Grace lit another cigarette.
You know, Marilyn said, returning to the bar with fresh coffee, I remember this bad string we had a few years back at Pax River. Probably the worst I’ve known. I mean, it was grim. We lost twenty-two pilots over an eleven-week stretch. That’s two a week! About halfway through my Jim comes home—on time, thank God—and I say to him, how was your day? Like a good wife. And he says, super, super. So I ask him, you know, did you fly? And he says, yup, lotta fun. And that was it. He started asking me about dinner or something. I found out later that he’d been practicing low lift-over-drag landings in a F-104 with John Murphy in the backseat. The idea was—and I only half understand these things—to land the thing at about two hundred knots using the afterburner for speed and stability, flaring the flaps … well, that was the idea. But the afterburner malfunctioned. They lost thrust, and dropped like a rock. Murphy told Jim he was gonna punch out if they couldn’t regain power. He’s in the backseat and the tail woulda hit first, right? So the tail hits the runway. Murphy ejects. Jim decides to stay with the plane, which hits the ground and screeches down the runway at God knows what speed before smashing into the mesquite.
She stopped and gave a small laugh at the memory and stubbed out her cigarette.
Jim was fine. Behind him, where Murphy had been sitting a few seconds earlier, was the engine. Murphy was fine. And if Jim had punched out as well?
What? Grace said.
His ejection mechanism broke on impact, Marilyn said. He would have been killed either by partial ejection or the nitroglycerine explosion. Super, super; lotta fun. So, your Jim? It doesn’t surprise me. It’s what they’re like.
I know but—
I know.
Grace stared into her coffee. Marilyn lit another cigarette.
You have a beautiful home, Grace said.
Why, thank you. Let’s go outside.
The women left their drinks and sat out by the pool on green chaise lounges.
It all feels so … normal, doesn’t it? Marilyn said.
Grace thought for a second, then said, yeah.
So normal it’s weird! Marilyn said.
I know what you mean, Grace said.
You know, Marilyn said, I was so thrilled when Jim told me about this astronaut business—no, thrilled isn’t the right word, it was more than that. Relief. That’s what it was: relief. It was only a matter of time—and that’s all it is, time—before some officer or base chaplain was going to walk up my path and knock on my door. Now, Jim will tell you that every time you go up, the clock gets reset—you know, that the odds aren’t cumulative? That’s bullshit. Only a matter of time before he got killed testing airplanes for the navy. But he’s out, thank the Lord, and with NASA now. And this astronaut business? I know where he is pretty much all day! And when they put him on top of that rocket? I’ll be able to watch the whole thing on television right from the living room! I won’t have to wait and wonder and watch the clock as it pushes itself toward five and he still isn’t home. I won’t have to phone the wives of other guys in the group to find out if anything’s happened. I won’t have to call the base and demand to speak to my husband.
Yeah, when Jim told me he was going to be spending the next few weeks in class— Ha!
I almost cried!
And, Marilyn said, NASA says they’re even going to give us these little squawk boxes—at least, that’s what Chris Kraft called them—like an intercom, only one way—so we can listen in on the communications between the spacecraft and the ground. How about that?
Sounds pretty neat, Grace said.
This is the life, Marilyn said. The classroom, the office, the simulator …
And the only thing you have to worry about, really, is the launch, Grace said. Which, frankly, seems a hell of a lot safer than testing every crazy plane the air force dreams up.
Well, all I can say is that it’s about time, Marilyn said. So, enjoy it.
Yeah, Grace said, looking at the still pool. God. I feel so angry. At God. At Jim.
There aren’t many people who can go through what you’ve gone through and come out the other side, Marilyn said. But I believe you are one of those people, Grace. I really do. And we both know that God doesn’t cause cancers.
Why didn’t He cure it then? She was a child, for chrissake! How could He allow it? Miracles have happened before, you know—the blind man, the leper—why not my little girl?
She started to cry. Marilyn held her hand.
I don’t know, honey, she said. I don’t know.
I miss her so much, Grace said.