long division

we split the atom
and found only dust

---

Bear brushed away the sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand. Two dark, irregular plaques had already established themselves on the shirt's easy-iron cotton fabric at the boggy confluxes of his arms and torso. Although it wasn't strictly real cotton, or even cotton at all. At the shop, the matte black tag boasted fibres of a new semi-organic semi-synthetic hybrid polymer called POSC (short for polyvinyl-like organic silk cotton), spun from genetically engineered silkworms that produced an isomer of cellulose while possessing a molecular morphology nearly identical to polyvinyl chloride, intended to add to the lightness and breatheability of cotton the tensile strength and luster of silk. The modified silkworms possessed a truncated lifespan which meant that they never progressed to moths but simply died within their cocoons. This, while circumventing the need to boil the metamorphosing chrysalis, posed a problem in terms of sustainability as the immature silkworms could not be induced to mate. There were rumours of a method of interrupting the cycle at a stage of transformation which allowed for the genetic machinery to be dissected out and viably implanted into an artificial female moth replica for insemination by unmodified domesticated silkmoth. A study would be published the following year suggesting a correlation between the industry adoption of POSC and declining prevalence of wild type Bombyx mori, which would be buried under an avalanche of legal inquiry long enough for the contradictory study funded by Cora & Janssen, the beauty and pharmaceuticals subsidiary of Mortissen's lifestyle marketing arm, already in its final stages of conception, to be published.

The dark patches that began forming during dinner had by now become an integrated part of the shirt's expensive biochemistry. Bear had spent the past three nights pacing his apartment, deliberating over where to eat, eventually designing a spreadsheet which ranked 35 izakayas, trattorias, steakhouses, brasseries, curryhouses, hotel buffets, burger joints, health fusion delicatessens etc. on the basis of price, ease of accessibility, variety, novelty, Michelin brand recognition, cleanliness, local repute, queuing times, decor / ambiance, proximity in relation to nearby attractions, events and places of interest, waitstaff companionabililty, waitstaff diligence and in-house washroom amenities. After painstakingly eliminating 25 of them, he set about translating the remaining 10 into their respective radar charts, before receiving an email from April suggesting that they meet at a run-of-the-mill Japanese family restaurant outlet of decidedly below-average local standing.

Although his colleagues would never be mean enough to admit, Bear was regarded as something of an outsider. He had the cautious demeanour of a dog who had been hit too many times. On his own, as he frequently was, his default expression was that of a veteran athlete who had let down the team.

He also had a peculiar cough - one which seemed cut short and sort of swallowed instead of expelled, ending in a percussive and abrupt 'hup' as his lips came together to cut off the remaining sound. When he coughed in succession it sounded like a choking victim saying, 'help. help. help. help.'

It wasn't exactly that Bear's myriad idiosyncrasies were repulsive, or even off-putting. It was simply that the total sum of his traits and features yielded a net appeal of zero. For example, when he looked at you, his gaze betrayed no warmth or personal interest; no contempt or approval. You felt only observed - as if his eyes were camera lenses connected to some remote security monitor. There was an aberrant inertia that informed his interactions - a stark lack of agency or motive which perplexed people who, scanning for cues with which to establish some mutual interpersonal affinity, invariably drew a blank.

He never initiated conversation except to discuss work. If he was capable of any disposition besides polite acquiescence he was careful not to show it. He never made jokes, but always made an effort to smile or laugh appropriately at the jokes of others. His small talk always seemed scripted, inoffensive, perfunctory. His silences in contrast were dispassionate, pronounced and incumbent. It seemed as though his one overriding motivation in life was not to be noticed by anyone, and his colleagues and acquaintances, not wanting to impose, did everything within their power to facilitate this.

April, on the other hand, radiated an indomitable and expansive self love that seemed to extend outwards, forming a tight perimeter and imbuing the privileged few who were nearest to her with its irresistible glow. Her voice contained a gaiety and lightness that Bear could not help envy, but all the same longed to hear. Her actions betrayed an easy, innate consideration for others and in speaking revealed a candour and delicacy of thought that depending on the context sounded either comic or profound, but never banal.

