The Struggles of Math

Evangeline thought she had all but given up on college, considering how many times she's actually gone to school to study something new. Something she was still struggling with, as many times as she has gone over it, was math. It seemed as if she would never get it, but Evangeline wasn't one to give up so easily. She would take math as many times as she had to, to get it right. Of course she knew she wouldn't comprehend everything, it seemed like everyday they found some new equation to throw in the math world. How they just come up with these equations, she didn't know, and probably never would.

Evangeline was wearing a simple pink dress that reached above her knees, and wore black flats. She was sitting in a desk, with her legs crossed and tapped her pencil against the desk, she was growing irritated. The professor had just give the class an assignment, and she didn't understand. College professors were really bad at explaining things sometimes. To make it worse she was in a calculus class. The struggles of calculus were very real for Evangeline, and the longer she stared at her paper the more frustrated she got. Her forehead was crinkling, and she knew it was just moments before she gave up. But something told her she should keep on trying.

She looked through her book on how to solve the problems, and scribbled stuff down on her paper. She had finally finished the first question, to find out it was wrong.

"Stupid...stupid math!" she muttered loudly under her breath. She was never going to get this.

Evangeline continuously stared at her paper, frustration overtaking her. This is why she had taken a break from school. She should have skipped the math part altogether and learned a new language or something.

She began to ignore her paper and stared off into space.Staring off into space was something Evangeline was good at these days. Moments later she was pulled back to reality by someone nearing her, and a voice saying "Excuse me! You there, maths are not stupid!" But as she looked up she noticed the voice had not come from this boy in front of her.

But where had it come from? She looked around and noticed it was just her and this boy, and then she noticed his watch ,what kind of watch was that?

"What in the world? Evangeline muttered. The voice had come from it.

"I just don't understand it I guess, I never have."

Evangeline was very entertained by this watch. In all of her years she had never seen anything like it. She watched it listening closely, but found her eyes watching the boy, Zeke the watch had called him. The watch wanted to help her, but it seemed as if this Zeke was rather uninterested, or perhaps he wasn't use to making conversation. Evangeline thought about it momentarily, perhaps she could get him to at least like talking to her. That couldn't be so hard, could it?

Without help, she would never understand this math. It was funny in a way to watch them conversing back and forth. It wasn't until the watch asked if she minded them helping her that she replied. "I would actually love some help! Without help I'll be sitting here getting more frustrated until the end of class. I have not a clue as to what this stuff even is." She gave a small laugh, and smiled. If they couldn't help her, she had no idea who could.

Evangeline took note that the watch seemed super interested in helping her, but not Zeke. He seemed like he'd rather be doing something else. Maybe she was misreading things, but for some reason he listened to the watch.

"My name is Evangeline, or Lina if you prefer." Evangeline smiled. "And he is Zeke," she gestured, "and your name is Fletcher?"

She watched as Zeke helped Fletcher look at the paper, they worked like a team. It was fascinating to watch in a way. Evangeline put her chin in her hand, and tried to pay attention.

"You see, the professor didn't explain it to me throughly, he seemed to just do it in his head and put the answer. I need steps to help me through. Are you any good at explaining in steps?" She asked curiously, hoping he could.

"My mind just doesn't process this stuff."

"It's nice to meet you both as well," Evangeline said quietly. She thought anyone would be better than the professor, plus these two really seemed to know what they were doing.

She listened closely as Zeke began to explain. She had never seen anyone so serious about math before. She wondered how he could keep such a straight face, Evangeline found it really hard not to smile, but it just depends who you are she guessed.

She listened and watched closely as Zeke showed her the first question. It looked as if it came so easy to him, why was it such a struggle for her? She had no idea. The way he explained it though it made so much more sense to her.

"Wow you make it seem so easy!"

Her eyebrows creased, and then she gave a small smile. "How did you get so good this?"

She listened as he talked about how he got so good at math, and he had really good points. Baking was definitely a good example, without math you wouldn't know exactly how much of something to put into your recipe. Evangeline had gotten really good at baking over the years. She knew it involved math, but just never thought much about it. Evangeline especially liked the painting example.

Evangeline made a pouting face when he said he'd watch her do the next one. He made it seems so easy, and she just wasn't good With numbers. She scribbled down what she thought seemed right, but she had a feeling that she made a mistake.

"Hmm.. Like this?" She motioned to the paper with her pencil.

She was really excited to hear that it was right, or so she thought. She watched Zeke skimming over her paper and telling Fletcher that it was wrong, or that she left out really important steps, what important steps? Evangeline bit her lips in disappointment.

"What important steps?"

She signed to herself, she'd just have to keep trying. She really needed to get over her fear of math. She didn't have to be a genius at everything, right? Although she sure tried to be. She was brilliant in English, and a few different languages. But math? Forget it.

"I'll try again." She wrote below her work and tried something else, and scribbled down something different. It seemed to be right but she wasn't going to get her hopes up.

It seemed to Evangeline that Zeke was growing impatient, all the time she's spent with people she knew when someone was growing impatient, it was easy. It didn't help the matter when he snatched the paper from her. She began to wonder if she liked Fletcher more, at least he was enthusiastic about helping her, when Zeke hadn't been the least bit.

When he said she forgot to carry the number over she groaned, and fixed it.

"I think I've got it now." She mumbled, impatient herself.

She smiled a little when he had said she was getting better at it, maybe he wasn't so bad, after all he was still impatient. But she had to give him credit, he had helped her. He didn't complain, but his actions may have said differently. She just decided to ignore it.

"You don't have to help me anymore, if you don't want." She mumbled again, she had a bad habit of that,

At the mentioning of Zeke being a bad teacher, Evangeline felt the need to defend him in a way.

"He's not a bad teacher, I'm just a difficult learner is all."

At the idea of a break Evangeline was shocked and relieved, but to go eat? Maybe that's what she was shocked about. She wiped her face of emotion.

"Yeah that sounds like a good idea. When I'm hungry I usually get in a crabby mood."

Evangeline gathered her things, and got up.

"Where to?"

Evangeline tried to wrap her mind around the choices she had, she wasn't much good at making choices, well when other people were involved. She cared about their tastes as well as her own. But then Zeke made the decision, and she was actually kind of grateful.

With that she followed them out the door, and was a bit shocked Zeke had opened it for her, but she said thank you to him and gave a smile.

As they made their way into the diner she noticed they had quite a few choice including salads, soups, sandwich type things. It was school food, but here at the academy it seemed to be really good.

"What do you suggest I try?" She really wasn't sure, she couldn't make her mind up.