Chapter 20: Talking
After breakfast, Jay, Gloria, Manny, Brenda and I went back to the house. Brenda left her bike at Claire's place and planned to pick it up later. I went upstairs to finally take off my suit and rest, and Brenda came along with me.
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"I thought you wanted to rest," Brenda muttered, resting her head on my shoulder. We were lying naked in my bed, the blanket covering us.
"I will now," I agreed sleepily. "But I couldn't resist before," I added, running one hand along Brenda's bare back.
"Jake," Brenda whispered.
"Mmmm," I murmured back.
"I love you," she declared.
My eyes opened. Isn't meeting my father for the first time enough drama already...
"I know we had already talked about how a long-distance relationship would be impossible, and that you don't intend to go to Yale," Brenda began, "especially now with your father in the picture. But I thought about it, and I think I'd regret not saying this," she added
I took a long breath.
"I love you too, Bren," I looked into her eyes, making a little lie.
We had known each other for barely a month - love felt like a strong word (not for our age, though). But there was no doubt I had great fondness for her.
She kissed me, and we lay down staring at each other.
"These past years, I basically dedicated myself as much as I could to earn a place at a university I always dreamed of," she started again. "I only dated a few guys, never really into the whole bad boy style. When you came hitting on me, I decided to at least have one adventure.
I didn't think I would completely give myself to you," she confessed.
"Me too, I thought you would be just a cute little chick to fool around with. But then I realized you were a Yale girl who won me over with your intelligence, kindness, humor..." I also revealed
Brenda glared at me. "You said such sweet things, but why does your hand keep squeezing my bum?"
I looked at her innocently, but my hand was still squeezing her butt as a kind of stress relief. We ended up laughing
"Don't try to be the innocent one, Bren," I murmured in her ear. "I know you keep sneaking a peek at me."
"You do have a nice body," she admitted, her hand roaming over my chest, down my abdomen, and even lower.
We ended up giving ourselves to each other again.
"Hey, Jake, how smart are you?" Brenda looked at me while we were putting our clothes back on.
I looked at her weirdly. "That came out suddenly..."
"I don't know why you're hiding it, and I won't pry. But I really am curious to know just how intelligent you are," she said, adjusting her shirt.
"With the way you taught me things, I'm sure you'd pass any college test easily, perfect SAT scores, especially with your broken memory," Brenda added a little sullenly at the end.
Photographic memory is indeed enviable
"Hmm," I said thoughtfully. "Intelligence is a very broad subject. But specifically in mathematics, there might be only a handful like me in the world"
Her eyes widened
I showed her a book. "I just finished writing the solution to the Fundamental Lemma of Langlands, so I won't stay hidden for long."
Even if I don't want a college life right now, mathematics has always been part of my life. I will need to look for new challenges in the future.
She picked up the book and started flipping through it. "My God, it's like you wrote in another language. What is this?" Brenda asked about the idea.
"Let me use an analogy. The Fundamental Lemma shows that even when you use different rules - like counting apples one way and oranges another - the result can still be the same.
It's the idea that two different ways of counting can lead to the same total," I explained in the simplest way possible.
Brenda laughed. "You said you were surprised that I wasn't just a 'cute chick' and that I'm going to Yale, but you are by far the biggest surprise of all. It's still unbelievable that you're a genius."
"Cool, right?" I moved closer to her while she was sitting on the bed putting on her socks, and I started kissing the back of her neck.
"Jake! We just put our clothes back on," she said, a little exasperated but smiling.
"I'm a genius, a good-looking guy, but also a hormonal teenage boy," I smirked. "I can't fight against nature."
"Oh, poor you, you can't fight against nature," Brenda remarked sarcastically.
"I also blame my dad," I added.
"Your dad?" She looked at me. "You just met him."
"On a soccer field, wearing a tuxedo, and with a hangover," I defended my position. "Clearly a bad apple."
"Exactly the same as you..."
"Yeah, but in my case I was lured by an older girl to her room yesterday," I pulled Brenda back under the blanket again.
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I went downstairs and had a big cup of coffee (since I ended up not taking a nap). After a while Claire and Mitchell showed up.
In the end, it was decided that Gloria, Jay, Mitchell and Claire would go.
Why Mitchell? Even though I had little contact with him. Well, somehow he convinced everyone since he was a Pritchett and a lawyer.
Or, more likely, because Cam and Phil could make things worse. The kids were vetoed, to Haley and Manny's dismay.
"Take care, Jake. Good luck there," Brenda gave me a goodbye kiss.
"Tomorrow's plan still stands?" I looked at her.
"Sure," she agreed, but I could see she was holding back from looking sad.
Tomorrow will be our last day before she flies to New Haven.
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