Christian Kiefer - The Infinite Tides

On the adjacent table was a newspaper and he reached for it for no reason other than to divert his mind, staring at headlines on foreclosures, the imploding real estate market, the rising price of oil, the increasing unemployment rate. Servicemen captured in Iraq. Bombs in Afghanistan. It might have been yesterday’s paper or the week before for little seemed to have changed. As if to confirm this fact he found a brief article on the comet on page four, apparently somewhat more important than it had been but still not quite worthy of the cover. The tagline read: “Comet Set to Hit Earth?” Perhaps when scientists removed the question mark from their sentences the paper would move it to the front page. The story noted that it would take nearly two months before it would make impact, if it was indeed on an earth-bound trajectory. It simply might have been too many weeks away for page one.

He had sat there for perhaps thirty minutes in the calm quiet semi-darkness when the door opened and the loud Russian man entered. Fantastic. He was the same man Keith had seen and briefly spoken to the morning after he had first returned to the cul-de-sac and he made a mental note to try a different Starbucks next time, lest he continue to overlap with what was, apparently, this man’s break from work.

The blonde barista — Audrey, he remembered — looked up from the counter as the man came through the door and greeted him and immediately the man looked around as if the source of the greeting was somehow inexplicable. “Who said this to me?” he said. He mocked looking around the room the way a parent might to entertain a very small child. In his hands: a white department store box.

“It’s me, Peter,” she said. She was clearly playing along with a kind of strange, childlike flirtation.

“I hear beautiful voice, but I see nothing,” he said.

“I’m right here,” she said again. She was smiling.

The man, Peter, jumped back, his face appearing startled, eyes wide. “My goodness! Audrey! How you sneak up on me!” Peter glanced toward the back of the shop, to where Keith sat with his paper. “Hello, famous astronaut Keith Corcoran!” he boomed.

“Hello,” Keith responded, trying to suppress both his surprise and his annoyance. Had he told the man his name? If so he did not remember it. Unlikely.

“I would speak to you soon but first my attention is diverting here to counter,” Peter said.

As if on cue, Keith’s phone began to ring. He fished it out of his pocket. Eriksson.

Audrey laughed. “You’re so weird,” she said to Peter.

“Hello?” Keith said into the phone.

“Not weird. You mean charming,” Peter said. “This word I am learning in English class.”

Audrey laughed.

“Chip, Eriksson here.”

“Look here what I have got,” Peter said to Audrey. “Like a present maybe. You open.”

“Hi, Bill.”

“Where are you? At the airport?”

“No, I’m at Starbucks,” Keith said. He glanced up from the paper again. Audrey took the white box slowly, as if handling something dangerous. Chemicals. Something that might explode. She said something but Keith could not hear it.

“Starbucks again? Is that how you’re spending your time off?”

“No,” Keith said.

Eriksson laughed briefly.

Across the room, Peter’s voice continued to boom: “You are so sweet to me. You deserve something nice. Is that not right, famous astronaut Keith Corcoran?”

Keith waved him off, pointing at the phone. Peter bowed to him. “Hey, have you checked with Mullins about those files?” Keith said.

“Well, yeah, that’s what I’m calling about.”

“OK.”

Across the room, Audrey opened the box. Her “Oh” was audible even through Eriksson’s voice but her face revealed no emotion.

“So it doesn’t sound like he’s going to send them,” Eriksson said.

“What?”

“He says it’s against protocol. It’s hard to argue because he’s technically right about that.”

Keith was silent for a moment. Then he said, simply: “Crap.”

“Yeah, probably not what you wanted to hear, but I thought I should let you know what was going on.”

“OK.”

“Sorry about that, pal.”

“Sorry about what?”

“Just sorry he won’t do it. No big deal though, right? You’re supposed to taking a break.”

“Yeah, I’m taking a break.”

“At Starbucks.”

“At Starbucks.” A series of ones and zeroes crossed through his mind, affixed themselves to the surfaces of the visible world before him, and then faded from view. “Is that all?” he said into the phone.

“Well, yeah,” Eriksson said. “That’s all. Just wanted to give you a quick call to let you know what was happening.”

“OK,” Keith said.

They exchanged a few more brief words and the call was over. He snapped the phone shut and sat staring into the air-conditioned atmosphere before him. He should be in Houston right now. This was what he told himself. He should be in Houston.

Across the room, Peter was mid-monologue and his voice was loud enough to bury all else under the onslaught of volume: “I think of you when I see this. I know it is hot, it is hot outside, but in here always so cool and quiet. I think of my Audrey.”

In a voice that was, by comparison, the chirping of a tiny bird: “That’s really sweet, Peter. Thank you.”

“And now,” Peter said, half turning toward Keith, “I visit famous astronaut Keith Corcoran.” And with these words Peter turned and crossed the room quickly, his hand already extended. “I want to shake hand of famous astronaut,” he said. He grasped Keith’s hand in his own and shook it vigorously twice before letting it drop again. “I look up pictures of astronauts on Internet until I see you,” he began, his voice trailing off as if looking for the correct word and then finding it: “Magnificent.”

“Oh … thank you,” Keith said.

“You are famous man.”

Keith looked at him but said nothing.

“I have much to ask you but now I must work,” Peter said.

Again Keith did not answer, only looking back at him without words, without expression.

“Peter Kovalenko. From Kiev. Ukraine.”

And now Keith said: “OK.” And then: “Keith Corcoran.”

“Of course this I know,” Peter said. “We’re like old friends already.”

Keith did not say anything in response. He thought perhaps he should dissuade this man of such a notion but could think of no method that would not sound abrupt or cruel so he simply sat there, quietly waiting for Peter Kovalenko to leave.

“Astronaut. And right here,” Peter said at last.

Keith nodded.

“You cannot resist Audrey either,” Peter said. “But she is all mine.” He said the end of the sentence loudly and turned toward the front of the store. Audrey looked up from the box and smiled, that smile turning to something else as Peter turned back around. Pain or confusion, Keith could not tell.

“Now I go,” Peter said. He rubbed his hands together as if he were brushing off flour. “Very nice to meet you,” he said.

“OK,” Keith said. They shook hands a second time and Peter nodded at him and then turned on his heel. Audrey was staring at Keith and when he looked up at her she turned to Peter and said something quietly and Peter’s voice boomed back at him again: “Yes, he is astronaut. Famous astronaut. Look on Internet.”

Audrey looked back at Keith and smiled. “Neat,” she said.

Keith nodded toward her.

“Don’t get any ideas!” Peter said, yelling down the length of the narrow room even though it was small enough to render such volume unnecessary. “Famous astronaut! Magnificent!” He looked at Audrey one last time and then backed through the door and out of the shop.