“Yes,” Coop lied. He wasn’t ready to share stories about his family’s financial situation or other extremely personal details. (He had no problem talking about it with Matty, though he blamed that on the night.) He could still hear his dad cursing on the phone. “It’s just a little harmless flirting.”
“It’s one thing to be a plus one to a party, but you’re full-on messing with this kid by pretending to be his friend.”
“But what if I’m not pretending?” Coop asked both Rafe and himself. That was the most frustrating part of this. The more time he spent with Matty, the more the lines blurred. “I had fun with him last night. A lot of fun.”
Rafe observed another piece in the Coop art collection.
“What?” Coop asked.
“Maybe that’s what scares you the most. I think you’ve got a crush.”
I’ve got more than that. I have it bad.Coop rubbed at his forehead. He now had the Sunday headache he was missing. He just didn’t need alcohol to make it happen.
Chapter 14
Matty
Matty triedto be good on Sunday. Even though he got to bed extremely, extremely late, he made himself get up by nine to study. He had a test in Chertok’s class Monday morning. He pushed himself to block out everything that had had happened with Coop on Saturday. He promised himself he would think about it later. Sunday was study time.
But exhaustion got the better of him. He fell asleep in the library for a solid four hours and was groggy for the rest of the day. He couldn’t fall asleep until past midnight because of his screwed-up sleep schedule, and at that point decided to take a Tylenol PM to ensure he got rest. The pill knocked him out like a bear hibernating, and he was still recovering from its power in class Monday morning.
In class, he stifled a yawn as he went to work on the test. All of his classmates looked so prepared, so well-rested. Especially Kelvin.
Matty wouldn’t think about him. He concentrated on the next question, which involved them reading through part of a research paper. It seemed to be a law of academia that research papers had to be as dry as sandpaper. Matty’s concentration clung to the question like it was Spider-Man on the side of a building.
He imagined Coop slowly prying concentration’s fingers off the ledge and letting it plummet to the ground.
Coop.
Matty couldn’t figure out what Saturday meant. He had never had a night like that, where he felt himself getting so close to somebody.I told him too much. Why would he want to kiss me back after I spilled my guts about having no other good qualities except being smart?
But he did kiss me back!
“Matty?” The professor looked up from his papers. “Are you talking to someone?”
Matty turned redder than a bushel of beets. His classmates gave him quick glances before returning to their tests. He went to the multiple-choice section of the test. First question: Was Coop spending the night flirting with him, or was that all in his head?
He remembered glimpses of Coop smiling at him, taking an extra second to hold his eye contact. Coop was a popular guy with lots of friends. Why did he give up his Saturday night to Matty? Matty replayed the night, wondering if he made a major misstep.
But he kept coming back to the undeniable fact that when he kissed Coop, Coop kissed him back. It only lasted about three or four seconds before Coop pushed him away, but something was there.What if I was a terrible kisser?
Matty wasn’t used to this complexity. He could handle calculus and physics because they were grounded in finite rules. This social stuff was a whole different beast, and there was no textbook he could read to better educate himself.
“This is your five minute warning,” the professor called out. He set an egg timer to make everyone even more frazzled.
Matty forgot about Coop. His brain went into panic mode. He read through the rest of the research paper sample and made himself understand it, like squeezing juice out of an orange. He scrambled to answer as many questions as possible. He never had to hurry like this. He usually had time left to check his answers and perfect his penmanship to ensure that the professor could read his numbers without any doubt.
The egg timer was silent, but Matty heard it tick in his head. Each tick was like atsk tsk. How did he let this happen? How could he get Coop out of his head?
Kids walked up their papers, and they all eyed Matty, except for Linh who shot him a quick supportive smile. He tried to ignore them.
Only one minute remained on the egg timer. His pencil worked double-time, cramping his hand as he wrote in as many answers as possible. He hit up the last remaining multiple choice and short essays. He scanned his mathwork on the problem sets and sure, they looked okay and mathlike.
“Time! Please hand in your tests,” Professor Chertok called out.
And that’s when Matty saw a sight so grotesque that his bones felt like toothpicks about to snap. There, at the bottom of his test, was one question that he didn’t answer. One unanswered question, staring at him like he was a parent ostracized from the PTA.
He handed his test to the professor and managed a weak smile. One unanswered question. After the events of this weekend, it seemed all too fitting. Apparently, robotic engineering had a delicious sense of irony.
