Vox Mentis

Give it a week or so before you try this plan, but:

Just find an opportune moment when he's started watching a decent-length movie or a TV series or something in the rec room, then sneak into his room and pack up all his stuff. When he confronts you, tell him you went and talked to the examiners, seeing as you'd been forewarned he'd be a crap source of reactions. Anyway, they agreed you'd won this and they've packed his shit for him. Obviously, refuse to divulge what exactly you told the examiners to convince them.

Wow, what a well thought out strategy to use on the girl who has literally nowhere better to be than here. I mean, feel free to try and waste a year or two or three waiting us out, i'm sure that'll do wonders for your social life.

Yeah, tell him you're perfectly happy accepting free meals and lodging for life if that's what this test takes.

"You don't know me at all, do you? You think you do but you don't. This place is a dream for me. Just living here is better than anything I've ever had. I'm guessing this is at best par for you, maybe even a step down. I think I'm a lot more comfortable waiting you out than you are waiting on me."

The boy smirks. This enrages you. This little bitch thinks he's better than you?

You could always try persuading him with your fists, he's probably super-wimpy.

You grab the front of his popped collar, yank him up off the couch, and cock your fist back. He starts laughing. Nervous laughter, but still. Fuck him. "You're already losing," he says. "You think they won't" - gasp - "kick you out for assaulting me?"

You drop him. He lands back on the sofa, rubbing his neck. He smiles. "I didn't want to win like that. It's good to know how easily provokable you are if it comes down to it, though." He leans back and puts his feet back up on the coffee table.

Give it a week or so before you try this plan, but:

Just find an opportune moment when he's started watching a decent-length movie or a TV series or something in the rec room, then sneak into his room and pack up all his stuff. When he confronts you, tell him you went and talked to the examiners, seeing as you'd been forewarned he'd be a crap source of reactions. Anyway, they agreed you'd won this and they've packed his shit for him. Obviously, refuse to divulge what exactly you told the examiners to convince them.

That's a good idea, you think. While you're waiting, though, it wouldn't hurt to try a few other avenues:

Try to persuade a teacher to persuade him for you

Are you allowed to enlist the examiners' help on this? If you tell them your opponent has declared they're choosing the path of passive resistance, maybe you could with their help and a limo trick him into taking a one-way ride out of the Academy.

You storm off to Jane's office. She sits nunnishly behind her desk. You wonder if she sleeps under it. "He's not even taking part in the examination," you say. "He says he's just going to wait me out."

"And what exactly would you have me do about it, Elise?"

You're going to have to spell out exactly what needs to be done. Try and persuade her.

"I'm going to engage in two more days of laughably childish methods of "convincing" him to leave. After which point, I'm packing my things on the off-chance he peels himself off that couch to check on me, and I'd like you to tell him he's won. Put him in a nice limousine heading to the Graduates Ball or whatever, and give him a one-way trip to the airport instead.

I don't exactly have any way to bribe you, seeing as you've got power over me as a student or whatever, other than the offer of netting a proactive graduate who bothers to try over someone who'll be constantly relying on everyone else to do their work for them."

You're not an idiot, they aren't running a charity here. The entire point of this 'school', 'training' and these 'exams' is to give you the skills to do something for whoever's behind it, something that presumably involves all this persuasion you've been doing. You doubt whatever tasks they have for the 'applicant' that makes it through will be completed by sitting around doing nothing.

We should establish what is and is not a valid manner of persuasion for this particular test. Don't want to get in trouble for breaking rules.
Violence, for example, can be very persuasive. And it would feel really good to beat up that jerk.

You're not an idiot, they aren't running a charity here. The entire point of this 'school', 'training' and these 'exams' is to give you the skills to do something for whoever's behind it, something that presumably involves all this persuasion you've been doing. You doubt whatever tasks they have for the 'applicant' that makes it through will be completed by sitting around doing nothing.

"I'm going to engage in two more days of laughably childish methods of "convincing" him to leave. After which point, I'm packing my things on the off-chance he peels himself off that couch to check on me, and I'd like you to tell him he's won. Put him in a nice limousine heading to the Graduates Ball or whatever, and give him a one-way trip to the airport instead.

