Good Morning, Midnight

ELEVEN

AUGIE AND IRIS reached the small camp by the lake as darkness fell, and they stumbled into the first tent they came to, a sparse but welcome respite from the raw cold of the outdoors. Despite the dilapidation, the crisp scent of frozen mildew, and the minimal furnishings, it felt more like a home than anywhere Augie had lived in years. There were four camping beds with canvas mattresses, an oil-burning stove, a gas range, and a few sticks of furniture. The aluminum rods that held the vinyl shell of the tent in place curled overhead. Augie felt he was sitting inside the belly of a whale, admiring its rib cage. In the center of the room was a card table with a few folding chairs, and beyond it a desk covered with meteorological maps and weather records, a small generator, a few wooden crates used as bookshelves. A dozen kerosene lamps with blackened glass chimneys were clustered in the center of the table, and a mismatched collection of ragged carpets lay on the plywood floor. There was a comfort in that one room that the entire Barbeau outpost had lacked—a sense of personality, of coziness. It was clear that lives had been lived here. Meals had been made, novels had been read, games had been played.

They put down their gear and began to look more closely at what had been left behind. The crates were packed with paperback books, mostly romance novels, along with a few mysteries and one or two basic cookbooks. The mattresses on the cots were sheathed in protective plastic, and upon unwrapping the first one, Augustine found a few wool blankets, a crumpled sheet, and a mealy pillow stuffed inside the plastic case. He shook out the sheet and stretched its elastic to cover the corners of the slim mattress. Plumped the pillow. Refolded the blankets.

At the table, he lit a few of the lamps, then propped the front door open to let in the last of the natural light. The musty smell of abandonment stirred around him and started to trickle out into the open air. Iris had gone back outside and was sitting in the snow a few yards from the edge of the lake, drawing figure eights with a rock. Augustine found a boulder to sit on and stayed with her there for a moment, taking in the view. He was filled with a sense of relief. The journey had been worth it. They had made it. There would be no return trip, and yet—he felt safe there. Without the shadow of the evacuation, the looming emptiness of the hangar and the runway, this place felt more like an oasis than a place of exile.

The sun was already gone, captured by the mountains that circled the lake, and the sky had deepened to a dark blue. There would be plenty of time for exploring in the coming days. They sat in silence and listened to the ice. A wolf howled somewhere far away, and then another answered from the other side of the lake. Still they sat. Full darkness settled and a snowy owl swooped overhead, landing on one of the antenna poles, where it watched the two humans with curiosity. Stars began to prickle in the sky above them.

“Hungry?” Augustine asked, and Iris nodded. “I’ll make something,” he said, and slowly, stiffly rose from his boulder. He was looking forward to sleeping on the cot—it would be no worse than the nest they’d made in the observatory and much, much better than the frozen ground they’d spent the last few nights on. As he approached the hut, he saw the glow from the kerosene lamps illuminating the walls and the flicker of their flames from just inside the threshold. He was glad they’d come.

Inside, he started the oil stove, but he left the door unfastened so that Iris could slip through when she was done communing with the first body of water she’d seen in—well, he didn’t know how long. He hadn’t seen water since flying over the fjords on his way back to the observatory outpost after his last vacation, over a year ago now. The frozen lake was a reminder of a gentler season fast approaching. He closed his eyes and imagined how it would look in a month, when the midnight sun had risen and the trickle of spring had found its way to them. He imagined the softness of the mud, the virility of grass poking up through the barren land, the liquid glass of the melted surface, and it filled him with a sense of serenity. He could stop fighting the landscape, just for a moment, just this once. Since the evacuation, since Iris, he had felt more earthbound than he had in years. There was a time when the changes in the sky meant more to him than the ground beneath his feet, but not right then. He had been looking up for long enough; it felt good to think of the dirt instead, to imagine the life that would soon return to the land.