She wore her obvious intelligence like a pair of earrings, on display but as small accessories to her beauty, fingering them unconsciously from time to time but never obtrusively, never deliberately to draw attention to them. She possessed a mischievous and playful manner that managed to never stray into obnoxiousness and kept her from seeming aloof. Perhaps her most attractive quality was this, however: the fact that although friends openly adored her and she was the object of many a hopeless crush, she seemed to lack in herself any capacity for conceitedness, ostensibly too busy being interested in and in love with others to bask in or it seems even consider her own blinding excellence.

April had not given much notice, indeed had not disclosed her reason for visiting. Nevertheless, Bear had agreed to meet and now found himself sat across from her, perspiring heavily as plates of conveyor belt sushi paraded past.

"So how's biochemical engineering treating you? Engineer any biochemicals lately?"

Bear laughed and swallowed nervously. "Yeah! It's really interesting actually... Yeah, I actually helped make this shirt," he said, pinching his collar with his thumb and forefinger, straining to match her effortless interestingness.

"Oh really?"

"Yeah! It's made out of POSC which is a new hybrid polymer. It's uh- made out of part silk and part cotton... but they're both one single fibre. Like, it's actually really really cool. Um, it comes from genetically modified moths... and there's a way to, uh, get the moths to die before they um... they hatch from the cocoon - which is... it makes it easy to harvest... the cocoon I mean.... Um..." Bear's eyes lost focus as his explanation stalled.

"Wow, that sounds really elaborate," said April politely. "All this for a shirt?"

"Yeah..." He grimaced apologetically. "Saying it out loud, it sounds kind of dumb I guess."

April raised her eyebrows and remained quiet for a moment. "I don't think it sounds dumb," she said finally.

Bear coughed weakly, trying to think of something appropriate to say.

"By the way, are you thinking of going home any time soon?" April asked.

"For good?"

"Mmhmm."

"Em..." His pupils darted back and forth as the muscles around his eyes constricted slightly, which then gave way to a pained expression. "I don't know really... I- I can't really see things getting better back home... I mean I'd love to someday. But not right now... You?"

April raised her eyebrows and stared up into the overhead lighting fixture for a few seconds, before saying, "Maybe."

Another pause.

"Can I ask you a strange question - do you feel like you belong here?"

"What, in this country?"

"Yeah."

"... Not really," Bear conceded.

"So you expect that to change? If you s-"

"Not really."

April tilted her head slightly.

"Hm. You've been here three years now, right?"

"Yeah..."

"But it's not 'home' for you?"

"No... I guess not."

"So why stay?"

"I guess I'm... used to it? It's just... easier than moving, I guess..."

April nodded and stared up at the lighting fixture for a long time, as if searching for some kind of answer.

"Do you feel-"

"Have you heard of Zeno's paradox?"

Bear, visibly puzzled, decided to answer at face value. "...Vaguely?"

April leaned forward. "It's the idea that if infinity is real then motion is impossible. As in to travel to point A, you first need to travel halfway to point B, but in order to travel to B you must first travel halfway there to point C, and so on ad infinitum. His argument was that since the journey can be divided infinitely, you have to perform an infinite number of actions to travel from A to B -- so it's actually impossible. You see?"

Bear made a show of scratching his head. "Sort of..."

Undeterred, April continued. "Or put another way, if you're travelling home from here, you can maybe make it 1/2 of the way, sure - and then you can go a bit further and travel 2/3rds of the way, and so on and so on till you get 99/100ths of the way there, but the thing is, you never actually reach your destination, because there will always just be that little bit further to go. You see? That's what Zeno was saying -- that if infinity exists then you can get as close to home as you like, but you can never actually get home."

She looked at Bear expectantly. Still nothing.

"But I was thinking..." She continued, "Maybe Zeno was right. Maybe infinity is made up after all. Maybe we're thinking about the problem the wrong way. Let me ask you this, do you believe in infinity?"

"... I guess I do." He conceded.

"How come?"

Bear's gaze reflexively sharpened. "Well... because you can theoretically count forever and never run out of numbers," he concluded.

