Analyze
When Paige is away, Walter will play. Most grown men would get drunk and throw a party, but Walter is running experiments and analyzing data. It was a saturday morning, and Paige had woken up sick. Walter offered to watch Ralph so she could rest, and that's how 5 geniuses came to be gathered around a chalkboard trying to assemble a formula for the perfect relationship. There was no way Mr. No EQ could do anything of this nature on his own, and as with any other mission, every member of the team had a role. Happy walked into the garage to find the four boys huddled around Sylvester's chalkboard talking loudly over each other.
"Hey." No one even noticed her presence, let alone her tiny voice.
"Guys." A little louder, but still nothing. If anything they were talking louder. On to plan B. Happy grabbed a frying pan and a spatula from the kitchen and began to make as much noise as she could. If that didn't work, she was going for her power tools. She was losing all of them down the rabbit hole.
Thankfully it did work, and it was Toby who noticed her presence first. "Holding a frying pan, but minimal traces of anger in your features, only mild concern and annoyance. Interesting. You never cease to amaze me." Such a flirt.
"I'm concerned and annoyed because I've been here for five minutes and none of you noticed."
"Sorry Happy. We got a little carried away." Sylvester said, after he had calmed down from the near panic attack Happy's noisy distraction had caused.
"Sorry Happy." Walter said with a shrug.
"Morning Ralph. Where's your mom?" Happy asked.
"She's sick, so I came here with Walter." Ralph looked up at Walter.
"Speaking of, why am I here on a Saturday, Walt?" Walter turned to look at the chalkboard, seemingly deciding on where to start.
"I want to see if I can apply intellect to emotion. Create an algorithm for the perfect relationship."
Happy rolled her eyes. "Sounds like a wonderful thing for you 197, but that doesn't explain why I'm here."
Walter nodded. "I have no EQ, Sly has too much, you suppress yours , Toby analyses everyone else's, and Ralph hasn't been through enough to truly damage his yet." He pointed to each person as he said their name.
"And Paige is okay with you using her son as a lab rat?" Walter started scratching the back of his neck. It didn't take a psychiatrist to see he was nervous.
"Actually Paige doesn't know about this. I'm buying Ralph ice cream to ensure that it stays that way." Walter thinks he has a solution for everything.
"Really kid? Ice Cream? You got bought off that easily?" Given Ralph's intellect, she would have thought he'd be a little more ambitious. Ralph shrugged.
"I may be a genius, but I'm still a nine year old." Everyone laughed, even Happy.
They spent hours trying to create a formula to make a perfect relationship. Nothing ever came of it. Walter will just have to learn as he goes when it comes to his nonexistent emotions. If a genius psychiatrist, a brilliant mathematician, a woman who's been through more emotional trauma than anyone ever should, and a man with one of the highest IQs ever recorded can't transfer their intellect into emotions, then no one can. Walter, Sly and Ralph went to get ice cream as promised, leaving just Happy and Toby alone in the garage. Spending hours talking about relationships from a technical standpoint had somehow struck a nerve with Happy. Walter treated emotions like a problem he could solve, Sylvester just did whatever his anxiety allowed him to do with respect to emoting, and Toby tried to learn everything about someone based on their emotions, most of the time forgetting his own. Happy was different, she knew she had emotions, but she wouldn't let anyone see them. Anger is what she's known for, because that's all she shows. She's so much more than anger. Everyone is scared of the Happy they see. The real Happy is buried deep inside. Outside Happy is content to keep Inside Happy right where she is. She hasn't found anyone worth letting her out for.
"Happy talk to me. It doesn't take a PhD to see you're upset. If it did, I could still see you were upset because I do indeed have a PhD. That would be why you call me Do-"
"Ok wiseass, I want human Toby back."
"Are you going to tell human Toby what's upsetting you so he can fix it?"
"Well I'm not telling wiseass Toby."
"Ok, I'm human. Talk." He did one of those dramatic "changing faces behind the hand" things.
Happy shook her head. The open book side of her was threatening to show itself, and she didn't like it. "I don't know." She turned to walk away but he grabbed her wrist.
"Happy look at me." He would pull her chin towards him, but he's pushing the physical contact limit as it is.
Surprisingly, she did look at him.
"Don't shrink me Toby." Her gaze hardened and her jaw set.
"I think someone already did." He couldn't resist. It even got him a half smile.
"Shut up."
"Not until you talk to me. If you don't want me to be a shrink, I won't. I'll just be a friend, maybe more. I'll be what you want me to be Happy."
She pulled away from him.
"I don't know what I want you to be." She said, barely above a whisper.
"Whenever you find out, let me know. I mean it, I'll be what you want me to be.. Now and forever."
She nodded. She was grabbing her bag and walking towards the door when a thought struck her.
"Hey, Toby?"
"Yep?"
"Do you think there's a such thing as a perfect relationship?"
"If it's between me and you."
That's something she's going to have to analyze.
Each chapter in this story will be titled and have something to do with each letter in the alphabet. Meaning there will be 26 "letter themed" chapters that make up one continuous story.
Next Chapter: Birthdays
Thanks for reading.
M.
