The Genius of Little Things (22 page)

I picked up an alumni magazine. After scanning the same first paragraph seven times, I focused on title of the article, “Caltech scholars try olive-growing.” I attempted to turn it into an anagram. I came up with
Call:
Tyler saves two gringo choirs
.

“Tyler.” It was a deep baritone voice. A hefty man with gray, curly hair stood in front of me with his hand outstretched. He introduced himself as Mr. Bingaman. As I rose and held out my arm, a clump of damp paper towel fell from my armpit and became lodged between my shirt and my torso. This made me pull back a little. Mr. Bingaman’s hand caught only the ends of my fingers, as if I were a queen allowing him to kiss my ring. I made a mental note to shake his hand vigorously on the way out.

He led me into the office and gestured to a chair across from him. I walked in sideways to avoid showing off the granola grease on my pants. He dropped his bulky body into an expensive-looking leather chair and asked whether I had any questions for him.

“What correspondence have you received from my principal?”

He frowned and moved some papers on his desk. Each time he held up a paper he pursed his lips and set it aside. “I have some recommendations.”

“From the principal?”

“No. Your chemistry teacher had some great things to say.”

“But not the principal?”

“Was he supposed to send something? You might want to ask him to send it again.”

“I’ll do that. Don’t call him, please.”

He leaned back and asked why I was interested in Caltech, as if he had asked it ten thousand times.

I was prepared for this one. I threw out all of the statistics I knew. I explained how it would fit into my life plans. “Most of all, I like the idea of a community of scholars. That’s a phrase in one of your brochures. As a foster teen I have experienced a lack of a permanent home. I feel that Caltech is welcoming, a place where I can have a sense of belonging.”

That should have been a slam-dunk. Perhaps I had dropped in the foster teen remark too casually. Mr. Bingaman didn’t appear to be intrigued. He was expressionless. I continued.

“I’m drawn to research. I’ve done quite a lot of it, under
several
mentors. It hasn’t been under the
same
mentor and not at the college level. That’s because I’ve moved around so much. Did I mention I’ve been in the foster system for four years?”

His eyes were unfocused but generally aimed at a piece of paper in his hand. I suspected it was part of my application letter. I was becoming uncomfortable with the silence. I laid out the basic facts—father unknown, BiMo dead, many FoFas, many schools, and that my BiMo was the reason for my interest in biology.

“You say in the essay it was your fourth grade teacher who introduced you to biology.”

He’d actually read it. I should have been encouraged.

“My fourth grade teacher was the catalyst for my interest in science, but my BiMo, I mean my biological mother, spurred my interest in biomedical engineering and immunology.”

Mr. Bingaman shifted in his seat. I assumed he wanted me to go on, because he wasn’t telling me
not
to go on. I already played my diversity card. If I were to reveal any more, I would have to explain how my BiMo died. I didn’t want to go there.

I went there anyway.

“My biological mother had allergies. Shellfish and eggs were the worst.”

Mr. Bingaman was looking at me now.

“She died eating Thai food with shrimp and egg. She thought she had cured her allergies through some kind of pseudo-science. But she hadn’t. That’s why I am committed to real science. She was found a few blocks from the restaurant, on the sidewalk. She might have been saved if someone had found her sooner, but they didn’t because nobody walks in Las Vegas. Except for me.” I made a spastic arm gesture and the paper towel under my other armpit slipped down my shirt. Now there was a clammy, moist roll at the top of my beltline.

“That must have been traumatic,” he said, without emotion.

“I’m sure. I mean it
was
. For me.”

I wanted to take it all back. I didn’t want to be admitted based on pity, though I would have reluctantly accepted it. Why the fark wasn’t he asking any questions?

“I want to know why people kill themselves,” I said. “I mean why our
bodies
kill us. Why our immune systems go on overdrive and react to things that should be benign, like pollen or nuts or shellfish, and treat them like invaders.
Dust
. Think about it. Dust is mostly flakes of human skin. So in a way, we’re rejecting ourselves.” I had just enough saliva to keep talking for another thirty seconds. I switched topics.

“My biology II teacher went to Caltech. He liked it. Mr. Proudfoot. I don’t know his first name. He says he had a
great
time.” At that moment I realized that the meth lab Mr. Proudfoot mentioned may have been something he participated in.

Mercifully, Mr. Bingaman’s phone rang. He apologized and took the call. This offered a minute-long opportunity to reflect on how I was doing. I judged myself harshly.

He finished the call and re-focused on me. “Sounds like you’re set on Caltech. Any questions for me?”

I had none. Everything was clear. My clothes were spotted with protein bar oil. I was too skinny, my handshake was feminine, my voice was squeaky, and my shirt had two growing orbs of sweat. I didn’t come with biological parents. I had spoken a bunch of
scheizen
and revealed that my BiMo died in the stupidest way possible.

I hurried through my closing statement. “My biological mother called me ‘the genius of little things’ because I paid attention to detail. Science is a lot of little things that add up to big things. But you can’t see the big things until you understand the little things. I forgot to mention, I’m saving the bees. In a science fair. But, maybe, I’ll be saving the world’s food supply if I can pull it off.”

He scrunched up his face in the way people do when they think they might have heard something profound but don’t really get it.

He stood and thanked me for interviewing
him
. He extended his hand. This time I didn’t pull back, but I forgot to be vigorous. His hand enveloped mine and squeezed it to the point of pain. On the way out, I stopped at the receptionist’s desk and thanked her for her help. Even though she hadn’t helped. At that point nothing could help.

