The final chapter of Letters For Simon is here. I am SUPER EXCITED for the next story after this. Alvin enacts another scheme in it that you don't wanna miss.

Writing for "Geinus Alvin" is hard because he's like Alvin 2.0, but he's also not like Alvin 2.0.

He's not as mature as he thinks he is. He's just starting out. He doesn't quite understand what he should understand.

But I adore him anyway. Little newborn nerd.

Simon's POV

I returned to the bedroom to find Alvin bouncing around from worksheet to worksheet. He sure had an odd and very distracting way of completing his homework. He also frequently got up from his seat to pace around. I decided to do my best to ignore it.

Thankfully, the stain remover I invented took all his equations off the walls. I read over them again as I erased each one, double checking the calculations. They were uncomfortably similar to some of the most difficult calculations I could do.

Maybe Alvin really WAS a genius! Or maybe he was very good at faking it? Yeah. He'd been watching a lot of shows with smart characters. He could be memorizing things they write and things they say. There's no way his mindpower matches mine.

Case in point, when I was finished cleaning off the wall, Alvin had vanished AGAIN. I heard rattling around in my lab and leapt into action. He better not start tampering with my inventions. Some of those could KILL him if he's not careful.

I entered the lab and saw Alvin sitting at my desk watching my Newton's cradle decoration. Click, clack, click, clack. The metal balls swung back and forth and Alvin's eyes watched them with an intent focus I'd never seen before. I almost didn't want to disturb him, but we still had work to do.

"What have I told you about going in my lab without permission?" I asked, grabbing the Newton's Cradle away so it couldn't distract him anymore.

He blinked and shook his head. Then, he blurted out… "Hey, do you think we could invent a Time Machine like in the movie Hot Tub Time Machine?"

"You have a long way to go before you're ready to be my lab assistant." I reminded Alvin sharply.

"I dunno." He spun around in the chair and then put his feet on the desk. "I feel like I have come a long way. Maybe you just don't see it." He launched into another scientific explanation. "You gotta really observe me. We each create our own reality based on what we observe. That's like quantum physics 101."

He wanted to try and use science to explain himself? Two could play that game. "That also means that you create your own reality based on what you observe, and right now you appear to have created a reality of denial and overexaggeration."

"Huh?" A high pitched voice came from the exit of the closet lab. Theodore was standing there trying to make sense of our conversation.

"We're discussing the mysteries of the universe." Alvin told Theo. "You're welcome to join in."

Theodore frowned. He knew this was above his skill level. Still, he walked inside and decided to join us. I'm not sure why.

"I don't know much about the universe." The boy in the green hoodie squeaked softly. "So, it's a pretty big mystery."

Alvin continued to touch my things without asking. He wheeled out a whiteboard and started drawing a diagram on it. "Did you know that our universe is likely only one out of INFINITE universes?"

"Well, that's just a theory. It's never been proven." I told Alvin. "However, there is scientific evidence to back it up….so I guess you aren't totally wrong." I looked at the whiteboard sternly. "Don't touch my things without asking, please."

"My apologies, dear brother." Alvin said in a very scholarly tone that he was clearly putting on for show. "Would you rather I resume writing on the wall?"

"Okay, back it up, I'm lost…" Theodore rubbed his chin. "What do you mean infinite universes?"

"Whenever we make a choice, we change the trajectory of our life." Alvin began. "Now, suppose we made a different choice. Suppose we were still the same people, but under completely different circumstances. I believe that every decision we make creates an alternative reality. I'm gonna use an example. I decided to sign up for physics class by accident instead of music appreciation. Somewhere out there, there's another Alvin who signed up for music appreciation instead. He never discovered his hidden love of science. Heck, there's probably an Alvin who decided to take the agriculture class with Jeanette too, or maybe one who decided not to take any extracurriculars."

"There's even an Alvin, theoretically speaking, who never tried to win the Most Improved award." I added, filled with a mixture of confusion and pride. Alvin had studied hard, and it showed.

Theodore raised his hand. "So if there's a lot of Alvins, does that mean there's a lot of Simons and mes too?"

