Love and Other Unknown Variables

by Shannon Alexander

  “You’re a dead man, Hanson,” she cackles, yanking her foot away, and pursing her lips. God, I’d love to kiss those lips. Just once.

  She maneuvers so she’s kneeling on the cushion between us wiggling her fingers in my direction in a prepare-to-be-tickled sort of way. Her eyes roam over my body to find her target. Every inch of me pleads to be chosen.

  When Becca stirs in her sleep, Charlotte’s fingers freeze. Her eyes widen. I grit my teeth in a startled expression, which makes Charlotte snort, which makes me laugh. Actually, it may be fair to say I guffaw. I don’t know that I’ve ever guffawed before. It feels pretty good.

  The old recliner squeals in protest as Becca sits up. “What did I miss?” She’s looking toward the TV, so I’m guessing she means the movie, but I’m suddenly all too aware that I was just about to get into a tickle war with her best friend. Her only friend.

  Bad form, Chuck, the Greta in my head snipes.

  I stand and straighten out my rumpled shirt. “I’d better get back to work.”

  Charlotte sits back and pulls the blanket over her again. She runs her smudged fingers—the ones enticing me just moments ago—through her inky hair.

  My insides ache. “Thanks for the movie, Charlotte,” I call out as I turn to leave. I need to go. I need to do some wicked math to get this girl out of my system.

  “Anytime, Charlie.”

  ---

  Settling in front of my computer again, I pull up the proof I’m working on for the Young Mathematicians online journal, the one I’m hoping will catch Dr. Bell’s eye. Working through the numbers usually calms me down. Instead, I keep imagining Charlotte, standing alone on an empty street, singing in the rain.

  When she tilts her head back to sing, I see the girl in the picture Charlotte drew. The girl lost somewhere between a song and a scream.

  Nope. I can’t work on this proof if I’m distracted like this. I’ll screw something up.

  I pull out my scrap paper, noticing the infinite line I’d drawn earlier. I mark off a section, assigning each point a value. Behind the line, I draw an X- and Y-axis and begin solving for the slope. It’s a simple problem. I’ve solved hundreds of them. It’s like breathing. Isolate the variable. Stick to the plan. Solve the equation.

  It’s as easy as 3.14159265.

  I scribble more problems, increasing the difficulty, until I’m finally staring down an equation worthy of my skills. But even working through this behemoth does nothing to erase the memory of Charlotte’s eyes on me in the dark.

  I jab my pencil at the paper, pressing the tip so hard it snaps. Closing my eyes, all I see is the nape of her neck, a black curl draped along the soft line of her spine, and her tattoo. There is a physical pulling in my gut, tugging at me in all sorts of places, aching to reach out and trace the lines of the indelible infinity symbol there.

  Math isn’t working. How can math not be working? Is this the beginning of another psychotic break? If it is, why do I suddenly feel so calm, like I’ve broken through the eye wall of a hurricane and into the tranquil heart of the storm?

  I open my eyes and focus on the first straight line I drew. When I stood up in class to be counted on Charlotte’s side, I changed the direction of my life. I deviated from my safe course. I could go back and erase the point at which I turned, but I don’t want to. I don’t want to erase Charlotte from my life.

  Looking at my page of solved problems, the inkling of a plan wheedles its way into my mind. It’s there on the sheet in front of me—over and over again. Have a problem to solve? Isolate the variable.

  If Ms. Finch can refuse to give us feedback in the form of a grade on that stupid novel, then we’ll withhold our feedback, too. All of it. Every last word.

  2.7

  “So we’re really doing this, eh, Chuck?” Greta asks Monday morning on our way into school.

  “It’s what the people want.” I grab the heavy exterior door before it closes in my face. “As the valedictorian, it’s my duty to lead.”

  “In your dreams,” Greta hisses, squeezing through the door before me. “This moves forward because I made it so. Without me, you’d be the only jerk-off in class playing this little game.”

  James chuckles. I scratch my nose with my middle finger. He grins even wider.

  “You’re right. We’re a team.”

  James tosses his meaty arms around our shoulders. “The A-Team.”

  Greta and I both groan.

