Page 138 of Atmosphere

“I listened to you. And you wouldn’t let me talk. But now it’smy turn.Andyoudon’t get to talk. My answer isno.Absolutely not. I don’t care what Antonio said. I don’t care what they can take from me. I don’t care if they never let me set foot in the fucking space shuttle ever again. No. I will not leave you and Frances. Iwill not.And you don’t get to tell me what to do.”

Joan wiped a tear from her eye and watched Vanessa yell at her from the pay phone.

“You have no right to tell me I don’t get a say in this,” Vanessa said. “And you have no right to do to me what you did tonight.”

“I’m sorry,” Joan said, “But—”

“I didn’t ask for this!” Vanessa shouted. “I didn’t ask to meet your niece and help you deal with your stupid sister and meet your parentsand imagine a life where the two of us could have things that I never dreamed the world would let me have! I didn’t ask for that! That was you!”

“I—”

“And now, when one asshole scares you, you’re going to give it all up? No! I don’t accept it. I love you. And I love Frances, too, and you don’t get to take her away from me. Just because you’re scared. Or just because you think you know what’s best for me.”

“All you’ve ever wanted is to fly the shuttle,” Joan said.

“All I ever wanted—past tense,” Vanessa said. “But you changed what I wanted, and what I thought was possible.”

Vanessa started losing track of her breath as she broke down. “What an awful thing to do to a person! To make them believe they can have the things they never believed they deserved. And then take it away. What an awful thing.”

“I’m sorry,” Joan said. “I’m so sorry.”

Joan, staring out the window, saw Vanessa looking at up her. “Please don’t make me go,” Vanessa said, crying harder now. “Please.”

“But you might lose everything you dreamed of.”

“Then I’ll lose it,” Vanessa said. “Let them take it. Just don’t let them take you.”

Tears fell down Joan’s face.

“Will you come back up here?” Joan asked.

“Will you let me in and let me talk?” Vanessa asked.

“Yes,” Joan said. “Of course.”

Two minutes later, Vanessa was at Joan’s front door. Her face was red. Joan hated herself for ever making Vanessa cry like that. But denial wasn’t going to fix any of this.

“I’m not the one I’m worried about here. I don’t care if I lose my job,” Joan said. “I will find another one somewhere. At some university, if I have to. I’ll teach freshmen again if it comes to it. I don’t care. But you. You can’t give up what you’ve been working so hard for.”

“I told you,” Vanessa said. “I don’t care.”

“But I do,” Joan said. “Maybe you don’t care about yourselfenough to do what’s smart, but I won’t be able to live with myself if I don’t look out for you.”

Vanessa wiped the tear from Joan’s face.

“You don’t know what’s best for me,” Vanessa said. “As much as you may think you do.”

Joan sighed. “But…”

“I don’t know what’s going to happen,” Vanessa said. “But if it’s you or the space shuttle…fuck the space shuttle.”

Joan dropped her head and laughed. Then she looked back up at Vanessa. “The woman I fell in love with would never have said that,” Joan said.

Vanessa smiled her lopsided grin. “Then I guess I’m not the woman you fell in love with.”

It was more than three years ago that Vanessa had pushed Joan up against the very door they now stood in front of.

Joan had told her that she thought she’d always be alone. Vanessa had told her that she thought she’d never have the things other people had.

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