Clever Girl

Chapter 7 : I know your secret.

We usually sit far apart - I sit in the far back corner, right by the window, while he takes a seat in the front row, right in front of the teacher. Today, for some odd reason, he's decided to take the seat right next to me. 

He doesn't look at me. He doesn't say a word for the first half of the period. Then softly, when we're all going over the marked papers the teacher's just handed back to us, he leans in, "I'm onto you."

"What are you talking about?" I whisper, turning to face him, then scowling when I realize he's still not looking at me. 

"I know your secret."

"I don't have secrets."

He pulls out a couple of sheets of paper from his backpack and shoves them in my face, "Care to explain these?"

I yank the papers from him. It only takes a second for me to realize what they are, and in that second my eyes widen. My heartrate speeds up, and I try my hardest to not show my panic. They're some of the problems I had solved two days ago, when I had decided to deviate from the textbook and try something far more advanced for fun. "I have no idea what these are."

Jay finally looks at me, skepticism and curiosity intact, "Bullshit. I pulled these from your bag yesterday, when you went to the washroom."

"You went through my things? Why would you do that?"

"Don't turn this around on me, princess. How did you solve these? It's University-level work that I can't even solve, so how did an idiot loser like you get through them?"

"I don't have to explain anything to you. When Cranston gets back, I'm telling him I need a new tutor, because my current one is a nosy, delusional thief."

"Then I'll tell him you've been hustling us for the past three years, wasting everyone's time, and I'll show him those papers."

I hold up the papers in front of me, then begin ripping them apart. "What papers?"

The English teacher dismisses us, and I rise up quickly and begin gathering my things. Jay gets up from his seat, moves close to me, and grabs my arm, "Are you a genius? Have you been downplaying it for all these years? And if so, why?"

I snap my arm out of his grasp and scowl at him, "Not that it's any of your business, but I copied those equations from a tutorial website, since you've decided to be completely useless. I didn't actually solve them. I just wrote them down and tried to understand them.  So you don't need to start crying about it, you're still the smartest person at Apollo."

"I don't believe you." He follows me as I speed out of the classroom, hovering like a mosquito, "I knew there was something off about all of this. When I was marking your work last week, the way you settled the problems, it wasn't normal. It was like you were deliberately writing down the incorrect answers, while simultaneously distinguishing the correct way of getting those answers."

"Look, I don't have time for your conspiracy theories. I have to get home. You can continue writing this little fantasy novel of yours, but I'm done." I continue walking rapidly towards my locker. I need to get out of here before I completely lose it.

"You mean you have to get home to your tutoring job?"

I stop and face him again, my anger about to reach its boiling point. "What?"

"I have a cousin who's in your brother's class. Josh? You've already tutored him, and he told me you were the smartest person he's ever met. Granted, it's not high school-level subjects, but he said your teaching method was much better than mine, and that you've already helped several of his classmates get A's in their last set of quizzes and tests. There's no way a C-average, remedial student could pull that off."

What lie can I possibly tell that will get Jay off my back? "So you're stalking me now?"

"Don't flatter yourself. I'm telling Cranston everything." He begins walking away, but I can't let him claw his way deeper into business like this. I can't let him ruin the facade I've so intricately perfected for all these years. I can't let him destroy my life. 

I catch up to him and place a hand on his chest, furiously thinking of a way to explain everything without telling the truth. "Don't tell Cranston. Please. I'm not smart. I just memorize online content to trick these kids into thinking I know what I'm talking about. If you tell Cranston, he might contact those parents, and I'll lose this gig."

"Again, I don't believe you."

"I'm only good at pretending to know shit, I swear. I'm good at cheating. I... I'm a cheater."

"If I were to believe you, why would you even need to do this?"

"A car... I want a car, and my parents won't buy me one. I swear to you, that's all there is to it. Please don't blow my cover. And come on, think about it; do you really think I'm a genius? Me? The girl who has helped sink the school's GPA below the national average? Why would anyone pretend to be that much of a loser?"

As other students pass us by, some glancing in our direction, probably wondering what two people at the opposite ends of the social latter could possibly have to say to each other, I can feel my heartbeat through every inch of my body. I wait for Jay to say something, anything, that might calm me down. After glaring at me with those pierceing blue eyes, for what seems like a millenia of judgement and suspicion, his face finally softens, and my heart softens with it. "Fine. I won't say anything. For now. But if I notice anything weird, like anything at all, you're fucked."