Me You Us (19 page)

It's mad. It's genius. It's scary. And the subtitle reads “Galgorithm—courtesy of Anonymous.”

If Mr. Kimbrough didn't name names, then how the hell did it get linked to me?

To make matters much, much worse, beneath the spreadsheet are some of the tips and techniques I've been periodically doling out to Mr. Kimbrough over the past few months. Only he calls them “Corollaries to the Galgorithm,” has given some of them overly fancy technical names, and follows each one with a detailed explanation.

• Social media initiation window

• Blind carbon copy trapdoor method

• Female Pavlovian response mechanism

• Prejection avoidance and warning signs

• Nonsense text beachhead establishment

• Two-dot ellipsis/period hybrid character

• Laying groundwork for future physicality

• Eyelash fail-safe with Latisse modification

• Cloud-based fragrance application strategy

This doesn't sound like advice on talking to women; it sounds like instructions for installing new enterprise software or launching a counterterrorism offensive.

I think I'm gonna have a panic attack. At the very bottom of the post is a crude visitor counter. It reads 15,014.

I look at the school paper again. Brooke has taken all of this nonsense from the blog and attributed it to me in far-from-flattering fashion.

I've been outed.

Before I can even figure out what to do next, the door to the computer lab opens, and Mr. Kimbrough himself rushes in. He looks distressed. So I can only imagine what I look like.

I glare at him. He puts his hands up as if he comes in peace.

“Some students told me you were in here. Are you okay?”

“Bob, what the hell is this?
What did you do?
”

“I was just messing around, and I decided to take all the advice you gave me and . . . see if I could reverse-engineer the formula. It was just a goof.”

“A goof? A
goof  
? Bob, this is insane!”

“I didn't mean for everyone to see it. It was just for a few of my nerdy math-teacher friends who read my blog. It's supposed to be a joke. I didn't even put your name on it.”

“Then why the hell is my name all over the front page of the paper!”

“I don't know! I swear!”

“This article makes me look like some kind of freak!”

“Now, Shane, just take it easy. We'll figure this out.”

I look back at the computer screen, as well as the newspaper. This feels like it isn't real, like it's some kind of nightmare.

“You have to delete this!” I say.

“It's too late. It's already been duplicated on the
Chronicle
website and God knows where else. If I delete it now, it will only make things worse.”

“Goddamn it, Bob. You
do
know this isn't right, right? You can't put girls into a formula. You can't predict what they're gonna do. They're
girls
. This is creepy!”

“But
you
have a formula, Shane.”

“
It's not real!
There's no such thing as the Galgorithm! It was just a ploy to bolster your confidence, to get you to believe in yourself and listen to my advice! Which, by the way, I'm not even giving out anymore. I'm done with the whole thing.
I gave it up. I'm being humiliated for something that doesn't even exist! People are gonna think I'm some kind of insane stalker!”

“I'm so sorry, Shane. I don't know what to say. I don't know how it got out. I posted this stuff weeks ago, and no one even said anything. It had twenty-six views the last time I checked.”

I rub my temples and run my hands through my hair.

“This can't be happening.”

“I'm sorry,” Bob repeats. “I didn't mean for any of this. The
Chronicle
picked it up and it just went viral. I only found out this morn—oh no. Deb! Deb is gonna see this!” Bob suddenly gets lost in his own thoughts.

But I don't have any time to deal with his problems. I have to get to Balloon!

I jump up from my seat, but then stop for a moment to shake my head.

“Bob, you were supposed to deny till you die!”

I BRAVE MORE HALLWAYS
full of leering classmates. Everyone loves a scandal, especially cruel and hormonal high school kids. The article in the
Chronicle
not only makes me look like a creep who has reduced girls to a formula and gives his pickup lines military-grade nicknames, but also a puppet master who is deviously pulling the strings behind the ­Kingsview dating scene. It's a total hatchet job.

There's detail and dirt in the article that didn't come from Humble Pi, though, including my identity, so Balloon better be able to shed some light on what the hell is going on, and fast.

I manage to make it to the newspaper office, which is in the administration hallway between Student Council and Model UN. Fake government, fake diplomacy, and now fake news.

I've never actually been inside the
Chronicle
's
offices before and for some reason half expect it to be filled with whirring, steampunk-style printing presses. Instead it's just a bunch of desks arranged in bullpens. Oh, and there's a giant map of the world tacked to a bulletin board, laughably implying that anyone here really cares about what happens outside the stucco towers of Kingsview.

When I walk in, everyone in the room stops what they're doing and stares at me. I ignore them and zero in on Brooke, who is standing in an alcove in the back, talking to another student. I figure she's been in the office all day, moderating the sure-to-be-entertaining comments section for the story on the newspaper's website. When Brooke sees me, she sends the other kid on his way. I approach her. Cute, bubbly, cherubic Balloon is actually the devil in disguise.

“What the hell, Brooke?”

I can tell she's been preparing for this confrontation.

“I could say the same thing to you, Shane.”

“You have to retract this story. Or delete it.”

“Why would I do that?”

“Because it misrepresents me.”

“Is anything I wrote not true?”

“I mean . . . you don't understand,” I stammer. “First of all, how did you even find out about all this stuff?”

Brooke crosses her arms. “I'll never reveal my sources!”

“Brooke,” I growl.

“Fine. A few weeks ago, Tristen was working on a puff piece
about style trends among teachers. She googled Mr. Kimbrough to try to find some pictures of him and came across Humble Pi. She sent it to me and I started doing some digging.”

“Tristen?” This is not computing.

“I saw the Galgorithm post on the blog,” she continues, “and it immediately looked familiar. I recognized some of those tricks from when Anthony and I first started going out. I confronted him about it, and he caved pretty quickly.”

