The Unsolvable Equation

Chapter Nineteen

When Alexia was younger, she was obsessed with pretty pastries. She loved to stare at the glossy pictures of cakes resembling works of art more than food to be consumed. She was particularly fond of how the bright colour popped out at her, it’s vibrance the perfect accompaniment for the stories of prince and princesses that were played out in the form of sugar statues and an overload of icing. When her 6th birthday rolled around, she requested her mother to turn those pictures into reality. Her mother agreed, decorating the 7 layer work of art with layers of fondant sculpted to perfection. A bunch of rainbow sprinkles and hundreds and thousands adorned the cake and Alexia envisioned it melting like ice on the tip of her tongue. She was not let down, and an explosion of sugar and sweetness greeted her on the first bite. The cake tasted like the substance of every little girl’s dreams; unicorns and rainbows dancing on the tip of her tongue and fairies sprinkling their magic everywhere. Years later, Alexia discovered that she hadn’t grown up from those fantasies at all, except now, her dreams took the form of Almier, a perfect boy from the cutout of a magazine approved by someone of her caliber. He completed her already perfect life, he was the vibracy she needed.

However, Alexia remembered how after the first bite, the cake eventually became a lump of sugar after lump of sugar, assaulting her senses and driving her into a sugar ecstasy such that she did not realize the lack of variation in taste. It was one monotonous trail of sugared sponge, and the colours that had bled into the batter did not translate into the flavour. Alexia had barely gotten through the first piece when she was forced to put the work away in fear of a diabetic shock. Many years later, she watched her mother make her brother a cake. Because he liked chocolate, she threw in all sorts of cocoa flavoured items. She mixed everything together and the cake turned out to look like a huge dung of shit. When Alexia took her first bite, she scrunched up her face in disgust, for a stingy bitter tinge had somehow found its way through the immense lump of chocolate to attack the tip of her tongue. “What is that?” she had asked her mother, staring at the cake in disgust.

“Rum,” her mother replied, grinning with amusement. “Don’t worry if you don’t like it, it’s an acquired taste.”

And acquired it was. Alexia hated it at first. Due to the huge amount of leftovers, her brother and her began playing a game and each round, the loser had to eat a slice. Alexia was horrible at the game and she lost almost every round, forcing her to strike up interaction with the dreaded mudpie again and again. However, after awhile, she found herself growing more and more fond of the cake and by the time the entire thing was almost gone, she found herself losing on purpose.

Today, her mother was standing in the kitchen, lifting a freshly-baked chocolate rum cake out of the oven. She placed it in front of Alexia and for the first time in a long time, Alexia felt as though she had no appetite for the cake. Her mother gave her a funny look. “That’s strange, you aren’t attacking the cake in the way you would an exam paper. What’s wrong?”

Alexia sighed and murmured. “Not hungry.”

The look of suspicion didn’t leave her mother’s face but she left the matter as such. Alexia played around with her food, pondering on the topic of Almier and Caden in her head. She wasn’t sure what to think, what she felt, what she was going to do. After that night at the gathering, she was seeing Caden in a whole new light, and after his confession, she wasn’t even sure if she was as hell-bent on not reciprocating his feelings as before. As for Almier, her attraction towards him hadn’t weakened one bit. He was still the god among mere mortals, the only one she had a tinge of respect for. He was also the one who had asked her first.

I’m in a dilemma, Alexia realized with a mild shock. She hadn’t been in a dilemma for years now and she didn’t like the feeling one bit. Okay, that is enough. I am Alexia Lee, for God’s sake! I’m sure there is a logical way to reason and solve this. They say that the early bird catches the worm, and Almier did ask first. Besides, if I were to take away all emotional distraction, associating myself with Almier would bring me far more benefits than it would with Caden. Furthermore, the French exchange programme is coming up in about a month and I will need to get along with Almier if I have any hopes of enjoying myself in Paris. Besides, she thought with a little reluctance, in the rare occasion that I should need any assistance in learning French, Almier could help me. What would Caden possibly offer me?  

Well, he is your neighbour, a little nagging voice in her head said.

I can ignore the grumpy old couple, I can ignore Caden, she resolved with more determintation than she felt. Alexia knew that K.H would childe her on her reasonings, (“Boys are not bank deposits, Alexia,” she would say) but Alexia knew that emotion didn’t serve any purpose other than to complicate matters. There, settled with a little help from reasoning, Alexia thought, trying to convince herself that she was doing the right thing. Caden and I will continue being friends and Almier will go to the dance with me. Life is unfair, and Caden will just have to get used to that.

With the matter settled and in the back of Alexia’s mind, she threw herself into working on the first draft for her essay, which would be collected on Tuesday. Surprisingly, Alexia felt herself drained of all motivation and she stared aimlessly scanning the newspaper hoping some topic would just jump out at her. No such luck, however, and she began to wonder if having such was vague question wasn’t such a good idea, after all.  Come on, where’s a moment of brilliance and genius when you need it? she willed, staring at the ceiling, as if the answer was written all over it. She thought about what she hated most in the world: Her father, the dumb beings that coexisted within the same physical boundaries as herself, war, sickness, society in general.

In the end, she decided to write about what was wrong with society in general. She typed and typed watched her essay grow, but unlike normally, when the brilliance of the content shone through the computer screen, this time, she found her own writings dull, boring, predictable. Her brain felt hard, cold, unused, but deprived of her usual genius, she reluctantly hit send. Then, Alexia went to lie back on her bed and continued staring at the ceiling, the fan spinning round and round until everything became a blur, until she forgot how many blades it had.