Page 40 of Bound by Stars

Jupiter

Six days to Mars

The porters are starting to check the time at regular intervals.

I think I heard one sigh, but I’m not leaving until lunch hour is officially over at three.

Curran and Tar left the table nearly an hour ago.

I’m one of only two passengers still here at the tail end of meal service. I still have four minutes.

Bouncing my knees, I stare at the door. Weslie loves food and hates showing up at dinner. There’s no way she’ll skip lunch. And when she shows up, I’ll convince her to talk to me. Catch her in a good mood and get her to listen.

Slurping carries through the dining room from the other remaining passenger, an older man with a thin white mustache who’s been reading his tablet and loudly drinking coffee for the last hour. Without the lunch rush, I can hear every long sip.

The sound of footsteps brings me to my feet. I fall back into my chair when Skye jogs through the open door dressed in leggings and running shoes. The afternoon light setting shines off her deep brown skin, and she pats her forehead with the towel hanging around her neck before grabbing a plate.

I don’t know why I expected this plan to work. Even if Weslie came in, she probably wouldn’t talk to me. She did look at me in the agricultural bay without rolling or narrowing her eyes. It’s not a lot, but it’s progress. Two minutes left. My eyes shift back to the doors.

Skye slams her plate down on the table next to me.

My heart leaps into my throat and I fumble the meat-filled pastry that bounces off her plate and over the edge of the table.

“Jupiter Dalloway. If you want that girl, you’re going to have to do something about it, because she’s too damn stubborn to come to you.”

“What?” It takes a few extra seconds to process her words, shaking off her intense focus.

“You can’t just sit here and hope she’s going to show up and forgive you.”

I cross my arms. “I wasn’t—”

“Yes, you were. Because you’re patient. And I love that about you…usually. This time it doesn’t cut it. We only have six days left on this ship.”

I shift in my seat. “I can’t force her to talk to me.”

“But you can keep trying to get her to listen.”

“I don’t even know what to say. What if you and I can’t get out of this? What about my mom? What about—”

Skye grips my shoulder, staring me straight in the eyes. “It’s a verbal business agreement. It’s not like we’re bound by law. And forget your mom. She’ll get over it.”

Someone else comes through the doors. I sit up straighter.

Asha jogs to the buffet, smoothing her pink hair, apologizing as she grabs a plate. “I’ll be quick!” she assures the porters.

“Jupe.” Skye snaps her fingers in front of my face. “Why are you still sitting here? You’re miserable. She’s miserable. Go fix it.”

I take a long breath, hold it, and let it go. “Weslie doesn’t seem—”

“Believe me, she’s miserable.”

Asha approaches the table, grinning over her plate of greens. “Who’s miserable?”

“Weslie.” Skye sits back in her chair.

“Definitely.” Asha nods.

I stand. “Do you know where she is?”

Asha gnaws on her bottom lip and then scrunches her face. “I think she was meeting her Earther friend in the escape pod bay at three.”

I check the time. 3:01. My heart sinks. I imagine Weslie, tongue-tied and blushing. Reve leaning in, pulling her close. Do I even stand a chance against the guy? He’s taller, more muscular, and recklessly self-assured like he’s got nothing to lose. I look between them. “I’m too late.”

“No way.” Asha throws her plate on the table, shoving me out the doors to the base of the grand staircase. The minute hand on the clock ticks another minute past the hour. “You have to let her know you’re still an option.”

Skye waves me on. “Hurry!”

I take the stairs two at a time, running the straightaway at the top and cutting left, toward the back of the ship.

A sharp right takes me down the hall to my family’s quarters.

I keep my eyes on our door, willing my parents not to make an appearance.

Midway there, I cut left, running up the incline.

Past the last living quarters where the doors are all labeled crew only , I cut around the final corner. The pod bay door is in sight. A little farther. What if she… My feet slow. No. I can’t think. I just have to get there.

I collide with the door, catching myself with my hands braced against thick metal.

The auto-open is disabled. Hitting the button on the wall, I step up to the door again, but nothing happens.

It’s sealed. Through the little round window in the center, the bay looks empty.

If Weslie’s inside, she’s around the bend and out of sight.

I slam my palm into the door control again. Still nothing. Did she see me coming? Hack the system and lock me out? Or maybe she wanted privacy. I stumble back from the window, my chest suddenly too heavy.

The ship lurches under my feet, knocking me on my back. A rumbling boom echoes through the hall, followed by a chorus of squealing metal. I cover my head with my arms. The floor shakes under my body, rattling my bones. Another explosion jolts the ship. I squeeze my eyes shut.

Behind my eyelids, I see Andi. She was waving as she walked through the passage, making faces at me where I was perched in the main hub.

I looked away. I was mad at her that day for breaking our plans for a last-minute meeting.

It was starting to be more like that the older she got.

Less time for me. More time with Mom and her tutors.

I didn’t look back until the first explosion went off, rattling the hub’s outer wall.

Her face was pale, terrified. Her full blue eyes glued to mine like she was passing me a lifetime’s worth of words in one final glance until the flames ripped through the clear tunnel.

Debris slammed into the glass, and I ducked.

When I dared to look again, the passageway was gone.

No flames. No Andi. Fragments floated through the air.

People screamed and yelled, but the sounds were slow and far away.

A gradual thudding beat over every other sound.

My fists throbbed. My chest ached. My throat burned.

She wouldn’t have even been in that passage if she hadn’t been searching for me.

My hearing came back all at once, like time had stopped the moment she died and then finally started up again. It was loud. Too loud.

But I was the one screaming, yelling, pounding on the glass.

I open my eyes. My ears fill with a high-pitched, brain-splitting ring. Red lights flash around me. I pull myself up, holding onto the pod bay door.

Outside the window, the view is impossible. Debris, torn metal, space. Open space. The entire bay blown to fragments. Pods gone. Nothing left. Nothing to recover.

Weslie.

I’m peeled off the door. Multiple sets of hands pass me down the hall.

It’s not possible. Not again. The destruction.

It’s a memory. That’s all. I have to look again.

See the pod bay locked, but still intact.

Weslie stuck on the other side. I’m pushed from one porter to another down the hall, fighting and throwing them off.

Running back, I slam into the small window.

Only managing a glimpse before the porters, shouting directions I can’t hear, drag me away.

But I didn’t imagine it. The bay is gone.

I’m shoved back down the hall, passed along until the final porter takes me by the shoulders. “Are you hurt?” He checks me over.

I shake my head slowly. Maybe Wes wasn’t there.

“Looks like you’re uninjured,” the porter says.

I stare back down the hall at the sealed door. Maybe she changed her mind. She could be in the library or the gym. Maybe she was locked out, too.

“Hey.” The porter snaps his fingers in front of my face, pulling my focus. “Everything is going to be okay. It was only the escape pod bay. None of the rest of the ship is damaged. Go back to your quarters.”

She could have stayed in her room. If she changed her mind, that’s where she’d be, hiding in her room. I’m running again, turning starboard, weaving through halls until her door is in view. Be there. Please be there.

I skid to a stop. Gripping the edge of the doorway.

Thud, thud, thud.

No answer.

Thud, thud.

Please be here. I want to call her name, but I’m afraid she won’t say mine back. I press my head to the door and knock again.

Please. Please. I sink to my knees.

She has to be here.

“Weslie.” I weakly bang my fist against the door again.

No answer.

She’s gone.

“Jupiter?” Weslie stops at the end of the hall.