Relativity, page 20
After closing the bathroom door, Claire ran cold water in the sink and put her mouth to the tap. Gulp after gulp, she drank until she was almost choking. She washed her face and watched the running water spiral down the drain. His smell was on her body; she had to wash off last night. She didn’t understand how all of a sudden they were kissing, touching, undressing, making their way into bed. But she recalled vivid flashes of it: his hand running along the bare skin on her back, her lips making their way down his chest.
How had she let this happen? How had Mark? Both of them should have known better. Or maybe it wasn’t a mistake in his eyes, maybe this was his plan all along. To get Claire back into bed, manipulate her into having sex with him. Fuck his way to atonement. Would this make him feel better about himself, as though he hadn’t done anything wrong? He was disgusting. Worse. It made her insides curdle. He’d sucked her into his fantasy world where he was blameless. Where he could play the victim when he’d committed the crime. After all these years, she’d thought maybe he’d show just a speck of remorse for what had happened to their son. Be a human being.
Claire stood under the shower and caught her breath. The sound of running water made her calm down. She thought she hated him; she’d felt it in her blood. But she carried something else in her blood too—some involuntary pull, poisonously locking her body toward his, like a mutual blood-borne disease or virus. She wondered if she did still love him, if she could possibly be that stupid. Maybe with the vague affection everyone has for their former loves. Even the bluest veins continued to flow but the blood pumping through them was oxygen-starved. Her heart had that same starved duality, broken into chambers; Mark split Claire in half.
She lathered her body with soap. But what if he was innocent? Or shaken baby syndrome didn’t exist? Mark’s words from the other day weighed heavily on her mind—it broke our family, destroyed us, he’d loved that child and he was taken away. What if there’d really been a misunderstanding, some horrible misinterpretation of medical evidence? The shower floor felt like it was giving way under her feet.
“Claire?” He knocked on the door. “You okay in there?”
She let out a sob. “Mark.”
He came into the bathroom, wearing only his underpants. “What’s wrong?”
“I don’t . . . what if,” she said, choking on water. It was a struggle to articulate this tangle of binary feelings: love and hate, trust and doubt. Fallen scaffolding, fractured framework; she’d believed their lives were built around facts, but perhaps those facts were actually lies. She’d lost her bearings and felt swept away by an avalanche of uncertainty. Claire leaned against the tiles and cried.
Mark opened the shower door and turned off the tap. He tightly encircled her wet body. Claire didn’t want to be held like this. Inside, she refused to be contained, but on the outside she fell into his embrace. His arms felt safe; his touch felt dangerous. Frightened by blurred boundaries, she shivered; her sense of definition was as clouded as the bathroom filled with steam. Claire was a single heartbeat away from believing him.
“It’s okay,” he said, as he reached for a towel and carefully wrapped it around her body.
Claire shook her head. “No, it’s not okay.” Her mind focused on a question—how could somebody this tender hurt a baby? “Mark, I need to tell you something about Ethan.”
“What is it?”
“The doctors did all this diagnostic testing on him recently. They think he’s a genius; his IQ is ridiculously high.”
Mark took a step back. “Why are you telling me this?”
“Because,” she said. “I don’t understand how something violent could cause something so positive and good. Maybe there’s some other issue inside Ethan’s brain, maybe there’s always been. I was completely convinced it was shaken baby syndrome. But people used to believe the world was flat. I suppose you can convince yourself of anything. Now, I’m not so sure what I think.”
He looked stunned.
Claire got dressed. Her head was full of contradictions, as though each hemisphere of her own brain were battling some civil war. Confusion left her with a strong desire for solitude, to be left alone with her conflicting thoughts. She felt completely disoriented, questioning her entire life. What if her heart had reshaped itself around a lie? Part of her was angry, at the doctors who gave evidence at Mark’s trial, at the prosecution—for being too quick to point the finger, for maybe making a mistake. Another part of her was utterly distraught. If they’d been wrong, the consequences were devastating. Mark was right—it had broken their family.
Across the room, Mark was rubbing his face with his hands. She thought immediately of Ethan; it was a mannerism they shared.
