Orbiting Hearts

In the solar system of life, you’re a lonely meteor. Careening away from other heavenly bodies or crashing through their atmospheres are both catastrophic acts of self-destruction. Your only importance to the heavens are those times you threaten collision with a more important astronomical entity.

For now, you orbit.

Safe.

Distant.

Gravity will eventually suck you all the way in. Could you survive the impact? Or would it fragment you?

There are times gravitation pulls you nearer, brings you hurtling through family gatherings with white knuckles and grinding teeth as you navigate through the dangers inherent in proximity.

Of all your family, your parents have the strongest gravitational pull; all their expectations and disappointments threaten to drag you off course when you draw too near.

Even though you live with Haley, her gravity is less intense. With Haley, you’re able to maintain a distance that keeps everyone safe.

Most days.

Today is not most days.

Today Haley is hosting a party.

She expected you to stay in your room–you always hide when she hosts parties–but she suggested you attend.

“Maybe you’ll make some friends,” she’d said, and you knew then that hiding would disappoint her the way you perpetually disappointed your parents.

So here you are, hunched over on the sofa and staring at the floor while people you barely know—or don’t know at all—mill around you. The multiple conversations from thirty-odd guests may as well be a howling maelstrom. Headphones would be too conspicuous, but you could have gotten away with earplugs.

Too late now. There are people sitting on the stairs, deep in conversation and unaware they’re blocking your only route to safety. Your gaze lingers on the dark stairway behind them in despair until one of them catches your eye.

You look away, twisting your fingers in your lap.

The smell of tacos wafts through the living room from the kitchen, and your stomach growls.

You ignore it.

The food is all the way across the house in the kitchen, spread out on a folding table so that everyone can serve themselves. There’s a constant crowd milling around it, shoveling food onto paper plates, mulling over the options, or simply standing about chatting despite the fact other people are in line behind them.

Not to mention the knots of people you’d have to pass to get to the buffet. It’s shocking how many people can fit into one townhome.

You had grand plans for the evening. You were going to prove that you could socialize. (Prove to yourself? Prove to your family? You’re not sure. You’re never sure where their expectations and desires for you end and yours begin. Not really, not anymore.)

Perhaps you’d even engage in small talk.

That shouldn’t be an insurmountable goal. You’ve read plenty of articles with titles like ‘100 questions to ask’.

Conversation never sounds that complicated on paper. But sitting in the living room while Haley’s thirty-odd guests flit around the house differs from reading articles.

The chaos closes in on you, overwhelming your senses. The noises become all jumbled up and the familiar living room fades until you’re trapped inside your mind, struggling to process your surroundings in more than impressions.

The time you spent memorizing questions? Wasted. You can barely even think beyond a confused sense that thirty guests are far too many for one house party. Haley may not be the one with diagnosed mental disorders, but as far as you’re concerned, at this moment, she’s the insane one.

Your heartbeat thumps erratically. Your breathing becomes quicker.

You’re not going to have a public meltdown, you’re not, you’re not, you’re not.

You sit on your hands–you don’t want to call too much attention to their incessant movement–and rub your fingers against the fabric of the couch.

Instant regret. That’s the texture of discomfort, not reassurance.

The couch dips. A sideways glance reveals a pair of loafers. Your gaze moves to the tennis shoes you’re sporting. Was there a secret dress code?

No, there can’t have been. Haley would have told you. Although you don’t always get along, she’s never set you up to fail.

You scan the rest of the floor just to be sure.

Another pair of tennis shoes stroll past.

“You’re Haley’s sister, aren’t you?” The person beside you asks.

You nod and glance up–at his shoulder, not his eyes. Most people consider eye contact polite, but you always feel as if you’re signaling an impending attack when you try.

Or like they’re going to attack you.

“Addison, right?” The guest has apparently latched onto you as a conversational partner.

Your first thought is: What’s his motive?

Your second thought is: This is what I signed up for, isn’t it?

