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Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Caltech Campus, Pasadena, California

Five years, six months ago

I’m finishing my initial semester of grad school when I first meet Ian Floyd, and it’s Helena Harding’s fault.

Dr. Harding is a lot of things: my friend Mara’s Ph.D. mentor; one of the most celebrated environmental scientists of the twenty-first century; a generally crabby human being; and, last but not least, my Water Resources Engineering professor.

It is, quite honestly, an all-around shitty class: mandatory; irrelevant to my academic, professional, or personal interests; and highly focused on the intersection of the hydrologic cycle and the design of urban storm-sewer systems. For the most part, I spend the lectures wishing I were anywhere else: in line at the DMV, at the market buying magic beans, taking Analytical Transonic and Supersonic Aerodynamics. I do the least I can to pull a low B—which, in the unjust scam of graduate school, is the minimum passing grade—until week three or four of classes, when Dr. Harding introduces a new, cruel assignment that has fuck all to do with water.

“Find someone who has the engineering job you want at the end of your Ph.D. and do an informational interview with them,” she tells us. “Then write a report about it. Due by the end of the semester. Don’t come to me bitching about it during office hours, because I will call security to escort you out.” I have a feeling that she’s looking at me while saying it. It’s probably just my guilty conscience.

“Honestly, I’m just going to ask Helena if I can interview her. But if you want, I think I have a cousin or something at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab,” Mara says offhandedly later that day, while we’re sitting on the steps outside the Beckman Auditorium having a quick lunch before heading back to our labs.

I wouldn’t say that we’re close, but I’ve decided that I like her. A lot. At this point, my grad school attitude is some mild variant of I did not come here to make friends: I don’t feel in competition with the rest of the program, but neither am I particularly invested in anything that isn’t my work in the aeronautics lab, including getting acquainted with other students, or, you know?.?.?. learning their names. I’m fairly sure that my lack of interest is strongly broadcasted, but either Mara didn’t pick up the transmission, or she’s gleefully ignoring it. She and Sadie found each other in the first couple of days, and then, for reasons I don’t fully understand, decided to find me.

Hence Mara sitting next to me, telling me about her JPL contacts.

“A cousin or something?” I ask, curious. It seems a bit sketchy. “You think?”

“Yeah, I’m not sure.” She shrugs and continues to make her way through a Tupperware of broccoli, an apple, and approximately two fucktons of Cheez-Its. “I don’t really know much about him. His parents divorced, then people in my family had arguments and stopped talking to each other. There was a lot of prime Floyd dysfunction happening, so I haven’t actually spoken to him in years. But I heard from one of my other cousins that he was working on that thing that landed on Mars back when we were in high school. It was called something like?.?.?. Contingency, or Carpentry, or Crudity—”

“The Curiosity rover?”

“Yes! Maybe?”

I put my sandwich down. Swallow my bite. Clear my throat. “Your cousin or something was on the Curiosity rover team.”

“I think so. Do the dates add up? Maybe it was some kind of summer internship? But honestly, it might just be Floyd family lore. I have an aunt who insists that we’re related to the Finnish royals, and according to Wikipedia there are no Finnish royals. So.” She shrugs and pops another handful of Cheez-Its in her mouth. “Would you like me to ask around, though? For the assignment?”

I nod. And I don’t think much about it until a month or so later. By then, through means that I am still unable to divine, Mara and Sadie have managed to worm their way into my heart, causing me to amend my previous I did not come here to make friends stance to a slightly altered I did not come here to make friends, but hurt my weird Cheez-It friend or my other weird soccer friend and I will beat you up with a lead pipe till you piss blood for the rest of your life. Truculent? Perhaps. I feel little, but surprisingly deeply.

“By the way, I sent you my cousin-or-something’s contact info a while ago,” Mara tells me one night. We’re at the cheapest grad bar we’ve been able to find. She’s on her second Midori sour of the night. “Did you get it?”

I raise my eyebrow. “Is that the random string of numbers you emailed me three days ago? With no subject line, no text, no explanations? The one I figured was just you tracking your lottery dream numbers?”

“Sounds like it, yeah.”

Sadie and I exchange a long look.

“Hey, you ungrateful goblin, I had to call about fifteen people I’d sworn never to talk to again to get Ian’s number. And, I had to have my evil great-aunt Delphina promise to blackmail him into saying yes once you reach out to ask for a meeting. So you better use that number, and you better play the Mega Millions.”

“If you win,” Sadie added, “we split three ways.”

“Of course.” I hide my smile in my glass. “What’s he like, anyway?”

“Who?”

“The cousin-or-something. Ian, you said?”

“Yup. Ian Floyd.” Mara thinks about it for a second. “Can’t really say, because I’ve met him at like, two Thanksgivings fifteen years ago, before his parents split. Then his mom moved him to Canada and?.?.?. I don’t even know, honestly. The only thing I remember is that he was tall. But he was also a few years older than me? So maybe he’s actually three feet. Oh, also, his hair is more brown? Which is kind of rare for a Floyd. I know it’s scientifically unsound, but our brand of ginger is not recessive.”

Great-Aunt Delphina’s emotional manipulation game is clearly on point, because when my assignment’s deadline approaches and I text Ian Floyd in a panic, asking for an informational interview—whatever the hell that is—he replies within hours with an enthusiastic:

Ian:Sure.

Hannah:Thanks. I’m assuming you’re in Houston. Should we do virtual? Skype? Zoom? FaceTime?

Ian:I’m in Pasadena at JPL for the next three days, but virtual works.

The Jet Propulsion Lab. Hmm.

I drum my fingers on my mattress, pondering. Virtual would be so much easier. And it would be shorter. But as much as I hate the idea of writing a report for Helena’s class, I do want to ask this guy a million questions about Curiosity. Plus, he’s Mara’s mysterious relative, and my curiosity is piqued.

No pun intended.

Hannah:Let’s meet in person. The least I can do is buy you coffee. Sound good?

No reply for a few minutes. And then, a very succinct That works. For some reason, it makes me smile.


?????????My first thought upon entering the coffee shop is that Mara is full of shit.

To the brim.