I don't exactly have any way to bribe you, seeing as you've got power over me as a student or whatever, other than the offer of netting a proactive graduate who bothers to try over someone who'll be constantly relying on everyone else to do their work for them."

"Look, Jane," you say, taking a seat, "we both know you want motivated individuals at this school. I'm here to tell you that I'm motivated. I'm a girl who likes to get things done. Buddy out there, he's not like that. He literally just told me he doesn't care, and he's not going to try. So let me ask you this, Jane: Is that the sort of person you want to have studying in your Academy? I know I wouldn't. I have been trying my fucking hardest here, and this... this kid is just going to ride it out? No fucking way."

Jane's lip twitches.

"So here's my plan. I'm going to screw around for two more days poking him while he just sits there, and then I'm going to pack my things. I want you to tell him he's won. And then I want you to have your driver put him in a limo and fly him out to Hellscape, New Mexico. Or wherever you send the factory rejects."

There's silence. Then Jane speaks. "Well, Ms. Jackson, you certainly make a case for yourself. We are, of course, aware of your competition's behavior. We accept your terms, providing you make it through the next two days."

That was easier than you'd expected.

We should establish what is and is not a valid manner of persuasion for this particular test. Don't want to get in trouble for breaking rules.
Violence, for example, can be very persuasive. And it would feel really good to beat up that jerk.

"Well, uh, great. And just so I'm clear, are there any invalid forms of persuasion here? Like... violence, for example?"

"All forms of persuasion are valid at one time or another. Your challenge is to use the right form at the right time to exert the appropriate pressure on your mark."

That sounds fair.

You have two days. How would you like them to play out?

Well, a little paranoia never hurt anyone. You'll note that Jane said they're "aware of his behaviour', not necessarily that your assessment is completely factual. Ask whether she can give you assurance of the following, while preparing yourself for the likelihood they can't or won't give you straight answers to the following:

1. Has Smugass propositioned a member of the faculty in the same way you have?
1a. If he has, will they divulge to you what he said/suggested to them?
1ai. If they will not, is this because of Academy policy or because he explicitly told them not to?
2. Whether he has or not, and whether you are now privy to his plans or not, are you able to trust the faculty to lie to him if he does come and inquire as to your movements?
2a. Would Jane ensure, in the event Douchebuck does come knocking at her door, to impart to him the following information: that you came, complained that his methods were bullshit, and got told to suck it up and to not expect outside help?
3. If Prickstain does proposition the faculty in future to help with a scheme, and he does not explicitly swear them to secrecy, if you inquire will they tell you his plans, or, say, at least the existence of a plan?
4. (contingent on your bedroom having a lock, I don't remember) can the faculty promise to not use their skeletons keys or whatever to enter your room on his behalf?
4a. Can they promise to refuse his requests if he does ask them to do so, making up a rule like that doesn't count as "persuasion" for their purposes?

These are all general assurances so you can afford to be a bit less paranoid, spend a bit less time trying to second-guess him, and thus make the next two days more authentic. Get well-rested and visibly take full advantage of the comparative luxury this place is offering you.

Once you've made sure you've got appearances covered, go nuts. Smear vaseline on his doorhandle, take the batteries out of the tv remote, launch spitballs, prank him, gaslight him in incremental movements of his possessions if you can sneak into his room, basically take the excuse to be as juvenile as you wish. Have a screaming tantrum, pull his hair, walk in and change the channel, ignoring him, be loud and/or obnoxious in his vicinity, and really make it look like you're giving it your all.

You need to stick to the most childish methods you've got to make it seem like you're not a threat to him, and he can afford to stick to putting up passive resistance. That's the best-case scenario, but you need to be prepared for him cracking and replying in kind (at which point you're going to want sanctuary in your own room), or having something nastier planned out.

Late on day 2, get frustrated that he's still here and punch him square in the face. That'll give a reason you're being expelled that he already expects to apply.

Late on day 2, get frustrated that he's still here and punch him square in the face. That'll give a reason you're being expelled that he already expects to apply.

Also, it'll be glorious

Alternatively, do absolutely nothing. Don't react to anything he does, don't even leave your bed. It's his race to lose.

SpoilerShow

Sorry for the lack of updates recently, work's been busy. Here's a nice massive one with lots of developments to make up for it!

