Octavia let out a strange sound of frustration and slammed her pencil on the counter.
"What's wrong?" I asked coming into the kitchen. She rubbed her face with both hands and then signed, "I can't get this last problem." I walked over to her seat at the counter and asked, "Do you need help?" She looked up at me and again she had this suprised look in her eyes. It had been a long time since anyone had offered her help, especially with her homework.
"Sure," she said and I came up behind her to look at her text book. She pointed at problem thirty-four and I slowly read through the instructions and looked at the diagram.
Each side of the square pyramid shown below measures 10 inches. The slant height, H, of this pyramid measures 12 inches.
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a. What is the area, in square inches, of the base of the pyramid?
b. What is the total surface area, in square inches, of the pyramid?
c. What is h, the height, in inches, of the pyramid?
d. Using the height you determined in part (c), what is the volume, in cubic inches, of the pyramid?
"Questions with multiple parts are literally the devil," I said after reading through the problem and I felt panic start in my chest because I had no idea how to even start solving the problem.
"Tell me about it," Octavia signed glaring at the problem and tapping her pencil against her notebook. The bottom of the paper was filled with eraser markers and was grey with smeared pencil lead.
I shouldn't have offered to help. I hadn't set eyes on a geometry text book in at least fifty years. My degree in vet tech hadn't required anything more than college algebra.
"I have no idea how to do this, I'm sorry," I admitted and I felt unreasonably inadequate. I suddenly got an idea.
"But I know who might," I said and I shouted, "Sissy!"
Sissy appeared a moment later with a mirror in one hand and a bottle of liquid eyeliner in the other.
"What?" she asked. She only had eyeliner on one eye and it was kind of funny. Octavia and I stifled a laugh.
"Could you help us with this problem?" I asked putting on the most charming smile I could. Octavia smiled as well and I couldn't help but notice how pretty she was.
Sissy sighed, put down her mirror and eyeliner and then walked over to look at the problem. I heard Octavia take a sharp breath as she felt the heat radiating from Sissy's body and her cheeks turned red.
Sissy stared at the problem for a moment and then said, "100 inches squared. 340 inches squared. The squareroot of 119. 363.6 inches cubed." Octavia's mouth fell open and she quickly motioned, "I am so turned on right now!" I covered my mouth to silence a laugh.
"What?" Sissy asked. "What did she say?" I rolled my eyes and muttered, "What every person says when you're around." I wasn't jealous...was I?
Octavia quickly copied down the answers and then paused.
"Can you ask her to tell me how she worked that out? I don't get full credit if I don't show work."
"Sis, she needs to know how you worked it out," I said as Sissy was reaching for her eyeliner.
Sissy sighed and then ripped a blank page out of Octavia's notebook. She grabbed a pen out of the holder near the phonebook and tapped it against her shapely lips.
After a moment she sighed again and said, "I don't know how I worked it out. I just did."
Octavia glanced at me and motioned, "She just did? Is she a super genius or what?" I shrugged and replied, "Only with math." Suddenly Sissy said, "Ah!" and hunched over the paper scribbling furiously. She then presented the paper to Octavia so she could copy it down in her handwriting.
Octavia's fingers just barely brushed Sissy's and she suddenly sprung back, jumping off her stool. The paper fluttered to the ground.
"What was that?!" Octavia gestured wildly. Her face was red and she was breathing hard.
"What was what?" I asked looking between Octavia and Sissy.
Sissy smirked and then flounced out of the kitchen with her mirror and eyeliner.
I looked at Octavia who was slowly picking up the piece of paper she had dropped.
She sat back down and began copying down the explanation for the problem Sissy had solved.
