Love and Other Unknown Variables

by Shannon Alexander

  I mumble to myself, “I’d like to see your ancient butt do a better job.”

  She may be old, but her hearing is seriously intact. From three yards away, she hears me and counters, “My ancient ass had planted perfectly good roses before you drove over them.”

  Should have said ass. Your ancient ass is some sweet alliteration. Or is it assonance? Crap. Ms. Finch is a bad influence.

  I roll my eyes and attempt to push dirt around the prickly rose. The thorns lash out at me once again, drawing fresh blood. Frustrated, I swat at the beastly plant with the trowel.

  “There you go again,” she says. “Messing it all up.”

  Exasperated, I snarl, “Show me then. Teach me, Obi Wan.”

  Mrs. Dunwitty snatches the trowel out of my hand and waggles it in my face. “All right, jackass. Let’s get to work.”

  Kneeling next to me in the dirt, she lovingly lifts the rose out of the hole I’d shoved it in. Her nimble fingers brush the dirt off the roots. “These right here are the life of the plant. The soul.” She checks to see that I’m paying attention. “These hold the power to regenerate life year after year. This here is the beginning.”

  She prepares the hole with compost and gently places the plant inside. She covers the roots with more dirt and soft, black compost. The plant is spindly now, but it has one big-faced flower open on it, a deep orange rose with petals smooth as velvet. Mrs. Dunwitty breathes in the scent of the rose and sighs.

  “Nothing like it. Reminds me of my momma and her garden. Of late summer and fireflies and big orange moons hanging in the sky. That’s what a rose smells like to me.”

  She rocks back on her heels, her face grimacing like something hurts. Getting old does not look fun.

  “Funny how it works,” she says. “The scent of this rose is made from one chemical compound, but it smells differently to each of us.” She pulls off her garden gloves, stretching her long, dark fingers out to touch the rose. “It’s a rose, plain as day, but what I smell is so much more. Perception is a powerful tool.”

  My mouth is hanging open out of pure shock. I know about plants and roots and growth patterns from botany classes, but this is something different. Something alive. This is poetry. Dimwit is a poet.

  “Close your mouth, son. You’ll swallow a fly.” She stands, her joints sounding like a bowl of Rice Krispies. “How about you perceive yourself planting the rest of these?”

  I watch her back as she shuffles to her rocking chair. She closes her eyes, and I guess she is remembering the smell of her youth and the big orange moon.

  3.1

  The clouds let loose as I pull into the driveway. I jog into the mud room, shaking off my wet jacket, and see Charlotte leaning on the kitchen counter thumbing through an MIT course catalogue that I had left out. I was inspired to finish my short answers after watching the movie with her (forty-seven days to spare), and am just waiting for all my transcripts, scores, and recommendations to come in before I double-check that everything is in order and hit send. Greta says she’s proud of me, but every time I think about it, I feel like I’ll puke or crap my pants or maybe both at the same time.

  I push the application and MIT from my mind.

  “Hey,” Charlotte says, smiling and closing the booklet. Her face looks pale with dark circles under her ocean eyes. “We need to talk.”

  “Ugh,” I groan as I toss my keys on the counter. “I’m no good at talks.”

  The half-smile on her lips makes my blood rush audibly past my eardrums. “Regardless,” she says, pulling me toward the table. “We need to talk.”

  Charlotte sits at the kitchen table, her knees facing me with her ankles crossed and fingers intertwined in her lap. It reminds me of Mrs. Web, my third-grade teacher; nothing good ever came out of her mouth when she assumed this position.

  I flump into a hard wooden chair beside her and fight the urge to put my head down on the table. “Okay. Talk.”

  “I appreciate whatever it is you’ve been doing to drive my sister crazy.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  “But—”

  I can no longer hold my head up. It thuds to the table.

  “I was wondering if you could maybe do something else.”

  “But this is working. You said this was working.”

  “It was, but—”

  “She’s miserable at school.” I lift my head.

  Charlotte bites her lip and turns her face to look out the window. “I think that has less to do with you and more to do with me.”

