I put my head into my hands and breathed in deeply. I could do this. I opened my eyes and looked at the test paper. I was only on the second page of the test and I was already having difficulty answering the questions. All the formulas I thought I knew swirled together in my head until they became an unrecognisable lump of rules. What was the formula for calculating the volume of a sphere? How did calculating simultaneous equations work again? What was the rule when multiplying variables with each other? Am I supposed to add the number as an exponent or put it in front of the variable. No. No, no, no! Why can't I think? I know that I know these things? Why can't I remember them? What is wrong with me?
I glared at the back of Ms Rose's head as she turned to the white board and erased the numbers that were scribbled on the board from the previous class. It was as if she was afraid that we would copy the numbers onto our test. I was tempted to raise my hand and say: "Ms Rose, we didn't forget how numbers look like. There is no need to remove them." But of course I didn't say that. I was annoyed. Annoyed at Ms Rose for treating me like I was a hazard to everyone in the classroom, annoyed at myself for getting into this situation in the first place and annoyed at Melanie. Boy, was I annoyed at Melanie. What was her problem? Just waltzing up to my table and starting to provoke me like that. I didn't do anything to her and there she was, acting as if I was dirt that was stuck to the soles of her shoes.
A bell rang in the background. It seemed to fill the classroom and everyone's hearts with dread. We couldn't possibly finish this test on time. The last ding, dong faded but it still seemed to be reverberating within my skull. It almost seemed to me as if the pounding in my forehead seemed to throb in time with the vibrations of the bell. It was as if my entire head was shaking. My teeth were clacking together uncontrollably. I sighed shakily. My stupid nerves. I had to get them under control and focus on the test.
I didn't even realize that I was clenching my hand around my pencil, until I had to let go of it and turn to the next page of the test. I held the pencil in a white-knuckled grip, like it was the last thing keeping me grounded to this world. Almost, like my pencil was a sword and I was going to fight a battle. Which wasn't that inaccurate, now that I actually thought about it. The only difference was, that in my imagination, I would have surfaced from the battle; cut, battered and bruised; but still victorious. In the face of this math test though, I felt like I was just fighting for the sake of trying. Of at least scoring some points even though I knew that I would never be able to pass this. I gave the paper before me a long and calculating look. Like my imagination, this was a battle. But this was one I couldn't win. However, I proudly thought, my name wouldn't be Ruby, if I didn't go down fighting. I shook out my hand to give my sore fingers a short reprieve. Time to write like there was no tomorrow. Lena could be motivational if she wanted to be. Even though it seemed like I didn't pay Lena any attention during the bus ride this morning, I still heard, loud and clear, what she said before: "It's still at least worth trying, right?" Yes. Yes, it was. I slowly picked up the pencil again and tried to use the tingling in my palm to fuel my determination to continue the test. The pounding in my head subsided a little. I would try. I had that much pride left. Yes, it's worth trying, Lena. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise. Even me.
***
Thump. Thump.
My eyes felt bleary. My head was pounding. I was on the second last page of the test, but I couldn't pull myself together anymore. All of the numbers and letters on the page seemed to melt together into one unrecognisable blob. A blur of ink. A stain. It seemed to be yelling at me. Come and meet your DOOM! Give up! Why try? I groaned. I was going insane. Now I was imagining that paper could talk to me! But it really looked like it: The letters seemed to move across the page and form dark, hopeless messages. Great, a test with attitude. More messages swamped across the paper, some of them even overlapped. There were so many...
"Fifteen minutes, everyone! You have fifteen minutes to complete the test, and then I will come around and collect them from you," Ms Rose announced from the teacher's desk, where she was sitting in apparent comfort, reading a book. I could imagine her smirking at the entire class' struggle. She probably thought it was like a movie or something similar. Maybe she even wanted to order popcorn and a big cup of fizzy drink on the side. I could imagine her lounging in the cinema, pointing at the screen and laughing: "Look at those idiots! They don't even know what they are doing!" Geez. Thanks, Ms Rose.
Thump, thump. Thump, thump.
