Zenn Diagram

by Wendy Brant

  I can’t exactly explain that he has painted what I “see” in my head. The detail, the pattern. The colors and organized chaos. I get up and cross the room to stand in front of the painting, which sits on a makeshift easel. Other paintings lean against the wall, but this is the one that has caught my eye. Close up, the intricate detail is amazing.

  “You know fractal means broken?” he asks.

  I nod. Yes, I know. That’s my brain: broken, shattered.

  “Why did you paint this?” I ask.

  “Why do I paint anything?”

  He still thinks I’m making polite conversation about his art. He doesn’t realize that I’m freaking out on the inside. His hobby is painting the very images that haunt me.

  “I don’t know. It’s kind of … therapeutic.”

  I’m a little creeped out. It’s like he got into my brain somehow and found the worst and most disturbing part and then painted it and put it on display.

  He shrugs. “When you get into airbrushing anything, that’s what people usually want. Weird shit that looks like it could be on an album cover or something. But actual fractals — they’re really interesting to me.”

  “Have you heard of Benoit Mandelbrot?” I ask. Just on the off chance.

  Zenn shakes his head.

  “He’s, like, the father of fractal geometry. He once said, ‘The goal of science is starting with a mess, and explaining it with a simple formula.’” I don’t tell him that’s what I’m hoping to do some day: use my math and science skills to figure out my defective, chaotic brain. Reduce it to a simple formula and come up with some sort of cure.

  “I don’t know much about math. Or science. But that’s pretty cool.”

  “He died in 2010.” I don’t tell Zenn this, either, but Mandelbrot’s death breaks my heart because I hadn’t even heard of him, or fractal geometry for that matter, until I was in ninth grade, and he died that fall. I think if I had known about him sooner, I would have hunted him down and picked his beautiful brain for a theory on why mine is such a disaster.

  I turn away from the painting and nearly bump into Zenn. I hadn’t realized he was right behind me. Tea sloshes out of my mug and onto the floor.

  “Sorry,” I mumble.

  “It’s okay,” he says. “It’s a rental.”

  His chest is just inches away from my face and I can smell the laundry detergent from his T-shirt. He lingers for a moment, and then steps around me to look through the stack of small paintings on the floor.

  “I was going to give you this one, to thank you for your help with trig.”

  I look down at the painting and exhale. This one is different. It is almost soothing in its repetition, like a lavender seashell that circles in on itself. It reminds me of the kind of peaceful, well-adjusted fractal I used to get from Charlotte. I take the painting in one hand and rub my thumb over the patterns. The fractal he painted me doesn’t give me a fractal, and if that’s not the definition of irony, I’m not sure what is. His hands didn’t actually touch the paint or the expanse of canvas. Just the paintbrush.

  “Thank you.” My voice is nearly a whisper.

  Zenn is standing so close to me that I can feel the soft exhale of his breath on my hair. I look up at him. Swallow. Force some words out of my mouth. “I should probably go. I usually start dinner on Fun to Be Three days.”

  Zenn nods and takes my mug from me. In my distraction I’m not careful and our fingers touch, just a gentle brush of my cold ones against his warm ones. I pull back immediately and brace myself. If touching his jacket almost made me vomit, I’m not sure of the havoc his actual hands might wreak.

  But there is nothing.

  The touch must have been too quick.

  I’m glad. I don’t want to know only the dark stuff about him, the fractal stuff. I want to get to know him like a normal girl gets to know a normal boy.

  He has a surprised look on his face as well, probably because I flinched from his touch. Not an inviting vibe.

  Oh, well. Chalk up another one for weird germaphobe girl.

  I slip on my wet shoes, grab my plastic bag of soggy clothes, my backpack and my painting, and follow Zenn back out to his truck.

  He drives me to church, where I pick up a spare house key. My dad gives me an odd look when I go into his office. I had forgotten about the Juicy sweatpants and uncharacteristically Walking Dead-themed sweatshirt. I’ll have some explaining to do over dinner tonight. I don’t give him time to ask many questions now, though. Zenn is waiting out in the truck.

