Page 122 - The Love Hypothesis

“God, Ol.” Anh rolled her eyes. “You’re so dramatic sometimes. Hang

on—” She waved at someone behind Olive, and when she spoke, her voice
was much louder. “Hey, Dr. Carlsen! Have you put on sunscreen yet?”
In the span of a microsecond Olive’s entire brain burst into flames—and

then crumbled into a pile of ashes. Just like that, one hundred billion
neurons, one thousand billion glial cells, and who knew how many

milliliters of cerebrospinal fluid, just ceased to exist. The rest of her body
was not doing very well, either, since Olive could feel all her organs shut

down in real time. From the very beginning of her acquaintance with Adam
there had been about ten instances of Olive wishing to drop dead on the

spot, for the earth to open and swallow her whole, for a cataclysm to hit and
spare her from the embarrassment of their interactions. This time, though, it
felt as though the end of the world might happen for real.

Don’t turn around, what’s left of her central nervous system told her.
Pretend you didn’t hear Anh. Will this into nonexistence. But it was

impossible. There was this triangle of sorts, formed by Olive, and Anh in
front of her, and Adam probably—surely—standing behind her; it wasn’t as

if Olive had a choice. Any choice. Especially when Adam, who couldn’t
possibly imagine the depraved direction of Anh’s thoughts, who couldn’t

possibly see the bucketful of sunscreen that had taken residence in Olive’s
hands, said, “No.”
Well. Shit.

Olive spun around, and there he was—sweaty, holding a Frisbee in his
left hand, and so very, very shirtless. “Perfect, then!” Anh said, sounding so

chipper. “Olive has way too much and was wondering what to do with it.
She’ll put some on you!”

No. No, no, no. “I can’t,” she hissed at Anh. “It would be highly
inappropriate.”

“Why?” Anh blinked at her innocently. “I put sunscreen on Jeremy all
the time. Look”—she squirted lotion on her hand and haphazardly slapped
it across Jeremy’s face— “I am putting sunscreen on my boyfriend.

Because I don’t want him to get melanoma. Am I ‘inappropriate’?”