This Place Has No Atmosphere (4 page)

Grandma Jennifer laughs.

So do I.

She’s so terrific.

So’s Grandpa Josh.

I only wish that I felt this good at home.

S
ometimes I think that there was a mistake in the birthing room and that Mom and Dad brought home the wrong baby.

My parents say that’s impossible since they were both present at my birth and watched as the identidisk was implanted on my shoulder blade.

They do agree that otherwise they’d also wonder if there’d been a switch.

We’re all so different.

My parents don’t care about fashion, saying that their old-fashioned mylar jumpsuits are good enough. It’s so embarrassing to be seen with them. Half the time they just wear their doctor and dentist uniforms.

They’d like it if I’d be more academic and less social. I have tried to please them. When they wanted me to take computer lessons, I did. After I learned, I used my new skills to break into fifteen bulletin boards to leave the message “Aurora loves Albie.” I thought that would impress Albie. He said it made him want to puke. I guess girls are more mature than boys are in the third grade. Somehow I don’t think my parents were overwhelmed about my chances for a career in computeronics.

The only thing my whole family agrees on is exercise.

Today’s the day I’m spending with my mother to pay back Grandma Jennifer. But my mother has no idea that’s why I’m doing it.

We’re on our exercycles in our fitness room.

I’m really going to try to make this day a good one.

“Mom, how old were you when you knew you were in love with Dad?” I pedal quickly.

She stops looking at the video projection wall, at the ongoing scene of an old-fashioned mountain road, and stares at me. “I had a crush on him when I was thirteen years old.”

“My age.”

“But we didn’t even date until your dad became the dentist at the holistic wellness center where I was interning. That was after we had both devoted time to our studies and were fully developed individuals.”

“How could you be fully developed individuals if you didn’t let yourself fall in love?”

She shakes her head. “Aurora, you just don’t take things seriously enough—not the important things. Anyway, your father and I met again and we fell in love. Why are you asking? You know all this already.”

“I love stories about love.” I sigh.

My mother smiles. “You’re going to tell me that Matthew’s your true love, right? Honey, you said that about Joandrew and Michael and Doug and Phil and Albie and Cliff and Julio.”

“Mom, Julio was in preschool,” I remind her.

“You sent out wedding invitations as soon as you learned to print,” she reminds me.

We laugh.

“Let’s change the biking scenery,” my mother suggests.

“Okay. Let’s push the shore button.”

She does, and all of a sudden it’s like we’re riding on a sandy beach, with rolling waves and the sound of birds overhead.

We ride for a while.

It’s so nice and peaceful.

I say, “Next week is cheerleading tryouts. I know that you think it’s silly of me to want to be a cheerleader, but everyone says I have a really good chance to be on the squad, and I’m excited.”

My mother says nothing for a few minutes. Then she stops her exercycle.

“Aurora, I have something to tell you.” She doesn’t look happy. “Your dad and I were going to wait to tell you and Starr when we were positive, but since it’s probably going to happen, I think it’s only fair to prepare you now.”

I stop my bike. “What is it? What are you talking about?”

“Honey”—she gets off her exercycle and comes over to mine—“your father and I have the opportunity to use our skills in a very special, very wonderful way. We’ve
been offered new positions and will probably take them.”

“What does that mean?”

She hesitates. “It means . . . that the family is going to have to move. But it’s going to be a wonderful opportunity for all of us.”

“Move?” I whisper.

She reaches over and touches my hair. “It’s far.”

“How far?” My stomach begins to hurt.

She doesn’t say anything for a minute.

I start to have terrible thoughts. What if we have to move far away . . . out of the state or even out of the country. . . . I know that my parents are always getting job offers from all over.

“How far?” I repeat.

“Honey”—she reaches over and touches my hair—“it’s far. We’re going to be pioneers. We’re going to move to the colony on the moon.”

The moon.

“Do Grandma Jennifer and Grandpa Josh know about this?” I ask.

“No. We didn’t want them to try to talk us out of it.”

The moon.

I don’t believe it.

I’ll just refuse to go.

I don’t believe it.

I wish that the shore video and the bike were real.

If they were, I’d drive right into the ocean.

S
chool is going on as if the world as I know it has not ended.

The Turnips are sad, but they haven’t stopped breathing from the shock.

I was kind of hoping that they would storm my house and hold a sit-in and refuse to leave until my parents changed their minds. They didn’t. Juna and Matthew care the most—the rest seem most interested in turning up for my going-away party.

It makes me feel a little sad that they don’t care more.

The school intercom clicks on and Mr. Finsterwald begins the announcements.

1. “EVERYONE MUST HAVE MORE SCHOOL SPIRIT.”

Juna slumps down in her desk, pretending to snore.

2. “ALL SENIORS ARE TO MAKE AND KEEP APPOINTMENTS TO BE VIDEOTAPED FOR YEARDISK PICTURES.”

Finsterwald reminds us that it’s an innovation and a privilege to have permanent videos of school life to look at forever. He stresses that suitable attire is necessary and
no
attire will mean suspension from school.

Juna giggles. “I kind of liked last year’s pictures of Terrence Bradman and Larry Ardville.”

Terry followed Finsterwald’s order that all senior boys wear ties. Of course, that’s all he wore—a fluorescent tie.

Larry, on the other hand, was totally dressed. The only problem was that the clothes he wore were made out of clear plastic wrap.

Last year’s senior class is a legend in the history of Alan Shepard High School.

It makes me laugh to think about them until I realize that my parents have pledged five years of time on the moon. I won’t be back in time to graduate with my class or to be in the yeardisk. They won’t even let me stay with my grandparents or with Juna’s family.

