Barbary

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High in the corners of the spaceport waiting room, four small TV screens displayed a space shuttle, piggybacked on external fuel tanks, shedding clouds of vapor down its flanks.

Barbary watched the shuttle intently. Other times she might have wished to see it real, instead of filtered through lenses and electronics. Other times, but not now.

She brushed her fingertips across the front of her baggy jacket, checking for her ticket in one of its many outside pockets. She had buttoned the ticket safely in; she knew she had not lost it. During her first hours in the waiting room, two weeks ago, she had made touching the ticket a habit. The habit no longer reassured her, though, for she had been bumped off two flights and the ticket had been revalidated twice. Now, as launch approached, she felt the awful certainty that once more she would not get on board.

She fumbled in another pocket of the jacket, pulled out her old silver dollar, and passed it across the knuckles of her right hand. She flipped it over and over with her fingers, caught it with her thumb, brought it under her palm and back up onto her knuckles, then started over again. The trick was a good one to do when she felt nervous, because it took a lot of concentration.

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