In response, Alice pulled me to her and kissed me once again, passionately this time. And, this time, I did not resist.

When I awoke the next morning, Alice was nowhere to be seen. I dressed and went downstairs to the kitchen. No Alice.

I looked at the clock on the wall: 9:15 a. m. I remembered Alice telling me she had an eight o’clock class that morning. The topic: exoplanets. She’d beamed when she told me she’d assembled half-a-dozen film clips to illustrate the topic. Shot in lavish detail-she laughed when she told me she’d filmed on location-they were sure to be a hit with her students.

Just then I spied a note on the counter. She’d written that she wouldn’t return until six, that I was to make myself at home, and not to worry about dinner for she’d be bringing home

Chinese. It certainly seemed an invitation to stay.

Which I did.

***

A week later I moved in. Alice made it clear it was her apartment and she was allowing me to stay only on a trial basis. She would be up at the crack of dawn and wouldn’t return until evening so it would be my responsibility to have dinner prepared. Further, I was to do the grocery shopping and the laundry once a week. I wasn’t working, so I had nothing against this arrangement. She laughed when she added she was lucky to have found me. But she always had a mischievous look about her and I never knew whether to take her seriously.

During the day I spent my time reading and taking care of the apartment as Alice had instructed. I also enjoyed watching the fish tank for long periods of time. Another unusual fish soon joined the speculated goldfish and the salamander-like creature. This creature was eel-like, long and slender, with wide dorsal fins and green-and-blue pectoral fins. It was covered with downy-white cilia which undulated as it moved across the tank. I’d never seen anything like it. When I asked Alice about it she told me she’d acquired it on one of her recent travels and that its mate would be arriving soon. She didn’t tell me the name of the species nor where the purchase had been made and I didn’t ask. I had a hunch as to what was going on and to tell the truth I wasn’t sure I wanted to know. The importation of exotic specimens was illegal in this day and age.

Most evenings our discussions extended late into the night. They usually involved astronomical topics, and her knowledge about that subject seemed limitless. But she had questions as well. For all her scientific knowledge, she seemed ignorant about human history and was constantly peppering me with questions about culture and politics. Questions I often found amusing.

One conversation in particular sticks in my mind. It was a Friday evening in early December. The wind was howling, the naked branches of the elm trees grating against the windows. We’d just finished dinner, when I popped the question that had been bothering me for weeks:

“The universe is expanding,” I said. “That I know and understand. But doesn’t that imply that weare expanding as well?”

“Whatever do you mean?”

“Space is expanding, correct?”

“Yes.”

“The atoms which make us up are part of space-exist in space, do they not?”

“Of course.”

“Then the distance between the atoms must be expanding, that is, we ourselves are expanding.”

She laughed-how I loved her childish laugh-“First you say we’re shrinking because the cosmos is expanding, now you say we’re expanding because the cosmos is expanding. Which do you mean?”

“I guess I really don’t know,” I said, gazing at her quizzically. “I’m thoroughly confused!”

“I’ll tell you how it is,” she said, “though I don’t think my explanation will satisfy you.”

She took my hand and led me to the couch in her living room. I heard the tick-tock of the grandfather clock in the hall. The timepiece was encased in a cabinet made from stained cherry that had been etched with an intricate design depicting the planets and the stars.

“From the point of view of the universe we are expanding,” she explained. “From our point of view, we’re contracting. In other words, we’re both expanding and contracting and at the same rate. The effects cancel each other out, but they arehappening.”

“Wouldn’t that mean we’d be dizzy all the time?” I meant it in jest, but she didn’t laugh.

“We aren’t. And that’s because we don’t notice what’s happening. The effect is rather small.”

I frowned. “What you say might be true,” I said. “Nevertheless, I don’t like it.”

“I didn’t think you would.” She smiled. The candlelight danced across her pretty green eyes.

I looked over at the fish tank and saw that the axolotl seemed to be watching us, or me.

Alice continued, “Have you considered the possibility that it’s not the universe you’re preoccupied with, it’s something else, something within this universe and around which you revolve?”

“Like?”

“Me, perhaps?”

I felt my cheeks redden.

“My dear,” she said with a sigh. “It’s rather obvious, isn’t it? You’re falling in love with me!”

I sighed. Alice could be so disarming.

“But this discussion will have to wait for another time. Tomorrow I’m off to the Twelfth International Conference on Astrophysics. I’ll be gone a week.”

I looked around the room. I’d only moved my things the month before and wasn’t sure how she’d feel about my being here alone.

“You can stay, of course,” she said. Only one thing I insist on: don’t open the closet. With me being gone for days, the temptation might become too great.”

“Why not?” I asked. “I’d love nothing more than to study the black hole.”

“I’m sure you would,” she said. “But without me to guide you-well, the thing is rather dangerous. If you were to get too close …”

“I promise I’ll be careful.”

“I insist,” she said. “I’d never forgive myself if something were to happen to you.”

I nodded. “Okay.”

One week turned into two, two into three, three into four-and I grew concerned. I called her cell phone several times, but she never answered. I rang up the physics department and inquired as to her whereabouts. I was told she’d attended a conference in northern Chile, but that they weren’t aware of her plans afterwards. Her classes were finished for the semester so they weren’t concerned. I was about to call the police to report Alice missing when I wandered into the living room one morning after breakfast and found her sitting on the sofa thumbing through a magazine, her suitcase on the floor.