Chapter 2: Vanilla and Mint

During math class, the beautiful class president Aubrey and I were called up to the whiteboard to solve a problem.

I could feel the cold marker trembling in my hand as the whole class watched us—Aubrey, perfect as always, brushing a strand of honey-blonde hair behind her ear. It was an arithmetic sequence.

Aubrey finished in just three neat steps.

Her handwriting was like something off Pinterest—curvy, precise, decorated with a little heart over the i. But I, flustered, wrote out more than a dozen lines and still wasn't done!

I don't know who laughed first—

Probably one of the lacrosse boys in the back, but soon, mocking laughter rippled through the classroom.

Aubrey had this sweet, vanilla scent. That vanilla cloud? Turns out it was just her Juul, not some fancy perfume. When I got overwhelmed by it and started sneezing, the whole class burst out laughing.

I tried to keep it in, but the sneeze exploded out of me, echoing off the whiteboard. The embarrassment burned up my cheeks. At that moment, a cool, minty scent drifted down from above, somehow calming me.

It was as if someone had just peeled open a stick of spearmint gum. The top student, Caleb, was called up to check the answer.

At my most embarrassed moment, he took my marker and patted me on the shoulder, as if to comfort me.

His touch was brief, just a soft tap—almost like he was giving me a silent pep talk before a big game. But the very next second—

He didn't even look before erasing a big chunk of my answer, then broke Aubrey's three steps into four, getting the same result: 51/50.

He worked with such confidence, hardly glancing at my messy scrawl. "I got the same answer as Aubrey, but not as concise as hers," he said.

The teacher looked at him approvingly, erased even more of my work, and started writing the official solution.

I was left standing awkwardly at the front of the class, not sure whether to stay or leave. My sneakers squeaked on the linoleum as I shuffled aside.

Sure, I got 51/50 in the end too!

But to these geniuses in the top science class, my method was the clumsiest, dumbest way possible.

Just like my student number—51—I was the extra one, the fool everyone looked down on.