got connections. I’ll even eat the cost of rebooking. Merry Christmas from your big bro.”
How did you turn down an offer like that? “As long as I don’t have to babysit.”
“You can do your own thing. And I don’t have to be with them 24/7. It’ll work out.”
Trevor finally said yes, leaving his brother to get the German 201 class from Portland to Seattle and driving up on his own. It would be fun to hang out with his brother. And who knew? Maybe Kurt was right. Maybe Trevor would meet somebody. Although he doubted it.
* * *
Kurt’s prediction about finding someone proved right. Trevor met someone at the airport, all right. Not the kind of someone he wanted to meet, though.
He was sitting at Gate 20 at SeaTac International, checking his messages on his phone while his brother checked on his herd, when one of the herd broke away and plunked herself down right next to him, dropping a bulging duffel bag in front of her. She was a skinny kid in a winter coat and a long, black sweater that hung over blue leggings with a pattern that made him dizzy. Her feet were in boots that looked like she should be on parade with a drill sergeant yelling at her. Unstyled brown hair hanging to her shoulders and a face scrubbed clean. No makeup. No piercings, no tats to be seen. No perfume. No nonsense. Snap judgment: nerd girl. If they ever did a reboot of The Big Bang Theory she’d be a perfect Amy Farrah Fowler.
He could almost hear his mother scolding, “Look at the heart, not the outward appearance.”
“Guten Tag,” she said. “Sind Sie der Bruder von Herr Professor March?”
Why wasn’t she over there with the herd, practicing German with someone her own age?
Mom had taught him to be polite so he didn’t ask.
“I am,” he said, and looked to where Kurt stood talking with a hefty kid in ripped jeans and a black leather jacket, with blue hair and gauges in his ears. Had Kurt sent this girl Trevor’s way just to mess with him? After their conversation at Pok Pok he’d better not have or Trevor was going to drown him in the Rhine.
“Sprechen Sie Deutsch?” she asked.
“What?” Seriously?
“Do you speak German?” she asked in English, looking almost exasperated that he hadn’t caught on.
“Sorry,” he said. “I barely sprechen English.” He tried to sic her on the hefty kid with the blue hair. “I bet that guy does.”
She rolled her eyes and snorted. “Hugh? He’s pretty but he’s dumb. He’s on the downside of a C in class. Anyway, boys that age are so immature. I’m Harriet,” she added.
“Trevor,” he said in return.
“This is my first trip outside the US. I still can’t believe it’s happening.”
That made Trevor smile. Little Harriet with her big brain sounded like a little girl who’d just been promised she could stay up late on New Year’s Eve.
“It’s happening, trust me,” Trevor said.
“It’s so awesome of Professor March to do this trip for us.”
“Always good to learn the people and their customs as well as the language,” Trevor said. His German grandma would have been glad to see that he was finally getting his butt over to the fatherland.
“Have you traveled very much?” Harriet asked.
“Some.”
While Kurt’s studies had taken him to Germany, Trevor’s interests had sent him places like Ecuador and the Ivory Coast. The two of them hadn’t traveled together since a road trip to the Grand Canyon after Trevor’s high school graduation. They were past due.
“I intend to travel a lot,” Harriet informed him. “I’m going to be a citizen of the world.”
Trevor had his hands full being a citizen of the US. “Go for it,” he said.
“Do you believe in the propinquity effect?”
The switch in topics about gave him whiplash. “Pro what?”
“Propinquity. It’s one of the main factors leading to personal attraction. The more we interact with individuals, the more likely we are to form friendships and romantic attachments with them.”
“What if someone doesn’t want to spend time with you?” Trevor asked.
“Oh, they will eventually,” she said, confident in P-power. “People think you form attachments just seeing someone across a room full of people. You know, love at first sight. But it’s much more complicated than that.”
He nodded. “Interesting.” Oh, shit. Wrong thing to say.
“Isn’t it?” she said, warming to her subject. “It’s a scientific fact.” She pulled a cheap supermarket chocolate bar from her backpack.
Trever watched in disgust as she broke off a piece,