I gave her my brightest, most Stetson-Parker smile. “Well, bless your heart. Why would I be mad?” One little girl. I was here for one little girl. I tried my damnedest to block out the cameras and the men shouting for us to look at them and smile. One little girl. Her name was Claire Lebourgeois and her daddy was in space.
I could keep from throwing up for long enough to reassure her that he was coming home.
Fourteen days after they went into space, Lebourgeois, Cleary, and Malouf safely returned to the ground. They hadn’t accomplished all of their objectives, but they’d proven the main point that the lunar module would sustain life long enough for an exploratory moon mission. That just left it up to us to get them there.
Sitting at my shared desk with Basira, I tried to ignore the constant bouncing that the engineer next to us was doing. I’d offered him a chair when he came in, but he was too eager. Resting my head on my left hand, I tried to surreptitiously rub my temple while studying the figures that Clarence “Bubbles” Bobienski had brought from the latest engine test. I’d been on the radio this morning before work, and getting up two hours earlier had left me with a headache that ran from my left eye, over my scalp, and down to the base of my neck.
I was fairly certain it wasn’t fatigue that was the problem, though. “Bubbles, this doesn’t make sense.”
“I know!” He jabbed a finger, raw with chewed cuticles, at the paper. “That’s why I want you to go over the calculations.”
I shook my head, running the tip of my pencil over the machine-generated numbers. “It’s not an error in calculation.”
“Please. That machine adds wrong if the temperature is over sixty-five.” The cuffs of his shirt were smudged gray with pencil lead. “I need a computress.”
As a group, we hated that nickname. Lifting my gaze, I fixed him with a dead stare that I’d learned from Mrs. Rogers. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see that Helen had done the same. “You need a computer.”
He waved my correction away. “Can you help me?”
“I am. I’m telling you that there are no errors in the calculations, so it’s either an error in the initial data set, or you’ve found a spectacularly effective engine arrangement.” It was possible that going to a star pattern in the middle of the solid propellant could lead to a more efficient burn ratio. In fact … “This structure reminds me of a theory that Harold James Pool had.”
“Yes!” He bounced on his toes, and behind him, Myrtle covered her mouth to stifle a laugh. There was a reason he had the nickname Bubbles among the computers. “See! That’s why I need you doing this, because you understand. That contraption doesn’t. I mean, great Scott! —you’ve got a PhD.”
That was the first time my degree had come up at work since I was hired. Mrs. Rogers knew my credentials, of course, but after our interview, I’m not sure I ever mentioned it, even when trying to make a point. I guess he watched Mr. Wizard or listened to ABC Headline Edition.
It wasn’t as if it made me a better computer, and trotting it out always sounded like posturing. I mean, anyone with a background in physics would have been just as capable of the type of work we did. And several of the women in the computer department didn’t have college degrees at all.
“My degree is irrelevant here.” I flipped back through the pages that Bubbles had brought me. “Do you have the raw data?”
“Of course!” He shrugged as if I’d asked a stupid question. I waited, smiling at him, until he snapped and pointed both fingers at me. “Oh! You need it. Right. Got it. It’s over in the lab. I should go get that. I’ll go get that.”
“Thank you.” I stacked the pages on my desk as he bounded out of the room, tie flapping with each step.
The moment he was out of the room, giggles escaped from almost every desk. We loved Bubbles, but oh, he could be such an engineer sometimes. We had a saying: Engineers caused problems. Computers solved them. Bubbles? Perfect example of the type.
Basira pushed back her chair and jumped up, bouncing from one foot to the other. With an exaggerated American accent, she kept bouncing like Bubbles. “Ah need a computress! Lord help me, ah need a computress!”
“Bless his heart.” I laughed and rested against the back of my chair. “He means well.”
“Oof. Harsh words.” Myrtle left her desk and came over to join us. “But, seriously, what do the numbers look like?”
I slid the paper over to her so she could flip through it. Helen appeared at her elbow, head tilted to the side as she studied the printed output. “Something must have been mistranscribed on the punch cards.”
“That’s why I wanted the raw data, which really … how hard is it to figure out that you need to bring that with you?”
Nathaniel came into the computer room. The giggles stopped and everyone returned to work mode. He was my husband, but he was also the lead engineer. I winked at Helen as she returned to her seat, then turned to give him my full attention.
His mouth was compressed in a narrow line, and a muscle bunched at the corner of his jaw. Between his brows, concentration furrows had appeared. He had a magazine rolled up in one hand and was slapping it against his thigh as he walked. “Elma. May I speak with you? In my office.”
“Of course.” Exchanging a look with Basira, I slid my chair back from my desk. “If Bubbles returns before I’m back, will you just tell him to leave the raw data on my desk?”
As I followed Nathaniel out of the computer room, the other women did a pretty poor job of pretending not to stare at us. Nathaniel’s back was rigid, and his strides ate up the length of the corridor that led to his office. My heels clattered against the linoleum as I hurried after him.
Nathaniel held the door to the office for me, staring at the floor. That muscle in his jaw kept clenching and unclenching, and my heart seemed to be joining it in a race. The last time I’d seen Nathaniel this furious was when he had fired Leroy Pluckett for grabbing one of the computers.
The usual organized chaos dominated his office. The blackboard on one wall had been filled with what looked like equations for a lunar orbit, which made sense, given the next phase of the space project. Nathaniel shut the door carefully, so it barely made any sound.
He strode across the room and tossed the magazine on his desk. It unrolled as it hit—the issue of Life I had been in. I wasn’t on the cover, thank God, but there was a one-page write-up about my Girl Scout appearance. At some point, I was going to forgive Betty for ambushing me. Maybe. She didn’t understand how much being the center of attention terrified me—but that didn’t stop me from feeling panicked that she would pull a stunt like that again. Especially with how thrilled she’d been because her story had made it to a national market.
Nathaniel loosened his tie, still staring at the floor. “Elma. I’m furious. It’s not at you. But it’s going to sound like it is.”
“That … that sounds ominous.” I sank into the chair near his desk, hoping it would inspire him to do the same.
He grunted, sweeping his hand over his hair, and then just … stood there, with one hand on his hip and the other gripping the back of his neck. “It’s fucking stupid.”
“Nathaniel!” I think that reaction is a permanent imprint from my mother.
“Fucking. Stupid.” He turned and glared at me. “I have just spent the last fucking hour in the office of Director Norman Fucking Clemons who fucking said, and I quote, ‘Control your wife.’ I don’t think he appreciates the fact that I did not fucking slug him.”