Chapter 14: 12 [a classmate anew]

The classroom immediately quietened down when Ms. Zamira, the Biology teacher, walked through the front door. “Good morning, Class 19S07G.”

“Good morning, Ms. Zamira,” we said in a chorus. 

“Thank you, please take your seats,” she said. “Full attendance today, Fang?”

“Liam is on sick leave today, Ms. Zamira,” he replied dutifully. “He sprained his ankle yesterday.” 

“Is that so? I’ll have to trouble you to keep him updated on our lesson progress and assignments.” Ms. Zamira clapped her hands together and scanned the classroom. “Now then, I’ve heard that we have a transfer student who just joined our class? Can you please raise up your hand?” 

Terasia exchanged a glance with me before tentatively raising her hand up. “I’m Terasia, Ms. Zamira.” 

“Terasia, Terasia…ah, I see your name has been added to the class attendance sheet.” She clicked her mouse and looked up from her laptop. “Have you gotten the tutorial notes for Biology from the school bookshop?” 

“Uh…no, I haven’t done so.” 

“It’s okay, you can share Avery’s notes for today’s lesson. Do remember to go down to the bookshop later to get your tutorial materials.” Ms. Zamira switched the projector on and pulled down the screen in front of the whiteboard. “Today, we will be starting the chapter on photosynthesis in plants. I want to finish this chapter before your school holidays begin, so if you don’t pay attention and delay our progress, I will have to ask all of you to come back to school during the holidays for remedial lessons.” 

“Remedial lessons? You must be kidding me,” someone whispered a little too loudly. 

“Apa? Not happy with coming back to school during the holidays, is it? Saya juga tak gembira,” Ms. Zamira huffed. “Please turn to page sixty-seven of your tutorial notes, and we shall begin with the definition of ‘autotroph’…”

I flipped open my notes to the correct page and moved my desk closer to Terasia’s. “Are you able to read it clearly from here?” 

“It’s fine, I don’t really need it.” She waved her hand over the paper and hummed something under her breath. “Alright, I’m done.” 

I blinked. “You’re…done?” 

“Mm-hmm, I have everything captured in my memory now.” She gave me a small grin. “You don’t believe me?”

Without a word, I flipped a few pages ahead and propped the book up so that she could not see what was written on the pages. “What is the process of ‘photoactivation’?” 

She made a show of yawning and stretching her arms high over her head. “When a chlorophyll molecule absorbs a photon of light, one of the pigment molecule’s electrons is elevated from its ground state to its excited state, or in other words, the photon boosts an electron to an orbital of higher potential energy. Since the excited state is unstable, the electron quickly falls back to its ground state orbital and the energy released is passed to another chlorophyll molecule by resonance. Alternatively, the excited electron may be captured by the primary electron acceptor molecule in the reaction centre of a photosystem.” 

“It’s word for word…” I dropped my book and gawked at her. “If you can do that, why do you even bother coming to school?”

“But you’re in school, no?” she replied back in an earnest tone. 

“That’s because I don’t have any cheats like you,” I muttered. “I didn’t volunteer to be in school, you know.” 

“Avery Ruan!” Ms. Zamira shouted from the front of the classroom. “Talk, talk, talk, talk so much can get you good grades meh? Please focus!” 

“M-maaf, Ms. Zamira!” 

 

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It didn’t rain in the afternoon, but the midday sun shining through the windows warmed the classroom up till it felt like an oven on full blast. By the time Fourth period was about to end, my brain had become fried tofu from both the unbearable heat and the amount of lesson content forcefully crammed down my throat. 

“Yes, that is the correct solution. Thank you, Yun Li,” Mr. Ong said, fanning himself with his sweat-soaked shirt that clung to his back. “Alright, for our final problem, can I have Avery come up to the board and solve it?” 

I was so weary from the heat that I didn’t hear my name being called out until Terasia gave me a small kick in the leg. “Y…yes, Mr. Ong?” 

“Please solve the question that is on the board.” He rapped his whiteboard marker against the palm of his hand. “What is the answer to ∫(3x²+3x-2)/[(1-x)(1+3x²)] dx?”

“W-wha…” My mind turned completely blank at the alien letterings scribbled on the whiteboard. “Uh…this…well…I’m not…”

“You should know your integration by now, Avery.” Clicking his tongue loudly, Mr. Ong shot me a look of disappointment before shifting his demonic gaze to his next target. “Terasia, are you able to help your classmate out?” 

“Sure, Mr. Ong.” Flashing me a ‘don’t worry about it’ smile, she confidently walked to the whiteboard, picked up a black marker, and jotted down the solution perfectly in neat lines. 

“Excellent work, Terasia.” Mr. Ong nodded his head in approval. “You may return to your seat.” 

“That’s very reassuring,” I said half-jokingly when she sat down beside me. 

She shrugged her shoulders. “Mathematics is by far the easiest subject to comprehend, I feel, because it works on a similar logic to the principles of magic.” 