  When he drops me off at home I thank him for rescuing me. Again.

  “Any time.”

  I hop out, protecting my painting from the rain.

  Sure enough my dad brings up my unusual outfit over dinner.

  “What was with the getup today? Was it clash day at school or something?”

  I explain that I forgot the umbrella, and my key, and my phone this morning and that Zenn gave me a lift after I got soaked in the pouring rain.

  My dad looks skeptical. “Your sweatpants said Juicy on the butt.”

  “He loaned me some clothes.”

  “He had these extra clothes ... in his car?”

  I understand why he’s concerned — I mean, what kind of guy has extra women’s clothing in his car? — but I am impatient nonetheless.

  “I didn’t have my key, so we went to his house and he gave me some of his ... sister’s stuff.”

  They are white lies. Zenn’s “house” is not a house, and his mom is not his sister, but I sense that if I admitted we went to an apartment above a garage where Zenn pretty much lives alone and that those clothes were his mother’s, it would give my parents a bad impression of him.

  My dad still looks doubtful about the whole thing, as a good dad should. But he knows me. Knows my issues with touch, knows that I have not had a boyfriend. Like, ever. He knows he doesn’t have much to worry about.

  Chapter 20

  The air is almost balmy for Halloween, warm and moist and more like June than nearly November. All the cozy, insulated costumes that would be great on a cold day are making trick-or-treaters sweat bullets, but the girls my age who are dressed up as sexy nurses/pirates/police officers are happy: no need to cover up their carefully displayed boobs.

  The quads are going as the Teletubbies, which I don’t think my mom realizes are outrageously outdated costumes. In fact, I was a Teletubby back in 1999 or so: Po, the red one. My mom found the three other coordinating costumes online for a steal and so the kids are all lined up in their rainbow dorkiness: Laa-Laa, Po, Dipsy and Tinky Winky. Even though Teletubbies has been off the air for ages, the kids still watch old VHS videos and are too clueless to know that their costumes are a decade or two too late. Thank God they are only three.

  We take the kids trick-or-treating down our street, my mom, dad and I following them with various cameras like paparazzi. When we turn onto Oak Street, my heart rate quickens. We approach the Arts and Crafts house, and I wonder if Zenn is around. We won’t go trick-or-treating at the apartment above the garage, but I wonder if he might be somewhere nearby. Raking or … whatever.

  As we get closer I see a woman sitting on the front steps of the house with a big bowl of candy. I assume she’s the owner of the Arts and Crafts house until I get closer and see she’s wearing a sexy devil costume. She has an ashtray and a pack of cigarettes sitting next to her on the step.

  Oh, wow. I have a sinking feeling we’re about to meet Zenn’s mom.

  “Oh. My. God,” she says, as we walk up the sidewalk. My dad visibly flinches at her saying God as if she had said fuck and by now he’s noticed her horns and her cleavage and her cigarettes. But being an open-minded and forgiving type, he doesn’t shuffle the kids away like I’m sure he wants to. I wonder what he’d say if I told him this is the woman I borrowed the Juicy sweatpants from.

  “These four are a-dor-able!” she nearly yells. She has clearly partaken of some Halloween treats of the Jack Daniel’s variety.
>
  The kids walk up the steps hesitantly. With a little encouragement from my mom, they say, “Trick-or-treat.”

  Zenn’s mom plops a handful of candy into each bag. “They’re the TVtubbies, right?”

  “Teletubbies,” I correct her gently.

  “Right! Teletubbies! My kid used to watch that when he was little!”

  I smile at her. Her kid! She’s talking about Zenn! She looks like him. Not so much her coloring, but she has the same smile and the same eyelashes, though hers are enhanced by a couple coats of mascara.

  I’d like to talk to her for longer but I’m terrified that her “kid” will come around the corner any minute and it will be this whole awkward meet-the-parents scenario. The slutty devil meets the man of God. Perfect.

  So instead of engaging her, we wish her a happy Halloween and steer the kids on to the next house.