I dropped my pencil like it was a hot potato and sneakily looked around the room. All around me I could hear the swish and rustling of paper. People were sighing their frustrations out into the air around them. But the air didn't care of course. It just minded its own business. Most people seemed to be stuck around the middle of the test though, so I gave myself credit for coming further at least. It was a miracle I came that far with my pounding head
Suddenly, I heard something fall down onto the floor on the other side of the room. Several other people glanced in that direction as well and then turned back to their tests when they found out it was just a pencil that had rolled onto the floor. Then the pencil clattered onto the floor. Again. And again. And again. At the same time, my headache suddenly acted up. The pounding became stronger and my blood seemed to pulse in my head at a faster rate.
Thu-thump, thu-thump. Thu-thump, thu-thump.
Ms Rose looked up irritated from her book. "Who is causing such a racket? Melanie, is that you? Are you the one distracting the others from their test?"
Melanie? I turned my head and sure enough: I saw her sitting at her table with her head bowed in shame over her test paper. She was holding her pencil in a death grip.
"S—sorry Ms R—rose, I—," Melanie stuttered. She didn't even finish her sentence when suddenly her pencil slipped out of her hands and rolled onto the floor. Again. Several students around me groaned in unison. Carlson laughed. Meanwhile Melanie bent down and retrieved her rebellious pencil and gingerly placed it on the table. I blinked. Her pencil couldn't have just fallen out of her hands this time. Not just like that. I saw how tightly she held it just a second ago. It was as if the pencil had a mind of its own. To me it looked like it was moving on its own for a second; it shifted in Melanie's vicelike grip before falling. And the air seemed to have shimmered, like it does when the heat is rising from the ground in waves on a really sunny day.
"Melanie!" Ms Rose snapped. Her face flushed red with anger. "Enough is enough! Pull yourself together and stop keeping everyone else from doing their work!" Her voice was rising in volume near the end of that sentence until it was almost a yell.
I winced. That really did not help my headache at the moment, Ms Rose. Besides: for once Melanie wasn't disturbing me. The questions about the topic we haven't learned yet in math started a page and a half ago already. I had no idea what to fill in, but I scribbled as many assumptions as possible on the page in a desperate attempt to seem like I knew what I was doing and to get some points for some correct working. On second thought, I could only hope that some of the working was correct. After all, since we didn't learn any of this yet, most of this was guesswork. But, like I said, Melanie didn't disturb me because she had nothing to disturb me for. The questions on the last couple of pages were so hard that I was just sitting, staring at them thinking: "Is this even something that is supposed to be in a math test for our level?" Long story short, there was no way I could answer those questions. All that's left was just to kick back my feet and try to calm down my head and my tingling hands.
I looked at my hands. Nothing unusual there. They look just like my normal everyday hands. They weren't even red or anything. And yet, I could feel a cribbling feeling beneath my skin, as if there were a ton of fire ants marching all over my hands, while stinging me. The pencil thumped onto the ground again on the other side of the class room. Nooooo! I couldn't handle this anymore. I rested my forehead on the table. For some unexplainable reason, the sound of the pencil clattering onto the ground really annoyed me, even though I've heard way more annoying sounds on repeat at home. I have a little brother, enough said. Maybe the reason this sound irritated me this much is because my head was pounding stronger and stronger each time the pencil rolled with a clicking sound on the wooden floor, while the fire ants in my hands seemed to be acting up and performing a flamenco dance with each clack of the pencil dropping.
Clack. Click, clack, click.
Ms Rose slammed her book onto the teacher's desk and abruptly stood up with a face as red as a tomato. "Melanie Campbell! What is the meaning of this? Are you trying to cheat?"
"N-no! Ms Rose, please! I don't k-know w-why my pencil keeps on falling. But I s-swear that I'm not cheating! Please believe me! I would n-never do that!" Poor Melanie. She was on the floor, on hands and knees trying to reaching for her pencil. If it was possible, her face looked even redder than Ms Rose's. In her case it was probably from embarrassment. Her eyes were wide with distress. I would have felt sorry for her, if her pencil stunt hadn't annoyed me and aggravated my headache and fire ants as much.
