Marisha Pessl - Special Topics in Calamity Physics

“If you don’t eat enough, your body goes into starvation mode and then when you eat a slice of angel food cake your body treats it like it’s penne à la vodka. You balloon within twenty-four hours.”

“I don’t like the fact that someone was here,” Leulah said suddenly.

Everyone looked at her, startled by her voice.

“That cigarette butt,” she whispered.

“Don’t worry about it,” Milton said. “Hannah’s not worried. And she goes camping all the time.”

“Anyway, we couldn’t leave now if we wanted to,” said Charles. “It’s the middle of the night. We’d get lost. Probably would stumble into whatever it is that wanders around—”

“Convicts,” said Jade, nodding.

“And that guy who bombed abortion clinics.”

“They found him,” I said.

“But you didn’t see Hannah’s face,” said Leulah.

“What was wrong with her face?” asked Nigel.

Lu looked forlorn in her blue windbreaker, her arms hugging her knees, that Rapunzeled cord of hair roping her left shoulder, touching the ground.

“You could tell she was as scared as I was. But she didn’t want to say so because she thought she had to be an adult, responsible and everything.”

“Anyone pack a firearm?” asked Charles.

“Oh, I should have brought Jefferson’s,” Jade said. “It’s this big. Adorable. She keeps it in her underwear drawer.”

“We don’t need guns,” said Milton, lying back, staring at the sky. “If I had to go — I mean if it was really my fuckin’ time — I wouldn’t mind doing it here. Under these stars.”

“Well, you’re one of those contented morbid people,” said Jade. “I for one will do anything I can to make sure my number doesn’t come up for at least seventy-five years. If that means shooting someone in the head or biting off some parkie’s chu-chu, so be it.” She looked in the direction of the tents. “Where is she anyway? Hannah. I don’t see her.”

We carried the plates and pots back to the clearing and found Hannah eating a granola bar in front of the fire. She’d changed her clothes. She was wearing a green-and-black checkered button-down shirt. She asked us if we were still hungry and when Jade responded in the affirmative, suggested we make S’mores.

As we roasted marshmallows and Charles told his ghost story (cab driver, ghoulish fare), I became aware that Hannah, sitting on the opposite side of the fire, was staring at me. The campfire jack-o-lanterned everyone, made them orange, carved certain parts of their faces away, and the sockets around her dark eyes, blazing with light, appeared unusually hollow, as if they’d been further dug out with a spoon. I smiled as fiddle-dee-deeishly as I could, then pretended to be entranced with the Art of Roasting a Marshmallow. Yet, when I glanced at her not a minute later, her gaze hadn’t budged. She held on to my eyes, then, almost imperceptibly, pointed to her left, toward the woods. She touched her wristwatch. Her right hand motioned Five.

“And then the cab driver turned around,” Charles was saying. “The woman was gone. All that was left on the seat? A white chiffon scarf. ”

“That’s it? ”

“Yeah,” said Charles, smiling.

“Suckiest ghost story I ever heard.”

“Sucked balls— ”

“If I had a tomato I’d be throwing it at your head.”

“Who knows that one about the dog with no tail?” asked Nigel. “He goes around looking for it. Terrorizing people.”

“You’re thinking of ‘The Monkey’s Paw,’” said Jade, “that awful short story you read in fourth grade but will remember for the rest of your life for unknown reasons. That and ‘The Most Dangerous Game.’ Right, Retch?”

I nodded.

“There is one about a dog, but I can’t remember it.”

“Hannah knows a good one,” said Charles.

“I don’t,” said Hannah.

“Come on. ”

“No. I’m an awful storyteller. Always have been.” She yawned. “What time is it?”

Milton checked his watch. “A little after ten.”

“We really shouldn’t stay up too late tonight,” she said. “We need to be rested. We’re starting early tomorrow.”

“Great.”

Needless to say, Fear and Anxiety typhooned through me. None of the others appeared to have noticed Hannah’s signal, not even Leulah, who’d forgotten all about the ominous cigarette butt. Now, rather blissfully, she ate her S’more (lint of melted marshmallow on her lip), smiling at whatever Milton was going on about, those tiny dimples splintering her chin. I sat on my knees and stared at the fire. I considered ignoring her (“When in doubt, feign oblivion”), but after five minutes, I noticed with horror Hannah was staring at me again, this time expectantly, as if I were playing Ophelia and had gotten so deep into character, into the throes of mental illness, I was missing all my cues, forcing Laertes and Gertrude to ad-lib. From the sheer force of her gaze, I found myself standing up, dusting myself off.

“I’ll — I’ll be right back,” I said.

“Where’re you going?” asked Nigel.

Everyone stared at me.

“To the bathroom,” I said.

Jade giggled. “I’m dreading that.”

“If the Native Americans could do it,” said Charles, “so can you.”

“Native Americans also scalped people.”

“Might I suggest dry leaves? A bit of moss?” said Nigel smirking.

“We have toilet paper,” Hannah said. “It’s in my tent.”

“Thanks,” I said.

“In my bag,” she said.

“Is there any more chocolate?” Jade asked.

I walked to the other side of the tents where it was dark and sandpapery and waited for my eyes to adjust. When I was certain no one had followed me, when I could hear their voices crackling with the fire, I stepped into the woods. Branches rubber-banded against my legs. I turned around and saw with surprise that the pines had fallen into place behind me, like those hippie beads decorating a doorway. Slowly, I moved along the arc of the clearing, back in the trees, so no one would see me, and stopped somewhere near the far left side, where I thought Hannah had pointed.

The campfire was close, some ten yards in front of me, and I could see Hannah still sitting with the others, resting her head in her hand. Her face looked so sleepy and satisfied, for a second I wondered if I’d been hallucinating. I told myself that if she didn’t appear in three minutes, I’d go back and never speak to that crazy woman again — rather, two minutes, for two minutes was all it took for almost half of the nuclei in a lump of aluminum-28 to decay, for one to die from VX exposure (pronounced “VEEKS”), for 150 Sioux men, women and children to be shot at the Battle of Wounded Knee in 1890, for a Norwegian woman in 1866 by the name of Gudrid Vaaler to give birth to a son, Johan Vaaler, future inventor of the paper clip.

Two minutes was enough time for Hannah.

Iwatched her stand up and say something to them. I heard my name, so I guessed she said she wanted to check on me. She walked toward the tents and out of sight.

I waited another minute, watching the others — Jade was doing her exaggerated impression of Ms. Sturds during Morning Announcements, feet wide apart, that bizarre rocking movement as if she were a ferry crossing a choppy English Channel (“This is a very scary time for our country!” Jade cried, clapping her hands together, eyes bulging) — and then I heard spine cracks of branches and leaves, and saw Hannah coming toward me, her face smudged by the dark. When she saw me, she smiled and pressed a finger to her lips, motioning for me to follow her.