Start Time: 0925 hours
Location: 45.1234° N, 123.4567° W, AKA the math classroom. Target: Ace the test

At exactly 0925, ask to use the restroom. If Ms. Waddell says no...she won't say no. Suavely depart from seat and head for the supplies closet. It's usually locked, but at precisely 0926, the janitor leaves it unoccupied to clean classrooms far down the hall. That's my chance. Select one brand new #2 pencil and hide it in pocket. Come back to class at 0928 sharp. Right before test, pull out pencil. Except this is no regular lucky pencil...screw off the eraser portion to reveal a slip of paper containing all the formulas for the test. And then ace it.

And eventually, that fateful morning of the heist came. After hours of scrutinizing techniques and methods, it was time. There was an ominous breeze in the air as I stepped off the creaky school bus, almost prophetic in a sense. I looked down at my palm, which was shaking almost as rapidly as the maroon-tinted leaves on the trees enclosing my path towards the brick building. Taking a deep breath, I stepped through the doors of Parkway Middle School. There was a quiet, unnerving feeling in the halls, starkly different from the loud, chaotic mess it usually was in the mornings. I'd bet the hall monitors would be thrilled if not for the looming danger ahead. At some point today, everyone in our grade level was taking the test. We didn't even call it by its name. Just...the test. It was sort of a rite of passage at this point, taking it. The older kids reminiscenced, we shivered in dread. Everyone knew it, Ms. Waddell made the hardest tests. It wasn't that we didn't study, it was just that you couldn't get a good grade regardless. Without cheating, that is. Technically, it wasn't cheating, not if you made it sound nice. Truly, I was simply consulting unsavory academic assistance, which was fine. Probably.

0920. It was almost time. The cheerfully decorated door did nothing to calm our nerves as we walked into the classroom. Ms. Waddell sat in her chair with a sweet smile on her face, waving the tests in her hands. Most of the crisp, perfectly printed white papers she held would soon be blotted with tears, but not mine, I could tell you that, because I had a plan. I quickly reviewed it in my head, breathing rapidly. 0925. Trying to stop my arm from shaking, I raised it above the bright blue test dividers.

"Yes?" She looked at me quizzically, most likely wondering why on earth I'd need to leave the room now.

"Can I use the restroom? Please. May I?" I cringed to myself afterwards, the sheer panic of the moment had disemboweled the sentence. Those few seconds before her response felt like centuries as I recalled all the times I'd butchered math tests and had to show the scores to my disappointed parents. And every time, they would tell me that I couldn't just breeze through life, that I needed to actually try. Well, this time I was trying...just not in the way they had in mind. All this effort couldn't fail now. Once she nodded her approval, I briskly shuffled out of the room, not quite as sophisticatedly as I had originally planned. Yet none of that mattered now, I needed to make a beeline for the supplies closet. Once the janitor had disappeared, I quietly swooped in and began to rummage through the box of pencils, praying my altered #2 hadn't been taken out. Just as it seemed as though that was the case, my fingers felt their way onto one particularly mundane looking pencil, slid up a notch, and out rolled the formulas from the hollowed-out core, neatly printed on a slip of paper. I grinned, but being careful not to savor this moment
for too long, lest be caught, I slid the #2 in my pocket and came back to the classroom right as the clock hit 0928. Taking the pencil out and laying it neatly on my desk, the sweet, sweet sensation of knowing I was about to ace the test came rushing through me.

"Alright, students," Ms. Waddell walked towards the middle of the classroom to deliver her speech. "You've all been preparing long and hard for this test. You may begin as soon as I pass your test out to you, and I wish you the best of luck."

I grinned, envisioning the near future where I could show off my pristine test score to an array of ogling faces. This would finally be payback for everyone who ever thought I wasn't good at math, including my parents. Well...truth be told, I wasn't good at math, but I could definitely make up for it.

"Oh, and one more thing, I almost forgot. I've been noticing that students have been needing to get up to sharpen or replace their writing utensils during the test, which is a bit distracting, so I went ahead and got some new pencils that all of you will use during the test, so you can go ahead and put your other ones away."

Dang it.