As the stove began to warm the hut, Augustine shed a few layers and rummaged through the boxes and packages stacked around the gas range. There was an abundance of food, and he suspected that one of the other huts would have an even larger store packed away for the long winters and rare supply runs a location like this would get. He found a skillet, sticky with old grease and dust, and rinsed it in a tin basin with water from the big insulated tank in the corner of the tent. When he set the skillet down on the hot range, the moisture began to spit and crackle. He emptied a can of corned beef hash into the pan, and when the hash was brown and crisp, he flipped it out onto two plates and scrambled some powdered eggs. There was an enormous can of instant coffee and both condensed and powdered milk—what riches, Augie thought—and while Iris began to eat he set some water to boil for coffee, then sat down beside her.

“Is it all right?” he asked her, and she nodded her approval between big bites of hash.

When the water was ready, Augie made himself a mug of coffee, sweetened with a generous helping of condensed milk, and decided it was the most delicious drink he’d ever had—better than whiskey, even. They continued to sit at the table after eating, their dishes stacked in front of them and the oil stove humming beside them, not saying anything, just enjoying the tones of silence. The kerosene lamps illuminated the hut and the stove kept it surprisingly warm, even as the temperatures outside plunged. Augustine set the dishes down in the basin and left them for the morning, then unwrapped another one of the cots for Iris. They weren’t accustomed to sleeping so far apart; in the observatory, they had curled up in the nest together, for warmth. Iris watched Augie fold the plastic and shake out the sheet, then fit it to the mattress. They took out their subzero sleeping bags and laid them on top of the beds.

In the night Augie woke to hear the howls of a pack of Arctic wolves. They sounded close—in the mountains behind the camp, he guessed, perhaps sniffing around their abandoned snowmobile and marking it as theirs. They can have it, Augie thought, and drifted back to sleep.

IN THE MORNING, he lay on the cot for a few extra minutes, enjoying the warmth of the oil stove still chugging away. When he got to his feet, he shuddered to hear the cartilage in his joints cracking, his bones clicking against each other like dominoes falling down the length of his body. He was sore from the tumble he’d taken off the snowmobile the day before, but he’d live. He found a scouring pad and soap, warmed up some water, and washed the skillet and tin camping plates from last night’s dinner. When he was done he wandered outside and looked back at their hut to see the smoke curling up through its slim silver chimney and disappearing into a pale blue sky. The sun had already climbed well past the tips of the surrounding mountains. He heard Iris before he saw her, the hollow beat of improvised percussion accompanied by the keening hum that could only be hers. He followed the sound and found her sitting on top of an upturned dinghy by the edge of the lake, tapping out a rhythm on the hull with a piece of wood, her skinny legs crossed beneath her, the green pompom of her hat jiggling in time with the beat. Augie waved to her and she waved back before returning to her composition. Something about her was different, and it took Augie a moment to realize—she looked happy. He left her to her music and turned back to the camp.

There were the three huts, two large white ones, one smaller green, set in a row, a cluster of oil, kerosene, and gas drums gathered behind them. Augustine inspected them in turn. The other white hut was more barren than theirs, but mostly the same. It had two more cots—a backup dormitory, he thought, perhaps for the summer season when the population of the little camp swelled. In the green hut he found the food stores and more cooking supplies. This seemed to be the cook tent, presumably used as such in the warmer, busier summer months. During the winter the operation probably shrank down to the one tent they’d taken up residence in. The cook tent was packed with canned and dehydrated food, a huge array of it—more fruit cocktail and instant coffee and creamed spinach and mystery meat than they could consume in years. The variety was staggering, the quantities ample, the quality questionable, but it was vastly better than what they’d had before. They would not go hungry here, nor would they freeze to death—that much was clear.

Back outside the cook tent, the air was incredibly still. The sun had warmed the basin surrounding the lake and the temperatures were almost balmy—about 35 degrees Fahrenheit, he guessed. He loosened his scarf and stood still, letting the light soak into his old, battered skin. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt this good. On the small island toward the center of the lake, he saw the Arctic hares bouncing up and down on its banks, watching him. He wondered whether they summered there or bounded across the ice to the mainland before it was too late and the ice turned to water, trying their luck in the mountains that ringed the lake. Or perhaps—he smiled to think of it—they were swimmers.