The second: I should really double-check the text Ian sent me. Make sure that he really said I’ll be wearing jeans and a gray t-shirt like I seem to remember. Of course, it would be a little redundant, especially considering that the coffee shop where he asked to meet is currently populated by only three people: a barista, busy doing a pen-and-paper sudoku like it’s 2007; me, standing in the entrance and looking around, confused; and a man, sitting at the table closest to the entrance, gazing pensively through the glass windows.

He’s wearing jeans and a gray T-shirt, which would suggest: Ian. The problem?.?.?.

His hair is the problem. Because, despite what Mara said, it’s most definitely not brown. Maybe a fraction of a shade darker than her bright, carroty orange, but?.?.?. really not brown. I’m ready to dial her number and demand to know what ridiculous ginger scale the Floyds operate on when the man slowly stands and asks, “Hannah?”

I have no idea how tall Ian is, but he’s much closer to eight feet than to three. And I find it very interesting that Mara claims to barely know him, considering that they look like they could be siblings, not just because of the aggressively red hair, but also the dark-blue eyes, and the dusting of freckles over pale skin, and?.?.?.

I blink. Then I blink again. If three seconds ago someone had asked me whether I’m the type to multiple blink at the sight of some guy, I’d have laughed in their face. This guy, though?.?.?.

I guess I stand corrected.

“Ian?” I smile, recovering from the surprise. “Mara’s cousin?”

He frowns, as if momentarily blanking on Mara’s name. “Ah, yes.” He nods. Only once. “Apparently,” he adds, which makes me laugh. He waits for me to take a seat across from him before folding back in his chair. I notice that he doesn’t hold out his hand, nor does he smile. Interesting. “Thank you for agreeing to meet with me.”

“No problem.” His voice is low-pitched but clear. Deep timbre. Confident; polite but not too friendly. I’m usually fairly good at reading people, and my guess for him is that he’s not quite enthused to be here. He’d probably rather be doing whatever it is that he came to California to do, but he’s a nice guy, and he’s planning to make a valiant effort to avoid letting me know.

He just doesn’t seem to be particularly good at faking it, which is?.?.?. kinda cute.

“I hope I didn’t mess up your day.”

He shakes his head—an obvious lie—and I take the opportunity to study him. He seems?.?.?. quiet. The silent type, aloof, a little stiff. Big, more lumberjack than engineer. I briefly wonder if he’s military personnel, but the day-old stubble on his face tells me it’s unlikely.

And such an intriguing, handsome face it is. His nose looks like it was broken at some point, maybe in a fight or a sports injury, and never bothered to heal back quite perfectly. His hair—red—is short and a little mussed, more I’ve been up working since sixa.m. than artful styling. I watch him scratch his—big—neck, then cross his—wide—biceps on his—broad—chest. He gives me a patient, expectant look, like he’s fully committed to answering all my questions.

He is, physically, the opposite of me. Of my small bones and tanned complexion. My hair, eyes, sometimes even my soul, are black-hole dark. And here he is, Martian red and ocean blue.

“What can I get you?” a voice asks. I turn and find Sudoku Boy standing right next to our table. Right. Coffee place. Where people consume beverages.

“Iced tea, please.”

He walks away without a word and I look at Ian once again. I’m itching to text Mara. Your cousin looks like a slightly jacked version of Prince Harry. Maybe you should have kept in touch?

“So.” I cross my hands and lean my elbows on the table. “What does she have on you?”

He tilts his head. “She?”

“Great-Aunt Delphina.” He blinks twice. I smile and continue, “I mean, it’s a Thursday afternoon. You’re in California for a handful of days. I’m sure you have something better to do than meet up with your long-lost cousin’s friend.”

His eyes widen for a split second. Then his expression levels back to neutral. “It’s fine.”

“Is it an embarrassing baby pic?”

He shakes his head. “I don’t mind helping out.”

“I see. A baby video, then?”

He’s silent for a moment before saying, “As I said, it’s not a problem.” He looks like he isn’t used to people pushing him, which is unsurprising. There is something subtly removed about him. Vaguely distant and intimidating. Like he’s not quite reachable. It makes me want to get closer and poke.

“A baby video of you?.?.?. running around in the kiddie pool? Picking your nose? Rummaging around the back of your diaper?”

“I—”

Sudoku Boy drops off my iced tea in a plastic cup. Ian’s eyes follow him for a few seconds, then return to mine with an interesting mix of stoic resignation. “It was more of a toddler video,” he says cautiously, like he’s surprising even himself.

“Ah.” I grin into my tea. It’s both too sweet and too sour. With a subtle aftertaste of gross. “Do tell.”

“You don’t want to know.”

“Oh, I’m positive I do.”

“It’s bad.”

“You’re really selling it to me.”

The left corner of his mouth curves upward, a small hint of amusement that’s not quite fully there yet. I have an odd stray thought: I bet his smile is lopsided. Beautiful, too. “The video was taken at a Lowe’s. With my older brother’s new camcorder, sometime in the late ’90s,” he tells me.

“At a Lowe’s? Can’t be that bad, then.”

He sighs, impassive. “I was around three or four. And they had one of those bathroom displays. The ones with model sinks and showers and vanities. And toilets, naturally.”

I press my lips together. This is going to be fun. “Naturally.”

“I don’t really remember what happened, but apparently I needed to use the restroom. And when I saw the display I was?.?.?. inspired.”

“No way.”

“In my defense, I was very young.”

He scratches his nose, and I laugh. “Oh my God.”

“With no concept of sewage systems.”

“Right. Sure. Honest mistake.” I cannot stop laughing. “How did Great-Aunt Delphina get a copy of the video?”

“Officially: unclear. But I’m fairly sure my brother made CDs of it. Sent them to local TV stations and whatnot.” He gestures vaguely, and his forearm is dusted with freckles and pale-red hair. I want to grab his wrist, hold it in front of my eyes, study it at my leisure. Trace, smell, touch. “I haven’t spent a holiday with the Floyd side of the family in twenty years, but I’m told that the video is a source of great entertainment for all age groups at Thanksgiving.”

“I bet it’s the pièce de résistance. I bet they press play right after the turducken comes out.”

“Yeah. You’d probably win.” He seems quietly resigned. A big man with a put-upon-but-enduring air. In an utterly charming way.