Well, a little paranoia never hurt anyone. You'll note that Jane said they're "aware of his behaviour', not necessarily that your assessment is completely factual. Ask whether she can give you assurance of the following, while preparing yourself for the likelihood they can't or won't give you straight answers to the following:

1. Has Smugass propositioned a member of the faculty in the same way you have?
1a. If he has, will they divulge to you what he said/suggested to them?
1ai. If they will not, is this because of Academy policy or because he explicitly told them not to?
2. Whether he has or not, and whether you are now privy to his plans or not, are you able to trust the faculty to lie to him if he does come and inquire as to your movements?
2a. Would Jane ensure, in the event Douchebuck does come knocking at her door, to impart to him the following information: that you came, complained that his methods were bullshit, and got told to suck it up and to not expect outside help?
3. If Prickstain does proposition the faculty in future to help with a scheme, and he does not explicitly swear them to secrecy, if you inquire will they tell you his plans, or, say, at least the existence of a plan?
4. (contingent on your bedroom having a lock, I don't remember) can the faculty promise to not use their skeletons keys or whatever to enter your room on his behalf?
4a. Can they promise to refuse his requests if he does ask them to do so, making up a rule like that doesn't count as "persuasion" for their purposes?

These are all general assurances so you can afford to be a bit less paranoid, spend a bit less time trying to second-guess him, and thus make the next two days more authentic. Get well-rested and visibly take full advantage of the comparative luxury this place is offering you.

Once you've made sure you've got appearances covered, go nuts. Smear vaseline on his doorhandle, take the batteries out of the tv remote, launch spitballs, prank him, gaslight him in incremental movements of his possessions if you can sneak into his room, basically take the excuse to be as juvenile as you wish. Have a screaming tantrum, pull his hair, walk in and change the channel, ignoring him, be loud and/or obnoxious in his vicinity, and really make it look like you're giving it your all.

You need to stick to the most childish methods you've got to make it seem like you're not a threat to him, and he can afford to stick to putting up passive resistance. That's the best-case scenario, but you need to be prepared for him cracking and replying in kind (at which point you're going to want sanctuary in your own room), or having something nastier planned out.

You ask your questions. While Jane will not confirm or deny that your opponent has spoken to the faculty, she also will not confirm or deny that you have spoken to them, should he inquire. If you wish for her to tell him that you spoke to her complaining about his methods, she will do so, but she will not lie. Fortunately, you did actually complain about his methods, so that's not a lie.

Jane will not tell the boy your plans, unless you want her to, but likewise, she will not tell you his plans, should he propose any. You can also rest easy in the fact that the faculty will not violate the privacy of your room. Again, though, they will not lie to the boy about the rules of persuasion, if he asks.

Comfortable with your answers, you return to your room to start plotting the shit out of this thing.

~

You make the next two days of curly-haired boy's life as obnoxious of a living hell as you can. Vaseline on the doorknobs. Clingfilm on the toilet seats. Packing tape across the door frames. Loosening the cable connection on the TV enough so that every time a door slams, the channels cut to static. You are become Asshole, harsher of mellows.

The prick remains stoic, however. If you're annoying him at all, he doesn't let it show. This serves to annoy you further, which is going to end up helping you sell what you're about to do even more.

Late on day 2, get frustrated that he's still here and punch him square in the face. That'll give a reason you're being expelled that he already expects to apply.

Late on day 2, get frustrated that he's still here and punch him square in the face. That'll give a reason you're being expelled that he already expects to apply.

Also, it'll be glorious

On the evening of the second day, you pass by the boy on his way to the TV room. He smirks at you. Now seems as good a time as any. You cock your fist back and let fly, fully bathing in the feeling of your hard knuckles connecting with his soft privileged nose.

Curly-haired boy goes down, holding his nose. A thick rivulet of blood trickles past his hand. His eyes well up a bit. "F-fuck you! You've just failed this exam, you idiot."

You show him two middle fingers. "No, fuck you. I'm done with this shitshow anyway. This school is bullshit, Jane is bullshit, but most of all, you're bullshit. Run off and tattle, microdick. See if I care."

~

From there, everything goes according to plan. You pack your stuff up and leave your door conveniently open for the boy to see your failure. You watch him get into the limo, strutting like a fucking peacock, and watch him drive away and out of your life. Your only regret is that you won't get to see the look on his face when he realizes how thoroughly he has been played.