“I need to go,” she said.
“Sure.” Mark still wasn’t dressed but he suddenly seemed guarded. “Let’s talk later.”
His distance made her skin flush with self-conscious heat. She wasn’t sure how to say good-bye to him now. One moment they’d been intimate, then arguing, then intimate again. Claire was exhausted; she felt nauseous as she contemplated what had happened between them last night. But her shame was coupled with this persistent exhilaration. She let herself out of the house.
Outside, the monochromatic sky slipped into morning. The storm was over and although the rain had stopped, the streets were covered in puddles. Claire walked through them, not caring if her feet got wet, as she made her way to the end of the road to find her parked car.
Ω
ETHAN WOKE SUDDENLY, covered in sweat. He’d dreamed of Albert Einstein. Universes had bent around them like a cosmic grid—time and space intersected, galaxies swirled. They’d shot across the dark sky, riding motorcycles and chasing beams of light. Then the white-haired man vanished, splintering himself into the shining beam of another time and out of Ethan’s dream.
Ethan’s T-shirt was stuck to his chest; he felt breathless and disoriented. He pulled the sleeping bag off his shoulders and wiped sweat off his face. Alison was in her bed on the other side of the room making sleeping noises—the sighs and snores of a body at rest—and while Ethan wanted to wake her up, he thought it was probably too early.
Dr. Saunders had said something about genetic memory, something about how—inside Ethan’s brain—a hidden gift had been uncovered. But if physics was really hardwired into his brain, how did it even get there in the first place? Where’d Ethan get his genetic memory? And from who?
On the other side of the window, the washed-out sky brushed up against tomorrow. That vague unbroken moment between late night and morning: now the storm was melting away and the clouds had cleared. Silver light shone onto Alison’s bedroom floor.
Ethan lay back down on the carpet, thinking about Einstein and the speed of light. The dream seemed real; he could still feel the motorcycle handlebar in his palm as they’d driven so fast that time had slowed down. He rolled over, pressing his cheek into his pillow, and sighed heavily.
“Hey,” Alison said, opening one eye. “What’s wrong?”
“Time is the biggest illusion.”
“Did you take drugs while I was asleep?”
“I was just thinking about the way time slows down as we travel fast. And how if we travel at the speed of light, we could really go to the future. Einstein’s theory of relativity says that’s possible. But only in one direction: forward. I’m not sure how to travel back to the past.” Ethan’s voice was throaty. “I wonder if we can change things that have already happened.”
She opened her other eye. “Okay, Time Lord. So worrying about time travel is keeping you awake at night?”
“If only there was some kind of space-time highway,” Ethan said. “Or a shortcut.”
“Like a rabbit hole?” Alison suggested.
“Exactly. Or a wormhole! It’s hard to travel at the speed of light when you’re heavy, so mass is still a problem. But to compensate for that you’d just need lots of energy. E=mc2. Energy is proportional to mass.” There was a long pause. “Alison, reckon it’s possible to make a time machine?”
She rubbed her eyes. “Totally possible. I’ve seen Dr. Who. Why?”
“I’m going to build one.”
“Cool,” she said, unfazed. “I guess if anybody could make a working time machine, it would be you. Will it be dangerous? Can I help?”
“Yeah,” Ethan said, rolling onto his back. “Probably really dangerous. I’m not sure how to do it yet. Something about energy.”
“Let’s talk about it tomorrow?” She closed her eyes again. “Good night, Ethan.”
“Good night. See you in the future.”
Alison smiled but kept her eyes shut. “You’re such a dork,” she said.
MAGNETISM
SHE WAS GONE NOW but Mark could smell Claire in the air. He searched the room for something more concrete, some solid proof of her presence. But the house was unaltered, a museum of his usual masculine artifacts—canisters of shaving cream, woodsy aftershave, dirty clothes hanging limply on a chair. It looked like any other day. That blossom-infused scent of her skin struck a nerve, though, triggering a string of excruciating memories. Strands of pale hair were stuck to the sofa; whispers of the previous night still rustled inside his head.
