Not so super -- Chapter 18.
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**Rick Smith
@LittleTwerp
This bus is rocking!
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**Channing
@MyFakeWife
Soooo... I shouldn’t come a-knocking?
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I cocked my head, trying to decide who was DMing me. ChannyOne put unswerving faith in her dreams, so she never asked questions. Question marks usually meant ChannyTwo. But this was just a joke. Did it count as a question? Probably not. Would ChannyOne make a joke? Maybe, with the smug conviction that it would be funny. But I couldn’t quite imagine a playful ChannyOne. But would ChannyTwo have...
But, really, none of that mattered. I was in such high spirits that I was happy to be talking to any Channy. Nothing could throw me. Except, maybe, awkward memories of that day at MIT. Every day since, those two words resurfaced in my brain. Every time they did, I felt dizzy and confused.
When I had heard her, there was no ambiguity. It could only have been her voice and it could only have meant one thing. On our date, we had talked about being siblings. But there was nothing sisterly in the voice accompanying those words. I struggled to make sense them.
My initial reaction had been a sudden blossoming of warmth, the unavoidable consequence of being loved. Behind that feeling was something less comfortable. I didn't love her, at least not yet. I couldn't imagine how she loved me. Every attempt to understand her left me more confused.
But I was worried about something even worse. The day I’d overheard the killer, she’d instantly known I was hearing him. She could tell by looking at me. Because of her dreams, she knew me better then I knew myself. Did she know what I’d overheard at MIT? If she did, she was keeping that to herself.
Our time together had ended soon after that fateful thought. Channy had left class to join me. She needed to return to get her bag. I walked her back to the entrance of the “Infinite Corridor,” where her class was. We were holding hands again, but softly, nicely, without the urgency that had marked our last attempt.
When we got to the door, she turned to face me. I was afraid that she was going to try to kiss me. She only looked at me with a shy, muted smile. After a few seconds she started to shrug off my jacket.
“No, you keep it,” I protested. “It looks good on you.”
She sat there, unmoving, with that same small smile. I’d a sense that I had said something wrong.
“You look really good in it,” I corrected myself.
She blossomed suddenly, her teeth bursting into a broadened smile. Behind her heavy lenses, her eyes narrowed as her cheeks strained to contain the blooming happiness. She hugged the jacket tightly, then walked into the building. I watched until she was out of sight and then headed home.
I didn’t have to guess what she was thinking. But what was I thinking? The jacket and compliment had only added fuel to the fire. I didn’t love her. She was too old. And she still scared me. I had led her on, worse than anything I’d ever done to Zeta.
Two days later, my fears were confirmed. A DM and jpeg arrived concurrently.
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**Channing
@MyFakeWife
The height of fashion!
#WorkItBaby
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I opened the jpeg. It was Channy, at the Cambridgeside Galleria, before changing into her GAP clothes. She was posed in a pale imitation of a fashionable selfie. She was wearing what I had come to recognize as the “Channy uniform” -- bright pink on top, black on the bottom. But she had accessorized with my jacket, draped over her shoulders like some kind of mackinac. Two older guys were walking behind her, looking over with expressions of stunned disapproval.
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**Rick Smith
@LittleTwerp
Looking good
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Since that day, every DM I received seemed to be concealing those two words: love… him... And with every DM I sent her, without setting the record straight, I was digging myself in deeper. I shook my head in an attempt to clear it. The madness on the bus was just what I needed.
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**Rick Smith
@LittleTwerp
Everyone is here today!
Even Jimmy, I think he’s hooked!
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**Channing
@MyFakeWife
It’s great that the freshmen are getting into it.
You’re going to need some new blood when Anthony graduates.
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And Jenny. Somehow I’d never gotten around to mentioning Jenny to Channy. I didn’t worry about Channy getting jealous. That wasn't her style. When Zeta had asked me out, Channy wasn't concerned about me, because she trusted me. Or at least, she trusted her dreams.
So why didn’t I tell Channy about Jenny? I wanted to protect Jenny from us, from Channy and me. Jenny seemed so fragile. She’d already exposed her thoughts to me. I wanted to protect her from Channy’s dreams.
I looked up, from my phone, towards Jenny. She sat there, slumped in her chair, uncharacteristically facing forward. She was staring out the front window. I could barely see her profile. From where I was, she appeared to be devoid of emotion -- neither sunshine, nor that darker side of her. The energy that surged through the bus illuminated the vacuum which she inhabited.