This school is yours.

~

You have sixteen classes per week. In between, you're expected to study and practice. Not on other students. That's a rule. Your first day, wearing a uniform that still smells of the plastic wrapping, you stand in Jane's office and take a lecture. There are many rules, and Jane takes you through each of them, patiently and in detail, like you're a moron. At first you think this is because Jane is still carrying a grudge from the cheating thing, but as the lecture wears on, you realize no. Jane just thinks you're that stupid.

"This is a nonnegotiable rule of the school," Jane says. "Indeed, of the organization as a whole. Should you break it, there will be no excuses. No second chances. Am I making myself clear?"

"You're making yourself clear," you say.

At this point, you didn't know what practicing meant. It takes you months to find out. You had thought they were going to teach you persuasion; instead, you get philosophy, psychology, sociology, and the history of language. Back in San Francisco, Lee had given you a little speech about how this school would be different because it taught interesting, useful things, and that was a joke, in your opinion. Grammar is not interesting. It's not useful to know where words came from. And no one explains it. There's no overview. No road map. Classes are eight to twelve students of wildly different ages, all of them ahead of you and no one asking the obvious questions. You have to stay up at night, staring at textbooks, trying to figure out why any of this matters.

You learn Maslow's hierarchy of needs, which is the order in which people optimally satisfy different types of desires (food-safety-love-status-enlightenment). You learn that leverage over people's desire for knowledge is called informational social influence, while leverage over people's desire to be liked is normative social influence. You learn that you can classify a person's personality into one of two-hundred and twenty-eight psychographic categories with a small number of well-directed questions plus observation, and this is called setting.

"I thought this was going to be cooler," you complain to Eliot. He's a part-time lecturer, teaching a few advanced classes, which don't include you. Whenever you see his car parked out front, you head for his office, because he's the only one you like to talk to. "I thought it would be like magic."

Eliot is busy with papers. But you figure he has an obligation to deal with you, since it's basically his fault you're here. "Sorry," he says. "At your level, it's just books."

"When is it like magic?"

"When you finish the books," Eliot says.

~

By the end of the year, you can see where it's going. You're not learning persuasion, you're still deep in Plato and neurolinguistics and the political roots of the Russian Revolution, but you're starting to sense the connections between them. One day you get to dissect a human brain, and as you peer through goggles at a frontal lobe, sliding the scalpel through the meat, separating decision making from motor function, memory from reward centers, you think, Hello. Because you know what the meat does.

~

You play soccer. You have to do a sport, soccer or basketball or water polo, and you're short and hate the swimsuits, so, soccer. On Wednesday afternoons you line up with the other girls, shin guards stuffed into knee-high purple socks, your hair dragged back, a yellow shirt billowing, and you chase a ball around a field. The girls are all ages, so it's mostly an exercise in kicking the ball to the oldest and shouting encouragement. The exception is Sasha, who is only your age but strong and graceful and has shoulders like battering rams. Soccer is supposed to be noncontact but Sasha's shoulders put you on your ass anyway. After a goal, she pumps her fist, unsmiling, like she's satisfied but not surprised, and although you don't enjoy soccer much, you find this terribly impressive. You want to be as good at something as Sasha is at soccer.

At night, you sit by the window of your cloister room, books piled on your desk. You study with your hair pinned up and your school tie slung. You don't really enjoy reading but you like how the books are clues. Each one a piece in a puzzle. Even when they don't fit together, they reveal a little more about what kind of picture you're making.

One day, exploring a corridor you'd always assumed went nowhere, you discover a secret library. You don't know if it's actually secret. But it's not marked, and you never see anyone else. It's very small, with shelves that stretch up so high you need a wooden ladder to reach them. Up there, the books are old. The first time you crack open a volume, its pages come apart in your hands. After that, you're more careful. It occurs to you that maybe you're not allowed here, but that hadn't been included in Jane's comprehensive list of rules, and the old books turn out to be interesting, so you stay.

