Provincial Exams

I had gone back to a place I'd hoped I would never see again.

Math class.

But this time it was worse.

Wayyyyy worse.

They call them the "provincial exams," but I think they're really just IQ tests, since they're especially hard.

There's no hope for me.

My overall grade right now is "barely" passing, as in one percent over the minimum. That's in all my classes. All of them.

Life after high school will not be more than school, that's for sure, I have other plans! Because I can't do anything else haha! No matter how hard I try haha! There is no way I will benefit this world at all haha!

All jokes aside, I am terrified.

Most people in my school already know I'm a certified idiot. Even so, the exam marks are going to be posted publicly! So everyone will know just how dumb I am.

And they have known.

The last time we had to do an exam like this was in ninth grade, and again, my mark was welllllll below the average.

So, I have no confidence in this.

After I got seated in my regular spot, the window — so I could ponder my failings in romanticized sunlight — I was given my exam sheet.

It was thick, like really thick, like it must have been at least 30 pages long.

I just stared at it.

My teacher, Mr. Burns, a ginger man that me and my friends call Ed Sheeran, gave me a sympathetic smile… He also was familiar with my academic skills.

I wrote my name down on the top my sheet in a nice neat handwriting style.

Maybe they would give me marks for that, who knows.

Name: Skye Thompson Date: June 8th, 2022

I looked at the first question glumly, I already felt sick.

What is sin(x)=2 ?

Yeah, no, whatever that means…

Skiiiiipppppppppppppppp.

Who cares about stupid numbers anyways right? I think I'll just move on to the word problems instead…

9. The hour and minute hands of a clock create a 60-degree angle at 2:00. How many seconds later is the next time when the hour and minute hands create a 60-degree angle? Round to the nearest whole number.

What the hell…?

They definitely didn't teach us this…

I started flipping through the exam, speed reading the questions. But there was none that I could do.

The only one that I thought was simple enough ended me up with the grand canyon being about 2 inches deep. In another one, I had the mass of a pencil being 50 kg.

So, yep, my earlier predictions were correct.

I was going to fail miserably.

The last question had a part in it that said "show your work."

I just drew a shotty picture of a girl with square glasses and bobbed hair digging herself into a grave labelled "Skye's Academic Future."

I thought it was pretty clever, for me.

Then I just stood up, walked over to Mr. Burns who was looking at me with those same little sad blue eyes and handed him my joke of an exam.

He stood when I gave it to him, and asked that I step out of the class to talk.

Of course, I knew where that was going to go.

Those same little "chats" teachers always gave to their failing students.

"You're not applying yourself,"

"Just pay more attention in class,"

"Maybe you should try another class if this one isn't working for you,"

And etc, and ect…

But he proved me wrong, somewhat unfortunately since I just wanted to go home.

"Skye," he said lightly, "there's going to be an assembly in the gym later today, I highly recommend you go."

I just squinted at him, and he sighed.

"I think you might make use of what the speaker has to say," he continued, though I was already planning my great escape of slowly shuffling away. "Just listen to it for a few minutes, you don't have to stay the whole time."

Hmm, well, if it made it so he would grade my next test better, then it couldn't hurt to go for a minute… as in one minute.

I nodded, "sure."

He smiled and went back into his class, leaving me out in the hallway alone, with nothing to do, since again, all my friends were also in exams, and they were actually smart so they wouldn't have ended up like me.

Bored, but mostly sad.