Origin & Earth (The Orris Project Book 1), page 36
7
Repeatedly in his mind, Mike could see himself and Becky throwing their arms around each other in their first act of physical affection. Reality though, as most people find in the first budding throws of infatuation, often gets in the way.
Not only did he not throw his arms around her when he left the secure area of the airport, he did not even see her. When the small crowd dispersed, he looked around for a sign that would tell him which direction to walk for the baggage claim. Before he found one, he noticed a girl leaning against a bright information kiosk and talking on the phone. The moment he recognized her, she smiled at him and waved. As he approached her, she pointed up at something behind him. It was a sign with an arrow and the words ‘Baggage Claim,’ printed on it. She walked in that direction and he followed her. He could not help but feel a little cheated out of his moment and wondered who she was talking to that was so important. He did not have to wonder for long, as hearing her side of the conversation revealed it was her mother. Mike thought she was adding the word “Mom” to her sentences just to communicate to him what was going on. As they arrived at the baggage conveyor, he watched for the single bag he had brought. Becky ended the call, with her words acting as a plea to her mother and a half-apology to him.
“Yes, Mom… Yes, he’s here. He’s been here for five minutes, waiting for me to get off the phone… I know… I know, Mom… I’m hanging up, Mom… yes… love you too, goodbye.” She ended the call and closed her eyes. Without opening them, she said, “I’m so sorry.”
He laughed. With the moment having passed, he thought diving in for a hug would be awkward. “It’s no big deal. I called my folks last night to let them know I was going out of town. When I told them it was to come here to see you, my dad said, ‘Go get her, son,’ and my mother asked me about four thousand questions. So, yeah, I get it.” She laughed, and Mike pointed at a green backpack several yards away on the belt. “That’s mine.” They waited a few seconds until it arrived, and Mike lifted it up and over his shoulder. She took the hand not occupied with the bag and pulled him toward the exterior doors.
“Follow me!” she said. They reached the door, and as she pushed it open, Mike expected a blast of frigid air. To his surprise, and not thinking about the fact that even though it was Alaska, it was still July, he found the air temperate. Once they were in the parking garage, he was astonished when she pressed a button on her key fob and the taillights of a big Ford F-350 blinked awake. The truck was a deep red with large, thick-treaded tires and a sleek, solid panel tonneau cover. Becky walked up to the back of the truck and dropped the tailgate. “You can put your bag in here. It’s clean. I almost never use the bed for anything.” Mike placed his bag on the bed, inside the gap between the tailgate and the liner. He inhaled to make a comment about it when she squeezed all the air right back out of him by clamping her arms around him, just above the waist. “Sorry, I’ve been waiting for a month to hug you,” she said. His face lit up with joy, and he hugged her around the shoulders, resting his face gently on top of her head. He relished the scent of her hair, pleasantly familiar from her time with him in D.C. He was in heaven.
She relaxed her grip but did not let go. Mike watched as she tilted her head back with her eyes closed. He may not have had a lot of experience with girls, but he knew she expected to be kissed. He leaned in and kissed her for the first time. When they finished, he lifted his head, and she opened her eyes. “I’m so glad you’re here,” she said.
He smiled. “Why do you drive a monster truck?”
She burst into laughter, and he joined her. She placed her hand on the back of his neck and pulled him in for another kiss, and said, “My Dad insisted on it. He paid for most of it, too. He was afraid of me moving up here. We’re from upstate New York, so it’s not like I didn’t already know how to drive in the snow, but he wanted me to drive a tank as long as I was up here.”
“It makes sense. I think I’d probably do the same thing if it were my daughter,” Mike said.
She offered him a half sly, half sarcastic look. “So, you don’t think women can take care of themselves?”
Mike was not falling for it. “I think my daughter will take help from her father, whether she likes it or not. Are you saying you don’t think a father should do everything he can to help his little girl?”
She smiled and kissed him again. “Touché. Let’s get out of this parking garage.” They got into the truck and started the hour-long drive back to the small house Becky rented.
8
Mike woke up on Becky’s couch the next morning to find her sitting on the far end, in her pajamas, eating a bowl of cereal and watching the news on her small TV. She glanced over at him as he sat up and smiled.
“Oh, I thought you were dead,” she said.
Mike shook his head and smiled. “Did you drug me?”
She laughed. “No, but I’m surprised you made it from the truck to the couch. That’s a long flight. It takes a lot out of you.”
He rubbed his face. “What time is it?”
She looked at her watch. “8:00 here, noon in D.C. Do you want coffee?”
He nodded emphatically. “A thousand times, yes.”
She got up and went into the kitchen. “Are you hungry?”
“No, just the coffee would be perfect.” A moment later, she was handing him a mug with a thin crown of steam dissipating off the top. He sipped it, and a look of surprise washed over his face. “Wow, this is fantastic!” He took another sip.
“I remembered you drink it black, not even any sugar. I tried to find the brand you have at your place, but I couldn’t, so I asked around.”
He finished the cup and smiled again. “Thank you, it was a big success.” He tilted his head down, staring into his empty cup until she laughed.
