She stood up, and things stayed relatively steady. All right. She could do this. It shouldn’t be a long meeting. She could just sit in the back and sneak out when it was over. And stop drinking for the afternoon, Cath. Seriously.
The huge conference room was crowded with all the engineers, admin staff—everyone with a hand in Sagittarius II at all. David would be around here somewhere. His department had worked on some of the communications systems. Catherine ducked down in her seat to avoid seeing him.
Aaron Llewellyn entered and went to the portable lectern at the front of the room. Stragglers found seats, and Catherine put her most attentive face on.
“All right, I’ll try to keep this brief,” Aaron said into the mic. “Everything is A-okay with the crew. They’re on schedule to hit their planned arrival at ERB Prime.”
A small cheer went around the room. Aaron went on, checking in with various department heads. Catherine fought to stay awake.
She started when she heard her name. “As some of you may not have heard,” Aaron was saying, “Catherine has been our expert spokesperson for Sagittarius II, and has already made several media appearances to try to make the mission more relatable to the general public.” He smiled at her, and Catherine had a sinking sensation in the pit of her stomach. “I hate to put you on the spot like this, but why don’t you give us a quick rundown of how it’s going?”
This was like that old nightmare of showing up at school naked. Oh God, she was much too drunk for this. What the hell had she been thinking? She stood and dropped her forgotten notebook, scrambling to pick it up as one of the AV techs handed her a mic. Everyone swiveled to look at her.
“Um. Good. It’s going good.” Was she slurring? She tried speaking very carefully. “After the— Right after the launch the major networks all wanted news—I mean, they wanted interviews. More information. It’s slowed down. Wo-once the ship reaches the bridge, it’ll get busy again.” Catherine couldn’t judge how well she was doing from anyone’s face. Couldn’t tell if she’d faked her way through it or not. Had she said enough? That was probably enough. She handed the mic back to the tech and sat down, her face on fire.
“Uh, thank you for the update,” Aaron said with a frown, and Catherine realized she’d blown it.
She spent the rest of the meeting swallowed up with dread, the anxiety making her more sober by the minute. When the meeting ended, she fled to the refuge of her office. The travel mug sat on her desk, mocking her.
Later that afternoon she got the knock on her door she’d been expecting since the meeting.
Aaron stood in her open door. “Catherine, can I talk to you for a sec?”
“Sure, come on in.”
“Let’s go to my office.”
Catherine’s heart sank. It was worse than she thought. She followed him like a condemned woman, feeling as if every eye was on her as they went down the hall.
Once inside his office, he invited her to sit and then just looked at her. Finally he said, “Was that the first time you’ve been drunk at work?”
Catherine started to argue that she wasn’t drunk, but knew it wouldn’t do any good. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what I was thinking. It won’t happen again.”
“You’ve had a lot going on lately. I won’t ask how you’re doing. I can see how you’re doing.” He gave her a rueful smile. “I know what a hangover looks like when you’re trying to hide it, and you’ve been having a lot of rough mornings.”
“Aaron, I—”
“Catherine, you don’t want to go down that road. I’ve been there. You’d be surprised how many of us have.” He was looking at her with sympathy, and she’d almost rather he was angry with her. “I want you to take some time off.”
“I can’t. I know this is a bad time right now—”
“You said yourself that you’re in a lull right now until Sagittarius reaches ERB Prime. I don’t want to say I’m suspending you, but if anybody’s earned a leave of absence, it’s you.” Aaron gave her a stern look. “Take the time, Catherine. Go to some support meetings if you have to. Get yourself back together. Okay?”
Bitterness flooded Catherine’s mouth and she felt something surging forward, like a tidal wave she couldn’t stop. There was a letter opener on Aaron’s desk.
Pick it up.
The voice wasn’t hers. She remembered wanting to hurt Cal and the engineer in the hallway outside the archives, seeing them as monsters. Oh, not again.
Instead of a sympathetic, concerned boss, Catherine saw a pale, shapeless mass of flesh and had an overwhelming urge to strike out.
Pick it up.
Her fingers itched to touch the cool metal object, already anticipating violence, while part of her wanted to scream. Not here, oh God please, not here…
She tore her eyes away from the letter opener with an agonizing wrench and realized Aaron was still waiting for her answer. He was offering it as a choice, but she knew better. “How long?”
“We’ll figure that out as we go. For now, let’s say three weeks.”
God. She’d go mad if she had to sit at home for that long. You almost stabbed your boss with a letter opener. That ship has sailed. She nodded. What else could she do? She was damn lucky he wasn’t firing her. If she wasn’t such a public figure, she had no doubt he would have.
“Okay,” Aaron said, standing up. “Go on home. And if there’s anything I can do to help you—anything—I want you to call me. Day or night.”
Catherine stood as well, and accepted the hand he extended to her. “I will.”
“I mean it. We will do whatever it takes to take care of you. We look after our own.”
He wasn’t wrong, but it wasn’t altruism, either. Damaged astronauts were bad PR, and that was especially true of her.
21
WHEN CATHERINE ARRIVED back at her apartment, she saw the mess with fresh eyes. There were empty wine bottles everywhere, take-out containers piling up, and something in the trash that needed to go out, now. Catherine sighed and put her things down before grabbing a garbage bag from the kitchen and starting on the worst of the mess.
It must not have taken long for the news to spread around NASA. She hadn’t been home two hours, spending most of that trying to reclaim her apartment, before she got a call from David. Oh Christ, David had been at the meeting this afternoon. She couldn’t bear the thought of talking to him. Or to anybody. She was much too ashamed of herself. He called three times before he stopped, and she wanted to collapse with relief.
The following days were a blur—not because Catherine lost time, but because she spent as much of her time away from work being as drunk as possible. Despite Aaron’s warnings, it was just easier that way. She didn’t go back to the vodka. She comforted herself with that. It was only wine. That made a difference, didn’t it? Either way, the voices stopped. When she slept, she didn’t have any dreams, and there was no suggestion that she was wandering at night, either. While she was awake, she felt… peaceful. Hazy but peaceful.
Aimee still refused to return her calls. If that bridge wasn’t already burned behind her, it was smoldering. It wasn’t the only one. David came by and knocked on the door several times, but she told him to go away. She’d sent Julie’s calls to voice mail more times than she could count. Catherine felt as if she were carrying a box of matches around with her, ready to throw lit ones at every bridge she saw, with the slightest provocation. For the first time since coming home, she thought about just… leaving everything. Ditching NASA, ditching what was left of her family, and just going. Some days, all that kept her in one place was not having any idea where she wanted to go.