"Theoretically, yes." Alvin and I both chorused together. That was strange. Alvin looked as weirded out by it as I did.

My baby brother blinked his brown eyes. "What does theoretically mean?"

"It's a fancier way of saying "in theory." Again, Alvin and I talked at exactly the same time. Unsettling. Very unsettling. I guess now I could tell that Alvin and I DO in fact share the same gene pool.

"Right." Now Theo was visibly unsettled by the little hive mind that had formed between Alvin and I as well.

Alvin drew some more diagrams on the board. "I think, if Si and I work together, we could find a way to visit different dimensions. We could meet alternative versions of us!"

"I thought we were talking about universes." Theodore was confused. "When did we switch to dimensions?"

"Universes, dimensions, realities. All words that mean the same thing in this context." I clarified.

"Ohhhh." The boy in green nodded.

Alvin smiled widely. "They're synonyms!"

I blinked. Why was Alvin using complicated vocabulary? You'd think he downloaded the entire dictionary into the language center of his brain. The last time I recall him doing this was when he changed his personality to avoid being Brittany's fated Mystic Mate. That magazine quiz shook both of them up.

EUREKA! That was it! I couldn't believe it had taken me so long to realize it. Alvin was still upset about his popularity being revealed as a sham. This new "genius" persona he had crafted was an attempt to ignore those feelings. He thought that the opposite of popular was nerdy outcast, and thanks to the placebo effect, he reacted accordingly. Thus, the total transformation into Mr. Physics Nerd.

Theodore's voice cut into my thoughts. "Well, you guys enjoy your cinnamons and universal stuff and I'm going to go eat some cinnamon buns cuz now I'm hungry for them." He misinterpreted the word synonym as cinnamon. How adorable and very in character for Theodore.

"Save me one, please." I requested, before turning back to Alvin. "Physicists have been trying to crack interdimensional travel for years with no luck. Besides, that's a little too ambitious for our first project together, don't ya think?"

"Yeah, you're right." He sighed.

DID ALVIN JUST TELL ME I WAS RIGHT!? What is happening to him?

"You have to think smaller." I patted his head.

He looked up at me hopefully. "But maybe someday in the far far future, we could totally do it."

I didn't want to burst his bubble. "Totally." I responded. Now, it was time to ask the more important question. "Alvin, are you feeling okay?"

"Positively splendid!" He exclaimed. "Why do you ask?"

"Oh I don't know." I rolled my eyes. "Maybe because you're not acting like your usual self and I'm worried that losing your popularity broke something inside you."

"Uh…I guess it did break me." He took off his cap and fidgeted with it. "I haven't really felt like myself since. I wanna be good ol classic Alvin, but I've never felt further from him…err me."

I knew it! It didn't take a rocket scientist to see what was happening. Alvin was having an identity crisis. Because he had ingrained Mr. Popularity into a core part of his identity, losing his status had rendered him aimless. He kept trying to shove physics into the hole in his psyche. It was basically the glue holding him together. This was bad. Very very bad.

"Well, re-inventing yourself can be therapeutic." I told him. Although, the last time anything like this happened, he dressed like Michael Jackson and bought a llama. I decided I needed to lay some more ground rules. "But, if you buy another llama, Dave will kill you."

Alvin was baffled at the notion. "What? When did I do that?"

Of course he didn't remember. Mind like a steel trap my furry tail! "Quite a while ago, during your last identity crisis."

His blue eyes blinked. "I'm not having an identity crisis." He said in a way that made it clear he believed he really wasn't. "I just don't feel, you know, 100% like myself."

"Who do you feel like?" I questioned, leading my brother out of the lab and back to the mini desks.

He turned a bit pale. "You." He said softly.

I felt my body tense. I could see why Alvin felt like he was turning into me. For the first time in my life I could see a lot of myself in Alvin. That didn't mean he actually WAS turning into me. "Liking physics doesn't make you me." I said firmly.

"No, I know…." He tilted his head, trying to make sense of all this. "But it makes me FEEL like you. And also Jeanette. Because I feel….shy? No, wait, shy isn't the word."

