I’m toey this morning, we’re getting a test back. I was all right or all wrong. I’m early, the first one here. I’m hoping the TA will early-bird and return my test before anyone else gets here. That way, when I run and jump out the 3rd story window, no one else will be traumatized.

I’m trying to have-sac but I’m keyed-up and quivering like a ******. My chair seems all hard angles. I didn’t sleep much. My mind is replaying the test in a loop, resisting the unreliable seduction of hope. I've decided my score depends on one variable in question 3.

This semester I feel like one of those Cirque du sloeil acrobats that spin ten plates on a pole while riding a motorcycle. I realize I’m biting my fingernails and the parental voices that live in my mind spring to life. I shut them down with a shake of my head, they’ll have their say later.

Oh, great, another student’s here, Clint, I think. He’s a stengo from someplace tropical. I’ve never talked to him 1-on-1 but we were in a lab group once, where we had to synthesize a coordination complex and characterize it. He’s smart, polite, and forever chipper. He settles into his seat and slouches like he hasn’t a care in the world. I don’t like him this morning.

If he’s wrong, he’s going to have to throw himself down the stairs, I’ve got dibs on the window.