Maybe This Time

Chapter 24

-Caleb’s Time-

This is it. Two days to go before the final examinations would commence.

After the usual Monday morning routine, the teachers gave the rest of the day for us to review on our own or with our friends. Jazzryl then stood in front and clapped her hands to get our attention.

“Hey fourth year B, listen up. Why don’t we play a game to liven up our review?”

The class gave a unanimous shout of approval.

“Ssh! Tone it down first. Okay, since it’s agreed then, we’ll divide the class into two groups. Columns one to three will be group one while columns four to six will comprise the other group. Agree?”

“Oh yeah! We have Tricia on our side!”

“Hey don’t forget that we have Caleb here!” Winston suddenly shouted. I gave him the are-you-kidding-me look.

Jazzryl raised her hand. “Hey guys this is just a friendly match. We’ll have different categories according to the subjects. A representative of team A will throw a question at his or her choice in team B and vice versa. Others are not allowed to help. But for every category, the team can ask help from its own members thrice only. Game?”

“Game!”

And so both teams took turns in asking. It’s actually fun, since we try to think of the hardest questions to ask the other team, and we learn as well. All of us gathered at the center, the aisle separating the two teams. I ended up sitting behind Bernadette, since it was the only space left.

“Okay, History is done. Let’s go to Math,” Jazzryl announced. I could hear some groan, including Bernadette in front of me. “Team A will go first.”

No one from team A tried to ask me, and I just helped my teammates in answering. We used up our three lives for this category, and two more questions are left.

Breanne stood up and said, “For this question, I’ll ask Ana.”

I saw Bernadette stiffen immediately. Sighing, she stood up, preparing for the question to be thrown at her.

“Answer problem number ten on page 268.”

She scanned the book frantically and dropped the pencil on her hand.

“Err… uh… sorry… uh…” She grabbed another pencil and a piece of paper, calculator ready.

“You have two minutes to answer, Ana,” Breanne said.

I could see Jamella’s sympathetic look to Bernadette, and the others tried to cheer her on. As I sit, seeing her tensed back, I could literally see her tension. Her math anxiety strikes again. Grabbing my calculator, I punched the necessary numbers and sighed.