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Pam quietly entered through the back door of the Wilson home. To be honest, she thought Larry was a little paranoid, but he and Ellen clearly had a system that worked for them, and Pam didn't want to do anything to disrupt it, especially now. She didn't find Ellen in the kitchen, so she headed for her bedroom, knocking on the closed door.
"Larry? I thought you and Peter had left already?" Ellen called from the other side of the door.
"It's me." Pam heard shuffling, and a few moments later the door opened, revealing Ellen looking excited, if a bit frazzled.
"Hi." Before Pam could say anything, Ellen pulled her into a deep kiss. Ugh. She was going to miss this.
"Is this a good time?" Pam asked as she looked behind Ellen to see various papers scattered over the bed.
"Oh, of course." Ellen began hurriedly tidying things up. "I was just going over some of the budget allocations for Pathfinder, but it's nothing that can't wait until Monday. I really need to stop working after hours."
"Can we talk?" Pam needed to get this over with or she risked losing the nerve to do it at all.
"Uh, sure." Ellen took a seat on the edge of the bed and gestured for Pam to join her.
"You can't leave NASA," Pam said in a matter-of-fact tone once she'd sat down.
"I know this wasn't what we'd talked about, but with everything that's been going on, with Tom gone and tensions with the Soviets so high... I promise that as soon as the new administrator is confirmed, he'll have my resignation within the week. The president's supposed to announce Tom's replacement any day now."
"I didn't mean you wouldn't leave NASA." Pam wasn't sure about that either, but that wasn't what she was trying to say. "I meant that you shouldn't ."
Ellen gave Pam a confused look. "What? I mean, I'll be forced out either way. Better to go quietly beforehand and avoid a big media circus."
"They won't fire you if there's nothing to fire you for." Wanting to make herself perfectly clear, Pam added, "I'm saying you shouldn't come out. You're too good at what you do to give them any excuses."
"Oh," Ellen said, finally understanding what Pam was getting at. "And in that case, you and I, we..." Ellen trailed off, not wanting to finish the thought.
"I don't want to do this, it's just... now that I've seen the life that you have, I can't ask you to give that up for me. And at the same time, as much as this seems to work for you and Larry, I just can't live like this. I love you, but, knowing what you'd be giving up for us to be together..."
Ellen was quiet for a bit as she formulated her response. "This life. It doesn't work for me, not really. I think it does for Larry, but... not for me. I spent half of the last decade on the moon, living my wildest dreams, and the other half here, alone. I told myself that I'd made the right decision all those years ago, that the things I'd gained made up for what I'd lost - who I'd lost. It wasn't until you came back into my life that I realized how miserable I'd been."
"And if you give up NASA, and find you're miserable without it too, what then?" Pam wanted to believe that Ellen could be happy without NASA, but she wasn't sure she could.
"It can't be worse than the past nine years." Shifting tactics, Ellen added, "and it's not like I'd be giving up space entirely. My astronaut days are probably behind me either way, but maybe private spaceflight is just what we need to get to Mars."
Pam wasn't sure how much Ellen actually believed going private was the right decision. She certainly hadn't made any effort to do so when NASA was still an option for her. But before Pam could respond, the phone began to ring.
"Ugh." Ellen put her face in her hands. "It's 8 PM on a Friday. If this is just Margo with thoughts on some docking module, I am going to kill her." The specificity of that example led Pam to think that it wasn't just a hypothetical.
"Please. Stay." Ellen squeezed Pam's hand and gave her a desperate look. "If this is anything that can wait till Monday, I swear, I will have them off the phone in a minute - two, tops."
Pam nodded, and Ellen picked up the receiver.
"Hello. Ellen Wilson." Pam couldn't hear what the voice on the other end said, but Ellen's disinterest quickly evaporated. She sat up straight on the bed, but held on to Pam's hand. Pam was about to ask who it was, when Ellen answered her question with her response.
"Good evening, Mr. President." Ugh. Ronald Reagan couldn't just be content with forcing Ellen into the closet and Pam into an impossible situation. He had to interrupt them at home too.
"To be honest, I'm a bit busy at home at the moment. Is this important?" This was a change. The last time the president had interrupted their time together, Ellen was completely deferential to him. Pam didn't blame her for that. A certain amount of deference was the smart move for anyone talking to their boss, let alone when your boss was the president of the United States. But last time, Ellen had physically separated herself from Pam during the call, making the metaphorical barrier between her personal and her professional life literal, as if the president could reach through the phone lines and discover Ellen's secret. Now though, Ellen clung to Pam like a liferaft and was talking to the president like it really was Margo with an inconvenient technical update.
