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Gemma was suddenly antsy and ready to get out of the car.
“Are we there yet?”
They had pulled off the freeway shortly before, and now Jack aimed the car at a collection of buildings Gemma had seen photos of online, maybe in a movie once.
She sat up straight, curious.
“Are we going to Caltech?”
Jack nodded. “Sure are.”
•••
After they parked,they strode across the university campus sitting squarely in the city of Pasadena. The stone buildings and shady lawns were a far cry from the parts of L.A. that Gemma normally frequented, and the break felt like a breath of fresh air. Though she could not stifle her curiosity as to why Jack had taken her to the elite private school made famous byThe Big Bang Theoryand home to real-life, world-renowned scientists.
“Don’t tell me you’re a closeted engineer who dropped out of one of the best schools in the country to pursue writing,” she joked as they followed a paved pathway alongside a trim lawn that was a startling shade of green.
“Oh no,” Jack said with a laugh. “I disappointed my parents with my career choices well before college. We’re here to see a friend of mine. A friend of my father’s too, actually. They were roommates in school.”
“Is your father the engineer, then?”
“He was, yes. He died when I was eighteen.”
Gemma almost stumbled, not expecting to hear anything of the sort. The wound was healed over but still sore, she could tell. “I’m sorry, Jack.”
“Thanks.” He gave her a tight, tired smile that looked like something he had been giving people for many years. “I’ve actually never told you that before.”
The vulnerable trust in his voice put a warmth in her chest. It also made her feel guilty for refusing to see her own living father when they inhabited the same city.
The thought was complicated and messy, and intruding on the scenic campus and sunny day. She shook it off as they turned toward a concrete building with square windows and arches leading through it.
“So, who is this person we’re meeting?”
“Dr. Simon Woods. He’s a theoretical physicist.”
Gemma couldn’t help but laugh. “From a psychic to a physicist? I guess we’re covering all bases here.”
“I told you: leave no stone unturned. And if a chat with a wacky old professor is what it takes to convince you this is all really happening, then so be it.” He smiled and stopped to open a door for her.
Her face warmed at the hopeful shine in his eyes as she passed by him, catching a hint of the fresh woodsy smell, to step into the cool building. “Seems like an odd choice to bring me to see a scientist to explain something totally nonsensical.”
He grinned at her. “You’d be surprised.”
They walked down a long hallway, passing a few closed doors that Gemma could only imagine what was behind. The hard sciences—chemistry, biology, physics—were about as remote from her profession as disciplines could be. She had taken the mandated courses in high school and only scraped by in the general ed classes required in college. Put to a test, she might have been able to remember a few basics but that would have been it.
Halfway to the other end of the hall, Jack stopped and gestured at a door. “Here we are.” He held it open for her, and they entered a room that looked like part toy shop and part laboratory. Either way, it was full of expensive, fragile things.
A whiteboard scribbled with equations that might well have been hieroglyphs stretched along one wall. Another wall held a long, black-topped workbench with all manner of mysterious objects balanced on it: spinning globes, tall glass tubes, boxy-looking little robot machines. Against the back wall was a grid of framed degrees from prestigious institutions hanging above a desk teetering with so many stacks of papers, Gemma almost didn’t see the man sitting at it.
“Simon?” Jack called into the quiet hum of the room. Gemma couldn’t be sure if the sound was coming from thefluorescent lights overhead or the little amusement park of scientific objects spinning and whirling on the workbench, but she found it comforting.
Dr. Woods popped up from behind the stacks of papers quickly enough to make Gemma jump. “Jack, my boy! I was hoping you would visit,” he said with a smile. He turned to Gemma and took her in with a bob of his head. He reached for the glasses dangling around his neck from a thin black cord and perched them on his hooked nose. Whether it was a conscious attempt to resemble Doc Brown fromBack to the Future, Gemma didn’t know, but he had nailed the look down to the white lab coat, unruly hair, and excited if not startled look on his face. “Is this the lovely young woman you told me about?”
He swept out from behind the desk in long strides, his body tall and thin but with the look of someone well-preserved for being, Gemma guessed, close to seventy. He probably took laps in a pool every morning.
“Hi, and yes, this is Gemma,” Jack said. They had stopped in the middle of the room, halfway along the workbench. Dr. Woods strode over to meet them with his hand extended.
“Pleasure to meet you, my dear. I’ve heard wonderful things.”