I looked across the way and saw Zeta and Dro, in animated conversation. I’d never imagined them inhabiting the same space. Once I saw it, they fit. It was painful seeing Dro disassociate from Jenny. The more she was suffering, the less attention he paid her. Dro was a great friend, but I couldn’t help feeling angry. He seemed to be distancing himself from her growing need.
Zeta caught me looking and gave me a smile. It was neither mischievous nor triumphant. It was just pleasant. It was the smile of a potential, future friend. I couldn’t call us friends yet; there was too much pain and discomfort under the surface. But she’d accepted our relationship for what it was. We seemed to be in a pretty good place. I’d even read that book she leant me. I preferred Channy’s books. Zeta was disappointed, but not surprised.
We pulled into the parking lot and exited the bus. As we did, I found myself remembering the team’s earlier dismay. At the beginning of the year, we’d reviewed the year’s schedule with no small amount of anguish. It was daunting to finish the season with matches at Weston and Newton. They were the top two teams. Every team got an extra lift when the meet was at home. The home team always picked up a few extra competitors, giving it a slight edge. Only the top three would count, but there were more people who might get a high score.
Now Weston was far behind us. It would have taken a miracle to get them back in contention. Newton was three points ahead of us. We needed our own miracle.
We filtered into the Weston cafeteria and found a cluster of seats. I sat in my chair and thought through my strategy for the day. I’d come clean to Channy regarding what we now called the “Zeta Experience.” I was worried that she was going to be angry, that she would finally display the jealousy she should have shown earlier. She’d only laughed.
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**Channing
@MyFakeWife
LOL! She’s lucky to have gotten that far in your dreams!
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I’d chuckled at first, although something in her DM didn't sit right. Worried about what I'd discover if I delved into Channy’s comment, I steered the conversation towards improving my strategy. Channy and I had exchanged many DMs trying to come up with an alternate, Zeta-free strategy. She decided that I needed better pictures of her. Consequently, over the last couple of weeks, she’d sent me dozens of selfies, taken all over campus.
I had to admit, she was very creative. She made herself look quite pretty in a range of different shots -- pausing on the breakfast line, musing in front of a statue, and one shot that looked suspiciously like it was taken during an exam. And, of course, the jeans jacket shot.
But if there was one thing that nineteen years ofintroversion hadn't taught her, it was how to take a sexy selfie. Still, I had managed to find a photo that I thought would serve my purpose. I opened it up and studied it, memorizing every detail. I longed for a when I would be secure to share it with Channy.
The teachers called for us to put away our electronics. I did so, taking one last look at the photo. Then I brought out my other secret weapon and waited to be checked.
“What's that?” asked the teacher as she stopped beside my desk.
“Raw ginger,” I answered, holding it up for inspection.
She took it from me and eyed it carefully, looking for hidden notes.
“I suffer from nausea during the exams. My, uh, friend, recommended…”
Someone punched me hard, in the back.
“My, uh, girlfriend recommended that I try chewing in it during the test.”
She set it back down, next to my pencils.
“Well, she has that right,” the woman said. “Ginger was the only thing that got me through my second pregnancy.”
And with that, she moved on. I turned my head around to see Zeta sitting behind me. She gave me a look that I chose to interpret as “I accept that you chose her. At least you could your relationship.”
I smiled weakly and turned back to face front. Seconds later, the test was on.
I was going to have more time, today.
I was going to need more time, today.
No room for complacency.
Time to scan.
1? Easy
2? Peasy
3? 4? 5? Schmeasy
6? Easy.
I'd run out of rhymes.
7? Probably fine
8? Nightmare
9? Come back to that one
10? Tough but fair
8.
8 was just the word “prove" followed by seven symbols. I recognized six of them. I frowned at the page while grinding my eraser into my chin. I was getting bogged down before I had written a single thing on the paper. I had to get my head back into the game.
7.
Zeta trick
Hot damn
Jacob owns
( 100 )
Striped
sheep
If he
Mates
( 22% )
Got it!
“That's not right,”
The tide was rising.
8.
Still impenetrable
“34”
No
No time
10.
Later
Back to the top
I started to work on the first question. Suddenly, I stopped and took inventory. So far, my labor had only produced one answer. I hadn't even double checked it. I felt the rising pressures of dwindling time and increased urgency. Adding that to the smattering of voices, I had an unavoidable feeling of steady descent. I threw myself back into the math.
