“That’s it,” I whisper roughly against her parted lips. “That’s my girl. Breathe with me, baby.”
Her chest rises with a shallow gasp, life flooding back into her lungs. Relief slams through me as her heartbeat climbs beneath my touch, and I never stop drumming a steady beat across her chest.
Her breath is a soft brush of warmth across my lips, and I draw it in like the sweetest relief. Pressing my forehead to hers, I whisper in my own broken breath, “Stay with me, angel.” I swallow, my throat tight with salt and desperation. “I need you to stay with me.”
Overhead, the corona flares around the eclipsed sun. Shadow swallows us, the chill sinking deep into our entwined bodies. My breath holds, lungs burning, until the moon starts its slow retreat into third contact—and her heartbeat steadies.
Her pulse stabilizes under my hand, rhythm aligning to mine. Two separate beats locking, a syncopation of pulses fusing into one beneath the waning shadow.
As I lift away, her eyelids flutter, opening to reveal those slate depths threaded by blazing striations of gold. Like a second corona igniting, its fiery filaments reflected in her eyes that flare with heat and life.
With a strenuous exhale, I lower my lips to the pulse in her throat, tasting of salt and life andher.
The moon shifts, shadow receding farther. Light bleeds across the shore. Warmth floods me as her breath meets mine on a shallow exhale.
“There you are,” I say, the anguish slowly ebbing like the tide. “There’s my fire.”
Her chest rises beneath my palm, and she coughs weakly. Her cold fingers find mine still splayed across her bare chest and she grips them, a sob catching in her throat.
“Take me in,” she whispers, her breath breaking. “Make me warm, Orion. Take me somewhere safe.”
Tenderly, I cup her cheek, powerless to deny her anything. Shifting onto my knees, I gather her into my arms and lift her from the sand. Just as I did once before, I cradle her close against my chest. Only this time, the threat isn’t in touching her.
As the shadow of totality retreats, a new, sinister fear seeps cold into the marrow of my bones.
I hold Collins tighter, desperate to keep her close, to keep her fragile melody playing as my fingers obsessively tap against her bare thigh, keeping pace with the arrhythmic beat of her heart.
“You know once I show you my secrets,” I say, voice low in warning, “I can never let you go.”
Collins cups my face, forcing my gaze on her. “Then show me everything.”
The black holes collide in complete darkness. None of the energy exploding from the collision comes out as light.
—DR. JANNA LEVIN,BLACK HOLE BLUES AND OTHER SONGS FROM OUTER SPACE
21
Sound of Space
The eternal silence of these infinite spaces frightens me.
—BLAISE PASCAL
ORION
There’s a quote often cited by musicians that says:the music is not in the notes, but in the silence between.
It’s been debated who first said this—whether Mozart, Debussy—because, I think, the truth of it transcends any single voice. For musicians, artists, those who hear beyond the notes and chords, the melody itself, there’s a profound understanding that the contrast, the tension—the emotional heart—lies in those quiet spaces between.
It’s the breath held.
The heartbeat suspended.
The anticipation for the next note.
Awaiting the shattering rise?—
The inevitable fall.