There was one more building that he hadn’t looked in yet. It was the control shed next to the radio antenna array, and he was saving it for last. A solid structure of wood and metal, it was set apart from the cluster of tents, nearer to the array than to the living quarters. Augustine walked to the radio shed and put his hand on the knob, then paused without knowing why. Surely this can wait, he thought, and let his hand fall back to his side. The radio was the reason he’d come here—a chance to contact what was left of the outside world—but suddenly it seemed secondary. They could build a home here, and wasn’t that what he’d really wanted? He turned to look at the camp and saw Iris lying on her back on the overturned dinghy, staring up at the sky, her crude wooden drumstick clutched across her chest like a funeral bouquet. He left the building and returned to her.

“Walk with me?” he called to Iris.

She lifted her head and swung her legs off the dinghy. She shrugged—a yes. Augie took her hand and pulled her to her feet.

“Come on,” he said, “let’s explore.”

THE ICE WAS still solid despite the creaking sounds it made. They skated back and forth, falling occasionally, attempting to race and spin and jump on its thick, slippery surface. Iris wanted to walk out to the island, but halfway there Augustine began to stumble. It was as if his legs weren’t obeying him. The second time he fell to his knees they turned around and headed back for the camp. The Arctic hares watched the two humans go with perked ears and quivering noses. He stopped to rest two hundred yards from shore and Iris waited by his side, attentive and mute, laying her palm against his forehead as though she were playing doctor.

Back at the camp, Augustine lay down on his cot and Iris made coffee. It was watery and black—she hadn’t used enough of the instant powder or any of the condensed milk—but he drank it gratefully and closed his eyes. When he opened them again the light outside was fading and Iris was sitting at the card table reading one of the romance novels. Her lips moved as she scanned the page. Two lovers in gauzy silks clutched each other on the cover.

“How is it?” he croaked, and his voice came out rusty, as if he hadn’t used it in days. She shrugged and made a teetering motion with her hand: so-so. She finished the page and turned the book facedown on the table, then got to her feet and began to root around the kitchen area. He gradually realized she was replicating the meal he’d made them last night. He felt a kernel of pride that she had paid attention, that he had taught her something useful without even intending to. Perhaps this is how fathers feel, he thought. The smell of the corned beef made him hungry, and when the food was ready he dragged himself to the table, where they ate in front of the kerosene lamps. After he finished washing the dishes, he turned around to find Iris asleep on his cot, curled around the paperback novel like a crescent moon. He fastened the door, just a little latch to make sure it didn’t blow open in the night, and warmed his dishwater-damp hands in front of the oil stove. Then he blew out the kerosene lamps and lay down beside her, the two of them nestled in the narrow cot. Iris shifted slightly and the book fell off the cot, but she didn’t wake. As he drifted off he focused on her breath and finally identified the source of the nagging fear that had been plaguing him all this time: love.

AUGUSTINE DRIFTED THROUGH high school and most of college under a cloak of social invisibility. He was quiet and smart and watchful. It wasn’t until he was a senior in college that he realized the two girls sitting on either side of him in his thermodynamics class were smitten with him—that he could have either of them, perhaps both, if he wanted. But did he want them? What would he do with them? He’d already had sex once, in high school, and he had found it pleasant enough, but too messy and awkward to be worth pursuing it again. And yet—this kind of romantic charge was new to him. It was beyond the puzzle pieces of human bodies; it was an emotional mystery. An experiment he’d never had the variables to conduct before. Not one to back down from an intriguing research project, Augustine didn’t hesitate to sleep with both girls in quick succession. It came out that they were in a sorority together, and they immediately became vicious, to him and to each another, when they realized they were dating the same boy. The semester ended with tears and nasty letters and one of the girls dropping out, but to him the experiment had been a success. He’d learned something, and he’d realized there was so much more to learn.

During the years that followed, he continued to experiment with these emotions. He developed new and more effective techniques for attraction. He would woo his test subjects diligently, sparing no expense, no compliment, and when they had finally fallen in love with him, he would reject them. It was gradual at first—he stopped calling, stopped sleeping over in their beds, stopped whispering flattery into their lovely ears. The subjects would begin to suspect they were losing him, just after they’d decided they wanted him, and they would double their efforts to keep him. The sex would become more adventurous, and he would enjoy these gestures as they came, then shame them later for offering themselves so freely. The invitations to dinner or the cinema or the museum would become one-sided. Eventually he would stop seeing them altogether, would scorn them without ever saying so, without ever saying goodbye or even offering the conventional “It’s not you, it’s me” line. He would simply disappear from their lives. If they had the gall to go looking for him, he would make them feel insane—as if he had been halfhearted all along, or as if he’d never wanted them at all. He never felt guilty about any of it, just curious.

