Love, Theoretically

Irepeat to him “There’s no need” so many times, the words lose meaning like in a tongue twister. It’s all in vain.

“Jack, I’m sure you have lots of things to do,” I say as he ushers me out of his office, arm brushing against mine.

“Like what?”

“Um.” Make necklaces out of baby teeth? Deadlift an anvil? “Work?”

He slides his key in the back pocket of his jeans and sizes me up from five feet above me. I feel ridiculously overdressed, even though I’m the one wearing proper professional attire. “I can make the time to show around a potential future colleague.”

Don’t snort, Elsie. Don’t snort. “There really is no need—”

He tuts. “If you keep repeating that, I’ll figure that you don’t want to hang out with me.”

I don’t. But I’d love to hang you.

He pushes me down the hallway with a hand between my shoulder blades, and for a second his many feet and inches and pounds feel tantalizingly, inexplicably inviting. I’m tired. A little weary. I could sink against him and . . .

Whoa.

I think I’m getting woozy. Maybe I need to eat. I shouldn’t, though. I had vitamin-enriched gummy rabbits between interviews to keep my blood sugar from dropping—unwise, letting yourself get hangry when you’re with someone you daydream of slaughtering at baseline. I take out my phone, meaning to check my glycemic levels. Except Jack is staring at it, eyes on the crack splitting the lock screen. (A selfie of Cece and me laughing as we hold up a block of cranberry goat cheese. It was on New Year’s Eve, before we spent four hours watching a Belgian movie about cannibalism, then one more hour discussing its emotional throughline. I wanted to die. The cheese was good, though.)

My glucose monitor looks fine, but I want to check my pod. I need a minute alone. Maybe I can pretend I forgot something in Jack’s office? I turn around to give the door one longing look, and my eyes fall on his nameplate.

“Where’s the Turner from, anyway?” Jack gives me a curious glance. I suspect that his leisure pace is faster than my full-on sprint, but he slows down to match me. How gracious. “Greg’s last name is just Smith.”

“Turner’s my mom’s last name.”

“And Greg didn’t take it?”

“See, this seems like the exact type of information that someone who’s in a loving relationship with my brother would already have.” Okay. That’s not untrue. “Where was Volkov supposed to take you?”

I take my itinerary out of my minuscule pocket. I have to unfold it about twenty times, which seems to amuse Jack. Dick. “Wait. It says here that Dr. Crowley was going to give me the tour.” I look up, hopeful. “You don’t need to—”

“Crowley—and Pereira—are no longer on the search committee.”

“What?” The very two assholes I overheard in the bathroom? “Why?”

“Something came up. They had to step back.” He says it in a monotone, like it’s not weird that two faculty members would pull out in the middle of a search. “But I’m happy to take over.” He holds my eyes, final, blue-quartered. “What does the schedule say?”

Dammit. “Tour of the labs.”

He huffs a laugh. “You sure you want to see those? They’re crawling with experimentalists.”

I stifle an eye roll. “I’d love to see the labs. Like I said, I firmly believe in the collaboration between experimental and theoretical physics, and I value . . .” Jack’s eyebrow lifts (subtext: You’re full of shit), and I trail off.

“Should I just show you the offices, Elsie?”

I press my lips together (subtext: Stop saying my name). “Yes, please.”

The thing about theoretical physics is, it mostly involves thinking. And reading. And scribbling equations on a chalkboard. And contemplating a hemlock salad when you realize that the last three months of your work don’t jive with the Bekenstein-Hawking formula. While writing my dissertation, I spent the bulk of my time in my apartment, staring at the wall, trying to make sense of the segregation of crystals into chiral domains. Every few hours Cece would poke me with the Swiffer to make sure I was alive; Hedgie was perched on her shoulder, eagerly awaiting the green light to feast on my corpse.