  After about an hour the kids are sweaty and exhausted and we are only too glad to return home to hand out candy instead of gathering it up. My mom dumps most of the candy the kids got back into our bowl to give away.

  They are barely in bed when my phone buzzes and at first I think it’s some kind of Halloween prank when Zenn’s name shows up. We exchanged cell numbers a while back in case he had any trig emergencies which, unfortunately, he hasn’t. Until now, maybe.

  Zenn: Hey

  I smile and slide my fingers over the screen. Our first text. It’s really him, right? I force myself to wait one full minute before responding, lest I look way overeager.

  Me: Hey! What’s up?

  Zenn: See any good costumes today?

  I had expected a question about trig, or maybe a follow-up about the van. But he’s just making conversation.

  Me: I saw a slutty Nemo.

  Zenn: Nemo? Like, the clown fish?

  Me: Yeah.

  Zenn: That’s so wrong.

  Me: Nothing is sacred anymore. How ‘bout you?

  Zenn: I saw a slutty ketchup bottle. But that’s not as good as Nemo.

  Me: How is ketchup remotely sexy? I don’t get it. Am I missing something?

  Zenn: It goes on wieners? I have no idea …

  Me: Right! It’s a condoment.

  There is a slight pause and I wonder if I’ve gone too far in our first texting conversation. But then he replies.

  Zenn: Sorry. You made me spit out my drink all over my phone.

  Me: Sorry.

  Zenn: Don’t be. That was good.

  Another text comes through, this one from Charlotte.

  Charlotte: Hey!

  Oh, look at that. It’s my super popular friend, the one I have spent every Halloween with in recent memory. The one who ditched me this year to go to a party dressed in some kind of couples costume with her new boyfriend. But look! She has deigned to communicate with me! Hooray!

  I ignore her text and send a goofy face to Zenn.

  Chapter 21

  The art room is locked when I try the door. I wait for a couple of minutes but when Zenn doesn’t show up I figure I have a choice: the library or the cafeteria. Alone by myself or alone in a crowd. I decide I’m tired of hiding out, so I head toward the cafeteria, determined to exude confidence.

  I sit down in my old spot and say hi to all the people I used to eat lunch with, minus Charlotte. They are friendly, though not that excited to see me. Makes me realize I should focus on trying to make more than two friends.

  I sneak a couple of glances in Charlotte’s direction and on my third covert look, she looks back. Then someone calls her name and she turns and I’ve lost her attention. Again.

  After school I wait for Zenn for fifteen minutes but he never shows. He might not be at school today since he wasn’t at lunch, but I wait for him just in case. My ego is taking a bit of a smackdown because I thought he would have texted me now that our relationship has moved on to texting status.

  I know I’m fooling myself about what our lunches and our texting could mean. But there is still a part of me that hopes we could have a normal relationship. I tested his jacket the other day when he stepped out of the room and it nearly flattened me again with that dark, almost violent fractal, implying something I’m not ready to face yet. It was deep crimson red and smoky black. It had the sensation of fighting, of battle. Plus a touch of the floaty, drunk feeling I got when I touched his mom’s clothes, and when I touch Josh. He may have a lot of secrets we haven’t talked about yet.

  Oh, who am I kidding? We both have a lot of secrets we haven’t talked about yet.

  I eventually give up on waiting and head home, irritated with myself that I didn’t catch the bus when I had the chance.

  I’m crossing the school parking lot when I hear Charlotte calling my name.

  I turn and there she is, lovely as always.

  “Hey!” she says, slightly out of breath from running to catch up. “I saw you at lunch today! Are you done tutoring?”

  Is she afraid I’ll be back for good and she’ll have to make a choice between the popular kids and me? If she’d have me back, would I go?

  “Um, not yet. He just … wasn’t here today.”

  “Oh! Cool.” She pulls her jacket more tightly closed and I realize it’s because she’s wearing a fairly low-cut shirt. Not super low-cut — I mean, it’s Charlotte — but it’s more revealing than anything she usually wears. We’re talking collarbones showing, not boobs. I wonder if she was fine with wearing the shirt today until she ran into me, the only one who would notice.