At this, she appeared triumphant, pleased with his response. "Right? That's how most people see it. Because you can imagine doing something forever -- because it's possible for there to be a never ending sequence of numbers, infinity must exist, if only as a concept. Aristotle believed there were two kinds of infinities; potential infinities and actual infinities. He used this distinction to refute the existence of actual infinites. He was willing to allow that certain processes could potentially go on indefinitely, i.e. counting forever. Here's where I disagree."

"You disagree with Aristotle?"

"Yes, because it doesn't solve Zeno's paradox at all. Because that means in order to get home you still have to traverse an infinite number of half distances, albeit a potential infinite. Tell me, can you think of any other process other than counting that goes on indefinitely?"

"Well, dividing distances I suppose."

"Ah, but if you think about it, dividing infinitely is simply another kind of endless counting, but in the inverse direction. They're two sides of the same coin, as in, it's the same process; obtain a number, apply the function, calculate the result, rinse lather and repeat. Apart from performing some kind of manipulation of numbers, is there anything else you can think of that goes on forever? Something infinitely wide or infinitely tall?"

"No."

"Exactly, me neither. So I started thinking that maybe this idea of the infinite comes from how we think of numbers. Within the set of natural numbers, there is a corresponding even number to every odd number. 1 corresponds to 2, 3 to 4 , 5 to 6 and so on. In the same way, for every natural integer there is a multiple of 2018. 1 can correspond to 2018, 2 corresponds to 4036, 3 corresponds to 6054 etc. Do you follow me?"

"I think so."

"So do you see what is happening? We are counting again - using numbers to try and describe numbers. And once we start counting, there doesn't seem to be any end."

Bear shook his head. "So... counting just numbers themselves doesn't count. It's a made up exercise, therefore infinity is a made up concept... is that what you're saying?"

April smiled again. "Close. Numbers were initially invented as a way to think about and keep track of physical quantities. One apple, two apples. That's how we discovered plurality. And then eventually we discovered we could ask the question "how many?" without having to ask 'how many What?' We then began to uncouple or dissociate the numbers from the objects they were invented to describe. And that's where this confusion comes from. We started thinking that a number was an entity that existed independent of other objects - we started treating it as if it were an apple. And we started thinking there could be an infinite set of numbers, because you could subject a number to a function again and again to continuously create new numbers. But let me ask you this, are there an infinite number of human words?"

"Of any language?"

"Yes."

Bear thought about this. "No matter how you look at it, there has to be a limit to the number of words that exist."

"That's right. No doubt, you could potentially create new words forever and ever simply by continually adding a letter to the end of an existing word and calling it a new word: Axexxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx for example. But this doesn't happen. This is because for it to be a 'new word', not just a nonsense word, it has to hold a new meaning - and also conform to the rules of the language it belongs to. In the same way, you could potentially conceive of absurdly large numbers, but they wouldn't ever exist for the same reasons. Words exist because of a need to convey to others some quality about the real world. For words to exist they must hold meaning. They can't exist simply for the sake of existing. The same goes for numbers. They are used to denote plurality, to describe quantities. But when you try to use numbers to count the number of numbers there are - it's like trying to invent a language that only describes itself. It's not a paradox, it's simply a nonsensical request. The only way numbers have meaning is by describing a plurality that exists in the natural world. And the dimensions that contain these pluralities are..."

"Time and space."

"That's right. Note that I used the word 'contain' and not exhibit or possess. Plurality isn't an inherent property of these dimensions. One apple, two apples. They exist in space, but are separate from space itself. When we think about 'distance' we think about two points existing in space, and then how to connect them. By doing this, we create a language to describe objects which exist in space. The terms length, width, height etc. belong to this language, and use numbers as the fundamental units of meaning the way the English language uses nouns and verbs. But take away the object and you find that space itself has no length, no width. There is nothing discrete to count in space - there is nothing either to divide. When we try to define a meter or centimeter or a cubit or an inch for instance, what we're doing is simply taking a thing with real height and width and length - a finite thing - and using its physical singularity as a frame of reference. If you think about it, any act of measuring is only possible thanks to the apparent finitude of our surroundings and our immediate experience. When you measure a road, you're measuring asphalt as opposed to sidewalk or maybe soil, but with space there's no delineation, no boundary where it transitions into some alternative medium. Because the asphalt has no end, we're forced to use its pebbles to try and comprehend its size. But space isn't made up of pebbles. It isn't divisible into discrete units. To measure space itself, we end up having to invent the pebbles. The fact is that numbers rely on finite objects, like pebbles, like you and me, to give it sense and meaning. For keeping track of apples, its vocabulary and grammar is flawless, but when it comes to delineating time and space, it's inadequate. Mathematics, as a language, simply isn't designed for it. The task of trying to prove or disprove infinity is as unfeasible as asking a universe of deaf-mutes to write music."

