Naomi didn’t grow depressed, exactly, but everything was a little more muted. At least once a week, she debated phoning up Valerie and asking if she could go back to Hawthorne. There, she had freedom, opportunities. Hawthorne was angling to usurp Lockwood out of its monopoly on space stations. There was still a chance she could go to low Earth orbit through the corporate sector.

She started looking at jobs, furtively. Late at night, when Cole was asleep. She’d scroll through them, peering at the job descriptions. They were either jobs she wasn’t quite qualified enough for, or openings that fit but were in places she didn’t want to live. Areas where the sea levels were going to rise, or the weather was increasingly violent, or there was simply nothing to do. Part of her wanted to leave the U.S.—to go further afield to countries where women had more freedom. Her father had been Scottish—she could qualify for an ancestry visa. She scrolled through the ESA website, but there wasn’t anything worth applying for.

As her eyes grew tired from the blue light of the screens, she worried her lip. If she really wanted to leave Houston, would Cole follow? Especially if it was for a job?

Cole had been raising the idea of children. An offhand comment now and again. But if there was anything she’d learned from growing up under Valerie’s roof, it was spotting when someone was pretending nonchalance to cover a calculated move. Naomi still hadn’t told him. She’d done her research. Even with PCOS, she could still potentially have a child. With the reduction in stress, her cycles had become more regular. There were options: metformin, or other medications. IVF. Adoption—there were more than enough orphans displaced by climate change, though she had the sense Cole wanted a child with his DNA. She wasn’t being fair to him, but she was afraid. He’d married her with the unspoken expectation they’d likely have kids and settle down. She didn’t want to admit to anyone, much less him, that it wouldn’t happen quite how he’d imagined.

Cole’s best friend at work, Shane Legge, and his wife had just had a baby. They went over for dinner one Friday night. Naomi held the small bundle, wrapped up in a blanket, warm against her chest. It felt nice. He smelled of talc and soap and that ineffable baby smell. She passed him back to his father, quickly, before the ache in her grew worse.

She didn’t want to have children any longer. The world was still too grim. But she wanted to want to have them. It was a subtle distinction. It was strange to grieve for something she didn’t know whether or not was right for her.