I spent the next two hours fast-walking across the university quads and gazing at people I would probably not see again. Bye, guy with big silver thermos. We might have been roommates. Bye, professor-looking man with white hair. I might have enjoyed your course. Bye, sarcastic flip-flop wearer, wherever you are. I hope you get an A on your sociology paper.

I found Levi sitting on the low, concrete bridge. The bandage on his forehead was too small for the scab it was covering. He looked up, then back at the water.

“How did it go?”

“Could have been worse,” I said. I was tired, suddenly. My feet hurt. I sat down next to him. “We can’t go to an amusement park. But there’s a great museum in Pasadena. It’s close.”

“If it’s all the same to you, I’d rather head back. I’m sort of not feeling a hundred percent, so to speak.”

“Did you go to a clinic?”

“Nah, the front desk guy gave me a bandage when I checked us out.”

I hoped it was a clean bandage. Given the look of the motel, that was not certain.

In the parking lot, Levi’s car came into view. The front fender was smashed and it looked like someone had taken a sledgehammer to the hood. There was a web of cracks in the windshield. He said nothing about the damage and didn’t notice my
what’s
going on
expression.

Our first and last tourist stop was Denny’s. I ordered a grilled chicken sandwich and Levi ordered a California burger, which was, as far as I could tell, a regular burger with avocado. I asked why the presence of avocado made something “Californian.” Levi didn’t know. For the record, I wasn’t expecting an explanation. I was just making conversation.

For five minutes he noisily sipped his iced tea and stared out at his wrecked Lincoln. I was getting ticked.

“Are you going to tell me what happened last night?”

“Why do you care? You’re not my friend. You’re my tutor, right?”

“What are you talking about?”

“You keep saying ‘Levi’s not my friend. He’s this idiot I teach.’”

“When did I call you an idiot?”

 “I’m not his friend. I’m Tyler and I’m so smart. I would never be friends with
him
.” He used a singsong tone to mimic me. I never sounded like this.

“I don’t think you’re an idiot,” I said.

“I wouldn’t be around if Levi wasn’t paying me, or driving me. Tutor, tutor, tutor.” His voice was annoying me.

“I’m
both
, okay?”

“You’re both what?”

He could be so dense. “Tutor and friend. But you look like
scheizen
and so does your car.”

“What’s
scheizen
? Oh. Right.
Thanks
.” He emptied sugar packets on the table and made little white mounds. If I were his therapist I could wait fifty minutes for him to say something important. That’s a therapist’s trick. They think you’ll get tired of saying nothing, and then you will burst out with some teary confession at the last minute. It never worked on me. I was able to run out the clock, every time.

But I wasn’t a counselor. I wasn’t being paid by the hour. I was impatient. I brushed the sugar mounds off the table. “Are you going to tell me where you were last night?”

“I went sightseeing.”

“At night?”

“
Yeah
, at night. I drove.”

“And you hit your head?”

“On a tree.”

“With your car?”

“No. I hit my
head
using my
head
. I
drove
to the
tree
.” He said this like I was an imbecile. But, frankly, his storytelling abilities left much to be desired. He was harder to follow than
The
Iliad
.

“I drove up the hills, except I kind of got lost. But I found a place high up where I could get a good view, except there were no lights up there. So when I get out, I bump into a tree. Then I hit my head on the tree on purpose because I’m so mad at hitting my head by
accident
. And just then I understand something. I don’t want to be LDS. I want to have a real life, like you.”

“Like
me
?” I half-snorted.

“You’re going to do all those things at Caltech. Be a scientist and whatnot. And what will I have? I’ll go on a mission for some religion that believes stupid things. You’re right about that.”

“I never said your religion was stupid.” I probably implied it many times.

“You think religions are stupid.”

“I don’t feel like taking the blame because you’re leaving the church and going around hitting your head on trees.”

“Not the blame,” he said. “You deserve thanks. For showing me a different way.”

“What different way?” I was almost laughing now.

He went on about the things his church believed. Some of these were new to me. He said if it hadn’t been for me he would never have seen the world.

“You’ve only seen Pasadena,” I said.

“Yeah but I’m going to see more. And they can’t stop me.”

When our food came, I scraped the mayo from the top bun—I had specified that I didn’t want mayo—and Levi put his hand to his head. I feared he was going to barf. I feared it even more when he said, “I think I’m going to barf.”

He left the table and spent several minutes in the rest room. I used this time to switch out the buns on our sandwiches. They had put no mayo on his. He came back to the table and practically inhaled his California burger, as if nothing was wrong.

 “Even if I go to Caltech, that’s no guarantee of a great life,” I said. “It might suck no matter what I do. I might end up in some nursing home. Nobody to visit me. Everything I own in a box, sitting in urine.” We were silent for a minute. Levi swallowed a mouthful of burger and looked up at me. My words surprised me. But they didn’t seem inaccurate. It was the first time I’d said that to anyone. One thing bothered me about what I’d said, besides the possibility that my prediction would turn out to be right. “I mean
I’d
be sitting in urine, not the box.”

“Why would you be sitting in—?”

“Never mind.”

“That’s kinda grim. You’re depressing me.”

“Yeah. Well. Life can be depressing. Sorry.”

We were quiet for a few minutes, until Levi had an important thought. He talked with food in his mouth, which grossed me out a little. “Did I tell you? I can’t work anymore. The parental units made me quit Covenant Catering. They say they’ll pay for everything I want. Well, what I want,
dad
, isn’t money.”