One shelf is for disaster stories. There is probably a classification scheme you haven't figured out. But the common thread seems to be that a lot of people die. After a few books, you realize they're all the same story. They're set in different places, in Sumeria and Mexico and countries you've never heard of, and the details differ, but the basics are the same. A group of people - sometimes they're called sorcerers, and sometimes demons, and sometimes they're just ordinary people - rule over a kingdom or nation or whatever. In four of the books, they begin building something impressive, like a crystal palace or the world's largest pyramid. Then something bad happens and people die and everyone starts speaking different languages. This story feels vaguely familiar to you, but you don't place it until you come to a book in which the impressive thing is a tower named Babel.

You think you hear a noise and freeze. But it's far away. You suddenly see yourself: sitting on the floor of a library in a blazer and pleated skirt, navy ribbons in your hair, reading old books. Before you came here, you'd seen girls like this - girls who wear ribbons, and enjoy books - and thought they were a different species. You'd thought you and them were separated by walls. Yet here you are, on the other side, and you don't know how you did it. You don't feel like a different person. You're just in a different place.

~

The junior dining hall makes excellent chocolate milk shakes. You get into the habit of swinging by after Macroeconomics and carrying one out to a sunny spot on the grass at the side of the building, where you can read. The cup is comically big. You always feel a little sick at the end of it. But you keep going back.

One day you pass a boy with a laptop at one of the outdoor tables. You've seen this boy in the halls, but you don't share any classes because he's older. He's more advanced. You sneak a glance at him, and another, because he's pretty cute.

The next day he's there again, and this time he looks up as you pass. His eyes take in your enormous milkshake. You keep walking to your sunny spot but can't concentrate on your book.

The day after that, he sees you coming, stretches, and pushes the hair out of his eyes. "Thirsty, huh?"

You smile. "Yeah," you say. "I am thirsty." You walk on.

You know you'll be passing him again tomorrow. Do you want to take this little thing you've got going any further? How would you like to handle this?

SpoilerShow

HELLA UPDATE <3

Don't be too thirsty, now. He's cute, but he's also like, at least a grade above you in the school of getting people to do what you want.

That being said, let's try to make a friend. Why not sit down at the same table tomorrow? Just bring your book and your shake. Maybe conversation will happen; don't stress if it doesn't.

If conversation does happen, see if you can ask him what they mean by "practice."

You should ask Jane what the rules are between inter-student relationships.

SpoilerShow

HELLA UPDATE <3

Don't be too thirsty, now. He's cute, but he's also like, at least a grade above you in the school of getting people to do what you want.

That being said, let's try to make a friend. Why not sit down at the same table tomorrow? Just bring your book and your shake. Maybe conversation will happen; don't stress if it doesn't.

I say: STUDY BUDDIES!

SpoilerShow

You should ask Jane what the rules are between inter-student relationships.

I'll bring this into it later - I haven't forgotten about it.

If conversation does happen, see if you can ask him what they mean by "practice."

You already know what practicing means, as Jane had hammered it into you before classes: trying to persuade another student. Maybe that's already what you're doing to this boy, unconsciously. It's nothing you're going to get in trouble for though. The fact is, if you pay attention, people try to persuade each other all the time. It's all they do.

SpoilerShow

HELLA UPDATE <3

Don't be too thirsty, now. He's cute, but he's also like, at least a grade above you in the school of getting people to do what you want.

That being said, let's try to make a friend. Why not sit down at the same table tomorrow? Just bring your book and your shake. Maybe conversation will happen; don't stress if it doesn't.

I say: STUDY BUDDIES!

The next day you head for your sunny spot, milkshake in hand. You round the corner and his computer is closed. He smiles, and gestures for you to sit, and you do.

~

His name is Jeremy Lantern. He had wanted to be a zookeeper. His family had a tiny house in Brooklyn but his mother rescued animals: rabbits and mice and ducks and dogs and two chickens. One of the chickens has been insane. It ran in circles, making noises like it was drowning. His parents had wanted to get rid of it, but Jeremy pleaded for mercy. He thought he could cure it. He imagined this chicken becoming his friend, and people saying, "Jeremy's the only one who can go near that chicken." But this never happened. One day the chicken attacked him, pecking his face, and his father wrung its neck. That's how he got the small scar near his left eye, and decided against zoology.

He asks you what your story is. What do you tell him?

Hm.

Telling the truth might be dangerous, but it would be nice to have an honest relationship for once. And to be fair, what he's told you isn't exactly the most detailed biography in the world either. Let's try to play it safe and give him about as much as he gives you. Make your life story a reward he has to work for.