  She pauses, taking a deep breath and forcing a weak smile. “Look, Jo’s been acting as surrogate mom to me since our mother died fourteen years ago.” She shushes the condolences on my lips. “I don’t remember my mother.” Charlotte covers my hand with hers. “I’m only telling you to illustrate the depth of experience I have in the field of Jo-isms. She’s not going to give up on you because you ignore her. I’ve tried. She has ways of getting in.”

  I’m looking at my dry, cracked fingers under hers as she continues to speak. Her fingernails are painted a pinkish orange, like the roses in Mrs. Dunwitty’s garden. I envision the tips of her rosy fingers tracing circles down the back of my neck just before I kiss her. Obviously, I’m not listening anymore.

  Charlotte removes her hand and snaps her fingers in my face to awaken me. I feel my ears flame up. An apology tumbles off my lips. “Sorry.” Why am I always apologizing to this girl? Greta’d have a fit if she saw how easy it is for me.

  “Me, too,” Charlotte says, her voice full of disappointment. She pushes away from the table and stands with her hands in fists on her hips. I can tell I’ve missed something during my daydream.

  I stand to face her, even risk putting my hand on her shoulder. “Look, Charlotte, I want to help you. I think I mean that.”

  She shrugs away from me. “But?”

  I don’t want to hurt her, but I need her to understand I’m doing the best I can. “You don’t know me. You don’t know that I feel like I’m constantly teetering on a fine edge of madness and the only thing that keeps me balanced is focusing on a steady horizon. My carefully planned future is what keeps me sane—a future I’ve been working toward since well before I met you.”

  Charlotte’s lips part as a breath hisses past her teeth.

  “This is my future.” I pick up the MIT catalogue. “This is who I am.”

  “Some ass puppet on the front of a brochure?”

  A hybrid scream/groan gurgles up from my chest. “Why do you need my help?”

  Charlotte looks away, her breathing ragged. “I need more time—”

  “For what?”

  Charlotte practically spits her answer in my face. “To figure my shit out.”

  “See? I don’t know what that means.” Frustration, fueled by anxiety, is crawling up my spine. I don’t even try to keep my voice low. “We’ve all got shit to figure out!”

  My outburst surprises us both. We’re inches from each other, too close. In the aftershock of my yelling, we each take a step apart.

  “You’re right,” she says before she turns and walks away, rubbing at her eyes with the heels of her hands. “Just forget it. Forget the whole thing.”

  The front door slams right about the same time the adrenaline washes over me with a wave of jitters so violent my skin crawls. Now that she’s gone, I feel like my entire future may hinge on the girl I’ve driven away.

  Sighing, I follow her outside.

  Charlotte’s legs extend from the top step of our porch into the rain. Rivers of water are running down those long legs and pooling in her sneakers.

  “I shouldn’t have shouted,” I say, as I close the door behind me. She looks up at me with dull eyes, but doesn’t answer. I try again. “Will you be okay?”

  She looks out at the gray rain and chokes on a bitter laugh.

  I’m not sure if that was an answer. Should I leave her alone? Offer her a ride home? Stand here and recite pi to the thirty-fourth decimal?


  “Sit with me?” she asks, her eyes still on the rain.

  I lower myself onto the step next to her, trying to tuck my legs under me in some strange yoga pose to keep them from sticking out into the rain. It’s no use though. I end up losing my balance and toppling into Charlotte. I jut my legs onto the steps below and watch as the rain splatters on my pants, dark pinpricks that spread into thumbprint sized splotches.

  Charlotte groans next to me. “Oh, God, Charlie,” she exhales. “I’m sorry, too. I know what I’m asking you to do is insane. You should just forget you even know me.”

  “We both know that’s not possible.”

  Charlotte’s eyes seem so much older, full of things I can’t understand. When she smiles, it doesn’t reach them. She wraps her hands around my arm and shakes me as she pleads. “Okay, don’t forget me, but please, don’t make me go home. It’s miserable.”

