“I don’t think people who are dating just . . . say hi to each other.”
“What do people who are dating do?”
It beat Olive. She had gone on maybe five dates in her life, including the ones with Jeremy, and they had ranged from moderately boring to anxiety inducing to horrifying (mostly when a guy had monologued about his grandmother’s hip replacement in frightening detail). She would have loved to have someone in her life, but she doubted it was in store for her. Maybe she was unlovable. Maybe spending so many years alone had warped her in some fundamental way and that was why she seemed to be unable to develop a true romantic connection, or even the type of attraction she often heard others talk about. In the end, it didn’t really matter. Grad school and dating went poorly together, anyway, which was probably why Dr. Adam Carlsen, MacArthur Fellow and genius extraordinaire, was standing here at thirtysomething years old, asking Olive what people did on dates.
Academics, ladies and gentlemen.
“Um . . . things. Stuff.” Olive racked her brain. “People go out and do activities together. Like apple picking, or those Paint and Sip things.” Which are idiotic, Olive thought.
“Which are idiotic,” Adam said, gesturing dismissively with those huge hands of his. “You could just go to Anh and tell her that we went out and painted a Monet. Sounds like she’d take care of letting everyone else know.”
“Okay, first of all, it was Jeremy. Let’s agree to blame Jeremy. And it’s more than that,” Olive insisted. “People who date, they—they talk. A lot. More than just greetings in the hallway. They know each other’s favorite colors, and where they were born, and they . . . they hold hands. They kiss.”
Adam pressed his lips together as if to suppress a smile. “We could never do that.”
A fresh wave of mortification crashed into Olive. “I am sorry about the kiss. I really didn’t think, and—”
He shook his head. “It’s fine.”
He did seem uncharacteristically indifferent to the situation, especially for a guy who was known to freak out when people got the atomic number of selenium wrong. No, he wasn’t indifferent. He was amused.
Olive cocked her head. “Are you enjoying this?”
“?‘Enjoying’ is probably not the right word, but you have to admit that it’s quite entertaining.”
She had no idea what he was talking about. There was nothing entertaining about the fact that she had randomly kissed a faculty member because he was the only person in the hallway and that, as a consequence of that spectacularly idiotic action, everyone thought she was dating someone she’d met exactly twice before today—
She burst into laughter and folded into herself before her train of thought was even over, overwhelmed by the sheer improbability of the situation. This was her life. These were the results of her actions. When she could finally breathe again, her abs hurt and she had to wipe her eyes. “This is the worst.”
He was smiling, staring at her with a strange light in his eyes. And would you look at that: Adam Carlsen had dimples. Cute ones. “Yep.”
“And it’s all my fault.”
“Pretty much. I kind of yanked Anh’s chain yesterday, but yeah, I’d say that it’s mostly your fault.”
Fake dating. Adam Carlsen. Olive would have to be a lunatic. “Wouldn’t it be a problem that you’re faculty and I’m a graduate student?”
He tilted his head, going serious. “It wouldn’t look great, but I don’t think so, no. Since I have no authority whatsoever over you and am not involved in your supervision. But I can ask around.”
It was an epically bad idea. The worst idea ever entertained in the epically bad history of bad ideas. Except that it really would solve this current problem of hers, as well as some of Adam’s, in exchange for saying hi to him once a week and making an effort not to call him Dr. Carlsen. It seemed like a pretty good deal.
“Can I think about it?”
“Of course,” he said calmly. Reassuringly.
She hadn’t thought he’d be like this. After hearing all the stories, and seeing him walk around with that perpetual frown of his, she really hadn’t thought he’d be like this. Even if she didn’t quite know what this even meant.
“And thank you, I guess. For offering. Adam.” She added the last word like an afterthought. Trying it out on her lips. It felt weird, but not too weird.
After a long pause, he nodded. “No problem. Olive.”
Chapter Three
HYPOTHESIS: A private conversation with Adam Carlsen will become 150 percent more awkward after the word “sex” is uttered. By me.
Three days later, Olive found herself standing in front of Adam’s office.
She’d never been there before, but she had no problem finding it. The student scurrying out with misty eyes and a terrified expression was a dead giveaway, not to mention that Adam’s door was the only one in the hallway completely devoid of pictures of kids, pets, or significant others. Not even a copy of his article that had made the cover of Nature Methods, which she knew about from looking him up on Google Scholar the previous day. Just dark brown wood and a metal plaque that read: Adam J. Carlsen, Ph.D.