Rap .. Rap .. Rap .. Chad ignored the sharp sensation from his knuckles slamming against the door a little too hard and then took a swig from his soda can. It was game night Thursday. The day his geeky friends all gathered to play some incredibly geeky board game in a ritual guaranteed not to attract any women, at least not any attractive women. Chad was a math-major. Every week his math-geek friends pushed him to join them for board games, and every week he offered up an obviously fictitious excuse for why he simply couldn't. This week he had apparently volunteered to paint flowers for the agriculture department. His jesting and lies were easier than admitting the truth, that each week he was ditching his friends to help his neighbors do their homework; neighbors Chad had a crush on; neighbors that normally wouldn't give Chad the time of day.
As the door opened, he got the same exciting nervous tingle he got every week from seeing Tracy. Somehow even wearing a simple white t-shirt and jean shorts, she was hotter than any girl he'd ever been around. Chad was too fashion oblivious to know how much effort went into Tracy's effortless outfits. How much time and care was spent selecting a t-shirt cut just low enough to highlight her bustline, shorts cut just right to make her look more tall and slender. "Sorry Chad, come on in." Tracy's words were colored by laughter, as she quickly continued something with her roomate, "seriously Erin. If you are going to stink up the room, at least ask the spirits to help me learn Spanish."
Chad let the door close behind him, immediately assaulted by a rank smell. Was it incense? Tracy hopped up on her bed behind her already open textbook. In the middle of the floor, Erin was sitting in a deliberate meditative pose, her eyes closed, a small circle of red and orange candles lit around her. She appeared to have ignored everything Tracy said. "Don't mind her, she's... you know."
Chad knew Erin was into some kind of wicca something or other. Erin had a fascination with ritual and religion. He didn't really know much more or care. He wouldn't be here if it wasn't for sharing an art history appreciation class with Erin a few semesters back. At the time he had a mini-crush on her, not unlike how he had a mini-crush on every half cute girl. Erin was smaller, more petite, more cute than Tracy, all of which had made it easier not to stumble over his tongue when she asked if he wanted to study together. He quickly found out that was code for help her with her homework, but ever since, Chad was happy to mindlessly tutor simple subjects just to spend time around the two of them.
Tracy already had her book open as he climbed up on the bed opposite her. "I'm still having trouble with this conjugation thing. How do I do 'jugar'?" As Tracy turned and pushed her textbook towards Chad, his spine jolted as his eyes caught a split-second glance down her open neckline. He almost coughed up a swig of his soda, and tried to cover by coughing. Even for a moment after, the lace of her bra and shape of her breasts held in his retina. These were the moments that brought him here, and he tried to hold onto it.
Chad reached to set his soda can on the nearby desk. "There really isn't any magic to it Tracy, it's just memorization. It stem changes from ju to jue in all but the nosotros and vosotros forms. Nosotros is easy, it's vosotros that's tricky." Spanish was actually one of Chad's worst subjects. He was a math-geek through and through. Chad took some kind of strange pride in being able to help someone in his worst subject.
"Think of it like the slangy casual form of them, like 'Jugáis al póker los lunes.', except for I suppose the future and conditional forms, which are also... Heck, I guess it's just memorization." He looked across at an expression on Tracy's face that was more confused than when he started.. "Didn't you say you have an exam this week?" Tracy nodded pleadingly, knowing she needed any help he could get. "It takes people years to get the forms of jugar down pat. Honestly, I recommend you just ignore it."
"Ignore it!?" Tracy exclaimed. I've spent all afternoon trying to memorize it and I still can't get it right. What happens when I can't do it? I keep getting this wrong on quizzes. She turned to Erin as if to garner some roomate support, but she was still in her own world. "How is ignoring it going to help!?"
Chad didn't just get good grades because he was smart. He was, for sure, but there was a meta-game to school. He knew the meta-game, he was a good test taker. "Look Tracy. Have you seen an entire quiz about jugar, let alone an exam?" She shook her head. "They need to test you on the entirety of what you're learning. The conjugation of one verb can't be worth more than a few points. They are teachers, they have to feel they are judging you on something, so they test you on some random junk like conjugations they know it takes years to learn. What you need to do, is focus on the stuff you can learn.
"Do you know your -ir forms?" She nodded, "-ar forms?" Again she nodded. "Great, then work on your vocabulary." He flipped a few pages to find the main words from her section. Turning the book, he pointed out the section to her. "Practice conjugating all these regular-forms, and writing out the definitions. This is going to be worth most of the points on the exam." As she glanced down, Chad was careful to watch her neckline, just in case she leaned in far enough to give him another peek. Sadly she didn't. After looking at the section he pointed out, the lit-up look on her face was enough of a reward.
"I already know all those!" She couldn't keep from bouncing a little bit on the bed, expressing her excitement. "Ohh, thank you thank you, Chad!" Before he knew it, she had quickly planted a peck on his cheek. Not an entirely unsatisfying reward in itself. A moment later she was on all fours on the bed. She may have been innocently reaching into her bookbag, she could tell Chad's mind was thinking very un-innocent things from the way she noticed him checking her out. It was almost her charity night. She did her share of flirting with boys at the local bars, she might as well let her helpful geeky neighbor enjoy checking her out one night a week. It only took a moment for her hand to find the book she wanted in her bookbag, but she rustled around in it for a minute pretending. Tracy pulled out her math book and gestured it towards him, "can you help me with a couple math problems too?" She knew her stance gave him a glorious view down her shirt, so his darting eyes were entirely expected.
