Love and Other Unknown Variables

by Shannon Alexander

  I clear my throat. Without turning to look at me, Greta snaps, “Don’t be a perv, Chuck.”

  I shake my head and stalk off. I don’t need this aggravation. “What I can’t figure is why his stunt got no reaction, but I get busted for checking the time.” I glance at my phone, 4:01 p.m.

  Greta and James catch up, flanking me. “She’s showing us her A-game,” Greta says. “Nothing’s going to get past her. She may teach English, but she’s no dummy.”

  I laugh, but the look on Greta’s face tells me that wasn’t a joke.

  Tobias closes his locker and steps in front of us. “So this is on, right?” He looks from me to James. “Time for a little mayhem?”

  Greta crosses her arms over her chest, and I instinctually lean away from her.

  James is about to answer, when I hold up a hand. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, man.”

  Tobias studies my face, which I try to hold perfectly still, but he somehow manages to read something there that he likes. I see it the moment his brows jump up and his pupils dilate. “Got it,” he says, nodding as he backs away, holding a finger up to his lips.

  “Seriously,” I call out, but the crowd has already swallowed him.

  1.7

  Dinner is at James’s house. He informed us at lunch that he’d put a pot roast in the slow cooker this morning. Who does that?

  Before I left for his place, I got a text from him asking if I’d pick up a fresh loaf of “nice, crusty bread—maybe sourdough?” I don’t know what that means, so I’m wandering the bread aisle of the grocery store, reading the packaging. I’m about to give up and grab a package of hot dog buns when I glimpse a familiar head of black curls walking perpendicular to the aisle.

  Is it the girl with the tattoo? My whole body feels jittery as I speed walk toward the end of the aisle and peek around the corner, just in time to see her turn down aisle twelve. It’s her. It’s Charlotte.

  Now what? Do I find her and say hello? Did she see me? Do I pretend to bump into her and act like I’m surprised to see her?

  Just knowing she’s two aisles over is messing with my body’s cooling system. I’m sweating even though the air conditioning is going full blast. I’m just about to make a dash for the front door when someone taps my shoulder.

  I whirl around to face Charlotte, smiling in this crooked way. “Thought that was you,” she says. “Charlie, right?”

  “Other Charlie,” I mumble, shoving my hands in my pockets.

  “Nah, just Charlie. I’m Charlotte now, remember?” She pushes a curl off her forehead. “Are you shopping?”

  “Uh, bread.”

  Looking around us at the shelves full of bread, she laughs. “You’re getting warmer.”

  What does this mean? Charlotte went out of her way to say hello to me and is now standing here bantering with me like we’re old friends. Maybe she’s just really nice. Maybe it doesn’t mean anything and I need to get over myself.

  “James—my, uh, friend—needs bread. He’s making me dinner.”

  Charlotte’s eyes widen a fraction. “That’s nice of him.”

  “I guess. It’s pot roast.” Why am I telling her this? I pull out my phone for lack of anything better to say and show her the text.

  She smiles as she reads it. “I was wrong. You’re ice cold.” She takes my forearm and drags me down the aisle. There is green paint under her fingernails. “You should be in the bakery.”

  I follow her past the cheese and yogurts along the back wall, to the corner where the bakery sits with its glass cases full of colorful cakes. There are racks and racks of fresh baked breads too. A delicious, warm scent wraps around my senses as Charlotte deposits me in front of a wooden rack and points toward the bottom. “Sourdough,” she declares.

  “Thanks.” I stoop to grab one and when I stand, she’s examining me like I’m a specimen in a Petri dish.

  “How long have you known James?”

  “Since freshman year.”

  “What’s he like?”

  I shrug. “I dunno. Tall, dark, and handsome, I suppose.”

  “Handsome?”

  “That’s what I hear.”

  “Tall like you?”

  “About the same, but broader.” I squeeze the bread in my hand, wondering if it’s supposed to be so hard. “You saw him at the Krispy Kreme.” I touch the back of my neck in the spot that corresponds with her tattoo.

  “The guy with the little redhead?” Her whole face lights up as she makes the connection.

