For just a second, the room dissolves. Explodes, maybe.
This, I think, is what Ben would call a Dharma Bomb. A truth bomb. I have been living my entire life in the future. The present has always been a means to an end. But what if my end is a wave, too? I’ve been living for a life that might never happen. What did I miss with my parents that I can’t ever get back?
“All right.” She smiles. “Let’s ride.”
We close our eyes. She rings the bell.
Almost immediately, I want to bolt.
My back hurts. Am I breathing right? Can Ben hear me breathing? Why does Bowie say “ground control to Major Tom” and not “mission control”? Maybe it’s like how in England they say jumper instead of sweater. So in England it’s called ground control. But they’re not controlling the ground, that’s bonkers, they’re trying to control a spaceship in the sky, and they’re obviously not doing a good job of it, because Major Tom is not going to be making it home. Are there even English astronauts? I think there are. Chris Hadfield’s Canadian, and that’s part of the Commonwealth, so I guess technically England is represented, but maybe there are actually British—
“You’re going to have thoughts,” River says, soft and gentle. “But don’t hold on to them. Let them be like clouds passing across the sky of your mind: Don’t cling to them, let them go. Focus on your breath. When a new thought comes, let that cloud go. Tibetans call this ‘sky mind.’ Thoughts, feelings, images, urges, sensations in the body—all of it is just weather.”
Okay. Breathe. Breathe.
I can’t hear Ben breathing. Is he alive? Of course he’s alive. But maybe I should open my eyes and look at him, to check, but then River will see me do it.
Sky mind. Sky mind. Weather.
“Just breathe,” River murmurs.
My back hurts. I can’t believe Dad did this every day. He never said his back—weather. Sky mind. Cloud. Cloud. Hannah breaks the ISS and Mom brushes back my hair, whispers, ‘We are responsible for the things we tame,’ and Dad says, ‘Would you look at the Milky Way tonight!’ I miss him. I MISS HIM. I MISS HER. I MISS. I MISS.
Oxygen levels low. Very low. Breath is fast and ragged, can everyone hear me? Is the whole room sounding like my breath and they’re all looking at me? No. Paranoia is setting in. Breathe. Sky mind, sky—I MISS I MISS I missed so much of the ride with them, and now they’re gone—am I going to faint? Or cry? Not here. NOT HERE.
This is a tailspin, that’s what this is, and see, this is what happens when you lose control, when you let your subconscious take over. A bad idea, a HORRIBLE idea, what sick game is Ben playing? Sky mind. Ground control. Ground control. Grip my knees—yes. A coping mechanism is key in life-threatening situations. Hold whatever is building in me at bay. Work the problem. Calm under pressure. An astronaut stays calm under pressure. When is she going to ring the FUCKING BELL because I can’t breathe. Calm. Calm. NO.
My eyes snap open.
The room is dark and quiet, a cocoon. Not a jet plummeting from the sky. Everyone’s eyes are closed. River’s, too. Ben’s. A sigh falls out of me. He is so beautiful. Dark crescent moon lashes. Would it be weird if I just laid my head in his lap for the rest of the meditation? Would he be okay with that?
“You don’t have to do anything,” River says into the dim room. “All you have to do is take this breath. All you have to think about is this breath. That’s it.”
I close my eyes. I take this breath.
Then the next one.
Then the next one.
For a sliver of that breath, I feel something. I touch … something. It is wide and deep, dark and light. It is quiet here. Still. It is like shrugging off yourself. Like yourself is a too-heavy coat and you don’t have to wear it anymore.
Silence.
The bell rings.
Good morning, Earth.
My eyes peel open.
I turn to Ben. When he looks at me, that something, that quiet place, it’s there, in his eyes. He smiles. I smile back.
“So,” River says, “this is the dharma according to James Baldwin.” She glances at a piece of paper in her hand.
“Love takes off the masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within. I use the word ‘love’ here not merely in the personal sense but as a state of being, or a state of grace—not in the infantile American sense of being made happy but in the tough and universal sense of quest and daring and growth.”
She looks out at us. “This is what the ride’s all about, my friends. Why we take it in the first place. Love. You’ve never been on a roller coaster that didn’t require some bravery. Right? Like Baldwin says, we need daring and growth. That’s what we’re doing here. We’re daring brave.” She places her palms together. ONLY LOVE. “Now go out there and don’t be assholes to yourself or anyone else. I’ll see you next week.”
Everyone laughs—even me. This is certainly not Midnight Mass with Gram.
“What did it feel like?” Ben asks later—much later.
We are at the Middle East and our bellies are full and he has pulled me into a corner. It’s so crowded here you can’t even see the floor. The room smells like old beer and good food. I suspect we are the only people drinking smoothies.
I think about it. “Like … finding zero gravity while on Earth.”
“The geophysicist version of that is grounded.” He takes my drink out of my hand and sets it on the counter beside us, then takes my hands in his.
“What are you—”
“Do you remember that night on the couch, how you told me the universe was once so small we could hold it in the palm of our hands?”
I nod. “And you … you said…”
“I am in so much trouble,” he whispers. “Do you know why I said that?”
I shake my head. Even though I know. This would be so much easier if he didn’t feel like a deep breath, like that bell, ringing: Good morning, Earth.
“Because, Mae, you hold me. Just like that. You hold me in the palm of your hand.”
He brings my palm to his lips. I don’t have an equation for turning into starlight.
It is the seventh time I cry in my life.
“Oh god,” he says, panicked. “Tell me this is good crying.”
“I don’t know!”
Ben smiles. His favorite words.
I shake my head. “I have felt everything, everything on the human emotional spectrum in the past seven weeks. I can’t … I just—”
Ben pulls me farther into the corner as a group of people push through the tiny space. Someone turns up the music and turns down the lights. He has to shout over the Arctic Monkeys.
“Mae, I’d like to join your crew. Now, before you say, no, no, you’re a geophysicist, and we don’t need a geophysicist, hear me out. Every team needs a mission specialist. And I am specialized. I didn’t realize this until, well, until I met you, but I have been training long and hard to be your person.”
“My person?”
He couldn’t know. What Mom said to me at the yoga studio. Did you hear him, Mom? DID YOU HEAR THAT?
I stare at him. Stare and stare. How, HOW is this possible? It’s like … magic. This is completely unscientific.