by Ben Bova
* * *
“Jake! Are you all right?”
His eyes flashed open and Jake saw Tami—with two of her younger brothers beside her—peering anxiously through his driver’s-side window.
Breaking into a sheepish grin, he saw that it was full daylight on the suburban street, and Tami’s father was coming down the porch steps toward his car.
“Hi,” he said, as he opened the door. Stepping outside the car, he wrapped an arm around Tami and bussed her, then explained, “I figured you’d all be asleep so I came without calling.”
Tami broke into a delighted laugh. “You could have called! We didn’t go to bed until we heard Sebastian’s concession speech.”
Mr. Umetzu extended his hand to Jake. “It’s good to see you again. Your man did all right for himself last night.”
With a laugh, Jake agreed, “He sure did.”
Pointing to the crowded driveway running alongside the house, Mr. Umetzu said to the elder of his two sons, “Move a couple of the cars so Jake can park on the driveway.”
“Okay, Dad.”
Within a few minutes Jake’s Mercedes was on the driveway and the five of them were climbing the porch stairs, heading for the front door, where Mrs. Umetzu stood waiting with a beaming smile. She was a formidable-looking woman: white hair pulled back in a bun, thick body, heavy arms and legs. Twice the size of her slimly elegant husband.
“You’re just in time for breakfast,” she said cheerily. “How do you like your eggs?”
“Any old way,” Jake said, one arm still around Tami’s waist.
* * *
Breakfast was cheery, with Tami’s brothers asking Jake about the Tomlinson campaign, her father sitting at the head of the table smiling approvingly, and her mother shuttling back and forth between the kitchen and the dining room table, carrying trays of steaming food.
Only one of Tami’s sisters was at home, the other lived in San Francisco with her husband, an advisor with a major wealth management firm.
The talk around the table was all about the election and Senator Tomlinson’s chances to capture the Republican nomination. Tami said, “If Tomlinson does win, it’ll be Jake’s space plan that wins it for him.”
Jake put down the coffee cup that he’d been sipping from. “And Frank’s foreign policy ideas, and his economic program, and his stand on terrorism…”
Tami’s eyes widened slightly at that last statement. She’s thinking of Billy Trueblood, Jake realized, counting himself an insensitive fool for mentioning the subject.
Recovering before anyone else around the table could notice, Tami shook her head stubbornly. “It’s your space plan, Jake. It gives the people hope for the future. It gives us something to work toward, to aim for.”
“Developing the new frontier,” said the younger of her brothers. “That’s something to shoot for.”
Mr. Umetzu smiled at his son. “So are you going to become an astronaut?”
“I might,” the lad said. “I’m taking a special course on lunar construction techniques next fall.”
“You’re gonna be a lunatic?” his older brother teased.
Mr. Umetzu glanced at his wristwatch. “The two of you will be late for school if you don’t get moving.”
Both boys scrambled out of their chairs and pounded up the staircase to their room.
Tami’s sister and mother began clearing the table. As Tami got up to help them, her father said, “Let’s go into the living room and let the ladies take care of the dishes.”
Surprised, Tami started to object. “I can help…”
Crooking a finger at his daughter, Umetzu said, “I want to talk to the two of you.”
Jake followed his wife and father-in-law into the spacious, meticulously decorated living room. Umetzu gestured to the sofa beneath a breathtaking photograph of the Grand Canyon he himself had taken years earlier, then pulled up one of the armchairs to face Jake and Tami.
Without preamble, the older man said, “It seems to me that you two have a big decision to make.”
Jake glanced at Tami, who looked suddenly concerned, as if she expected her father to lecture them both severely. She looked like a sheepish little kid who’d been caught sneaking cookies.
Trying to keep his voice even, nonconfrontational, Jake replied merely, “Yes, we do.”
“I know you may think your decision is none of my business,” Umetzu said softly, “but as head of the family I feel I have some responsibility here.”