1.
Reverse sign
Reciprocal
Multiply
“Ice cream”
Simplify
Simplify
Got it!
2.
Zeta
Zeta
Zeta
Solve for “34”
No
Got it!
3.
Adjacent angles
Equal
Got it!
Beat the voices!
4.
Tricky
Reverse the order
“Mating sheep"
Simplify
Divide
“51”
Redistribute
“Pascal’s triangle”
Got “silky hair" it!
Forty-one minutes to go.
I was turning this around.
5.
“Jacob”
“2 pi"
“37”
“Bra strap”
“Pascal”
Too much!
I closed my eyes and let the wave crash over me.
Hundreds of lost thoughts plowed through my brain, piercing me and driving me down. I couldn't differentiate the voices. Someone was happy, someone was sad; someone was failing, someone was high; someone was in love, someone was lonely. Maybe the same someone.
Just as the volume began to recede, I saw a face emerge from the noise. Not a sexy face, or even a particularly beautiful face. A face which made me smile. I saw that face, peeking seriously, from behind a lamppost.
The fact that I had grafted that face onto some superhero wearing a skin-tight costume only served to enhance the effect. I took in the image and almost laughed. I imagined Super Channy, lifting me up and out of the ocean. She grabbed me and drew me upwards, her powerful legs kicking us towards the surface. Her hair drifted gauzily, individual strands beckoning me back to reality. She looked down. Her smile was a warm haven of safety. Every inch of her was beauty personified as we broke into the salty air. My eyes opened. The world came back into focus.
With the nausea.
Sourness erupted, like some kind of metaphysical case of the bends. The pain destroyed the serenity that had so recently surrounded me. I could still hear an impenetrable, seething mass of voices, but I had to get back to work. I bit down hard on the ginger. Tears flowed.
Finally, the test came back into view.
When I was ready to get back in the game, I took a quick look at my watch. I had a luxurious 24 minutes left. I thanked my lucky stars to have a girlfriend -- a fiancee? -- with a weak stomach.
I took a deep breath.
Time for war
5.
Easy
Carry the one
Got it!
6.
Trick
Found it
Trick
Trick
That's it
Got it!
Too long
Too long
Fourteen minutes left
Maybe?
Try it?
No.
10.
Long method
Doable
Crank through it
Crank it
Crank
Crank
“Sheep mating"
Crank
Got it
9.
Maybe?
Try it?
Write something!
Four minutes to go
Only 8 left
Damn it
Check my work
1? Good
2? Fine
3? 4? 5? Okay
6? Wrong
“So tired”
TIME!
I put my pencil down, looking at the wrong answer which would stand for eternity, a testament to my careless scribbling. Once the tests were all collected, I struggled to my feet, chewing on the end of my ginger. Gers, Zeta and Anthony were all waiting for me when I got there.
“I know I missed two…” I admitted
“Yes, I also got an 8,” Anthony said with more confidence than he could possibly have merited.
“I might have gotten 8,” said Gers.
We all turned to Zeta, who had gone quite red in the face.
“I only answered nine but I think I got them all,” she burst, unable to contain it any longer.
Dro arrived with three cookies. I reached for one but Zeta grabbed it out of my hand and took a bite. With a smile full of mischief, she handed the partial cookie back to me.
“Or would you prefer a fake cookie?” she asked.
“He'd prefer a fake muffin, man!” Dro sung out. Zeta gave him a solid whack on the arm.
“Don't be crass!” she admonished. Then she turned to me. “And defending the lady is supposed to be your job.”
Before I could respond, the results were announced. Weston nailed it with a 29 against our 25, putting them just 2 behind us. In the end, Shao got our only nine, with many of us managing eights.
The good news was that Newton bombed worse than us. Their 23 left them just one point ahead of us, with one meet to go. The bad news was that Shao’s 9 meant that he had pulled back even with me.
With just one meet to go.
The ride back home was tense and full of anxious excitement. Things were quieting down as we turned onto Broadway, heading back to school. Just quiet enough for me to “and fucking end it all” hear...
My stomach twisted into a knot. For the next sixty seconds I clutched the back of the seat in front of me. The world buckled underneath me. Gers gave me a sympathetic look, doubtless mistaking my unnamable emotion for nausea.