These women Augustine experimented on called him the usual names: asshole, jerk, son of a bitch, dirtbag. Then there were the more clinical terms: pathological liar, sociopath, psycho, sadist. He was intrigued by these names, and there were moments when he wondered if they were correct. Asshole, certainly, but sociopath? In his twenties and early thirties, before his post in New Mexico, it seemed possible. He was observing emotions in these women that he’d never felt before, witnessing pain he’d inflicted with barely a flash of sympathy. He tried to remember: Had he loved his mother, or had he only manipulated her for his own comfort? Had he, even then, been experimenting on her to see what worked and what didn’t? Had he always been this way? The fact that he wasn’t particularly troubled by that possibility seemed to make it even more probable.

It wasn’t personal—it was never personal. He wanted to understand love’s boundaries, to see what sort of flora grew on the other side, what sort of fauna lived there. And infatuation, lust—were they different? Did they manifest with different symptoms? He wanted to understand these things clinically, to experiment with love’s limits, its flaws. He didn’t want to feel it, just to study it. It was recreational. Another field of study to explore. His real work was far loftier, but his questions regarding love were not easily answered. He never felt satisfied. And Augustine was accustomed to satisfactory answers, so he persevered.

His behavior wasn’t without consequence. Eventually he would overstep the mark. The women—the test subjects—would become too hazardous, too plentiful. He would run into them in cafés, see them at work or walking in his neighborhood. And they all knew each other, because what better way to leapfrog from one woman to the next than by exploiting the fringes of a lover’s social circle? Augustine didn’t care enough to apologize—it was easier simply to leave, to find a new observatory, a new fellowship or adjunct teaching position, and begin again. It was only a side project to him, an off-the-books experiment that was dwarfed by his real work, among the stars. He enjoyed the variety of bodies, different breasts and bellies and legs to explore when he needed a break from his research, but that was all. Occasionally he felt pity, but never compassion—he couldn’t understand the reactions he was confronted with. They seemed overblown, ridiculous.

His father was dead by the time he got his PhD, his mother in the locked wing of a mental hospital. He had no other family, no other examples of love to draw from, only blurry memories of dysfunction and an unhappy childhood. He had never been interested in television or novels. He wanted to learn from life, from observation. And he did: he learned that love was concealed by a swirling vortex of unpleasant emotions, the invisible, unreachable center of a black hole. It was irrational and unpredictable. He wanted no part of it, and his experiments only confirmed, again and again, how distasteful it all was. As time wore on he grew more fond of liquor and less fond of women. It was easier. A better, simpler escape.

In his thirties, he accepted a position at the Jansky Very Large Array in Socorro, New Mexico, home to some of the best radio astronomy opportunities in the world. Augustine was well known by then, among his colleagues, but also farther afield. He was young and photogenic, which made him popular with the media, and his work was revolutionizing his field. But he knew his contributions wouldn’t be remembered until he truly made his mark. He was at the edge, almost there, but he still needed the theory that would put his name alongside those of the pioneers of science. His reputation as a womanizing asshole preceded him wherever he went, but so did his reputation for groundbreaking, meticulous research. All the facilities wanted to host him, and he had his pick of the tenure-track posts. But Augustine hated teaching. He wanted—no, needed—to discover.

The Jansky Array was a rare departure from Augie’s optical research, but the funding practically landed in his lap, with no tedious paperwork or bureaucratic schmoozing required. Perhaps a few years of radio astronomy would be just the thing to take his research to a new level. He booked the ticket and packed his suitcase, just one, the enormous piece of distressed leather baggage that he’d been toting across oceans and continents since his undergraduate days. In Socorro they gave him a warm welcome and he settled in quickly, glad of the change of scenery and impressed with the scope of the VLA. He stayed for almost four years—longer than he’d anticipated, longer than he’d stayed anywhere since college—and it was there that he met Jean.