MOAB

Chapter i^2

Chapter i^2

“You’re not that old. We’re the same age. Are you saying I’m old too?” Thalia asked with a mind-your-words look on her face.

Yanni opened his arms in an apologetic gesture and replied, “No, of course not. I’m talking about academic age. About ideas. I just don’t feel that snappy anymore.”

Thalia thought about the situation seriously, cradling the baby who was asleep; the very image of cuteness. “Yanni, just take it as far as you can carry it. Maybe it needs to be passed on to the next torchbearer. Whom you will teach and bring to the finish line. Is that such a bad thing?”

“Ugh. It’s my idea, honey. I’ve worked so many years on it, I would hate to see it in someone else’s hands,” Yanni said, not really talking to anyone but himself.

Thalia walked in front of him demanding attention and said, “Yanni. If you establish a considerable part of your proof, they have no other choice but to credit you. Think of your family, do a good job, pass it on and let someone else finish the race.” She passed the baby on to him so that she should do the house chores.

He tended to the baby and then put her in the cradle. He turned the jingly tune on and she laughed at him, her eyes never really focusing anywhere but watching everything around her.

He spent the day working in his home lab. At least he remembered to turn the laser on this time.

He looked at it. It looked at him back, unflinching.

He wore his protective glasses and increased the intensity. “All I need is a Eureka moment. A bit of luck,” he thought. He knew of course that the eureka moment was a myth. Real science was slow and steady, or not so steady and full of dead-ends. At most, you would have a Huh-that’s-funny moment that would lead somewhere.

It wouldn’t hurt to try his luck though.

He began inputting random values to the variables he was working with, testing the laser after each one. The apodicticity of his proof was dependent on Maxwell’s equations, which, in their simplicity, had infinite permutations. He had a better chance of scoring with Kate Upton than randomly typing the variable that would validate his demonstration.

Type. Enter. No change.

Type again. Enter. Same.

Then he tried their anniversary, no use holding back on superstition now.

Nada.

Georgie’s birthday?

Then the phone rang. Thankfully.

The text from Nikos said: "A person who has not made his great contribution to science before the age of 30 will never do so. Albert Einstein."

Yanni started texting back something along the lines of, “Gee, thanks for twisting the knife,” but a car honked from the street below and it was obviously Nikos.

He rushed outside, eager for a change of scenery and closed the door on Thalia’s “No drinking” comment. He felt bad and peeked back inside the house and told her, “Ok honey, no drinking. Promise.”

Nikos was waiting in his convertible, laid back with eased hands as if sitting on a sofa. He was smiling at some girls crossing the street and they were smiling back.

“That was your chick maneuver, sending the text and then honking a few seconds later while I was replying. Don’t do that again to me,” said Yanni with spite, not getting in the car.

“Hey, you invented it, man. I simply honed it to perfection!” said Nikos and they both laughed loudly.

“Yeah, that seems to be the pattern lately,” said Yanni with a sad and worried look on his face.