Drown #7.4: the rights and wrongs

June 2085 — Stephanie Nova and Justin Kim are 25, Jeremiah Day is 28. 

*** NSFW


Justin had Stephanie's earlobe between his lips and his body between her legs when her phone rang on the bedside table. "Don’t stop," she said. "Ignore it. I don’t care who it is."

So Justin didn’t stop.



Three minutes later, when her phone rang a second time, she said, "It doesn’t matter. Everyone who matters is in this house already and— Oh god, oh, yes, do that again."


So he did that again. And again and again.

Eight minutes later, he could hardly notice the phone ringing for a third time over the incredible sound of her coming, his favorite sound in the world, which was soft and breathy and explosive in equal parts.






Fifteen minutes later, they were finished and collapsed with the gravity of two completely drained bodies melted into each other over the sheets.


Her phone rang again for a fourth time.


"Who’s trying to call me this late?" Stephanie reached for the phone. The area code was strange and seemed to have too many numbers. "That’s weird," she said, showing Justin the number.

"That code comes from the lunar base. Is it Keri?"

"Why would Keri be calling me and not you?"

Stephanie answered the call. It was from the base, but it wasn’t Keri. A smooth, deep voice spoke.

"Hi, Stephanie."

"Jeremiah," she said.

"My sweet, beautiful, loving wife. It’s so good to hear your voice again."


Justin tried not to take offense at how fast she pushed away from his body once her husband was on the phone—he couldn’t take offense though, because he was too focused on the look of overwhelming panic on her face. She didn’t have to ask Justin to keep quiet, he knew. He was perfectly still. Her phone was not quiet, or maybe the room was just very quiet, or maybe Jeremiah’s voice was just very powerful. Justin could hear most of what Jeremiah said to her.

"Four tries, Stephanie," Jeremiah said. "You’re going to have to work on your reaction speed. Too busy to talk to your husband?"

"How are you even calling me? I thought you couldn’t call direct from Europa."

"I’m at the lunar base now," he said. "They needed more people here, so they sent some of us back. You know, it almost feels like being home, seeing the Earth out there. So close and yet so far. You sound flustered. You have company?"

"No. No, I don't. It’s just … I just ran up the stairs. I was doing laundry."

Justin watched her cringe forward around her naked body, like she was trying to cover herself even though Jeremiah wasn't in the room to see her. She looked like she needed to be soothed but also like she didn’t want to be touched at all. Justin picked up a towel from the floor and placed it in her lap. She pulled it up, stunned and staring at the wall, and she wrapped herself in it.

He dressed without making any sound.


"It’s almost midnight," Jeremiah said. "I didn’t think you’d be so busy. Although I guess you usually write your emails in the middle of the day, so maybe you are busier at night. Lots of laundry to do?"

"My parents moved back here, because of what’s going on."

"I’m terrified for you," Jeremiah said. "It kills me to be out here and not be able to protect you. You have to know that I never wanted to leave you. I never would have left you for a minute. But you don't know how good it is to hear your voice, my love. To have a back and forth conversation. It’s been so long. Especially since you haven’t been writing very much again."

"Haven’t I?"

"I’ve been in transit for three months, Stephanie. You didn’t notice, did you? Three months to get from Europa to the moon and you sent maybe four emails, short ones."

"I wrote when I could. There’s a lot going on down here, that’s all."


"I know it’s because you have so much to worry about down there," he said. "I know that’s all it is. It’s a tough time for everyone, but you and I, we can get through this, too. I need you to tell me it's all okay, that I'm just imagining things, that paranoia, you know. I need you to tell me you still love me."

"Everything's fine," she said. "We love you so much and we can't wait for you to come home safe."


"You, Stephanie," Jeremiah said. "I need to hear it coming from you so I'll believe it. Say it like you mean it."

Justin could hear Stephanie gulp. He couldn't see her face but he could hear her breathing, short and shallow, he could hear her toes rustle anxiously into the carpet.


That was when he left the room. He didn’t want to hear what she said next. He’d heard enough already.


Her mother walked on the new treadmill they'd bought and her father watched some late night comedy show in the living room.

"It's funny," he said. "Come watch, it only just started."

But Justin wasn't in the mood for funny and he just wanted to be alone.

"No, thanks. I'm going to check on … the plants," he said, and he went outside. The plants didn’t need to be checked on.


