Brian woke up with a jolt, a film of saliva covering the left side of his mouth.

“Five minutes until the end of class,” Mr. Faulkner announced. “I’ll be collecting your tests at that time.”

Tests? Brian very clearly remembered waking up at the end of the last history class to news that the test would be today. However, he didn’t appear to have a test. He raised his hand with a slight yelp. Mr. Faulkner silently motioned toward the test that had been knocked to the floor while Brian was asleep.

Brain grabbed the test.

“Multiple choice,” he thought. “Lucky me.”

He looked at the clock. Four minutes left. He started flipping through the pages, glancing at each one for a second. A hundred questions. A hundred useless facts about the settlers before our founding fathers.

Three minutes left. He began to haphazardly fill in the bubbles on the sheet. A, C, D, A, B, D, C, B, C…

The next day, Mr. Faulkner was handing back the tests. “Once again,” he said, looking at a sleeping Brian, “Brian broke the curve.”