And then it’s science. He wants to know everything about rockets and medicine and the galaxy. He wants to know where the sky ends and how, what does it feel like when gravity’s gone and what is the food men eat on the moon. His questions come so fast and so often that we forget how quiet he once was until my mother buys him a chemistry set. And then for hours after school each day he makes potions, mixing chemicals that stink up the house, causing sparks to fly from shaved bits of iron, puffs of smoke to pop from strange-colored liquids. We are fascinated by him, goggled and bent over the stove a clamped test tube protruding from his gloved hand. On the days when our mother says she doesn’t want him smelling up the house with his potions, he takes his trains apart, studies each tiny piece, then slowly puts them together again. We don’t know what it is he’s looking for as he searches the insides of things, studies the way things change.
