And I’m gone.
“Cal, wait!”
I slam my bedroom door and lean against it.
Within seconds, my parents are back at it, and there’s a part of me that wants to turn around and fix this. To make things right again. They still fought before the astronaut thing, but rarely, and not like this. My fists clench as I argue with myself, wondering whether it’s worth sticking my neck out, trying to help them, trying to stop them.
But that’s never worked.
“You’re making me dread coming home, Becca. Every time I come back with good news, you fly off the handle!”
“I’ve lived here my whole life.” Mom’s hurt voice creeps through my door. It’s like they’re having two separate conversations. Neither’s listening to the other. “This was our first home. I was born here, my … family was born here.”
I hear what she doesn’t say—my aunt was born here too. She lived down the street from us for years. This street, this neighborhood is all tied up in memories of her. No wonder Mom doesn’t want to leave.
“You didn’t have the decency to run it by me before you—”
That’s all I let myself hear.
This is another reason why my dad can’t be an astronaut: we’re clearly not fit to be an astronaut family.
NASA picked their first astronauts for the Orpheus missions three years ago, in small groups—three or four added each time. Orpheus I through IV tested individual components of the spacecraft, each test more successful than the last.
The families, though, became stars. What they have is flawless; their personal and professional stories follow a story arc that even I couldn’t write. It’s hard to look at them and not think they have everything my family doesn’t.
The astronauts have heated arguments that line the pages of People magazine, and sure, sometimes one of the spouses will have a little too much to drink during brunch. But they still smile for the cameras. They know how to make their imperfections seem … perfect.
In the end, they stay happy and supportive—two qualities my parents haven’t shown in a while.
I plug my headphones into my retro tape deck and put them on. I add my new finds and sort through the rest of my eclectic collection of cassettes: Nirvana, Dolly Parton, Cheap Trick, bands and artists I only know thanks to my thrift store finds. I settle on Cheap Trick and jam it in, and let the guitar overtake the voices.
Dad wants to be one of them. The astronauts, that is. Way more than he wants to be who he is now—an air force pilot turned commercial air pilot who wants to ditch the 747 for a spaceship. NASA announced they’d be hiring the final five astronauts for the Orpheus project. He applied months ago, when most of the spots had already been taken up.
I didn’t have the heart to talk to him about his chances. I covered them all in my reports: one of the new recruits was an astrophysicist with a social media following nearing Kardashian levels, another a geologist/marine biologist who’d won two Oscars for her documentaries and even a Grammy for a spirited reading of her audiobook—which was a bestseller, of course. And those weren’t the most impressive ones.
Dad’s a good pilot, I’m sure, but he’s not like them.
He’s angry. Impatient. Surly. Okay, I’m not painting him in the best light. I mean, he is an okay dad in other ways—he’s super smart and gives killer advice on my calc homework. But it’s like everything my mom says hurts him like a physical attack. He snaps back, which triggers my mom’s anxiety. Their fighting isn’t camera ready. It’s messy, it’s real, in a way that’s too raw to be captured by a camera.
If they can’t put on a show for me—at least pretend that everything’s okay, like Deb’s parents do—how can they put on a show for the world?
I get through a few tracks while I sit on the floor and close my eyes. There’s nothing else but the music. And a few cars beeping outside. Okay, more than a few. This is Brooklyn, after all.
After a while, a calmness pours over me, drowning out the fear. I feel … at peace. Alone and no longer worried about my future plans. Not worried about the BuzzFeed internship I start next week. Not worried about the hundreds of messages in my inbox—replies to the weekly Cal Letter (I couldn’t think of a clever name, don’t judge)—where I link to my videos along with important news stories, geared toward those who give a shit about the world.
I think about these things, but I’m able to push them out of my mind for a few minutes, then a few more, until I have to get up and switch cassettes. The tension in my chest eases. It’s meditation. For me, it’s the most effective self-care system in the world.
That is, until I hear a knock.
Through noise-canceling headphones and blasted music, I hear it. Which means it’s less of a knock and more of a pound, but regardless, I take off my headphones and shout, “Yeah?”
My mom peers into the room—she’s always afraid she’ll catch me doing “something,” and we all know what that “something” is, but I’m also not an idiot and can figure out how to do said “something” twice a day having never been caught thank you very much.
But then I notice her expression. She’s tearing up, which is not good.
See, she doesn’t cry. They fight, they yell, they make things seriously unpleasant for everyone in a two-apartment radius, but they don’t cry. They shout, then Mom retreats from the world and Dad goes for a walk. It’s how they process. Getting at each other’s throats, but not offending the other bad enough to let them carry their hurt to the next hour.
And … here she is, crying.
“I, um.” Mom comes into the doorway now. I scan her for bruises, for covered arms, for anything—though I know Dad would never hurt her like that, I never see her upset like this, so my mind reaches for options.
Until she speaks.
“Come into the family room. Your father has news.”
News.
My mind freezes. Did the phone ring sometime in the past hour? Did NASA interrupt their fight to tell Dad he was chosen for …?
But that doesn’t make sense. We’re not like them. We’re not ever going to be like them. NASA should be able to figure that out, right?
Before I get too far ahead of myself, I stop the tape and make my way to the door, seeing the empty space where my mother just stood. She turns the corner quickly, leaving just a fluttering patch of fabric in her wake. She’s running away from this conversation, and away from the face I know I made when she said “news.”
Like it could mean anything else.
I make it halfway down the hall when, pop, a champagne bottle confirms the fears flowing through my body. My gut turns to mush. My heart rate doubles. I feel it all over my body like an electric shock, but instead of causing sudden jerks of movement, everything is slow. My nerves dance, but my limbs won’t cooperate. All is ash and tasteless, and smells are weak, and I can’t even come up with metaphors that make sense because …
“A glass for each of us—even for you, Cal. It’s a special occasion.” Dad hands them out, his happy face immune to the terrified, broken expressions on ours. “And a toast, well, to me. NASA’s newest astronaut.”
It takes a few seconds for the words to sink in, and it’s like my brain is the last one to this party. My fists clench. Breaths won’t come. I feel the pressure building everywhere, in my back, my sinuses, my stomach. My legs ache as I repeat the word in my head: Astronaut. Astronaut.