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His mind raced with the possibilities. Was she really that interested in his geeky posters? Or was she just being polite? Where should he start?

Lily gazed around the room, apparently waiting for him to say something to break the silence. She seemed particularly interested in a large poster of Earth set against the pitch black void of space.

“Oh, I love this one,” he said, getting up and walking over to the poster. “Most astronomers spend their time looking at other planets, stars, nebulae and galaxies, but I never get tired of seeing the Earth from space. This is–“

“A blue marble,” Lily said, walking over and reaching out to touch the poster-size print. Her fingers hovered above the image, running over the outline of the Sinai, Africa and Madagascar.

“Yes,” Jason replied. “This photograph was taken by Apollo 17 on their outbound journey as they headed to the Moon. For me, it’s an image full of wonder and sadness.”

Lily turned to him, her head tilted slightly in surprise. He could see she wanted him to clarify his comment.

“This was the last manned lunar mission in the Apollo program. NASA called this image The Blue Marble because Earth appeared to sit against the backdrop of space like a marble glistening in the sunlight, but Earth would have appeared much larger to the astronauts. Perhaps the Blue Basketball or the Blue Beach Ball would have been more accurate, but not quite as poetic. I often wonder what it must have felt like to stare out through that cold glass, looking at a planet you could hold in your hands.”

“It’s upside down,” Lilly said.

“Ah, no,” Jason replied tentatively. “That swirling mass of white at the bottom is the cloud cover over Antarctica. You can see Africa stretching out to the north, with that distinct green band of jungle giving way to the sands of the Sahara.”

Lily turned her head to one side, leaning over and looking at the image sideways as she spoke softly, saying, “I remember it differently.”

Jason laughed.

“Only a handful of astronauts have ever seen Earth quite like–“ He stopped mid sentence, changing tack. “You know, I do remember reading that the command module was inverted relative to Earth when the crew took this photo.”

He walked over beside her and pulled the poster from the wall. The tape came away easily.

“You’re right,” he added, turning the poster upside down and sticking it back on the wall. “There’s no reason to choose any one orientation over another. If anything, this picture should be viewed the way Cernan, Evans and Schmitt saw it. Looks kinda strange, though, doesn’t it? We’re so used to seeing north as up we assume that’s the way it should be.”

“It looks better,” Lily said, smiling.

Jason stood there for a second, examining the poster of Earth set on a jet black background. Thinking about it, he added, “With the Sahara desert encircling the bottom of the world and the lush greens of South Africa rising up toward the top, Earth looks like an alien world.”

Lily said, “Earth is an alien world.”

Jason raised an eyebrow in surprise at her comment. He started to say something, but Lily spoke first.

“And this one?”

“Oh,” Jason replied, losing himself in another poster. “Those are sand dunes on Mars, but it’s the dark fuzzy sections that are most intriguing. Current thinking is they’re the result of subterranean aquifers bursting through to the surface during summer.”

The two of them sat on his bed and talked into the early hours of the morning, talking about stars and planets, about Korea and America. Jason found Lily captivating, intoxicating. At times she seemed to barely grasp English, at other points she showed a surprising depth of intelligence, as though she knew far more than she was letting on.

There was something about Lily. Jason felt like he’d known her for years. He wasn’t one for concepts like déjà vu, but he could have sworn they’d met before.

When the conversation finally started to slow, Jason offered her his bed. Regardless of how much he protested, Lily insisted on sleeping on the loveseat. She said she wanted to keep watch over the intersection. She sat there, curled up with her head on a pillow, staring out the open window. Jason draped a blanket over her, promising he’d help her look for her father in the morning. He wasn’t sure how he was going to keep that promise, but it seemed to be the right thing to say.

“Jason,” she said, as he turned off the lava lamp and hopped into bed.

“Yes.”

“Thank you for being such a gentleman.”

Chapter 03: Alive

Lee woke to the sound of waves crashing and gulls squawking overhead. He was drifting with the tide. He could feel himself bobbing on the waves with his head kept out of the water by the headrest on his lifejacket. A chill ran through him. His feet were numb. Blood oozed through the cracks in his chapped lips.

Dawn was breaking. The sky was grey. Rain drizzled in the early morning breeze.