“It’s in the pot. The first one was on me, but you can get your own coffee from now on.” He stood and walked into the kitchen. Mike heard his phone chime and thought he heard Becky’s chime at almost the same time.
“Oh, you have got to be kidding me,” she said. Mike poured his second cup of coffee and walked back into the small living room.
“What’s going on?” he asked, as he sat back down on the couch.
She pointed at his phone. “You got it too…” she said, exasperated. Mike picked up his phone and could see it was from Garrett, a group text between the three of them. As he read the text, Becky’s phone rang.
Garrett: Hey guys, I wanted to warn you, they want Becky back in D.C. for the hearing. It’s on Monday. I had nothing to do with it.
“Hello?” Becky said into her phone. “Yes, sir. Yes, Garrett told me. I understand. Thank you, I’ll make the arrangements. Yes, I’ll keep a record. No, sir, not mad, a little frustrated, but that’s life, right? No, sir, I wouldn’t want to miss it. Okay, goodbye, sir,” she said, and ended the call. “This is just Murphy’s Law. Can you believe it?”
“It’s a pisser,” he said, secretly happy that he would have her company for the flight back.
As though she had read his mind, “Well, at least we’ll be together for the flight back. Count your blessings, not your problems, right?” Mike smiled. He had never heard the expression but instantly liked it.
“Yeah. And as long as you’re comfortable with the idea, you won’t need a hotel room. Just stay with me and Garrett.”
She frowned. “Where would I sleep?” Mike blushed hard, and she erupted into laughter.
“It’s so easy with you, Mike! I’m sorry.” She kissed him. That being the first time she got so close to him that morning, he grew self-conscious and asked her to show him to the bathroom so he could brush his teeth. She laughed and led him down a short hall and into her bedroom. On the opposite wall was an open door he could see was the single bathroom in the tiny house.
They spent the morning watching television and poking fun at those on the TV and at each other. Becky took him to a diner for lunch and while they were waiting for their food, a look of discovery appeared on her face. “Wait, Mike. We have to ask Garrett if it’s okay that I stay with the two of you next week. What if it makes him uncomfortable?” she asked.
Mike smirked. “What? Why? He won’t care. He’s a guy. Guys never care about that stuff.”
Her concern did not disappear. “He’s a guy from a different planet. Maybe not exactly like every other guy on Earth,” she said, and the waitress put their lunch in front of them. They both thanked her.
“I’ll bet you lunch that he doesn’t care,” Mike said.
She met his gaze and said, “Deal. Ask him.” Mike wiped his mouth and picked up his phone. He dialed Garrett and turned the speaker on. Garrett picked up on the third ring.
“Hello, Mike.”
“Hey, next week, Becky is going to stay with us instead of getting a hotel room. Is that okay with you?”
“Sure,” Garrett said. “But where is she going to sleep?” Confusion washed over Mike’s face a split second before Becky burst into laughter, and he knew it was a setup. “You kids have fun,” Garrett said, and hung up.
Becky wiped tears from her eyes. “I got the idea when you were brushing your teeth, and I texted Garrett. You’re right, he’s just a normal guy. Alien or not.”
“Well, you two are hilarious,” Mike said, and smiled. He also thought it was rather funny. “Even more hilarious is that I was right. You have to pay for lunch.” She rolled her eyes and smiled.
For the rest of the afternoon, they drove into Anchorage and went to a large shopping mall called the Dimond Center. They perused the stores and talked about but decided against seeing a movie. After a brief discussion, they left to head back closer to where Becky lived and get dinner at a pub there.
They each ordered a burger at the pub, and after they had finished eating, they played darts. By the time they left, it was after eight o’clock, and Mike noticed it was still bright and shining daylight. The sun wasn’t even threatening to go down. He understood the mechanics of the earth and the seasons and even understood the sun would not set until after eleven o’clock, but it was the first time he had witnessed it for himself.
Once back at the house, as they walked toward the front door, Becky blindsided him. “Can you believe this is the first night we’re going to sleep together?” Mike stopped cold and flushed red, something he was getting used to while he was with Becky.
“Are you ready for that?” he asked.
She recalled the words she had just said and flushed herself. “Oh, crap! That’s not what I meant. I meant actually sleep, like, in the same bed.” Mike smiled awkwardly and hugged her, which also felt awkward, but he did it anyway. They went into the house and watched TV for a long time.
With both of them dressed for sleep, teeth brushed, contacts out, and in bed together for the first time, Mike accidentally touched her leg with his hand as he was getting comfortable. Upon feeling the touch, she leaned in to kiss him. Forty-five minutes later, they were both sound asleep, and Becky was pregnant with the first of their five eventual children.