A response came back over the phone line. "Oh. Wow. I would - I would be honored to be appointed as administrator of NASA," Ellen said into the receiver, obviously taken aback. Ellen had clearly been correct in assuming the president's nomination was imminent. Pam was proud of her - she'd clearly demonstrated that she'd earned the role - but she was also disappointed that Ellen's earlier assurances that she would leave NASA for the private sector weren't true.
Managing the immediate crisis as acting administrator was one thing, but she wouldn't go through the whole Senate confirmation process if she wasn't planning on staying with the agency long-term. Pam wasn't mad at her though. Ellen was brilliant at her job, and Pam couldn't force her to choose between it and their relationship. That was the whole reason she'd come here to break it off tonight.
However, Ellen's next words managed to surprise her. "I would be honored, but..." There was a pregnant pause before she continued. "There's something you should know about me before you make that decision."
What? Pam furiously shook her head at Ellen, mouthing "no." Even if she was going to give up her NASA career by coming out, Pam didn't expect Ellen to just tell the president directly.
Ellen covered the receiver and whispered to Pam, "it's okay. I know what I'm doing." She certainly hoped so.
"If you'll excuse the personal inquiry, Mr. President, you've been divorced, correct?" Where was Ellen going with this? Probing Reagan on his divorce? She continued, asking "are you glad you did? Get divorced, I mean."
After the president presumably responded affirmatively, Ellen chuckled. "I thought as much. I know that you and the First Lady have a lovely marriage." For all of Pam's problems with President Reagan (and there were many), she did grant him one thing: he really loved his wife.
"The reason I ask is, well, I'm reconsidering my relationship with my husband." Ellen turned to stare at Pam as she continued, "Larry and I, we make a good team, but... I don't love him the way a married couple should. We're probably going to get divorced soon."
Ellen was silent for a bit, listening to the president's response. "Well, I'm glad to know that doesn't change anything about your nomination, but I'm afraid there's more." Ellen squeezed Pam's hand tight, looking for reassurance. She still didn't think this was the smartest way to come out, but if Ellen was sure about this, Pam was going to support her. She squeezed back, smiling at her girlfriend.
"There's no easy way to go about this, so I guess I'll just go ahead and say it: I'm gay. That's why I'm divorcing my husband." There was a long moment of silence from the receiver. Pam assumed the president was too shocked to say anything. She couldn't imagine this was at all how he expected this phone call to go. Eventually, he said something, though Pam could still only infer the words from Ellen's response.
"No, I'm not going to hide this any longer. I can wait until after the confirmation process if you want, but I'm done living a lie. I lost a decade with the love of my life because of it." Smiling and staring into Pam's eyes, Ellen added, "I'm actually sitting with her right now, and I'm not going to lose her again, even if keeping her means losing NASA."
Not giving the president any time to respond, Ellen continued. "Now, if you'll excuse me, it's a Friday night, and I'd like to get back to my girlfriend. I'm sure you can understand. We can talk more about my future at NASA on Monday. Goodnight, Mr. President. And give my regards to Nancy."
Ellen hung up the phone, and she and Pam sat in silence as they let what had just happened sink in. Pam was the first to speak up.
"Did you just come out to the president of the United States?"
Ellen took a deep breath. "I guess I did."
"So what happens next?"
"Well, there's no way he actually nominates me for administrator now, that's for sure. He'll probably try to force me out quietly once the Senate confirms whoever he nominates instead, so at least I have another month or two to tie things up at NASA."
"All that stuff about his divorce and his wife, what was that all about?"
"I don't know." Ellen collapsed back into the bed with a shrug. "I guess I thought that if I could make a personal connection, maybe I could get through to him."
"Do you think it worked?"
"Doubt it. And even if I somehow did, he still wouldn't risk alienating his base for me. I think the best I can hope for is that he feels a little guilty when he fires me."
"You okay?" Pam joined her girlfriend on the bed, planting a kiss on her cheek.
"Yeah, I am." Ellen turned and smiled at her. "And I meant what I said about private spaceflight being our best hope for getting to Mars anytime soon. Maybe it's NASA that gets us over the finish line, but they're gonna need a push from some outside force, and I don't think it's gonna be the Soviets this time. My dad will be glad to have me back at Cavalier too."
"Speaking of your father, does he know anything about, well, any of this?"
Ellen's eyes widened in panic. "Coming out to Ronald Reagan? Easy. Coming out to William Waverly? That's gonna be harder." Squeezing Pam's hand, she added, "but I will do it, and I'm sure he'll come around. I love you, and I know he will too."
The two continued to lie there for some time. On Monday, they would have to deal with the fallout of what Ellen had just done, but for now they could both just bask in the moment and contemplate their future together.