“So, what you’re saying is that I’m already disadvantaged from the start when it comes to maths?” 

“A real shame, isn’t it?” 

The bell finally rang at that moment. Mr. Ong quickly dismissed the class, which had erupted into a roar of joy and relieved sighs. 

“Bye, Mr. Ong!” 

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“I can’t wait to go home and have a good sleep…”

“Hey, hey, should we go to the arcade over the weekend?”

“Yo, Avery, Terasia!” Seberas approached our desks with a beaming smile, his bag slung over his shoulder. “Are you guys ready to go? The rest are already waiting outside.” 

“Give me a moment.” I swept everything on my table into my bag in one smooth motion and tossed it over my shoulder. “Done. Terasia?” 

Standing up, she hastily smoothed down her skirt. “Yep, I’m ready!” 

For a few moments, I couldn’t help but linger my eyes on her fluttering skirt. Was what she said earlier… 

“Y’know, what you did just now was too awesome,” Seberas remarked, snapping me out of my silly thoughts. “I couldn’t have done that question without a calculator as quickly as you did. Have you ever considered taking Further Mathematics?”

Terasia giggled and shook her head with a demure smile. “Thank you, but I’m perfectly content with staying in this class.”

 

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When we finally reached the ground floor, the study area was starting to fill with students who had just been dismissed from other classes too. Here, the refreshing breeze from the giant water-misting fans strategically placed around the open-air space was pure bliss in the tropical heat. I couldn’t resist standing in front of a fan to cool myself down before Yong Yu waved his hand at me to come over. 

“This is as good a spot as any for our discussion,” Yong Yu said, pointing at an empty table tucked against the back wall of the bustling study area. “Seberas, you brought your laptop to school, didn’t you?” 

“Yup, sure did.” He pulled his laptop out of his bag and quickly set it up in the centre of the table. “Right, let’s do a brief rundown of our agenda for today before we start. We should be done with our research and have a general outline of our presentation by the time we conclude this meeting. Sounds good?” 

We all nodded their heads in acknowledgement. Seberas created a Google Docs and shared the link with us in the group chat, instructing everyone else to find relevant articles and sources on Malta while he worked on the Powerpoint slides. 

“I…did a little bit of research on Malta yesterday night,” Xian Jing revealed in a shy voice. “I found a project done by the European Institute for Gender Equality in 2010 to 2012 to promote women’s participation in Malta’s labour market…I-I think we can use it in our presentation.” 

“Yep, that sounds perfect,” Yong Yu said, giving her a thumbs-up sign. “Do you have the link to the website? You can put it in the Google Docs.” 

A happy smile lit up her face. “I-I will do that.”

“What am I even supposed to type in the search box?” Terasia grumbled, fiddling on her phone. “I don’t know where to start…” 

“Why don’t you try searching about gender stereotypes?” I suggested. “I’m searching up on gender representation in Malta, so we can combine our findings later.” 

It didn’t take long for us to come up with a decent list of sources that we had found online. Seberas had us organise the sources into specific subtopics, then we began putting summaries of each source in our slides while eliminating those that we thought were unnecessary.

“Alright, that is good progress for today,” Seberas announced, saving the presentation on his laptop. “I believe Xian Jing has to leave for tuition now, right?” 

“Y-yes,” she replied in a quiet, apologetic voice. “Sorry for inconveniencing all of you…”

“Don’t worry about it,” Yong Yu said, waving his hand. “Say, why don’t we meet again over the weekend to do the finishing touches and have a rehearsal before Monday?” 

“That’s what I was going to suggest too.” Seberas nodded his head and looked at us. “Do you guys want to meet online? Or if you don’t mind, we can meet at a specific time and place to hold our meeting.” 

“I’m down with that,” Yong Yu said immediately. “What about the rest?” 

We nodded our heads to indicate that we had no objections. 

“But where will we be meeting?” I asked. 

“Since Seberas was the one who suggested it first, I vote that we meet at his house,” Yong Yu proclaimed. 

“Oi, you were the one who said it out loud,” Seberas retorted. “Besides, you know that my Ah Ma will kill me if I disturb her with guests at our place. Why don’t you let us go to your house instead?”

“Bro, my sister is having a sleepover with her friends this weekend.” He shook his head. “My house is already booked full.”

“Then…”

“We can have the meeting at my place,” Terasia suddenly said. “Will that be okay with everyone?”

“Of course!” Seberas and Yong Yu replied without hesitation, while Xian Jing nodded her head quietly. 

I gave her a curious look. “Your place?” 

“Mm-hmm,” she said, winking at me with a teasing grin on her face. “Curious to see it, Avery?”

“N-not particularly…” I mumbled, quickly averting my eyes. 

Seberas gave the both of us an amused look before clearing his throat. “Man, I’m hungry AF after using up all my brain cells in school. We should head to J8 before the crowds get too big, shall we get going?” 

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