"Self conscious?" I asked.

He nodded. "Yeah! It's a feeling I don't usually feel, that's for sure."

"Maybe it's because you're still hiding it." I suggested. "If you told everyone, then perhaps you could finally feel proud of your accomplishments instead of self conscious. And an A in physics class is a BIG accomplishment."

Alvin got up to pace again. "I want to tell everyone, really I do." His pupils shrank to pin pricks as he stared off into the distance in horror. " It's gonna change how people treat me. I want that, but I also don't want that. Because then I can't manipulate situations to my advantage anymore. They'd be less predictable."

That's a new one! "I knew it! I knew you do that! This is the first time you've ever admitted it!" I smiled. "You little mastermind."

"Well, not always on purpose." Alvin went on. "I see a goal and then I just focus on that one goal and do whatever it takes to accomplish it. I didn't even realize how much I manipulate people until recently."

"Wait….really?" I couldn't fathom being a genius who was completely and blissfully unaware of it. Maybe all these years I'd been reading Alvin wrong. Maybe even ALVIN had been reading Alvin wrong.

He nodded and then sat down again, working on a math problem. "Uh huh. And I really don't wanna tell Britt tomorrow. I promised myself I would, but I am TERRIFIED." He walked away from the desk again after finishing the problem and flopped down on his bed.

I decided that the homework was a lost cause at this point. Alvin needed my help with his "not identity crisis" I sat down on my bed and faced the anxiety ridden chipmunk. He'd always been high strung, but since when did Alvin have THIS much anxiety?

What would make Alvin feel better? What would convince him to tell Brittany? "You've gotta tell Britt soon." I warned. "Cheesy knows and he's famously a blabbermouth."

"Cheesy knows! AW NUTS!, Cheesy knows!" Alvin paced around atop his bed. "I am attached to an inclined plane by being wrapped helically around an axis!"

There he goes with the overly complicated words again. I sighed. "I am begging you. Just say "screwed."

My brother in the red glasses looked puzzled. "But it's more fun to say it the other way. It's like I picked up a whole new language. You know I've always WANTED to speak another language, but French was never my thing."

I realized something else at that moment. For every drop of supposed genius that had somehow been gifted to him, there were still 3 or 4 drops of natural Alvin stupidity. I suppose that made sense though. Alvin had just figured out he was a lot smarter than he previously thought. He was a newborn nerd opening his eyes for the first time. As weird as it was, I owed it to him to supply a crash course in how to be less annoying about his genius.

Because of COURSE Alvin would show off. That was what he did, always. I foolishly assumed this sudden enlightenment would change his thought process entirely. That's not how it works. It was up to me to mold him into the kind of intellectual that didn't go all Dr. Sheldon Cooper on everyone. I had my work cut out for me.

"Okay, ground rules." I slid off my bed and onto the floor, where I started to pace. "I can't believe I'm about to say all this to you." It seemed so STRANGE! "Rule number one of being highly intelligent is, if you talk to people using complicated words all the time, most people are not going to take you seriously…or attempt to understand you. Only the other intellectuals can, and there are VERY few of us."

Alvin rolled his eyes and hung upside down off the bed. "You talk like that."

I frowned. He had noticed? Had he picked up his vocabulary skills from ME? "On occasion, yes. Not all the time. And I know who I can talk that way with and who I can't." I informed him.

"Got it." He started to fidget with a rubix cube he'd pilfered from my lab. "Less wordy, more cut to the chase."

"Rule number 2. You cannot talk back to your teachers. I don't care if they are boring. I don't care if you're smarter than they are. It's inappropriate. It will get you in trouble." I continued.

"Urgh! Fine. Even Miss. Smith?" He asked.

I crossed my arms. "Especially Miss. Smith!"

Alvin was now hopelessly bored. This wasn't off to a great start. "How many more rules are there?"

I let out another sigh and continued my list. I hoped that he would glean a fraction of this information. It was all very important. I took great pleasure in showing my budding protégé the ropes.

