24
“My mom’s going to besad she missed this.”
Clarke’s stretched out on a towel, sun on her face and toes in the sand. She cracks one eye open at Julian’s approach, squinting. It’s bright at the beach. “My mom didn’t call her, when she was scheming with Ndira and Elise?”
“Oh, she did,” Julian says. He plants his butt on the towel next to Clarke’s, loops his elbows around his knees. His warm brown skin is glowing in the sun, and there’s soverymuch of it on display with him only wearing swim trunks. His tattoos glisten. His hair is wet, shining blue-black, and dripping onto his nose and shoulders. “But the belt’s transit time’s a nightmare right now, and the orbital alignment is bad, too. My mom didn’t want to be away from work for that long.”
It’s a long trip to the Galilean colonies. If Jupiter’s on the other side of the sun, which it is right now, it takes two weeks to get from there to Earth, and that’s not even taking into account extra time needed to navigate the asteroid belt. There are patches of the belt that are less fraught and patches that are impassable; if you have to go out of your way to cross at one of the former, that adds to your travel time. Luana Casperi took a few years offwhen things were getting serious for Julian in Juniors so she could be inner-rim with him at the best programs, but when her company offered her a directorship, Julian insisted she go back to work. Julian’s dad offered to quithisjob, but that’s when Clarke’s parents cleared space for Julian in their home.
“She’s good, though?” Clarke asks. “Your mom? And your dad?”
“They’re good. They ask about you. A lot, actually.”
“Tell them I’m glad they’re doing well? And I miss them?”
“I will,” Julian promises.
They’re quiet for a few minutes. Clarke can’t think of anything to say, but she doesn’t feel pressure to fill the silence. It’s okay for them to just…be here, next to each other. She’s as content as she can be, given everything that happened yesterday.
Julian rolls onto his side, propping himself up on an elbow. “What are you doing during the rest of bye week?”
“Work. Until Graham’s party, that is.” Their nextJulian & Clarkefriendship session is this coming weekend. Graham’s having an engagement party on Luna, because his fiancée’s family is Lunar. Julian’s a groomsman, Clarke’s his plus-one. Clarke feels weird about invading a personal event, but Graham insists it’s fine, although he did draw the line at having Sara and her cameras in attendance. They’ll rely on Clarke and Julian to take their own pictures, like they have been today (Clarke had Ndira film them burying Kuari up to his neck in the sand, and got a photo of Julian napping under the umbrella looking relaxed and young). “I hope you know I only agreed because a bunch of other Chronicle people will be there, too, and I’m going to get them to tell me embarrassing stories about you.”
“Never. Team’s a vault,” Julian says happily.
“No luck on ice rice, but we did find Popsicles,” Elise announces, appearing arm in arm with Imogen at the mouth of the little path that leads back to town. She shields her eyes from the sun, peering out at the water. “Ndira still out there?”
Julian points. Far past where Ihaka and Kuari are splashing in the shallow surf, a figure of dark brown skin and red bathing suit cuts through teal waves with sure, even strokes.
“I swear, the woman’s part fish,” Elise jokes, setting down the bag as Imogen goes to collect her husband and son. “I’ve been trying to get her to move to the coast for years.”
“I don’t know how she stands it. It’s unnatural,” Clarke says. The water turns a darker shade just beyond where Ndira is, and Clarke shudders thinking about what might be in the depths. Clarke, like any self-respecting Martian, is both terrified and enamored of the ocean. Shecanswim, she’d just prefer not to do it unless she can stand up, thank you very much.
“It’s more natural than your Martian lakes,” Elise retorts, handing Clarke a Popsicle.
“We barely even havelakesin the colonies, and I’m more comfortable in the water than you,” Julian teases.
Clarke rolls her eyes at him and holds the Popsicle in her teeth while she digs through her bag for her cuff. It’s getting late, and she needs to call Rhynn at some point.
She has more than twenty missed calls.
She scrolls through the log, confused. It’s all people who know where she is and that she has the day off. Yves, Sara, Amira, Sara again, Rhynn, Naomi—
Matthew. Four of the calls are from Matthew, whom she hasn’t heard from since Iskret. Alarm blooms hot behind her sternum.
She steps away from the group (Kuari’s pawing throughPopsicles, looking for the best flavor, and Elise is ankle-deep in the water attempting to catch her wife’s attention with big arm motions) and calls Matthew back. The line trills.
Julian follows her. “Everything okay?”
“Not sure,” Clarke says, pinching the audio loop out of her cuff and hanging it on her ear. “I had a lot of—hi, Matthew.”
“Clarke, finally, I amsosorry,” Matthew babbles. He looks awful, stressed beyond belief. His hair is poofed out around his skull like he’s been tugging at it.
“Sorry about what?” Clarke asks, bewildered. A notification box pops up over the bottom half of Matthew’s face; Naomi calling again. She dismisses it. Dread is building in her stomach.
Matthew drops his face into his hands. “You haven’t seen it yet?”
“Seen what?”