“I understand,” Jake said.
“My children are very dear to me.”
“Your daughter is very dear to me.”
Umetzu smiled gently and nodded his approval. But then he continued, “My daughter has been offered a very good position here in Fresno,” Umetzu said, his face a noncommittal mask.
“And I’m an advisor to a man who might become president of the United States.”
“Which means you would be separated by nearly three thousand miles. That’s not good for your marriage.”
“No, it wouldn’t be,” Jake agreed.
In a very small voice Tami said, “Unless you decide to stay in Fresno.” Then she added, hopefully, “Or maybe in San Francisco, Silicon Valley, someplace nearby.”
Jake wanted to counter, Or you could stay with me in DC while I help the new president start up our space plan.
But he remained silent, frozen, staring not at Tami but at her father.
Umetzu sighed. “Where is Scotty with his transporter beam when you really need him?”
No one laughed.
Tami said, “This anchor position is the chance of a lifetime for me.”
“Maybe Frank or Kevin or somebody could get you a slot in the DC area,” Jake said. It sounded pretty desperate, even to himself.
“Too much competition there,” Tami replied. “Everybody wants to be on Washington TV. I need to prove myself, work my way up. Fresno is where I can get a start.”
Umetzu raised both his hands. “In my day, a wife followed her husband’s career, wherever it led.”
Tami started to object, “But—”
“But it’s no longer my day, I know that,” Umetzu went on. “You have your career to think about.”
Tami’s eyes started to fill with tears. “I had a good career in DC until Senator Santino wrecked it.”
Jake remembered. The Little Saint had gotten Tami fired from her position as a reporter on the local Reuters news bureau because of an environmental story she had broken, and effectively blackballed her in the entire region. Santino had been a ruthlessly powerful figure in the US Senate in those days. Now he was in a nursing home but Tami was still persona non grata in Washington.
“So what are you planning to do?” Umetzu asked. “Both of you.”
Jake heard himself reply, “If Senator Tomlinson doesn’t win the Republican nomination, I’ll quit his staff and come out here.”
“You will?” Tami blurted.
Nodding solemnly, Jake said, “I will.”
She threw her arms around him and they kissed.
Umetzu waited until they broke up their embrace, then asked, “And what if your senator wins the nomination?”
Shrugging, Jake admitted, “I don’t know. That would change things, wouldn’t it?”
“Considerably. And what if he is elected president? Could you leave then?”
Jake was silent for several long moments. Then, staring at Tami, he said, “That would change things even more. That would change things a lot.”
American Airlines Flight 19
Winging high above the craggy peaks of the Rocky Mountains, practically bare of snow, Jake leaned toward Tami and said, “He might make it, you know.”
She turned from the window she’d been staring through. “You mean Tomlinson?”
“Who else?”
“And then what?”
Jake shook his head. “I don’t know. I don’t think it would be fair for me to leave him at that point.”
Looking as if she’d just watched a puppy die, Tami said, “Jake, I’ve got to take the KSEE job. It’s the break I’ve been searching for.”
“Your father’s right, we can’t have a marriage with three thousand miles between us.”
“No, I guess not.”
“When do you have to give your answer to KSEE?” he asked.
“I should have told them while I was in Fresno. I asked them to give me another week.”
“Another week,” Jake echoed.
“Jake, I’ve got to say yes to them! I can’t turn them down!”
“I know,” he said, hating the necessity, the finality of his wife’s decision.
Tami forced a grin. “Maybe Frank will lose to Sebastian, after all. That would mean we’d only be separated for a couple of months.”
Jake nodded and tried to smile back at her. He failed.
Maybe Frank will win, he thought, and I’ll stay in DC while Tami goes to Fresno. Shit!
* * *
For a week the two of them lived like strangers in their condo, neither of them daring to bring up the subject of Tami’s parting. Jake fumed to himself. We ought to be shouting at each other, he told himself, yelling and throwing things. I ought to demand that she stay with me. I can get her a job somewhere in DC. It might not be what she wants, not be as good as the Fresno offer, but at least she’d be with me, we’d be together.