9
Garrett sat in front of his laptop, his eyes fixed on the folder that read “T1-Rhodes.” Everything in that folder was old. It had been old for billions of years by that point. Although the total time elapsed in his own mind was only perhaps twenty years, ages upon ages had passed since any of the sentiments in the messages there corresponded to anyone living. His gaze traced the folder icon, and he reread the name affixed to it a hundred or two hundred times before he ultimately got up and abandoned the effort. As he did, his shifting weight levered his finger on the mouse button in what must have registered as a double click, and it flooded his screen with thumbnails. In the same motion, he turned away, but the thumbnail images caught his eye and a small photo of his mother registered completely in his mind. He sat back down. Sitting still and leaning on the island, he stared fixedly at one of his shoes in the short hallway leading to the front door of the apartment. The shoe was meaningless. It was just a point in space at a comfortable distance upon which to fix his gaze while he remembered. Several times during his trip into his mental history, his binocular vision gave up, and he saw two identical right shoes.
He shook his head to snap himself out of it. Still with his back to the laptop screen, he decided. Tonight is the night, he thought, but not without beer. A lot of it. He picked up his phone off the couch and called one of the two places he knew of that would deliver beer in addition to food. He ordered a burger and fries and three six-packs of Clotz’s ale.
“Sounds like a hell of a party,” the burger shop employee, who had identified himself as Jeremy, said. Garrett laughed but did not reply. “It’ll be about 45 minutes.”
“Thank you.” Garrett ended the call. Without thinking about it, he glanced at his laptop and was happy to see the screen had turned off to conserve power. He placed his phone on the island and returned to the couch to watch television until his order arrived. Nothing on television interested him, but a commercial about a cruise line triggered his memory of crossing the Atlantic on the Amerique all those years ago. He had never finished the book that Jacques had given him. He stood and walked into his room where he had laid the book on his nightstand but otherwise had not touched since arriving in D.C. Seated on the couch, he opened to the place he left off. As was his habit, he reread the previous page to reacquaint himself with the position of the story before he dove deeper into it. He read until his food and beer arrived, while he ate his burger, and while he drank beer, purposely leaving the empty bottles on the coffee table as an indicator of how many he had drank. Only after there were six empty bottles would he watch the content that his family and friends had made for him. It would make him more emotional, but it would also dampen the impact of the experience. When he reached that point, he gathered his six empty bottles, rinsed them, and placed them in the recycling bin.
With the seventh beer in hand, he sat down at his laptop. He touched the mouse gently, just enough to wake the computer up, and noticed his heart was pounding. After a deep breath, he sorted the files by date, thinking it would be utter chaos if he did not go in clear historical order through the messages. The first one featured both of his parents, and once he opened the file, he could see that the videos each had a date stamp and a timer. They recorded the first video the same day he had launched. The two sat on chairs in front of what looked like a gray sheet hanging from its long edge to create a solid background. The video was moving for Garrett, as he had not heard the voices of his parents in twenty years, and it lasted about twelve minutes. He did not scan the thumbnails, he simply clicked the next one, and the next one, using his peripheral vision. The first four were from either both of his parents, or from just his mother. The fifth one was Breni and Rodney with little one-year-old Rodney Junior bouncing on his father’s leg and smiling. He was apprehensive about the sixth. As he double clicked the thumbnail, not looking directly at it, he knew. He registered the deep auburn of Lauren’s hair in the tiny picture, and then her face filled his screen. His heart dropped, crushing into his stomach and making him feel sick. His eyes welled with tears so completely that her image blurred out of view almost as abruptly as it had displayed. He blinked rapidly through the whole video to clear them of the film, which would not stop coming. He could see a small smile on her mouth but deep sadness in her eyes.
“Hi, slouch. I’m sorry I waited almost four months to make the first of these videos, but it was for a reason.” She looked tired. She wiped away a tear from one eye, but it was for naught, as they kept coming and the emotion rose in her voice. “I know… that you know.” She looked down at the floor and cried. Finally, she looked back up, but not at the camera. She was looking at something, or someone, beyond the camera.
“How long do I have before I have to stop?”
Faintly, in the background, he could hear a man’s voice say, “You’re his wife, Mrs. Rhodes. Spouses and children do not have a limit.” Lauren smiled at that and nodded. Garrett relished the happiness on her face, however brief it was. He was curious to find out if she would correct him, because her official prefix was “doctor,” but she did not. She turned her attention back to the camera.
“Before you left, on your launch day, when you were in the transport waiting on the countdown,” Garrett did not need her to recount it for him. The memory was so seared in his mind that he had only to close his eyes and recall every detail of those moments. “You held up both of your index fingers, kissed one and then the other, and blew them both to me. I knew in that moment that my deep suspicion was not a secret to you.” She looked back up at the man. “Would you mind turning around for a moment? It won’t take long, I would just like a moment alone with my husband.”
“Of course, Mrs. Rhodes.” She stared in the same direction for another second, and then looked back at the camera and stood. She was wearing a light, blue cotton skirt with an elastic waist and loose and light white button-down top. Garrett watched as she unbuttoned her shirt, starting from the bottom and working her way through half of the buttons before pulling the two halves apart like drapes and revealing her naked and clearly pregnant belly. Almost as soon as she had revealed the product of their love, she refastened the buttons, leaned back down to the camera without retaking her seat, and blew a kiss into it.
