Out for the Night (Browerton University #4)(26)

Matty didn't come with a price tag.

Coop put down his weights and puffed out his chest. "See you later, Kelvin."

He left the weight room and walked past the row of treadmills. Whatever moral victory Coop had wasn't worth a damn because he'd already succumbed to Kelvin's wallet before. Kelvin stopped him on the staircase down to the locker rooms.

"Where is Matty right now?"

Coop shrugged as if he didn't know, but they both knew.

"And where do you think he'll be if he wins this competition?" Kelvin asked. "Research assistants start right away. It's only going to get worse. I don't think Professor Chertok has a social life. Matty locked himself away in the library just for regular classes. If he gets this research slot, you'll never see him again." 

Coop gulped hard. His phone remained silent in his pocket, no new text messages or voicemails. He hated Kelvin more than anyone else in this moment, because maybe he was right.

But that was a risk he was willing to take.

"Fuck off, Kelvin." Coop swung open the locker room door and hoped that it smacked the kid in his entitled face.





Chapter 22





Matty





The campus was at its quietest in the early morning, quieter than the latest of nights. On his walk to the computer lab at seven a.m., Matty didn't see anyone else out, not even groundskeepers. He could've been the star of an apocalyptic story.

Matty hoped Coop understood about the Zone. The Zone was propelling him to succeed. The reason people were unproductive was because they let distractions get in the way of solid work. Working was like sleeping. You had to give yourself some time and peace to fall into a deep sleep. The only way Matty was going to achieve breakthroughs on his algorithm was by getting into the deep sleep-like Zone of work. He kept his phone on airplane mode. The Zone carried Matty into another dimension that didn't obey the normal rules of time. Hours flicked by in minutes.

Coop was ticked off when he visited Matty in the computer lab, but what did he expect? He knew what he was getting into from the first time he dragged Matty out to a party. It would all be worth it. In two weeks from Monday, Matty would show off his algorithm, blow away the competition, get the research slot, and get back to normal with Coop.

His footsteps echoed on the floor of the engineering building. He slowed as he heard a cranking sound coming from Professor Chertok's robotics lab. He could hear it all the way down the hall.

He stopped just outside the entrance. The cranking got louder. He craned his neck to peek through the observation window. Professor Chertok sat on the floor, tinkering away at some bottom screws on Imelda.

"Good morning, professor."

Professor Chertok looked up. His hair skewed in all directions and his glasses sat crookedly on his nose. He was deep inside the Zone and had to take a few seconds to come out of it.

"Matty. I'm surprised to see you here on a Sunday morning."

"Likewise." Matty stood in the doorway. He wondered if his professor wanted anyone else in there.

"Don't hover. Come in or get out." Professor Chertok picked up some screws from the floor. "Imelda was having some functioning issues. Her arm wasn't extending all the way. I figured it was a coding glitch."

"It's been very humid this week. I wonder if that's causing circuitry problems."

"That's possible. I should get her into a climate-controlled room." Professor Chertok looked up at Imelda and shook his head. "You are so difficult."

"I don't want to disturb you." Matty turned to leave, but Professor Chertok held up a hand.

"I'm almost done. And it seems like I am the one disturbing you." Professor Chertok wiped away some dust off of Imelda. "Are you here to work on your project for the competition?"

"I am. I thought it would be less busy than the computer lab."

Professor Chertok seemed pleased by his answer, which pleased Matty. He'd wanted to get back into the professor's good graces after that last test. "This really is the best time to do work. Nobody will disturb you in here for at least another two hours."

"That's good." Matty sat on a stool and watched him wipe dust off of Imelda's visual processing lenses.

"I'm glad you're here, Matty." Professor Chertok tossed his handkerchief into his front shirt pocket. Matty noticed the crags and creases of his face and how his wild, electric blue eyes belied a touch of madness. "I was worried about you."



       
         
       
        

"Me? Why?"

"I saw a great deal of myself in you. Ambitious, driven, brilliant. But then that started to fall off."

Matty burned with embarrassment. Professor Chertok didn't need to elaborate, but he did anyway.

"Your grades have been slipping, and I know it's not because the material is getting harder."