"Oyako Don, large." A young waiter set Bear's dish down with a clatter then promptly disappeared, leaving Bear's punctured reverie in his wake.

"Which doesn't mean we'll stop trying," She added with a wink.

Bear looked up at April and blinked, having forgotten now to be nervous.

"Do you know where the word infinite comes from?"

"No."

"It comes from Latin. In- meaning not, and -finitus meaning finished, an inaccurate translation of the Greek word apeiros, meaning endless--"

As she was speaking her right hand yanked itself up an inch, fingers splayed and contorting as if possessed, only her wrist visible from across the table. It shuddered spasmodically for a microsecond before returning to her lap like a whip. April bit her lip and lowered her head, staring down at her hands.

"Did you want something?" Bear asked, motioning towards the endless procession of sushi bypassing them.

"No... yes, some edamame please." April said. "Sorry, I get a bit jumpy sometimes," she added.

Bear placed one of the itinerant plates carefully between them.

"Thanks," April said.

"No worries."

After dinner, Bear offered to take April to the Esplanade for a panoramic view of the bay, but she declined, saying she had to be at the airport early the next morning. Instead, she suggested a circuitous route which would bisect the financial district, allow them to traverse the mouth of the river and wind up at an MRT station a little further uptown. So they ambled down the manicured urban walkways, past the rumbustious crowds clustered tightly in bistros and cafes, past the towering, glittering skyscrapers the city had exchanged for stars, until they had reached the underground shopping mall adjacent to the predetermined MRT station.

The mall was vacant, save for the two of them. The place's moneyed sheen seemed to reflect and multiply its own emptiness, expanding it. They walked through its catacomb-like stillness and muted man-made glow. The lustrous hallways echoed like a forgotten cathedral.

"The really tragic thing is that after spending all that time competing with each other neither of them get to see the finish line."

Bear tilted his head. His shoulders were relaxed now as he sauntered alongside April. "I feel like the tortoise probably doesn't even know he's in a race."

April let out a delighted chuckle. "He's not even trying? While Achilles is like dying?" Here she did a little pantomime of a sprinter getting out of breath.

Bear smiled. "You could see it as kind of romantic though."

"Hmm?"

"A journey that lasts forever."

April Itsuka said nothing as they approached the bank of AFC gates, then suddenly clapped a hand onto Bear's shoulder with an excessive amount of force. Grasping his deltoid with an unbalanced, avuncular roughness, she turned him to face her.

"Well partner - it's been good to see you again," she said, then before Bear could react, she pulled him in for a hug. Bear felt a strange tightness in his chest and wondered if it had something to do with how she seemed suddenly small and not invincible in his arms, or the way the top of her head was nuzzled against his cheek, or the way her breasts were pressed up tightly against his chest, or the way her perfume smelled sweet and delicate and of somewhere else, of somewhere far away, and how quickly it would be gone once she left.

"See you again soon?" Bear said after he'd recovered his balance.

"Anything's possible," she replied, smiling.

Bear watched as April Itsuka disappeared past the gates and down the escalators, her head sinking below the steps' metal horizon. He had already forgotten the scent of her perfume. Wanting to prolong the memory, Bear stood by himself, in the shimmering quiet of an empty shopping mall and thought of April Itsuka. He tried to imagine her world. A world without infinity; a world where if you only traveled far enough and for long enough, you could end up coming home again.

Bear brushed away the sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand.