by Rose, Aubrey
A student walked around the corner of the library into view, and I instinctively sat back upright, realizing the insanity of the situation. This was a man I did not know at all, a stranger in the snow, and I was ready to fall into his arms as quickly and easily as if I had known him all my life. I stood up from the bench, scared by the intensity of my attraction to him, unlike anything I had felt before.
“I have to go,” I said. “My study group.”
“Yes, of course,” he said, still sitting. He did not seem anxious at all to see me go, but as I moved past him his hand shot out to stop me, catching me by the elbow.
“May I ask your name?” he said.
I hesitated for only a split second. “Valentina,” I replied. “Valentina Alastair.”
“My name is Eliot. Thank you for the coffee, Valentina,” the man said. He let go of my arm and I walked quickly toward the library, forcing myself to only look ahead. I thought that if I turned to look at him, I would not be able to leave him. But at the library door, I gave into curiosity and let myself glance back at him.
There was nobody there. He had vanished, like a snowflake that falls onto your cheek and melts into water before you feel it touch your skin. Above the bench there was a wisp of white breath that curled into itself, fading, until it dissipated into the air. Under the bench no footprints left any indication to where he had disappeared. The sheets of snow whipped along the sidewalk and brushed away any trace of the man who held my hands in his so possessively.
The snow continued to fall and I blinked once, hard, then went inside.
CHAPTER TWO
“Dr. Herceg! Dr. Herceg! Wait!”
Eliot turned to see the department chair fairly skipping to catch up to him.
“Eliot, please,” he said, shaking Patterson’s hand in greeting.
“Eliot. Yes. Excellent. I’m so glad I could catch you,” he said.
“What can I help you with?” Eliot asked, faintly irritated. With gray hair and spectacles resting on his thin nose, the department chair resembled just about every other mathematician Eliot had ever known. Dr. Patterson had been running the department for as long as Eliot could remember, although he tried to avoid the man as a rule. Patterson preferred conversation about office politics to those of mathematics, and Eliot’s disdain for the academic rat race had not endeared him to the man. Eliot’s position as a fellow had been granted as a special exemption so that he could remain in America to study, and he knew Patterson resented the way Eliot isolated himself.
“I wanted to talk to you about your internship prize. And your work in general.”
“Of course.” Eliot paused, then realized the man didn’t want to speak in public. “Your office?”
“Yes, please, this way. Crazy weather we’ve been having, isn’t it?”
Eliot murmured his assent as the gray-haired man led the way down the hall and into his office.
“As you probably know, there have been rumblings about the internship program. Please, sit.” The department chair sat behind his desk. Eliot scanned it quickly. On the desk were a number of official-looking papers: grant proposals, staff recommendations. A picture of a slim, blonde wife and two children. A half-empty glass of water. A gilded clock on a marble base. A framed plaque of commendation from a mathematical society. He had no mathematics on his desk save a pile of student homework papers.
Eliot eased himself into the leather chair in front of the desk. His frame was too long, his elbows jutting out over both armrests.
“Rumblings?” he said.
“On the email lists for the math department.” Patterson raised his eyebrows meaningfully, but Eliot didn’t get the meaning.
“I don’t read them.”
“Ah, hmm.” Patterson shifted in his chair. “But of course you’ve talked with the other professors in the department about your work.”
“No.”
“Well,” Patterson said. He tapped a pen on his desk. “Well.”
Eliot stared ahead calmly. The clock on the desk filled the room with its ticking.
“It’s just that…” the department chair began. He coughed.
“Just that what, Dr. Patterson?”
The man coughed again into his hand, evidently not wanting to bring up the subject. Eliot leaned over and pushed the half-empty glass of water toward him.
“For your cough.”
The gray-haired professor looked startled, his eyes glinting with suspicion. Eliot met his gaze coolly. Patterson set the glass aside without taking a drink and leaned forward over his desk.
“It’s been some time since you’ve last published anything, Dr. Herceg—”
“Eliot.”
“—and many in the department feel as though you have been too selective in your internship program. Dr. Carrey, for example.”
“The one whose son was rejected last year,” Eliot said. The math professor had called Eliot to beg for his child’s acceptance. That conversation had not gone well.
“That’s right.” Patterson did not meet Eliot’s eyes. “Many here take his side.”
“Good for them.”
“And many have noticed that you have not visited your internship program in Budapest at all since its inception.”
“I manage the students remotely.”
“Some say you don’t manage at all.” Patterson breathed heavily, as though under a great weight.
“I have tried to do my best working from here. I need to focus on my research.” Eliot felt his skin heat up slightly. He hated to lie, even a lie by omission. Truthfully, he could not bring himself to return to Hungary.
“That’s another thing. Since your contributions to the mathematical profession have waned…”
“I’m working,” Eliot said, lightly touching his fingertips together, “on a difficult problem.”
“So you may well be. But since you do not—or cannot—publish, we feel that it would be beneficial for you to increase your contributions in other areas. For example, taking on more students for your internship.”