  “Yeah, that’s my friend Greta. They’ve been dating for years.”

  “Dating?” Her thin, black brows are so high up they’re hidden behind the curls on her forehead.

  “Yeah?”

  Charlotte’s cheeks puff out when she exhales. “I thought—no, never mind what I thought.” She points at the bread I’m holding. “You’re so hot, you’re on fire.”

  “Wait, did you think—”

  “Nope,” she says, turning away, her cheeks going hot pink.

  “You thought he was my boyfriend.” My voice cracks with surprise.

  Charlotte has reached the produce section and grabs a few lemons from a teetering pile. “If it helps, I hoped I was wrong.” She smells one before beginning to juggle them.

  It does help. Well, it would help if it’d bothered me to begin with. “How are you doing that?” I point at the lemons orbiting her head.

  Charlotte shrugs. “I’ve had a lot of free time in the past.”

  I set the bread down and grab my own lemons. “Teach me?”

  She grins. “So you can impress your boyfriend?”

  “So I can impress you. I’m not James’s type, which is a shame because Greta says he’s a great boyfriend. Very giving.”

  Charlotte snorts and drops one of her lemons.

  ---

  By the time I leave the grocery store, I can juggle three lemons for over a minute. Of course, that’s only if I turn away from Charlotte because one look at her face and I lose my concentration—and my lemons.

  At James’s, I hand him his crusty loaf of bread and grab Greta’s elbow. “I’ve got a question.”

  “It’s called a nocturnal emission and it’s completely normal, Chucky.”

  “Grow up, Gret.”

  “You grow up,” she says, her smile so wide it’s smooshing up the freckles on her cheeks.

  James is busy plating dinner as his little sisters, Melody and Ella, dance around the table setting out the silverware. I tug Greta into the front hallway.

  “How do I know if a girl is interested in me?”

  “What girl?”

  “Any girl.”

  “Are you going to ask someone out? Is it Jenna?”

  “No, now answer the question.”

  “Okay, okay,” she says, shaking me off her elbow. “First, let me say that I think this is a great idea. Having a girlfriend will help you gain perspective, see that there is more to life than school and MIT and the future.”

  I roll my hand to get her to move along.

  “Fine,” she snaps. “If a girl is interested in you she might find little ways to touch you, like your arm or shoulder. She may compliment you, sometimes indirectly.”

  “Would it be complimentary if she looked a little upset when she thought maybe I had a boyfriend?”

  Greta begins to nod and then her brow furrows. “I’m sorry. What?” I can see she’s biting back laughter.

  “Never mind.”

  “Boyfriend?” A snicker escapes. “Who’s your boyfriend?”

  James calls for us from the kitchen and my ears go bright red at the sound of his voice.

  “Oh, shit, no,” Greta squeals. “James, you are never going to believe this.” She takes off down the hallway.

  “Greta don’t—” Judging by the howling coming from James, I’d say I’m too late. I make a mental note to try to figure this stuff out on my own next time. Or maybe since James is supposed to be so giving, I’ll ask him first.
<
br />   1.8

  James makes an ass of himself in English on each of the remaining days of the week, making me think I’m definitely on my own when it comes to figuring out relationships. He says he’s starting small, laying the foundation for the skyscraper of hell he will erect around Ms. Finch. I say he’s sniffed one too many chemicals in the lab, and his brain is starting to short-circuit.

  On Wednesday, he “forgot” his textbook. He may get an Oscar for his performance as Genius Suffering a Nervous Breakdown. I caught Greta’s attention during the climax of his performance to ask, “Did I look like this?” She snorted and shook her head. It took 7.27 minutes of class before Ms. Finch could regain control.

  On Thursday, he sneezed every time she said the word, “story.” She was lecturing on the structure of the short story. Fifty-three sneezes. Tobias even got up to get him the box of tissues from the bookcase in the back.

  I do my best to keep my head down in class and never make eye contact with my classmates. I don’t want anyone thinking I’ve got anything to do with this crap.

  Today, James’s plan A had been to fall out of his chair and fake a head injury, but Ms. Finch declared we all needed a special Friday treat (her words, not mine). We grab our bags and follow her to the grassy courtyard, where we sit cross-legged in a circle.

