Solving for Ex

Chapter 6

Chapter Six

apt to expect too much

It was only the second week of Junior Honors English, which was basically the next lowest form of hell before we would descend into Senior AP English the following year. I’d seen the reading list for AP, with such delights as Moby Dick, Notes from the Underground, and Middlemarch. So you’d think that our Junior English professor would let us read some lighter stuff.

No chance. She plunked down a shiny new copy of Mansfield Park on each of our desks on the first day.

“I’m not trying to be cute,” she said, her sentences punctuated with the thunk of each book on a desk. “Okay, well, maybe I am. I do love that our school shares a name with my very favorite Austen novel. But that’s not why it’s my favorite. Compared to Pride and Prejudice, which you’ll read in AP next year, Mansfield Park is mature and nuanced, studded with deeper social issues than all the rest of Austen’s works put together. We’ll be having a quiz next Wednesday about the major themes and character arcs, so I’d suggest reading it more closely than you would, for example, the newspaper. Or your fashion magazines.”

Britt raised her hand. She had been the rare freshman Mathlete, was freakishly good at every other subject, stunningly gorgeous, and incredibly popular. Yes, she was one of those girls. “We don’t get the newspaper.”

Mrs. Crawford rolled her eyes and, without looking back, said, “My point exactly, Miss Harding.”

Some of the guys in the back of the class snickered at that last name, just like they did every single other time anyone said it. Including themselves. This was going to be a long year.

  I’d heard enough about Mrs. Crawford to know to take her seriously, so I’d spent Saturday afternoon after breakfast with Brendan marking up my copy with theme, major plot points, and some interesting character stuff.

On quiz day, most of the kids had buried their noses in their books in the five minutes between arriving to class and the bell ringing, as though the text could be absorbed through their eyeballs in that span of time and then magically translated by their brain into quiz answers when the time came. Britt was one of them, and Vincent leaned across the aisle and rested his elbows on her desk, pretending to look at her notes with her, his gaze flicking down her shirt. I rolled my eyes, and then leaned back in my desk and closed my eyes for a moment of peace and quiet before bell rang.

Just as I was imagining the next shot of the river walk I’d like to attempt from the fire escape of one of the old restaurants in downtown Pittsburgh, my ponytail flipped up and around in a circle. I sat straight up and turned slowly to see Vincent, who slouched back and smirked just enough to let a dimple show in the expanse of his ridiculously flawless skin.

I caught my breath against the annoyance of some guy I didn’t know, gorgeous or not, flicking my hair around like we were best friends. I cocked my head and raised my eyebrow.

He leaned down in his bag and pulled out his copy of Mansfield Park. It was one hundred percent flawless—unmarked and free of dog-ears—like it was pure luck he’d remembered to bring it to class today.  “Ready for this quiz?” he asked. “I hear Crawford’s a hard-ass.”

I quirked an eyebrow. “Are you ready? Looks like you didn’t prep.”

“Looks can be deceiving.” He tapped the cover of the book. “We read this at my old school. I’ll get a perfect score, mark my words.”

He’d read Mansfield Park when he was a sophomore? And I thought this school was nuts. I smiled. “We’ll see.”

Mrs. Crawford handed the papers back and we got to work. Twenty-five minutes later, I’d thrown down three different main thematic threads in the work and bitched for four paragraphs about why Edmund Bertram really had to be such a clueless dickheaded milquetoast when all the rest of the characters were really deep and interesting. I of course had already completed the first page, which had been regular multiple choice.

“I’ll take your long answers,” Mrs. Crawford said, pacing the front of the room. “You’ll do me a favor by grading one another’s multiple choice right now. Please pass your tests one seat forward and mark off any answers that don’t match what I read here.”

True to his word, Vincent got a perfect score. We handed the tests forward just before the bell rang. I didn’t know why, but I let myself hang back to walk out into the hallway with him.

 “I’m very impressed,” I said.

He laughed. “By what? I told you I’d get a perfect score.”

“So you just really love Mansfield Park, then?”

“Obviously.” He smiled, but I couldn’t tell what kind of smile it was. It looked completely genuine, yet vague. Like there was no real anchor between his expression and the meaning of smiling. Like it was his default when he didn’t want people to know what he really thought of something.

At least it was a damn beautiful smile, though. I had to avert my eyes to keep myself from enjoying it too much, or I’d probably crash into the wall or something.

“So, you and Sofia,” I said as we walked. “Are you, like, Fanny and William close, or more like Henry and Mary close?”

“Huh?” he said, looking at me with a furrowed brow.

I knew he had heard me. I got suspicious about that uncracked book all over again. “Mansfield Park?”

There went that smile again. Totally chill, totally relaxed, totally in control. Totally disconnected.

He laughed again. “Well, let’s just say we’re close enough. We grew up moving around a lot. Most of the time, we were the only people we knew at a new school. So we’ve hung out more than most siblings, probably. And I know her well enough to know that if I ever called her Franny she’d kill me.”

“Fanny.”

“Yeah,” he grinned, “That’s what I said.”

I knew something about that wasn’t right, but my drive to bring up another topic of conversation was way too strong to let me push something less important.

“So it looks like Brendan and Sofia got friendly pretty fast on the cruise,” I said, wondering how I could have thought that something that forward could ever sound like a casual ask.

“Okay, see? That’s where we’re not close. Because I do not get involved in my sister’s love life. Line drawn. Right there.”

“Who said I was talking about her love life?”

“Is there any other reason you would bring that up?” he asked, his grin now turning playful. “Whatever. The point is, I don’t know anything.”

We were most of the way to the lunchroom before I realized that we’d walked the whole way together. There were two interesting things about this: First, girls’ heads turned for Vincent like the boys’ heads turned for Sofia. Second, Vincent was only looking at me.

“So, this Mathletes thing,” he said.

I almost jumped when he spoke; I was too busy thinking about why he was walking with me. Way to look like an idiot, Ash.

“Tell me about it. It’s pretty cool, here?”

“Yeah, and if you get on the team and we go to State, it’s really good for your college applications. Like, basically guaranteed to one of the better schools.”

“And that’s why everyone’s so obsessed?”

“Yeah, pretty much.” Except me.

 “What about Brendan? He seems cool.”

This, I could hear in his voice. He was saying that Brendan seemed too cool to be a Mathlete. I shrugged. “He just loves it. That’s it. And, yeah, he wants to go Ivy League. So…”

“Okay, so show me the ropes?”

“You want to join Mathletes?”

“Why not? I’m good at math, and it’s cool here. And you’ll be there, right?”

My cheeks blazed red as I dipped my head in a single nod. “I will be there.”

“Then so will I,” he said with a smile. This one seemed genuine.