Tell him about the easiest hundred bucks you ever made; how proud you were of yourself back then, how the you right now could've snagged quadruple that and how little it matters in retrospect.

SpoilerShow

Incorporating Crowstone's question about relationships in this one, and taking Chwoka's study buddies idea to the character's natural conclusion for the purposes of time jumping here.

Hm.

Telling the truth might be dangerous, but it would be nice to have an honest relationship for once. And to be fair, what he's told you isn't exactly the most detailed biography in the world either. Let's try to play it safe and give him about as much as he gives you. Make your life story a reward he has to work for.

Tell him about the easiest hundred bucks you ever made; how proud you were of yourself back then, how the you right now could've snagged quadruple that and how little it matters in retrospect.

You decide to play it safe. You tell him your family is Canadian and you were raised on hockey. You describe how when you were six, your father took you to a game and you were terrified because the crowd was so angry. There was an incident, a splash of players on the ice, and you turned to your father for protection but his face was monstrous. On the way home, he asked if you'd had fun, and you said yes, but it was a lie.

You discovered your father gambled on the games. You were able to decipher patterns in the ways the games played, and could usually pick out which team was going to win just by seeing the lineups. You were your daddy's good luck charm. He gave you a cut of every win he had, and it just seemed so simple to you to read the patterns. It was the easiest hundred dollars you ever made. It was power.

It wasn't perfect, though. Sometimes you were wrong. And daddy hated it when you were wrong. You'd go to bed on game days with bruises sometimes. Eventually you couldn't take it anymore. One night you packed up what little belongings you had in a backpack and left, never looking back. You honed your craft on the street. Not only seeing patterns, but getting other people to see them where they didn't exist. Tricking fools into parting with their money. You could easily snag four times that first hundred dollars in a few minutes now.

But it all just seems so silly now, doesn't it? None of that even matters here. You're a new person and the past is the past.

Jeremy's hand touches yours.

Most of what you just said was lies, of course. You can't tell a student anything true about yourself. You couldn't help but let a little truth sneak in, though. There's something to be said for the real, you think. It'd be nice to let someone in, just a little. You've been closed off for so long.

It'snot a rule, exactly, this lying about yourself thing. It's just healthy paranoia. You're in you're second year and learning how people can be categorized into distinct psychographic groups based on how their brain works. Set 107, for example, is an intuition- and fear-motivated introvert personality: those people make decisions based on avoiding the worst outcomes, find primary colors reassuring, and, when asked to pick a random number, will choose something small, which feels less vulnerable. If you know someone is a 107, you know how to persuade them - or, at least, which persuasion techniques are more likely to work. This isn't much different from what you've always done, without thinking about it too much: you'd developed a sense of what a mark desired or feared and used that to compel them. It's the same, only with more theory. So that's why you shouldn't talk about yourself, and why the other students are so aloof and inscrutable: to avoid being identified. To guard against persuasion, you have to hide who you are. But you suspect you're not very good at this. You guess there's probably a whole bunch of clues you're inadvertently dropping to someone like Jeremy Lantern every time you open your mouth, or cut your hair, or choose a sweater. You figure the reason the school has a no practicing rule is that sometimes people do it.

~

"Tell me what they teach you," you say. "Give me a sneak preview."

You and Jeremy are making slushies. You've progressed beyond milkshakes. The advantage of the slushie is you have to leave school grounds. Tuesdays and Fridays, if the weather is clear, you and Jeremy Lantern walk the three-quarters of a mile to the nearest 7-Eleven. You like walking beside him, because cars would zoom by and the drivers would probably assume you're his girlfriend.

"You use very direct language," he says. "You don't ask. You command. That's a useful instinct."

"So tell me why I'm learning Latin."

"I can't."

"Do you always follow the rules?"

"Yes."

"Bah," you say, defeated.

"The rules are important. What they teach us is dangerous."

"What they teach you is dangerous. What they teach me is Latin. Dude, I'm not asking for state secrets. Just give me something. One thing."

He attaches the slushie lid and pokes the straw through the plastic.

