This Is My Brain in Love - I. W. Gregorio Page 0,52

half an hour.

“Have you had any other people come in with Boilermaker coupons?” I ask Alan.

He shrugs. “Maybe one or two a week.”

“We need to keep on tracking that. How about the e-mail list? Is anyone updating that?” The little spiral notebook I left at the front of the restaurant where we leave the magazines for people waiting for pickup has at least two or three new names.

“Uh, I don’t think so,” Alan mumbles. He’s squinting down at his homework like it’s written in hieroglyphics. “I don’t get this problem,” he whines. “What do you know about proportional relationships?”

The seat of the booth squeaks as I sit down and try to remember the finer details of seventh-grade math. Alan’s mind reminds me of those gel-filled slippery snakes—as soon as he catches on to an idea, he’s slid on to another topic. About halfway through solving a multistep word problem he’ll start blinking more often and spinning his pencil around. His eyes will flit to the wall-mounted TV and the silent CNN tickertape. Invariably he’ll make a multiplication error, or forget to carry when he’s adding. As he muddles his way through the problem set, I hear my mother’s voice in my head, judging him (judging me). Stop being so careless, she would say. You need to focus. Pay attention to the work, or the work will not pay. And then finally, when I’ve just given up on the problem and moved on to the next assignment: Not to know is bad. Not to wish to know is worse.

My dad would be gentler. He’d suggest moving to a quieter room without distractions, and he’d bring me some mint tea to help me concentrate. I was lucky—I only struggled with math once in all my schooling, when I had a particularly ineffective fourth-grade teacher. After that, things started coming easier, but I’ll never, ever forget my first mixed fractions quiz and how the edges of my vision seemed to white out in panic when I realized that I just didn’t understand. I’ll always remember how helpless—and worthless—I felt, how utterly betrayed by my brain.

The homework that Alan’s been assigned is the worst kind of math—problem after problem with no progression of difficulty, no creativity in how concepts are presented. It’s busywork, pure and simple, and it’s painful to watch Alan struggle through it.

“Okay, hold on. Can you explain to me what you’re doing with this problem?”

He stumbles through about two-thirds of a half-hearted explanation before trailing off and shrugging.

“That’s a good start.” In Big Brothers Big Sisters they always emphasized the need for positive reinforcement. “You’ve got the big picture—we just need to work out the little steps and the order you need to take them in.…”

It’s past nine by the time Alan’s done with his homework, but he actually does the last ten on his own. I’ve handled a few more pickups, and a group of five college students came in and ordered two dinner specials to share among them. At least they left a 20 percent tip. On my way out, I slip the money into the COLLEGE FUND jar when Alan isn’t looking.

I don’t see Jocelyn. But I manage to avoid Mr. Wu, too, and when I leave, Alan makes sure to tap his book bag as he mouths, “I’ve got your back.”

The next day Priya shows up at my door.

This Is My Brain on Communications Lockdown

JOCELYN

It takes me a while to get a message to Will. I’ve got to give my parents credit. Neither of them has a college education, but they clearly have graduate degrees in soft incarceration, surveillance, and obstruction.

Then again, it’s not rocket science—they just don’t let me out of their sight. Literally. They managed to get my amah on their side, which is frankly unfair. Because she isn’t as distracted by the business as my parents, she’s the perfect (read: worst ever) babysitter when they’re at the restaurant. When we’re in the living room she parks herself by the router so I can’t sneak by and turn it on. She even makes me put Priya on speakerphone when I call her on our landline to schedule time to work on our project. I don’t know what exactly Mom and Dad said about my infraction when they made her their enforcer, but Amah doesn’t say anything when I give her my best “et tu Brute” look, just clucks her tongue and shakes her head.

So I resort to the old-fashioned way to communicate. Snail mail. It