SIMON: Your turn again, Alvin. If you need me, I'll be watching the discovery channel.

ALVIN: Are you sure you aren't gonna watch Equestria Girls for the 12th time?

SIMON: Don't make me slap you.

ALVIN: Fine! Fine! Moving on! Here we go! Coming up, I MIGHT finally break the news to Britt. Ya don't wanna miss it, folks.

Genius Alvin's POV

As Si droned on and on about the perils of being super smart, I began to regret my decision to tell him about my brain upgrade. I know he was only trying to help, but all his nagging was understimulating me again. My thoughts grew fuzzy and my mind went blank.

Until I heard…

"Rule number 83 is, avoid bragging as much as you can." Did Simon know me? Avoid bragging? There's not an Alvin in the whole multiverse that can do that! "Especially about IQ scores, because IQ is an inherently flawed system that doesn't account for the vast variation in…"

I cut Simon off. It was time to, well, brag. "Oh speaking of IQ, mine's 155 now." I said.

My blue clad bro's eye twitched. "R…Really? How do you know?"

"Cuz I took that online test thing again." I brought up the photo on my phone and showed him the result. "I scored 102 last time, but this time I got 155."

His eyes grew even wider than they had when I broke the news that I love studying physics. "How is that possible?"

I didn't know exactly. Still blamed the aliens. I came up with something quick and believable on the spot. "Well, the questions were easier to focus on without people laughing at me while I took it."

"One point above my IQ." I heard Simon mutter angrily. "The universe is playing the biggest joke on me."

Ohoho! He was JEALOUS! For once, Simon, Favorite Genius Goody Two Shoes Simon was jealous of little old me. "What was that? I thought you said IQ is an inherently flawed system? Do you care?" I taunted.

"No, of course not." My younger bro lied.

"Good." I smirked my classic smirk. "Cuz it's only one point, ya know, no biggie."

Simon broke the pencil he'd been holding in half. "Yep. Not. A. Problem." He lied again.

I needed a good subject change. ZAP! Idea! I would show Simon some of my doodles from class. I raced over and grabbed my notebook, flipping through it to find a drawing of Simon's robot son. His name was Geizmo and Si built him basically for no other reason than to prove he could. I, on the other hand, had some nice practical ideas for upgrading Geizmo. Improving him, if you will. I'm all about improvement these days.

"Oh, hey, before I forget, I have this FANTASTIC idea for giving Geizmo water canons that shoot out of his hands. That squirting bowtie thing is pretty lame, you know, cuz bowties are lame." I said excitedly.

Simon handed me back the drawing. He wasn't impressed. "I'm very happy with Geizmo the way I designed him."

"Ya sure?" I stuck out my lower lip. I just wanted to help. I wanted to be a part of Simon's team.

"Positive." He responded, likely still fuming over my new IQ score. "Let's finish our homework."

We just managed to squeeze in the homework before dinnertime. I'm pretty sure I did the best I could. Hey, maybe my ego was coming back bit by bit. I was getting very confident in my academic capabilities.

During dinner, Dave looked right at me like I'd done something wrong. "Alvin, Miss. Smith called today."

"Whst did she say?" Yep. Definitely something wrong. I maaay have been a little menace in class to throw people off. Hopefully, if Cheesy had spilled my secret, no one would believe him.

"That your latest book report needs to be redone. She said it was a good try, but your grammar was horrible." My dad scooped me a bowl of salad. Not the pasta variety this time, just boring salad.

I groaned. "Can't we just leave it at "good try?"

"Now now now, Alvin." Simon taunted me. "That's not what the Most Improved student would do."

I hissed at him. Chipmunks, similarly to cats, tend to do that when extremely angry.

"No hissing at the table." Dave scolded.

Theodore kept to himself and ate his salad. I wonder what he was thinking.

Using my new understanding of physics, I turned my fork into a catapult and sent an olive flying in Dave's direction. It hit him right in the nose, exactly where I aimed. Hey, does a catapult count as a simple machine? Or a compound machine?

"Ow! Alvin!" My father glared at me with his amber eyes.