“But how do you blackmail someone from this? How much worse can it get?”

He sighs again. His broad shoulders lift, then fall. “When my aunt called, she briefly mentioned uploading it on Facebook. Tagging the NASA official page.”

I gasp into my hand. I shouldn’t laugh. This is horrible. But. “Are you serious?”

“It’s not a healthy family.”

“No shit.”

He shrugs, like he’s past caring. “At least they’re not trying to extort money out of me yet.”

“Right.” I nod solemnly and collect my features into what hopefully passes for a compassionate, respectful expression. “The assignment I told you about is for my Water Resources class, so this is surprisingly on topic. And I am truly sorry that you got stuck with meeting your little cousin’s friend because you publicly urinated in a Lowe’s when you barely knew how to talk.”

Ian’s eyes settle on me, as if to size me up. I thought I had his full attention from the moment I sat down, but I realize that I was wrong. For the first time, he’s looking at me like he’s interested in actually seeing me. He studies me, assesses me, and my first impression of him—detached, distant—instantly evaporates. There is something nearly palpable about his presence: a warm, tingling sensation climbing up my spine.

“I don’t mind,” he says again. I smile, because I know that this time he means it.

“Good.” I push my tea to the side. “So, what would you be doing right now, if three-year-old you had known about sanitary sewers?”

This time his smile is a tad more defined. I’m winning him over, which is good, very good, because I’m rapidly developing a thing for the contrast between his eyelashes (red!) and his deep-set eyes (blue!). “I’d probably be running a bunch of tests.”

“At the Jet Propulsion Lab?”

He nods.

“Tests on?.?.?.??”

“A rover.”

“Oh.” My heart skips three beats. “For space exploration?”

“Mars.”

I lean closer, not even bothering to play it like I’m not avidly interested. “Is that your current project?”

“One of them, yeah.”

“And what are the tests for?”

“Mostly attitude, figuring out where the ship is positioned in three-dimensional space. Pointing, too.”

“You work on a gyroscope?”

“Yes. My team is perfecting the gyroscope so that once the rover is on Mars, it knows where it is, what it’s looking at. Informs the other systems about its coordinates and movements, too.”

My heart is now fully pitter-pattering. This sounds?.?.?. wow. Pornographic, almost. Exactly my jam. “And you do this in Houston? At the Space Center?”

“Usually. But I come up here when there are issues. I’ve been struggling with the imagery, and the feed update keeps lagging even though it shouldn’t, and—” He shakes his head, as if catching himself halfway through a rant that’s been playing over and over in his mind. But I finally know what he’d rather be doing.

And I sure can’t blame him.

“Did they send your entire team here?” I ask.

He tilts his head, like he has no idea where I’m going with this. “Just me.”

“So your team leader is not around.”

“My team leader?”

“Yeah. Is your boss around?”

He is silent for a second. Two. Three. Four? What the— Ah.

“You are the team leader,” I say.

He nods once. A little stiff. Almost apologetic.

“How old are you?” I ask.

“Twenty-five.” A pause. “Next month.”

Whoa. I’m twenty-two. “Isn’t that early to be a team leader?”

“I’m?.?.?. not sure,” he says, even though I can tell that he is sure, and that he is exceptional, and that even though he knows it, the thought makes him more than a little uncomfortable. I picture myself saying something flirtatious and inappropriate back—Wow, handsome and smart—and wonder how he’d react. Probably not well.

Not that I’m going to hit on my informational interviewee. Even I know better. Plus, he’s not really my type.

“Okay, what’s the security like at JPL?” I’ve never been. I know it’s loosely connected with Caltech, but that’s about it.

“Depends,” he says cautiously, like he still cannot follow my train of thought.

“What about your office? Is it a restricted area?”

“No. Why—”

“Awesome, then.” I stand, dig into my pockets for a few dollars to leave next to my unfinished tea, and then close my fingers around Ian’s wrist. His skin glows with warmth and taut muscles as I pull him up from the table, and even though he’s probably twice as big and ten times stronger than me, he lets me lead him away from the table. I let go of him the second we’re out of the coffee shop, but he keeps following me.

“Hannah? What—where?.?.?.??”

“I don’t see why we can’t do this weird informational interview thing, get some work done, and have fun.”

“What?”

With a grin, I look at him over my shoulders. “Think of it as sticking it to evil Great-Aunt Delphina.”

I doubt he fully understands, but the corner of his mouth lifts again, and that’s good enough for me.


?????????“See this thread right here? It’s mostly about the behavior of one of the rover’s sensors, the LN-200. We combine its information with the one provided by the encoders on the wheels to figure out positioning.”

“Huh. So the sensor doesn’t run constantly?”

Ian turns to me, away from the chunk of programming code he’s been showing me. We’re sitting in front of his triple-monitor computer, side by side at his desk, which is a giant, pristine expanse with a stunning view of the floodplain JPL was built on. When I mentioned how clean his workspace was, he pointed out that it’s only because it’s a guest office. But when I asked him if his usual desk back in Houston is any messier, he glanced away before the corner of his lip twitched.

I am almost certain he’s starting to think that I’m not a total waste of time.

“No, it doesn’t run constantly. How can you tell?”

I gesture toward the lines of code, and the back of my hand brushes against something hard and warm: Ian’s shoulder. We’re sitting closer than we were at the coffee shop, but no closer than I’d feel comfortable being with one of the—always unpleasant, often offensive—guys in my Ph.D. cohort. I guess my crossed knees kind of pressed against his leg earlier, but that’s it. No big deal. “It’s in there, no?”

The section is in C++. Which happens to be the very first language I taught myself back in high school, when every single Google search for “Skills + Necessary + NASA” led to the sad result of “Programming.” Python came after. Then SQL. Then HAL/S. For each language, I started out convinced that chewing on glass would surely be preferable. Then, at some point along the way, I began thinking in terms of functions, variables, conditional loops. A little after that, reading code became a bit like inspecting the label on the back of the conditioner bottle while showering: not particularly fun, but overall easy. I do have some talents, apparently.

“Yeah.” He’s still looking at me. Not surprised, precisely. Not impressed, either. Intrigued, maybe? “Yes, it is.”

I rest my chin on my palm and chew on my lower lip, considering the code. “Is it because of the limited amount of solar power?”

