Holding Up the Universe(10)

None of this helps me with Chapman. I’ve never had class with her before, and everything about her is young and also ordinary. I mean you’d hope that the woman your dad decides to cheat with on your mom is so remarkable that even a person who doesn’t remember anyone would recognize her. But there’s nothing about her that stands out. Which means she could be anywhere.

I choose a seat at the back, by the window, and someone sits down next to me. There’s this look people get when they know you and when they expect you to know them, and he gives me this now.

“Hey, man,” he says.

“Hey.”

At some point, this cluster of girls breaks apart and one of them walks to the whiteboard at the front of the room. She looks around at everyone, introduces herself, sees me, and her face freezes, just for an instant, before she remembers to smile.

After everyone settles, Monica Chapman starts lecturing about the different branches of chemistry, and all I can think about is the branch she’s not mentioning—the one that’s responsible for her affair with my dad.

The way I found out was Dusty. He was the one who saw the text on Dad’s phone. It was just sitting there, where anyone could see it. Dad had walked away, and Dusty was looking for things to collect—like me, he’s always collecting things—and later he said to me, “I thought Mom’s name was Sarah.”

“It is Sarah.”

“Then who’s Monica?”

So the bastard didn’t even bother to change her name on the phone. There it was, plain as day, Monica. To make matters worse, it wasn’t his regular phone, but some phone he must have bought just to talk to her. Figuring out which Monica took a little more work, but you can take my word for it, it’s her.

Right now she starts in on physical chemistry, and I raise my hand.

“Do you have a question, Jack?”

I think, Do I ever. If I can get the next words out of my mouth, it will be a miracle, because I feel like my chest is stuffed into my throat.

“Actually, I just wanted to tell you what I know about physical chemistry.”

The guy next to me—who seems to be Damario Raines—nods at his desk, and some of the girls turn around to see what I’m going to say. They are identical to each other, and I wonder if they want to look exactly the same or if they even know they do. They’re expecting me to say something clever. I can see it on them. Besides, no one else knows about what happened between Chapman and my dad. Marcus doesn’t even know, and I want to keep it that way.

“Go ahead, Jack.” Chapman’s voice sounds perfectly normal, breezy and clipped, with a hint of Michigan or maybe Wisconsin.

“Physical chemistry applies theories of physics to study chemical systems, which include reaction kinetics, surface chemistry, molecular quantum mechanics, thermodynamics, and electrochemistry.”

I smile this dazzling smile, one that competes with the overhead lights and the sun beating in the windows. I am going to blind her with this fucking smile so she won’t ever be able to see my dad again. A girl two chairs over is grinning at me, chin in her hands, but the others look confused and a little disappointed. The Guy Who Seems to Be Damario says to his desk, “Man.” And I can tell in that one word what a letdown I am.

“Actually, I think that’s my favorite, electrochemistry. There’s just something about a good chemical reaction, am I right?” And then I wink at Monica Chapman, who—for the next twenty seconds—goes speechless.

As soon as she can talk again, she gives us a pop quiz to “judge our aptitude,” but really I think she’s doing it to mess with me, because she grades them at her desk and then says, “Jack Masselin. Pass these back.”

And it is on.

I get out of my seat and walk to the front of the room and take the quizzes from her. And then I stand there for a minute, trying to figure out what to do. The class is looking at me as I look at them. There are four kids who are definite IDs. Three, I’m fairly sure I don’t know and am not supposed to know (but I’m not completely, totally sure). Eight are in the gray zone—better known as the danger zone.

Now, I can march up and down the aisles, trying to match the names of people I know with the faces. I can take all the shit that would be thrown at me as soon as it’s clear that I don’t know who everyone is. Prick. Dumbass.

Or I can do what I’m doing now—hold up the stack of papers and say, “Who here really wants to see what you got?” It was a pop quiz, after all, so it’s not like any of us prepared for it. For good measure, I flip through the pages, and most of the grades are C, D, C-, C. As expected, no one raises a hand. “Who would rather take this opportunity to promise Mrs. Chapman you’ll do better from here on out?” Almost all hands go up. These hands are attached to arms that are attached to torsos that are attached to necks that are attached to faces, which swim at me, foreign and unrecognizable. It’s like being at a costume party every single day where you’re the only one without a costume, but you’re still expected to know who everyone is.

“If you’re interested, I’m going to set them right here.” I drop them onto an empty desk at the front and take my seat.

When the bell rings, Monica Chapman says, “Jack, I’d like a word with you.”

I walk right on out the door like I don’t hear, and go directly to the school office, where I tell them I need to change to the other advanced chemistry class, even though it’s taught by Mr. Vernon, who is at least one hundred and deaf in one ear. The secretary starts in with “I’m not sure we can switch you because we’ll have to reorganize part of your schedule …”