“I take on many students each year to the academy.” Eliot tilted his head to one side, casually cracking his neck.
“But only one from this university!” Patterson pointed one finger in the air, as though he had made an important issue clear. “Only one!”
“Are the students from Pasadena inherently more qualified than those from other universities?”
“No, but many are qualified who are not picked. Dr. Carrey’s son, for example.”
“Dr. Carrey’s son is incompetent,” Eliot said. “He should not be practicing mathematics at all, let alone at the Hungarian Academy.”
Patterson licked his lips but ignored the insult.
“Then surely you could pick others. More than one!”
“Surely. But why should I favor Pasadena?”
“Pasadena University supports you and your fellowship, Dr. Herceg.”
“Eliot, please.”
Patterson leaned forward, his eyes narrowed, and Eliot knew just then what was on his mind.
“Your fellowship here is continued, in part, because of your contributions to the prestige of this university.” Oh. So that’s what he was driving at. Eliot realized why the department chair had been so eager to talk with him. This conversation had nothing to do with mathematics. Eliot spoke his next sentence carefully, as though wading through a particularly difficult proof. He wanted the point to be perfectly clear.
“Because of my financial contributions.”
Patterson paused.
“In part, yes. Yes, you are correct. This would all be much easier to handle if you continued to be as generous to our department as you have in the past.”
“What contributions do you make to this department, Dr. Patterson? Apart from teaching the mandatory lectures.” Eliot brushed his thumb against the stack of homework papers on Patterson’s desk.
“I teach all of the higher level courses I can manage with my schedule.” Patterson seethed. �
��But then again, I happen to enjoy making a contribution to this university.”
“The last contribution I made,” Eliot said, “was handed out as bonus grants to already-tenured professors.”
“Not at all!” Patterson cried out. “The money came from the general fund.”
“I’m no idiot,” Eliot said. “The year before my contribution there was no money for grants. I wonder where you happened to find such funds?”
“The grants were handed out to those who increased the prestige of the university!”
“By publishing reams of tedious, uninspired dreck. I fail to see how that does anything for Pasadena’s prestige.”
Dr. Patterson flushed a bright red. Eliot tried to remember how much of the bonus the department chair had claimed for himself. Although he couldn’t remember names, he remembered math, and the chair’s papers had been supremely lacking in actual mathematics. He focused his research almost entirely on statistical economics, and for the past few years had been pushing out newly-polished computer generated statistics on the same basic market algorithms, over and over again.
“But then…what of your research, Dr. Herceg?” Dr. Patterson said, trying to regain the upper ground. His forehead was beginning to glisten unattractively with tiny beads of sweat. “When was the last time you published anything?”
“I’m sure you know that better than I do,” Eliot replied. “As I said, I’m working on a difficult problem.”
“Surely you can publish something!”
“The problem has not been solved.”
“But surely…surely—”
“I won’t publish my work until it’s done,” Eliot said.
Patterson exhaled loudly through his nose.
“When do you expect your work to be done and first ready to publish?”
“When it’s done,” Eliot said. “And not a moment sooner.”
“That’s unacceptable!” Patterson rapped the top of his desk with his hand. “A completely unacceptable answer! You haven’t published a single paper in the years you’ve been here!”
“What did Gauss say about Dirichelet’s publications?” Eliot leaned forward, his face growing hot with anger. “Jewels are not weighed on a grocery scale!”
Patterson sighed. “Your reputation has waned in this country, Dr. Herceg. I can’t force the department to keep your fellowship on for another year like this.”
“Then don’t.” Eliot paused. “ Are we finished?”
“You’ll lose your visa. You’ll have to go back—”
“Are we finished?” A streak of fury flashed behind Eliot’s eyes and he hissed the words.
Patterson stood up behind his desk. He leaned forward across the papers and extended one trembling hand. His gaze flickered over to Eliot’s scar, then quickly back.
“I look forward to seeing your work published,” he said.
“So do I,” Eliot said. He shook the man’s clammy palm once, forcefully, turned on his heel and left.
The inanity of it all! A dull fury burned in the embers of Eliot’s heart. To be forced back into a game of prestige and reputation! And then for Patterson to threaten his fellowship—
A bluff. The same game lay at the heart of all organizations, academia most of all. Eliot strode past the reception area, pushing his way out the door and past a group of tittering students. They still believed in the purity of academics, in the chase of knowledge above all else. He hoped that they wouldn’t learn the truth until much later, until they had already done something significant.
Dr. Patterson was more right than even he knew. Eliot’s work had stalled. True, his initial forays into the experimental field of projective groups had broken new ground. When he was only a kid of twenty, he had published paper after paper on projective algorithms without breaking a sweat, and if he never published again he would still be remembered as having made significant contributions to the field of mathematics. Now, though, stuck on a monumental problem, Eliot felt himself losing hope.