Which means you should correct his assumption. Addison is the other sister. The one who has her own friends and doesn’t need to tag along with her sibling.

“Chloe,” you whisper at last.

The Guest leans forward. “Sorry, I didn’t catch that.”

“Chloe.”

You must have gotten the volume control right this time, because the Guest says, “Right! Chloe! I’m Clint!” and extends a hand.

You try not to flinch as you remove your hands from underneath you for the expected handshake. His hand is warm and solid and too much other human touching you.

You let go after one shake and sit on your hands again.

Clint doesn’t comment on your discomfort. Usually, people who corner you at parties aren’t so polite. But he asks, “Are you enjoying the party?”

Is this a sincere question or is this one that has an expected answer? Of course you’re not enjoying this party. But you’re here to try, and admitting you’re not having fun is admitting failure. You can’t bring yourself to lie, either.

You compromise with, “It’s a little loud.”

Clint laughs. “I guess it is loud,” he says. “There are fewer people out on the patio.” He stands, walks a few paces, then stops. “Coming?”

You scramble to your feet. “Oh. Uh…yeah.”

You follow Clint onto the patio. A meteor pulled along by a larger object. He’s not family; not a planet. Perhaps Clint is a moon. (Will you collide and pockmark his heart the way the moon is pockmarked? Will you collide and break into millions of pieces?)

The screen door closes. Silence falls. It’s a relief to only have the chirping of cicadas in the background. The night sky is clear, and as dark as the suburbs ever get.

It’s just you and Clint and the silence. You glance at him again. He’s smiling and staring up at the stars. It’s easier to stare at his face this way, when you’re not expected to look into his eyes.

Constellations of freckles paint his face. His dark hair is tied back in a ponytail, and although he’s twice your width, he’s as beautiful as the night sky.

You still can’t bring to mind any small talk questions, and successful conversations require a little more input than you’ve provided so far.

“Did you know Saturn’s rings have less than a hundred billion years to live?” you ask.

That was not on any list of small talk questions you’ve read, but screw it. It was the first thing that came to mind and if you spend any more time trying to think of an appropriate question, you’re never going to speak.

“No, I didn’t.” Clint faces you. You wish he’d kept looking at the stars. “How do scientists know that?”

The answer to this comes more easily than the answer to small talk questions, especially without the strain of ambient chaos. “NASA’s Cassini spacecraft observed ring material falling into Saturn. Apparently, exposure to the sun changes whether Saturn’s rings are more susceptible to orbital velocity or Saturn’s gravity. It makes sense, because the rings are made of ice water, and ice melts, doesn’t it? Anyway, it creates a type of rain that falls into the atmosphere, but obviously if the rings are the source of the rain, they’ll eventually melt away, right?”

“Oh,” Clint says.

You’re undeterred by this response. After all, you take a long time to reply to other people with embarrassing frequency; you can’t judge someone else for not immediately providing a reply.

You continue talking, to give Clint more time to think.

“Some people think the rings were created from the destruction of a satellite that was pulled into Saturn’s orbit by gravity.”

“I see,” Clint says. “I’m not sure I understood most of that.”

“I’ll text you links!” you offer, even though you don’t know his phone number. You can ask Haley for it later.

“That’s okay.”

Your enthusiasm deflates at this response. So much for sharing knowledge. Or having a successful conversation. You scuff your feet against the grass. “Sorry.”

“It was…interesting.” Clint’s nod is slow and deliberate. This is what Haley does when she’s trying to convince herself of something; you wonder if it means the same thing when Clint does it.

The information you shared was interesting. Wasn’t it?

Before you can ask if he’s being honest, he asks a question of his own. “You’re interested in science?”

“Astronomy, mostly,” you answer. Not that you understand everything you read. So much of it is complicated, well beyond the science you learned in high school.

But what you understand is fascinating.

“Cool. Is that what you’re in school for?”