The bus pulled up by the school and Jenny was gone like a shot. Several others exited before I could pry myself out of my seat. I grabbed my bag and bolted for the door. Dro, Gers and Zeta were waiting for me. I didn't stop. I mumbled something and sprinted off in the direction I believed Jenny’s apartment to be.
Up ahead, I saw her blonde, bobbed haircut walking at a surprising pace. I activated my nascent power walking muscles, and sprinted like her life depended on it.
“Hey,” she said, managing a smile.
“Huff. Huff. Gasp,” I said, clutching my side.
“What's up?”
“I just…” I paused for another deep breath. “I just wanted to thank you for everything you did for the team this year,” I stammered in a painfully artificial lilt.
She stared, not saying anything.
“We're right in the thick of this,” I said, feeling compelled to continue. “What you did really means a lot to all of us.”
She looked away for a second and then looked back. Her smile had faded.
“I'll bet the drama club appreciates everything, too,” I forged on, like the idiot I was.
“Are you getting all ‘It's a wonderful life’ on me?” she asked, finally responding.
“Uh. I don't know what you mean,” I admitted.
“You never saw the movie?” she asked, startled.
Of course I'd seen the movie, but I was unable to say so before she continued.
“Good,” she said, suddenly enthusiastic. “I still owe you for Weezer. It's a Christmas movie. You'll love it. He wishes that he’d never been born. An angel tells him how much everything would have sucked without him.”
“Do you wish that you’d never been born?” I asked quietly.
“Who said that?” she scream, the force of her emotion pushing me backwards. “Did I say that?”
Her mask had totally fallen away. Before me, in her fury, stood the Jenny I’d so often heard in my head. Every facial feature, from her eyes to her mouth to her cheeks, held an alien mixture of anger, self-loathing and disgust. It took all of the courage I could muster a response.
“No, it’s just…” I started and stopped. “Yeah. You basically did.”
There was a long pause while she stared at me with increasingly red eyes. As the seconds ticked away, I watched the anger drain out of her face. It was replaced by something far worse. I saw that dejected feeling of hopelessness which I’d only ever heard before. She shook her head, like she was trying to wrestle with two inner demons at once. She looked at me fiercely and shouted. The sounds were horrid, meaningless combinations of phonemes. Her mouth was moving a mile a minute but her emotion overwhelmed any meaning that might have been coming out. Eventually, I was able to understand as actual words emerged from her primordially gooey words.
“I can’t fucking be what they want me to be! I can’t live up to my parents’ God damned dreams for me. I’m not going to Harvard. I’m not going to an Ivy. But I'm going to a great school. That's not enough for them. Nothing’s ever enough for them! I can’t take it. I can’t fucking take it!”
I knew, deep down inside, what I was supposed to do. With no small amount of fear, I took a step forward and awkwardly wrapped my arms around her. She was stiff and I worried that she’d shove me away. But instead she collapsed into me, her head buried deep into my chest.
She let out a series of wails and her entire body spasmed. These were not the ladylike tears I’d seen my mother shed when times were tough. These were not the attractive tears Channy had shed when she learned that an innocent girl had been murdered. These were the big, wracking sobs of a girl close to her limit. I squeezed and waited for whatever came next.
I’d never really hugged a girl before. And with Jenny being on the plus side, I thought that it would feel weird. But it didn’t. She folded so neatly between my arms and body, like we’d been made for each other. I felt a momentary pang of regret that my first hug hadn’t been with Channy.
I started to feel moisture as Jenny’s tears and snot soaked through my t-shirt. She was still shaking in my arms, but her crying was tapering off. A few other kids on the street stared briefly, but they were kind enough to move on. As her shaking slowed down, I became aware of her arms, clutching my upper back.
We stayed there, wrapped in each other’s sanctuary for a minute or two. She pulled her face out of my chest and looked up at me with a teary, rueful smile.
“Your girlfriend doesn’t go to our school, does she?” she asked, half-laughing through her tears.
“No,” I agreed, too emotionally drained to deny Channy’s existence. “She doesn’t.”
“She goes to another school? Good. I’d hate for you to catch trouble because she caught us like this.”
She nuzzled her cheek against my chest, breathing slowly and deeply.
“I don’t think she’d mind,” I said. “You shouldn’t worry.”
We stood there for a few minutes longer. The sun was still high in the sky. I had no idea how late it was getting, but I was starting to feel uncomfortable. I felt like I wasn’t really helping Jenny, only allowing her to avoid thinking about her problems.