“Yes.”

“And I bet it prevents gyro drift errors during the stationary period?”

“Correct.” He nods, and I’m momentarily distracted by his jawline. Or maybe it’s the cheekbones. They’re defined, angular in a way that makes me wish I had a protractor in my pocket.

“It’s not all automated, right? Earth-based personnel can direct tools?”

“They can, depending on the attitude.”

“Does the onboard flight software have specific requirements?”

“The pointing of the antenna relative to the Earth, and?.?.?.” He stops. His eyes fall on my chewed-on lip, then quickly move away. “You ask a lot of questions.”

I tilt my head. “Bad questions?”

Silence. “No.” More silence as he studies me. “Remarkably good questions.”

“Can I ask a few more, then?” I grin at him, aiming for cheeky, curious to see where it’ll take us.

He hesitates before nodding. “Can I ask you some, too?”

I laugh. “Like what? Would you like me to list the specs of the maze-solving bot I built for my Intro to Robotics class back in college?”

“You built a maze-solving robot?”

“Yup. Four-wheel, all-terrain, Bluetooth module. Solar powered. Her name was Ruthie, and when I set her free at a corn maze somewhere near Atlanta, she got out in about three minutes. Scared the crap out of the children, too.”

He is fully smiling now. He has a heart-stopping dimple on his left cheek, and?.?.?. Okay, fine: he’s aggressively hot. Despite the red hair, or because of it. “You still have her?”

“Nope. To celebrate, I got wasted at a bar that didn’t bother to check IDs and ended up leaving her at some University of Georgia frat house. I didn’t want to go back, because those places are scary, so I gave up on Ruthie and just built an electronic arm for my Robotics final.” I sigh and look into the mid-distance. “I’ll need a lot of therapy before I can become a mother.”

He chuckles. The sound is low, warm, maybe even shiver-inducing. I need a second to regroup.

I’ve settled—at some point on our five-minute walk here, probably when he pulled out a pretty effortless scowl to intimidate the security guard into letting me in despite my lack of ID—on the reason I can’t quite pin Ian down. He is, very simply, a never-before-experienced mix of cute and overwhelmingly masculine. With a complex, layered air about him. It spells simultaneously Do not piss me off because I don’t fuck around and Ma’am, let me carry those groceries for you.

Not my usual fare, not at all. I like flirting, and I like sex, and I like hooking up with people, but I’m really, really picky about my partners. It doesn’t take a lot to turn me off someone, and I almost exclusively gravitate toward the cheerful, spontaneous, fun-loving type. I’m into extraverts who love banter and are easy to talk to, the less intense the better. Ian seems to be the diametrical opposite of that, and yet?.?.?. And yet, even I can see how there is something fundamentally attractive about him. Would I try to pick him up at a bar? Hm. Unclear.

Will I try to pick him up after the end of this informational interview? Hm. Also unclear. I know I say I wouldn’t, but?.?.?. things change.

“Okay. My question now. Mara—Mara Floyd, your cousin or something—said that you were working directly on the Curiosity team?” He nods. “But you were, what? Eighteen?”

“Around that age, yeah.”

“Were you an intern?”

He pauses before shaking his head but doesn’t elaborate.

“So you just?.?.?. happened to be hanging out with mission control? Chilling with your space bros while they landed their remote control rover on Mars?”

His lips twitch. “I was a team member.”

“A team member at eighteen?” My eyebrow lifts, and he looks away.

“I?.?.?. graduated early.”

“High school? Or college?”

Silence. “Both.”

“I see.”

He briefly scratches the side of his neck, and there again is this feeling that he’s not quite used to being asked questions about himself. That most people take a look at him, decide that he’s just a touch too aloof and detached, and give up on figuring him out.

I study him, more curious than ever. “So?.?.?. were you one of those kids who was really advanced for their age and skipped half a dozen grades? And then ended up joining the workforce while still ridiculously young?” And maybe your psychosocial development was still kind of ongoing, but you were never really sharing professional or academic settings with people in your age group, just much older ones who likely avoided you and were a little intimidated by your intelligence and success, which meant being the odd man out for the entirety of your formative years and having a 401(k) before your first date?

His eyes widen. “I?.?.?. Yeah. Were you one, too?”

I laugh. “Oh no. I was a total dumbass. Still am, for the most part. I just thought it might be a good guess.” It fits the persona, too. He doesn’t come across as insecure, not quite, but he’s cautious. Withdrawn.

I lean back in my chair, feeling the thrill of having puzzled him out a little better. I’m usually not this dedicated to figuring out the backstory of everyone I meet, but Ian is just interesting.

No. He’s fascinating.

“So, how was it?”

He blinks. “How was what?”

“Being there with mission control when Curiosity landed. How was it?”

His expression instantly transforms. “It was?.?.?.” He’s staring down at his feet, as if remembering. He looks awestruck.

“That good?”

“Yeah. It was?.?.?. Yeah.” He chuckles again. God, it really does sound great.

“It looked like it. From TV, I mean.”

“You watched it?”

“Yup. I was on the East Coast, so I stayed up late and all that. Looked up at the sky out of my bedroom window and cried a little bit.”

He nods, and suddenly he is studying me. “Is that why you’re in grad school? You want to work on future rovers?”

“That would be amazing. But anything that’s space exploration will do.”

“NASA can put your maze-solving skills to great use.” His dimple is back, and I laugh.

“Hey, I can do other things. For instance?.?.?.” I point at the third monitor on the desk, the one farthest away from me. It displays a piece of code Ian hasn’t walked me through yet. “Want me to help you debug that?” He gives me a confused look. “What? It’s code. It’s always nice to have a second pair of eyes.”

“You don’t have to—”

“There’s an error on the fifth line.”

He frowns. Then he scans the code for a second. Then he turns to me, to the monitor, to me again with an even bigger frown. I brace, half expecting him to lash out defensively and deny the error. I’m familiar with the crumbling egos of men, and I’m pretty sure it’s what any of the guys in my Ph.D. class would do. But Ian surprises me: he nods, fixes the mistake I pointed out, and looks nothing but grateful.

Wow. A male engineer who’s not an asshole. The bar is pretty low, but I’m nevertheless impressed.