"Sorry! Accident!" I lied. "I was trying to launch it into the bowl over there."

"What has he told you about goofing off and playing with food?" Simon scolded me just like Dave.

"Not to. It won't happen again." I spoke begrudgingly.

I began to second guess my decision to launch the olive. Was goofing off something the new Alvin would do? Well DUH! I mean I wanted to goof off. And I WAS the new Alvin, ergo, that meant it was something he would do.

"Goofing off is beneath you." The nerdy voice in my head insisted. "You're too smart for that now."

"Nah. Me being smart just makes it EASIER to goof off." I told it. I would have stuck out my tongue too, if the nerdy entity guiding me was a physical person. Where did this voice come from anyway?

"I've always been here, Alvin." Creepy. So creepy.

Anyway, dinner concluded and I helped with the dishes this time. Dave was clearly weirded out by it, but he took it in stride. I dunno why I did it, maybe it was the guilt from messing around compelling me to be helpful? Or perhaps it's because my homework was basically done and I still had free time.

I went upstairs and loaded up Galactic Invaders on my game console. Time to enjoy blasting some virtual aliens back to their planet! I didn't get very far though.

Simon held up my book report and waved it in my face. "Your writing is atrocious. We need to work on it."

I scowled. "It's beautiful cursive!" I protested.

"Oh, the writing looks okay until you actually attempt to read it. It's basically incomprehensible. No wonder you've been asked to redo it." Simon quipped.

I shrugged. "Hey, I might be an intellectual now, but I can't spell to save my life. Any tips?"

"You can't keep spelling words the way they sound." He informed me in that tone that made me feel stupid. Or at least, it USUALLY did. Now I was uplifted and I couldn't feel stupid anymore. "I don't know if you realize this, but there are these things called silent letters." He went on.

I rolled my eyes. "Well, if they're so important, they should speak up." I joked.

He facepalmed, which I expected.

"You okay?" I poked at him and turned my game off. I was getting bored with it anyway.

Simon waved his arms around the way I usually did. "I don't understand. Your letters were so beautifully written. All the grammar was PERFECT!"

I chuckled nervously. "Yeah. Cuz Jeanette edited them."

"That explains it." He looked a bit less aggravated. "I'm glad to hear my spelling bee championship record will remain untouched."

"Knock knock!" Said a voice coming from the window ledge. "Guess who!"

I recognized the voice immediately. It was my good pal Warbie! My best birdie friend forever. I hadn't told him about my new abilities yet. Oh, and speaking of abilities, Warbie couldn't always talk, but he does now. It's all thanks to a little misshap with Simon's vocabulary serum thing.

"Good evening, Warbie." Simon waved to the little bird.

"What's shakin'?" I asked, letting him fly in and land on my finger.

"Oh, you know, the usual." He chirped. "Flying around, watching humans be dumb."

"Warbie!" Theodore ran into the room and reached out to pet the yellow warbler on my finger. "Nice to see ya."

This was a good segway into what I wanted to say. "Speaking of dumb, turns out, I'm not." I boasted. "I have an IQ of 155."

"I said not to brag about your IQ score." Simon frowned. "You never listen."

Warbie tilted his head. "And that means?"

Theo explained it in the worst was possible. "Alvin has a Simon brain too."

"Wait, really? So Alvin's a dweebus!?" Warbie laughed. "Hahaha!"

"I'm not a dweebus!" I insisted, knowing that I was at least HALF a dweebus. I sure hoped my inner dweebus wouldn't spread and consume my soul.

Simon raised his pointer finger in the air. "Technically, just being smart doesn't make one a dweebus." Ohoho! Thank you, bro. And then he ruined it. "But in THIS case, Alvin is in fact a dweebus."

I sighed. "But I'm also still cool!" I added.

"It's very weird." Theo added. "But this is who Alvin wants to be now."

"Dr. Wilson's class has transformed me. Like the mighty phoenix, rising from the ashes of despair, I am REBORN!" I reached my arm for the ceiling and Warbie flew off to perch on Theo's shoulder.

