clean.
The contaminated parts were inside me.
So on Saturday, still shaken from Major Connor’s visit—and partly spurred by it—I inched my brand new lipstick-red Toyota Corolla out of the garage and filled up two buckets of soapy water to clean it for the hundredth time.
Since the beginning of summer, cleaning my car had become a ritual.
I gathered whatever else I could from the medicine cabinets and under the sink. Alcohol, bleach, hydrogen peroxide—anything with the words disinfect or sterilize on the label.
I dragged a foamy sponge across the windshield and down the driver’s door, scrubbed under the handles. Kneeling, I attacked the hub caps, got behind them. The soapy water ran down in gray rivulets, and I had a moment of panic before I remembered I’d driven the car last week to the trailhead.
Relax, Leona.
I set the sponge down and wiped my thumb and forefinger on my jeans—even after the skin had been ripped off, it still felt like there was something on them—then got back to work.
My eyes flicked to the front bumper, and my pulse quickened.
Not yet.
I tried to distract myself.
Thorough . . . be thorough . . .
Like the Air Force cleanup crew had been with me and my room. Thorough. Clean up everything, get rid of everything. Like they had done.
But even they hadn’t been as thorough as they could have been.
If they were so worried about radiation, why hadn’t they brought in Geiger counters? Radiation detectors? That way they could have seen what was contaminated and what wasn’t.
Instead, they’d cleaned me out of anything that had even the slightest chance of touching the meteorite.
Since when was radiation that contagious?
I thought back to how they’d raided my room—ripped out my carpet, peeled the paint off the walls, ripped the skin off my stomach and hands—and a disturbing thought struck me.
That wasn’t how they handled radiation.
That was how they handled an infectious disease.
Instinctively, I wiped my fingers on my jeans again. My tongue rewetted my lips, and I continued to scrub the tread on the rear wheel, feeling strangely uneasy. The sponge made tiny circles.
My gaze went back to the front bumper.
Not just yet.
I forced myself to keep scrubbing the wheel, but my nerves had begun to buzz, agitated. I couldn’t focus.
I had to check.
What if I missed a spot?
Paranoia won out. I grabbed the alcohol and bleach and scrambled to the front of the car. Heart in my throat, I inspected the bumper, ran my finger along the front grill, breathless. It was still there.
The tiny dent.
A soreness spread through my chest.
Hands shaking violently, I doused a towel in alcohol and rubbed down the bumper, the front of the hood. My fingers probed every nook and cranny, got into every slot. I slid my fingernails along the cracks, scooped out tiny bits of dirt and grime, then rubbed it with alcohol until it was spotless.
Next I popped the trunk.
The space had that chemically, new-car smell, which I inhaled deeply. No other smells. I wet another towel with alcohol and ran it along the trunk interior, the plastic siding. The rug had to be cleaned too. I mixed bleach with shampoo and worked it into the fibers, producing a satisfying foam, which I wiped away. At last I lifted the rug and rubbed down the spare wheel, the car jack, everything I could see. Finally satisfied, I let the rug fall and wiped my hands on my shirt, lungs rising and falling.
Relax . . . deep breath.
No one will ever know.
The sight of the empty trunk brought an uncomfortable tension to my heart, and I was about to avert my gaze when a glimmer caught my eyes near the back.
I leaned closer, but now my shadow blocked it. Breathless, I ran my hand along the rug, still wet. Nothing there.
But then my head shifted and sunlight poured past me.
It gleamed again, caught between the rug and the rear seats, almost invisible.
A shiny fiber of some sort.
I plucked it out of the trunk and held it up to
The contaminated parts were inside me.
So on Saturday, still shaken from Major Connor’s visit—and partly spurred by it—I inched my brand new lipstick-red Toyota Corolla out of the garage and filled up two buckets of soapy water to clean it for the hundredth time.
Since the beginning of summer, cleaning my car had become a ritual.
I gathered whatever else I could from the medicine cabinets and under the sink. Alcohol, bleach, hydrogen peroxide—anything with the words disinfect or sterilize on the label.
I dragged a foamy sponge across the windshield and down the driver’s door, scrubbed under the handles. Kneeling, I attacked the hub caps, got behind them. The soapy water ran down in gray rivulets, and I had a moment of panic before I remembered I’d driven the car last week to the trailhead.
Relax, Leona.
I set the sponge down and wiped my thumb and forefinger on my jeans—even after the skin had been ripped off, it still felt like there was something on them—then got back to work.
My eyes flicked to the front bumper, and my pulse quickened.
Not yet.
I tried to distract myself.
Thorough . . . be thorough . . .
Like the Air Force cleanup crew had been with me and my room. Thorough. Clean up everything, get rid of everything. Like they had done.
But even they hadn’t been as thorough as they could have been.
If they were so worried about radiation, why hadn’t they brought in Geiger counters? Radiation detectors? That way they could have seen what was contaminated and what wasn’t.
Instead, they’d cleaned me out of anything that had even the slightest chance of touching the meteorite.
Since when was radiation that contagious?
I thought back to how they’d raided my room—ripped out my carpet, peeled the paint off the walls, ripped the skin off my stomach and hands—and a disturbing thought struck me.
That wasn’t how they handled radiation.
That was how they handled an infectious disease.
Instinctively, I wiped my fingers on my jeans again. My tongue rewetted my lips, and I continued to scrub the tread on the rear wheel, feeling strangely uneasy. The sponge made tiny circles.
My gaze went back to the front bumper.
Not just yet.
I forced myself to keep scrubbing the wheel, but my nerves had begun to buzz, agitated. I couldn’t focus.
I had to check.
What if I missed a spot?
Paranoia won out. I grabbed the alcohol and bleach and scrambled to the front of the car. Heart in my throat, I inspected the bumper, ran my finger along the front grill, breathless. It was still there.
The tiny dent.
A soreness spread through my chest.
Hands shaking violently, I doused a towel in alcohol and rubbed down the bumper, the front of the hood. My fingers probed every nook and cranny, got into every slot. I slid my fingernails along the cracks, scooped out tiny bits of dirt and grime, then rubbed it with alcohol until it was spotless.
Next I popped the trunk.
The space had that chemically, new-car smell, which I inhaled deeply. No other smells. I wet another towel with alcohol and ran it along the trunk interior, the plastic siding. The rug had to be cleaned too. I mixed bleach with shampoo and worked it into the fibers, producing a satisfying foam, which I wiped away. At last I lifted the rug and rubbed down the spare wheel, the car jack, everything I could see. Finally satisfied, I let the rug fall and wiped my hands on my shirt, lungs rising and falling.
Relax . . . deep breath.
No one will ever know.
The sight of the empty trunk brought an uncomfortable tension to my heart, and I was about to avert my gaze when a glimmer caught my eyes near the back.
I leaned closer, but now my shadow blocked it. Breathless, I ran my hand along the rug, still wet. Nothing there.
But then my head shifted and sunlight poured past me.
It gleamed again, caught between the rug and the rear seats, almost invisible.
A shiny fiber of some sort.
I plucked it out of the trunk and held it up to
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