Sarah Gerard - Binary Star

I write: Type-1a Supernovae Progenitors From Merging Binary White Dwarfs. Underline it.

Traditionally, the scientific community has believed that mass accretion from a companion red giant pushed a white dwarf past the Chandrasekhar limit creating a standard-sized type-1a supernova explosion. This standard-sized explosion allowed for the use of type-1a supernovae as standard candles for measuring interstellar distances and the expansion rate of the Universe at different epochs. Indeed, it even allowed for the discovery of the dark energy instigating the acceleration of the Universe’s expansion.

My chest expands and contracts. I turn the pages of a study. I set it aside and turn the pages of another study. My heartbeat skips and I return to the first. The white glow of the paper is blinding. I blink. The backs of my eyes feel hot.

I return to the first study and underline and make marginal notes on the first two pages. I do the same for the second. I stare at the space between the two for a long time without seeing anything. I realize I have not breathed for several seconds and take a deep breath.

However, recent studies throw doubt on our understanding of the causes of type-1a supernovae. Intercontinental analysis of 23 type-1a supernovae shows them exploding with different luminosities, suggesting that up to 75 percent likely originate, not with single degenerates accreting matter from main-sequence companions, but from merging double degenerates.

John calls me and the sound of my phone makes me jump. He has not taken his pills. Otherwise, he’d be asleep.

I’m in the library. I can’t talk.

I have new information, he says.

I’ll call you when I leave. Why aren’t you sleeping?

I’ve stopped taking my medication. There’s too much to do.

I have a paper due at eight. Let me finish and call you after.

I’ve made a list of supplies.

Just send me everything. I’ll find what we need.

Pay cash, he says.

I lie on the grass of the quad and feel the distance between my class and me. The difference between my class and me is vast. I don’t belong in a class.

I feel I don’t belong anywhere. I feel I don’t belong. I feel estranged from my body. It weighs me down. The best is to do away with it: be light.

Be free.

Shine without physicality.

I see myself as I am on the grass. I see myself as someone sees me. I see I am the grass.

Feminine, happy, successful, confident, alluring, intelligent:

the dark body that draws your gaze magnetically toward it.

Kelly Rowland Admits She Was Jealous of Beyoncé. I spin. The grass is cold, wet flesh.

I turn; draw away. I find this disgusting.

I find myself disgusting.

My body is disgusting.

A wreck.

5 Instagram Tips Everyone Needs To Follow According to The #RichKids of Beverly Hills.

Please don’t touch me, Earth. I’ll wreck you.

When animals feel they’re backed into a corner.

Brooke Burke-Charvet on That Sexy Gas Pumping Photo: “It Could Have Been Bad.”

I rise and flow to the concrete monolith, enter through the double-doors, pace the halls.

Is This Demi’s Best Hair?

I turn in celestial communiqués for a living to my professors: manifesto.

Please approve of the work I do. That’s all I ask.

To be a good worker or to do without.

Arms, legs.

Or to finally stand alone.

In June, my coworker invites me out for drinks after our shift. My birthday has just passed and she buys me a Bacardi and Diet, and a Smirnoff and tonic for herself. She tells me she moved to New York from Oregon with her girlfriend and their dog. Her girlfriend’s parents didn’t approve of her being a lesbian and after months of suffering demonization from her mother, they thought it best to leave. My coworker is majoring in biology with a minor in poetry. When she can, she takes her dog to Jones Beach.

She’s only working at Starbucks because they have health insurance and stock options, and plans to leave if she gets into grad school at Harvard or MIT, where she’s currently applying.

John joins us halfway through our first drinks and orders a Dewar’s on the rocks. He’s had a few beers already, at home, and I can picture the cluster of bottles left by the trashcan. My coworker tells me how she misses her parents’ farm.

What kind of farm was it? I ask.

A dairy farm.

Gross, John says.

My coworker looks at me.

We’re vegan, I explain.

Oh, sorry. I didn’t realize. I grew up on a farm, I could never be vegan.

Did your father send a lot of cows to slaughter when they stopped giving milk? John asks.

Excuse me?

Did you feel bad separating the calves from their mothers when they were only a few days old? Did they scream until their throats bled?

I don’t understand.

Do you miss bearing witness to the millions of tons of greenhouse gases cattle fart into our atmosphere every year?

I’m going to go.

Please don’t, I say.

I don’t know what his deal is. I didn’t mean to offend you.

You didn’t.

My deal is that I don’t believe in enslaving non-human animals and damaging the environment so that you can butter the bread on your grilled cheese sandwich.

Okay, I’m leaving.

John, stop, I say.

He looks at me.

No, I’ll go. You two have fun.

John leaves. We sit in silence.

I’m sorry. I should probably go talk to him.

Happy birthday.

Write this down.

— In the case of a double-degenerate explosion, nothing of either white dwarf will remain.

Stand. Go to your partner. Don’t wait.

I walk in a circle around the room. I look into the face of each student. I have eaten nothing since the day before yesterday evening. I carry a leaking black Starbucks Venti coffee in my hand because last night I read that the Grande has four times the amount of caffeine as a Red Bull, so I thought I’d do better.

Remember this:

— The two stars orbit tightly. Some say they’re magnetic.

Take your partner’s hands. Orbit so tightly, there is nothing between you. Make sure your breath is foul and she smells it.

— They will orbit so tightly, they are not even aware of the force that binds them.

Squeeze your partner’s hands until both of you are numb.

— There is no telling who leads and who follows. Neither. It’s as if they’re compelled.

Look your partner in the eye. Say I love you. Lie if you have to. Don’t even know why.

— They orbit until they come close enough to collide.

Bash your partner in the head.

Do it hard. There should be nothing left.

Grind his brains into the carpet.

That’s right, let it out. Use your heel. Use your nails.

Remember that time he spit on you? Now’s your chance to get back at him.

Really let him feel it. Be cruel. Merciless. Petty.

Now tell him you love him.

Tell him you’ll die if he leaves you.

After school, I sit in my car in the parking lot. I smoke a cigarette even though that’s illegal within 1,000 feet of a school. I leave the windows closed. I listen to but don’t hear the static coming from my speakers on B-103. I bite all my fingernails off one after the other but don’t realize it until I’m done.

My mentor’s crotch appears in the passenger window, in my periphery. His khaki Dockers bunch like he has a short, flaccid dick. I roll the window down.

His face appears at crotch-level.

Want to talk?

Not really.

Can we talk anyway?

I unlock the doors and he climbs inside. He moves the seat back and adjusts his pants. He closes the door.

You don’t have a thyroid disease.

I keep my eyes on the steering wheel. I don’t say anything.