I wasn't scheduled to work tomorrow, so I didn't have an excuse not to stay out late. Besides, I hadn't convinced Rafi to stop seeing me yet.
We went to the local diner. After we ate our pancakes but before the waitress brought out the check, Rafi excused himself to the bathroom. Part of me wondered if he were going to dine and dash.
I watched the bathroom door until I got bored of it and glanced around the diner. The red-skinned trucker one booth over double-fisted a fruity umbrella drink and a cup of coffee. The manager- a skinny woman with smoker's lips and a 90s perm- dragged a chair beneath the TV hanging in the corner. Her nylons ripped as she climbed onto that chair and whacked the TV with a broom. The screen flashed from a Spanish-channel soccer match to CNN. The manager scratched her fluffy head at some footage of the latest violence in the Capitol. A senator had been shot. Blood was everywhere.
"Well," a gawky-looking waiter said behind me. "I guess nobody has a good job."
I averted my eyes as another senator fell to the ground. I couldn't tell you if it were a bullet or panicked exhaustion that took him down. I didn't look. The white-blue ceiling light above our table flickered, and my phone jumped in my hand. I read the text message.
Okay, here's a thought I'm sure escaped you. Have you told him to quit smoking? If no, that will do it.
Then a second message:
Nobody likes a nag
Abby's common sense. Classic. I don't know why my mind jumped to chemtrails at the festival. As if that would make Rafi think I was crazy. Most of the world was crazy. We were all used to that. But try to change a pothead, and he'll bolt. I would too, I thought, if somebody tried to change me. A replicant is a replicant, and a pothead is a pothead.
I would tell him that he needed to get clean. That twenty-two is too old to get wasted. That he should start thinking about putting his money away for a wedding, or a down-payment on a house. Or his future kids' college tuition fund-
"Let's go, Lee."
Rafi had appeared before me. His wrists pressed against the edge of the tabletop. A friendship bracelet rode up an inch on his arm. I caught a glimpse of a white tan-line.
"What about the check?" I asked.
He reached around to his back pocket and pulled out a receipt.
"Already covered it," he titled his head toward the front counter. "It's about eleven. Want to get an early midnight-slushie?"
I didn't say no. And as I rose from my chair, my eyes caught his. Sleepy, sweet, starry. His eyes were the eyes of good guy. Even if he were a rich kid frat boy with a pot habit.
At that moment, there was no part of me that wanted to nag him.
***
"What even is a good job?" I asked. This was an ostensibly rhetorical question.
"A job that doesn't make you evil," Rafi answered anyway. "Or believe in evil."
"What even is evil?" I took a sip of my slushie. "Who came up with that?"
"Pfft," Rafi exhaled. "If ya wanna talk like that, dude, I got a joint in my pocket. Just take a drag."
A squad car had pulled into the Wawa parking lot. Otherwise, I might have said yes. I think I would have said yes. Moth in my mainframe, weed-induced anxiety migraine or not.
"I mean, I'm not a fucking communist," I said. "It's good to want things and want to be better at things."
"Sure," Rafi said. "Have aspirations."
A chubby cop walked by us. His eyes fell on the blue slushie in Rafi's hand.
"Evening, officer." Rafi played coy and boyish. I wondered if the cop would be able to smell this afternoon's weed on him.
The cop nodded and disappeared into the Wawa. Of course. Now if I were the one with the weed in my back pocket...
"Hey can I ask you a question?" Rafi tapped my shoulder with his fist.
"Go ahead."
"What do you want?"
Something in these words startled me. It was a confusing question. I needed context. I bounced my gaze around Rafi's face. His eyelids were heavy. I tried and failed to discern if this were some fuckboy seduction move.
"Like, tonight?" I asked.
His eyebrows lifted and his forehead wrinkled and his shoulders moved backward an inch or two.
"Like any night," he said, "or any day. Anytime. What do you want?"
"Like for a career?" I asked.
He groaned.
"Like for a life," he said.
"I," I didn't know how to answer this question.
"Ah, come on," he said. "What would be in your ideal life?"
"I," my mind was blank, and my mouth was dry. "I don't know."
"How can you not know?" his tone sounded almost accusatory. At least for a pothead. As accusatory as a pothead could be.
"Maybe I should ask Buzzfeed," I heard myself chuckle. "Find an appropriate quiz." I reached for the phone in my pocket. Rafi put his hand on mine.
"It doesn't have to be a big answer," he said. "You like observatories, right?"
"Yeah," I said. My voice cracked.
"Do you want an observatory in your life?"
I gaped, wordless.
Rafi shook his head and slapped the curb.
"Okay," there was exasperation in his voice. "Your slushie. Do you want your slushie in your life?"
"I mean," I said. "I'd be sad if I never had another slushie-"
He grinned.
I could have sworn he leaned a little closer to me.
"Does that mean I want slushies in my life?" I asked, and now I was certain Rafi had leaned closer than a little closer to me. The world around Rafi's face seemed to fade and blur. I could barely see the Wawa's automatic doors swipe open as the cop left. I could feel a gust of cold, temperature-controlled air on my arms, and a rush of hot blood to my cheeks. I fixated on Rafi's soft-approaching lips, and the warmth of his palm on the back of my hand. I couldn't hear traffic whiz by out on the street.
And then- just before contact-
The phone in my pocket began to wildly ring.
"Jesus Christ," I muttered. I checked my home screen. Dr. Moreno, at near eleven thirty at night. I had to answer.
"Leela!" Dr. Moreno said. "Am I glad I got ahold of you."
"Mhmm," I watched Rafi leaned backwards.
"I'm going to need you to come into work tomorrow morning."
My stomach dropped.
"I thought that Janice was covering the animal exhibit this week-"
"This is about the star shows," Dr. Moreno interjected. "The board of directors want them every day and night for the next week."
"But- we never have shows on Thursdays-"
"Look, Leela," Dr. Moreno said, "the planetarium has not provided anywhere close to the expected return on investment."
"But you only finished building it a month ago-" I said.
"If I had known that the flat-earthers had so much convincing evidence, I never would have pitched the damn thing," Dr. Moreno spat. She had to be joking.
"You're joking, right?"
"The board of directors came up with a great PR opportunity: the solar eclipse next week," she said.
"You mean, the solar eclipse that's only visible in Botswana?"
"We've decided to have star shows on an around-the-clock basis, from opening to closing, every day until the eclipse. We've started promoting it on Twitter."
"Around-the-clock?" I swallowed. "Does anybody cares about a solar eclipse in Botswana?"
"Do you want to make us look like Twitter liars?"
"Does anybody tell the truth on Twitter?" My voice cracked again. "What even is truth?"
"You're going to do this," Dr. Moreno said, "and on the big day, you're going to Skype my Africa contact, and show the eclipse in real time."
"But the height of the eclipse will be, like, four in the morning, our time," I said. "Who in this po-dunk will get up at four in the morning to watch an eclipse they don't even believe is really happening-"
"You will," Dr. Moreno said. "Because the board of directors want it. Do you think the board of directors are idiots, Leela?"
"I-"
"I'll see you tomorrow, bright and early." And she hung up.
Rafi's face was a question mark.
"I got called to work tomorrow," I stood up. "I gotta get to bed."
Rafi's shoulders fell.
"Come on," I jangled my car keys. "I'll drive you home."
***