They’d made love twice: slowly the first time, then with a quickening greed as they rediscovered each other’s bodies, navigating through the sweet animal landscapes of familiar skin and bone. Could Mark call it making love? Was that love or just ease, like a body’s sigh after slipping on an old pair of well-worn jeans? The two of them were a good fit.
But something about Claire had hardened and callused. The intensity of their fused bodies bothered Mark. Surely that radioactivity meant something; he tried his best to push it out of his mind but it kept rushing back in hot waves, flushing his face hypertension pink. Last night had fried his circuits: he couldn’t think straight but couldn’t stop thinking about it.
Downstairs in the kitchen, Mark fixed himself breakfast. He made an instant coffee, watched the brown lumps dissolve into the water as he lazily stirred, and considered calling Claire. But there wasn’t a reason to ring, just the vague desire to hear her voice. Stupid idea. He sipped the bitter coffee and brushed the impulse aside.
He opened his laptop and glanced over the subject lines of his emails. There was one from his boss, asking when he’d be coming back. Mark needed to return to work soon. Back to Kalgoorlie, back west to the dust, back to the middle of nowhere. He’d been gone three weeks already, used up all his compassionate and personal leave—now he was eating into his annual holiday. Not that it really mattered. Nobody to go on holidays with anyway; nowhere he really wanted to see. His criminal conviction made it hard to leave Australia and freely explore the rest of the world.
Last year, Mark had driven up to Darwin by himself—almost five thousand miles round-trip, fourteen days there and back—just him and the asphalt belt of the Great Northern Highway. He traveled through the white deserts of the Western Australian salt lakes, up to Newman and Broome, and into the ancient limestone reef of Geikie Gorge National Park in the Kimberleys.
On the night Mark finally arrived in Darwin, he parked his car near the beach and stretched his stiff legs. On the crowded sands of Mindil Beach—a skewer of satay chicken in one hand, a can of sweating beer in the other—he watched the evening sky change from coral to red. Purple waves lapped gently at the shore; children chased one another down the smooth stretches of wet sand. He’d never been this far north before. As the orange sun disappeared over the horizon and into the gulf, Mark was suddenly overcome with loss. He’d wasted so many years of his life, been robbed of so much time. This was the closest to the equator he’d ever come, the farthest from the two poles he’d ever ventured.
On the dining table, his cell phone vibrated, jerking sideways along the varnished wood. Mark picked it up and read the screen. Claire. He wanted to answer immediately and started to sweat lightly as he stared at the phone. But he hesitated; just let it ring in his hand. What would he say? These days, he was systematic in his dealings with women and treated flirting or dalliances as simple transactions. But this was his ex-wife, not some casual fuck. Mark didn’t know which tone to take with Claire—could he even modulate his voice to sound cool, casual, warm? Without a guaranteed strategy to cut through the tension, he felt exposed.
With a lucid jolt, Mark suddenly remembered the way last night Claire had reached for his cock, how she’d maintained eye contact as she rubbed his erection against her inner thigh, quickly thrusting herself onto him with an unbroken focus. He’d let out an involuntary groan.
The phone stopped ringing.
Don’t overthink this, Mark thought to himself. He brushed a hand across his eyes. Claire had called him; she’d dialed his number. She’d obviously felt the same urge he’d felt and acted on it instead of shrugging it off. There was nothing to lose by calling her back. But in the shapeless years since Mark had lost everything—lost Claire, lost his son, lost his former life, lost his freedom—he’d at least tried to save his dignity. Preserve some pride. Risk was best avoided; vulnerability was pathetic. He recoiled from even the slightest chance of failure. He’d felt enough defeat.
Mark returned Claire’s call. His mind went blank as he listened to her phone ring. He wanted to see her again, but wanted her to suggest it. His stomach muscles tightened. The call connected with a click.
“Hey,” Mark said. “Sorry I missed you before.”
The other end of the line was silent.
“Claire? Can you hear me?” Mark stood up and walked toward the front of the house; the phone reception was patchy in the back. “Claire?” he repeated. Down the line, he heard the softest breaths.
