nathaniel just watched the laughter, smiling with us, but otherwise clueless. Which reminded me that I would have to talk to him about Leroy Pluckett. It made for a funny story, but I didn’t like him coming into our department and disrupting it. Technically, personnel issues were Mrs. Rogers’s job, but I was the one who was sleeping with the lead engineer, so I was in a better position to fix it than the other women.

Wiping my eyes and still chuckling, I slid my chair back. “Looks like my ride is here.”

“Are you not going to finish that cake?” Myrtle reached across the table.

“It’s all yours.”

Nathaniel picked up my coat from the back of my chair and held it up for me. This July was almost warm enough to not need it, but not quite yet. Summer was coming, sooner than we liked. I waved goodbye to the women. “See y’all tomorrow.”

A chorus of goodbyes followed us across the cafeteria amid bubbles of laughter. Nathaniel took my hand. “You seem to be in a better mood.”

“Well, cake helps. And getting a rose from you.”

“I’m glad you liked it.” He waved to one of the other engineers as we walked down the hall toward the front doors of the IAC. “I learned something today that might also cheer you up.”

“Oh?” I stopped by the door to let him open it for me. “Do tell?”