space as much as possible, thank you, human veneration of the wealthy—and sipped my tomato juice as I stared out the window at the receding shape of Cleveland, Ohio.
Back in Dublin, my parents were probably watching the airport departures list, waiting for the last plane to Portland to take off. If I didn’t call them a half hour after that, they’d know I was on my way, finally taking my first real step toward rejoining the world. Mom wouldn’t sleep until I landed in Oregon and texted her to let her know I was all right. That was fine. She usually had some snarly accounting problem to keep her distracted. Or maybe she and Dad would take advantage of having the house to themselves for five minutes. Alex and Shelby were in Australia, Drew was in California, and I was on a plane. They could—
Ew. No. I didn’t want to think about that. We’re all adults, but there are some thoughts that send me hurtling right back into easily horrified childhood.
The man who was sitting next to me had been trying to get my attention since takeoff. The fact that I was wearing headphones and staring fixedly out the window didn’t appear to be doing anything to dissuade him. If anything, it was just making him try harder. I did my resolute best to ignore the increasing waves of irritation and impatience rolling off him, focusing instead on my recording of the latest lecture series from the American Mathematical Association. They were doing some fascinating things with intuitive primes, and I wanted to see how far they could take the theory before things either resolved or fell apart.
In math, something is either true or it’s not. Something either works or it doesn’t. If something works and it feels like that shouldn’t be possible, it’s not the math that’s wrong: it’s your model of the universe. Mathematics is the art of refining our understanding of reality itself, like a sculptor trimming down a brick of marble until it frees the beautiful image inside.
Math is also distracting for me, like it is for any cuckoo. Something about the calm march of numbers and theory and equations is utterly enthralling to us. We’re an entire species of mathematicians, and that fact is the only thing that keeps me believing we can’t be all bad. How can anyone who truly loves numbers be irredeemable?
I was so wrapped up in the equations that I didn’t realize the man was planning to move until he hooked a finger around the cord of my right headphone and popped it out of my ear. The drone of the plane’s engine came roaring back, drowning out the lecture still playing in my left ear, followed by the sound of his smug, faintly nasal voice.
“I said, will you let me buy you a drink? Pretty lady like you shouldn’t have to fly alone.” He laughed, amused by his own feeble attempt at humor. “Of course, this is first class, so the drinks are free . . . unless you want to go someplace nicer with me after we land. I could show you a good time.”
Of course. Of course. There are days when I wish whatever evolutionary path had decided I should pass for human could have settled on something a little less eye-catching. Not that being pretty by human standards doesn’t smooth a lot of rough edges out for me, but it can create a few, too.
I turned to face him, offering a thin, glossy smile. “No, thank you,” I said. “I’m sorry. I just want to listen to my book and get some rest.” I could have tried to shove “you’re not interested in me” at him, but at our current proximity, that was likely to result in him deciding I didn’t exist and trying to claim my armrest.
“Book?” He grabbed the headphone before I could protest, bringing it to his own ear. A wave of confusion and disgust rolled off him an instant later. “This isn’t a book. This is a lecture.”
“It’s a lecture taken from a book on mathematics.” I tweaked the cord nimbly out of his fingers, pulling it protectively closer to myself. “I don’t want any trouble.”
“I think you need a little trouble,” he said, and grabbed my wrist.
Big mistake.
Maybe once, I could have kept myself pulled back enough not to touch his mind even while he was touching my body. Maybe. But that was before my injury, and before I’d been forced to