"Bah," you say again. You both walk to the front of the store and stand in line behind a kid paying for gas. The man behind the counter is balding, in his fifties, Pakistani or something like it. You nudge Jeremy. "Which set is this guy?" He doesn't answer. "I'm thinking one eighteen. Am I right? Come on, I'm doing setting; you can answer the question."

"Maybe one seventy."

You hadn't considered that one, but see instantly how it makes sense. "See, that wasn't so bad. Now what? What do we do once we know he's a one seventy?"

"We pay for our slushies," Jeremy says.

~

You hang with Jeremy in his room sometimes. One time you stick chewing gum into the lock before you leave and come back when you know he has a class. You go to his bookshelf and pull down three titles you've been eyeing for a while. You're sitting on his bed, deep in Sociographic Methods, when the door opens. Jeremy stands there, one hand on the knob. You've never seen him mad before. "Give me that."

"No." You sit on it.

"Do you know what they'll do-" He tries to grab it and you resist and he lands on top of you. This you slightly engineered. His breath brushes your face. You let the textbook slide out and clunk to the floor. He raises a hand and hold it tentatively over your breast. You inhale. He moves his hand away.

"Keep going," you say.

"I can't."

"Yes you can."

He rolls off. "It's not allowed."

"Come on," you say.

"We're not allowed to be together." That's a rule. Fraternization. "It's not safe."

"For who?"

"Either of us."

You stare at him.

"I'm sorry," he says.

You shuffle closer. You touch his white shirt. You've spent a lot of time imagining taking off his shirt. "I won't tell anyone." You stroke his chest through the fabric. Then his hand close on yours.

"I'm sorry," he says.

~

"What's with the fraternization rule?" you ask Eliot. You wander around his office, fingering books, being casual. Eliot looks up from his papers. Originally, you were going to ask, Why can't we have sex. Because, just once, you'd like to see Eliot surprised or offended. Or anything, really. Just to prove that he's human. But then you lost your nerve.

"Students aren't permitted to enter relationships with each other."

"I know what it is. I'm asking why."

"You know why."

You sigh. "Because if you let someone know you well, they can persuade you. But that's incredibly cold, Eliot." You go to the window. Outside, you watch a sparrow hop across the slate roof. "That's no way to live." He doesn't reply. "Are you saying, for the rest of my life, I can't have a relationship with an organization person?"

"Yes."

"Do you appreciate how dull that is?" Eliot doesn't react. "And what about... you know, purely physical relationships?"

"It's no different."

"It's completely different. Relationships, okay, I get it. But not for just sex."

"There is no 'just sex.' It's called intimacy for a reason."

"That's one word," you protest. "Coincidence."

"'And the man knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain.' Note the use of the word knew in this context."

"That's from three thousand years ago. You're talking about the Bible."

"Exactly. The concept is not new."

You shake your head, frustrated. "Have you ever done it?"

"Done what?"

"Broken the rule," you say. "Fraternized."

"No."

"I don't believe you." You do. You're just pushing. "You must have thought about it. What about with Jane? There's something going on with you guys. Your feet always point toward her. And she goes very still around you. It's like when we're acting up in class and she's trying not to get pissed. She goes still when she's trying to control her emotions."

"I need to get some work done, if you don't mind." He sounds completely unruffled.

"I think Jane wants to fraternize with you," you say. "Badly."

"Out."

"I'm going!" You leave. You're more frustrated than ever.

~

You turn eighteen. You lie in bed awhile, thinking about what that means. Anything? You get up and go to class and of course nobody knows. At lunch, you walk to the 7-Eleven with Jeremy and debate telling him the whole way. Finally, while filling your slushie, you say, "I'm eighteen today."

He looks surprised. This is the kind of information you're not supposed to share. "I didn't get you anything."

"I know. I just wanted to tell you."

He's silent. You walk to the front of the store. You smile at the man behind the counter. "It's my birthday today."

"Oh my goodness."

"Finally free." You lean across the counter, grinning. "Free to give a long and happy life.

"I tell you what," he says. "I give you the slushie for free."

"Oh, no," you say.

"Happy birthday." He pushes it across to you. "You are a good girl."

As you leave the store, Jeremy seizes your arm. "Give a happy life? Finally free?"

You smile, but he's serious. He steers you to a bench beside the road and sits you on it and stands there, glowering. You feel a tickle in your stomach, simultaneously sickening and thrilling. "You can't do that."