“Uhhh. I’m a cashier. At Kroger. College didn’t work out.”

This admission further dampens your mood. Being an Astronomy major would be a less embarrassing answer—and an actual impressive accomplishment to share—but you could barely handle the demands of high school.

College was too much.

“College isn’t for everyone,” Clint says, which is very diplomatic of him.

What your parents said was you’re not trying hard enough.

There’s silence again. You know by now that long periods of silence aren’t considered signs of a successful conversation, but you’re not sure what you’re supposed to do now:

You initiated information sharing by telling him about something you’re interested in. Why isn’t he sharing information in return?

Perhaps you ought to share more information, to reassure him you weren’t sharing out of obligation, but because you’re interested in a topic exchange.

“Saturn also has storms that last for hundreds of years,” you offer, hoping that he’ll reciprocate with his own interest soon. “This seems to be related to anomalies in the concentration of ammonia in the atmosphere.”

“Uh-huh,” Clint says.

Perhaps he’s a private person and doesn’t want to talk about his interests with someone he just met. You can respect that. It’s a little disappointing, since he approached you, not the other way around. Did that not indicate he was open to an information exchange?

And, in a moment of shallow weakness, you’d like him to talk to you because he’s pretty.

That’s not a fair reason to wish someone would tell you about their interests, is it? Isn’t it dishonest? By not disclosing your attraction, is that violating one of the fundamental laws of consent?

You feel a rush of guilt, which you squash with further rambling.

“And,” you say, trying to think less about how you should just tell this guy he’s hot, “Jupiter has hundred year megastorms, too, but Jupiter’s storms aren’t associated with its tropospheric anomalies.”

Clint isn’t leaving, but he’s still not supplying more to the conversation than, “Uhh. I see.”

“Yeah,” you say, to keep talking while you try to remember anything helpful about conversations. To your relief, you remember something your therapist told you: reflect people’s questions back at them. The point where this was appropriate has long passed, but it’s the only conversational rule you can bring to mind at the moment, so you rush out with, “Uhh. What are you in school for?”

You sigh in relief as Clint answers. “I’m done with school, thank god.” Then he laughs, “Or at least, I’m done being a full-time student. I teach elementary school art.”

Memories of your own elementary school experience spring to mind: crying because you were supposed to be using a grid to replicate a panel of a Foxtrot cartoon and failing. Resisting using finger paint because you didn’t like the way it felt. Butchering that paper folding project that you had been so excited about.

You’re aware you’ve been staring into the lawn, lost in memories. How long were you zoned out?

At least Clint is still here. You can still reply about his interests. Still, you’re unsure what to say about elementary school art. You settle for, “That sounds messy.”

“It can be, but it’s fun. I wouldn’t do anything else.”

You’re not sure if you admire him or if you fear for his sanity. “So…art….” you say, and then stop there, because you don’t know how to turn this into a coherent question.

“Art?” Clint prompts.

“Art…when did…when did you know…you wanted to do art teaching?”

“Well, when I was a kid, my parents ran our church’s Vacation Bible School. I started helping when I was in middle school and I loved it.”

“When I was a kid I tried to hide in the linen closet every time my parents made me go to summer camp,” you say. In retrospect, you should have varied your hiding places.

Clint laughs. “Some of our VBS kids probably tried to hide, too. There were always a couple of shy ones.”

You don’t know how to tell him it’s hard not to be shy when you have a social disability that impedes on things like social reciprocity and cognitive empathy. “You’re not shy,” you venture.

“I was, believe it or not!” Clint says. “I had serious separation anxiety when I was a toddler. But not anymore.”

You’re jealous now. And once again don’t know how to continue the conversation. You glance around the patio, hoping for inspiration, but before you can come up with anything, Clint says, “I’m hungry. Want anything?”

“Uhh.” Yes, yes, you do. But you don’t want to go back inside to get food.

Clint waits a moment, while you continue to stare at his shoulder, then says, “Be right back.”