"I just … " Matty didn't want to admit it. He let this happen. Everything in his life seemed so frivolous at the moment, compared to giant tech breakthroughs he could make. For science, for his mom.

"College is filled with lots of distractions. I get it. But so is life!" Professor Chertok slammed his hand on the table. He spoke with a weight that Matty hadn't seen from him. "The great ones don't let themselves get distracted. They know how to focus."

"You're right. I can focus, Professor. I am in the Zone." His words faltered. He wasn't sure how focused he had been. He had let himself get distracted, but that's not how he saw Coop. He wasn't taking away from his life, but adding to it.

"When you wake up every morning, you need to say that out loud, so you can hear it. Focus is key, Matty."

"I've been at the computer lab every day."

"You don't just need to earn it. You need to want it." Professor Chertok strolled away, toward Imelda. He circled her, studying the sensors on her hands. "I was married once. Barely older than you. She supported me through my years of graduate school and getting my PhD. She knew how great I could be. But she wanted us to have that typical life of kids and houses with white picket fences, and I had to make a choice. I could have gone down that path. I could've had a family. But then where would my research be? Where would the field of robotics be? The greats, Nicola Tesla, Thomas Edison, Steve Jobs, they all had singular focus. They chose their priority."

Priority singular. No pluralization. Matty remembered.

"I developed robotic surgical tools that have helped doctors perform operations thought unimaginable. Hundreds of lives have been saved. My research will make artificial intelligence the stuff of reality one day, not science fiction. I had to make a choice." Professor Chertok held Imelda's robotic hand, caressing the sensors softly. "I chose to focus."

"Skin," Imelda said.

Professor Chertok smiled at her, maybe the same way he had smiled at his ex-wife all those years ago. Matty felt himself turn to steel as the professor's words sunk in.

"Looks like she's all fixed." Professor Chertok patted Matty on the shoulder on his way out. "Keep up the hard work."

 

Others must've had the same idea as him. A few hours later, the computer lab was now full with students. Linh waved and said hi to him when she entered the lab, and he returned the courtesy, but that was it. He had to focus. His eyes flickered to his "Don't Mess with Texas" flash drive, and he thought of Coop's fingers on it. Lucky flash drive.

He realized he had to rewrite some of the code to get it to function properly. He scribbled away in his notebook hoping to get some clarity that way, but he kept picturing a ticking clock and wondering what his other classmates had up their sleeves. Matty slammed his pen down on his notebook, feeling the red emanate off his face. His classmates gawked at him. Linh stared at him from her computer, with caring in her eyes. She came over to him.

"Do you need help with anything?" she asked.

"No. I got it."

Matty closed his eyes to get in the Zone. He imagined leaning against Coop as he did his work. Peace hummed through his body. But Coop wasn't there. Coop couldn't help.

"Hey!" Coop said. He was there. Right next to his workstation with a slice of pizza. "Thought you might like some lunch."

"Thanks." Matty's heart hummed with delight. He didn't know he was hungry until the slice was in his mouth.

"How's it going?" Coop gave him a secret kiss on the neck. It was a jolt of juice to his system. He sat in the chair next to Matty.

"It's fine. It's fine. I'll be glad when it's over."

"Me, too," Coop said lightly, but Matty knew that wasn't a joke. "Well, you have Philly to look forward this coming weekend. It'll be a nice break."

Matty's head shot up, out of the Zone and into reality. "It's this weekend?"

Coop nodded yes. "It's not even a full weekend. We'll drive down Saturday afternoon and come back Sunday morning. You'll be away from campus at most twenty-four hours."

That seemed too much. Every day mattered. Breaking momentum meant falling out of the Zone. "I can't go, Coop. I'm really sorry."

"But this is Dr. Kobayashi," Coop said, as if he understood the importance of that name.

Matty's head pounded with stress and confusion and decisions and coding.

"I get it. You have to work." Coop squeezed his hand. "I am totally fine with that, but don't say no right away. These upperclassmen that Rafe knows are going down to Philly, so we can hitch a ride with them. One of the guys' boyfriends lives there and we can crash at his place."