Six months later, I stand on a riverbank outside Edinburgh looking at the beginnings of a pedestrian bridge. My bridge. Not the first one I have designed. The first one I understand differently. James is arguing with a contractor fifty metres away. Daniel is pretending not to enjoy it. Some things remain wonderfully normal. Saoirse walks toward me carrying two coffees.
“You’re late.”
“I brought coffee.”
“Accepted.”
She hands me one. She still doesn’t wear perfume. I still do. Bentley Absolute this morning—dry woods, incense, cedar. Saoirse once told me it smelled like a building I would design. I still haven’t decided whether that was romantic. She insists it was. The Council sent my original birth chart last week. Not a copy. The actual paper. My mother thought I should have it. For years, I imagined the blank centre as an absence. Every other chart carried a mark that told the world where the person belonged. Mine carried nothing. Now, when I look at it, I see space. There is a difference. My mother visits Edinburgh more often now. Sometimes she stands in my office looking at the drawings on the walls.
The first time she saw them all together, she said, “You have been doing this your whole life.” I told her not to become poetic. Apparently that is another thing I inherited from my father. Saoirse nudges my shoulder.
“You disappeared.”
“I’m here.”
“What are you thinking about?”
I look across the river.
“Nothing dramatic.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“That sounds like a personal problem.”
She laughs. There are days when I still wake expecting to hear my father’s voice. There are days when the Observatory returns without warning. Grief has not become beautiful. It has simply become part of the structure. Something I carry because removing it would mean removing him too. The celestial field has been stable for four months. Kareem and I meet twice a month. Dr Vale resigned her seat but continues cooperating with the investigation. The Council still wants a term for my function. I keep rejecting all of them. Conductor. Axis. Convergence. One scholar suggested Nexus. I suggested they find a hobby. Saoirse liked Nexus. That nearly ended the relationship. Nearly. She slips her hand into mine. The workers across the river begin lifting the first major steel section into position.
Two separate banks. One structure between them. I smile before I can stop myself. Saoirse notices.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“You hate when I say that.”
“I know.”
She waits. I look at her. At the woman I saw before I knew her. The woman who found me without knowing my face. The woman who never once asked me to become easier to understand. For most of my life, I thought being undesignated meant something had been left out. Then I thought it meant I was beyond the system. I was wrong both times. There was never anything missing. The stars could not name me. Saoirse never tried. And somewhere along the way, that became enough.