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Incoming Tablet Communication Darcy Dubois:Berry emoji loading

Incoming Tablet Communication Magnolia Jones:Oh, my…

Incoming Tablet Communication Cherry Dawson:Well that sounds like a DAMN fine meal.

Incoming Tablet Communication Darcy Dubois:SOUNDS LIKE OAKEN HAD A DAMN FINE MEAL.

Outgoing Tablet Communication G. Jaya:Don’t worry, ladies. I’m keeping my husband well-fed.

I smirked and closed the group chat. Before I put my comms tablet down, though, it buzzed again, this time with an incoming call. The name Tasha Wallace flashed on the screen. I accepted the call.

“Hello, Jaya!” Tasha said. “I have good news for you!”

“Good news?”

“Yes!” she chirped. “The sonic recalibrater has arrived!”

My stomach clenched, then turned to ice.

“That… That’s impossible,” I stammered. My palm began to sweat against the tablet. “It was supposed to take two weeks! Two weeksminimum!”

“It looks like there was a supply delivery ship that already had the part you needed on-board heading in this direction. It didn’t have to come all the way from Elora Station. Tenn can bring it out to you on the slicer immediately.”

Warden Tenn had told me that as soon as I had the sonic recalibrater, I had to install it and then leave.

I’m going to puke.

“Could he actually, um, not? Not yet?” My mouth felt like someone had shoved a fistful of dirt into it. Swallowing dryness and nausea, I hastily cobbled together a lie. “I still have a few more repairs to make on my ship before I can install the part. I don’t want Warden Tenn having to hang around here babysitting the sonic recalibrater that whole time. Since I know he has to keep his eye on it until I leave.”

My voice sounded high and jittery and like I was lying through my fucking teeth. Because I was.

Maybe Tasha didn’t know me well enough to notice. Or maybe she was just too kind to poke holes in my story. Because all she said was, “Are you sure? Tenn says there’s some bad weather heading your way. So if he doesn’t get going to deliver it now, it might be at least a few more days before he can head out that way.”

“Perfect!” I exclaimed, sickness and relief roiling in my guts. “A few more days… A week… You just tell the warden to take his time!”

“Alright, Jaya. I will. I’ll talk to you soon.” There was a pause. Then, just before she ended the call, I thought I could hear a smile in her voice when she added, “Tell your husband I said hello.”

* * *

The phone callfrom Tasha had popped the happy bubble of my earlier mood. The bubble where I’d felt safe. The bubble where I could keep on pretending that I wouldn’t actually leave soon.

The bubble that protected me from the fact that something had violently, and probably irreparably, shifted inside me.

I didn’t want to take my ship out of here.

And that was so fucking scary, because that was who I was. Wasn’t it? A pilot. An explorer.

I was free.

But I was starting to think that leaving now wouldn’t be the freedom it once was.

Instead, it would just be running away.

Maybe I’d been running away for years, by now. Hopping from place to place to avoid the hole at the centre of my life. The hole that opened up when my parents died, and then got ten times bigger when my aunty did, too.

But where the hell did that leave me now?

Oaken and I had always functioned under the assumption that this relationship had an expiration date.