The secretary led her across the spiky grass of the campus. The woman was around thirty. She trailed a cloud of cosmetic fumes — perfumes and face powder and hair spray — that made York’s eyes sting. She looked oddly at York, and York could see the woman considering giving her girl-to-girl tips about where to get something done about that hair.

York clutched her empty briefcase and wondered what the hell she was doing there.

The secretary took her to Building 4, and told her she was expected to attend the regular pilots’ meeting straightaway. Every second Monday morning, at eight: she was already late.

She slipped into the meeting room, at the back.

There were maybe fifty people sitting around in the room: all men, clean-cut, close-shaven, crew-cut, wearing sport shirts and slacks. There was a lot of wisecracking, and deep, throaty laughter that rumbled around the room.

Chuck Jones, chief astronaut, stood at the front of the room, hands on hips. Jones was talking about some technical detail of the T-38 training aircraft.

York spotted an empty seat, not far from the door, and with muttered apologies she squeezed past a few sets of knees toward it. The astronauts made way for her politely enough, but she was aware of their gaze on her, curious, speculative, checking out her figure, studying her un-made-up face. What the hell’s this? Is it female? Are you here to take notes, baby? Make mine decaffeinated…

She spotted Ben Priest, sitting up front with his arms folded, looking the part.

“Now,” Jones said from the front of the room, “I’ve had reports from Ellington that some of you guys aren’t checking out your equipment before flying the T-38.”

There were groans. “Christ, Chuck, do we have to go through all this again?”

“We want to keep the privilege of flying the T-38s. But it’s a privilege that can be rescinded any time. You may be astronauts, but you aren’t free from the routine responsibilities of checking out what you fly. All I’m asking for is a little more effort, to keep those guys at Ellington sweet…”

Jones started going through assignments for the next two weeks. “Okay, we have Bleeker, Dana, and Stone to the Cape Tuesday to Friday. Gershon to Downey, all week. Curval and Priest to Los Angeles.”

Someone spoke up from the floor. “Hey, Chuck. I thought you were coming with us to L.A.”

“No, I changed my mind. I’m going to the Cape. I want to go through the new CM sim they’re building out there.”

“Don’t you like us anymore, Chuck?”

“You guys go west and I’ll go east anytime…”