3. “THERE WILL BE AN AFTER-SCHOOL MEMORIAL SERVICE FOR MR. ED, THE BIOTECH CLASS GERBIL, WHO DIED FROM CONCUSSION COMPLICATIONS SUFFERED WHEN HE TOOK A WRONG TURN IN THE MAZE.”

“He was cute,” Juna says. “We should go.”

I remind her that she still has detention.

4. “THE PERSON OR PERSONS WHO BROKE INTO THE SCHOOL COMPUTER SYSTEM AND CHANGED ALL OF THE SENIORS’ GRADES TO A’S WILL BE PROSECUTED AS SOON AS CAUGHT. THE SYSTEM IS NOW BACK IN WORKING ORDER.”

Darn it. Everyone was looking forward to a graduation with three hundred and forty-two valedictorian speeches.

5. “TRYOUTS FOR THE SCHOOL PLAY,
CATS, BATS, RATS, AND GNATS
, WILL BE HELD NEXT WEEK.”

Oh, no. That’s what I really wanted more than anything else—to be in the high school play. When I first got to Shepard, the drama coach came up and said that she’d seen me in the junior high play and that she was looking forward to working with  me. Now we never will, because I have to go to the moon. I don’t know what I want to do more: die or kill my parents. Either way, though, I still couldn’t be in the play. It’s so not fair. Being in a play is something that I’m good at and really care about doing.

Mr. Finsterwald is droning on over the loudspeaker about the need for more discipline.

Someone throws a paper airplane.

Juna.

Someone hits the intercom speaker with a paper space shuttle.

The homeroom teacher.

Mr. Finsterwald reminds us how lucky we all are that the administration allows students to have homecoming week with such events as Jet Set Tennis Day, Come As a Martian Day, and Walk Backwards Afternoon. He is very angry about Come As You Were Day—yesterday—when students dressed as past reincarnations or as they were when they were little. It seems that someone stole the Student Council president’s Cabbage Patch robot.

It must be returned by the end of the day . . . or else.

Mr. Finsterwald isn’t quite clear on what “or else” means in this case, but then he never is.

The bell rings, signaling the end of homeroom—not a moment too soon.

I rush out of homeroom.

Matthew’s waiting for me.

As we walk down the hall, he has his arm around my shoulder.

Juna is at her locker, trying to find her elementary geoalgebra homework.

Kids say hello to me.

It’s going to be very hard to leave.

It’s no use. Kids have no say. Tomorrow night’s our going-away party.

Some party.

T
hey’ll be sorry someday.

I’ll become a universe-famous actress, win an Oscar, and tell the world that my parents deserve absolutely, positively no thanks at all.

Then when I have kids, I’ll tell the children that their grandparents were eaten by aliens, even if my parents are still alive.

I’ll pretend that I’m a full-term test tube baby who never knew who her parents were.

I’ll fall into a moon crater and suffocate on lunar dust, and everyone will blame my parents.

It’s no use.

It’s just no use.

Sitting on my bed, I look around my room. All the posters are off the wall, to be stored for the five years that we are supposed to be gone. By the time we return, most of the groups won’t even be popular anymore.

I can’t even take my collection of plays with me. They’re antiques, real books, given to me at Christmas by my grandparents. “Too heavy. Store it,” my father told me. “You can look up anything you’ll need on the computer and get a printout if you want.” He just doesn’t understand anything that’s not scientific. It’s not the same to have a printout as the real book.

I also can’t take all my clothes with me. Two suitcases each—that’s all we can take to the moon. New moon clothes will be “issued” to us when we get there. I’ve lent most of my stuff to Juna, who has promised to wear some of my clothes each day, so that part of me is at Alan Shepard High as long as my class is there.

I’ve cried so much in the past few days.

The tears start again.

There’s a knock at the door.

“Aurora, the company’s arriving. I want you to come downstairs.” It’s my father.

“Go away,” I yell. “I’m not going to a party to celebrate my having to go away from a place that I don’t want to leave.”

He opens the door and comes in.

I pretend that he’s not there.

He steps over the boxes filled with all my stuff that’s to be put in storage and sits down on the chair next to my bed. He doesn’t even move the stuffed animals that I’m putting into storage. It’s a shame that they don’t bite.

“Aurora.” He leans over and moves my hair from in front of my eyes. “Honey, believe us. We don’t want you to be so unhappy.”

“If you didn’t want me to be so unhappy, you wouldn’t move just when I’ve started high school and love it,” I cry.

He sighs. “We’ve been through this already, so many times. Mom and I can make a real contribution on the moon. It’s such an honor to be chosen, and
our research will open new frontiers in medicine. We’ll be able to try out new techniques and experiment with the manufacture of new medicines while in orbit and while on the moon.”

I feel like my heart is going to break. Maybe my mother should do a transplant on me and put in an artificial heart or at least one that isn’t in so much pain.

He continues. “We also want to get you kids away from pollution, overcrowding, and values that we don’t like. We only want what’s best for all of us. Surely you understand that.”

“Not best for all of us—
you!
” I pull at a thread on the bedspread. “Daddy, please let me stay here.”

“No.” He frowns. “Remember the first time you stayed overnight at Juna’s. You were so homesick that we had to pick you up at three o’clock in the morning—you, your teddy bear, and your binkie.”

“Daddy, I was six years old,” I remind him. “I’ve stayed over at Juna’s house a zillion times since then. I don’t take my teddy bear with me anymore, and my binkie got shredded in the wash years ago. And I promise you, I’m not going to call you to pick me up to take me to the moon.”