Chad couldn't keep his eyes from darting down to the opening in her shirt, so he did what any geeky gentleman would do while stealing a glance, he lost his composure while totally oogling her, "I uhm." If his earlier momentary look down her shirt gave him a little jolt, this was a lightning rod. The way he could see a good portion of each of her gently hanging tits just sitting there made him totally hot yet totally embarassed. He felt his face flush red. He tried to simultaneously stop staring while still stealing glances. What had she asked him? Right. "Yes. Math, I can help you with math."
A moment later she was sitting closer to him, her book open and math homework spread out. "Can you check this over, I just can't see what I did wrong?" He looked over the sheet and could obviously see her mistake. She dropped a negative sign on the second line. He really tried hard not to 'do' their homework while helping them with their homework, while Tracy tried hard to get him to do it for her. At least this time she had attempted the problems. He looked at her, puzzling how to make her work for the answer. "Please. If you just fix this one, it might help me fix the others myself." Her hand fell on his knee as she pleaded, and while he was no longer offered a view down her shirt, her closer proximity was intoxicating.
"Okay, okay. This first one you just dropped a minus-sign here. See if you can find the mistakes in these other three." He circled the minus-sign and three other problems with mistakes. She quickly took the paper with a smile and began to correct it herself. While she did, Chad looked over at Erin, who was no longer in eyes-closed meditation. "How about you Erin? Do you have some homework questions, or are you casting a VooDoo hex on your professor to pass?" He let out a little chuckle.
"Laugh all you want. This is not VooDoo. That's some doctored up form of Christianity, merely religion. This is HooDoo, real magic." She looked incredibly serious. Chad couldn't help but roll his eyes at the thought. It didn't hurt that rolling his eyes got him a little glance at Tracy. Erin was cute, but she was no Tracy. "Do you think I can't see you rudely rolling your eyes at me? If you want to say something say it." Tracy was going to be busy with her problems for a few minutes, so Chad didn't have much choice but to respond.
"Erin... It's just that, real magic? Seriously? You burn some candles, light some smelly stuff on fire, and it's supposed to do something mystical? You know what would be magical? If you could burn that stuff and not make the room stink." Chad sometimes thought himself capable of making a witty joke. He was wrong. Erin was still sternly staring back at him. "There is no such thing as VooDoo."
Hadn't she just told him? Was he not listening. Erin lashed out with a bit of anger, "I told you, it's HooDoo." She punctuated her words with a broad movement of her hands. Both their single dorm window and hallway door slammed shut. Chad turned his head, startled by the sounds, and wondering how there could be such a gust of wind on a calm night. Tracy was also startled, and looked right at Erin in disbelief. "You think your science knows everything?" Erin slowly stood from her position on the floor as she spoke. "Why are the emotions of mother and child linked at birth? Twins? Why are success, beauty, and power not explained in science textbooks? You know Cleopatra was a practicing HooDoo." Her implication clear. She was just steps away from being an emperor. Erin was pretty small. Chad couldn't help chuckle at the thought.
Erin was standing just in front of the bed now, unnerved at Chad's laughing. "You think being smart is everything? Let me as you this? Why are you here?" She posed expectantly, waiting for him to answer..
Chad looked to Tracy and back as if it was a trick question. "To help you two with your homework?" Phrasing it as a rhetorical question as a way to make it sound even more obviously true, even if it wasn't the whole truth. Erin simply stood silent as if giving him more time to answer.
"Really now? That is why we want you here. But why are you here?" Erin shifted her body language, unbuttoning the top button of her blouse and wedging herself onto the sliver of space between him and the edge of the bed. "Ohh Chad." Her voice was thick with melodramatic mockery. "I'll keep letting you look down my shirt if you keep doing my homework." Across from them, Tracy's face quickly turned unfriendly as she realized the mockery was aimed at her. "And if you finish it all, I just might bump my boobs into you once or twice before sending you home." Erin dropped character, shooting Tracy an evil glance of condemnation. "THAT is why you are here. The atraer...the seduction."
Tracy wasn't sure what to make of that. In the end there it almost sounded like a compliment. Of course Chad wanted her. Still, she felt like she was being made fun of. "THAT is totally not me." She scooted herself a little bit further away to make her point. "I just needed help with problem number seven."
For an instant, Chad's mind imagined this the start of his threesome fantasy. Then he came to his senses. He stood from the bed, nudging Erin out of his way in the process, and gathered his things. "Girls, I think someone spiked your fruit punch or something. I'm here because you to need to not flunk Math. And because it's more rewarding to help my neighbors than sit around playing geeky board games all evening." Chad was a geek, but he wasn't meek or shy. He placed his books back in his bag as he finished his witty retort. "Now, if you two want to trade sexual favors for term-papers, I'm not exactly saying no, but this is just innocent help-thy-neighbor." Tracy smiled, possibly because she felt vindicated somehow. Chad stepped towards the door, planning to open it before finishing with a final quip. However, the handle wouldn't budge, not even a little play in the lock, like it was weilded shut.