  Thwarted, James reverts to plan B.

  “Buzzzzzzzzzz.”

  The buzzing noise is coming from my left, where James is sitting, looking overly interested in a wrinkle in his pants. On my right, Greta groans. Across the circle, Ms. Finch is reading to us from the paperback book.

  “Buzzzzz. Buzzzzzzzzzzz.”

  This time Greta leans behind me and smacks James on the back of his head, denting his kinky black curls. James gives her a devilish grin and, looking right at her, he barely parts his lips and goes, “Buzzzzzzzzzz.”

  Two people over¸ Debbie French’s blond ponytail starts swinging around as she whips her head from side to side looking for the phantom insect. Once Debbie starts flinching, the movement moves around the circle like a ripple, until it stops at Ms. Finch. She continues to read.

  “Buzzzzzzzzz.”

  Debbie looks at me, and I curse inside for letting her catch my attention. She mouths, “Is that you?”

  I give my head one solid shake.

  With my response, she hops up. “Um, excuse me? Ms. Finch. There is a bee somewhere. I don’t, um, like bees.”

  Ms. Finch looks up from her book. “I’m sure we’ll be fine,” she says, a soothing smile lining her face. Debbie’s eyes are wild, but she nods and sits back down.

  James stifles a laugh on one side of me, while Greta grinds her teeth. James’s being pretty stupid, but the pandemonium is cool from a sociological perspective. James gives me an elbow nudge, a silent plea to join him. Greta kicks my foot.

  “Buzzzzzzzzzz,” James hums more loudly.

  A breeze blows through the courtyard. Small vortexes of trash swirl in the corners. One bit of paper escapes and drifts our way, brushing Debbie’s neck as it makes its way around the back of our circle.

  Debbie screams, jumping to her feet and swatting her neck with both hands. She takes off running for the doors to the school. Her panic spreads out behind her like the tail of a comet. Justin sprints after her. He’s allergic to bee stings. Half the girls and a good handful of the guys jump to their feet and alternate between scanning the area for the illusory insect and shooting me questioning looks. I remain still, arms crossed over my chest, staring at a spot in the grass straight ahead.

  James stands, his hands up like a ninja ready to kick the bee’s ass. Greta jumps up and starts swatting at James, which others misinterpret. They think Greta is rescuing him from the bee, but she’s just pissed. Mob mentality takes over and everyone is standing and ducking and swatting the air.

  Ms. Finch and I are the only two people left sitting in the circle. She closes her book, and watches me from across the grass. I want to look away, but her eyes are so similar to Charlotte’s. I’m trapped in them.

  A flash of heat burns my ears as I realize Ms. Finch thinks I’ve orchestrated this. I’m the only one not reacting to the attack of the invisible bees.

  Greta wallops James in the chest with both her hands and he falls backward over me. I’m swept up in a cascade of limbs. When I right myself again, Ms. Finch is no longer studying me. Instead, she’s motioning for everyone not swept away in the wave of panic to follow her back inside.

  James breaks free from Greta and surreptitiously pumps the air with a victorious fist. It’s only a small victory, but he looks elated. Too bad Ms. Finch looks more amused than pissed.

  When we get back to the classroom, she apologizes for the disturbance, saying, “Well, that did not go the way I’d planned, but then, you all, as scientists and mathematicians, must know how that feels. At least I’ve learned something from it. How about you?”

  The grin on James’s face slips into a grimace. She’s not pissed. Not even a little. And she turned it back around on us and made it like she’s some sort of scientist, too. Something like admiration tickles the back of my mind.

  1.9

  Besides James’s antics in English, the rest of the week went by in a blur of physics labs and multivariate equations. It’s good to be back in school, where I know what to expect.

  Home is a different story. Becca’s new project partner has been over almost every afternoon. Mostly they stay holed up in Becca’s room, but just knowing Charlotte is here shorts the electrical impulses in my brain.