We theorists don’t really do labs, and the fanciest equipment we need is computers to run simulations. I’ve never even worn a lab coat—except for the year J.J. made me dress like a sexy neurosurgeon for a Halloween party. Even then, it was 80 percent fishnets.

“Conference rooms are that way.” Jack points to the right. His forearm is corded with muscle. What workout even targets those? “About sixty percent of the department focuses mostly on theory. More, if you include hybrid faculty like Volkov.” He gives me a sideways glance. “Nice job with the puns, by the way. Did you spend hours googling dad jokes?”

Only about twenty minutes. I’m a skimmer. “Tell me, do you feel safe here?”

“Safe?”

“If over sixty percent of faculty are theorists, there must have been instances of . . . slashed tires? Defaced mailbox? Giant dumps on your desk? Unless you sent every theorist an apology Fudgie the Whale on your first day.”

Is that an eye crinkle again? “I’m not the most popular guy on faculty. And I have yet to be invited to the department’s weekly happy hour. But most people are civil. And again, I have nothing against theorists.”

“Sure. Some of your best friends are theorists.”

He holds my eyes as he unlocks a door, and the single dimple makes a reappearance. “This will be your office, Elsie. If your pun game stays on point.”

My fantasies of filling Jack with candy and taking a bat to him—do I need sugar?—are derailed by the high window overlooking campus. And the beautiful desk. And the matching shelves. And the giant whiteboard.

God, this office is spectacular. I could sit here every day. Take in the hardwood smell. Sink into a comfortable chair MIT procurement purchased for me. Let my brain crunch away connections and expand my theories for hours.

Finish my manuscript—the one that’s been on pause for over a year.

I shiver in pleasure at the idea. Unlike at my apartment, no coconut-crab bugs would try to crawl in my mouth. My life would see a 900 percent reduction of May I pay this class’s tuition in Dogecoins emails. And the salary . . . I’d have personal finances. Real ones, not just dimes I forgot in my winter coat the previous year.

I want this office. I want this job. I want it more than I have ever wanted anything, including that Polly Pocket set at age five.

“Do you need some privacy? A mattress? Emergency contraception?”

I whirl around. Jack is leaning against the doorjamb, the set of his shoulders relaxed, his frame filling the entrance. He stares at me with that lopsided smile that almost has me forgetting that we hate each other.

“It’s . . .” I clear my throat. “A nice office.”

“Just nice? You looked on the verge of something there.”

I collect myself. “No, I . . . What’s the teaching load for the position, again?”

He studies me, assessing, and I face away. I’ve had enough of him for today. “Do you enjoy teaching?”

“Of course,” I lie, running a finger over a wooden shelf. It’s not even dusty.

“You don’t,” he says, pilfering truths out of my skull. “Maybe you did before having to teach ninety classes a week, but not anymore.” It’s not a question. “The teaching load is two classes per semester.”

I palm the filing cabinet. “Not too bad.”

“You do know that there are physics jobs that require no teaching?”

“I can get grants. Buy out my classes so I don’t have to teach.”

“Grants are rare for theory. It’ll take you months to apply, years to hear back. Wouldn’t you rather be a full-time researcher?”

I turn around, hands on my hips. “I’m okay with you not wanting me to get this job, but I draw the line at you not wanting me to want it.”

His mouth twitches. “Seems to me like you want to want it a little too much.”

“Jack, here you are.” A young woman stomps at the door of my—okay, the—office. She’s only a few inches shorter than Jack, with long dark hair and an accent that I cannot place. She is gesticulating. A lot. “They did it again.”

“Did what?”

“Overrode my booking of the tokamak. Can you believe it? Third time this month, what the fuck? I had it for next week, then bam, kicked from the calendar. All that bullshit about how the reactor is available to all MIT personnel? They clearly don’t mean grad students. How am I supposed to fuse the plasma—in my fucking pressure cooker?”

“Michi.” Jack sounds unfazed.

