It occurred to me that, in the future, I cast a shadow, Alex said; i couldn’t argue with that, but I also knew that representatives of congress come and go; so AOC, i think, might have hijacked Alex’s channel. But then it occurred to me that Alex and or AOC were unhappy with the voices I’d proscribed to them: they wanted me to stop conflating Alex and AOC such that I would end up confused and misguided by thinking that what I had with AOC could have been replicated with what I wanted to have with Alex. Furthermore, I think Alex felt that I was talking down to her. She seemed to know that I was using both her voice and the voice of my internal narrator to talk to her when, as I’d previously understood, thinking in one person’s natural voice means that you’re talking to that person.
So I switched it, which, honestly, didn’t change things that much. When I tried, while occupied, to think of AOC’s voice it usually merged with the voice of my internal narrator anyhow. Furthermore, I needed to back off AOC because I’d gone far enough: we weren’t going to be inviting people to the wedding any time soon—and, in all likelihood, my repeated invocation of her image and her voice, which, while occupied, might’ve merged, might’ve meant that I was in her head and driving her out of her mind. It was decided then: AOC’s image might mean I was imagining both AOC and Alex, but I changed it so that I didn’t bother myself or Alex too much by constantly intoning her voice.
So what are our options? AOC said. So I projected AOC’s voice and said, “We can do whatever we want.” Then I was certain that I’d heard from Einstein—because his image popped into my mind and he said, “I want to be like them.”
Like them? “Yes, sir, I want to be like them!”
It occurred to me then that I was talking to both Einstein and AOC because AOC answered my question: this, undoubtedly, was a woman that was good at math—and she wanted to show me that. Considering that the iceberg, for me, was theoretical physics, I figured I needed to incorporate AOC (and, at times, Einstein) into my research. I needed to think of Einstein less like a vain idiot and I needed to think of AOC more like a theoretical physicist or mathematician.
“That’s what I want,” AOC said. you can’t hurt me, Alex said. But how was I supposed to interpret that? Did she think I was trying to hurt her—or was she saying that, although I needed to dial it back a little, I didn’t need to dial it back all the way? The latter made me happy: i’d be sure to connect with AOC, perhaps while reading a book or something; i could report what was said between us, too. But I needed to understand that I might’ve confused my feelings for Alex with for my feelings for AOC—my protégé.
“What do you care?” Alex asked.
Now we were on to something. “You have a boyfriend,” I projected. But I think she might’ve been miffed because she didn’t think that a relationship between us should get physical—she might’ve just wanted to be my friend.