Page 101 - The Love Hypothesis

Olive squinted against the sun. The parking lot of the biology building

was uncharacteristically jammed with traffic. People were blowing their
horns and getting out of their cars, trying to figure out the source of the
holdup. She and Anh walked around a line of vehicles stuck in the lot, until

they ran into a group of biology grads.
“Someone’s battery died, and it’s blocking the exit line.” Greg, one of

Olive’s lab mates, was rolling his eyes and bouncing impatiently on his feet.
He pointed at a red truck stuck sideways in the most inconvenient turn.

Olive recognized it as Cherie’s, the department secretary.
“I defend my dissertation proposal tomorrow—I need to drive home to

prepare. This is ridiculous. And why the fuck is Cherie just standing there,
chatting leisurely with Carlsen? Do they want us to bring them tea and
cucumber sandwiches?”

Olive looked around, searching for Adam’s tall frame.
“Oh yeah, there’s Carlsen,” Anh said. Olive looked where she was

pointing, just in time to see Cherie get back behind the wheel and Adam
jogging around the truck.

“What is he—” was all Olive managed to say, before he came to a stop,
put his hands on the back of the truck in neutral, and started . . .

Pushing.
His shoulders and biceps strained his Henley. The firm muscles of his
upper back visibly shifted and tensed under the black fabric as he bent

forward and rolled several tons of truck across . . . quite a bit of a distance
and into the closest empty parking space.

Oh.
There was some applause and whistling from bystanders when the truck

was out of the way, and a couple of faculty members from neuroscience
clapped Adam on the shoulder as the line of cars started driving out of the

lot.
“Fucking finally,” Olive heard Greg say from behind her, and she stood
there, blinking, a little shocked. Had she hallucinated it? Had Adam really

just pushed a giant truck all by himself? Was he an alien from planet
Krypton who moonlighted as a superhero?