“If they want me to superheat gases in my bathtub and blow up my roommate’s Pomeranian, I will fucking do it, but the entire point of being employed by MIT was not having to coalesce my own antimatter! This is the worst goddamn place in the universe, and I’m going to quit this program. I should have stayed at Caltech. I should have gotten into Grandma’s squirrel feeders business—”

“Michi,” Jack interrupts, his voice just a touch firmer. “This is Dr. Elsie Hannaway, one of the candidates for the open faculty position. Dr. Hannaway, Michi is one of my grads.”

Michi had not realized someone else was in the room. The way she turns beet purple is a dead giveaway, and so is her appalled, wide-eyed expression.

I run a quick APE: Michi’s smart, motivated, overworked. She likes and trusts Jack (so maybe not that smart?). She’s mortified her rant was overheard. Judging from her quivering lower lip, she’s about to burst into tears.

Uh-oh.

“That sucks,” I say quickly. The Elsie she needs commiserates. “I hate it when labs double-book.” I’ve never booked a lab in my entire life. But. “How hard is it to set up a functioning Google calendar?” Very, I assume. But Michi’s lip un-quivers. She un-purples.

“Right?”

“It’s not just MIT. Every place is like that. I was a grad until a year ago, and we were always the last to get access to equipment.” If by equipment you mean colored chalk. “It gets better after you graduate.”

The lip re-quivers. “It does?”

“I promise.” I smile reassuringly. My weakness is women in STEM. I want to protect them from the structurally unequal hellfire of academia. “In the meantime, I’m sure Jack will be happy to intercede.”

Jack’s scowl broadcasts his unfamiliarity with the concept of happiness. “I’ll make sure you have access, Michi.” He says Michi, but he’s looking at me. Glaring, to be precise. And when Michi scurries away with a nod, he pushes from the door and walks right up to me, a vertical line between his brows.

It’s almost a physical shock, redirecting from Michi—open-book, see-through Michi—to Jack. He’s the usual blank brick wall of question marks, and I want to tear out my hair. His hair. All hair. Why does he have to be so frustrating? Why does he have to be the most unreadable—

“The real girl who wished to be a puppet,” he murmurs, low and rumbly.

“What?”

“I can actually watch you do it.”

“Do what?”

“Analyze people. Turn yourself on and off.”

I take a terrified step back. A combative step forward. I can’t read him for shit, and he’s in my head? “You know, Jack, we all interact differently with different people. It’s called code-switching, a totally normal social skill—”

“Code-switching has nothing to do with erasing who you are and twisting what’s left of you. Have you ever even booked a lab? What equipment were you denied?”

“Listen, it worked. Michi was about to cry. I anticipated her needs, and there were no tears.”

“You lie, Elsie. Every single one of your interactions is a lie.” He crosses his arms and looms. We’re supposed to be on a tour of the department. I feel like he’s taking a tour of me. “Is this what you do with Greg, too? You code-switch a conjured, nonexistent persona he fell in love with?”

“No.” Jesus. Greg needs to get his ass back from yoga camp as stat as possible.

“Are you doing it with me, too?” His scowl deepens.

“What? No!” I can’t even read you!

“Are you turning yourself into what I want? Is that why whenever I’m with you, I . . .” His voice trails off, or maybe it doesn’t. Maybe I’ve just reached critical mass.

I’m dizzy. My heart’s a drum in my ears. There’s a single droplet of cold sweat running down my spine, and I’m sure, absolutely positive that fighting with Jack has burned the last of my glucose molecules.

My blood is 0 percent sugar. Fun.

“Elsie?”

Vision’s blurry. Where’s the wall? I gotta lean against the—

“Elsie?” Hands. Muscles. Bones. Warmth. I’m pressed against something and—“Elsie, what the hell is going on?”

“Sugar.” So nice, not having to stand anymore. I feel so light. “Fast-acting carbs. Juice or soda or . . . candy. Can you . . . ?” There’s warm, smooth skin under my palm. Then I’m deposited on top of the desk—my desk—my future desk—God, I really hope I get this job—I’ll put that Bill Nye figurine I like to pretend J.J. didn’t give me by the computer—my Alice and Bella Funko Pops on the cabinet—a plant on the windowsill—something vicious and carnivorous—a Venus flytrap, maybe—I’ll feed Jack’s cactus to her—I’ll feed Jack to her—

“Here.”

My eyes flutter open. I suspect Jack was gone for a peaceful moment, but now he’s back. To witness my misery. Like those arsonists who return to the crime scene to masturbate—

“Elsie. Take it.”

There’s a bottle in front of my nose, full of a dark liquid. I pry it from his hand and take several long gulps. Instant bliss.

Well, not instant. Not bliss, either. It takes a few minutes for my blood sugar to stabilize. Even then, I still feel like a cadaver. A bad one that you get when you’re in med school and show up late for anatomy lab.

Should I drink more? I check my glucose level on the iTwat—shit, my pod malfunctioned again. Delivered too much. Blood sugar’s under seventy milligrams. I’ll take two more sips, then wait two minutes, then—

“You have diabetes.”

I look up. Oh, right. Jack’s still here. Watching me with a half-hawkish, entirely concerned expression. Taking up most of my future office in that visceral, present way of his. I need to get going with that Venus flytrap purchase.

“Mm-hmm.”

“Type 1?”

I nod.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

I take another sip of my soda—which, I’m slowly realizing, is not Coke—and laugh. “Why would I tell you? So you can slip Werther’s Original in my tea?”

“Funny you mention that.” He doesn’t seem to be having fun. “Since I’ve met you exactly five times so far, and during two of those you suffered from some diabetes-related complication that required my help.”

“Eight more and I get a free sub?”

He snorts a laugh. “With this level of self-sabotaging, you don’t need outside help.”

I evil-eye him half-heartedly, too tired to bicker. “The only two times I’ve had glycemic attacks in the last year were in your presence. Maybe your superpower is making my pod malfunction.”

“You need to tell Monica.”

“Monica’s not going to like me any less because I have diabetes.” I think?

His eyes harden. “You think I want you to tell her to diminish your chances? You’re shitting on your chances all on your own, with the fainting around and the easily disprovable lies. I’m concerned about your health.”

“I take full responsibility for my health, and it doesn’t affect my work. I’m not required to share my status to—”

“You almost passed out.”

“My pump malfunctioned. It’s old and shitty and I need a new one. But they’re prohibitive without health insurance, so.”

Does he look guilty? Maybe. Maybe it’s just resting frown face. “Does Greg know about the diabetes?”

How socially acceptable would it be for me to burst into Greg’s corporate bonding retreat and drag him back to Boston by the ear? “He doesn’t need to know.”

Jack’s lips thin. “Is this part of your game?”

“My what?”

“This weird thing. Where you delete and remake yourself?”

“You are obsessed.” And disturbingly right. “Are you into conspiracy theories? Lizard people? Fictional Finland?” I take another sip. “God, this is bitter.” The label on the bottle is in a foreign language. “What is it?”

“Volkov’s favorite drink.”

“What?”

“He has his brother send a few cases over from Russia that he rations and cherishes like liquid gold. That’s the last bottle.”

I’d do a spit take if I could bear to drink another sip. “What?”

“Don’t worry. I’ll mention that you really needed it, Elsie. He won’t mind much.”

“No. No, no, no. Don’t tell him. Do not tell Volkov. I’m gonna find an import store. Buy a replacement. Where did you get this from? I can . . .”

I trail off. Jack’s dimple is back. He’s smiling.

Evilly.

“It’s not really Volkov’s, is it?”

He shakes his head.

“I hate you,” I say without heat.

“I know.” He grabs the bottle, takes a sip. Scrunches his nose in an almost cute way. Does he know my lips were right there? “Disgusting. I stole it from the student lounge. Only non-diet soda I could find.”

“You just stole from a grad student?” I laugh.

“Yeah. An unexpected low.”

I laugh harder—must be that sugar high. “How do you sleep at night?”

“I have a really firm mattress. Great for spinal health.”

Laughing again here. And so is Jack. I take the bottle back and sip again. I guess we’re both vaccinated. What’s the harm? “God, this tastes like paint thinner.”

“Or a plankton isopropyl alcohol smoothie.” Oh my God. I’m laughing even more. Do I have permanent brain damage? “Are you going to be okay?” His voice is suddenly softer. More intimate. He’s really standing closer than we need to be. At least he’ll catch me if I fall again.

“Yeah. I just need a second to recover.” Last sip. Is this compost juice growing on me? Maybe it’s just this place. The midafternoon sunlight warming the hardwood floor. The shelves waiting to be filled with my books. “And another second to marvel at the splendor of my future office.”

Jack shakes his head and smiles, almost wistful. “Sorry, Elsie. It won’t be your office.”

The thought is bloodcurdling. “You’re not sorry. And you don’t know the future. I’m outpunning you, Jack. The teaching demonstration—it went really well. And I didn’t even steal Volkov’s mother’s milk. I have a chance.”

He studies me for a long moment, silent. Then asks again, “Will you be all right?”

“Yeah, I just need a second to—”

“No, I mean . . . will you be okay? If you lose Greg—because I will tell him about you. And if you don’t get this job. Will you still be . . . fine?”

I can’t immediately decipher his tone. Then I do and burst out laughing.

He’s worried. He seems genuinely worried about my well-being and state of mind. Which is surprisingly nice and maybe a tad amusing, until I realize why: he’s convinced that I’ll fail. And that makes me feel . . . something. A mix of anger and fear and something else, reminiscent of the carefree joy that comes from dancing on the graves of enemies who dared to underestimate me.

“What will you do if I get this job, Jack?” I lean forward. My face is a couple of inches from his. “Pull out your hair? Ask for the manager? Leave the department and become a Zumba instructor?”

He doesn’t pull back. Instead he watches me even more intently, like I’m a critter in the palm of his hand, and I contemplate the possible scenarios, the same ones that must be filling his head, too.

Jack Smith-Turner and Elsie Hannaway. Esteemed colleagues. Office neighbors. Academic foes.

Oh, I could make his life so hard. Spread the rumor that he wraps his entire mouth around the water fountain. Put a nest of killer cicadas in the lowest drawer of his desk. Push him outside bare-eyed during an eclipse. The sky’s the limit, and I want to see him suffer. I want to see him lose. I want to see him sweat it. I want to see him cry, because he lost and I won.

But perhaps I won’t.

Because: “If you get the job . . .” He leans close. That slice of eye burns bright blue, and his mouth curves. “I’ll make do.”

“While crying yourself to sleep because I’m not George?”

“Not everyone wants you to be someone else, Elsie.” He’s wrong about that, but I can smell his skin. It’s good in a way that’s primeval. Almost evolutionary. I hate it. “And I definitely wouldn’t want you to be George.”

“And why is that?”

He presses his lips together. He’s even closer now. Surprisingly earnest. “It would be a waste.”

“A waste of what?”

“Of you.”

My heart skips. Stumbles. Restarts with a gallop. What does he even—

“Jack! Dr. Hannaway—here you are. My meeting just ended.” Volkov appears in the doorframe. “I’m so sorry for running late.”

Jack has taken a step back. “No problem,” he says, looking at me. “I just hope you wore something reflective.”

A moment of silence. Then Volkov registers the pun and starts wheezing. “Oh, Jack, you—you—” He chortles. Jack’s already walking out of the room, but he stops in the door for a long glance and a low “Goodbye, Elsie.” After a beat, he adds, “It was a pleasure.”