  She drops her head on my shoulder and looks up at me. “Did you know Jo doesn’t allow sugar in the house? Has us on this horrible whole foods diet. It’s all antioxidants all the time. How’s a girl supposed to survive like that, Charlie?” She’s trying to be funny. I think. It feels so sad though that I just stare at her.

  She drops her hands back into her lap.

  “You can stay for dinner,” I offer.

  The right side of her mouth pulls up a little. “You asking me to dinner?” Her shoulder nudges mine.

  “No,” I say too quickly.

  More silence as the rain continues to kiss the ground.

  “Why don’t you and Ms. Finch get along?”

  “Because I’m sick in the head.”

  I think she’s joking, so I say, “Crazy teenager,” but her laughter feels wrong. My body shivers with the sound of it. Or, perhaps, I’m just cold. My pants are soaked and the fabric is wicking the cold rainwater toward my crotch. “Charlotte, is there something I don’t know?”

  “Despite your IQ, I’m sure there’s plenty you don’t know.”

  “That’s not what I mean.”

  Charlotte watches the rain instead of me. My ears are feeling hot. Why won’t she just say what she means? Girls defy all logic. Or maybe I’m just incapable of understanding their brand of logic. I don’t know. What I do know is that I can’t sit here any longer, feeling the touch of her arm on mine and imagining her head resting on my shoulder. I hop up, wrenching myself from the closeness of her skin.

  Charlotte grabs my calf. “Wait. I’m sorry. Again. Pay no attention to the foolish girl in the rain.”

  We chuckle, but it’s hollow. I shift my weight from foot to foot and wish I’d been able to get Becca out here to help. I think I’ve only made Charlotte’s mood worse.

  Charlotte tugs on the leg of my pants. “Where ya headed?”

  Crap. Uh, wherewherewherewhere? Somewhere she’d never want to go. “Comic book store.”

  “Take me?”

  It’s a simple question. She wants me to take her to the comic book store. Right? Simple question = simple answer. Except what I say isn’t simple.

  “Love to.”

  ---

  Charlotte may be beautiful and cool, but as soon as I get her into Comic Place, her true colors are out. Charlotte is a nerd.

  She’s in love with every comic and graphic novel she touches. I’m surprised once again by the things we share—the things that move us both. We pour over the racks as she devours the colors, action, and shapes that move for her across the pages.

  “Look at the lines in this one, Charlie,” she says, shoving another Avengers in my face. “Look at the expression on Hulk’s face.”

  “Well, it’s hard being Dr. Banner,” I say, looking up from my book. She stops flipping through pages and looks at me with her brows pulled together. “He’s hiding a monster inside himself. Never sure when it’ll erupt and tear down, like, a city block.”

  She looks back at the illustration. “I totally get that.”

  I reach over and pull out a Fantastic Four, pointing to The Thing on the cover. “It’d be worse to be Ben though. All everyone sees is the monster.”

  Her expression gets serious, lip clenched between teeth, eyes narrow, as she studies Ben.

  “I feel his pain,” I say.

  “Why?”

  “Well, look at me,” I pause, frozen in her eyes as she looks at me. I swallow. “I’m a geek, right?”

  “If you say so.”

  “No. Everyone says so.”

  There’s a half-smile pulling at her lips. “So, what you’re saying is that you are a geek on the outside, but a muscle head on the inside?”

  “Sure,” I say, drawing the word out. We laugh. “I’m just saying, it’s hard to be anything but a monster, when that’s what everyone expects of you. Plus, we can’t all be gorgeous like—”

  “This guy,” Charlotte says, pulling Thor off the rack and shoving his blond, muscleyness in my face.

  I laugh. “I hate that guy.”

  Charlotte puts Thor away, and takes the comic with The Thing. “I’d like these,” she says, handing the cashier an Avengers and my Fantastic Four. When we leave, she touches my arm. “Thanks.”

  “For what?”

  “For making me feel like less of a monster.”

  On the drive home, I consider her from every angle. But any way I look, she’s beautiful.

  3.2

  It continues to rain. Not gentle rain, but wake-you-too-early-with-thunder-and-wind-slamming-against-the-windowpane rain. When we get to English on Monday, Ms. Finch is sitting by the windows in the back of the classroom. The syllabus on the board is a unit on short stories, which will be painful, I’m sure, but at least they’re short.

  A streak of lightning reaches for the ground outside, making her flinch. Forgetting we aren’t speaking to her, she asks, “Does it rain like this often here?”

  The class stares back at her, careful not to shake or nod our heads.

  She sighs, her chest rising as she fills her lungs with the silence. “Right.”

  Another flash draws her attention back to the window. “Anyone familiar with the poet Robert Frost?” She doesn’t pause for an answer, but continues, “Normally, kids learn about him in American Lit. However, since you’re obviously not normal kids, you may have no idea to whom I’m referring.”

  She places a hand against the windowpane. “‘Something there is that doesn’t love a wall.’” She turns and assesses our faces, her lips pressing together. “It’s from ‘Mending Wall,’” she says in exasperation. “In the poem, two neighbors meet each year to mend the gaps in the fence between their properties.”

  We look uninterested, but sweat prickles along my brow. Too much talk of walls and barriers. When are we going to get to the short stories? I can’t believe the lesser of two evils at this juncture is a short story.

  Ms. Finch strolls up the center aisle toward her podium. “Literature is different from math and science because we don’t always have one correct answer. So I ask not what are you keeping out,” she says, turning to face us, “but what are you holding in? The answer will be different for each of you.”

  This time it’s impossible for most of the class to keep up the disinterested façade. Every one of us is searching for the answer to her question. Ms. Finch’s keen eyes are on me. She’s made a gap in the wall. She’s made her way in, just like Charlotte predicted.

  And she knows it.

  ---

  Greta grabs my arm above the elbow as we leave Ms. Finch’s classroom. She steers me past my locker, which is far too close to Finch’s office, and around a corner before letting go.

  “Something’s going on.”

  “What?” I swallow a chunk of anxiety wedged in my throat. I still haven’t said anything about Charlotte, and with each day it gets harder to keep it to myself, but equally as difficult to find the words to explain her.

  “Finch is acting weird.”

  Yes. In my experience, this is true.

  James leans against a locker beside me. “Naw.
She’s just worn down. Teachers like to make an impression and all that crap.” He shrugs his massive shoulders. “She’s just bummed she’s not making a difference in our lives.”

  I nearly pass out from the exertion of holding up all the irony. Ms. Finch just so happens to be making an enormous impact on my life.

  Because Ms. Finch couldn’t pass up some stupid opportunities, she moved herself and her little sister here. As a result, said little sister (and her tempting long legs) have practically moved into my house, making it impossible for me to go a day without discovering something new that intrigues me—things that I must study more in depth. God help me, I love a problem to solve.

  Greta’s shaking her head though. “No. It’s something else. I’m not the only one. Some of us were talking about it in—”

  “Mr. Hanson,” Dr. Whiting, our principal, interrupts, his loud voice cutting through the chaos of the busy halls. “Just the young man I was looking for. A word?” He nods in the direction of his office and takes off without waiting for me.

  Greta and James exchange a look, but before either of them says anything, Dr. Whiting turns around. “Actually, Miss McCaulley, please join us.” He nods once at James before spinning on his heel again.

  James turns a deep mahogany, but he rolls his eyes and grins. “Later, suck-ups.”

  Greta swats at him before grabbing one of the straps of my backpack and pulling me after her.

  “Have a seat,” Dr. Whiting says, pointing to a set of uncomfortable-looking red chairs in front of his massive desk. He runs a hand down his tie, straightening it along his barrel chest. I keep my backpack on, perching myself on the edge of my seat.

  “I asked you here because I wanted to discuss a pertinent matter with you both.” He gives us what I’m sure he thinks is a soothing smile, but since his canines are prominent, it looks more like a snarl. “As our top students, you two are paragons at Brighton. The other students look to you for guidance.”

  I try not to snort because they aren’t looking for guidance. They’re looking for weak spots to exploit so they can be top of the class—chinks in my armor like Charlotte Finch.