Page 92 of The Genius
“Why would William and Plato try to hurt me? I always thought they liked me.”
Turning my head, I threw another small rock into the water. “They weren’t trying to hurt you. That snake was harmless. If it’s any consolation, I made sure they got their punishment.”
“I thought they liked me,” I repeated.
“Hey, you really shouldn’t take it personally. The boys messed with all us mentors from time to time. To them it was nothing but a fun prank, and I assure you that I did stupid things like that all the time when I was a kid.”
Shelly sat for a while, her head leaning on her knees, which were still pulled to her chest. “Would you describe your childhood as a happy one?”
“Yeah, I would say so. I mean, I’ve taken my share of spankings and physical punishments, but it shaped me to be resilient and strong.”
“Violence is wrong.”
“So you Motlanders say, but in the Northlands it’s been that way for centuries and growing up I didn’t know it could be different.” I cleared my throat. “Things were simpler when I was a child. With the impenetrable wall between our countries there wasn’t a matchmaking program or integrated schools. All we had was the Northlands with ten million men and what?… a hundred females or so. Being named after role models from the past, we were raised to dream of greatness and taught to fight so we could become champions. I grew up surrounded by friends and we all wanted the same ultimate prize, a wife.”
“Statistically, few of you could achieve that dream if you really only had a hundred women.”
Pushing my chest out, I reminded her, “I’m a champion.”
“Sure, but for every five champions, only one gets married.”
“True.”
Shelly found the same lock of hair that she always twisted when thinking hard. Rolling the strands of hair around her finger seemed to somehow sooth her. “Marco, I feel guilty for coming between you and your dream.”
“Stop saying that you’re sorry. I’m tired of hearing it. What I need you to say is that you’ll marry me.” It came out in the clumsiest of ways and I rubbed my forehead with a sigh.
Shelly was unnervingly quiet while I battled my fear of being alone up here if she took our child out of my reach in the Motherlands. When she finally spoke, she sounded casual, like it wasn’t my whole goddamn future on the line. “You know what makes a genius?”
“Yeah, a high IQ.”
“You would think that, but it’s not true. Throughout history there were people with high IQ’s who contributed nothing of significance to the world. It’s not about that.”
“So what defines a genius then?”
“It’s a hard thing to define, but my definition is that it’s someone who is original in his or her thoughts and achieves something that hasn’t been done before. They see connections where others don’t.” She leaned back on the rock, placing her hands behind her as support. “Geniuses are often considered crazy for their wild ideas at first, but then when they turn out to be right, we call those ideas revolutionary. I wonder how many revolutionary ideas have been shot down by small-minded people because the idea didn’t fit the norm.”
“A lot,” I guessed.
“One thing that’s generally true about geniuses is that they are productive people who are blessed or cursed, depending on how you see it, with a mind that is spinning constantly. You know the saying, ‘The key to having a great idea is to have many ideas’?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Being productive is a component, but so is stamina and discipline. You can’t be lazy and go with the first solution to a problem you have. There’s always other options, you just have to explore them.”
“Not sure about that. Sometimes you’re bound and have no options.”
Shelly frowned. “Don’t be an elephant, Marco.”
“A what?”
“An elephant. You know, the giant animal with the long trunk.”
“Yes, I’ve heard of them.”
“There was a shameful time in human history where people would enslave animals and keep them for entertaining. You would think an animal that large and powerful would be impossible to contain, but humans enslaved their minds.”
“How?”
