Worry overrode Coop’s pride for once. “Dammit. My break is almost up.”
He handed back Rafe’s phone.
Coop returned to training. Lauren walked him through the rest of the cash register protocol, plus how to close down the store at the end of the day. Coop watched and listened, but only half of his brainpower was focused on the present. His mind kept going back to Matty. The kid didn’t deserve to be the campus joke. He didn’t deserve to be mindfucked. Coop didn’t know how, but he was going to make things right.
Chapter 32
Matty
Matty hadan inkling tales of his disastrous program were spreading outside the department when he came back to his dorm one day during the midst of a hallway hockey game. The goalie immediately stopped the play and approached him with his phone in hand.
“I don’t know if you’ve seen this yet,” he said.
So it was more than an inkling.
He already knew he was an embarrassment to the engineering program. But his infamy was school-wide. No—international.
Matty tried to go about his days as normally as he could. He summoned strategies he hadn’t needed to use since high school and the days of Matty germs. When random people around campus looked and pointed at him, he stared straight ahead. He took circuitous paths to classes through less-trafficked areas of campus. He listened to podcasts at meals in the dining hall so as to block out the whispers and chatter.
Don’t give them a reaction. Don’t give them a show.
Akash and Tim had tried to get him to play Catan, or even just come over and talk, but Matty refused. He didn’t want to know what they thought of him. Maybe it was a trap. Or maybe it wasn’t, but either way, he didn’t want to see their awkward expressions and faces filled with pity.
After his latest robotics class, where Professor Chertok announced that Kelvin was the winner of the competition (for a machine that could give eye exams. Matty didn’t think Kelvin was that good of a programmer), he came back to his room and proceeded to crawl under the covers. His bed felt extra cold, like it didn’t even want him there.
He had to talk to somebody, somebody he could trust. That number had dwindled substantially ever since he found out…he couldn’t even think it. Every time he pictured Coop’s face, which was more often than he preferred, he felt another surge of pain to his heart, another kick to the proverbial nuts.
Minutes later, he was seated at his desk Skyping with his sister.
“This is the internet, Matty,” she said. “By next week, there will be another video for everyone to obsess over and you will be old news.”
“The internet is forever. Whenever I go for a job interview, any type of technological breakthrough I have, this video will always come up.” Matty would never be known as a great inventor or researcher. Five minutes of disaster would define his entire professional career. Thanks, Internet.
“They’ll also note how far you’ve come, how much you’ve improved.”
“I still don’t understand how this happened. I went over that program. I tested it on Marathon the day before the competition. It worked perfectly. I think I was sabotaged.” It’d been a thought Matty had ever since the day of the contest. It was the only thing that made sense. “I looked over the program and flash drive when I got home, and it worked fine.”
“Who do you think did it?”
Matty replayed the day over and over in his head, and his interaction with Kelvin kept sticking out. Kelvin had been in contact with the flash drive right before, but…that was all Matty had. There were missing pieces to this puzzle, and it killed him that he couldn’t figure it out. “Doesn’t matter now.”
“Have you tried talking to your professor about it?”
“Without proof, I have nothing, just an excuse.” Matty felt wrecked all over again. He looked into his sister’s eyes. “It was going to be step one in helping Mom. It was going to give her the aid she needed, so you and Dad wouldn’t be so burdened.”
“I am one lucky sister.” Aditi seemed visibly touched.
“I wanted to help you.”
“And you are. Your strength gives me strength. I know it wasn’t easy for you growing up. And you are persevering. You opened yourself up to someone—”
He put his hand up.End of that conversational thread.
“I don’t think Coop’s the villain you want him to be,” she said.
“You’re taking his side?”
“I’m not. What he did wasn’t right, but I don’t think it was all a lie.”