Goddamn it, Hedgehog.

“He told me all about your little scheme.”

“It's not a scheme!”

She ignores me.

“I looked through all of your Facebook friends and noticed that you had a few random older friends.”

Somehow I've always known that Mark Zuckerberg would screw me.

“I also noticed that some of those friends had one thing in common: They were dating girls way out of their league.”

No such thing!

I keep my mouth shut.

“I put two and two together,” she continues, “and reached out to them. A few of them were former clients who had already graduated. They agreed to talk to me if I kept them anonymous.”

So cold. Sold out by my own clients.

“And you didn't think to come to me to get my side before you printed anything?”

“I knew you would have just freaked out and denied everything and had Mr. Kimbrough take it down.”

“Damn right I would have freaked out!”

“Exactly.”

“Oh, so you have your little scoop and that's all that matters?” I say. “I thought we were friends. Well, congratulations, this is much bigger than Watermelongate.”

“If fruit salad is advertised on the menu, it should include watermelon! Our tax dollars pay for that food!”

I try to get back to the point.

“Brooke, you don't understand. There's no such thing as the Galgorithm. That thing on Mr. Kimbrough's blog, I've never seen it before in my life. He created it on his own. There was no Galgorithm until he made one!”

“So all those pickup lines and little tricks, those aren't yours?” She arches an eyebrow.

“No. I mean, yes. I mean, they used to be. It's complicated.”

“Try me.”

“That thing on the blog, it makes it seem like there is some algorithm to get girls. There's not. You can't distill everything they do down to a number. That's not how it works. The whole thing needs a human touch. Someone to interpret everything.”

“So that's what you do? You're an interpreter for guys who you label nerds? Like some kind of dork whisperer?”

I don't even know where to begin. “Brooke, this isn't even me anymore. I'm retired. Out of the game.”

This does not satisfy her in the slightest.

“I just want to make sure I'm clear. So you never advised your clients to use the same technique as Pavlov's dogs?”

I sigh. “Yes and no.”

“Go on.”

“
Obviously
Pavlovian conditioning doesn't work on human girls.”

Just saying these words makes me feel like such a tool. Brooke rolls her eyes. I need to explain.

“I mean, the reason I advise—
advised—
my clients to be near the girl they like when the girl gets good news is
not
so that the girl will somehow eventually associate good news with the guy.”

“Then what's the reason?”

“It's to help the guy start to feel comfortable around the girl. It's to give him a specific time and place every day or every week when all he's thinking about is the girl. It's to give the guy a moment to look forward to when he knows the girl he is pining after will be all smiles and good vibrations. It's to give him hope.”

“Uh huh,” Brooke says, unconvinced. “Yeah, well, I didn't really appreciate finding out that Anthony was stalking me for months before we went out.”

“He wasn't stalking you! I was there. He was
learning
about you so that he could have a meaningful conversation with you once he got up the nerve to even talk to you. Anthony will tell you himself. Where is he?”

“I don't know. We broke up.”

No.

“What do you mean you broke up?”

“I mean, when I found out what he did, and I put all the pieces together, I ended it. Just before we went to press.”

“What he
did
? He adored you. He was devoted to you. Years before you even knew he existed.”

“I know. And that's weird.”

“But you can't break up. You're Hedgehog and Balloon. You're the perfect couple. You're
totes adorbs
.”

“We're not Hedgehog and Balloon anymore.”

“Okay, time-out: I understand why Anthony is Hedgehog, but why are you called Balloon?”

She loudly
CLAPS
her hands in front of my face, startling me.

“Because I
pop
when you least expect it.”

“Jesus Christ. Really?”

“No, it's because when I laugh it sounds really squeaky, like a balloon.”

“Oh.”

“You messed up, Shane. You lied to a lot of people. And a lot of people are hurt.”

My mind suddenly starts to wander. . . .

“Shane,” she continues, “are you listening to me? Shane?”

I need to find Jak.

JAK HAS VANISHED.
She didn't respond to any of my calls or texts. She wasn't at her locker at any of her usual times. She didn't even go to any of her afternoon classes—including Ms. Solomon's history class, which I barged into only to find Jak's seat in the back row unoccupied. I checked all our usual haunts. She wasn't in the cafeteria or the courtyard. I called her house, and her mom said she hadn't come home from school yet. I even drove to Perkin's Beanery to see if she was hiding out there. No dice.

It's a million-to-one shot, but I decide to look one more place and blow right past Zoey with a
y
or Sofia with an
f
or whoever is currently manning the front desk at Sweat ­Republic. I search the gym floor and the treadmills, but Jak's not there. Finally I check the yoga studio in the back. It has
clear glass windows, but the lights are off. I walk inside and flick the lights on, and that's where I find her: sitting on an oversize ab ball in the corner, staring at the wall. It would be a depressing sight if she didn't look so beautiful.

“Jak!”

She doesn't respond. I cross the hardwood floor, grab another ab ball, and sit on it next to her. She's furious and doesn't acknowledge me.

“I've been looking all over for you. Are you okay?” She doesn't answer. I'm not sure what to do. “I guess neither of us is having a sweat-tastic day,” I offer.

She rotates away from me on her ball. My attempt at lightening the mood has fallen flat.

“Jak, the whole thing in the paper is totally blown out of proportion. Is that what you're upset about? Because I don't do that stuff anymore. The whole Galgorithm thing is made up.”

She rotates back so that we are side by side but she doesn't have to look at me.

“I thought I knew you,” she says.

“You
do
know me, Jak. You do know me. You knew I helped some of the nerdy guys talk to girls.”

“I thought you were just messing around. I thought it was just for fun. Shane, I didn't know the extent. I didn't know that you had half the school on your roster.”