You take this opportunity to sit in the grass, twisting blades of grass between your fingers until an ant climbs its way onto your hand. You reflexively fling it away, then feel guilty. “Sorry,” you whisper into the darkness.

When Clint comes back, he has not one but two plates. “You didn’t want a chair?” He nods toward the plastic patio furniture.

You shake your head, then say, “I like the grass.”

Clint lowers the plates onto the patio table until you say, “There’s wasps. In the umbrella.”

He carries the plates to you, instead. “Will you hold these for me?”

You don’t have much of a choice unless you want him to drop the food, which would be great for the ants, but not so great for Clint. “Sure,” you say.

He drags a chair over beside you. You hand the plates back. He only takes one. “That’s yours,” he says, gesturing to the one in your hands. “I asked Haley what you like. She said you don’t like buffets.”

“Oh. Thanks.” You pick up a potato chip. It was sitting in melon juice, so it’s a little soggy. As recently as last year, you would have rejected it, but in your desperation to appear more normal you tentatively take a bite. The texture is horrible. You suppress a shudder and pop the rest of it into your mouth.

Might as well get it over quick.

There’s silence as the two of you eat. A glance in Clint’s direction reassures you he’s not waiting for you to speak again.

You think back to when you first read your mental health files. Your mother had given them to you back when you’d moved in with Haley. Away from her and dad and their overwhelming parental gravity.

It was a mistake, but you’d read them right then instead of waiting for her to leave.

Lacks social reciprocity and cognitive empathy.

The words stung, even though their meaning wasn’t clear. “What does that mean? Lacks cognitive empathy?”

Didn’t you have empathy? If empathy meant caring, then you did. Or so you’d believed.

You wonder if part of your diagnosis was sociopath and nobody ever told you.

Your mom took a deep breath. “It means you don’t notice how other people are feeling or respond appropriately. Like when they’re delivering a monologue and they’re bored.”

“I’m not that bad,” you said.

“Chloe. You really are.”

That conversation still hurts to remember. How are you supposed to understand what other people are feeling?

You glance at Clint again, wondering if you’re failing to read his emotions even now.

Maybe he is impatient, and you haven’t noticed.

Why does this have to be so hard?

When you’re finished, you rub your fingers around the bumpy rim of the paper plate. “What’s your favorite art genre?”

Genre isn’t the correct word, but you can’t bring a better one to mind.

Clint’s answer confirms ‘genre’ wasn’t the right word when he answers. “I’ve always had a weakness for landscapes. You?”

“Oh. I meant what, uhhh, art family you like. Style. Art style.”

“Art movement?” He asks.

“Yeah, that.”

“It’s hard to pick a favorite,” he says. “But I’m partial to Precisionism.”

You wait for him to explain more, but he doesn’t. Does he expect you to know what that is? Or were you supposed to ask for information?

Another minute goes by before you ask, “What’s that?”

“What’s what?” He looks in the direction you’re staring, off into the tree line.

“The thing you mentioned. Precision…?”

That must have been the magic question, because he finally launches into a monologue. This is more like it. You don’t recognize most of the artists he mentions, but you don’t mind. It’s just nice to listen to someone talk about their interest without having to maintain your side of the conversation.

You realize you’re smiling—Genuinely, face-stretching smiling.

“That sounds interesting,” you say. “If I wanted more info, where should I look?”

Clint grabs your empty plate and stacks it on his. “Oh, man. I’d have to think about it. There’s this brilliant book on Modern Art called ‘What Are You Looking At?’ but Precisionism is only a small part of the Modern Art movement.”

“You can text me when you think of something,” you say.

After all, what meteor can resist the moon?

“Sure,” he agrees.

When he leaves, you haven’t told him he’s hot, but you have his number and he has yours.

Orbiting him for one night didn’t pull you down into self-destruction.

You didn’t follow a script or rely on memorized questions, but you had a conversation, a real one.

And for now, that’s enough.