"You would make such a great writer." Simon remarked, finding my comparison charming. "If only you used proper grammar and could spell."

I scoffed. "You still on that?"

Theodore's brown eyes lit up with an idea. "Maybe you could teach him! And me too!"

"No no no no no!" I didn't want to get any nerdier than I already was. "I don't wanna challenge your spelling bee record, remember, Simon?"

"You'll never be taken seriously as an intellectual if you can't spell." My brother in blue pointed out.

"How very ableist of you, Si." I teased.

"Who needs spelling?" Warbie interjected. "Talking is so much better than spelling."

Simon rubbed his chin. "Would you agree to a short English lesson, if I could make it fun?"

My nerdy impulses took hold again. "Maybe." I didn't want to say that.

"I would!" Theo squeaked, enthusiastically.

Warbie shrugged…I think. Hard to tell with wings. "I'm in. Not that I NEED to know."

"Excellent." Simon wheeled out the whiteboard from his lab and washed off my scribbly multiverse diagram. Rude. "Now, how many of you like Weird Al Yankovic?"

"Are you kidding?" I squealed like a fanboy. "He's the greatest musical parody guy ever! Even better than me!" Another first. I normally did not admit I thought ANYONE was better than me out loud.

Simon chuckled and then turned on some music. "This'll be fun!" He said.

What followed was a Weird Al song I'd never heard before called Word Crimes. It was something, let me tell you. Simon looked like he was having a ball and I didn't have the heart to tell him that I was pretty much distracted the entire time he was writing stuff on the whiteboard.

He was just so ANIMATED! His facial expressions as he was singing were HILARIOUS! I hoped that even though I wasn't fully listening to every lyric, some of the lessons he was trying to teach would get absorbed anyway.

"Everyone listen up!

Hey, hey, hey, uh

Hey, hey, hey"

This song was really catchy! I liked it so far! I can't believe I am saying that.

"If you can't write in the proper way

If you don't know how to conjugate

Maybe you flunked that class

And maybe now you find

That people mock you online"

People do mock me online, but not because of my poor grammar. they have various other reasons.

"Okay, now here's the deal

I'll try to educate ya

Gonna familiarize

You with the nomenclature

You'll learn the definitions

Of nouns and prepositions

Literacy's your mission

And that's why I think it's a

Good time

To learn some grammar

Now, did I stammer

Work on that grammar

You should know when

It's "less" or it's "fewer"

Like people who were

Never raised in a sewer."

Well, that's rude, Simon. I was not raised in a sewer. I am not a teenage mutant ninja turtle.

"I hate these word crimes

Like I could care less

That means you do care

At least a little

Don't be a moron

You'd better slow down

And use the right pronoun

Show the world you're no clown

Everybody wise up!"

I didn't feel wise at the moment, but he didn't have to rub it in.

"Say you got an "I", "T"

Followed by apostrophe, "s"

Now what does that mean?

You would not use "it's" in this case

As a possessive

It's a contraction

What's a contraction?

Well, it's the shortening of a word, or a group of words

By the omission of a sound or letter"

I could tell Theo and Warbie didn't know what to think either. Both of them bobbed their heads to the beat.

"Okay, now here's some notes

Syntax you're always mangling

No "x" in "espresso"

Your participle's danglin'

But I don't want your drama

If you really wanna

Leave out that Oxford comma

Just keep in mind

That "be", "see", "are", "you"

Are words, not letters

Get it together

Use your spellchecker

You should never

Write words using numbers

Unless you're seven

Or your name is Prince"

How long was this stupid song anyway? Go off, Simon, but keep it truncated. How the heck do I know a word like truncated?

"I hate these word crimes

You really need a

Full time proofreader

You dumb mouth-breather

Well, you should hire

Some cunning linguist

To help you distinguish

What is proper English"

Simon broke out into a faster rap. It was actually really cool. It would have been cooler if he wasn't making fun of me the entire time. This song was kinda mean.

