A Paradoxical Pair ➫ Brallon

one

methodical

[muh-thod-i-kuh-l]

adjective

painstaking, especially slow and careful, deliberate

"Dallon!!" Mrs. Weekes called from the foot of the stairs. "You're going to be late on your first day if you don't hurry up!!"

"I'm coming, Mom!" He replied, as he carefully scampered down the stairs with his backpack slung over his shoulder.

To any other high school senior (to people in general, really), a simple trip down the stairs was a mindless action.

To Dallon, however, one misstep meant starting over from the top. Which happened to be an extremely frustrating process.

Right foot down, left foot down, right foot down, left foot down, he silently coached himself, making sure that the clean white soles of his black Converse high tops landed on the dead center of each step.

His long, slender fingers grazed the wooden railing bolted to the pale blue wall. During every third step, he lifted his thumb and rubbed it along the bottom of the railing. The smooth, polished wood felt grainy and cool under his fingertips.

Right foot down, left foot down, right foot down, thumb rub, right foot down, left foot down...

"Dallon! Are you doing that whole stair routine again?" Mrs. Weekes inquired loudly, her voice laced with frustration.

Dallon jumped at the sound of his mother's voice, and stumbled down the last three steps as a result. "Mom! Now I have to do it all over again!" He shouted, blood rushing to his cheeks.

"Sweetie, this isn't going to get any better if you keep doing those weird rituals of yours." She explained, her voice unnaturally calm.

"Y-You don't understand." He panted, his eyes clouding with tears. "I can't not do these things."

Dallon examined his reflection in the hallway mirror, straightening the collar of his dark blue flannel shirt.

He raced up the stairs once more, and began to take small, slow, and excessively calculated steps toward the foot of the stairs. He could feel his mother's irritated glare, and tried his hardest to ignore it.

"Elle, can you talk some sense into your freak of a brother?" Mrs. Weekes complained rampantly, stirring a mixture of eggs and vegetables in the frying pan. "He practically fell down the stairs today trying to do that crazy thing he does."

Elle rolled her eyes and snorted mockingly. "There's no changing him. It's insane how he can do all that advanced calculus shit and take every AP class there is but can't stop all of his weird compulsions." She crammed half a slice of buttered toast into her mouth.

"It would be nice if you didn't talk about me like I'm not here." Dallon muttered under his breath, as he sliced his toast into tiny right triangles.

90°, 45°, 45°.

Even the simplest functions of geometry were calming to Dallon. He loved the way everything fit together as it should and followed the same set of rules every single time. On particularly restless nights, he'd spend hours staring at his window panes.

The way each of the squares interlocked with its neighbors had an oddly calming effect on him. Four angles, each of which was 90 degrees, adding up to a perfect 360 degrees. 360 degrees meant two sets of 180, or four sets of 90, or six sets of 60. Eight squares in total, combining to create a rectangle, which consisted of two squares horizontally and four squares vertically

"Face it, Dallon. You're going to have to get rid of this sometime soon." Elle laughed, interrupting his train of geometry related thoughts.

"Fuck this." Dallon muttered angrily, placing his knife and fork on the right side of his plate and stepping away from the kitchen table. "I'm leaving early."

He stormed out of the kitchen without a word, his eyes pinned to the tiled floor as he stepped over each and every crack between the black and white speckled squares.