And she’d hate me. I’d have ruined her career. That’s not fair. It wouldn’t be right.
Jake realized he didn’t care what was right and wrong. He loved Tami and he wanted her to stay with him. He talked with Earl Reynolds about finding Tami a job in the DC area.
“Not easy, Jake,” Reynolds said, his handsome face pulling into a frown. “She’s overqualified for most of the available spots, underqualified for the big ones. She doesn’t have the chops to knock off one of the local anchors.”
Jake nodded; Reynolds’s assessment had been just about what he’d expected.
“I could keep her on here, on my staff,” the PR man suggested.
Jake forced a smile. “That’s not what she wants, Earl. This job out in Fresno is what she’s looking for.”
Reynolds grimaced. “The Walter Cronkite syndrome.”
“Yeah. Guess so.”
* * *
Jake drove Tami to Reagan National, pulling up in the special lot reserved for congressmen and their aides.
“You could’ve dropped me off at the curb,” Tami said as Jake tugged her oversized roll-along bag out of the convertible’s trunk.
“No,” he said, slamming the trunk lid with unnecessary violence. “I’ll go to the ticket counter with you.”
“They have curbside check-in,” Tami pointed out.
“Big deal.”
They checked Tami’s bag at the curb and Jake walked into the terminal building with her. At the entrance to the security check area, they stopped, both of them suddenly feeling awkward.
“Uh … call me when you arrive,” Jake said.
“Sure.”
“Have a good flight.”
“Sure,” she repeated.
Jake fidgeted for a miserable moment, then grabbed her in both his arms. “Tami, don’t go! Please don’t go!”
Looking up into his eyes, she said, “If you don’t want me to, I won’t go.”
There it was. The moment of truth. She’s willing to throw away her chance of a lifetime—for me. If I’m a big-enough scumbag to tell her I want her to stay here with me, she’ll do it. And end up hating me for it.
Jake had to swallow hard before he could say, “Go on. Call me when you land.”
Without another word Tami turned and started up the aisle toward the TSA officers, the roll-along behind her. Jake stood rooted to the spot, watching her leave him.
Suddenly Tami turned back toward him and shouted, “I hope he loses big! I hope he gets trounced!”
Then she turned again and hurried along her way.
Back-Channel
The campaign roared on, with Sebastian and Tomlinson neck and neck as they raced across the country giving speeches, interviews, meeting with local leaders, wooing votes. Jake stayed in Washington for the most part, but even when he had to travel he phoned Tami every evening.
She seemed happy enough, caught up in the excitement of the campaign and a plethora of local happenings, ranging from a suspicious warehouse fire to a heroic dog that saved a ten-year-old boy from drowning by rousing a pair of firefighters to rescue the lad when he got swept away in a flooded river.
Tami sent Jake DVDs of her appearances on the evening news. She seemed bright, knowledgeable, cheerfully smiling. She even interviewed Senator Tomlinson briefly when he swung through Fresno on his way to a major party rally in San Francisco.
Bright, Jake thought, watching her on the TV in their empty condo. Knowledgeable. Cheerful. But he thought he caught an edge of sadness in Tami’s smiling face, an undertone of misery. Jake shook his head, frowning. That’s projection, he told himself. You’re miserable so you think she ought to be miserable, too.
She’s not, he saw.
* * *
As if Jake wasn’t already up to his earlobes in work, William Farthington called him, exactly one week before the GOP nominating convention was scheduled to begin in Philadelphia.
“Hello, Bill,” Jake said tightly to the image of NASA’s chief administrator on his wall screen. “How are you?”
For once, Bloviating Billy didn’t waste time on niceties. “Hal Harmon wants to talk to you.”
Surprised, Jake asked, “General Harmon?”