"One thing I ask of you

Time to learn your homophones is past due

Learn to diagram a sentence too

Always say "to whom"

Don't ever say "to who"

And listen up when I tell you this

I hope you never use quotation marks for emphasis

You finished second grade

I hope you can tell

If you're doing good or doing well"

Yeah, I get it, Simon. SHEESH! I'll work on my grammar! I promise!

"You better figure out the difference

Irony is not coincidence

And I thought that you'd gotten it through your skull

What's figurative and what's literal

Oh but, just now, you said

You literally couldn't get out of bed

That really makes me want to literally

Smack a crowbar upside your stupid head"

The feeling is mutual. HOW LONG IS THIS SONG!? YOU SAID THE LESSON WOULD BE SHORT!

"I read your e-mail

It's quite apparent

Your grammar's errant

You're incoherent

Saw your blog post

It's really fantastic

That was sarcastic

You still write like you're classic"

Because Classic Alvin and Genius Alvin are in here together. "Don't bring classic me into this." I huffed. By now, Theo was confused and Warbie was falling asleep.

"I hate these Word Crimes

Your prose is dopey

Think you should only

Write in emoji"

Simon finally noticed how spaced out we all were. He scowled.

"Oh, you're a lost cause

Go back to pre-school

Get out of the gene pool

Try your best to not drool

Never mind I give up

Really now I give up."

"Does this mean the song's over?" I asked, yawning. I was getting tired.

My brother in blue wheeled the whiteboard away. "Yeah. I hope you understood at least some of that."

"I didn't get much." Theodore said honestly. "You went so fast…and there were all those letters."

"I won't write words using numbers. Cuz my name isn't Prince." I said, repeating a line from the song to convince Simon I had actually paid more attention to it than I did.

"That was really good, Simon." Warbie complimented my bro. "You have a nice voice. Anyway, I should probably head back to the birdhouse now. Goodnight. Always nice to see you guys."

"I'll keep ya updated on my budding genius." I promised him.

With that, we all got ready for bed. I knew I had a HUGE hurdle to jump at school tomorrow. I wasn't looking forward to it.

I met up with Brittany the next day before school began. She was sitting on a bench in front of the school, touching up her makeup. My stomach flipped and flopped like a fish. I wasn't ready for this. I knew I had to be ready for this.

"Salutations, Britt." I said, shocking myself. That wasn't how I usually greeted her or ANYBODY. The nerdiness was either reaching for more crevices of my brain, or I'd learned the word from one of the TV shows I watched.

"Oh, hey Simo…." Her brows furrowed when she saw it was me.

I waved to her awkwardly. "Alvin, actually, but I can understand the confusion." What to say next? I tugged at the hem of my crimson T shirt with a cheerful yellow A. It was my gym outfit. The one with the cyan accents around the collar and sleeves.

"What's been going on with you?" Brittany demanded. "You've been acting like a different person."

"Any alterations you perceive in my behavior are merely your imagination deceiving you." I retorted, my scholarly tone thicker than butter.

She tucked her compact away. "Did you swallow a dictionary or something?"

"Not to my knowledge." I replied, sweating. Why was I so awkward? My A doesn't stand for Awkward!

"Are you sure you aren't Simon in Alvin's body?" She quipped, crossing one leg over the other.

I honestly FELT like Simon in Alvin's body, but I denied it. "Yes! WAIT! Why would you think that?"

"I know about the body swapping device that switched you and Jeanette on Wacky Wednesday!" Brittany revealed, a playful smirk crossing her beautiful face.

I was frozen to the spot, still sweating. "Drat. Who told you?"

She looked at her nails for a brief moment. "Uh….Jeanette. She tells me everything." She looked back up at me

I gulped. "Everything?" Crap! There was no getting out of this. I had to break the horrendous and life changing news to her, before Jeanette slipped up. "Hey, Britt, so uh….ya know how I promised to introduce you to the girl I've been dating?"

"I do. Why?" She asked.

Time to rip that metaphorical band aid clean off. "Well, here she is." I pulled Simon's Advanced Quantum Mechanics book out of my backpack and set it on the bench next to the girl in pink.