He noted the time first, 11:45. Sixteen percent oxygen. If you sat perfectly still, you might make it about half an hour before you got the dizziness and headaches. He knew they had time zone clocks just about everywhere up there on the lunar base. Keri would never call at midnight unless she was trying to be bitchy—Justin knew this by experience—so Jeremiah's timing felt very deliberate. This would be a thing they did now. Jeremiah would call whenever he wanted, Stephanie would answer, and Justin would have to find some quiet place to go deal with it.

It was the first time he’d heard Jeremiah’s voice in years, too, and Justin didn’t remember him sounding that way. Maybe it was because he was in love with Stephanie now, or maybe because they were older and wiser. Maybe the war had changed Jeremiah, or maybe Justin had never actually heard a truly private moment between them. He didn’t like the way Jeremiah talked to her and he couldn’t remember thinking that before.


Ten minutes later, she came outside.

"You shouldn't be out here," Justin said.

"Neither should you," she said. She sat down next to him anyway.


"How’s Jeremiah?"

"He’s fine. He said the lunar complex is like a resort next to the places he’s been staying for the past two years." She made a sound that was meant to be a soft laugh, but instead sounded like a heavy exhale. Her voice sounded flat and deflated, not like the voice of a woman who'd just spoken with her dear husband after two long years.

"Hmm," Justin mumbled.

"You’re mad now," she said.

"No, It’s okay. There was never really a right time to love you. Maybe it's just the way we are. In high school you had a boyfriend, then I had a girlfriend. Then you had a husband and I had a wife. Now I’m getting divorced and you’re … I don’t even know."

"Please don't say that," she said. "It's always the right time for you to love me. This doesn’t change anything."

"Are you sure? Seems like it’s going to change a lot."

There was more attachment left between her and Jeremiah than Justin had assumed. There was more there than she wanted to believe, too. Jeremiah stirred something in her, not the kind of love they shared, but something else, a devotion that seemed stronger than either of them had realized, something fearful and raw. It wasn’t like their love, maybe, but it might have been just as powerful.

Justin didn’t want to know, but he had to know. "Did you say it, what he wanted you to say?"


Her eyes looked sad. "You have to understand, I just don't want him to worry while he's out there."

"You said it?"

"What was I supposed to do?"

"I don’t know," he said. "Maybe tell him the truth? A little bit of it. Even just a shred."

"I wasn't ready. I didn't think he'd call me, he hasn’t been able to call me on the phone for two years. I didn't know what to say. It’s just words with him. It’s what he wanted to hear, but it doesn’t mean anything."

"They’re the same words you say to me."

"You think I’m lying to you?"

He never doubted her love for a minute and maybe that made it hurt more. "No. I can always tell when you’re lying. You’re a terrible liar."

The way Jeremiah asked for it, he must have known she was a terrible liar, too. He almost seemed to count on it.

"I never know if what I’m doing is completely right or completely wrong," she said. "Even when I think something makes perfect sense, it still turns out wrong. Do you ever worry that if you make enough wrong turns, enough mistakes, it’s not just that you lose the path you were supposed to be on, but that it gets erased from history entirely? That the other life you wanted, it’s not out there anymore. It’s gone. You could chase after it your whole life and never find it again."

"Is that your way of saying you won’t leave Jeremiah then? One phone call and you’ve already changed your mind?"

"No, that’s not what I’m saying. I'm just saying that it worries me."

"And what? You’re giving up?"

"I’m not giving up," she shouted, and even her shout came out deflated. "I’m just saying that leaving Jeremiah is not the same as leaving Keri. It’s not going to be the same."

Then she started to sob.



Justin didn’t know how to have a fight with Stephanie. Over the eighteen years he'd known her, he couldn't even remember how many actual fights they'd ever had. Maybe two? One time in ninth grade, he called her a snobby jock because she wanted to play soccer with her new friends instead of staying inside on a beautiful summer day to play video games with him. He apologized the next day because his mother told him he was being a jealous fool. Then once in college, she was mad that he and Keri were always making out and never spent any time with her anymore. But when Keri went home because she had school in the morning, they made up over some popcorn and zombie movies in the common room of their dorm a few hours later.

Stephanie wasn’t a fighter like Keri was. She didn’t fight back, she just got sad and balled up and cried.


"It’s okay, Steph. Come here. It’s going to be okay. Come on, let’s go back inside. Let’s go back to bed."

Jeremiah wasn’t even home yet and Justin already felt like he was losing her. He didn't want to fight, he just wanted to hold on to her while he still could.

—