I'm studying random survival techniques.

It's a fascinating field of research. Very upsetting, too. You can't calculate shit. I'm not sure what I should compare this to, but I imagine it like driving a sports car, full speed, blindfolded.

Nicole is a black belt grandmaster of this mysterious knowledge. I try to spend as much time with her as possible to get closer to her secret, but, for some reason, being studied makes her anxious.

So I decided that we were friends. It seemed easier than to explain the urgent necessity of providing me with the necessary data for science and the greater good. As I've never had a friend, our relationship is another exciting area to examine, not a simple waste of my time.

Nicole seems to like the idea of us being friends. Or, at least, she didn't protest. We're going to the movies today. That's what friends do, apparently.

I hate movies. But I won't watch it, anyway. I'll watch her.

"You're staring me in the eyes," Nicole tells me while we're waiting for the movie to start, with popcorn in our hands.

"Thank you."

"It makes me a bit uncomfortable," she says.

"I trained myself for years to keep eye contact," I inform her. "It's a major achievement."

"Is it? Okay."

"I can't turn it on and off," I apologize.

"Oh. Stare away, then. I'll get used to it."

"You can tell me to look somewhere else, specifically," I offer. "I can do that."

"No, don't worry about it. At least I feel that someone's paying me attention."

"Many people are paying you attention, Nicole."

"I don't think so."

"You're wrong," I point out. "Now, in this movie theater, seventy-eight people are watching you, sixty-five of them are men, thirteen of them are women. You're worried about catching the attention of males, aren't you? Well, you shouldn't be, as it's a plausible 83%, calculating based on the number of people watching you right now, and an estimated 54% of all the male specimens in the crowd, which is an outstanding conversion rate, I must say, not only compared to my meager 0.2%, but also compared to the second prettiest woman around, that one, in the white dress, because her percentages are—"

"Thank you, Edie. You are so nice!"

"I'm not nice," I correct her. "It's the numbers."

"Still, thank you for your encouragement."

"You're very pretty, Nicole," I tell her, hoping that it will make her feel better. But it doesn't. It makes her sigh. Not in delight, rather in a painful way. I wish I could be a better friend and say something she really wants to hear, instead of coming up with statistics and empty pleasantries.

"Still, I've never had luck with men." She pouts. "I'm pretty for nothing."

"Well, that sucks. Putting effort into something that doesn't pay off is not fun."

She nods and hangs her head. Finally, I feel that the time has come for me to be a better friend and tell her something useful.

"Have you tried to change your strategy?" I ask her.

"What?"

"If being pretty doesn't work, you should try to be ugly for a change."

Now it's her turn to stare at me. She looks at me as if I've lost my mind. But I haven't, and I'm willing to explain to her why.

"It's a logical method. If something doesn't work, especially after trying for a long time, the next logical step is to test the opposite of the practice in question. Doing that, you can analyze if the error is in your approach or there is no such correlation. In fact, but don't tell this to anyone, because it's still a theory of mine in the making, there's always a nearly 50-50% chance for both options, regardless of the nature of the issue. Isn't it exciting?"

She's still staring at me. The magnificence of my hypothesis broke her motor functions, probably.

"So, adapting this to your problem," I go on, "you have nothing to lose if you try to be ugly for a time. One, you may discover that it doesn't affect your success rate. Two, you may experience a pleasant increase in the rate of men actually liking you, per net male population paying attention to your boobs. Things can't really get worse, can they? It's logical, right?"

I'm not sure she agrees. She closes her mouth while staring at me without blinking, at least, which may or may not mean that she will give it a try. I hope she will. I want to see the results of this experiment in practice.

The movie itself is a boring one. I spend my time in the usual way, calculating the odds of someone dying on screen, giving mental advice to the characters in order to make them avoid all the reckless imbecilities they are keen to commit, and being nervous for them doing it anyway. I'm watching Nicole's face, too, of course, analyzing her reactions.

"It was such a good story," she tells me, leaving the theater.

"Yes. All the major characters would have ended up in a hospital, and two of them would have died, though, if it took place in real life."

"Shall we have a drink now, or what?" she asks instead of a causal reaction, out of the blue.

"No, we should go home. Children are always difficult on Mondays; their parents have a habit of systematically destroying their discipline during the weekend."

"Don't be such a spoilsport, Edie!" she protests. "Just one drink."

When she grabs my hand, I try not to freeze. But I can't help it.

"Sorry," I mutter. "I don't like being touched without warning."

"Well, you have to get used to it," Nicole insists, without letting me go. "We can practice this together. How to walk holding hands, for a start."

"Aren't we a bit old for that?" I ask, fighting the urge to pull my hand and run. "Little girls do that. Well, some of them. Not me, obviously."

"No, we're not. I'd rather walk hand in hand with your friend, though. You promised me his number."

"I'm on it," I promise.

"You may never see him again."

"If only. No such luck, Nicole. There's a 93% chance that—"

"If you don't track him down, I'll never have his phone number. Without having his number, he won't be the love of my life. And if he's not the love of my life, I can't have his babies, which is my new life goal, just saying."

I try not to roll my eyes, but, in this case, it seems inevitable.

"What?" she asks.

"You're a lemming, Nicole."

"Is it a cute animal?" She sounds positively stoked.

"It is." I refrain from adding other characteristics.

"Just imagine our babies," she gushes. "They'd be the most beautiful babies in the world! Okay, can we go?"

"Just a minute. I need to tap my forehead and breathe out first."

"Is it because of the babies I'll have with your friend?"

"No," I answer, "it's because you're still holding my hand. To get rid of the mental pictures of your babies, I have to hum Hakuna Matata. It usually helps."

"You're just jealous."

I nod. It's easier than to explain how disturbing the little Dukes with huge heads look in my imagination.

"You have no reason, though," she says. "It's you who know these god-like men, not me. So... could you tell me more about the perks of being ugly, please? I didn't understand everything, I'm afraid."

I tap my forehead three times.

"What's wrong exactly with being pretty?" she goes on. "Am I doing it wrong?"

"You never know," I find my voice, getting back to a topic I'm comfortable with, "until you try. It's too early to draw a conclusion, right? Experiments come first. Then, you need to break down the results and recompose them in different ways until you find a determining factor. It can be anything. For example, not prettiness itself, but the time you spend on it, which you could spend on something else."

"Spend on what?"

"It was just an example, Nicole."

"Spend on what?" she repeats, sounding distressed. "I just realized that I have no idea how to spend my time in any other way!"

"Don't panic. Just think of something you like."

"I have no idea what I like!" she cries. "I don't even have a fucking hobby!"

"Okay," I say, breathing out, ruling my urge to pull my hand from her grasp. "I got you. What about cosmology theories? They're very interesting!"

I can't say she nods. But she doesn't shake her head either, which may or may not mean that she likes to hear more about them. And you never know until you try, right?

I'm going to enjoy that drink.