Brittany picked up the book and raised an eyebrow. "I don't understand."

"Yeah. I get the feeling you'll be saying that a lot regarding me from now on." I replied. I didn't understand me either.

She sighed. "Just get to the point, weirdo."

How to explain it? "Okay okay, you know how I always like…talk about how I have similar brain juice stuff to Simon, but it takes mine a while to juice up from normal to genius?"

"Yeah." She looked disinterested.

I chuckled nervously. "Well, uh, turns out that's a way better analogy than I thought."

"Again, what's your point?" She put the book down.

Here goes nothing! "Turns out, Britt, I'm….I'm ACTUALLY a genius. I've had the potential sitting inside me to learn super duper hard this whole time….and I LIKE learning." I revealed at last.

"What?" She looked at me like I just grew a second head. Which, I guess I sorta did…like…internally. A second personality in my mind.

I continued to explain. Everything came pouring out. "My "new girlfriend" is…..physics. Everything physics. Ohohoho, it is AWESOME! It explains how things in the world fit together. It makes so much SENSE!"

Brittany looked disgusted. "Are you insane?"

"I kinda wish, but no." Unless having two personalities in the same head is insane. Maybe it is. I dunno.

Britt looked again at the book I set beside her. "Advanced….Quantum Mechanics? ADVANCED?" She shouted in disbelief.

I shrugged. "A Is For Advanced?" I pointed at my shirt.

She started to laugh. She put the book down again and laughed until she was coughing. "Alright, where are the cameras? I'm on some kind of hidden camera show, aren't I?"

I blinked. "What?"

"Nice try, Alvin. I know you're playing an elaborate joke on me." I insisted.

I frowned. "I can see you're gonna need a demonstration." I said, preparing my ever growing arsenal of science factoids.

She gave me an unimpressed stare. "Go for it." She dared.

What should I say? What would possibly make her believe me? I've got it! That soliloquy I memorized from that superhero show that had the sudden super genius kid I related to. No Ordinary Family? Yeah, pretty sure that's the name. I cleared my throat and stood proudly, staring up at the bench.

"What is a football? It's a prolate spheroid, which means a simple vector analysis can be applied to formulate its predictive trajectory. Now, I know what you're probably thinking - "Big whoop, Alvin, this is nothing more than graduate-level Newtonian mechanics, which is basically just a derivation of the laws of Kepler" - but I'm telling you an ordinary differential equation supports this!"

Brittany froze in place. I had blown her feeble mind. "…oh…my…..god."

"Impressive, right?" I boasted.

She remained frozen.

"Brittany? Brittany?"

Still frozen.

"Brittanyyy!" I yelled at her.

That's when Brittany Jewel Miller fainted. It almost looked like she was moving in slow motion. She toppled sideways off of the bench and onto the grass below. The Chipette in the cute pink dress lay there, completely still. She wasn't moving an inch.

Nuts! I may have killed her! I scrambled over and started to shake my best friend "Britt, WAKE UP!" I begged.

This was not the reaction I anticipated. I expected her to be mad I didn't tell her earlier. I expected her to whine about how I was ditching my popularity for science. I expected her to tell me I was making a huge mistake. I even expected her to say we couldn't be friends anymore because she didn't accept my change.

But this? Never in all the chronic overthink did this cross my mind. Was she gonna be okay? Did I come on too strong? I sighed as I sat beside her unconscious body. The truth dawned on me. My confession caused her a complete mental breakdown. What should I do now?

To be continued in the next story!

ALVIN: Sorry to leave you off there, but I love a good cliffhanger!

BRITTANY: Don't worry. I'm okay.

ALVIN: Or is she!?

Quiet, you two!

The next story is called Flowers For Britt and Netta. How did you like the craziness of this chapter?

Alvin's overconfident in his intelligence and only his intelligence right now. He feels he doesn't have anything else. I think Simon is correct about science being the glue holding Alvin together since having his popularity taken has cracked his psyche.

However, that's just one interpretation of many. I would love to hear your theories and your predictions for what Britt will say when she's conscious again.

See ya soon!