  By lunch, Greta confirms every student in our English class is committed to my plan. If this is going to work, we have to be all in.

  Class starts as usual. We’re in our seats as Ms. Finch rushes in sipping coffee seconds after the bell. She sets her coffee down on her podium, picks up the novel she’s reading to us, and tells us to shut our traps. Thing is, no one’s trap is open. Everyone is silent, with hands folded on their desks, looking anywhere but at Ms. Finch. The lecture begins and we take notes, but no one asks questions or makes any unnecessary noise.

  The silence is eerie. And awesome.

  Ms. Finch pauses at one point during the lecture and gazes out over the class, a crease in her brow. “Any questions?”

  Silence.

  “Oh-kay,” she continues. “Kinda weird, but okay.” The way she’s biting her bottom lip lets on how un-okay today’s class has been. “I tell you what,” she says. “I’ll give ten extra credit points to the first person who can tell me the difference between an epic and an ode.”

  Nothing. Which she realizes may mean we weren’t listening when she went over that crap earlier, so she tries again. “Too hard? Twenty points to the student who can tell me who wrote Shakespeare’s sonnets.”

  She looks triumphant, like surely even lit-illiterates like us can figure out that one. Still, no one answers. I know it’s killing them. It’s killing me. Twenty free points going to waste.

  “It’s Shakespeare, guys. Shakespeare wrote Shakespeare’s sonnets.”

  We look through her.

  She sighs, “Right. Um…so use the rest of class to work in your project groups. Anyone need a pass for the library?”

  A few people look at me. They’ve already forfeited extra credit points, and using this time to do research on our stupid projects would save valuable after-school time for research we care about. I shake my head once and look at my hands.

  I steal a glance around and notice everyone has his or her back turned away from the front of the room where Ms. Finch watches us with a furled brow.

  And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how you isolate a variable.

  If Ms. Finch has a compulsion to be the best, then our ignoring her should get so far under her skin, she’ll want to peel it off layer by layer to get to us. And while she’s peeling away, Charlotte should be able to enjoy her life for a little while with no interruptions. Perhaps she’ll enjoy some of that free time with me, in my room, in the dark—

  ---

  It started raining during English, so I’m free from my indentured servitude for the day. Charlotte’s car is parked in its normal spot on the curb when I get home. The joke around the house these days is that Charlotte hangs out all the time because Mom loads the pantry with junk food. Mom says as long as Charlotte stays, she’ll keep buying the good stuff. That’s how thrilled my parents are about Becca socializing for once. They are willing to slowly poison us with artificial flavors and preservatives. I say hurray for junk food, but sometimes it feels more like Charlotte is hiding out at our place, like we’ve taken in a refugee.

  Inside, Charlotte’s melodic voice is everywhere all at once. It makes my pulse stutter.

  She’s in front of the microwave, a bag of popcorn turning inside, singing a tune that’s upbeat and sad at the same time.

  I drop my keys on the counter, and Charlotte turns to see me. She’s not embarrassed that I came home to find her singing in my kitchen. Instead, she smiles, wide and warm, and reaches for a wooden spoon from the jar by the stove. Using it like a microphone, she switches to a fa
miliar refrain from Singing in the Rain.

  She stops inches from me. The last note trails off, washing away my senses.

  She laughs, her breath soft against my face. “Any requests, Charlie?” She grins up at me. Part of me wishes she’d take a few steps back so my heart can slow a little, but another part of me wants to pull her even closer.

  “N-n-no.”

  “Jo had a bad day at school today,” she says, her smile brighter than a supernova.

  Joe? “Is Joe your boyfriend?”

  Charlotte steps away from me, her head cocked to the side like a bird. “My wha—Jo is my sister.” She leans back on the counter. “Seems the kids were being mean to her last period.”

  “We weren’t mean,” I say, feeling heat rising to the tips of my ears. “I solved your problem with algebra.”

  Charlotte squinches her nose at me. “I don’t care what you did. She’s madder than a hatter.”

  I want to understand her. I do. “That’s good, right?”

