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“Let’s hear it—what is it?”
“Professor.”
“So you’d go from being a professor to being a professor.”
Needless to say, I don’t bother telling my parents about the pendulous nature of my job situation. Or... anything else. “I’ll call them tomorrow morning, okay?”
She grumbles for five more minutes and guilts me into calling tonight, then switches to complaining about something related to toxic deodorants that she saw on Facebook. I hang up to a notification—not Greg, but some guy looking for a fake girlfriend for a Valentine’s Day group date. I decide on the spot to personally blame Faux for tonight’s shit show and chuck the iTwat into the laundry hamper.
What’s the plan here?Cece asked.
I have a grand total of zero ideas, which means that I’m going to have to annihilate Jack Shitwipe Smith-Turner the old way: by excelling at my job.
I sigh deeply. Then I pull my ancient Mac onto my lap, click on my teaching demonstration, and rehearse the crap out of it.
5
GRAVITATIONAL CONSTANT
In the major motion picture of my life—a low-budget slapstick tragicomedy—Dr. Christophe Laurendeau’s role would be played by one of those old-school French actors who often star in Cece’s movies. He shouldn’t be hard to cast: a long-faced man who looks at once stern and wise, wears only turtlenecks, and never stops being handsome, not even in the tail end of his sixties, when his hair goes ash gray and his skin wrinkles into sandpaper. His office smells like chamomile tea and old books, and whenever I’m here (daily for the five years of my Ph.D., weekly since I graduated), he does the same thing: unfolds his tall, razor-thin frame from behind his desk and instructs, like it’s my first time on the Northeastern campus, “Sit down, please. In that green chair.” His English is never anything but perfect, even if his accent is still Disney strong. “How are you, Elise?”
It’s something I learned not to wince at, the way he always usesthe wrong name. In Dr. L.’s defense, he called me Elise on our first meeting, and I never bothered to correct him. I did consider asking him to switch to Elsie when he took me out for dinner after I defended my dissertation, but I chickened out.
Aside from Cece, Dr. L. was the only human being who acknowledged me getting my Ph.D.—a matter of circumstances, I tell myself. After the Smith-Turner hoax almost killed his career, I was his first mentee in many years, which meant no close labmates. The theoretical physics research group at Northeastern was not quite fond enough of women in STEM to celebrate one. And my family... They couldn’t make the two-hour drive because of Lance’s adult league game—and, likely, because I never fully managed to convey to them what grad school is, though Mom once asked if I was done with that paper I had to turn in (i.e., my dissertation), which I took as a win.
So Dr. L. took me out to a fancy restaurant, just the two of us, where the hostess gave me an inquisitiveDaughter, granddaughter, or sugar baby?look. And when he looked at me over a dinner that cost half my rent and said, “You carried yourself well, Elise. I am proud of you,” the rare spark of initiative died out. If I had Dr. L.’s approval, he could call me whatever he liked.
And that’s the story of my doctoral work: bookended by someone else’s name.
Elise, I’ve come to believe, is the Elsie that Dr. L. wants—a brilliant theoretical physicist with an illustrious job that will garner her the admiration of the scientific community—and while she might not be who Iam, she’s who Iwantto be.
Too bad that her existence is antithetical to this other guy’s.
“Jonathan Smith-Turner.” Dr. L.’s mouth is a thin line. His eyes, hurt. “A disgrace.”
I nod.
“The likes of him taint physics and academia.”
I nod again.
“It is apparent what needs to be done.”
More nodding, in full agreement.
“Clearly, you must withdraw your application.”
Hang on. Maybe notfullagreement. “Withdraw... my application?”
“I cannot allow you to work in the same department as thatanimal.”
“But I...” I squirm and lean forward in the chair. So much for elegance and poise. “I need the job.”
“Youhavea job.”
“I cannot adjunct for one more year.”
“But you are an adjunctprofessor. You should beproudof your current employment.”
