Beyond the Mapped Stars by Rosalyn Eves

Author:Rosalyn Eves [Eves, Rosalyn]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Random House Children's Books
Published: 2021-08-24T00:00:00+00:00

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* * *

By late afternoon the following day, I’m going through a now familiar routine: climbing down the metal stairs onto a wooden platform, retrieving my luggage from a porter. I marvel that only a few weeks ago I had never done any of these things.

I arrive with my sister’s words still echoing in my ears: How do you know who you are meant to be? Perhaps you’re meant to study the stars.

Now that I’m in Denver, I intend to find out what I’m capable of. I mean to see the eclipse, to seek out the scientists in the city, to learn as much as I can about the eclipse and figure out how someone like me can get to college to study astronomy.

Setting a goal like this—a goal just for me, a goal that flies in the face of what others expect of me—is both exhilarating and terrifying. Maybe this is how Will felt, when he stepped out onto the trestle.

It’s a feeling I could get used to.

I skirt the station and emerge into the cross streets before the Denver and Rio Grande building. Though it is early evening, the street is ablaze: gas lamps lining the streets, lights from the hotel adjoining the station, and long gold streams from the brick-front businesses facing me, their doors thrown open late to catch the traffic from the incoming train.

Streets splinter away at right angles from the tracks, opening up before me like some darkening maze, and as I peer down them, they appear endless, crammed with three- and four-story buildings, church spires soaring above them in the distance. I have never seen a city so big—bigger even than Salt Lake City.

But before the city has time to completely overawe me, Alice is calling my name and waving to me. Will saunters behind her.

“Well, what do you think?” she demands, gesturing at the city around her.

“It’s so…big,” I manage.

“The crown jewel of the plains,” she says proudly. “When the Union Pacific Railroad snubbed us and ran through Cheyenne instead of Denver, everyone thought Denver would shrivel away. Instead, we raised nearly three hundred thousand dollars in just a few days to run our own railroad, the Denver and Rio Grande, up to Cheyenne, and now we are the fastest-growing city in the West.”

If I mean to make a study of entire universes, I can’t let one city daunt me. I lift my chin. “It’s lovely.”

Will tips his hat. “Good to see you again, Elizabeth.”

“And you, Will. I’m happy to see you’re all in one piece.”

Will glances uneasily at Alice, who has folded her arms across her chest. “Ah, about that…My parents don’t know, and I’d take it as a favor if you don’t mention it to them.”

I nod understanding, and follow the Stevens siblings to the curb, where a carriage waits. It’s big and dark and gleaming and nicer than anything I’ve ever ridden in, including the trains. Their driver loads up my trunk, and Will helps me into the vehicle.

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