ALPHA
Maybe because it was the most unreachable goal a woman like me could attain, I decided, the day my father left, that I was going to win the Nobel Prize one day. I elaborated a simple but foolproof plan and visualized it like a blackboard inside my mind:
1- Physics degree,
2- Masters in Astrophysics,
3- Prestigious professorship,
4- Graduate work in theoretical physics,
5- Make a major scientific breakthrough,
6- Win the Nobel Prize,
At the bottom of this list. Almost as an afterthought.
7- Get a boyfriend.
It seemed simple enough, but for me it was particularly complicated. My deadbeat dad left us scraping bottom, or so my mother said. And all the scholarships I applied for rejected me.
"Their loss..."
I had to submit myself to the most shameful act a scientist, or any woman for that matter, could endure to collect the necessary money to enroll at Cal Poly Pomona.
"Many women enoy that kind of...event, you know?"
The rest of the money for my education I was earning honestly with a part time job at a grocery chain. At this point the first item of my list was half way finished.
Sadly, I didn't know how I would pay for my Masters and I had yet to meet any other acceptable ambitious scientists to start working with on research. But then during the second quarter - exactly in the middle of the semester - my perfect guy started to share one of the classes with me.
That particular spring, global warming had decided to play one on us again and made the weather unnaturally hot for the season. It was particularly uncomfortable for me, because I insisted on looking professional at all times. Buttoned up shirts, long pants, closed-toe shoes, and a ponytail: my perpetual self-imposed college uniform.
The truth is that I tried to always look like I could be a teacher. My own way to push my credentials even though I still didn't had them. It worked so well that in fact a few times I got mistaken as one.
"I love those moments!"
As you can imagine, all I could think about was for winter to come and make my existence a bit easier. Maybe that's why I decided to take so many credits that quarter; every time I ducked into the cool, crisp air-conditioning of a classroom; I breathed a sigh of relief. Sometimes I would stay in the car between classes, running the AC for a few minutes just to endure the heat.
Mom, the few times she was sober enough to notice, always tried to convince me of wearing more fresh and sexy clothes to no avail.
This twister of hot weather and too many classes was the moment the three of us clashed together, like the meteor that impacted Tunguska. It changed the landscape and our lives forever.
We shared my fourth period class, Fundamentals of physics. The other subjects were easy and uneventful: General physics, College physics and their respective laboratories. I just glided through the lessons with ease. I only needed to reread the day's subject a few minutes before the class started. I was ready for whatever question or challenge then.
"Easy as pie…"
It wasn't the first time I saw any of them. I remember vague annoying sightings of William, but Toby was my "first time" to call it some way. The memory of his touch was always lingering in my mind. It was the one and only time Toby and I were so close. I constantly thought about him ever since.
"Pathetic..."
When I realized in the first day of class that Toby