  Back when Greta and James began to date, Greta went through this annoying phase where she was very un-Greta-like. James would join us at lunch and she’d stop eating, twirl her hair like Becca, and blush whenever either she or James said anything. I did a lot of talking back then. It was the only way to keep Greta from looking like she was about to overheat. Even when James wasn’t around, it felt like he was because Greta never shut up about him.

  I couldn’t understand what was happening, so I did some research to figure out what was short-circuiting Greta. Turns out, other scientists had the same questions and conducted studies to understand what makes us act like assholes when we fall in love.

  The answer is chemistry—brain chemistry. These scientists discovered three phases in relationships: lust (all hormones, all the time), attraction, and attachment. Greta and James are in the attachment phase now, which means Greta can eat again and doesn’t obsessively talk about James. But back during the attraction phase her neurotransmitters were all out of whack.

  I’d like to think my brain is more advanced than most humans, but whenever I think about Charlotte, which is more than I’d like to admit, I feel completely adrift in a chemical bath.

  I’m at the kitchen table making quadratic equations with the alphabet cereal Mom buys because I said I liked it when I was five. As far as I can tell, Becca and Charlotte’s group project today is an experiment to determine at what decibel a bass line can fracture plaster. The entire kitchen ceiling rumbles like an aftershock.

  “What is that?” Mom asks.

  I look up from my cereal. “That,” I say, pointing toward the ceiling, “is Charlotte.”

  “Becca’s…friend?” Mom says it like she’s test-driving the word.

  I shrug and go back to my cereal. Charlotte’s coming over on a Sunday feels like a friendly visit, not a schoolwork thing. She walked in with a sketchpad and a fistful of charcoal pencils, but no textbooks. I’m not sure what’s more disconcerting—Becca having a friend, or the friend being the girl with the infinity tattoo that I can’t stop obsessing about.

  Mom drops the armful of files she’s carrying on the kitchen table and papers scatter. She’s an elementary school principal (spelled with a p-a-l because she’s your pal!), so the beginning of a school year means tons of paperwork.

  She pushes her glasses up on her head, pinning her blond hair back. “Please go tell them to turn it down,” she says, scrabbling to put the wayward pages bac
k in order and mumbling about noise ordinances and buying Dad a new weed whacker. His is whining just outside Mom’s office window.

  “Don’t make me do that, Mom.” I carry my bowl to the sink and face off with her. I get my height from Mom’s side of the family. Last year, I finally overtook her in height. She always jokes that she’s 5 feet, 12 inches tall. I’m 6’4”. Still, she’s far more imposing than Dad’s 5’9”.

  “Charlie, please. I’m buried. What’s the big deal?”

  “Nothing,” I say heading for the stairs. I don’t tell her “the big deal” is that for every moment I spend with Charlotte, my mind must then spend many, many more moments analyzing each aspect of our brief interaction. I fail to mention that I think her eyes look like a clear day at the ocean when it feels like the horizon is at your fingertips. And I definitely don’t let on how much all of this bothers the hell out of me.

  The music is louder upstairs. I bang on the door and holler, “Mom says to turn it down.”

  I’m hoping to retreat to my room, but—

  “What?” Becca asks as she whips open the door. Her shoulder length brown hair is falling out of its usual ponytail and her cheeks are pink. “Charlotte’s teaching me a funny dance. I couldn’t hear you.”

  Behind her, I catch Charlotte shimmying to the thick bass. Her slim hips move in a sweet, slow circle. She’s singing along with the music. I’m shocked by how effortless her song is, like a bird in flight.

  Since I’m still not moving, Becca asks, “Did you want to learn?”

  “God, no,” I say, but just as I say it the song ends, so my voice is extra loud in the hallway, crowding us all. “Mom just wants you to turn down the music.”

  “Oh, sure,” Becca says as she’s closing the door. I tell myself not to, but before the door clicks shut, I crane my neck to catch one more glimpse of Charlotte swaying with the melody of the next song.

  2.0

  12:38:17 a.m. I want to sleep, but my normally obedient brain will not shut up. I keep imagining myself striding into Becca’s room and sweeping Charlotte in my arms in some elaborate, yet terribly manly, dance move.