Hypergifted, p.3
Hypergifted, page 3
He shrugged. “It isn’t usually how I introduce myself. Who’s heard of Noah Youkilis?”
Was he serious? The whole campus was buzzing about how Dean Kendrick had convinced Noah to come to Wilderton. Noah had the highest IQ in the state—maybe even the whole country. To land a student as young as Noah, who was as smart as Noah, was a major triumph for our university.
“Are you kidding?” I shot back at him. “Everybody’s heard of Noah! He’s going to be one of the greatest minds of the twenty-first century!”
He showed me the teeth again, smiling wider this time. I got the feeling there was a private joke in there somewhere.
“What’s he like?” I probed.
“He’s one of a kind, all right,” Donovan replied. “Good thing too. I don’t know if the world could handle more than one.”
I could feel my eyes narrowing. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
He shrugged, a gesture that was a perfect match for his appearance. “Nothing. You’ll have to find out for yourself. He is really smart, though. Big brain.”
“Well, where do you fit in?” I persisted.
He heaved a sigh. “I honestly wish I knew.”
I’d only spent a few minutes with Donovan, but this was exactly the kind of cryptic reply I’d already come to expect from him. It gave me the sense that I was allowed to see only half the play I was acting in. But then he went on: “The college said Noah could bring one person along with him and he picked me.”
I was just beginning to think this Donovan guy was kind of a jerk, when that set me on a different path. True, he was a smart aleck who never gave a straight answer. But think about it: Noah Youkilis chose this kid to be his companion for the opening summer of his college career. And that meant Donovan had to be pretty special. It didn’t matter that I couldn’t see it. Noah saw it—and that was good enough for me.
“You two must be very close,” I told him.
He seemed surprised at that, but our conversation was cut off by the arrival—finally—of Mr. Arthropod. He called the meeting to order, acting as if we were the ones who’d kept him waiting—like he hadn’t breezed in twenty minutes late, fifty minutes late for being half an hour early.
“Gather round, people. We’re already behind schedule.” Like it was our fault. “There’s only one rule at this camp: Leave me alone.” There was laughter all around the room, but Mr. Arthropod didn’t crack a smile. “I’m serious about that. I don’t want to hear your problems. What’s so hard about taking a bunch of kids and keeping them happy for one summer? You’ve got world-class facilities here: Pools. Fields. Basketball courts. A half-dozen theaters. Art studios for when it rains. Great food. I’ll be right here if you need me. My advice: Don’t need me. Remember—this is Wilderton. Everything has to be top-notch. Let’s keep it that way. I’ll see you all soon enough—at the Labor Day picnic.”
A dozen people called out questions and the camp director held up his arms for quiet. “You’re not listening, folks. You just broke rule one. I’ll give you a pass on it today because I’m a swell guy, but don’t let it happen again.”
You could identify the people who weren’t used to the camp director’s offbeat sense of humor. They were straight-backed and alarmed while the rest of us were exchanging knowing smiles.
I reached out and tapped Donovan on the arm. “That’s just his way,” I whispered. “He’s a big kidder.”
But Donovan didn’t seem worried at all. It was as if he hadn’t even been listening. What an oddball. How did a guy like that come to be friends with a renowned genius?
Well, it wasn’t my problem. Pretty soon the meeting was over, and we all went to the bulletin boards to get our assignments. The luck of the draw gave me five eight-year-olds: three boys and two girls. It gave me something else too: my very own counselor-in-training. Guess who? Donovan Curtis.
“Oh, it’s you,” we chorused when we realized we were stuck with each other.
But come to think of it, maybe this wasn’t such a bad thing. For sure it was better than getting paired with some stuck-up eighteen-year-old who would try to boss me around even though I was the full counselor and they were just the CIT. Plus if Donovan and I became friends, I’d get to meet Noah! I’d been dreaming of that ever since I heard he’d be coming to Wilderton. How cool would that be?
