Laura Steven - The Love Hypothesis

First published in Great Britain in 2020

by Electric Monkey, an imprint of Egmont UK Limited

2 Minster Court, 10th floor, London EC3R 7BB

Text copyright © 2020 Laura Steven

The moral rights of the author have been asserted

First e-book edition 2020

ISBN 978 1 4052 9694 6

Ebook ISBN 978 1 4052 9695 3

www.egmont.co.uk

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

Stay safe online. Any website addresses listed in this book are correct at the time of going to print. However, Egmont is not responsible for content hosted by third parties. Please be aware that online content can be subject to change and websites can contain content that is unsuitable for children. We advise that all children are supervised when using the internet.

Egmont takes its responsibility to the planet and its inhabitants very seriously. We aim to use papers from well-managed forests run by responsible suppliers.

For Louis – because I love you more than

any hypothesis can explain

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright First published in Great Britain in 2020 by Electric Monkey, an imprint of Egmont UK Limited 2 Minster Court, 10th floor, London EC3R 7BB Text copyright © 2020 Laura Steven The moral rights of the author have been asserted First e-book edition 2020 ISBN 978 1 4052 9694 6 Ebook ISBN 978 1 4052 9695 3 www.egmont.co.uk A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Stay safe online. Any website addresses listed in this book are correct at the time of going to print. However, Egmont is not responsible for content hosted by third parties. Please be aware that online content can be subject to change and websites can contain content that is unsuitable for children. We advise that all children are supervised when using the internet. Egmont takes its responsibility to the planet and its inhabitants very seriously. We aim to use papers from well-managed forests run by responsible suppliers.

Dedication For Louis – because I love you more than any hypothesis can explain

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Acknowledgments

Allow me to explain the plethora of ways in which my love life is screwed. You know, scientifically.

According to the Matching Hypothesis, two people are more likely to form a successful relationship if they’re equally desirable. This desirability can come in the form of wealth or fame, but it’s usually determined by physical attractiveness. Which is to say: most folks fall in love – and stay in love – with other folks on the same level of hotness.

Back in the sixties, social scientists held a Computer Match Dance which, despite its cool name, was nowhere near as fun and futurey as it sounds. Basically, four judges rated a bunch of participants according to their hotness, and these participants were randomly paired up for the dance (except no man was paired with a taller woman, because god forbid their masculinity be challenged in any way!). During an intermission, participants were asked to assess their date, and the results showed that partners with similar levels of hotness expressed the most liking for each other. Shocker, I know.

The sixties may as well be Tudor England, but unfortunately this theory holds true in the internet dating age. One recent study measured the hotness of sixty men and sixty women, and their interactions were monitored. While people at least attempted to contact others who were significantly hotter than they were (probably because the variable of face-to-face rejection had been eliminated, as is the appeal of all online dating), it was ultimately found that the person was way more likely to reply if they were closer to the same level of hotness.

No, you haven’t stumbled upon a social psychology journal by accident, like I did one heady night while researching Walster and Walster over a glass of 2003 Merlot.

All I’m saying is that if the Matching Hypothesis is anything to go by?

Yikes.

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His name is Haruki, and he doesn’t know I exist. I know, I know. It’s a high-school cliché. But clichés are usually clichés because they’re true. And this particular cliché – nerdy-comma-unpopular-girl-falls-for-hot-guy – is only ever a recipe for disaster.

Haruki bleeds charisma. You know the type. A jock who walks the halls surrounded by disciples like he’s the second coming of Christ, or whatever. His family is basically royalty in my small town, since they own a multi-million dollar hotel chain that dominates most of the midwest. And it helps that Haruki is practically a supermodel, despite having the same basic haircut as every other attractive teenage boy in America. Plus we’re in all the same AP science classes, and while he’s hardly at the top of the pack, he is whip-smart.

So, to sum up: Haruki Ito? Way out of my league. Like, we’re not even playing the same sport.

It should come as no surprise to you that I’m not the only girl at Edgewood High who’s madly in love with Haruki. And, as per the unrequited love trope, I’m utterly convinced I’m the only one who *gets* the real him. Despite, you know, him not knowing I actually exist.

(I cannot emphasize this last part enough. I could perform an elaborate macarena in front of his desk right now, and he’d stare straight ahead as though the light was simply bending around me. Maybe it is. I can never know for sure.)

Today we’re in double AP Physics, which sounds like a cruel and unusual punishment to the normal high-schooler, but seeing as I’m not a normal high-schooler, this is my idea of utopia.

I adore science. Not so much biology, because it’s all kinda messy and unreliable and oftentimes smelly. Or chemistry, because I still have scar tissue on my left hand following a bunsen burner incident a few years back. But physics? Physics is my dirty talk. It’s clean and neat, and simple and complex, and it makes perfect sense to me. It’s one of the few things that does. So, if you ever want to lure me into the boudoir, talk Newton to me.