IT'S FOR RESEARCH PURPOSES

chapter 6

Dear research report on Ari P Palpersin, It's past a month. Julie has been too nice to me, most likely expecting something in return. She said her deadline's in two months. This is her biggest project, how she'll get her doctorate degree. She's certified as a licensed psychologist. She's gonna be extra certified after this. That's insane. She's come far. I have three thousand new words written. Early this morning, I got an elephant-orphanage-sized drive at three am. The drive is gone. Speaking of motivation, I'm gonna try to ignore Ari... at least for today. I know that I get kinda groggy when I'm tired and... It's- I'd be able to benefit from the research if I'm nicer to Ari. It'd be nice to be more realistic, to act like a realistic girlfriend. Making a normal factor. That said, I plan on not making many brute-honest observations. He sees that I'm trying to switch it up. I'm grateful enough that he lets me make the occasional mistake or ten. We're starting to be real friends. Of course, we are a 'couple' but I mean real friends. Ari and I have gone on at least two dates since the time has passed. Each of them was even more correct than the last. Ari's been coaching me in social situations, and I've been taking lots of notes to help the characters in my book. I'm currently lying in my bed this afternoon. It's nice to be able to daydream after I get all my work done. I have a bunch on my mind, but it's all pretty positive stuff. I'm not too stressed. It doesn't feel cold when I'm at school anymore, I'm pretty happy with that. Sincerely, the second guinea pig in the experiment, Elaine. I got another text from Ari. He's been non-stop texting me. 'Waiting for me to wake up.' It's a lot, but I can't say I mind. He's been spamming my phone as if he's the first person in the morning. As if I lie restless, not able to arise from slumber until I get a kissy-face on my notifications screen. Who does he think I am? Some damsel holding my phone above my face? Willie Shakespeare's the one typing me the first draft of 'Macbeth'. As if, Ernest Miller Hemingway would write me abbreviations for inside jokes--

***3rd person perspective flashback***

Elaine opens her eyes for the day and grabs her phone at three in the morning. "Text me morning dammit... aw"

Coop clicks his nails, getting up the stairs to her room, hitting his little claws on the hardwood. Elaine and Coop make eye contact as She removes her face centimeters away from the screen. "Shut up."

Coop continues digging his jelly-brown beady eyes into her soul.

****end of 3rd person perspective flashback****

....or something. I'm entranced by the lock screen of my phone suddenly. If I open my phone, it'll mark his messages as read because my phone goes to my texts first. This means I can't access my phone. He spams faster than I can comprehend the words he's sending. 'I'm sorry for spamming, but um I'm at sixty, so I'm gonna keep going.' He sends at least ten more texts saying 'wake up.' 'I wanna talllkkkk to youuuuu PLS respond! I wanna hang out today...' one text after another, this is getting impressive.

His endurance is masterful. How can he have such a drive to talk to a person that's not responding? I'm not alive enough to be in another social situation. I'm aware I'm being a d**k, but at least I'm not leaving him on read... On the other hand, he thinks communication is like important and junk. It'd be wise to let him know I'm exhausted. Being the most lone-shelled person I know. Despite that non-existent competition, distance makes you miss people and junk. The idea is to treat the experiment more realistically. I set my phone back on my rug blanket along with the rest of them. Finding Coop being a little rascal trying to get into the trash bin, I take the bin away from him and scold him a little. Waging my finger and poking his nose. His little canine face acts guilty when that happens. Julie says dogs can't feel guilt, they act like they're sorry, so you'll forgive them. She says it's a way dogs manipulate humans. Then she went into a three-hour conspiracy theory about animals. 'Cats are gaslighting humans into being slaves.' Coop feels at least a bit apologetic. He's innocent and sweet, but he's hungry... Or he's being a little attention w***e.

"Don't act like you're staving. There's food two feet away from you." Hissing as I'm pointing at his half-full bowl of doggy kibble.