  Charlotte taps out a rhythm on the palm of her hand with her wooden spoon microphone. “Yes, that’s good. So good that she’ll be working late on new lesson plans for the geniuses. Currently, I am not her top concern. I’m even on my own for dinner tonight.”

  Becca has come downstairs to hear this last bit. “You can have dinner here. Right Charlie?” Charlotte stops mid-drum and arches a brow at me. My heart ratchets up again.

  Dad comes in from the garage, shaking water from his coat. Becca asks, “Charlotte? Dinner? Yes?”

  Dad nods. “Food. Good.” His brown curls are sagging into his eyes and his mustache looks like a wet dog hanging out under his nose. Dad likes to point out that he’s had a mustache since before the hipster douches decided they were cool. “Cool” being a relative term. He notices he’s dripping everywhere and heads for the mudroom.

  “That’s settled,” Becca says as she plunks one of my science journals on the counter.

  I thought my heart was flying before, but the thought of Becca sifting through my magazines has launched it into supersonic speed. “Where’d you get that?”

  “I didn’t go anywhere near your stash of girlie magazines.”

  “Becca—”

  “Research, Mr. Hanson?” Charlotte’s face is a replica of Ms. Finch’s teacher-y look.

  I try to act cool, as if that’s possible after my little sister has sunk me like a battleship. “Whatever,” I say, coughing on the word.

  “Actually,” Charlotte says, laying the journal on the counter so I can see the page, “I could use that super brain of yours.”

  I don’t step any closer. I’m not getting sunk twice.

  “I need you to explain this Austrian cat thing.”

  “Austrian cat what?”

  “Schrödinger,” Becca says.

  I groan, “God, not Schrödinger again? That theory is so played these days.”

  Charlotte giggles. “I’m sorry. Did you just say that some obscure Austrian scientist is played?”

  I cross my arms over my chest, trying to stand my ground, even though the look in her eyes is threatening to make it impossible for me to stand at all. My voice falters, only an angstrom, “I’m just tired of the stupid cat. Is it dead? Is it alive?”

  “Yes.” Charlotte waves one finger in the air “That is the question. So which is it?”

  “Well, it isn’t anything, really. It’s just a thought experiment to illustrate the concept of quantum states. Until we look in the box, the cat is in a superposition of being both dead and alive. But, once we look, we force the dumb cat into one state or the other. It’s called a collapsing reality.”

  “Which is the real reality?”

  “I don’t care. It’s a cat.”

  “Let’s suppose it isn’t a cat,” Charlotte says, her voice tinged with a current of electricity. “Let’s suppose it’s something else.”

  “Like what?”

  “I dunno—me.”

  Shit.

  Charlotte continues. “So if I die, but no one is there to see it, am I still alive until the moment someone notices?” I exchange a look with Becca. What the hell? Becca shrugs and looks like she may say something until Charlotte says, “Or, if I’m alive, but no one notices, does that mean that I’m already dead?”

  “Where is this coming from?”

  Charlotte’s smile is mysterious, but it doesn’t reach her eyes. “Let’s call it scientific curiosity.”

  Becca leans on the counter beside Charlotte, shoulder to shoulder. “I’ve read another interpretation—reality splits instead of collapsing. So the cat is alive in one reality and dead in the other, right Charlie?”

  I nod, watching Charlotte’s face as she digests this new possibility. “In this instance, the observer becomes entangled in the cat’s state. So to those on the outside of the box, the cat is either dead or alive when they peer in, but the cat kind of gets to decide.”

  Becca rolls her eyes at me. My interpretation is loose, at best. I don’t care though because Charlotte is smiling, a close-lipped curve to her bow lips directed solely at me. I’ve made her happy and, in turn, I can feel a rush of pleasant neurochemicals flooding my brain.

  “Well,” Charlotte says, “that’s nice for the cat, then, isn’t it?”

  2.8

  It’s quiet enough in the English classroom to hear the soft rattle of Ming’s asthmatic breathing, and he sits three rows over from me. The controlling Mrs. Bellinger would keel over in ecstasy if her class were this well behaved.

  At first, I felt squeamish whenever one of Ms. Finch’s questions went unanswered, but now, just one week into my plan, I’m used to the odd feeling of not performing to my potential. Plus, I’ve noticed Ms. Finch is asking fewer questions. Better not to ask than to leave unanswered questions cluttering the classroom.

