Orbit

though he’d always followed the path of a responsible man, the promised land was eluding him.

Watching the flickering orange rays playing off the paneled walls of his den had been mesmerizing until Sharon walked in, naked and desirable beneath the ratty terry-cloth robe she knew he hated, and she opened the robe and flashed him as she shook her head, a signal that she was mad and that there was, once again, not a chance in hell of sex this evening. It was a weapon she’d grown too used to wielding as their lack of intimacy had progressed. There she stood, preparing to verbally batter him over something. Tonight, he figured, it was either the evils of the cigar he was smoking, or his pathetic recent campaign of systematically investing in lottery tickets.

The lottery.

She was right about that one, but he couldn’t tell her how desperate he was for a windfall or any reprieve from what was becoming a conjugal prison. He was even becoming desperate for sex. But he couldn’t win on any front, and he’d concluded that, at best, the universe was not listening to his needs.

At worst, it was plotting against him!

And the growing pile of dead lottery tickets was irritating the daylights out of Sharon Dawson.

The late-evening phone call had come as a welcome interruption, a lovely female voice on the other end asking a few identifying questions before getting to the point.

“And, Mr. Dawson, you did enter an Internet-based contest with American Space Adventures, to win one of four seats on one of our spacecraft into low Earth orbit, correct?”

“Yes. It’s always been a dream of mine, to fly in space.”

“And, you charged the entry fee on your Visa card?”

“Yes. Is there a problem?”

“No, sir. Quite the contrary. I’m calling because you’ve won the trip.”

It was hard to remember exactly how much he’d whooped and smiled and jumped around in the moments afterward, before explaining the happy call to Sharon. Carly and Carrie, their five-year-old twins, had come running in to see what all the noise was about, followed by thirteen-year-old Julie, his daughter from his first marriage. Sharon had shooed them back to bed without explanation before turning to Kip, and he’d been stunned at the look of horror on her face, her eyes hardening as she forbade him to go.

“Excuse me?” he’d said, still smiling. “What did you say?”

“I said you’re not going! I have this gut feeling and it’s really strong, Kip. I don’t want to be a widow.”

Within minutes it became an argument spanning the house, and then it turned somehow to encompass everything wrong with him and a marriage he’d refused to see as imperiled.

“Once again all you think about is yourself!” she wailed. “You’re never here for me and the girls and now you want to go kill yourself in space? Then go!”

“Sharon, for God’s sake, I’m never here? That’s BS. I don’t even play golf anymore. What time do I take away from you?”

“All you do is work! The girls are suffering.”

“Name one school function I’ve missed.”

“Even when you’re there, you’re thinking about business.”

“Sharon, I sell pharmaceuticals. I’m a regional sales rep for a huge drug manufacturer. What’s there to think about?”

“You could have been in the oil business, but no! You had to go be a peon for Vectra and work your rear off for no recognition, no advancement, and no time for us.”

“Of course. I didn’t go to work for your father. That’s always it, isn’t it? I don’t measure up because I went out to get a job on my own.”

“Stupidest decision you ever made.”

Except marrying you! he’d thought, careful not to let his face show it. The thought shocked him, somehow defiling the very walls of the den he had shared with Lucy before her fatal accident. But that was long ago, before Sharon came along and caught him on the rebound. Before he caught himself growing numb.

It ended as usual with her storming off to bed alone. But for once, this time he didn’t follow her like the usual whipped puppy begging to be forgiven. He’d returned to the wicker chair and sniffed the sweet woodsmoke he loved and made the decision that for perhaps only the second time in his adult life, Kip Dawson was going to stay the course and cling to his dream.

Kip’s thoughts return to night in the high California desert, and he realizes he’s been clutching his cell phone with a death grip as he leans against the SUV. He checks his watch, grimacing at the late hour, but pausing halfway into the front seat to watch the beacon at Edwards AFB for a few more sweeps, spotting a late-night flight lifting off, maybe a test run of some sort. He thinks of Chuck Yeager and Scott Crossfield and the other early Edwards flight test pioneers, wondering if they ever stopped like this in the early desert night to stand so deeply humbled by a celestial display?

Maybe, he decides. But they’d probably never admit it. Believing in a personal aura of invincibility was important to test pilots who routinely challenged the edge of the envelope. And besides, he thinks, men like that were constrained by the code from discussing feelings.

The cell phone rings yet again and he answers without looking at the screen, letting his voice convey the weariness with this game she’s playing.

But the voice on the other end is different.

“Mr. Dawson, Jack Railey at ASA. We couldn’t find you in your room, so I thought I’d phone you.”

Kip chuckles. “Is this a bed check? Am I in trouble?”

“No, sir. But we have a problem. Could we come talk to you about it?”

“What problem, exactly?”

“I’d rather not go into it over the phone. We do have some options, but I need to speak with you about them in detail.”

A kaleidoscope of possibilities, few good, flash across Kip’s mind, depressing him. “I’m just a few miles south. Where can I find you?'

He listens to the brief description of Railey’s office location before promising to be there in fifteen minutes, his voice heavy with concern before he disconnects and stows the cell phone. Sleep, he thinks, may not be necessary after all.

Chapter 2

MOJAVE, CALIFORNIA, NIGHT BEFORE LAUNCH, MAY 16, 9:49 P.M. PACIFIC

As Kip approaches the airfield, the tails of nearly fifty mothballed airliners rise from the desert like a ghostly fleet of square riggers. The buildings of the Mojave International Aerospace Port come into view as well, the ramp awash in a sea of artificial orange light. He spots the specially outfitted Lockheed 1011 that ASA uses as a mothership to launch its spacecraft, the old jumbo jet sparking an unexpected stab of anxiety—as if finding it parked on the ground means neither he, nor it, will be flying in the morning after all.

It isn’t hard to figure out, he decides. Something technical has gone wrong and the launch has been canceled, and now they want to give him his options for rescheduling. He’s not sure whether disappointment will be worse, or embarrassment over not going up as planned. He can depend on one negative at least: Rescheduling will give Sharon that much more time to complete her campaign to wear down his fragile resolve.

It always seemed too good to be true anyway, winning this trip.

ASA’s headquarters are housed in a new glass-sided six-story building and finding Railey’s office is simple. He’s not surprised to find that the other face at the conference table is Richard DiFazio, owner of ASA. DiFazio gets up to shake Kip’s hand as he enters.

“I didn’t expect to see you again this evening, after the party,” Kip says, recalling the founder’s appearance at their prelaunch celebration in a local restaurant. DiFazio had planned to just drop in, a regular courtesy to his customers, but he had lingered through dessert to talk with one of Kip’s flightmates, Tommy Altavilla, an extremely wealthy Seattle industrialist and raconteur who’d kept them laughing for hours.

“Kip, just after you left, Tommy had a heart attack.”