“You know … you’d think that we’d do a better job of leaving by sundown in the summer.”
Nathaniel spun in his chair to face the parking lot. “What time is it?”
“Almost nine.” I came into his office and set my purse and coat down on one of the chairs. “Did you take a break today?”
“Yeah … I had a lunch meeting with Clemons.” He turned back to the desk and picked up the paper he’d been studying. “Elma, if you were in orbit, would an r-bar or a v-bar rendezvous make more sense to you?”
“Okay, first of all, a lunch meeting does not count as taking a break.” I leaned over the back of his chair, so I could see the paper he was so fixed on. It was a report called Line-of-sight guidance techniques for manned orbital rendezvous, which seemed to consist of more questions than answers. “Second … what’s the assumed orbit?”
He flipped through the pages. “Um … hang on. Let’s say four thousand miles.”
Putting my hands on the base of his neck, I dug my thumbs in while I considered the question. One of the challenges of orbital mechanics was that the faster you went, the higher you orbited, and thus the slower the orbit. It was completely counterintuitive without equations or a model. So my instinct as a pilot to do the v-bar rendezvous couldn’t be trusted.
The v-bar rendezvous got its V from velocity, which you used to catch up to the target by flying in the same direction that it was speeding. I dug my finger into the muscles that ran up the back of Nathaniel’s neck. His head dropped forward until his chin rested on his chest.
But an r-bar rendezvous might work … if we dropped into a lower orbit than our target. That would make the ship move faster than the target, and we’d catch up with it. Once close enough, we could just fire thrusters to push back up toward the target, which should use less fuel.
I had a possible answer, but given the little grunts of pleasure that my husband was making, I wasn’t entirely sure he would hear me. His trapezius was a solid mass of knots down to between his shoulder blades. “I’d lean toward an r-bar rendezvous. Less fuel, plus the orbital mechanics mean there would be natural braking action if the thrusters failed.”
Lifting his head, he leaned forward to stare at the page. “See, that’s what I thought, but Parker wants v-bar.”
My hands paused and then smoothed out his dress shirt. “Well. He’s been in space and I haven’t. As a pilot, I’d probably give his opinion more weight than mine.”
“That’s part of my problem. Everyone gives his opinion more weight because he’s one of the original Artemis Seven.” He threw the paper back on the table. “Even on things that have nothing to do with piloting. I mean … he’s still going on about the Soviet—excuse me. The ‘Communist Threat. ’”
“The long winter hit them harder than us. The Soviet Union dissolved, for crying out loud. What’s he thinking?”
Nathaniel rubbed his forehead. “The Soviet Union is gone, but Russia is as big as ever.”
“And starving.” The long winter had affected the nations closer to the poles more than others. “China isn’t in any better condition.”
“I think he’s trying to curry favor with Eisenhower by trying to … I don’t know, and I’m totally talking out of school.”
With the elections, people were starting to lose sight of the reason for getting into space. At least they weren’t dismissing the importance of a space program. Yet.
It’s not always Nathaniel who keeps us late at the office. The next Monday I got caught up in a series of equations for translunar trajectories. It was fascinating, because I was trying to account for the shift in gravitational pull as the spacecraft transitioned from the Earth’s sphere of influence to the moon’s. It affected everything, including the amount of propellant required. By the time Nathaniel and I got back to our tiny apartment, I had a head full of porridge.
Throwing the day’s mail on the table, I dropped into the closest chair. My fingers were smudged with ink but I still rested my head on my hands with a sigh. “Space sounded so romantic.”
Nathaniel chuckled dryly behind me and bent down to kiss the back of my neck. “I thought I wasn’t going to be able to pry you out of the office tonight.”
“Well, Sanchez needs the propellant calculations by tomorrow so he can adjust the payload parameters.” I massaged my temples, trying to ease some of the strain from staring at numbers all day. “Becky was working on it, but then someone told Director Clemons that she was pregnant and … She was just barely showing. It’s not like we do anything but sit at a desk.”
“And run back and forth to the labs. And sit in on tests when we’re firing experimental engines. And propellant tests, and—”
“You are just as bad.” I straightened and glared at him.
He was leaning against the kitchenette’s counter with his coat off and his tie half-undone. “Oh no … no, I would have let her keep working, but maybe kept her out of the test sites. But I understand why the director made the call he did.”
“Because, and I quote, ‘Pregnancy has a direct effect on women’s brains’?”
He snorted. “Politician. Not a scientist. If something happened to a pregnant woman working at the IAC, it would set back public relations.”
I opened my mouth to retort and snapped it shut. He was right, darn it. People were already trying to shift funding from the space program because they couldn’t grasp the scale of the disaster that was coming. Turning back to the table, I picked up an envelope. “I’m going to go through the mail.”
“You can pay the bills tomorrow.”
“I won’t be any less tired.” Part of our marriage agreement was that I handled the bills and balanced the checkbook. We were both good at math, conceptually, but I could do it in my head, and Nathaniel needed to write things down, which meant I was faster.
Behind me a cabinet opened, followed by the rattle of crockery. “Baked potatoes and … we have a little bit of ground beef. Chili sound good?”
Yes. Yes, I have a husband who cooks. He does not have a wide array of dishes, but the ones he does know how to prepare work well with our ration books. The chili would be mostly beans, but tasty. “That would be welcome.”
There was a letter from Hershel, which I put aside to answer over the weekend. If I tried now, he’d get nothing but a string of numbers and symbols. Electric bill. Phone bill. Those went in another stack to pay tonight.
A heavy white envelope, which fairly screamed invitation, caught my eye. We got a lot of those from different people wanting to have The Doctor York at their soiree. He was front and center at every press conference explaining trajectories and mission parameters in ways that anyone could understand. Doing the same thing at a dinner party was just tiring.
But … but this invitation had Senator Wargin’s return address. I knew his wife: Nicole Wargin had been a pilot with the WASPs during the war. And Senator Wargin was a vocal supporter of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. I was hoping that the combination of his progressive politics and his wife’s interests would make him sympathetic to my own hobbyhorse.
I opened the envelope, sliding out the heavy white card.
SENATOR AND MRS. KENNETH T. WARGIN
REQUEST THE PLEASURE OF
DR. AND MRS. YORK’S COMPANY
AT A DINNER PARTY AT HALF PAST SIX O’CLOCK
ON THE SEVENTH OF AUGUST.
“Nathaniel?” I turned in my chair.
He had his shirtsleeves rolled up and was rubbing a potato with oil. “Hm?”
“Senator Wargin and his wife have invited us to a dinner on the seventh. Shall I say yes?”