Jarhead: High IQ isn't Always Good

Barb was a freshman at BC (Boston College) but was living at home to save money. She was majoring in social activities, apparently -- she left about 10 minutes after sitting down, going out with some friends. She had a backpack, for 'studying', but it looked padded and I strongly suspected it had party clothes in it that she didn't want to wear in front of her parents.

After dinner, Cleo and I went to her room, though she said her mom's rules were, her door had to stay open. Cleo was 18 already, but there are technical rules, and mom's house-rules, and rules that come from inside yourself, and not always do they match.

It was a typical high-school girl's room (I guessed, I hadn't been in many), except she had a queen-sized bed and her tastes went to light greens instead of pinks.

We turned on her computer monitor and brought up a streaming service to watch a movie. The headboard was on the same wall as the door, opposite her desk, so we could snuggle up and watch together.

I loved it!

We ignored about half the movie to just lie there and kiss, and kiss, and kiss. I didn't have any other agenda, I just loved the kissing.

After the movie, we watched an anime that Cleo liked, but we paused it and talked for a while. Cleo was working on a series of history projects that her mom had assigned. She had to pick a technology or type of object and chart important developments of that object over time, just the highlights of new developments, who made them, what the prices were, etc.

She liked it, and even I thought it was kind of interesting. She had to turn in three charts a week, one more in-depth than the other two. She could pick any object she wanted, so she'd started with toasters, microwaves, and wooden spoons one week, but the next week she did steam engines, steam turbines, and steam irons, etc.

I loved it, and loved to hear her describe her findings. She got out her presentation materials -- she had to do powerpoint slide presentations, but follow best-practices so the presentations weren't boring, and do videos of her doing a speech of each one. One of the 3 had to be a written paper in addition, so she got practice writing, her mom said. That was better than any English class compositional practice in my opinion, at least you got to do it about something that wasn't a weird piece of literature.

She hoped to make a channel out of the videos and make money off it eventually, once she had enough material to make a decent claim to things.

I thought it was cool all around. She knew a ton of stuff about the history of everyday objects, including cool stories about how the guy who invented the toaster had huge frustrations because no one could ever make toast right when he'd ask at a restaurant. You had to watch to make sure the toast didn't burn, Each Time, super-carefully, to get it right.

This guy's 'automatic toaster' did the right thing every time, using a timer and a thermostat. He sold them and now every house has one.

Our "date" came to an end about 11 when we'd had one too many check-ins from Cleo's mom, and she walked me down to the door.

I thanked her, we kissed again, and I said goodbye.

Getting home was Not A Problem.

On the way, just feeling good, I was whistling my tune, and just went with where it led me, and that gave me some ideas for where to take my symphony.

The next 3 hours was sketching how the theme would roll and ebb and build and fire into a massive concluding thing with tympani and cymbals and an electric bass guitar to get the really deep notes.

I thought about adding a diggeri-do but gave that a miss in the end because you don't exactly tune those.

== Chapter: Saturday ==

Saturday I was up at 8, too early maybe, but I'd rolled over and an idea for how to address that second paper I was reviewing for Andy.

A while back my handwriting had turned to crap unless I was really concentrating, but I could get my ipad into equation mode and it would translate my thoughts fast enough I could do some real work.

Writing up a dissection of what was wrong with that second paper turned into writing another paper, on a whim, spelling out the right way to approach the problem, re-writing the whole thing, and adding a neat way to map his topology problem into polar coordinates and N-branes.

That was a fun paper.

On a whim, I had to add a name at the top, so I did a quick look-up on Wikipedia and put my name as the lead author as, "P. Aristoxenus Diogenes", and put Andy in as the second author.

Writing an abstract and summary seemed a waste since it was repeating the paper, but I just summarized an intuition that the math might be applicable to stellar cartography as influencing the way the Hubble Constant changed over time.

I might have been speaking out of my ass, but it was a funny idea and I figured Andy would make me take it out.

By this time it was almost lunch so I fired that off and sat down to watch Phineas since what the hell, why not.

My phone rang (voice) and it was ... Cleo! I answered fast, "Hey, Gorgeous!"

She laughed, "Flattery will get you everywhere, mister, but not in my house."

I laughed back and imitated the way her mom 'checked' on us, and we both laughed.

Looking around, I checked my mom's schedule and said, "Well, you could come over here, my mom doesn't get off work until ... 3 am. Double shift Saturday, she makes good money that way."

