remember when I knew

JAI PRICE

"WHAT IS the nominal 'average' value of gravity on Earth?"

"9.81!" Was Frigg's quick answer. Her teammates high-fived her as the rest of the class glared at the now winning team.

"It's actually 9.80665 m/s," Aiden muttered.

"True," Mrs. Lundberg nodded. "But I accept Ms. Evans' answer and since she was quicker, point to her team."

Saying that the whole class was participating in that competition was an overstatement. Frigg and Aiden were, the rest of the teens were just watching them like a drama rom-com.

"What's the point in this?" Azalea sighed as she rested her head on her arms. "Like, I could just sleep right now, it would make no difference."

Jai threw her an amused look from his seat beside her. They were sitting next to each other in every class they shared now. It had happened pretty automatically, naturally, even. Jai liked it there. He was used to being sat alone, so he wouldn't worry about the person next to him, but it wasn't a person next to him now, it was Azalea.

"What is the theory of relativity?"

"The theory of relativity usually encompasses two interrelated theories by Albert Einstein: special relativity and general relativity, proposed and published in 1905 and 1915, respectively. Special relativity applies to all physical phenomena in the absence of gravity. General relativity explains the law of gravitation and its relation to other forces of nature. It applies to the and astrophysical realm, including astronomy," Aiden replied, this time before Frigg, in a long, quick rant.

Jai had to admit: he understood none of that. Those were English words, but thrown together in that peculiar order, they meant absolutely nothing at all. The only place he'd understood science was Stranger Things.

"And a tie, again," the teacher sighed. "We've been doing this for hours now and I won't be able to think of more questions."

"So did we get the point?" A girl asked in the back of the class, wording Jai's thoughts exactly. "I mean, I didn't get a word of whatever he just said."

"Aiden's team gets one more point and we're now 46 to 46."

Azalea whined as she bumped her head several times on the desk. "Kill me now," she begged. "I should've ditched."

"This is fun!" Aiden protested, a light in his eyes as he leaned forward, glancing quickly at Frigg. "I just need to beat Freya, and then we'll stop."

"This honestly can't be fun. Your brain's just fucked up," Azalea narrowed her eyes at him. "Right, Jai?"

He just nodded quickly, not wanting to get in troubles.

"It is fun, and my brain's normal. Right Reece?" Reece didn't answer: he was on his phone. Aiden had to nudge him. "Right, Reece?"

The boy blinked, and when he seemed to understand what was happening, he shrugged. "Sure."

"Who-"

The door opened, making Mrs. Lundberg stop dead in her sentence, and Mrs. Evans came, accompanying a girl of their age. Her skin was of a medium, still light, brown, on which the white tights, and the white shirt popped out quite well. Her top claimed that 'you can tune a guitar but you can't tuna fish. Unless you play bass, then you can play all the scales' in a bright pink ink, marrying the purple of her skirt. She smiled wildly, playing nervously with her caramel frizzy hair that reached all the way to her hips.

"This is Chloe Acharya, a new student," Mrs. Evans announced. Being Frigg's mother, her eyes were as blue as her daughter, and they wandered across the room. "I'll leave you with that." She stopped her inquisitive glance on the point count on the desk. "I thought we'd already established that this quiz game wasn't the good thing to do with Frigg and Aiden?"