anyway. With my bullies vanquished I didn’t need the space to study anymore. So, I started spending the entire evening with her in the kitchen.
She’s a universe of knowledge and she shares it all with me. From baking to history, politics to Pokémon evolution, she knows everything. And when she’s talking to me, I get the feeling that she’s been waiting to tell someone all the things she’s sharing with me.
Some nights, we just listen to music and work on our own. She plays music I’ve never heard before. Her favorite is “Just my Imagination” by The Temptations. When that comes on, she sings along. Her voice is nice enough. But it’s the smile she wears when she’s singing it that makes it my favorite.
Other times, she brings her laptop and gives me an education on movies shot in Houston. We watched Terms of Endearment, Jason’s Lyric, Armageddon, and Selena. All of them were sad, but Selena is the only one that made her cry.
And on the nights when we get every scone off the cookie sheets, without any of them sticking, she plays this song called “Southside” and makes me dance with her. She smells like those scones she makes: lemon and ginger and vanilla… I could smell it all day, every day, and still never get tired of it.
The loud, long screech of a car horn shakes me awake just in time for me to stop myself from walking into the crosswalk. I jump back onto the sidewalk and clutch my backpack to my chest.
My heart thuds against the hardbound book inside. This signed special edition copy of Cosmos by Carl Sagan is my most prized possession. I’m giving it to her as a graduation gift. Last week she found out she’s going to be her class Valedictorian.
I wish I could go watch her graduate. But I’d have to ask my mother to drive me all the way to Hofheinz Pavilion. If she knew I’d even met a Wilde, much less spent time with one, she’d raise hell and this small peace I’ve found would be taken from me.
So, I’m taking her my present now. I’ve read it at least a hundred times in the two years since my stepfather brought it home for me. I can recite entire chapters with my eyes closed. But there’s one in particular, about the planet Venus, that made me decide to give this book to Regan.
The transits of Venus - the point in its orbit when it moves between the earth and the sun – only happens once a century. It is the rarest of predictable astronomical phenomena – and one of the most important. Before we had high powered telescopes and the ability to launch satellites into space, scientists used its occurrence to map our entire solar system.
The book has taught me more than planetary order. It helped me understand that even in chaos, there’s order.
When my stepfather died, I read it obsessively to remind myself that there is no such thing as bad timing, or coincidence, or luck. As intelligent as we are, we’re no more important than a speck of stardust compared to the age and size of the universe. Just like those planets up there - we’re on a collision course with our destiny and everything we do, everyone we meet, shapes that journey and becomes part of it.
Regan has become part of mine.
I wrote an inscription on the inside of the book that says, “You’re my Venus and I’m your Mars.”
It’s simple, but when she reads the book, she’ll understand. She’ll see I’m not some ordinary kid. When I finish school, I’m going to marry her. I used to think I’d never get married, because I didn’t want to leave people behind the way I was. But I’d do it with her.
I gulp down the cool night air to calm my racing heart. The sidewalks here are pristine strips of large red pavers that line the glass fronted stores on the street. The leaves and petals of the hanging plants that give it a small town feel during the day, cast eerie shadows now.
The telltale glow of light from the back of the store makes my heart skip a beat. I’m early, but I wanted to have time to give her my present before we got to work.
I’ve just opened the door and am about to call out for her when a shrill, short scream rips through the quiet of the bakery.