“Hi,” said a small voice. “It’s not Claire.”
Now Mark was silent. This was a child’s voice, silvery and clear. He coughed, and felt a sharp clang in his chest. Coffee rushed up his esophagus.
“Ethan? Is that you?”
Ω
AFTER BREAKFAST, Mum picked Ethan up from Alison’s house. Her hair was wet when she arrived; she smelled like shampoo. Ethan told her about the storm, how they hadn’t been able to camp outside, but his mum’s eyes were fixed on the road. She yawned and pushed her sunglasses up her nose. Maybe the lightning and thunder kept her awake last night, lying in her bed, scared to be home alone.
“Mum, can I ask you a question?”
“Shoot.”
He groped for the right words. “Did my father ever study physics?”
She sucked in her cheeks. “Why do you want to know?”
“I dunno,” he said, rolling down the car window. Outside, the air smelled fresh and rich. Ethan could see that the rain had brought ozone molecules down from the upper atmosphere. “Just wanted to know if I was like him. Figure out how all these tesseracts and geodesics got inside my brain.”
They stopped at a traffic light and she turned to face him. “Ethan, they’re inside your brain because you’re you. Are you worried about what Dr. Saunders said? All that stuff about being an acquired savant?”
Ethan nodded.
The red light changed to green. His mum put her foot on the accelerator and directed her eyes back to the road.
“You didn’t answer my question,” he said.
Mum leaned forward in the driver’s seat and pressed her lips together. She turned the steering wheel as they took a sharp corner. “Your father was a theoretical physicist.”
They drove toward the Sydney Cricket Ground and Football Stadium; the arena’s jagged steelwork looked like an ivory web streaked across the pale blue sky. Ethan stared ahead, his eyes fixed on the trail of broken white lines along the road. It felt like his body was floating. “He liked physics,” Ethan said quietly, “like me.”
Ω
BACK AT HOME, Ethan tried to draw a picture of a wormhole: a tunnel bridging two pieces of time and space. How could he make one? Nobody had ever seen a real wormhole; they only existed in theory. Wormholes were probably everywhere but they’d be too tiny to see. He imagined stretching one to fit the size of his body, jumping inside it, and traveling across to the unreachable past.
But no matter how hard Ethan thought about it, he couldn’t see the solution. Backward time travel was full of paradoxes and problems. He didn’t know how to get enough energy, how he could remove mass from matter, how to travel at the speed of light. It was impossible; he’d get swallowed or shattered as the wormhole collapsed.
Ethan pushed his notes away and put his head into his hands. He felt stupid. He was stupid. Wasn’t he meant to be special, a savant? Some genius; he couldn’t even figure out how to convert a wormhole traversing space into one traversing time. Ethan hadn’t really talked to Einstein. That was a dream.
If only he had somebody to help him, who could explain all the mathematics he didn’t understand. Ethan’s muscles went rigid. He felt a strange fluttering inside his belly. If only he knew a physicist. His dad was one.
From the other side of her bedroom door, he heard his mum breathing deeply. It was weird she was asleep in the middle of the day. Why was she so tired? Ethan took her phone out of her handbag, went to the other side of the house and unlocked the screen of her phone. He scrolled through her contacts until he found the number. Ethan let his finger fall on the button to dial.
But his father didn’t answer. The call rang out and went to voicemail.
Ethan swallowed hard; his finger touched his parted lips. He was listening to his father’s voice.
“Hi, you’ve called Mark Hall. Please leave a message and I’ll call you back.”
The recording was only fourteen words long, but those words were the acoustic vibration of his father’s voice, speaking to him across signals carried through the radio frequency in the air. Ethan didn’t leave a message.
Immediately, the phone trembled in his hands; Mark was returning the call. Ethan quickly flicked it to silent and stared blankly at the name on the screen. His face felt cold. He wanted to answer but was paralyzed with fear. Yet his desire to speak to his father—years of building layer upon layer of curiosity—outweighed whether or not answering the phone was the right thing to do. He held it to his ear and listened.