"I got a slushie. One free slushie."

"It's a serious breach of the rules."

"Come on. Like word suggestion is even a real technique. I bet it's nothing compared to what you can do."

"That's not the point."

"Is this because he gave me a present and you didn't?"

"You think the rules don't apply to you? They do. You can't practice. Not outside the school. Not on that guy. Not on me."

"You? When have I ever practiced on you?" You poke him with your shoe. "As if I could compromise you. You're going to graduate next year and I don't know anything. Come on. Sit. Drink slushie. It's my birthday."

"Promise me you'll never do that again."

"Okay. Okay, Jeremy. I was just playing."

After a while, he sits. You lean your head on his shoulder. You feel very close to him. "I promise not to turn you into my thought slave," you say, and feel him smile a little.

But you've thought about it.

~

The next Tuesday, you hang around the school gates but Jeremy doesn't show up for your slushie run. You trudge back to the school. Something must have come up. Some class. He's getting busier. But you pass the front lawn and there he is, lounging with his friends, his pant legs rolled up in the sun. They're talking in the way of older students, no one laughing or even moving much, every sentence dripping with irony and layers of meaning, or so you guess. You stop. Heads turn. Jeremy glances at you, then away. You walk on.

You understand that you can't be seen together too often. You can't be attached. You know this. You reach your room and sit at your desk and open a book. If you turn your head, you could look down to the lawn and see Jeremy and his little group of conceited friends. But you don't. Occasionally you lean back and stretch your arms, or fiddle with your hair, because you know he can see you too.

~

From time to time you see students with ribbons tied around their wrists. The ribbon is red or white; if it's red, it means a senior taking his final exam. The rule is not to talk to them, or even look to closely, although of course you do, because one day you'll be wearing that red ribbon, and you want to know what that means. One time, you see a red-ribboned boy building a house of cards in the front hall. He's there for two days, making the house taller and taller while he grows thinner and more haunted-looking and it gets so people avoid the hall, in case of drafts. Then one morning the cards are gone and so is the boy. You never find out what happened, whether he passed or failed. Another night, you wake to an odd bell, and go to the window to see a girl leading a cow up the driveway. An actual, live cow. You can't deduce anything useful from this.

At the end of your second year, you find a slip of paper beneath your door, notifying you of a room change for Higher-Level Machine Languages. But when you turn up, you're the only student there. The teacher, a short, balding man named Brecht, hands you a white ribbon. "Congratulations. You're ready for your junior exam." You tie the ribbon around your left wrist, feeling excited.

Brecht tells you to make a computer print the word hello on its screen. THis sounds like something you can do in about two minutes, with a command like PRINT or ECHO. But Brecht says not to leave the room until it's done. You sit on a cardboard box, because this isn't a classroom so much as a crypt for the corpses of prehistoric computers, and flip open a laptop.

The laptop doesn't work. What do you do?

Good thing you kept your fingernails long — unscrew the casing, let's take a look at the computer's guts.

Good thing you kept your fingernails long — unscrew the casing, let's take a look at the computer's guts.

You take the bottom off the laptop. After a short inspection of its innards, you isolate the flaw: it's totally fucked. The power supply is shot. The fan is broken. The cables to the screen are frayed to hell, splayed every-which-way. The only things that still appear to be undamaged are the processor and the hard drive.

Check out all the other computers. If none of them work, start opening up a few compatible-looking ones for salvage parts.

Check out all the other computers. If none of them work, start opening up a few compatible-looking ones for salvage parts.

You crawl around the racks scattered throughout the room, testing power supplies and fans. You find a monitor that powers on but has a burned-out VGA input. Everything in the room is like that, you discover: sabotaged in key ways.

You're able to take what parts you find, though, and assemble a machine, Frankenstein-style. It has a hard drive and a monitor and it powers on but won't do anything else. You have a blinking cursor that refuses to respond to the keyboard. The operating system is sabotaged, too, apparently.

put a post-it note on a screen with "hello" written on it. Not as an attempt to pass the test, just to keep your morale up while you try to figure out what the frick to do with this mess

put a post-it note on a screen with "hello" written on it. Not as an attempt to pass the test, just to keep your morale up while you try to figure out what the frick to do with this mess

You do that. It helps a little.