Taylor gave me a look, a look I couldn’t quite identify. It didn’t look happy, nor sad, nor neutral. Just… something. “Yeah,” she said quietly. “Do you think we have enough time to study?”
I glanced up at the cafeteria clock. “Honestly, no,” I admitted. “Plus, it sounds like your friend is hurting.”
Taylor gave me a sad chuckle. She didn’t speak for the longest time. “Quinn…” she started.
“Yeah?”
She gave a great big pause. “You’re, uh… you’re cool. I’m sorry about that thing Crystal said today.”
I shrugged. “It’s not like she was wrong. But for the record, I wouldn’t want to see that nude of her anyway. I mean…” My face scrunched up. “I don’t mean that as if she doesn’t look nice, I just mean… I’d only want to see her body… on her terms… if we were like that.”
“Yeah,” Taylor quietly agreed.
“I should go. I hope you all resolve this soon,” I told her as I stood up and put my book back in my bag. She smiled politely then turned back to her friend group. They were still in a huddle as I walked out of the cafeteria.
I can probably just finish my lunch in the study hall or something, I reasoned to myself as I kept walking. On the way, I saw some guys outside the gym. They were huddled around one guy, showing off something on his phone. They were hooting and hollering and offering him fist bumps as they gawked over whatever the phone was showing.
Somehow I didn’t need to think hard to know what was on those phones. She was worried she might get expelled. He was getting fist bumps.
***
GameStop was alright. It was a job. Stand and work the cash register. Answer questions. Make sure people don’t steal stuff. Know where the game CDs are. The hours simultaneously lasted forever and went by way too quickly. Thoughtfully, they decided to put my first shift alongside the one guy in the universe who was shier and talked less than I did. Either that or I really was getting better at this whole socialization thing.
I came home to an awaiting smiling Mother and a small basket of sweet nian gao. “Well done on completing your first shift, my son.” Mother said to me. “I am very proud.” She picked up the basket and offered it to me.
“Hey, wow! Thank you,” I said bashfully. I loved red bean snacks, not to mention I started associating them with accomplishments (or the New Year).
“How was it?” she asked.
I shrugged. “It’s a job,” I laughed. “I don’t think I’ll be working much at GameStop after I graduate. Where’s Kevin?”
“He is out, also giving résumés to stores,” Mother explained, getting a broom and absentmindedly sweeping the floor.
I smirked to myself. So, the extracurriculars didn’t save him after all. Mother and I made small talk about the future for a bit longer before I dismissed myself to my room. Normally I would have booted up my PS4, but after working all day, at a games store no less, I just flopped down on my bed and lay there. No sleep, no games, just a dead tired Quinn.
After a few minutes, my phone started to buzz. I lazily lifted my head to look at my phone and saw Taylor’s name on my phone. She was calling me. Weird.
I hit the “talk” button and put my phone to my ear. I didn’t say anything. After a few seconds of silence, a hesitant, “…Quinn?” met my ears.
Oh, right. “Hello, Taylor. How can I help you?”
“Hey. So, I’m like, freaking out. The test is tomorrow, right?”
“I believe so. For Data Management, right?”
“Yeah. But, like, I still don’t know how to do combinations, and Mrs. Li wouldn’t give me an extension! What do I do?”
I sighed exasperatedly. I would have helped her out today, but I had the shift. “Um, we could try tomorrow at lunch…”
“We both know that’s not gonna work,” she complained.
“Well, I don’t know any other options,” I replied plainly. “I have a full class schedule tomorrow. My only free time is lunch.”
She was silent for a few seconds. “Could you… could I pick you up and we study at my place? Just until I get it, then you can go home.”
I glanced at my alarm clock. “Taylor, it’s like, eight o’clock at night.”
“I know, I know, but like – look, I’ll pay you, okay? I can drive, and I’ll pay. I just really need to pass this test. Please, Quinn? Please?”
I put the phone down to my chest and sighed to the ceiling. “Give me a sec,” I said back into the phone, then set it to mute and walked back to the kitchen.
“Mother, is it okay if I go out for a few hours?” I asked, bracing myself?
“A few hours? It is PM eight o’clock! Where would you go at PM eight o’clock?”
“Taylor Wise needs me to help with her math.”
“A girl?! Quinn!” Mother laughed. “First a job, now a girl! Wā!”
“It’s not a girlfriend, Mother. She’s the classmate I’m tutoring. We have a test tomorrow and she feels underprepared. She’ll drive me.”
Mother looked unconvinced. Now was the time to hit her with the big one. “She’s offering to pay me.”
Mother gave me a look. “Be home and in bed by eleven, do you understand?” she finally told me.
I agreed and went back to my room, hitting unmute. “Hey, Taylor, you still there?”
After a second or two, her voice greeted me. “Yes. Can you do it?”
I wasn’t thrilled about it, especially considering I was getting money now anyway, but frankly, at this point a part of me felt sorry for her. I just couldn’t articulate how. Maybe this was how she won over Mrs. Li and it was just a slower burn on me.
***
When we got to Taylor’s place, we almost immediately went to her basement. She lived in, go figure, some sort of ridiculously posh and nice suburban house. The first floor had a foyer, a staircase that went up, and a door that went down, as well as arches into the kitchen and living room. The living room had several couches and a big television. The kitchen was done up with black countertops and white floors. Her mom was in that kitchen, waving politely to us as we descended the stairs.
Her basement was also kind of typical for a suburban house – white shag carpeting, plain white walls, some furniture but mostly just unorganized stuff like magazines on the floor.
“Okay,” Taylor said, sitting down on the floor. “So, we just need combinations, right?”
“The test covers factorials, permutations, and combinations. I’m gonna make sure you know the first two as well, since I don’t think Li is going to give us any formulas.” I opened the book, trying to find the section on combinations. “So what does a factorial look like and how do you calculate it?”
“That’s like… a number with an exclamation mark after it, and… you calculate it by multiplying it by every number below it.”
“Good, okay. What’s a permutation?”
“Um…” She struggled a bit more with this one. “Like… a combination but…” She sighed. “I um… I forget. Could we go over it quickly?”
There was a lot of work ahead of us.
***
“So the answer is…” I trailed off.
Taylor sat unmoved for a bit. She wrote a few things down, filling in n and r, and did a bit of math in her head. Finally, she sat up. “Fifteen?”
I grinned. “Yes! You got it!”
“Really? Oh my god!” She seemed to be as ecstatic as I was.
Just to make sure the work was done, I covered up the formula. “Now, just rewrite the formula for combinations and I think we’re done here.”