Roomies (boyxboy)

Math is Hard

Diego 

Cameron wondered if this is what everyone felt like all the time. He did pretty well in all his classes; he liked school, liked studying, liked being part of classroom conversations. His grades reflected this.

Except in math.

He just didn't get it. Cameron didn't know why. All through grade school and junior high, he paid attention in math class, tried to do the homework, but even through so many teachers had spent countless sessions with him before and after school, the minute he was given a new assignment, everything he had learned flew completely out of his brain. He could add and subtract and multiply and divide, and do some basic algebra, with little difficulty. But percentages, fractions, decimals, word problems. It was literally a foreign language.  

It hadn't really gotten him down too much. Every math teacher he'd had were such amazing individuals who cared about him and had worked with him with kindness and understanding. They were actually some of his favorite teachers despite how much he hated math with a passion. His mom had placed him in the hands of her colleagues. Every time she'd tried to help him, they'd end up fighting, which was rare. Cameron was generally a mild person, easygoing and flexible. But after Jess would try and explain a problem, using all her arsenal of teaching tips and techniques, only to have Cameron start to snap and argue, she threw up her hands and admitted defeat. Every teacher he'd had known his limitations, gave him extra time, worked with him, cared about, just about flipping loved him, until...

Mr. Jeffries. Mr. Jeffries, his algebra two teacher this year, was new. He didn't know Cameron from anyone, had not known Cameron since he was a baby. Cameron had never been to his house before. He was also young, fresh out of college, only a few years older than his students. He shared with his students that math was his passion, that he lived and breathed math and that it had always been his favorite subject.

This didn't go over so well in Cameron's class, where most of the students were seniors who were two years behind in math. Most of the kids skipped class frequently, had serious attitude issues and couldn't care less whether they passed or not. Cameron himself didn't have a problem with anyone. He kept his head down when he needed to, but otherwise was able to be friendly with everyone; he was easy to like because he was generally well mannered, smiled, helped whenever he possibly could, picked up dropped books and shared any snacks he might have on him. Didn't matter if the person three seats down  had just gotten out of juvie, or if the girl next to him repeatedly came to class high. He was a nice guy. They left him alone.

But Mr. Jeffries wasn't so nice, so understanding. He had zero classroom management, had already resorted to shouting at kids who disrupted class and shaming kids who failed to understand what he said was the simplest of math exercises. Cameron tried to lay low, didn't talk in class and turned in his homework on time.  

The rest of the class was chaos, no one respected Mr. Jefferies, back talked, refused to work, brought out their phones. It was bad all around.

Cameron was starting to get stomach aches just thinking about class. It had been a month or so since school had started, all his other classes were great; even things with Ryan had mostly gone back to normal. It's like that night never happened. Cameron kept his "needs" to only when he showered; anyway, he hadn't felt very in the mood as often as he had in the past, homework, taking care of Leah, stress about math and college kept him pretty busy. When he and Ryan climbed into bed, turning off the lamp they shared, he fell asleep basically as soon as his head hit the pillow.

Walks to school, like this morning, were good. Cameron had been able to go back to regular conversations with Ryan without blushing beet red every time he looked at him. This morning, for example, was so nice. The season was slowly changing and the trees of his street were starting to change from bright green to red and yellow. The air smelled wonderful, like earth and leaves. As they walked, Cameron and Ryan had taken turns kicking seed pods that looked like brown porcupine meteors into the street, seeing who could make it all the way to the other sidewalk.