“Would you really be up for going through the rest of the code with me?” he asks cautiously, surprising me even more. The contrast between his gentle tone and how?.?.?. how big and guarded he is almost has me smiling. “It’s the workaround to fix the two-second delay in the pointing issue. I was going to ask one of my engineers in Houston to debug, but?.?.?.”

“I got you.” I roll my chair closer to Ian’s. My knee presses against his, and I nearly move it away automatically, but in a split-second decision I decide to leave it there.

An experiment of sorts. Testing the waters. Taking the temperature.

I wait for him to shift back, but instead he studies me and says, “It’s a few hundred lines. I’m supposed to be helping you. Are you sure—”

“It’s fine. When I write my report, I’ll just pretend I asked you a bunch of questions about your journey and make up the answers.” Just to mess with him, I add, “Don’t worry, I’ll mention how having the clap did not set you back on your road to NASA.” He scowls, which has me laughing, and then I’m going over the code with him for five, ten minutes. Fifteen. The light softens to late-afternoon hues, and over an hour goes by while we’re side by side, blinking at the monitors.

Honestly, it’s pretty basic rubber duck debugging: he’s explaining out loud what he’s trying to do, which helps him work through critical chunks, and also figuring out better ways to go about it. But I’m a pretty happy rubber duck. I like listening to his low, even voice. I like that he seems to consider every single thing I say and never dismisses anything outright. I like that when he’s thinking hard, he closes his eyes, and his lashes are crimson half-moons against his skin. I like that he builds meticulously pristine code with no memory leakage, and I like that when his biceps brushes against my shoulder all I feel is solid warmth. I like his short, crisp functions, and the way he smells clean and masculine and a bit dark.

Okay. So he’s not my type.

I do like him, though.

Would Mara mind it if I shamelessly offered myself to her kin at the informational interview she kindly set up? I would normally just go for it, but this friendship business can be a bit of a burden. That said, maybe I can safely assume that she won’t care, considering that she doesn’t seem to know how exactly she and Ian are related.

Plus, she’s a generous soul. She’d want her friend and her cousin-or-something to get laid.

“Did you get randomly assigned to the Attitude and Position Estimation team?” I ask him when we get to the last few lines of code.

“No.” He lets out a small laugh. His profile is a work of near perfection, even with the broken nose. “Clawed my way there, actually.”

“Oh?”

He saves and closes our work with a few rapid keystrokes. “For Curiosity, I joined the team pretty late into the development stage, and I mostly focused on launch.”

“Did you like it?”

“A lot.” He angles his chair to face me. Our knees, elbows, shoulders have been brushing so much, the closeness feels familiar by now. So does the liquid warmth under my belly button. “But after that I began working on Perseverance and I asked for a change. Something actually related to the rover being on Mars as opposed to three hours in Cape Canaveral.”

“So they put you on A & PE?”

“First, I joined the NASA expedition to Norway’s Mars Analog site.”

I inhale audibly. “AMASE?” The Arctic Mars Analog Svalbard Expedition (AMASE, for friends) is what happens when a bunch of nerds travel to Norway, in the Bockfjorden area of Svalbard. One might think that the North Pole has nothing to do with space, but because of all the volcanic activity and glaciers it’s actually the place on Earth most similar to Mars. It even has one-of-a-kind carbonate spherules that are almost identical to the ones we found on meteorites of Martian origin. NASA researchers like to use it as a location to test the functionality of equipment they plan to send on space exploration missions, collect samples, examine fun science questions that can prepare astronauts for future space missions.

I want to be part of it so bad, a shiver runs down my spine.

“Yup. When I came back I asked for an A & PE placement, which apparently everyone wanted. To the point that the mission leader sent out a NASA-wide email asking whether we thought we’d get double pay and free beer.”

“Did you?”

I laugh at the look he gives me. He is just so hilariously, deliciously teasable. “Why did everyone want to be part of that team, anyway?”

He shrugs. “I’m not sure why everyone else did. I assume because it’s challenging. Lots of high-risk, high-reward projects. But for me it was?.?.?.” He glances out of the window, at a maple tree in the JPL campus. Actually, no: I think he might be looking up. At the sky. “It just felt like?.?.?.” He trails off, as though not sure how to continue.

“Like it was as close as possible to actually being on Mars? With the rover?” I ask him.

His eyes return to me. “Yeah.” He seems surprised. Like I managed to put something elusive into words. “Yeah, that’s exactly it.”

I nod, because I get it. The idea of helping build something that will explore Mars, the idea of being able to control where it goes and what it does?.?.?. that does it for me, too.

Ian and I study each other for a few seconds in silence, both of us smiling faintly. Long enough for the idea that’s been bouncing in my head to solidify once and for all.

Yeah. I’m gonna go for it. Sorry, Mara. I like your cousin-or-something a little too much to pass this up.

“Okay, I do have a career question for you. To save our informational interview appearances.”

“Shoot.”

“So, I graduate with my Ph.D. Which should take me about four more years.”

“That’s a while,” he says, his tone a bit unreadable.

Yes, it feels like forever. “Not that long. So, I graduate, and I decide that I want to work at NASA and not for some weirdo billionaire who treats space exploration like it’s his own homemade penis-enlargement remedy.”

Ian’s nod is pained. “Wise.”

“What would make me look like a strong candidate? What does a great application package look like?”

He mulls it over. “I’m not sure. For my team, I would usually hire internally. But I’m almost certain I still have my application materials on my old laptop. I could send them to you.”

Okay. Perfect. Great.

The opening I was waiting for.

My heart rate picks up. Warmth twists in my lower stomach. I lean forward with a smile, feeling like I’m finally in my element. This, this, is what I know best. Depending on how busy I am with school, or work, or binge-watching K-dramas, I do this about once a week. Which amounts to quite a bit of practice. “Maybe I could come to your place?” I say, finding the sweet spot between comically suggestive and Let’s get together to play Cards Against Humanity. “And you could show me?”

“I meant—in Houston. My laptop’s in Houston.”

“So you didn’t bring your 2010 laptop to Pasadena?”

He smiles. “Knew I’d forgotten something.”

“Sure did.” I meet his eyes squarely. Lean half an inch closer. “Then maybe I can still come to your place, and we could do something else?”

