“Are you…nervous?”

“I’m embarrassed,” Vanessa said.

“What on earth is it?”

Vanessa laughed. “It’s actually not on Earth.”

Joan shook her head and smiled.

“I’m not able to orient myself in the night sky as well as some of the others. Lydia can spot every constellation, and she’s incredibly smug about it. But I’m having trouble recognizing them consistently. Especially in a dark sky.”

“Okay, what can you spot?”

“Well, I can find Polaris. And I have a handle on Vega, Deneb, and Altair. So I can always find north and south. But I’d love to feel more confident about the dimmer constellations.”

“Then you’ve come to the right place. Of course I’ll show you.”

“Thank you,” Vanessa said, her eyes warmer than Joan had ever seen them.

“You’re an astronaut who doesn’t recognize most of the stars,” Joan said, “That’s pretty funny.”

“I’m a pilot who applied to NASA because I want to fly out of the atmosphere,” she said. “And I’m willing to learn anything I have to in order to do it.”

“Okay,” Joan said. “I would love to teach you. Tomorrow night. We can head out of the city. I can even bring my telescope.”

“Yeah?” Vanessa said.

“Yeah, it will be fun.”

—

Joan arrived at Vanessa’s front door one minute before six o’clock. She waited two full minutes to ring the doorbell so that Vanessa could see she was perfectly capable of being late.

Vanessa’s bungalow was painted teal with a red door, a curved archway at her front porch. Joan could hear the doorbell ring inside the house.

Vanessa appeared with a cooler in her hand. She was wearing jeans and a dark gray T-shirt with the sleeves rolled up, her hair still a tad wet. In a flash, Joan went from liking the dress and jean jacket she was wearing to feeling mortifyingly overdressed. And why had she never thought to roll her sleeves up like that?

“I made sandwiches and brought us sodas and beers,” Vanessa said, gesturing to the cooler.

“That’s great. Thank you.”

“Well,” she said. “I like to pull my own weight. Thank you for helping me.”

Joan waved her off. “It’s a good excuse to do a little stargazing myself. I don’t make time for it as often as I’d like. So, really, you’re doing me a favor, too. Keeping me company.”

Joan started walking to her Volkswagen, but Vanessa stopped her. “We can take my car,” she said. “You can just tell me where we’re going.”

“You’re sure? It’s a bit of a drive.”

“It will be nice,” Vanessa said. “Wait here, I’ll pull out of the garage.”