“Thank you.”
“No, thank you,” Shizuka said, shaking herself to attention. After all, this woman had saved her life.
Donut Lady smiled.
And Shizuka felt herself fall into a field of stars.
Somehow, Shizuka managed to take her tray to a clean table. She needed to clear her head. This was no time for infatuation. It was already February. She had a student to find, a demon to feed, her soul to save.
Then Shizuka bit into the soft, sticky Alaska Donut.
It was second grade, and Mrs. Jennison had brought donuts to class. She said something about an American orbiting the earth and he was called an “astronaut.”
Shizuka took a glazed one and Julie Kiyama took a red, white, and blue sprinkle. The fruit punch was red and cold and sweet.
The donuts were happy and fluffy, and even better than the peach cobbler in the cafeteria …
Wait—why was her coffee cold?
How long had she been staring out the window? Mrs. Jennison? Second grade? Where had that memory come from?
Where was her mind? She must still be jet-lagged.
She glanced at Donut Lady. Donut Lady glanced back. Shizuka felt herself blushing and immediately looked away.
Come on, Satomi, focus.
This wasn’t the time to daydream or make eyes at donut ladies. Somewhere out there was that next student. She wrapped the remaining half of the Alaska Donut, put on her sunglasses, and left without looking back.
But as Shizuka drove away, she could not forget Donut Lady’s starry, faraway eyes.
* * *
Was it her appearance? Yes, but more than that. Her voice. Lan had heard many voices since arriving on Earth, but that sunglass lady worked this very ordinary oxygen/nitrogen atmosphere into something beautiful.
“Mother?”
Or maybe the way she held herself. Her posture was effortless, elegant, as if denying the planet’s gravitational field.
“Mother?”
Lan pulled herself from her reverie. How long had Shirley been standing there?
“That woman. I am positive that she heard the space warp.” Shirley lowered the last part to a whisper.
“What?” Lan looked at her sharply, and shushed Shirley back to the kitchen. “What do you mean, she heard the warp?”
“Markus was running a low-level continuity test when that woman asked about the sound.”
This is not good, Lan thought. This was not good at all. If Sunglass Lady was versed in warp theory, she would know what they were doing. She might identify their harmonic signature, or even discern the specific warp profile and guess their origin.
“Was there any indication that she identified the signature?”
Shirley shook her head. “She seemed surprised more than anything.”
Lan tried to steady her breathing. Sometimes these bodies were not easy to control. Yes, of course. There was no way Sunglass Lady was a warp expert. They were on a technologically primitive planet, in El Monte.
“Good. But we should be careful.”
Still, what was a being like that doing in a place like this?
“But, Mother, why did you let her use the bathroom?”
Why did she let her use the bathroom? Mr. Thamavuong warned that they needed to be careful about the bathroom. Why had she said yes?
“I don’t know. I just wanted to help, and she was in need, and—wait, do you think it was mind control? If it were mind control, we would have sensed it, right?”
“I detected no psi activity,” Shirley said. “And, Mother, it is not unlike you to help someone in need.”
Yes. Of course she would help someone in need, especially someone like Sunglass Lady. Lan remembered how she’d said, I would like an Alaska Donut and a small coffee, please.
Like mathematics. So clear, so pure.
“Mother?”
What? Had she drifted again?
“I’ll make sure to turn off the warp circuitry next time she’s here,” Shirley finally said.
Next time? Lan felt her heart skip and her face smile.
What was she doing? There was no time for Sunglass Lady! She needed to lead her crew. She needed to protect her family.
“Thank you, Shirley. That will be all.”
Captain Lan glanced toward the front of the store, then walked into the control center. The space around her was filled with the soft, glorious hum of the warp field.
It was the second-most beautiful sound she had heard today.
4
Yes!
Finally. A rainbow flag on the door, a compost pile in the yard. Katrina had arrived.
Katrina had met Evan at a queer youth conference. She was a timid newbie geek with facial hair and bad skin. He was a film student who seemed far too queer and fierce to notice her.