Ms Rose ignored Melanie's pleas and stormed up to her desk, snatching the test. She peered at the paper and finally glanced at Melanie, who was still crouching on the floor. Ms Rose stayed quiet and flipped through Melanie's test. By now, everyone abandoned their own tests to watch this drama unfold. Ms Rose looked at Melanie again. "I'll be taking this, by the way. Since you are busy creating a racket in a test environment, I assume that you are done with your test. Right?" Ms Rose raised her eyebrows.
Melanie meekly raised her hand. "Umm, Ms Rose, I'm not--," she started
"Great! I'll be collecting this then." Ms Rose narrowed her eyes at Melanie, who was still cowering on the floor. "And I would think twice before I started cheating on a test, little Ms Campbell. I might have to give you a zero for this one."
A chorus of "Oohhh!"s rippled across the classroom. John muttered: "Get burned, Mel." Carlson looked as confused as always. I eyed Melanie. She looked like she was about to cry.
I cleared my throat and raised my hand hesitantly. "Ms Rose, just because Melanie dropped her pencil several times doesn't immediately mean that she was cheating. I haven't seen exactly what happened, but from what I've noticed, Melanie was only ever picking up her pencil. She wasn't doing anything else." I paused for a second when I noticed that Ms Rose looked at me as if she wanted to give me a zero instead, but I pressed on. "Isn't it a little harsh to just hand out zeroes just because you feel like it?"
Someone tapped my shoulder. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Lena urgently putting a finger over her lips. I got the message. A part of my brain was yelling at me to stop, that this was a crazy idea. After all, what was in it for me? Melanie seemed to actively hate me and I was risking unleashing Ms Rose's full potential wrath for her. Meanwhile Melanie was staring at me wide eyed with an unhinged jaw. I looked pointedly at her. She quickly lowered her head and fixed her gaze on her pencil. I couldn't believe that it was still on the floor.
Melanie wasn't the only one who was looking at me. Ms Rose gaped at me like a stunned fish. "E—excuse me? What are you trying to suggest, Ms Tinkers?"
I stood up from my desk and the chair scraped behind me. I closed my eyes for a second. I could feel the pounding in my head. This time though, instead of it being painful, it felt exhilarating. Like the adrenalin rush I got when I went with my brother to the amusement park and hopped on a really fast rollercoaster. My pressed my hands onto the table top.
"Hmm... Let's think... What could I possibly be suggesting? Oh yes," I said, "how about you give us a warning the next time when you want to give us a test? This test was supposed to be next week! Why did you decide to assign the test today?"
Lena hissed at me to shut my mouth before I got an overtime, but I ignored her. I was on a roll. Ms Rose looked at me blankly for a moment. She looked like she was about to agree with me, but then her eyes glazed over and she finally regained her composure and glared at me. I blinked. Did I imagine that as well just now? "Ruby Tinkers! Sit down and finish the test! I expected better of you! Such impertinence! Unciv—"
With burning hands I held up my paper and showed it to Ms Rose. "Look at this! Look at it! You seriously expect us to finish this test? Sure, we can finish it if you want, but then most of it would just be guesses! You. Didn't. Teach. Us. This. Okay? We don't know how we are supposed to answer these questions. But we tried anyways! I don't know what the others thought, but I considered that maybe this was just a miscommunication. When it wasn't though, I hoped that you would be nice and give us an easier test. But of course not! And you know what?" I pointed accusingly at Ms Rose. "I'm not even going to be bothered to answer the rest of the questions. So go ahead," I taunted, "take my test. It's not like it is going to make any difference..."
I looked down at my hands that were still clutching the paper. It was getting crumpled in my hands, but I wasn't concerned about that. Something smelled strange, like...
"Is something burning?" asked Carlson. Everyone either groaned or snickered at his question. John face palmed himself. Even Lena smiled weakly. Melanie looked around confused, while Ms Rose looked ready to kill Carlson for interrupting her, because she was about to say something. I doubted that it was important anyway. I had no reaction. For once, Carlson might have a point.
I slowly uncurled my fingers and flattened out the paper. My hands were trembling slightly, but it had nothing to do with the strange tingling and burning I felt all along today. Actually I was even more worried when I noticed that my hands stopped tingling and that my headache had also disappeared. I was a bit scared about what I was going to find on my test.
Or what was left of it.