There was a silence, then a, "Sure, what the hell. What's your address?"

I texted her the online maps link and said, "Anytime, but if you get here too fast you'll have to let yourself in, I have to clean my room."

She laughed again and said, "See you soon," and hung up.

I had no idea what that meant.

One thing it did mean - I had to clean the kitchen!

We weren't too fastidious about keeping the kitchen clean, and I knew how clean Cleo's mom kept theirs, so I decided that was the biggest worry, along with the garbage and recycling, and then one thing led to another, and the doorbell rang.

It was Cleo.

I let her in, and she laughed openly at how flustered I was since I was out of breath from cleaning everything. She took off her coat (it was November) and I gave her the tour, picking up stuff as I went.

She insisted I didn't have to, but I felt weird showing off my place when I hadn't really cleaned it up.

We got upstairs (a whole-house tour) and when she'd seen my room (with papers everywhere) she bent over and looked at some of them. "This ... isn't calculus."

I laughed nervously, "Uh... NO. Definitely not. I'd get thrown out of calculus turning in something this crappy."

My attempt to take it from her failed. Her next move was to look at the printout of the paper I'd made, and saw the super-obvious diagram I'd put in that showed how branes align in polar but not in x-y coordinates.

"Kev. You're... doing something. Did you write this?"

"Uh... just ... last night. Sorry it's a mess."

"What kind of math is this?"

"Kind of..."

She finished my sentence because I was falling off in volume and embarrassed, but that made her confused. "Why are you embarrassed about this? You're writing a math paper, like a for a JOURNAL [she'd seen the abstract, the format gave it away], and you're... what's going on?"

I fessed up. "Nobody knows. Well, one guy knows, he's a... prof from MIT, kind of a friend, just... made friends. He threw a paper at me, and I read it and had the huge guffaws 'cuz it's like cubic parsecs of compressed stupid, but it had one idea, and I thought that was worth it. I've never written a paper before... You just..."

"What?"

"Inspired me, I guess."

"Call him."

"Now?"

"I want to know, I need to know, if you're bullshitting me. If you're not, you've got a solid girlfriend. If it's B.S., I'm walking out the door."

"Uh... Now?"

"Now."

I could see in her eyes she was serious.

I texted his number, in the clear, and said 'Please Call Back Emergency it's Kevin."

My phone rang about 20 seconds later, I put it on speaker.

"Kevin? It's Andy. What's up?"

"Uh... hi. Ummm... I'm ..."

Cleo interrupted, "Kevin was explaining to me how he wrote a paper last night and I need to know if he's bullshitting me or if he's serious. No one writes a paper in a night."

Andy laughed, "AAAhhhh!! Girl trouble. I get it, it's THAT kind of emergency." He kept laughing. "So what is this paper you wrote?"

"Hold on..."

I pasted the PDF into the chat and he told me to hold on.

On the other end, we heard mumbling, then a lady calling out and a toddler saying, "UP! Daddy! UP!"

We laughed, but Cleo was still mostly serious.

The kid, toddler age if I guessed right, laughed a delightful laugh and I heard some gootchie-goo's, and then a bellowing, "Needra! Can you come and??? I've got a thing!".

There was more overtalking and it got quieter, maybe with a door slam.

The call's video turned on, and I saw him for the first time outside of a publicity photo on the faculty pages.

Cleo said, "Turn on your video, Kevin."

"I was..."

Andy had furrowed eyebrows and inhaled sharply several times, then shook his head, and did the 'oh, yeah' thing.

I turned on my video under the glare of Cleo, and set it on my bedside table while we sat the edge of the bed.

"What? Stellar Cartography? How in the fuck?"

Glancing up at the phone he said, "OH, wait, sorry, miss, didn't mean to swear... Wait. Kevin. You have video on. Is that okay?"

I sighed. "You needed that anyway."

He looked down at the paper, then set his phone on his desk propped up like ours, sat in his chair and held his face in his hands a minute, talking from behind them. "You CANNOT mess with the fine structure constant. Dirac-Eddington would need... a repulsive gravitation at kiloparsec scales. Please don't do that to me. I was just reading green eggs and ham."

Cleo laughed, but asked, "I need to know, sir."

"Andy."

"Andy. I need to know, is Kevin bullshitting me, or could he have written this paper last night."