He gives me a half-puzzled look. “Do what?”

I press my lips together. Okay. Maybe I overestimated my flirting skills. Have I, though? I don’t think so. “Really?” I ask, amused. “Am I that bad?”

“I’m sorry, I don’t follow.” Ian’s expression is all arrested confusion, like I just suddenly started talking in an Australian accent. “Bad at what?”

“At hitting on you, Ian.”

I can pinpoint the precise, exact moment the meaning of my words sinks into the language part of his brain. He blinks a few times. Then his big body goes still in a tight, impossible, vibrating way, like his internal software is buffering through an unpredictable set of updates.

He looks absolutely, almost charmingly mystified, and something occurs to me: I’ve struck up flirtatious conversations with dozens of guys and girls at parties, bars, laundromats, gyms, bookstores, seminars, muddy obstacle races, greenhouses—even, on one memorable occasion, in the waiting room of a Planned Parenthood, and?.?.?. no one has ever been this clueless. No one. So maybe he was just pretending not to get it. Maybe he was hoping I’d back off.

Shit.

“I’m sorry.” I straighten and roll my chair back, giving him a few inches of space. “I’m making you uncomfortable.”

“No. No, I—” He’s finally rebooting. Shaking his head. “No, you aren’t, I’m just—”

“A bit freaked out?” I smile reassuringly, trying to signal that it’s okay. I can take a no. I’m a big girl. “It’s fine. Let’s forget I said anything. But do email me your application package once you’re back home, please. I promise I won’t reply with unsolicited nudes.”

“No, it’s not that?.?.?.” He closes his eyes and pinches the bridge of his nose. His cheekbones look rosier than before. His lips move, trying to form words for a few seconds, until he settles on: “It’s just?.?.?. unexpected.”

Oh. I tilt my head. “Why?” I thought I’d been laying it on pretty thick.

“Because.” His large hand gestures in my direction. He swallows, and I watch his throat work. “Just?.?.?. look at you.”

I actually do it. I look down at myself, taking in my crossed legs, my khaki shorts, my plain black tee. My body is in its usual condition: tall. Wiry. A bit scrawny. Olive-skinned. I even shaved this morning. Maybe. I can’t remember. Point is, I look okay.

So I say it—“I look okay”—which should sound confident but comes out a bit petulant. It’s not that I think I’m hot shit, but I refuse to be insecure about my appearance. I like myself. Historically, the people I’ve wanted to sleep with have liked me, too. My body does its job as a means to an end. It manages to let me kayak around California lakes without muscle aches the following day, and it digests lactose like it’s an Olympic discipline. That’s all that matters.

But his reply is: “You don’t look okay,” and?.?.?. no.

“Really.” My tone is icy. Is Ian Floyd trying to imply that he’s out of my reach? Because if so, I will slap him. “How do I look, then?”

“Just?.?.?.” He swallows again. “I?.?.?. Women like you don’t usually?.?.?.”

“Women like me.” Wow. Sounds like I’ll actually have to slap him. “What’s that? Because—”

“Beautiful. You are very, very beautiful. Probably the most?.?.?. And you’re obviously smart and funny, so?.?.?.” He gives me a helpless look, suddenly looking less like a genius NASA team leader built like a cedar tree and more?.?.?. boyish. Young. “Is this some kind of joke?”

I study him through squinting eyes, revising my earlier assessment. Perhaps my conclusions were premature, and it’s not quite correct that no one can be this clueless. Perhaps someone can.

Ian, for instance. Ian, who could probably make good money as a stock-photo model, tags: Hot Guy, Ginger, Massive. I saw about four people check him out on our way here, but he apparently has no idea that he could be fancast to play the hot Weasley brother. Absolutely zero awareness of how glorious he is.

I grin, suddenly charmed. “Can I ask you a question?” I roll myself closer, and I’m not sure when that happened, but he angled his chair so that my knees end up slotted between his. Nice. “It’s a bit forward.”

He looks down at our touching legs and nods. As usual, only once.

“Can I kiss you? Like, right now?”

“I?.?.?.” He stares. Then blinks. Then mouths something that’s not a word.

My grin widens. “That’s not no, is it?”

“No.” He shakes his head. His eyes are fixed on my lips, the black of his pupils swallowing the blue. “It’s not.”

“Okay, then.”

It’s pretty simple, standing from my chair and leaning forward on his. My palms find the armrests and press against them, and for a long moment I stay right there, caging this bear-size man who could flick me away with his little finger but doesn’t. Instead he looks up at me like I’m wondrous and beautiful and awe-inspiring, like I’m a gift, like he’s a bit dumbstruck.

Like he really wants me to kiss him. So I close that last inch and I do. And it’s?.?.?.

Kind of awkward, to be honest. Not bad. Just a little hesitant. His lips part in a gasp when they touch mine, and for a split second, a terrifying thought occurs to me.

It’s his first kiss. Is it? Oh my God, it’s his first kiss. Am I really giving someone their first—

Ian angles his head, pushes his mouth against mine, and it destroys my train of thought. I’m not sure how he manages, but whatever he’s doing with his lips and teeth feels massively, aggressively right. I whimper when his tongue meets mine. He growls in response, something rumbly and deep in his throat.

Okay. This is no first kiss. This is a fucking masterpiece.

He’s probably two hundred pounds of muscles and I have no clue whether the chair can hold us both, but I decide to live dangerously: I straddle Ian’s lap, feeling his sharp inhale vibrate through my body. For a suspended second our lips part and his eyes hold mine, like we’re both waiting for every piece of furniture in the room to collapse. But JPL must be investing in sturdy decor.

“That was high-risk, high-reward,” I say, and I’m surprised at how short my breath is already. The room is silent, bathed in warm light. I let out a single, shaky laugh, and I realize where Ian’s hand is: hovering half an inch above my waist. Warm. Eager. Ready to snap.

“Can I—?” he asks.

“Yes.” I laugh into his mouth. “You can touch me. It’s the whole point of—”

I don’t get to finish, because the second he has permission his hands are everywhere, one on my nape, pulling my lips into his, the other on the small of my back. The moment my chest presses against his, he does another of those low, rough sounds—but ten times deeper, like it comes from his very core. He’s all scratchy stubble, warm unwieldy flesh, and in the corner of my eyes I see only red, red, so much red.

