Defying Mars (The Saving Mars Series) - By Cidney Swanson Page 0,15
mother …” Jessamyn’s father broke off. “It’s been hard for her since we got the news about Ethan. She didn’t feel like she could face the crowds at touchdown today.”
“It’s okay,” said Jess. She hadn’t enjoyed the crowds, either.
“And then, well, she fell asleep waiting for you to get home and I didn’t have the heart to wake her—”
“It’s okay,” Jessamyn heard herself repeating. It felt anything but okay that her own mom wasn’t awake to give her a hug. “I’ll see her in the morning.”
“Jess,” said her father, frowning and looking toward the room her mother slept in.
“It’s okay, Dad. Really. I’m tired.”
Father and daughter stared at one another, unable to find words that felt as if they were the right size or shape or color.
Finally her father spoke. “It’s good to have you home, Jessie.”
The answer Jess knew she should give stuck in her throat. She couldn’t say it was good to be home when so many things felt awful and wrong.
7
TERRAN FEVER
Jessamyn settled upon the bed in her room, which smelled faintly of peroxide and dust, and fell swiftly asleep. But at some point in the night she awoke from a dark dream. Jumping from her bed and ready to flee, she felt too light, as though the planet were debating simply letting her go, no longer keeping her tethered to the ground. The sensation was vastly unpleasant and put her in mind of her brother’s preference for Earth’s heavy gravity. As she thought of him, her heart felt suddenly too large in her chest.
Already standing, she drifted toward his room. The sleep mat she’d brought in before the mission lay still upon Ethan’s floor. Pulling a blanket from off his bed, Jess curled onto the sleep mat and gazed up through her brother’s clear ceiling. She didn’t know where Earth would be at this time. A quick scan of the heavens showed her nothing with a bluish tint to suggest the Terran world. The Terran satellites, however, rolled past alongside Phobos, Mars’s largest moon. Deimos, the smaller moon, was nowhere to be seen. Staring until her eyelids grew heavy, Jess fell at last into a dreamless sleep.
She woke the next morning uncertain where she was. The surface upon which she lay was vibration-less and her eyes flew open, fearful the Galleon’s engines had cut out, which would mean no air filtration, no heat, no—Ethan’s room met her gaze, and she remembered where she was.
Outside the room, she heard her mother’s voice. Jessamyn was home. She tilted her head to catch Lillian’s words.
“She’s not in her room,” Jess heard her mom saying. “I shouldn’t be surprised, I suppose. It’s just …”
Jess heard her father’s deep baritone. “Did you check Ethan’s room?”
There was a long pause. Her mother didn’t respond. And then Jessamyn heard Lillian’s familiar tread as her mom walked toward her.
Jess sat up, eager for the remembered touch of her mother’s worn cheek against hers. She felt like a four-annum-old child again.
But her mother, when she entered into the room, did not offer an embrace.
“This is your brother’s room,” said Lillian Jaarda, voice pinched with anger and pain.
Jess blinked. Her inner child scrambled for cover. Under the pretense of rubbing sleep from her eyes, Jessamyn hid her face. Excuses shuffled against one another for precedence. I couldn’t sleep. I wanted to watch the stars. I miss Ethan. She shoved all the excuses away, unwilling to expose the soft underbelly of her soul.
“It’s nice to see you, too, Mom,” Jess croaked. She placed a hand to her throat. She’d meant for her voice to convey sarcasm, not thirst.
Lillian Jaarda opened her mouth to snap something in retort but then seemed to change her mind. As she left the room, she called over her shoulder, “We’re sitting down for morning rations.”
Jess rose, realizing she’d slept in her clothes. She didn’t feel like changing even though she knew her mom wouldn’t like it. Well, her mom could just deal. Jess paused before the rations table, and her father leaned over to kiss her forehead.
“Morning,” he said, smiling.
“Morning,” she replied, her own face carefully neutral.
“Do you have plans to take over your brother’s room?” asked Jess’s mother in clipped tones.
“No, Mom,” she replied, pausing from a sip of water. “I just had a bad dream. I thought maybe watching the sky would help.”
“I see,” said her mother, her lips tight.
“The Secretary had a case of the new rations delivered this morning,” said Jess’s father, attempting to gently steer the conversation.