Okonkwo traveled with them, carrying a battered canvas bag full of emergency supplies. There were spare pencils, adhesive tape, throat lozenges, printed abstracts, and a tiny plastic four-color puzzle she had slipped inside in case Elijah became overwhelmed. He insisted he did not need a toy. Twenty minutes later, when anxiety made him unable to concentrate on his notes, he quietly held out his hand for it. Okonkwo gave it to him without comment.
Their hotel room overlooked a parking structure instead of the city skyline shown on the booking website. The air conditioner clicked unpredictably, and a water stain crossed the ceiling above the second bed. Elijah unpacked his blazer, hung it carefully in the closet, and spent an hour rehearsing beside the television while Danielle pretended to watch a cooking show. Every time he said the word conjecture, his voice became higher, and he began again because he wanted to sound like the people in the videos he had watched.
"You don't have to sound like a professor," his mother told him. "You have to sound like you."
He shook his head. "Professors are going to be listening."
"Then let them hear a person who knows what he worked on." Danielle folded her work-worn hands in her lap. "I can't tell you whether the mathematics is right, baby. But I can tell you that pretending to be someone else won't make it more right."
On the first morning of the symposium, the convention center looked enormous. Glass walls rose above wide stone steps, and banners displayed equations against backgrounds of blue and silver. Teams of students entered in matching jackets embroidered with school crests. Adults discussed summer research placements, private tutoring, and university recommendations in conversations that seemed to continue from one expensive event to the next.
Elijah stared at a group from Phillips Exeter Academy carrying presentation cases with wheels. The cases looked like luggage designed to protect works of art. His own slides were on a borrowed flash drive, and his notebooks were tucked inside a grocery-store backpack. He reminded himself that paper did not know how much its container cost, but the difference still made him feel very small.
At the registration desk, a volunteer looked from Elijah to Danielle and asked if they were there for the public science exhibits downstairs. Danielle showed the acceptance email on her phone. The volunteer searched the list, located number 47, and apologized before handing over Elijah's badge. It was a minor mistake, perhaps, but it was the first of several that morning, and each one accumulated in him like a pebble dropped into a pocket.
A security guard stopped him near the participant entrance. "Visitors' gallery is upstairs," the man said, pointing toward an escalator. Elijah lifted his badge. The guard examined it, looked at his face, and consulted a tablet before reluctantly stepping aside. Ten minutes later, the same guard stopped him again on the way back from the water fountain, and Elijah had to explain who he was a second time.