6 Approaching SAT [2]

Meanwhile, let's transport ourselves back two hours in time, right after the Math class had concluded.

"Students, do you know what happened with Max today? He's been answering all my questions," Mr. Johnson inquired.

"All I know is he was buried in that 'PreCalculus' book all day yesterday," Alex chimed in.

"Exactly! Learning for just one day couldn't have transformed him like this," Charlotte remarked, her tone a mixture of astonishment and skepticism. "He's been dragging down our class's average grades every semester; there's no way he suddenly became a genius overnight. I wonder what kind of trick he used, maybe some secret headphones?"

As the class monitor, Charlotte's comments were met with indifference by Alex, who couldn't be bothered with her.

Dylan, sitting quietly, mused, "Yo, maybe we messed him up so bad he had to get all brainy, you know what I'm sayin'?" 

"What was that?" Mr. Johnson asked.

"Nothing, Mr. Johnson. Perhaps he borrowed the book you read all the questions from, in the library," Dylan replied, attempting to redirect the teacher's focus.

Mr. Johnson gazed at the book he held in his hands, contemplating whether such a resource could be found in the library. After all, there seemed to be no other plausible explanation for Max's sudden transformation in just two days since their last Math class.

He dashed out of the classroom, not bothering to bid farewell to the students he most likely wouldn't be teaching again.

As he exited, Olivia rose from her desk and approached Alex, clearly having something on her mind that she wanted to ask him.

Alex looked at her with a stunned expression.

Olivia was a beautiful girl, her figure was slim, her skin radiated with a glossy allure, and she had a gracefully sculpted nose.

Her piercing blue eyes locked onto Alex's, fluttering beneath her velvet-black eyelashes as she inquired:

"Alex, do you perhaps know Max well?"

Alex couldn't help but feel a little letdown, thinking to himself, "Damn, she's freakin' adorable."

...

"So... have you tackled Calculus already?" Amelia asked as she pulled out a book of her own.

"Nope, haven't dabbled in any extra Math courses. I've just been diving into this Algebra book, and it's pretty darn awesome," I replied.

"Oh, hell no, it's not. I had Algebra last year, and it was a total nightmare," Amelia groaned.

"Yeah... my plan is to totally nail the SAT and not have to rely on any extra points for admissions."

"Good luck with that. You know, some folks with a perfect score still don't make it into universities of their choice. Without those extra points or some solid recommendations from professors, you can't be too sure."

Our conversation sort of petered out after that. I was engrossed in my Algebra book, tearing through it at a breakneck pace, about a page a minute for sure.

Then, after a while, Amelia got stuck on one of the Calculus problems. I hadn't really studied the Calculus material, but I figured I'd give it a shot.

She handed me her Calculus textbook and pointed to a particularly complex limit problem. "Let's see if you can crack this one, Max. I've been struggling with it for a while."

I examined the problem and admitted, "I haven't covered this material yet, but I'll give it a shot"

'Find the limit as x approaches the infinity of the expression:'

' lim x->∞ (5x^3−2x^2+3)/(2x^3+4x^2−1)'

I dove in and started breaking it down, "Alright, let's focus on the biggest terms in the numerator and denominator, which are both x^3. So, we can rewrite this thing"

"Now, we can divide both the top and bottom by x^3, which cleans it up a bit, As x heads to infinity, all the terms with 1/x or 1/x^3 in the top and bottom go to zero, leaving us with"

'(5−0+0​)/(2+0-0)'

I wrapped it up, "So, the limit as x goes to infinity is just 5/2"

"Damn, Max, that was solid! Have you really never seen this stuff before? I don't believe you"

"Sometimes, you break down a problem step by step, and it helps, even if you ain't seen the specific thing before. It's all about seeing the patterns and keeping it simple."

Even though I hadn't encountered examples like these before, considering they were from a Calculus book, it felt like I was back in kindergarten doing basic arithmetic.

Today, everything seemed to fall into place, especially as I dug into my Algebra book, which I'm almost through with.

Even those more abstract topics like orthogonality and linear transformations in vector spaces, which I gotta admit had me scratching my head at first, are starting to make sense.

In fact, I've got this growing confidence that I might just wrap up the whole darn book by the end of the day.

"Hey Max, just thought I'd ask, how 'bout hittin' up a Karaoke party the day before the SAT?"

"You mean, just the two of us?"

"I've got a friend I want to invite as well. If you want, feel free to bring someone along.  "

"For sure, then. I'll bring a buddy I share a place with. He's hella outgoing. He'll be thrilled to join."

After a while, we wrapped up our study session and went our separate ways. On my way, I swung by a grocery store and picked up the cheapest stuff I could get my hands on.

My funds were running dangerously low, and I knew I had to figure out a way to earn some, but I decided to put that off until after the SAT.

After reaching the apartment I didn't see Lucas there, which was a rare sight to behold.

"Yo, Max!"

Luckily, Alex was around to keep me company.

I borrowed three hefty books from the library: Algebra, Calculus I, and Calculus II. Judging by the breakneck pace at which I was devouring those pages, I had this feeling that I could conquer them all before the SAT.

I opened up the Algebra book, and the only section left was the questions at the back—easily the most time-consuming part.

Sometime in between, Alex had to jet off to his pro tryouts, leaving me alone. With peace and quiet enveloping me, time seemed to whisk by, and I eventually powered through the entire book, my brain now overflowing with new knowledge.

A new thought popped into my somewhat scatterbrained mind: Maybe starting a blog wasn't such a bad idea after all, especially now that my brain seemed to be firing on all cylinders.

If it was thanks to Dylan and his crew, well, then I owed them a big, sincere thanks!

I flipped open my laptop and checked out my messages.

'Karaoke Group'

'Members:'

'Amelia Rosby'

'Olivia Sparrow'

"Olivia Sparrow?! What the fuck! She was the friend Amelia talked about?"

I was a bit thrown off for a hot minute, but I was like, "Screw it," and tossed Alex into the mix.  and then dived into learning more Python for the rest of the day. Today, it felt like a breeze; Python was playing nice and seemed like such a straightforward language.

Finally, it was time to hit the hay. Tomorrow, It's grind time!

As I drifted into slumber, a dream akin to the previous one unfolded. But this time, alongside the familiar blue comet, there was another one, smaller and vividly green, trailing closely behind.