## 2 - Where no woman has gone before
I had second thoughts the next day, when it occurred to me that Kirk himself could be put off by my notorious reputation. Most men I fuck enjoy the hint of scandal, but this was the Big Blue Boy Scout. Maybe he'd need to protect his image.
But he wouldn't ghost me, right? I couldn't imagine the Superman being that kind of rude. Was it naive of me to think that? Could I have just bought into some kind of extraordinary public image management?
No. That didn't feel right. I mean, I read the trashiest gossip sites. Lots of hacks had tried to go after the "too good to be true" angle on Kirk, but I'd never seen anyone make it stick. And I'd just spent a long, rather intimate night with him. I did buy it: he really was that upright.
I really am good at reading men, I reminded myself. Noble he might be, maybe even inhumanly noble, but he was also deep into infatuation. I would be willing to bet a lot on that. It might even be
first crush
infatuation, and that kind of hormone rush would make sure he saw the media kerfuffle as cheap attacks and his boy scout nature would rise to defend me.
Assuming his hormones worked anything like a normal man's. Argh.
I spent the next couple days sweating it out. I tried to calm down by telling myself that it was no big deal if the Superman went on about his life, and our one intimate night didn't have to be anything more than that. If it was just a bit of fun, at least I'd have a great story to tell in the old folks home.
Trying to calm down didn't work because I knew I was kidding myself. I really wanted there to be more. A lot more. I hoped I'd made him want that, too.
On the third day I whooped like a
dork
when he finally called the number I'd given him. He didn't say how things with Lucy had gone, and I didn't bother asking. He was calling me, and that was was all I really needed to know. Could I meet him the next day at a lonely spot out in the desert? I pretended to check my schedule before saying fuck yes.
"It's kind of an adventure. I think you'll like it. Maybe bring some layers for warmth."
⤎ ✵ ⤏
Later that evening I got a second call, from an unknown number. Of course I didn't answer, but they left a message.
"This is Lucy Lyon for Erika. My boy says he's going to see you again, so I just need you to know this: if you hurt him, he might be too forgiving to do anything about it, but I'm not. I have a very long memory, and you won't believe how many interesting people owe me favours."
I smiled. As threats go, I gave that one 7 out of 10. Her voice just didn't have enough edge to be genuinely scary. It just made the game more interesting.
⤎ ✵ ⤏
I brought a full suitcase of clothes, shorts, longs, motorcycle leathers, ski goggles, all the way up to an Antarctic parka. It wasn't the sexiest move, but fuck it. He'd been vague, but if we were going flying again I was not going to let our speed be limited by a too-skimpy outfit. That shit was a rush almost as good as sex.
I was not overdressed when I arrived, though. It was the fucking Mojave in August. I was in shorty shorts, crop jacket, bikini top, and sunglasses. I was looking as fun and sporty as I could manage, with great cleavage and a taut belly button on display. I was a dangerous weapon.
The fucking Superman was there waiting for me. The Unstoppable Man. What a rush, hey?
He was still wearing the spandex suit. I guess he just did that all the time, whether he was on duty or not. I wondered if he even owned any other clothes, or if it was like Steve Jobs and his closet full of identical black Issey Miyaki turtlenecks.
Next to him was a blue metal cylinder with the Superman "S" next to the logo of an annoying billionaire's pet rocket company -- not Trevor's company, the other one, Oberon. A couple techies were disconnecting some frosty hoses and poking around a row of big white pressure tanks.
"How are you with motion sickness?" Kirk asks the moment I get out of my car. "I know you're fine with heights."
"Cast iron stomach," I said. "Or anyway, if that's what I think it is, all the barf bags in the world won't stop me."
"Life support capsule," he said. "They made a deal with me to help them test things, and this is how I'd rescue people if there's another accident like Apollo 13."
"Great Scott!" I said.
The way it worked was, the Superman strapped himself into the middle of the thing so he basically wore it like, I don't know, like a fancy space-going barrel. Like how crazy people used to ride over Niagara Falls, or maybe broke prospectors in a Bugs Bunny cartoon. I got in the cylinder with him.
It wasn't small. There were windows all around so he could see to maneuver it, and half a dozen passenger seats. Then there were systems for air, water, heat, lights, radios and whatnot, but no rockets or anything. If the big guy wasn't strapped in, it was just a glorified tin can with air conditioning.
I pulled my bag of clothes out of the car. "No worries about weight, I guess."
He shrugged. "Maybe your shoes."
"Wise guy."
I chucked the bag in the capsule. Yeah, it was kind of cool in there. I'd probably want long sleeves, anyway. No problem.
When we were both buckled in, he grinned at me like a kid about to demonstrate a favorite trick. "Ready?"
"Fuck yes."
"Should I take it fast or slow?"
"Fast!"
We took off, well, like a rocket. I was flattened into my chair, and even the Superman couldn't prevent a ton of vibration at that speed. But in one minute flat the sky went from white-blue to jet black, and the horizon curved down in all directions.
The acceleration lessened. "You can take off your belt if you want," Kirk said. "We're well out of the atmosphere, so there won't be any more shaking."
"Whoa." I stared out the window for a moment. All of SoCal was spread out beneath me. I could see the Channel Islands and Baja. "We're really in space." After a moment, I asked, "So, why aren't I, uh, floating?"
"Oh, we're not orbiting. I'm just holding us here, and we're still pretty close to Earth so gravity's pretty normal."
"If you say so..."
"Think of it like, we're actually just hovering the same way we did over the park, except a bit higher and this time I'm holding a seat for you."
"Oh, got it. For real orbit we have to do the thing where you throw us at the horizon and miss, right? Which you haven't done yet."
"That's it."
"Look at me. I survived Physics for Poets, you know."
"Do you want to orbit now? I thought we might go a little higher, first."
"It's your tour. I'm happy just to be here."
"Is there anything in particular you want to see?"
"Um, all of it, I think. Yeah. All of it."
"High orbit, then."
We took off upward again. The Earth receded slowly until the disk no longer filled my field of view - I saw for the first time the real blue marble hanging in black velvet space. Good god it was beautiful! I sat kneeling beside the floor window, looking down at the whole planet. There was a line of storms strung out across half of North America, while the sun glittered over the Gulf of Mexico.
You know how blown away I was by this whole trip? I had completely forgotten to fuck with Kirk, from the moment I saw the capsule sitting in the desert ahead of me, that's how excited I was.
The universe outside rotated around us. Earth wasn't
below
us anymore; it slid up into the side windows, as Kirk accelerated us into orbit.
"Fuck, from this high the planet really does look small." I was surprised to hear wonder in my voice. I really didn't think something that simple would get to me, but it did.