  I’ll admit the plan isn’t bold, but sometimes simplicity is best. I hope that’s true. I’m not sure I’ve got it in me to be a true agitator.

  When I walk into class today, Ms. Finch is standing at her podium, staring into a half-empty coffee cup with unfocused eyes. I hide a smile. She looks deeply distracted.

  The bell rings and she doesn’t bother telling us to shut our traps and listen up before reading to us. About mid-way into today’s pages, she loses herself in the story and becomes animated again. But when she finishes and sees us, her good mood slips away. This looks like more than distraction.

  There’s a strange little tug in my chest, but I ignore it. My allegiance is with Charlotte (and algebra), but I wish I knew more about why Ms. Finch is smothering Charlotte. What’s the cause to that effect? The action behind that reaction? Charlotte seems convinced that by distracting Ms. Finch, we’re actually doing her some sort of favor, but I don’t see how.

  A small anxiety purrs in my stomach like Schrödinger’s damn cat. There’s a piece to this problem I haven’t accounted for, and I need to know what it is.

  “None of you care,” Ms. Finch says, closing her novel and sipping her coffee, “but today we are going to talk about circles.”

  Ms. Finch projects a poem onto the board—a poem so poem-y it makes me seriously consider puking on her again. The kind of poem that’s full of words like “thy,” “thou,” “whilst,” “wilt,” “hearkens,” and a few “doths.” Oh, and one “erect.”

  In the poem, a guy is going on a trip and has to say good-bye to his girlfriend. He’s not cool with PDA and wants her to remember they are like a compass (the stabby-end thing for drawing perfect circles).

  “I’m kind of in love with the idea that kindred spirits stay connected no matter the distance between them,” Ms. Finch says. “We’re safe within the boundaries of the shared circle our lives create.” Since she’s facing the board when she speaks, we’re not sure she’s even talking to us. I can tell no one would know what to say even if responding to the teacher were allowed.

  I don’t want to think about who I’d like to draw close in my circle. Or maybe I do want to think about her
, but whenever I do, everything else fades, which scares me more than finishing my MIT application.

  “Special treat today,” Dimwit says as I get out of the car. She’s leaning on her porch railing with a wicked grin stretched across her weathered face, her wide, white dentures gleaming at me.

  This can’t be good.

  Dimwit meets me by the garden. I haven’t been back since I finished the wall last week because of all the rain. It’s holding up fine against the heavily saturated ground.

  “Today, you’re going to add life to the soil.”

  I look at her like she’s speaking Wookie.

  “Come on,” says Dimwit, grabbing a cane from beside her rocking chair and walking toward her backyard. The cane is new. I mean, it looks old, but I’ve never seen her use one before. I’m a little worried she’s only carrying it so she can beat me in the head if I do something wrong. “Bring the wheelbarrow and shovel,” she calls back to me.

  More shoveling? At least I’ll have something to defend myself with.

  I follow her to the back where she shows me to a neat pile of, well, garbage. It’s her compost pile, and from it I can tell she had eggs and a banana for breakfast this morning.

  Dimwit smiles. “Black gold,” she says, grabbing a handful of the decomposing nastiness. “Mix this up real well and fill the wheelbarrow full of the good stuff from the bottom. Bring it around front to add to the garden soil.”

  “You’re just making up gross stuff to torture me longer, aren’t you? Mom made a flower bed last spring in less than an hour.”

  “How are those flowers looking?” Mrs. Dunwitty asks.

  Dead. I grimace and thrust my shovel into the pile of compost.

  Dimwit chuckles. “That’s what I thought. It’s the circle of life. From all this decaying matter, my new roses will grow taller and stronger. Respect the circle.” She hobbles back around to her porch, humming.

  “Sick of circles,” I grumble and immediately feel guilty. I love circles. They’re amazing. It’s not the circles’ fault I’m stuck here mixing the new ick with the old ick and chopping up bigger pieces of ick with the point on the shovel. When I’m done, I bring the full wheelbarrow around to the garden and freeze.