Ximen hunched his gangly self over his notebook and tomb of advanced number theory. Learning this complex and bizarrely illogical branch of mathematics challenged his confidence in the field, but at least studying it felt witchy. This stuff was as close to black magic as he could get without Lovecraft, and this way he avoided the awkward racism and sexism that plagued the horror master’s work.

His table was far enough inside the boba shop to avoid the rolling heat whenever a customer walked in, but not so far in that the A/C unit in the back rustled his notebook. He only had one eraser and a half-finished peach tea to weigh down his papers, after all, and he’d like to avoid water stains on his materials.

Even in his carefully chosen study spot, the summer heat stultified his mind. If he’d gone home for summer quarter like his sister, then wild horses wouldn’t have been able to drag him from his ice-cold room. The blackout curtains would’ve protected his delicate eyes from the sun’s glare, and he’d alternate between blasting metal and practicing the bass. Maybe one day his high school band would get back together. Maybe one day he’d make another one, a real professional one this time, and they’d break into fame before he lost his soul to the soul-crushing workforce.

But he couldn’t daydream in a musical haze, because he’d signed up for the two hardest classes in his senior year as a math major. They were easier during summer quarter, just as he’d expected, but he’d forgotten to factor the abhorrent lack of A/C in his shitty off-campus housing. Everyone said it was a Seattle thing, so he thought the locals were morons. Who endured summer heatwaves without fucking A/C?

Sighing, he ruffled his head’s shaved sides. Maybe he’d bite the bullet and lop the undercut into a low fade. That’d help, right? But then he’d lose a full year’s growth. As much as summer robbed him of his sanity, he refused to lose this battle, because what was a goth boy without his nonconformist hairstyle?