His tail still wagging. He puma-pounces in place at the running water from the tap. I nudge the bowl to the ground, making sure to not spill on the floor. I hold Coop back with my other hand, to straight-jacket his fifteen-pound body. My hands place it in front of the kitchen cabinets on top of an industrial-sized bath towel. He charges at the water and jumps inside, splashing it up and soaking the entire towel. Along with the surrounding area, he drowns his face in it and sticks one of his paws in the leaf and dirt-filled water. He looks at me and barks, his face dripping wet. There's new dirt on his forehead. Ground leafs trapped by his sopping whiskers. Coop spins in a little circle and scratches at my shins. He looks at me, then at the bowl, then at me, then at the bowl, then at me again. He whines as if this was not his fault whatsoever. I refill his water for him once again and rinse it out, so it's clean water again. I set it down after wiping up the mess he made by stepping on the damp towel and scooting it around with my foot. He dips his head inside and inhales the water. It's fast enough for you to blink and miss it. I have no idea how he carries this much liquid in his body, but he's doing it. I watch him finish his water to make sure he doesn't choke or ask for more. But he casually bunny hops on the hardwood to lay down on a dirty coat on the floor in the laundry room. I unlock the doggy door and walk back to my room. As I'm walking to the end of the hall upstairs, I see Julie with both hands in her hair. She's staring at her screen in nothing but utter confusion and stress. She looks like she's working on an assignment for a class other than psychology. She seems lost, as am I with the research. Ari's been helping me take loads of notes, but I don't know which ones are useful. For all I know, this 'relationship' was doomed from the start. Well... I know how to fix it. It's that I don't want her to harm the experiment. If she calls him a science rat or a tool, that will make this project go by a lot faster, however. Ari's starting to warm up to me. He's making the process of collecting research easy since he's playing the role of 'boyf' well. Con, if I start doing a more extreme study it could harm his experience as me being for practice. If Julie could find a way to stay humane under pressure, I'll find a way to work in a format that's favorable to the study. Ari and also Julie's assignment. Speaking of school, the debate club slides in the stream of Ari's texts like a single pea in a chicken noodle soup. They've been trying to catch me ever since the experiment started. It was 'cause the improv speech moved him to pieces. It doesn't matter how bad it was. Just that fact that I used the persuading argument type, and it won. I'm not gonna say it makes sense, most of the percentages were straight out of my ass. I didn't recognize the phone number, till I realized it was the debate club. I stopped responding to the texts and soon enough blocked them. It's not exactly a club I'm interested in. They suggested having me write the speeches in secret, and they would say them and then credit me. I told them nothing. I lie on my bed and pause time for a moment. It doesn't need to continue yet. I need a bit longer to enjoy my Saturday before I have to worry about the tedious wake-ups and having to go to school. My phone vibrates under my back. I let it ring for a second, assuming it's a wake-up alarm or the default tea time timer. When I realize it could be mom calling me or an emergency, I pull the back-massager from under me and check who it is. 'Cow-man'... Of course, he will not stop texting me, and now he's calling me. What does he want that badly? This is more important to him than eating breakfast or some-

'Do you like the book I sent you? Did you read it yet?' He texts as the phone continues to buzz. The room turns white. It seems to disappear as I close my eyes. I feel like I'm no longer held by gravity's natural pull. My back is lying on air and my legs dangle off the edge of nothing. I am held by no bounds. I'm lighter than helium, and earth has frozen in place. Each buzz after another feels like my heart rate. The beats have long pauses in between, unlike how they were rapidly paced previously. I no longer feel the vibration of his submission. My eyes flick open at the moment I realize the dreamlike irregularity.

"That was... strange." I huff.

The call is missed. To use for...research, I type the feeling I felt into a computer document. 'It's a floating feeling that I have no idea is taking place, and though I'm scared of heights, I like being up high like that. Surprisingly, he's the one that got me the book.'

