Chapter 2
Charlie and Manny stood around the office, smiling at each other, trying to avoid any uncomfortable talking. Both, it seems, were not gifted in the social sense. Charlie was the first to break the silence.
"So, did you transfer here, or are you…uhh…new?" he asked, stuttering a little as he spoke. Manny was impressed by his first step.
"I transferred here. From New York. It's just too cold over there." She smiled, starting to loosen up a little.
"Right, right." Charlie smiled a little as well. "I've never been to the east coast. How is it over there?" he asked, moving away from the board slightly.
"It gets cold a lot, but not everywhere. It's nice. You should visit sometime."
"I'll have to try."
And the silence continued. This time it was Manny's turn to talk.
"What's this?" Manny questioned, motioning to the problem on the board. She walked over to it and looked at the numbers and letters and signs intensely, as if she would be able to understand it if she stared at it long enough.
"It's a formula I developed. It goes with the case." Charlie looked at his problem, proud of this one. The case seemed simple enough and so this problem matched its simplicity. Or, it did in his mind. It made no sense in most people's minds.
"So that's what you do? Use math to help with the cases?" He nodded, still looking at his problem. "Ah. That's cool. We don't really have that in New York." She smiled, thinking of her home. Her old home, that is. "What is this case anyway?"
Charlie still faced the problem, but his eyes were dazed, looking past the equation. "It's really a strange case. It started out simple, something worth ignoring by the FBI. But it got bigger." He paused. "It started as a simple breaking and entering. Only a few hundred dollars worth of things were stolen. Then another breaking and entering occurred, but this time a little more was taken and the owners of the house were roughed up a bit. It's been escalating like that, up to the last one. A large house was broken into and thousands of dollars of one-of-a-kind items were stolen, the father of the household strangled to death and the two children physically assaulted. We're not sure what the person will do next. That's the problem." Charlie's eyes refocused on the problem. "I came up with a simple problem to track their movements. It was really easy; I've done it many times. I actually just did a similar problem not too long ago."
Manny just listened in awe to something she'd never understand. She had a creative mind, one that could follow the thoughts of a criminal rather than the patterns. She had a knack for picking out a motive or a blip in a pattern when no one else could. "That's incredible," was all she could say.
Charlie blushed at her adoration. He was used to getting complements from adults, but the awe of a gorgeous girl was hard to come by for him. Especially when it involved math.
The two of them continued talking for a time, exchanging light conversation, talking about their pasts, interesting cases from the FBI, anything and everything they could think of. In time, they had become very comfortable with each other and knew quite a lot of the other. Manny knew all about Charlie's difficult childhood, trying to deal with such a gift. Charlie knew all about Manny's time on Broadway and how she stopped when her father was killed in the line of duty.
The group of agents returning broke their conversation. Some of them were a little out of breath, but everyone seemed okay. Don walked to the two, his face grim. "Something was wrong Charlie. With the problem." Charlie looked at him in horror.