“I’m in love with your freckles,” I say, right before nipping at one on his jaw. “I thought about licking them the moment I saw you.” I make my way to the hollow of his ear. He exhales, sharp.

“When I saw you, I—” I suck on the skin of his throat, and he stutters. “I thought you were a little too beautiful,” he finishes, breathless. His hands are traveling under my shirt, up my spine, cautiously tracing the edges of my bra. He smells magnificent, clean and serious and warm.

“Too beautiful for what?”

“For everything. Too beautiful to look at, even.” His grip on my waist tightens. “Hannah, you—”

I am grinding my groin against his. Which is probably the reason we both sound like we’re running a marathon. And in my defense, I really only meant for this to be a kiss, but yeah. No. I’m not stopping, and judging from the way his fingers dip into the back of my shorts to cup my ass cheek and press me tighter into his hard cock, he’s not planning to, either.

“Does anyone else use this office?” I ask. I’m not shy, but this is?.?.?. good. No-interruptions-please good. I-don’t-want-to-wait-till-we-get-home good. I’m-going-to-come-in-about-two-minutes good.

He shakes his head, and I could cry of happiness, but I don’t have time. It’s like we were playing before, and now we’re in earnest. We’re barely kissing, uncoordinated, unfocused, just grinding against each other, and I chase the feeling of his body against mine, the high of being so close, his erection between my legs as we both make hushed, grunting, obscene noises, as we both try to get closer, to get more contact, skin, heat, friction, friction, friction, I need more friction—

“Shit.” I cannot get enough. It’s not a good position, and I hate this stupid chair, and this is driving me insane. I let out a loud, infuriated groan and sink my teeth deep into his neck, like I am made of heat and frustration, and—

Somehow, Ian knows exactly what I need. Because he stands from the cursed chair with a muted, “It’s okay, it’s okay, I’ve got you.” He takes me right with him and does something that could technically qualify as destroying NASA property to make enough room for us. A moment later I’m sitting on the desk, and all of a sudden we can both move like we want to. He opens my legs with his palms and slots his own right between them, and—

Finally. The friction is—this is precisely what I asked for, precisely what I needed—

“Yes,” I breathe out.

“Yeah?” I don’t even need to move my hips. His hand slides down to grip my ass, and he somehow knows exactly how to angle me, how the hem of my shorts can brush against my clit. “Like this?” I feel his cock iron-hard on my hip and I make mewling, embarrassing, pleading sounds into the hollow of his throat, murmuring incomprehensibly about how good this is, how grateful I am, how I’m going to do the same for him when we finally fuck, how I’m going to do whatever he wants—

“Stop,” he pants into my mouth, urgent, a little desperate. “You need to be quiet, or I’m going to—I just want to—”

I laugh against his cheek, reedy, hushed. My thighs are starting to shake. There is a liquid, pressing heat swelling in my abdomen. “Want to—ah—want to what?”

“I just want to make you come.”

It sends me right over the edge. Into something that’s nothing like my usual, run-of-the-mill orgasm. Those tend to start like small fractures and then slowly, gradually deepen into something lovely and relaxing. Those are fun, good fun, but this?.?.?. This pleasure is sudden and violent. It splinters into me like a wonderful, terrible explosion, new and frightening and fantastic, and it goes on and on, as though every heart-stopping, delicious second of it is being squeezed out of me. I screw my eyes shut, clutch Ian’s shoulders, and whimper into his throat, listening to the hushed “Fuck. Fuck,” he mouths into my collarbone. I was so sure I knew what my body was capable of, but this feels somewhere well beyond it.

And somehow, on top of knowing exactly how to get me there, Ian also knows when to stop. The very moment it all becomes unbearable, his arms tighten around me, and his thigh becomes a solid, still weight between mine. I twine my arms around his neck, hide my face in his throat, and wait for my body to recover.

“Well,” I say. My voice is raspier than I ever remember hearing it. There’s a wireless keyboard on the floor, cables dangling by my thigh, and if I move even half an inch back, I’ll destroy one, maybe two monitors. “Well,” I repeat. I let out a peal of winded laughter against his skin.

“You okay?” he asks, pulling back to meet my eyes. His hands are trembling slightly against my back. Because, I assume, I came. And he didn’t. Which is very unfair. I just had a life-defining orgasm and can’t really remember my own name, but even in this state I can grasp the injustice of it all.

“I’m?.?.?. great.” I laugh again. “You?”

He smiles. “I’m pretty great, to be—” I drag my hand down between us, palm flush against the front of his jeans, and his mouth snaps shut.

Okay. So he has a big cock. To exactly no one’s surprise. This man is going to be fantastic in bed. Phenomenal. The best sex I’ve ever had with a dude. And I’ve had a lot.

“What do you want?” I ask. His eyes are dark, unseeing. I cup my hand around the outline of his erection, rub the heel of my palm against the length, arch up to whisper in the curve of his ear, “Can I go down on you?”

The noise Ian makes is rough and guttural, and it takes me about three seconds to realize that he’s already coming, groaning into my skin, trapping my hand between our bodies. I feel him shudder, and this big man coming apart against me, utterly lost and helpless in front of his own pleasure, is by far the most erotic experience of my entire life.

I want to get him into a bed. I want hours, days with him. I want to make him feel the way he’s feeling right now, but a hundredfold stronger, a hundred million more times.

“I’m sorry,” he slurs.

“What?” I lean back to look at his face. “Why?”

“That was?.?.?. pitiful.” He pulls me back to bury his face in my throat. It’s followed by a lick, and a bite, and oh my God, the sex is going to be off the charts. Earth-shattering.

“It was amazing. Let’s do it again. Let’s go to my place. Or let’s just lock the door.”

He laughs and kisses me, different from before, deep but gentle and meandering, and?.?.?. it’s not really, in my experience, the type of kiss people share after sex. In my experience, after sex people wash up, put their clothes back on, then wave good-bye and go to the nearest Starbucks to get a cake pop. But this is nice, because Ian is an excellent kisser, and he smells good, he tastes good, he feels good, and—

“Can I buy you dinner?” he asks against my lips. “Before we?.?.?.”

