Will Grayson, Will Grayson(21)
Author: John Green

Chapter six

at this moment, i want to jump ahead in time. or, if that doesn’t work, i’ll settle for traveling back in time.

I want to jump ahead in time because in twenty hours i will be with isaac in chicago, and i am willing to skip everything in between in order to get to him faster. i don’t care if in ten hours i’m going to win the lottery, or if in twelve hours i’m going to get the chance to graduate early from high school. i don’t care if in fourteen hours i am going to be jerking off and have the most life-altering orgasm in all of unrecorded history. i would fast-forward past it all to be with isaac instead of having to settle for thinking about him.

as for traveling back in time, it’s really simple – i want to go back in time and kill the guy who invented math. why? because right now i’m at the lunch table and derek is saying

derek: aren’t you psyched for mathletes tomorrow?

with that simple word – mathletes – it’s like every ounce of anesthesia i’ve ever collected in my body wears off at once.

me: holy sweet f-ing a

there are four mathletes in our school. i am number four. derek and simon are numbers one and two, and in order to enter competitions they need at least four members. (number three is a freshman whose name i deliberately forget. his pencil has more personality than he does.)

simon: you do remember, right?

they’ve both put their meatburgers down (that’s what the cafeteria menu calls them – meatburgers), and they’re staring at me with looks so blank i swear i can see the computer screens reflected in their glasses.

me: i dunno. i’m not feeling very mathletic. maybe you should find a subset-stitute?

derek: that’s not funny.

me: ha ha! wasn’t meant to be!

simon: i’ve told you – you don’t have to do anything. in a mathletic competition, you enter as a team, but are judged as individuals.

me: you guys know i’m your biggest mathletic supporter. but, um, i kind-of made other plans for tomorrow.

derek: you can’t do that.

simon: you said you’d come.

derek: i promise it’ll be fun.

simon: nobody else will do it.

derek: we’ll have a good time.

I can tell derek’s upset because it looks like he’s considering having a slight emotional response to the informational stimuli being presented to him. maybe it’s too much, because he puts down his meatburger, picks up his tray, murmurs something about library fines, and leaves the table.

there’s no doubt in my mind that i’m going to bail on these guys. the only question is whether i can do it without feeling like shit. i guess it’s a sign of desperation, but i decide to tell simon something remotely resembling the truth.

me: look, you know that ordinarily i’d be all over mathletes. but this is like an emergency. i made like a – i guess you could call it a date. and i really, really have to see this person, who’s coming a long way to see me. and if there was any way to do it and go to the mathletic competition with you, i would. but i can’t. it’s like . . . if a train is traveling at ninety miles an hour and it needs to get from the mathletics competition to the middle of chicago in, like, two minutes for a date, it’s never going to make it in time. so i have to jump on the express, because ultimately the tracks that lead to the date are only being laid down this one time, and if i get on the wrong train, i’m going to be more miserable than any equation could ever account for.

It feels so strange to be telling someone this, especially simon.

simon: i don’t care. you said you’d be there and you have to be there. this is an instance where four minus one equals zero.

me: but simon . . .

simon: stop whining and find another warm body to get in mr. nadler’s car with us. or even a cold body if it can stay propped up for an hour. it would be a change of pace to have someone who can actually add, but i swear i won’t be choosy, you fart.

It’s amazing how i usually make it through the day without realizing i don’t have that many friends. i mean, once you get out of the top five you’ll find a lot more of the custodial staff than members of the student body. and while janitor jim doesn’t mind if i swipe a roll of toilet paper every now and then for ‘art projects,’ i have a feeling he wouldn’t be willing to forfeit his friday night for a trip with the calcsuckers and their faculty groupies.

I know i only have one shot, and it ain’t an easy one. maura’s been in a good mood all day – well, a maura version of a good mood, which means the forecast calls for drizzle instead of thunderstorms. she hasn’t brought up the g*y thing, and lord knows i haven’t either.

I wait until last period, knowing that if the pressure’s on, she’s more likely to say yes. even though we’re sitting next to each other, i take my phone out under the desk and text her.

me: whatre u doing tmrw night?

maura: nothing. wanna do something? me: i wish. i have to go to chicago with my mom.

maura: fun?

me: i need you to sub for me in mathletes. otherwise s&d are screwed.

maura: ure kidding, right?

me: no, theyll really be screwed.

maura: and y would i?

me: because ill o u 1. and ill give you 20 bucks.

maura: o me 3 and make it 50.

me: deal.

maura: im saving these texts.

truth? i probably just rescued maura from an afternoon of shopping with her mom or doing homework or poking a pen into her veins to get some material for her poetry. after class, i tell her that she’ll no doubt meet some other deadbeat fourth-string mathlete from some town we’ve never heard of, and the two of them will sneak out for clove cigarettes and talk about how lame everyone else is while derek and simon and that stupid freshman get smashed on theorems and rhombazoids. really, i’m doing wonders for her social life.

maura: don’t push it.

me: i swear, it’ll be hot.

maura: i want twenty bucks up front.

I’m just glad i didn’t have to lie and say that i had to go visit my sick grandma or something. those kind of lies are dangerous, because you know the minute you say your grandma’s sick the phone’s going to ring and your mom’s going to come into the room with really bad news about grandma’s pancreas, and even though you’ll know that little white lies do not cause cancer, you’ll still feel guilty for the rest of your life. maura asks me more about my trip to chicago with my mom, so i make it sound like it’s necessary bonding time, and since maura has two happy parents and i have one bummed-out one, i win the sympathy vote. i’m thinking about isaac so much that i’m completely scared i’m just going to blurt him out, but luckily maura’s interest keeps me on my guard.