Carly shrugs and starts singing that song again as we continue the walk home. One thing my sister sucks at is singing, so I try not to laugh at her so-called singing abilities—I also can’t sing to save my life so who am I to judge?
I glance at Diana and her eyes are filled with laughter. Yeah, she’s trying not to laugh as well.
I smile to myself. She’s starting to tolerate me a whole lot more. It gives me hope that we can get through the rest of the tutoring sessions.
“Oh, thanks by the way,” she tells me.
“For what?”
“Paying for the food.” She tucks a stray hair behind her ear. “You didn’t have to do that.”
“Funny how you thought I would let you pay,” I smirk, which causes her to let out a laugh.
Yeah, I think we’ll be fine.
“How the fuck am I supposed to remember this?” She exclaims angrily, a little too loud for the study room we’re in.
Our sessions have been going off without a hitch for the last few days but the moment we reached optimization, all hell broke loose. To be fair, out of everything we’ve learned in this class, optimization was my least favorite. It’s the literal hell we’ve been fighting over.
Today, we had only thirty minutes to go over this topic because we both had to work. I may have finished assisting with a class for the evening but Diana has a night shift at the library so we took some time during her break to start looking over a new chapter that we will continue tomorrow.
“The context of the problem,” I try to explain. “The arch is the same as a parabola that opens down.” I draw it on the whiteboard, pointing to the curved end. “This is the midpoint.”
“Ohh,” she groans, rubbing her wrist for the umpteenth time. Some people rub their heads when math troubles them—Diana Blanco rubs her wrist. Singular, because it’s always her right wrist and never the left. “I hate word problems.”
“Me too,” I agree.
“We better get a cheat sheet of equations.” Diana lets go of her wrist. “There’s no way we’re expected to remember any of thislike last time. No wonder everyone else failed. Speaking of…” Her gaze meets mine with curiosity. “How did you not fail?”
“It’s not a big deal,Just Diana,” I answer.
“You managed to remember all of those equations for the midterm just because? I don’t believe that. You don’t have a super brain or something. Do you?”
So I’ve never had trouble remembering a lot of things growing up. That’s just how I’ve been. But I’ve never been asked about it before until now. “It’s eidetic.”
Diana raises a brow, clearly not knowing what it means.
“It doesn’t take a lot for me to remember details,” I explain.
“So, you have a photographic memory?”
“No. I can still forget things.”
She wrinkles her nose in this adorable manner. “Man, you’re lucky. If I had an eidetic memory, I wouldn’t be struggling with this stupid class.”
“My memory is not getting me an A in this class.” I’m running on sheer luck, expensive-ass coffee, and a small will to live.
She scoffs, crossing her arms. “Yeah, right. You and your pretty little eidetic brain are breezing through this class just fine.”
I raise a brow curiously. “Oh, so you think I’m pretty?”
She narrows her hazel eyes at me, and I swear I saw a tinge of pink in those cheeks. “Really? That’s all you heard?”
I chuckle at her frustration—she’s cute when she’s annoyed—but before I can say anything else, a knock on the study room door shifts her attention from me. Through the windows, I notice a very tall guy with dreadlocks and deep bronze skin, standing next to a cart of books. “Hey, D. Lottie said your break ended ten minutes ago.”
“Mierda,” she mutters to herself. “I gotta go.” She starts packing up her things.
“When does your shift end?” I ask her.