I shake my head. The tips of our noses brush against each other. “No need.”

“I?.?.?. I’d like to, Hannah.”

“Nah.” I kiss him again. Once. Deep. Glorious. “I don’t do that.”

“You don’t do”—another kiss—“what?”

“Dinner.” Kiss. Again. “Well,” I amend, “I do eat. But I don’t do dinner dates.”

Ian pulls back, his expression curious. “Why no dinner dates?”

“I just?.?.?.” I shrug, wishing we were still kissing. “I don’t date, in general.”

“You don’t date?.?.?. at all?”

“Nope.” His expression is suddenly withdrawn again, so I smile and add, “But I’m very happy to come to your place anyway. No need to be dating for that, right?”

He takes a step back—a large one, like he wants to put some physical space between us. The front of his jeans is?.?.?. a mess. I want to clean him up. “Why?.?.?. why don’t you date?”

“Really?” I laugh. “You want to hear about my socio-emotional trauma after we did”—I gesture between us—“this?”

He nods, serious and a little stiff, and I sober up.

Seriously? He really wants that? He wants me to explain to him that I don’t really have the time or the emotional availability for any kind of romantic entanglement? That I can’t really imagine anyone sticking around for something that’s not sex once they really get to know me? That I’ve long since realized that the longer people are with me, the more likely they are to find out that I’m not as smart as they think, as pretty, as funny? Honestly, I know that my best bet is to keep people at arm’s length, so that they never find out what I’m actually like. Which is, incidentally: a bit of a bitch. I’m just not good at caring about?.?.?. anything, really. It took me about one and a half decades to find something I was truly passionate about. This friendship experiment I’m doing with Mara and Sadie is still very much that, an experiment, and?.?.?.

Oh God. Does Ian want to date? He doesn’t even live here. “So you’re saying?.?.?.” I scratch my temples, coming down fast from my post-orgasm high. “You’re saying you’re not interested in having sex?”

He closes his eyes in something that really doesn’t look like a no. Definitely doesn’t look like a lack of interest. But what he says is, “I like you.”

I laugh. “I noticed.”

“It’s?.?.?. uncommon. For me. To like someone this much.”

“I like you, too.” I shrug. “Shouldn’t we hang out, then? Isn’t that good enough?”

He looks away. Down, to his shoes. “If I spend more time with you, I’m only going to like you more.”

“Nah.” I snort. “That’s not the way it usually works.”

“It does. It will, for me.” He sounds so solidly, irrefutably sure, I cannot do anything but stare at him. His lips are bee-stung, and everything about him is beautiful, and he looks so quietly, stoically devastated at the idea of fucking me with no strings attached that I should probably find this comical, but the truth is that I can’t remember ever being this attracted to someone else, and my body is vibrating for his, and?.?.?.

Maybe you could go out with him. Just this once. An exception. Maybe you could try it out. Maybe it could work. Maybe you two will—

What? No. No. What the fuck? Just the fact that I’m contemplating it scares the shit out of me. No. I don’t—I’m not like that. These things are a waste of time and energy. I’m busy. I’m not cut out for this stuff.

“I’m sorry,” I force myself to say. It’s not even a lie. I’m pretty fucking sorry right now. “I don’t think it’s a good idea.”

“Okay,” he says after a long moment. Accepting. A bit sad. “Okay. If?.?.?. if you change your mind. About dinner, that is. Let me know.”

“Okay.” I nod. “When are you leaving? What’s my deadline?” I add, attempting some lightheartedness.

“It doesn’t matter. I can?.?.?. I travel here a lot, and?.?.?.” He shakes his head. “You can change your mind whenever. No deadline.”

Oh. “Well, if you change your mind about fucking?.?.?.”

He exhales a laugh, which sounds a little like a pained groan, and for a moment I feel the compulsion to explain myself. I want to tell him, It’s not you. It’s me. But I know how that would sound, and I know better than to put the words out there. So we regard each other for a few seconds, and then?.?.?. then there’s nothing left to say, is there? My body goes through the motions automatically. I slide off the desk, take a moment to straighten the monitors behind me, the mouse, the keyboards, the cable, and when I walk past Ian through the door he follows me with his solemn, sad eyes, running his palm over his jaw.

The last words I hear from him are, “It was really good to meet you, Hannah.” I think I should say it back, but there’s an unfamiliar weight in my chest, and I can’t quite bring myself to do it. So I make do with a small smile and a halfhearted wave. I stuff my hands in my pockets while my body is still thrumming with what I left behind, and wander slowly back to the Caltech campus, thinking about red hair and missed opportunities.

That night, when I get an email from [email protected], my heart stumbles all over itself. But it’s just an empty email, no text, not even an automatic signature. Just an attachment with his NASA application from a few years ago, together with a handful of other people’s. More recent ones that he must have gotten from his friends and colleagues, a few more examples to send me.

Well.

He’ll make for a great boyfriend,I tell myself, leaning back in my bed and staring up at the ceiling. There is a weird green thing in one corner that I suspect might be mold. Mara keeps telling me I should just move out of this shithole and find a place with her and Sadie, but I don’t know. Seems like we’d get too close. A big commitment. It might get messy. He’ll make for a great boyfriend. For someone who deserves to have one.

The following day, when Mara asks me about my meeting with her cousin-or-something, I say only “Uneventful,” and I don’t even know why. I don’t like lying, and I like lying to someone who’s rapidly becoming a friend even less, but I can’t make myself say any more than that. Two weeks later, I turn in a reflection paper as part of my Water Resources class requirements.

I must admit, Dr. Harding, that I initially thought this assignment would be a total waste of time. I’ve known I wanted to end up at NASA for years, and I’ve known that I wanted to work with robotics and space exploration for just as long. However, after meeting with Ian Floyd, I have realized that I’d love to work, specifically, on Attitude and Position Estimation of Mars rovers. In conclusion: not a waste of time, or at least not a total one.

I get an A- for the class. And in the following years, I don’t let myself think about Ian too much. But whenever I rewatch video recordings of mission control celebrating Curiosity’s landing, I cannot help but look for the tall, red-haired man in the back of the room. And whenever I find him, I feel the ghost of something squeeze tight inside my chest.

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