When Chad gave up on the door-handle and turned back around, Erin had a smug look on her face and continued as if she expected he wasn't going anywhere. "So Chad. You expect me to believe you don't come here to steal glances down our shirts?" Chad shook his head before she had even finished. Even with her blouse still discheveled and open a bit in front from her unbuttoning and mockery of Tracy, she wasn't showing enough skin to even glance at. Besides, Erin was cute at best. Tracy had always been the one to catch his eye. "You don't come to fuel your hormone laiden fantasies? And you don't think there is any such thing as magic; science has all the answers."
Even a bit shocked at her directness, Chad was prepared to deny anything and everything, no matter how close to home she hit. The proposterous suggestions that there was such a thing as magic simply firmed up his resolve. He nodded, wrapping up her whole challenge as foolish silliness, "correct. I'm here to help you with your homework, and there is no such thing as magic."
Erin's stance relaxed a bit as she put on a smug smile and reached towards him. "In that case, thank you for being so selfless. Please, stay a moment longer." She took his bad, setting it down before taking his hand and leading him away from the door. "if I can show you magic, certainly you would like to see it, wouldn't you? Certainly proof would change your mind."
Chad never figured Erin for a kook, but a man of science was also a man of curiosity. There was no way she was going to 'prove' anything, and he wanted to see her make a fool of herself. He sat back on the bed next to Tracy, who simultaneously started to get up as if to get herself out of there. Erin held her hand out, "no, no Tracy. You're part of this little challenge as well, sit." Tracy realized her footing must have been off, as she felt her balance shift as she gently fell back to the bed, not sure why she was getting up in the first place.
"HooDoo, you see, is a magic charged by atraer." Erin took a step back as she began her monologue. "Tracy may have been flirting for homework problems," her roomate motioned to object again before Erin's outstretched hand gave her pause. "I, however, have been soaking in every ounce. I've been channeling and capturing the shok-tu. From both of you." She eyed them each with a look that was as sinister as it was out of place on a petite college girl.
Chad interjected, "It this some kind of drama class rehersal? Perhaps a psychology class challenge? Make someone believe the unbelievable?" Tracy giggled at the retort, obviously siding with Chad in this bizarre interaction.
"Laugh roomate, you flirt because you're attracted to him." Erin beamed down at her before turning back to Chad, "Even though social norms keep her from dating the geek, her body wants her babies to have your intellect." Tracy's body language projected outward shock, while at the same time she felt herself covering a shred of truth within. She had always considered her roomate a close friend, and was beginning to feel betrayed.
Erin's hands came together on an amulet around her neck, and she chanted to herself, gradually becoming audible enough for them to her murmurings. "mm-cha.... rah-cha.... mm-cha.. ka rum pahtoda too sa." After what seemed like a couple minutes of chanting, Erin started at them again as she spoke. "Let the universe prove the truth that you each deny." Her hands circled round and slowly came together. Defying expectation, a compression of air and an unexpectedly loud sound filled the room. Each of them felt their hair toss about.
Chad noticed the drapes on the wall rustle before settling back down. He wondered if Erin had rigged up the room for that little display. His curiosity at what would happen next was giving way to his boredom. What did he expect? Erin to turn into a supernatural seductress? No, because that was not possible. This was the real world, not fantasy land. Though she was quite attractive, it was Tracy who had always caught his eye. "Erin you should consider majoring in theatre. It could really work for you." Even as he delivered his retort, he found himself staring at her a bit deeper and longer than seemed proper.
That little puff of air had blown her hair up into an attractively energetic state that it somehow stayed in. Chad felt something odd, as if the world was turning around him even as everything was still. Erin while looking the same, somehow seemed much more attractive than he remembered. The curve of her breast pushed perfectly into her blouse; a sliver of skin showed at her hip; and the feminine line of her arms and fingers were apparent. Suddenly slender curved features all over her body seemed in resonance, from the thin line of her eyebrow, to a frock of her hair, to the swell of her hip, to the gentle curve of her leg, to the seductive curve of her lips. Erin briefly peeked into a mirror mounted to their closet door. When she opened her mouth, her voice sounded different, melodic, "Oooh. How unexpectedly pleasant."
Chad felt almost drugged, and looked at his soda can, wondering if Erin had slipped something into it. He forced himself to snap out of it, and acted on an urge to get out of there. Chad liked to feel in control, and he sensed he might be losing it. Something was not right. "Well, that was fun and all, but I think I think it's time to show the cafe who's boss." As he walked across the room, he struggled to deny what some small part of him could not, that Erin was simultaneously the same but not the same. He couldn't help but meet her eyes. Her slender hand reached and barely touched his shoulder as he mode for the door. Only he didn't reach the door. As he passed, his body curled to face her, as if held by gravity; rapt by her gorgeous eyes and the barest brush of her touch.