Page 100 of Happily Ever After

The reply came almost immediately.

Oh Mom! I’m crying. That’s such good news! I love you!

Cece smiled, blinking hard. Love you too!

Then Cece texted Joe.

Bloodwork is clear. All good.

Her phone rang before she could even set it down, his name on the screen. They didn’t talk long. Just a few words of congratulations and affection from him. It was all she needed. When they hung up, Cece took a deep breath and returned to her note-making.

And as much as she wanted to tell the Queen Bees, she decided to wait until this evening when they were all together.

She picked up her pencil again. The world hadn’t stopped spinning just because she’d been given good news. She went back to Marlene Reyes.

Cece had printed out the bio she’d found for Marlene and reread it. Thirty-five years at NASA, much of it spent in systems modeling and anomaly detection. Not a household name, but then, so few at NASA were. She didn’t strike Cece as someone who wanted a lot of attention, making this interview that much more of a win.

In retirement, Marlene had built her own observatory in the desert outside Tucson. Nothing elaborate, although the setup was still impressive. A modest dome, a powerful telescope, and a bank of computers that processed data while the rest of the world slept. And, obviously, an incredibly intelligent woman who knew what to do with that data.

Cece scribbled another note.

The discovery was made outside of any institution.

That felt like another major point. She imagined the interview unfolding. Marlene’s answers would be precise and thoughtful. She’d explain the mystery of the anomaly, one that reminded people of how much there still was to learn.

How much was still out there to be revealed.

Cece scribbled down a few lines beneath her notes, testing out some phrases, then wrote a question.

You’re careful not to call this a discovery in the cinematic sense. Why is that important to you?

She paused, then added another question. What does it feel like to realize the universe still has the capacity to surprise us? That one made her smile.

Her phone buzzed with a notification. She glanced at the screen and narrowed her eyes. A new email. She opened her inbox and frowned.

Podcast Partnership Inquiry. Probably a spammer. Wouldn’t be the first time since she’d launched the podcast. She opened it, fully prepared to hit Delete next.

The email was polite, professional, and refreshingly low on spamminess. A small vitamin and supplement supplier had been listening to her podcast. According to the email, they liked the idea of it and the way Cece let people talk. How she let them tell their story.

They weren’t offering a formal sponsorship just yet. They wanted to send her some product samples so she could get to know them.

Cece read it twice. Then she laughed. It wasn’t the idea of the sponsorship or the money. The offer was modest. Almost symbolic. But that was exactly why it meant something to her.

Someone had noticed what she was doing.

She typed a thoughtful reply, thanking them and sending them her mailing address, then she put her phone down again. What a day.

Good news had a way of stacking up, she thought. Not all at once, but quietly, in a way that made you realize you were on the right path.

She returned to the notes for Marlene’s interview. Cece could already hear the episode in her head.

Marlene explaining what she’d shared with Cece in email. How the anomaly first appeared as a blip she’d almost dismissed. How she’d flagged it, then flagged it again weeks later when it returned in the same pattern. How curiosity had driven her to keep watching.

Cece wrote: You’ve said you didn’t set out to discover anything. You were just paying attention. What do you think gets lost when we stop paying attention to the world around us?

Was that question a little too philosophical? Maybe. But she kind of liked it.

Her thoughts shifted to the signatures Paige had undoubtedly delivered to the Colony office this morning. About how many people had signed. About the Queen Bees’ chances for getting the bylaws rewritten.