Page 11 of Bound by Stars

Jupiter

Thirty-four days to Mars

In the corner of the busy gym, a red-faced guy grunts out reps on the weight bench while the mullet-ed woman spotting him shouts encouragement in Russian over the chorus of panting runners.

Behind them, the gym door slides open and Weslie steps inside. Her gaze passes over the row of treadmills, all in use—aside from the one beside me. She deflates.

I turn back to the wall-size window displaying an unchanging view of far-off stars and planets. The way she’s been avoiding me since Calypso paired us up on her project, I imagine she just turned around and left.

“ Calibrating …” the machine beside me announces, welcoming Weslie. Passenger #2037. She starts jogging in a steady rhythm, staring out into space, seemingly oblivious to anything else happening in the room.

Is this good luck or bad? She can’t avoid me here at least.

My machine notifies me of a speed increase.

I try to catch her eye, but she stares forward like she’s shut off her peripheral vision.

“Do you run on Earth?” I have to speak louder than usual over the collective hum of the machines, pounding of feet, and the Russian weightlifter, who’s now growling through the last of his reps.

Weslie’s expression stays flat and focused. I may as well not exist.

On my other side, Curran shrugs.

I settle into a light jog, rifling through possible conversation starters. I don’t know anything about this girl other than the fact that she’s from Earth, she built an incredible bot, and she doesn’t seem to like me.

“Where’s ILSA?” I try again.

“Am I giving off some kind of friendly vibe? Maybe I’m not frowning enough because of the endorphins, but I was really going for disinterested and unapproachable,” she says with the rhythm of her strides, keeping her eyes trained on the star-filled window in front of her.

“I think you nailed it.” There’s a laugh in Curran’s voice.

For an Earther and the highest-born Big Six heir, my best friend and Weslie have more in common than they’d think.

Curran can be just as difficult when he doesn’t want to talk.

When something bothers him, he shuts out the world.

But growing up around his father, I can understand why.

After his mom died, his dad went on like nothing happened.

And Curran’s always been expected to deal with everything with the same stoic resolve.

Like emotions are an inconvenience. Like if he keeps everything to himself, nothing can ever really hurt him.

And I’ve had plenty of experience breaking down walls.

I try again. “I didn’t mean to bother you—”

“And yet, here you go.”

On either side of me, both of them are in a full run with straight backs, relaxed hands, and long strides, while I struggle to adjust to my treadmill’s speed increase. My lungs burn, making my words spaced out and breathy. “But Calypso…is pretty set…on us working together.”

“This again.” She rolls her eyes.

It’s not like I’ve been stalking her, begging her to partner with me for the past twenty-four hours.

She completely shut me down after we got the assignment, and we didn’t get a lot of conversation in between me almost dying in the maintenance airlock and her swooning over that porter.

This morning, I managed to get half the question out before she bolted out of the room at the end of class.

I tried to ask Calypso for a different project, but they wouldn’t budge. Told me to “make it work.”

“If we can just…talk, I’m sure…we can figure out…a situation…that works for both…of us.”

“No thanks.” Her stride and stony expression are unchanging.

I’m having no luck trying to be friendly, so maybe I need to be straight with her. I hop onto the side of the treadmill closest to her. “If you don’t let me help, I’m screwed.”

“Not my problem.” This girl is impossible.

“Workout incomplete. Workout incomplete. Workout … ” The machine chants at me.

I hop back onto the belt in a full run. “What if we—”

“You know, I think I’ll swim instead.” She hops off her treadmill and it repeats the same alert mine did until she pops open a panel on the side and fidgets inside for a second. The machine goes silent, its screen displaying the start menu.

I jump off to follow her. “Wait, hear me ou—”

“Workout incomplete. Workout incomplete. Workout … ”

I reach back and hit the screen, but it flashes the same message.

The door to the locker room between the gym and pool slides shut behind her.

“Workout incomplete … ”

“Will you finish your run before that thing drives us all nuts?” a girl calls down the row of treadmills.

I jump back on the insistent machine in a full run.

That was a disaster. I have to find another angle. Find a way to make it seem beneficial to her. Dammit. Now this girl has me thinking like my mother.

Curran keeps running like the entire gym didn’t just witness me getting brutally shut down. His speed increases again. He unzips his black hoodie and tosses it on the floor beside the machine.

“Maybe…you…could talk…to her…for me.” I can barely manage a word between short, ragged breaths.

He throws a quick glance back and then frowns at me without breaking his stride. “Why would I have any more luck than you?”

“She seems to be…particularly…offended…by my existence.”

“It’s your rank, not your personality. No one could hate you who really got to know you, Jupe.” He keeps his eyes forward. Compliments, given or received, have always made him uncomfortable.

After thirty minutes of burning lungs and staring out into space, the treadmill slows to a walk and when the timer hits zero, it stops. “ Fitness objective achieved. Have a good evening, passenger #374 . ”

“How…much…longer…do you have?”

“I’m still on for another thirty.” In a full sprint, Curran’s forehead is barely glistening, while sweat rolls down the side of my face.

“See you later.” I grab my towel and mop my head on my way through the door to a hall of lockers. Pulling out my comm, I check for alerts and chug water from my canteen.

Echoey laughter bounces down the tiled hallway from the door to the pool.

Placing my stuff back in the locker, I walk down to peek out the round window in the door.

A girl with dark hair in a standard-issue navy one-piece suit shoves off the edge of the pool.

She comes up into a freestyle stroke. Making it to the other side, she wipes water off her face and pulls herself up on the far end.

Weslie. She falls back, water splashing around her.

I shift to get a better view.

Hale is at the end of her lane with his new collection of followers behind him.

Weslie glares up at them, saying something I can’t hear, and then pulls herself back up onto the edge of the pool.

He squats, shoving her back down.

I slam through the door.