The Brightest Star in a Constellation

22: How Should I Know?

☽ Peter ☽

The week drags incessantly, to the point where I'm convinced time is playing tricks on me, digging its fingers into the mediocrity of each day and never letting go.

Halloween decorations line the hotel walls as the month draws to a close. Bent over her seat, Nicole paints her nails a bright shade of green. The same colour invades her outfit, a holographic t-shirt and matching pants. On her head, a headband with two green pompoms bounces as she moves.

Seated behind the desk, I bend over the guest book next to me. As I record the number of guests for the week—eleven, which is three more than the average for October—Nicole slams her hands against the table. "Are you done?"

"Almost," I reply. She hovers over me, tapping her shoes against the floor. The noise it makes is erratic—the beat of an unknown song. Two hits of her foot against the desk, then three.

"It'll be dark soon. I can't believe you want to work today." Sighing dramatically, she twirls a strand of her hair around one of the hotel's pens. She covers the logo, cutting the crescent moon in half. "By the time we get out there, all the best candy will be gone."

I sigh. "Please don't poison yourself with Reece's Pieces."

"You don't tell me how to live my life. If I want to die eating peanuts, then that's what I'm going to do. At least then I get to die like a badass."

I take a sip of water. My throat is dry—it tastes almost scratchy when I swallow—from the new medication that the psychiatrist prescribed. It's the most prominent side effect, besides a slight headache. "Dying from a peanut allergy is not as cool as you think it is. Please tell me you brought your EpiPen."

She blinks at me. Her eyeshadow makes her lashes longer, and the slightest hue of blush highlights her cheeks. When it catches the light, she looks a bit otherworldly, which I'm guessing was the intention. Nicole can be sweet when she tries, and the mismatched clothes she usually wears is like the mimicry of a butterfly, but if I'm honest, I'm not sure what she's distracting from. "I can't believe you sometimes. You're on my case just like my dad, do you know that?"

"If I'm half as worried as him, you can hit me over the head," I say, knowing that Nicole's father tends to get himself worked up about it. It's the only time that he does, however, and for good reason. Seven-year-old Nicole thought it was funny (read: a terrible idea) to shovel ten peanut butter cookies into her mouth before I could stop her, sending her to the hospital. She wasn't even guilty about it; I feel like I just cursed humanity with my hubris, she'd said, and in that case, it was worth it.

"You're not even ready yet. My costume makes no sense without yours," Nicole says.

She waves the pen at me, smudging her finger with green paint. As she moves toward me, I duck. Pushing the guest list out of the way, I amble out of my seat and walk over to the seating area. The semicircle of chairs hosts my costume, which contains three pieces. The helmet with its visor, that feels like putting a fishbowl on my head—and the jacket and pants. Nicole is grinning ear-to-ear when I slide on the jacket. The sleeves glitter with silver, and it's backed by a cluster of stars. My mother stitched my name on the front, right underneath the NASA emblem, like it's always been there, like it's a real jacket and not a Spirit Halloween knockoff.

"Very Chris Hadfield of you," she says, and I smile, although I look nothing like the astronaut. He was practically my idol in middle school; we had gathered in the gymnasium to watch a live feed of the first Canadian astronaut to walk in space. Nicole cinches my collar so she can zip it up. "Now we match."