I could have guessed. It makes sense. It's just it was the day after we had that horrible date. I'm bewildered that he would give me a present without any sort of heads up. Maybe I don't remember it that well, and it was later. I don't think I deserve a present. I put my phone on the charger, and turn off my computer from where I'm sitting. The light dims in my room. The initial light source from the door crevice is jammed. The light in my room is nonexistent. It's a shadow of darkness that covers it instead of the other way around. I know that sounds Emo. I resize how that sounds emo, but it's not creepy, I swear. The darkness is as pitch black as my soul. The only color is the musk-raspberry hue of Ari's eyes I drew in my notebook. He's got such sickly unique little marbles. Like a stop sign in the middle of life's road telling everyone, at least me, to stop and stare. Eyes like a bat. As inelegant as one of those geese that glide with their goose mate constructing hearts with their necks for greeting cards. My monitor shuts off because I haven't used it in the past hour. Thanks to the blackout curtains I got for writing and sleeping, not a single object in my room is visible. I close my eyes, my body starts to float again but in a much sleepier way. The tone down makes the room soft and quiet. It'd be peaceful if I didn't know something was causing the blockage of light. Someone. I find it hard to believe that it's Coop. While he's large enough to block the light like that, he doesn't sleep in front of entrances anymore. He's used to getting nudged a lot. It's not a stable spot to rest. He switched to lying square on the top of the stairs, causing many people to walk over him, likely trip, or give him a treat. It's like a reward for him. Straight after, I shake as I hear a knock at the door.

"What?" I ask, having a small epiphany that it's not Coop at the door, but not knowing the correct way to respond to a knock.

I'm not used to it. People don't knock on my door, Julie leaves me in my room all day if I'm busy. I could say I'm busy... But I don't really need to lie at the current time. "

"Hey, can I come in?" she asks outside the door.

I stare for more than a couple seconds at it. My eyes have adjusted to the difference in light. I chuck my phone somewhere under a pillow, sinking it in a cluster of blankets. It begins buzzing again, and I cover it more convincingly. As I can't quite hear it buzzing, I yell, "Gimme a sec!" I put another blanket over the first one. I've appeared to have made a pillow snow golem. I stare at it with my arms guarding either half of its body like a soccer goalie. It refrains from tipping over despite the movement making it juggle itself. With a minute unspoken time limit, I scurry to turn on a song to distract from the buzzing. Thirty seconds left! A race to hide Ari! She might get the wrong impression if she realizes I have a 'boyfriend.' Regardless of it only being a gazillionth of a second. She'll think it's a Boyfriend-boyfriend. That's not a possibility. I'll do whatever I can do in my nature to not let her find out. I will hide every text! Every visit, every call. Ari is my experiment and I plan to keep it that way! I switch on my 'King George era' radio at the foot of my bed. To reiterate, not King George the second or third. I got it as a family heirloom from my grandpa Mcfathlefut, on my dad's end of the family. On my mother's side is Jeffiner Diomand and Chrsiphene Oakispruan, names of that class. Mcfathlefut told me when he first let me keep it, 'it's at least two hundred years old.' It's smarter to have turned on the radio rather than put a song on my computer. Playing in front of my bed makes a noise. It almost serves as a sound barrier. I have two defenses working to my advantage. There's no possibility of her finding out about my little pawn. Hehehe the game of secrecy's aloof.

"Ok," I say after being silent for about a minute.

She creaks open the door. "There's no way there's not a guy in here! I'd be more suspicious if you had a place to hide the kidnapped."

I look around for a suitable lie.

"No- I wasn't wearing decent clothing... I was wearing a super cropped tank top that shows a lot of yano skin- it's crazy comfy, that's why it was in my pajama pile." I say noticeably looking up and to the right.

"Uh-huh, I'll act like that's a decent fib." She says seeing through me like tracing paper.

Ari was telling me about tracing paper. The crap is super loose-leaf, it's the Elon Musk of all paper types. He said animator legends used to use them in their movies for the super cool 'hand-drawn-frame-by-frame animations'. He said he's working on an animation for me... I guess that would mean he wants to be friends then? After this whole scheme, that is, being that he said animation takes months to years. Granted, I don't know how long the animation's gonna be. However, no one's ever done some huge project for me like this for funsies. It feels anxious to be wanted like that but strangely at the same time...

"Why do you think I'm fibbing?" I gently pull at the blanket covering my still-shaking phone.