“Listen, Jenny,” I said. “You need to talk to someone. Not someone like me, someone who can help.”
“Who’d help me?” she asked, picking up her head to look at me. It wasn't a challenge. Her face was full of innocent confusion.
“You know,” I said, willing her to understand. “A therapist. A psychologist or someone like that.”
She looked down, as uncomfortable receiving my advice as I had been in giving it.
“What would you know about that?” she asked my feet.
“I saw someone for a long time,” I said. “I used to… share too much. My parents worried that there was something wrong with me.”
“Parents?” she asked, looking up at me skeptically.
“Yeah,” I said. “This was back when I was younger. Before Dad ditched us.”
Jenny seemed reluctant to take my advice. I wanted her to know how well I understood her state of mind. I desperately wanted to tell her about the things I’d heard. About her animosity towards Zeta, her eating disorder, her suicidal thoughts. But I couldn’t. Maybe I was wrong about all of those things. I never heard more than a snippet of thought. Maybe I was right, but those thoughts were buried deep inside. Maybe I would scare Jenny by revealing them.
I thought about how often I heard Jenny, how she was easy to hear, like Channy. I wished that I could hear her then. I looked down into her eyes and listened, really listened.
I heard nothing.
But she looked up at me and smiled. It was a smile I had never seen before. I didn’t know how to describe it, other than as a connection. It was like we were connecting on some level that was deeper than my hearing. As I thought about the connection, I realized that she and I shared a lot in common. It occurred to me that maybe we shared something I hadn’t yet considered.
“It’s really hard,” I started “when there are thoughts inside you and you can’t share them with anyone. My therapist was good for that. My girlfriend has been great, too.”
Her smile faded, but not in a bad way. I knew that I’d hit close to the mark. She knew how much she was bottling. She sensed that I knew, even if she didn’t know how. But suddenly, it was as if she had figured something out.
“That thing you can't share… it’s your girlfriend, isn't it. She's the big secret!” she gasped. “You can’t tell anyone about her.”
I tried, unsuccessfully, to hide my surprise.
“What is it about her?” Jenny asked, suddenly very engaged. “Is it that she’s young? Is she, like thirteen? Is that the big secret?”
“No, it’s not like that,” I said, trying to contain my laughter. “She’s not too young for me.”
“I’m sorry,” she said kindly. “I shouldn’t try to guess when you’re working so hard to keep her secret.”
We held each other for several more seconds, Jenny’s head back on my chest.
“So,” she said quietly. “What did you see a therapist for?”
“You know,” I said. I weighed my options. I decided to go for the truth, or something like it. “Sometimes the voices in my head just become too much, right?”
“Yeah, that sounds about right,” she said. The smile that beamed back was almost Jenny Sunshine.
“You know, there’s a psychologist at school,” I mentioned.
She stayed there, looking at me, without moving. Then, after several seconds, she gave me a slight nod.
“I'll go. I will. I'll set up an appointment and go. It's time I talked to someone. I need to.”
She put her cheek back on my chest and continued to talk.
“Oh, Rick!” she murmured enthusiastically. “You’re my guardian angel. You’re my hero.”
I smiled. It suddenly dawned on me that I had done it. I had become a hero. I had heard things nobody else could hear. I had used my power for good. Maybe I had even saved someone's life. I looked down at Jenny who was looking up at me. A beautiful connection was beaming in her eyes.
“Come with me! Let’s go to therapy together!”
I froze.
I
Did
Not
Want
To
Go
To
Another
Psychologist.
But what did Jenny need? How close to the edge was she? What impact would my decision have? For one brief moment, I truly envied Channy and the clarity she would have here. At least she’d been given a script. How could I avoid the ripples when nobody even told me my lines? Was Jenny’s life only contained on this side of the pond?
“Yeah, okay. We’ll go together,” I guessed.
She reached up and kissed my cheek.
“Oh! Would that bother your girlfriend?”
“No, she’s pretty secure in our relationship,” I admitted.
“You’d better tell me that something bothers her or I’ll keep pushing the boundaries,” she scolded. “I’ll make an appointment for us for next week.”
I nodded, clearly committed to this. We finally separated. She squeezed my hand and was about to head back towards her apartment. She turned back to me suddenly.
“Thanks,” she said. “I really mean it. This means the world to me.”
I only smiled and nodded. It was only after she was long out of earshot that I let myself whisper the words which had almost slipped out.
“I know.”