The snow fell, and he had forgotten his gloves. He sat down on the bench in front of the library. It was cold outside, colder than he had ever known it to be in California. The soft, drifting snowflakes reminded him of his home, of Hungary. Of walking by the Danube in the springtime as the surface of the water crystallized at the edges, the delicate floes of ice breaking off from the riverbank and floating down slowly in the current.
He had come to America to escape, but there was no escaping his memories. As his eyes glazed over, the sounds of the Budapest streets filled his ears. He clasped his hands between his legs and felt her hand in his as they walked alongside the river. And as the snowflakes tumbled one by one at his feet, he heard her laughing next to him.
Clare, my Clare.
His heart rewound the years and played them back. Every memory ached with painful longing alongside the beauty. The summer picnics, the winters by the fireplace, all tinted red and dark and lonely.
A snowflake landed on his nose, and he was back on his estate with her, playing in the bright cold morning. She had made him a snow angel, and the back of her coat was dusted white with snow, her hair tinged with the drops of it that had already melted. He heard her voice ringing from far away.
"Eliot! Come make angels with me!"
He turned to see her falling backwards, her arms spread out to either side, her face beaming, reflecting the sunshine. She fell into the snowdrift, her arms and legs already sweeping the ground into the winged shape. He walked over and she smiled up at him from the ground.
“You try now,” she said.
He turned and closed his eyes, letting himself fall backwards, but as he fell he felt his stomach rise in his throat, and a cloud moved over the sun. His breath emptied from his chest as he hit the ground, and for a moment he felt as though he would die from suffocation—there was no air in the world.
“Eliot!” He heard the cry again, the piercing echo of her voice turned frightened. He opened his eyes and turned to reach out to her, but she was gone. The only trace of her left was the thin marking of the angel she had made, already filling with soft drifts of snow.
Eliot shook his head and came back to the present. This was California. A chill ran down his spine, but it was not due to the cold.
Ten years ago. Ten years to the day.
Not for the first time, he thought of what would happen if his life were to end right now. He had nothing to show for the past decade but an endless muddle of pages of mathematical work in the wastebasket. Useless, really. The ghost of his wife haunted him in dreams and reality both. No matter where he looked, Clare was there. Hiding in the crowds, in the face of the women he passed on the sidewalk. He shut himself up and hid, because it was easier than seeing her face everywhere.
He felt numb. Always there had been something to sustain him, a new problem in mathematics or the touch of his lovely Clare’s hand. Now… he had shut himself up in his work and produced nothing. He had closed off his heart and loved nothing. A veil had fallen over his world, had crept over his vision slowly, until he could not see at all except through a haze. Bit by bit, obligations had replaced his desires and he had ceased, finally, to want anything. Air went in and out of his lungs, but he did not breathe.
Eliot did not know how long he had been sitting on that bench when he looked up and saw a woman standing in front of him, a coffee in her outstretched hand.
Valentina? That wasn’t my name. Why had I lied? I rushed up the stairs to the second floor, the magic of the past few minutes evaporating quickly in the warm crowded air of the library. Everything felt too strange for words, and I couldn’t get Eliot’s face out of my mind. That scar, and those eyes…
My study group sat at a long oak table near the back side of the room, by the windows. I could spot Quentin’s bright red hair a mile away, and he gestured wildly all around him as he talked. Mark sat across from him, the calm bespectacled geek. Together, we made up the nerdiest group of math majors on campus, but Mark and I took solace
that no matter how bad it got, we could never outnerd Quentin. Outside, the snow fell against the glass, the only indication that this night was anything but normal.
“Brynn!” Mark waved at me, shaking his black hair out of his eyes. “You’re late!”
What’s up, Brynn?” Quentin gave a half-nod my way.
“Sorry,” I said, dumping my backpack onto the table. Pages of notebook paper scattered across the hard polished surface and one of them fluttered against the candle in the middle of the table. I grabbed the paper quickly before remembering that the flicker of light was electric. Silly me. “I… um, I was practicing down at the music hall.”
Again a lie. I never lied. But something in me wanted to keep the handsome man in the black coat a secret. Something special. Just for me.
“Oh cool, I didn’t see you there,” Mark said, pushing his glasses up on his nose. “Did you hear they might open up the midnight piano room on Sunday?”
“Really?” I asked.
“The what?” Quentin sounded annoyed. “Pianos? Really, people? Can we please get back to these proofs?” He had three pages of scrawled notes in front of him and looked as though he wanted to set the whole thing on fire.
“You’d like this,” Mark said, ignoring his protests. “It’s a ghost story.”
“I don’t believe in ghosts,” Quentin said dryly. “Unless it’s the ghost of Euclid haunting this problem set.”
“That bad?” I said, not looking forward to the work.
“It’s the hardest problem set we’ve done all year.”
“No, but really. There’s a ghost in the practice hall,” Mark insisted, his eyes bright behind his glasses. “You’ve heard the story, right Brynn?”
“Sure,” I said. My eyes quickly scanned the problem set, which did indeed look menacing. “The midnight piano ghost.”
“See? Everybody who plays has heard of it.”
