“Huuuuh.” He stretched the syllable.
“Does that make sense?”
He nodded.
“Things you can’t see, but you know they’re there.”
“Yes,” she said.
“Like some people.”
“Exactly.”
A knock on the door shook them both.
“Professor Jones?” A mousy girl stuck her head inside.
Liam stood.
“Thank you,” he said hurriedly.
He picked up his tablet—nearly blank.
“We didn’t finish,” Sophie protested.
“You’ve been extremely helpful. And I do have a painting to…” He waved an invisible paintbrush. “Thank you for your time.”
“It’s all the same.”
* * *
Sophie stepped up to the podium for her last lecture of the semester. Today, she’d explain her famous proof, the Malchik theorem. The auditorium was packed, buzzing with conversation. People crammed into the aisle between rows and sat cross-legged on the carpet. More and more people kept trickling in now dangerously close to the 2 p.m. start.
Peter sat in the front row next to Maggie. They’d arrived twenty minutes early as they always did for this lecture. His cheeks were plumper than the sharp edges they used to be. His jawbones no longer converged into an arrowhead chin. Sandy brown age spots freckled his happy face. Everything about him was softer, which Maggie attributed to “peace of mind.” On Maggie’s other side, Isabel and Ronald sat holding hands next to their caretaker, a young nurse named Jolene. Isabel’s nails were painted white as her hair. Sophie smiled.
“Good morning,” she said.
Even with a gentle voice, she commanded attention.
“Today, I’ll describe the Malchik theorem…”
Peter remembered when he’d first read that name on their train ride into Cambridge. Sophie had been about to scribe her proof before a stadium-size audience of their most sophisticated peers. News crews were already on-site waiting to break the story of her success or failure. The last page of her proof lay on Peter’s lap. He’d been going through the hundred pages of her journal line by line before Sophie presented that afternoon just in case she forgot something and needed him to feed her the next step. She hadn’t asked for this, but he’d wanted to help. Peter had just come across the three-word title at the very end: “The Malchik Theorem.”
“Thank you,” Peter said sincerely.
English countryside rolled by their window.
Sophie removed an earbud.
Did he hear Ray Charles?
“Thank you,” Peter repeated.
“Of course.”
Sophie never explained why she hadn’t named it after herself. Peter had assumed that part of it was she wanted as little attention as possible. Part of it, though, must have been affection for him and Maggie—that she did value the time he’d devoted to her since her freshman year, that she did feel part of the home they’d opened to her leading up to that pivotal day.
After her presentation, Peter and Sophie hunched over two baskets of fish and chips in the back of a dark pub in England. Peter only ate a couple of French fries. He stared at the red checkered tablecloth while Sophie downed her grape soda and kept eating long after he’d finished. Peter wrung his hands, struggling to find the right words.
What Peter was trying to articulate was: he knew Sophie was driven by loss. When she stayed late in his living room to ask more questions, she wasn’t just looking for insight. She was looking for him, whoever he was, or for whatever it was that they’d had. But as Peter sat in that pub with Sophie—knowing the thousands of hours it had taken her to get there, the commitment through setbacks, the persistence through plateaus, and the mind-boggling number of normal life experiences she’d forfeited for the sake of this uncertain endeavor—it dawned on him that Sophie had proven something else. Maybe it was something only he could see. There was the math on the whiteboard, and that was one thing. But he saw another proof in Sophie’s life. Through her choices, she’d proven beyond a shadow of a doubt her own love for the one she’d lost. Peter wanted to tell Sophie how much he admired not just her mind, but her heart, and he was as proud as if… But none of the words seemed to fit.
Peter glanced sideways at Maggie. He reached for her hand and squeezed it, as proud as if Sophie were one of their own.
* * *
Minutes into class, the back door opened and clicked shut. Three more Yalies trickled in and disappeared into the crowd behind the last row. Sophie lost her train of thought. How many eyes were in this room? At least four hundred studied her. She shrunk her world down to familiar faces: her parents, the Malchiks, the woman who’d raised her hand every few slides all semester to ask a question, the man who’d eaten an entire bowl of cereal every lecture, and his friend who’d always used the chair in front of him as a footrest.
Liam and Daya entered through the back door. They held hands as they crept hunchbacked down the center aisle and across the front row to sit on the floor ten feet from the podium. Liam waved at Sophie until Daya forced his arm down.
Sophie smiled.
“As I was saying…”
* * *
Students lined up for Sophie after class. Her parents avoided the uproar by leaving with Jolene and the Malchiks. Sophie greeted everyone who waited their turn. At the end of the line, Liam stood with an arm around Daya. Between handshakes, Sophie checked on them in the back. Daya wore denim overalls cut off above the knee. Liam’s tee had a foot-long, apostrophic slash of silver paint on one side. Liam never looked more like Jake than when he was kissing Daya’s temple or squeezing her arm. The young couple didn’t seem to notice the irksome wait at all. Sophie shook hand after hand until it was only the three of them left.
“Sophie!” Liam hugged her. “That blew my mind.”
“Thank you for coming.”
“Well, we weren’t just here for the physics.” Liam fished a catalog from his pocket. On the cover, a painted lightning bolt struck earth. Comets ricocheted out of the point of collision. The impossible scene was strangely beautiful. The next page read, “Intertwined: Liam Carlson’s Graduation Art Show.” The subtitle “Thanks to” presided over a long list of names. Liam pointed to the middle of the stack, “Dr. Sophie Jones.”
“We’d be honored if you’d come,” he said.
Daya nodded.
“Not just because you helped me pass physics.” Liam laughed. “Our talks inspired one of my pieces. I’d love to tell you more about it at the show.”
* * *
Sophie studied the catalog as she climbed Hillhouse. Her head felt bloodless, brainless. She texted her parents and the Malchiks on the same thread to say she wasn’t feeling well, that she thought she should be alone tonight. She’d see them soon at graduation next week.
Would he be there?
Sophie shut the door to her house behind her. She dropped her keys on the silver console in the front hall.
Of course he’d be there.
Wouldn’t he?
Sophie climbed narrow stairs to the first floor and then a second flight to the attic. The roof sloped. Crouching, she moved a plastic bin of winter boots aside to reveal a shoebox covered in dust. She carried it downstairs to the living room sofa. Inside the box, a mound of envelopes were addressed to her. The delicate papers were tinged off-white. She removed faded loose-leaf inside one and unfolded a letter thin as tissue. His blue pen print read:
Sophie,
Merry Christmas! By the time you read this, you’ll be home, I’ll be at my place, and we won’t have seen each other for a few days. In case you aren’t feeling it right now, over there where I can’t hold you: I am out-of-this-world in love with you.
As I think about what was going on in my life last year, I never imagined that someone—you—would come into my life and sweep me off my feet. These months together have been a dream. I can’t say it enough: you’re beautiful, fascinating, kind, and you amaze
me every day. You listen whenever I say anything, and you hear what I mean. It’s easy to be romantic on special occasions. But when I see your face after I come back from the gym, or when I meet you on Science Hill, my heart jumps like nothing I’ve felt before. Every day, I wake up astonished at how we got here and, frankly, that this exists. I feel incredibly lucky to have found this one other person who understands me. I’ve never met anyone before who just understands.
Even when I’m not there—all of that is true.
See you soon.
Love,
Jake
Sophie put the letter next to her on the sofa.
She unwrapped another.
Sophie,
Time flies when you’re having fun. It seems like just yesterday we were sitting next to each other for the first time in psych. In case I haven’t told you any of this recently, for your twentieth (!) birthday (!), I say it again. Sophie, I love it when:
You hold my leg when we’re sitting side by side.
You slow the kiss down and run your hands through my hair.
You tilt your head to the side when you’re thinking hard about something.
You teach me before we go to sleep.
You leave me notes around our room.
You answer “I love you” with “I know.”
You make me feel like I can accomplish anything.
You make me want to be better without making me feel like I need to change. I’ve always had big dreams, but being with you gives them meaning.
For this and much more, I want you to know that, to me, you are perfect. Every day, I feel so lucky to have met you. I hope you had a great birthday, and I can’t wait to spend many, many more with you.
I love you with all my heart.
Jake
She read letter after letter, avoiding a particular envelope until it was the only one left. The Sophie on it was slanted, hurried. Jake had given her this on the day he postponed his birthday dinner with her senior year. He’d forgotten all about their plans until after Sophie had started cooking for them. It was the last letter he’d written her.
Sophie,
I’m so sorry for losing track of time.
I want to take this moment to say something I can’t say enough: my love, you are rare and extraordinary. I know you hate to be singled out, but it’s important to me that you know how special you are. Even if you won’t admit it.
I realize things are not the way they should be right now, but I also know that nothing is stronger than our love for each other. Things are messy and tough, but life is messy and tough. In the end, this will only make us better and stronger.
Love,
Jake
Sophie rested the note on her gut.
CHAPTER 13
Jake stopped in his lap pool and panted before the transformed New York City skyline. Goggles clung to his hairline above deep wrinkles as he gazed at the green panorama. Since college, warmer temperatures had brought the ocean into Manhattan, filling new canals, marshes, and grassy spaces. He checked the stalled timer on his Roxster: forty-five minutes. He stepped out of the pool and dried himself on the way to his master bathroom.
Walking through the empty apartment, he passed bare wall after bare wall. His decorator had propped enormous photographs—a portrait of Muhammad Ali, photos of horses caught mid-gallop—against the walls in dozens of places. Jake had promised to hang them, but the truth was that the blankness felt right. He still had more to do. This wasn’t where he was supposed to stop. He hadn’t furnished the place aside from his bedroom and a sofa in the living room, so his penthouse retained an uninhabited quality. He had no guests.
As Jake showered, headlines scrolled across the glass next to a display of his physical stats. He scanned them while washing his hair. When the water stopped, the news disappeared, and Jackie Wilson’s classic, soulful voice filled the apartment. Technology had leapt ahead, but Jake still loved that song “(Your Love Keeps Lifting Me) Higher & Higher.” He knew it by heart—a gorgeous internal tattoo.
His walk-in closet contained a long horseshoe of suit jackets hanging over a ring of pants. Shelves flanked him, filled with over one hundred pairs of similar loafers and sneakers. He dressed in a gray tee and lightweight suit jacket. Every day, a different version of the same outfit. He stuck to metallic shades in the same color palette as armor. In the elevator down to the lobby, he checked his neat reflection. He’d had the same haircut for most of his life.
He hopped in the back of a black car.
“Boss,” the car’s masculine AI greeted.
“Carl, please route to Olympus.”
Jake sat on a honey-colored seat. He read the news on his watch until they reached his office building in midtown.
“Boss, we have arrived.”
Jake kept reading.
“Boss, we have arrived.”
The alert repeated at higher and higher volumes.
“Carl, stop. Carl, what’s the weather today?”
“Today, expect a high of eighty-two degrees and a low of seventy-three degrees with clear skies.”
Outside, the dense air felt tropical. One Madison Avenue welcomed Jake back with air-conditioning. As he rose in the elevator up to Olympus, he scrolled through new emails—From: Carlson, Liam. No message preview. When Jake tapped to open it, a lightning bolt dominated his screen. He swiped to the next page which announced “Intertwined” as the title of Liam’s art show followed by a list of acknowledgments—Dr. Sophie Jones.
The elevator doors opened.
Jake stood still.
The doors started to shut.
His arm flew forward.
How did they know each other?
He stepped forward into Olympus, which filled the top floor. Above him, thick white beams sloped up, down, and sideways like roller-coaster tracks. The rafters were packed with plants: ferns, spear-leaved snake plants, dark green ivy with leaves down every tendril, and spider plants with long white arms. Jake walked down the central path dividing the office in half. Most of the analysts stood as they worked on clear touch screens at eye level. These hovered by magnetic suspension, barely distinguishable from the air around them. Only in passing did their round edges glimmer.
Jake shut the door to his office behind him.
He sat down.
His stomach shrunk.
Would she be at Liam’s show?
* * *
Right after Sophie had proved block theory, Jake had gone to sleep every night with the same fantasy vignette in mind: meeting again in New Haven. He imagined she’d reply to his email with thoughtful lines of her own. They’d schedule a time to find each other again in Blue State or Ashley’s, or on Cross Campus. During the day, between distracted meetings, he researched online to prepare for that moment. He searched for any science on “first love reunions.” Google would prompt in the “People Also Ask” sidebar:
What is first love?
Why is first love so special?
Why is the first love hardest to forget?
But most articles Jake found on “first love reunions” were fluff pieces in ten-point lists or slideshows where half the slides were ads. He stayed in that place of scattered reading for a week, not getting any half-decent information, but hopeful he’d find some, until the day she mentioned, “I have some ideas.”
Then, he let the fantasy go.
A few months later, he met Dr. Chuck Bradley at a fundraiser hosted by Olympus in New York City. The Midtown Cipriani’s high, painted ceilings paled in comparison to the black-tie crowd on its floor. All proceeds went to Empower Now, a charity devoted to breaking the cycle of poverty. Jake was already making waves as a philanthropist. He sat on Empower Now’s board; he personally funded education initiatives in bad neighborhoods; he visited high schools in the city to expose kids to finance; and he skimmed every résumé sent to Olympus that had been rejected for inexperience.
On that particular night, while in line for the bar, Chuck introduced himself
as a social scientist at New York University.
Jake shook his hand.
“What are you working on?” Jake asked.
“First love,” Chuck said.
Chuck said he was doing survey work on people who’d met their first love much later in life. Jake proceeded to ask a string of questions so passionately and precisely worded that he worried Chuck might wrongly perceive him as a potential benefactor. Chuck scribbled a list of relevant journal articles on a cocktail napkin.
“But those are just background,” Chuck said.
“What do you mean?” Jake asked.
Chuck said his new article, “Love Interrupted,” was the missing link in the literature. No one had looked at first love over a long enough time period. So, ten years prior, Chuck had identified 1,002 American couples in their late teens or early twenties who’d been dating for at least a year and claimed to be in love for the first time. Last year, he had contacted all of them. Twenty-three had been separated by circumstances—moving for a job or for school, most commonly—and had definite plans to meet up with their love again. Chuck interviewed them before and after the reunion. The results would be published in a peer-reviewed journal in two months.
Chuck then went on a tangent about how rare great research in psychology was becoming as it faced underfunding. “Dry period,” Chuck repeated. His palm stayed open as he bemoaned the challenges. Jake only nodded.
“Love Interrupted” came out on schedule.
Jake read it immediately.
Chuck had found that ten years later, 73 percent of the initial 2,004 people thought their first love was the greatest romance of their lives. Chuck had asked people to rank its specific traits as compared to those of relationships since. In this survey, the majority said their first love was the most trusting, vulnerable, sexual, dependent, euphoric, and painful romance of their lives. Across the board, first love was the most intense on every metric. Chuck explained this by saying that the best predictor of relationship caliber was the amount of quality time spent together. He referenced a shelf’s worth of research for support—some of which he’d recommended to Jake—and then summarized at the end, “The key to love is time.” When people were young, they were rich with it. They could funnel it in massive volumes into a relationship. “The chance to grow a relationship that deep almost never happens again.”
The Love Proof Page 17