Andy looked at me with a raised eyebrow. "I'd have to review it, some of the math will take me a few hours to get through. I'm not that fast with brane topo. Where'd it come from?"

"Mostly, Minglea's paper you threw at me, gave me an idea, since he did his math wrong and presumed - you know, his topology is fakaktah - but doing it in polar MIGHT make sense, so I transposed and the core of the idea was an invariance across 3-branes with the Lorentz and a positive-positioning twist to get the rates to align. Cool idea, maybe? I didn't know, I've never..."

Andy's mouth opened. "It was a shit paper, Kevin, I threw a shit paper at you because you were all hopped up on reading stuff and I figured you'd trash it in 3 sentences and move on. But.. you pulled out this? THIS, this is not shit. This... is, good shit." He smiled. "Seems like."

We nodded; he wasn't done.

He picked up the phone again and clicked on some things and scrolled again. "Who is... why did you choose a pseudonym of P, uh, Aristo-xenus-Diogenes?"

"Biographer of Pythagorus, plus an alternate spelling of Cleo's name."

Cleo smiled at me, but then asked, "Andy? Why are you qualified to read this? Who are you?"

Andy rattled off his title as he was reading, "Andrew Smithysmith, professor of mathematical physics, MIT. I specialize in quantum field theory from the pure-math end since I break things when I touch them."

This was a line he'd used before.

Cleo said, "So, Kevin's not doing some..."

Andy shook his head and said, "Thank you for the co-authorship, Kevin. I'll handle the press inquiries. I would really like you enrolled here if I can convince you."

"I'm in high school."

"I figured that. When do you want to show up?"

"Uh...

"January term? Summer? This paper, if it says what I think it says, if you're right? It's a master's thesis, one paper. Go directly past undergrad, do not pass go, do not collect $200. You have sheep, wood, metal, stone, grain, bricks. You have ALL The Things."

I liked his Catan reference.

Cleo said, smiling, "He has sheep? He definitely has wood."

Andy got it and laughed, too. "It's Saturday night, Kevin. Have fun. Yes, Cleo, Kevin's gonna do things. Might be a bumpy ride, but worth it. Kevin, I'll look at this, but it could go to J-AMS, if I can validate it. You might have to do some revisions... or, split it in two, might be too big for one, they might not want that much. Gimme some time to validate this, if my name's on it. Gimme... a couple of days?"

"Okay?"

"Don't show this to anyone else, Kevin. I'll give you the how-to-submit directions. And... don't use a pseudonym unless you really have to. Or, pick a simpler one."

"I'll think about it."

We said goodbyes, he wished Cleo luck, and we hung up.

"Did you sleep last night? You left my house at 11:30, then - you did this?"

"I got a couple of hours."

"You ... didn't shower, did you."

I was horrified, "Do I stink!!?? Ohmygod, I'm so sorry, I just invited you over and oh..."

She laughed, "No, silly, but if you want to, go ahead. I could use a shower myself."

I said, turning around, "Same time," and grabbed my towel, then added, "You can use the master bath shower, I'll use the hall bath."

Just as I turned back I saw her face go from incredulous to smiling and then she laughed, and I realized why. "Oh... No, that's not what I ..."

She sat down on the bed and grabbed her shoe to untie it. "Your mom won't be home? So... we have time, then?"

"I guess."

Looking at me, she waved her hand up and down to indicate all of my body and said, "Well then, get busy! I'm getting undressed, you'd better beat me to it or I'm going to think this not-showering thing was all a ploy to make me think you're a forgetful genius."

Taking her direction (I'm NOT stupid), I stepped out of my shoes and said, "Not _that_ forgetful, I think. I remember Exactly how heavenly it was to kiss your lips last night."

"Mmmm... We'll see, mister. I intend on finding out what else you're hiding from me."

Her eyes weren't on mine, they were looking right at my butt.

"Oh."

I stripped off my shirt and left it on my shoes, but she corrected me, "No, no. Always be tidy. Is that where that goes?"

Looking down at it, I outright laughed. "I'm getting naked in front of you, and you're making sure I put my laundry in the hamper?"

"Damn straight, mister. If I have to fold my things, you'd better fold yours."

"I didn't..."

She looked at me with one of those looks like my mother gives me, and I both laughed and cringed, "Fine! Ha! Wow, I didn't know this was a universal thing."

"It's not. It's me. We'll have some understandings, and we get along better. My mom said it could be you don't quite know how girls work yet, and I'd better start out on the right foot or I'm gonna get stepped on later. So, this is me."

