The afternoon session gets underway, and I'm counting down the time until a quarter to three. To pass the time, Ms. Tudor has some sheets she wants us to work on. I have the choice to participate. I don't have to, and she'll understand, but I will. I peeked at Kieran's sheets, and the questions look to be a "show what you remember" quiz.
"If you finish early, please wait quietly."
It doesn't matter if I wasn't here last semester. It's a matter of taking what I've learned elsewhere and putting it to good use.
A challenge!
"Okay," Ms. Tudor says. "We'll take about twenty to thirty minutes, then go over it together."
Okay, my mechanical friend. Let's rock.
"Any quick questions before we start?"
No.
"Does this count for our grade?" Steven has to ask.
"Yes, Steven, it actually does. Good question. And I'll collect them before we go over them on the board. ...Any other questions?"
Was that a joke?
The quiz is five sheets long, front only, and fifteen multiple-choices, three fill-in-the-lines and two short answers wide. A lot of what's asked was on the board earlier. I think back to the slides and pluck the answers from memory. What I don't remember being on the slides, I dip into the well of what I already knew. I love fill-ins, but the short answers (this boy's kryptonite) block my jog to the finish.
I glance up for a breather.
Max...already finished?
We're only ten minutes into the allotted time, and Max, the clever kid he is, sits back and crosses his arms after filling in all twenty questions. Kieran is on the last fill-in. I don't know where everybody else stands. I need to focus on my short answer. If I don't, then Jessica isn't going to understand the difference between conduction and convection...
Jessica Rabbit?
Jessica the Bleep.
...I write my response (conduction is by direct contact, convection is between matter), then put my mechanical pencil down. The quiz takes me fifteen minutes. Kieran's done a minute later. After twenty, half the class is ready. Josh is one of the last ones. He keeps trying to peek at Ash's sheets, but Ash isn't having any of it. At the forty-five mark, everybody waits for the next step.
"Okay. Pass them up," Ms. Tudor says.
I'm the last to handle them.
"Thanks," she says, taking them off my hands.
You're welcome.
"Let's see how everybody did..."
Ms. Tudor pulls the digitized version of our quiz up on the big board. Over the next hour, she picks willing (sometimes unwilling) hands out of the air as we go over the same questions together, the answers, why we came to those conclusions. I raise my hand for number five because it's an English one.
"Why shouldn't the comma be there, Chase?"
"Uh, should be after the next word."
"Why?"
"End of clause."
"That's right. Good, Chase."
Yeah. See? I may be new to you guys, but I know my stuff!
"Josh!"
Poor Josh has to answer question twelve because he doesn't know what it means to stay silent.
YOU ARE READING
Castling: A Novel (NaNoWriMo21)
Teen FictionIt's a slice-of-life centered around "Chase the Ace," who finds himself changing schools against his will mid-year to help make the most of that brain of his. It'll be good for him, they say. He won't be so bored. He'll get to be with an old friend...