Our group was waiting for us on the thirty-yard line of the football field. I checked my list. We had Manny, Luna, Claire, Jalen, and Victor.
I recognized Victor already. “That’s Victor the Underestimator,” I whispered to Donovan. “I remember him from last year.”
“Why do they call him that?” Donovan asked innocently.
“Because he always underestimates how long it’s going to take him to get to the bathroom. We have to watch him. Like a hawk.”
I could see Donovan’s skin tightening a little around his cheekbones. Could Mr. Cool finally be revealing a side of himself that wasn’t so laid back and chill?
The main order of business was for each team to come up with a name. We had a large blank poster board and markers so we’d have a sign that would serve as a rallying point for our kids.
Last year, the theme was animals. My group was the Antelopes—Lopes for short—and we prided ourselves on our fast running for all games and races. This summer’s theme was trickier: food. We could see the other signs taking shape on the field all around us: Team Pizza, the PBJs, Taco Tuesday, Burger Nation, the Big Cheese.
“All the good names are taken,” Manny complained. “Camp hasn’t even started and we’re already losers!”
“There’s no winning and losing,” I explained patiently. “We just have to pick a name. What’s your favorite food?”
“I like liver and onions,” Luna offered timidly.
“I hate liver and onions!” Claire countered.
“Watermelon’s pretty good,” Victor suggested.
“What kind of a group name is that?” Manny shot back.
“How about you, Jalen?” I prompted. “Is there a special food you like?”
The blond boy shook his head politely. “Whatever you guys decide is fine with me.”
I looked around the field. All the other groups had picked their names, their signs finished and displayed proudly. Mr. Arthropod was regarding us in annoyance. He didn’t much like holdups either. He considered it a form of not leaving him alone.
Feeling the pressure, I turned to Donovan, who’d been zero help and hadn’t contributed so much as a single peep so far. “Well?” I demanded. “Any suggestions?”
He let out a little snort. “If you’re going to be dumb enough to make people name themselves after food, try baloney.”
I felt a stab of anger. “Come on, Donovan, this isn’t a joke! Do you really think—?”
But suddenly our campers were jumping up and down, waving their arms and punching the air.
“Baloney!” Manny exclaimed. “It’s perfect!”
“No-o!” I tried to reason. “This has to be something we can be proud of. Do you want to spend the whole summer being called baloney?”
“It’s the best name by far,” Claire agreed sagely. “Everybody else just picked some random food, but we’re making a comment. We’re not baloney; picking a name is baloney!”
“But it’s our name,” I persisted. “Once it’s on the sign, we can’t change it!”
“I love baloney,” Victor added. “Thanks, Donovan!”
The group gathered around my counselor-in-training and high-fived him. Nobody high-fived me.
“No problem,” Donovan said with a big grin in my direction.
“Fine,” I sighed. “So what are we going to be? The Baloney Sandwiches? Baloney Squad? I know—how about Baloney Avengers?”
Nope. The five of them grabbed the markers and fell on the poster board, cackling with glee. Two minutes later, our sign was ready for all to see, proclaiming our name: Baloney.
Mr. Arthropod was circling the field, examining the signs from group to group. “The Chicken Nuggets—great name, guys,” he announced into a handheld megaphone. “And here we have Eggs Benedict Arnold—very clever . . . And give it up for”—the camp director stopped dead in front of our poster board—“Baloney? What kind of a—?”
Whatever he said next was drowned out by the cheers of our campers.
Mr. Arthropod pulled Donovan and me aside. “Listen, you two. You’re the youngest counselors here, and maybe you don’t know kids can be kind of pushy. You’re stuck with the name, but we don’t want your group embarrassing the university with anything else smart-alecky. So keep them on a short leash. Remember—the tail doesn’t wag the dog.”
As soon as he was gone, I wheeled on Donovan. “Now see what you’ve done? Thanks a lot for coming up with that stupid name!”
He flashed me the teeth again. “What are you talking about? Look how happy they are.”
Our five campers were marching around the sign, chanting, “Baloney! . . . Baloney! . . . Baloney! . . .”
I had to admit it: Nobody else was having this much fun. The other counselors were looking at us with everything from confusion to resentment. Camp hadn’t even started yet, but Group Baloney was in full celebration mode. What was our secret? Our campers were practically dancing.
Come to think of it, Victor was dancing a little bit too much.
“All right, guys,” I announced. “Let’s take a bathroom break.”
5
Hypersmitten
Noah Youkilis
I began my first official day of college by giving my elderberry bushes their daily 0.375 liters of water. The flowers were mostly gone now, and the fruit was growing in behind them.
Two windows down, a girl peered quizzically at me as I emptied the beaker, making sure the water was shared equally among the three plants.
I smiled at her. “Good morning! I’m watering my elderberries. They look purple now, but the color will darken to nearly black as they approach maturity.” Following Donovan’s advice, I made sure not to mention my age or the fact that my IQ was 206. Donovan felt this would be off-putting to people, even though I wished my IQ could be as low as theirs and I could be ordinary like them.
The head disappeared, and the window slammed shut.
I shrugged into my backpack and set off for computer science class. On the way, I played a little game in my head. Every time I spied a gavel and stars painted on a rock or fence, I would double the molecular weight of boron, which was 10.811 u. I was up to 172.976 u by the time I reached the double doors of the Technology Center. Interesting. I made a mental note to try it with magnesium during my walk to the cafeteria for lunch later.
My first class was Advanced Computer Seminar. Following Donovan’s advice, I walked into the room and announced, “Hello, I’m Noah, a typical student. There’s nothing extraordinary about me in any way whatsoever.”
I didn’t think it worked. I heard a lot of whispering—things like: “That’s him; that’s Youkilis!” along with the number 206. In retrospect, it didn’t make much sense to try to hide my identity. The youngest of them was at least five years older than me. They were adults; I was a boy. In fact, the atmosphere was almost hostile, as if my exceptionality diminished the others or even threatened them.
The only person who was nice to me was one girl. Maybe I should call her a lady. She sat down beside me, put an arm around my shoulders, and whispered, “Don’t worry about them, Noah. They’re just jealous. People have been talking about you for weeks now.”
She said her name was Arlene Pulaski, and she was a nineteen-year-old sophomore from Kentucky. She told me a lot of things, but the truth is I didn’t hear very many of them. I was too busy staring into her eyes and listening to her voice, which was like music. I didn’t think it was going to be possible for me to fall in love. I believed that my brain functioned at such a high level that no emotional response could ever prevent my 206 IQ from operating logically. When I watched a YouTube video where the Undertaker performed his signature move—the Tombstone Piledriver—I was exhilarated, of course, but my mind continued to compute, to analyze, to cogitate. This was different. The entire world became Arlene. She was the answer to every question, the solution to every equation. Even the wind whispered her name, although on some level, I understood that a) wind made no sound, only aeolian tones produced as it blew over objects, causing friction, and b) there was no wind inside the Technology Center.
I could have happily spent the rest of my life in that classroom, gazing at Arlene and blocking out the rest of the world, but at that moment, the professor showed up and ruined everything.
“Good morning. I’m Dr. Menzies. Welcome to Advanced Computer Seminar. In this course—Noah Youkilis!” All at once, his eyes locked on me. “I realized that our paths might cross eventually, but to meet you here on day one? What an honor!”
Oh, great. Just when I was starting to forget the frosty reception from the other students, along came the professor to remind people how different I was and why they all resented me. But this time, I didn’t feel so bad about it because Arlene was there. Just having her at the desk next to mine, knowing she was on my side, made everything better.
She even got the topic off me when she raised her hand and asked Dr. Menzies about the artificial intelligence projects we’d be working on during the summer semester.