  “So, how’s it going?” I ask.

  “Good!” she answers cheerfully. Too cheerfully. “Pretty good,” she amends, and bites her lip.

  “Great!” My voice has the same awkward quality. What the hell has happened to us? “How’s Josh?” I ask politely. I assume this is what we’re supposed to do: back and forth, keep it simple.

  “Good. He’s good.”

  “That’s good.” This is ridiculous. I remember texting her from the bathroom stall when I was thirteen and got my period for the first time. She once told me her dad used to apologize for her height, and that she would take cold baths and stack books on her head because she thought she could slow her growth. I used to tell her everything. I never thought we’d get to a point where we could barely have a conversation.

  “Do you … want a ride home?”

  I wave my hand. “No, that’s okay. I can walk.”

  She looks a little hurt. I know she knows how much I hate walking home. But God help me if I’m going to hop into her car like a dog desperate for a ride.

  “I mean, I don’t mind. It’s nice out.”

  Charlotte looks up at the cloudy sky. She can see right through me. It is not that nice.

  “Okay. Well … I’ll talk to you later, then?” she asks.

  I want to say, I don’t know, will you? But instead I just say, “Sounds good.”

  The next day Zenn still isn’t at school and I don’t bother waiting. I head for the bus but I’m barely out the door when Charlotte calls to me again.

  Today her collarbones are covered by a T-shirt with garden gnomes on it and Chillin’ with my Gnomies underneath. It’s one of my favorites. I smile a little.

  Better. Much better.

  “Hey, Ev. You want a ride?” she asks. Something in her voice challenges me to say no again. Her chin is high, and she looks a little … angry.

  Why is she angry at me? I’m not the one who started dating a popular jock. I’m not the one who abandoned her for a new group of friends.

  “Or is it so nice out that you want to walk?” Okay, I’m not imagining it. There is definitely some anger there.

  I look down at my boots and wonder for the first time how much of the distance between us has been her, and how much has been me.

  I hesitate. “I guess. If you don’t mind.”

  “I wouldn’t have asked if I minded.”

  There is a pause and then I say, “Yes, you would have.”

  “Yeah. I probably would have.”

  We walk
away from the buses toward her car.

  She talks me into swinging by Java Dock and before you know it we are pulled into the parking lot at the beach, sharing a muffin and watching the waves break against the sand, just like old times. I think of Zenn’s sand art, how temporary and fleeting it is. Just like everything else.

  We get out of Charlotte’s car and walk for a bit, like we used to. I pick up a couple of pretty stones that I intend to leave on my parents’ grave. My favorite one is a dark gray that looks black when it’s wet, with a thread of white cutting right down the center. It has a yin-and-yang feel to it, and it reminds me of the two of them, buried side by side.

  As we walk, I point out evidence of a bonfire to Charlotte, the charred remains of wood piled on the beach.

  “Yeah,” she says. “Halloween. I was here.” I don’t think she’s telling me to make me jealous. Her voice sounds kind of sad. “I texted you that night. You didn’t text me back.”

  Oh, right. Halloween. That was the first night Zenn texted me and when hers came through, I promptly ignored it. I don’t even have a good excuse to give her. I was mad at her. And I was caught up with a boy.

  Just like her.

  “I thought you went to some kind of costume party,” I say.

  “Nah. Everything changes at the last minute. It was just a bonfire.”

  I nod, knowing that she probably hates that: plans changing at the last minute.

  “In movies they always make those beach bonfires seem so cool.”

  “It wasn’t?” I ask.

  She shakes her head. “Josh disappeared with a couple guys for a while and I kind of sat by myself. It was too hot for a bonfire, so I was sweating.”

  I laugh. Charlotte may be gorgeous, but she’s also a sweater. She’s almost never cold, especially on a night as warm as this Halloween.

  “Sometimes it feels like …” But she doesn’t complete her thought. She seems sad, hurt by more than just my distance and half-assed friendship. I wait for her to continue, but she doesn’t.