“Right away,” Farthington said, his face dead serious. “Tonight, if you can.”
Jake didn’t have to check his calendar. He had nothing on tap for the evening.
“Okay. Where and when?”
“My house. Nine thirty.”
No dinner this trip, Jake said to himself. The expression on Farthington’s face, though, told him something serious was percolating. The head of the US Air Force’s Space Command doesn’t call for a private meeting to talk about trivia.
So he downed a TV dinner that purported to be manicotti, tossed the emptied container into the trash, then went downstairs for his car.
Fortunately, Jake had programmed the location of Farthington’s suburban Alexandria home into his convertible’s GPS. Traffic was on the light side, and he pulled up onto the NASA administrator’s driveway a few minutes early. Two other cars were already there: a sleek gray hatchback and a dead black Mercedes. A shadowy figure was sitting behind the steering wheel of the Mercedes, smoking a cigarette. He looked lean, youngish.
William Farthington himself opened the front door for Jake. No servants? Jake asked himself.
Farthington led him to a small book-lined study toward the rear of the big house. Two men got to their feet as Jake stepped in: General Harmon and a stranger. Harmon was in civilian clothes: his tweed sports coat looked like it hadn’t been pressed for ages, but his slacks were razor-creased. Jake imagined he could see the general’s four stars still on his shoulders, perfectly in place.
Farthington said, “You already know General Harmon, Jake.” Gesturing toward the other man, he introduced, “This is Grigor Medvedev, of the Russian foreign secretary’s office.”
The word for Medvedev was compact, Jake decided. He was the shortest man in the room, but his physique was burly, like a middle-aged weightlifter. Jake thought he must spend a lot of his time in a gym. His face was squarish, with a lump of a nose and a strong, stubborn chin. His eyes were small, squinty; his hair dark but thinning, brushed straight back from his advancing forehead.
“Mr. Medvedev,” Jake said as he shook hands with the Russian.
“Dr. Ross,” said Medvedev. “Author of the so-called Tomlinson space plan.”
Jake smiled. “Success has a thousand fathers.”
Each of the other three men already had drinks in their hands. Farthington said apologetically, “I’m afraid the servants have the
night off.” Pointing to the bar built into the bookcase near the room’s only window, he asked, “Can I get something for you, Jake?”
“A club soda will be fine.”
As Farthington went to the bar, General Harmon explained, “Grigor and I have known each other since we sorted out the mess in Syria.”
Medvedev nodded solemnly. “Without coming to blows.”
Jake recalled Bashar al-Assad’s final, desperate attempt to get Russia and Iran to prop up his tottering regime. The world had come closer to a nuclear confrontation than most people realized. If Medvedev helped get past that hurdle he must be an important man in the Russian foreign ministry.
At last Farthington handed Jake his club soda and all four men seated themselves in separate armchairs around a bare coffee table.
“So what’s this all about?” Jake asked. “Why have you asked me here?”
Medvedev broke into a guarded smile. “Typical American: straight to the point.”
General Harmon also came close to smiling. “Jake, this is what is called a back-channel meeting.”
“Back-channel?”
“Mr. Medvedev wants to discuss this undeclared war we’ve been having in Earth orbit.”
“Before something serious happens,” Farthington added.
Medvedev leaned back in his armchair, a glass of what must have been vodka in one hand, studying Jake as if trying to decide how far he could trust him.
“You are advisor to Senator Tomlinson, are you not?” he asked.
With a nod, Jake agreed, “I’m the senator’s science advisor, yes.”
“Good,” Medvedev said, with a humorless smile. “Perhaps we can achieve something here.”
Détente?
“Achieve what?” Jake asked.
Gesturing with his free hand, Medvedev replied, “An end to this nonsense of attacking each other’s satellites.”
All Jake could reply was, “Oh?”
Looking squarely at the Russian, General Harmon said, “You can incapacitate our satellites and we can knock out yours. We’ve proven that. So where do we go from here?”