“Yes, let’s get right to it,” the professor replied. “As you know, artificial intelligence is an incredibly broad topic. As we speak, AI systems are writing text, creating art, serving as chatbots and digital assistants, programming computers, and performing countless tasks. When you develop your AI system for this class, I want you to always be thinking of what the end use is going to be. Can anybody give me a sense of their ideas so far?”
My hand wanted to go up, but I kept it pressed to the wooden surface of my desk. Of course I had an idea—I had dozens of them. I’d been working on AI since fourth grade. I doubt even Dr. Menzies knew as much about AI as I did. But if I went first, the focus would be back on me again, complete with rumblings about my 206 IQ, and I didn’t want Arlene to have to stick up for me again.
A couple of people spoke about plans for their projects. The ideas were pretty ho-hum, miles behind my own thinking, but I pretended to be interested along with everyone else. And then Arlene raised her hand.
“I’m working on an AI-powered diagnostic tool to help mechanics repair motorcycles.”
“Excellent,” the professor approved. “As scientists, we sometimes have our heads in the clouds, and we don’t think about what our inventions will actually be used for. What could be a more practical purpose than fixing something that’s broken? But what made you think of motorcycles rather than, say, cars or trucks?”
Arlene blushed. “My boyfriend, Gator, rides a Harley, and he’s always complaining about finding a good mechanic. But with the right AI program, maybe he can be his own mechanic.”
Boyfriend?
The devastation was a supernova, a dying star triggered into runaway nuclear fusion. Of course, I should have known from the start that someone as perfect as Arlene would already have a boyfriend. How could I have missed that? A second emotional response overwhelmed my normally logical mind: bitter, churning jealousy. Did this motorcycle-riding Gator person even realize that he was the luckiest human being on the face of the earth?
A thick red haze enveloped my head, obscuring my vision. It took a moment to register that Dr. Menzies was regarding me expectantly and I was the center of attention in the room.
“Noah?” the professor prompted. “Can you tell us anything about what you’d like to work on this summer?”
At that moment, I was so wrapped up in jealousy and disappointment, it was a miracle my mind could function at all. So I reached back and blurted the first thing that came to mind: “I am going to create an AI engine that will get me into the Society of the Gavel.”
The classroom resounded with the laughter of the other students. Even Arlene’s perfect lips formed a tight smile, causing me to suspect that she was suppressing a giggle.
“But surely you understand that’s impossible,” Dr. Menzies told me. “Nobody gets into the Society of the Gavel without an invitation. And nobody can ask for an invitation because who would you ask? The membership is one hundred percent secret.”
“My AI will be able to overcome that,” I promised him. “It will have to crunch millions of terabytes of data, but it will identify current Gavelers who will let me in.”
A babble of protest greeted my announcement. Just the notion that the supersecret Society of the Gavel could be penetrated by a thirteen-year-old was outrageous to these Wilderton students.
“Impossible!”
“It’ll never work!”
“I wouldn’t let that little creep into a phone booth if he was changing into Superman!”
Dr. Menzies rapped on his desk for order. “Settle down, everyone!”
Arlene turned to me, her eyes huge and liquid. “Really, Noah? You think that could work?”
“Absolutely,” I assured her.
But what I really wanted was something that no computer program would ever be able to deliver. Oh, how I wished I could develop an AI system that would convince Arlene to break up with Gator!
6
Hyperpanic
Donovan Curtis
In the picture, Mom and Dad were standing on the observation deck of the Eiffel Tower, clinking champagne glasses with the lights of Paris all around them. After they texted the photo, they called, and I swear I barely recognized their voices. Maybe that’s because there wasn’t any yelling. In the Curtis family, conversation usually required a volume control set on eleven.
“How’s your friend Noah doing?” my father asked.
“I think he’s in love,” I replied. “I hear the name Arlene about eight hundred times a day. I’m not positive, but I think that’s a girl. In that class, it could also be a computer. On the plus side, he says our elderberries are starting to ripen.”