She waited a second for me to fold my t-shirt, regardless of my then putting it into the laundry hamper. As I finished, she nodded with an approval-eyebrow-raise-nod, then pulled her t-shirt off, too.

Cleo's bra was a black lace one, not like my mom's at all. This was much more ornate, but with some sizable elastic bands and joined straps across the back.

I realized I was analyzing how the structural elements of it worked to support weight and distribute it across her shoulders.

She watched my eyes as I did this. "No sister, right?"

"No sister."

"Figures."

She unzipped her jeans and pushed them down. They looked like they fit loosely, not like some of the girls at school who wore theirs super tight.

Her underwear was a light brown color that didn't match the black bra. I was pretty sure she hadn't planned any of this before she came over, or they might have matched?

So many things about girls were confusing, sometimes it seemed super important to them to have things match, but then other times a contrast was better? I had no clue.

I had my socks and t-shirt in the hamper, my sweatshirt folded on my bed, and my jeans folded on top of my sweatshirt.

"What's the chance your mom comes home early?"

I chuffed, "About one in 300."

"We'll chance it."

She looked at me, bra and panties and one hand on her waist, the other on the desk where she'd put her stuff. I was just in my tighty-whiteys and tent-poling that.

"You have a towel for me?"

"In the hall closet, I'll get it."

We walked over, she went into the bathroom and shut the door and said, "Hold on a minute, if you would."

I got the towel and waited, and pretty soon there was a flush, then the water started, then she called to me, "Come on, now, water will get cold."

The water would not get cold. She might turn the water cold, but she was trying to control the situation, and I didn't blame her. I knew I'd never done anything like this before, and I was willing to bet she hadn't either. As long as she was giving orders, though, she felt more comfortable.

As long as Cleo was comfortable, she'd be naked.

I liked it that Cleo was naked, so, yeah, sure, tell me to do whatever, I'm there!

I pushed the door open, and she was stepping into the shower, the shower curtain obscuring her body. The bra and panties were on the counter - haphazardly. I'd have to alert her to the problem later, I thought, smiling.

Coming in, I shut the door behind me, mostly out of habit, then somewhat bravely pulled down my underwear in a move that avoided catching my strident boner.

"May I come in now, or, should I wait out here?"

"Oh, come on in. But I get the warm water. Boys have to wait their turn."

I chuckled, "Oooooh! That's how it is." I pulled back the curtain at the end of the tub away from the spout, and saw her butt, then stepped in. "If you want me to smell less, I'm going to need some water eventually."

"Close your eyes, please. I didn't do this to get ogled."

"But I like ogling! You have beautiful Oggs!"

She laughed.

I compromised, "Okay, I can shut my eyes, but at least give me some water and the soap. I really don't want to be stinky near you?"

I had a decision to make. She'd asked for me to keep my eyes closed. So, I could follow her rules and really keep them closed, like I said I would, or I could cheat and squint-peek. Or, I could keep them completely open and just pretend to misunderstand.

The safest route for me was to build trust. Therefore, I had to completely trust her and hope that she would not guide me in the wrong direction.

She wasn't the kind of person to be mean. Some of the philosophy I read started coming in handy, and I shut my eyes super tight.

I heard the acoustics change, her voice echo differently as she turned around to me, hugged me with OH-SO-WOW-AMAZING skin, and then face me into the shower water. Once she had me in place, she started rubbing my back with soap.

"Hmmmm.... That feels soooo nice... I've never had someone wash my back before."

"We're even, I haven't done it, either."

Getting me all sudsy, obviously, she moved down and got my legs, inside and outside, making me stand spread-legged so she could reach.

Her hands came up by my butt and I made a high-pitched "WoooWhOOOO!" sound and we both laughed, but she turned me around to face her and went up the front of my legs, around my package with some minimal attention to my balls and penis but not obsessively so, and then up over my abdomen, etc.

You can bet I was standing stiff and 45 degrees for this process!

I relaxed and stayed calm, I figured she was exploring, and if she trusted me, this was better.

As for me trusting her, the more I thought about it, the more I clear I was that she wouldn't do anything bad. She didn't seem like the type. Standing there, I wondered what the 'bad type' would be, and then thought of some of the callous mean girls I'd known and decided that yes, there were people to fear, but Cleo was definitely not one of them.