"Firstly, you said 'fibbing'. Secondly, ignoring the basic psychology further, it's only about five pm. I have no idea why you would be going to sleep six hours from now. You're up till one in the morning at least, on a school night. I'm not trying to ridicule you for all your secrets. As long as you're safe and mentally undisturbed, then my job of checking up on you is done." She starts walking away.

My pillow's timber to the floor revealing my unanswered phone call, persistent after. I hope it's not like an actual emergency. Oh, do we have an interview- date scheduled? I extend my arm at Julie. She's halfway down the hall by now, and I can just see her silhouette in my dimly lit room.

"Julie?" I call as she retraces her steps and grabs the door handle.

"Oh! True, sorry-" She says mistaking that I wanted my door closed.

"No, um..." I say.

She dry-pills down a giddy smile that ends with her complete poker-faced. She must think I'm gonna ask her for help with my experiment. Granted, I could use the help, but there's way too much at stake here. Like I've stated, she's gonna turn him back into a lab rat if she gets her grubby raccoon paws on the notes I've written. Then again I'm not making any progress on the book if I can't get the main appeal down. I don't need a little research, I need to understand the fundamentals of a healthy and unhealthy relationship. The only part that Ari taught me was that communication is important in a healthy friendship. Meaning the friendship would be license-earned and honest. I'm not sure if that applies to romantic relationships or crushes. I would think that for crushes you would require a lack of communication if you want to drag out character A's feelings, making Character B the love interest in question. That might make an investing story, but the reader would get unhappy if I never let the characters become a pair. That's another reason I would somewhat benefit from help.

"Is that him?" Julie points at my uncovered phone.

Ari's contact is showing and while there's no picture, his name on the contact is seemingly telling. It's his nickname 'Ari' and a magnifying glass and a little yellow heart. This looks bad.

"Who?" I sweat, avoiding greeting my eyes with the phone quite blatantly. She stares smug at me, indirectly quoting my question and claiming it as her own. Her face says 'who indeed?' I turn my eyes away from hers, and they land on my bookshelf. "Debate club's looking to bug me to recruit again." I lie once more.

She grins like a Cheshire cat. "And you're in love with them? You have a crush on one of the members? Yeah? Playing hard to get, is that it?" she jumps off assumption after assumption.

"Fine, you wanna know the truth?" I look around the room trying to come up with yet another lie to protect me.

"It's umm...." I freeze.

I can't think of any remote lie to steer her away from the answer. This is awful. Am I gonna have to come clean? The thing is, I'm fine with her helping me.

"Stop, don't flap your lippies at me about your personal information I don't need to know. Given the build-up, you're grimy teen-scheming erotic trash on your phone. Evidently. Apologies for bugging you, and I'm sorry for begging you to let me help with your relationship thing. I'm gonna go. Have fun with your project." Julie cuts me off, folding her arms and cloaking her eyes with her eyelids gilded in a pinky-inky sticky-icky liquid shadow. Appearing intellectual and refined. It's the shade that best contrasts her eyes. Something I've always been jealous of.

I know I act like a tom-boy, but give me a break. I don't have a mom around. How else do I learn all that girly stuff? I'm realizing romance exists this year. Well, my mother's not that main blame. In a world where I hadn't avoided people like syphilis in middle school, I'd have at least one greasy little maggot magnet. Now I need to ask for help from my cousin with my love experiment. This is extraordinary... I guess that's what happens when you become an early hermit. Is to be expected, I suppose. But I do need help if I want to stay friends with him after this strange Hagabaloo.

"Alright, I can see you using emotional manipulation, and guilt-tripping. I can see that this is important to you and I respect the fact that you utilize what you've learned in school and apply it to real life." I extend my hand at her and roll my eyes. She reaches for my hand with a fake grin.

"Was that a compliment from the Icy Elaine?" She shakes my hand swiftly.

I break it away from hers.

"Under conditions! I will be the one with the interactions regarding Ari-" I pause, realizing I let the three children out the trench coat. Julie's eyes swell to enormous proportions. She makes a triangle over her mouth by connecting the pads on each of her fingertips. She squints in a smile.

"Ari?" she squweems in her standing position. Her nails clink together long and white some different lengths than the others.