“Efficiency” by Zander Zhang, XI: flash fiction

Efficiency

I’m trying something new today. I’m starting my homework early, no Instagram or YouTube breaks between assignments—pure efficiency. I open up my trigonometry textbook to page 551 and work on section 7.4. My textbook is written by a guy named Sullivan. I bet Sullivan is one evil guy—he probably hates babies or something like that. He probably goes around kicking puppies too, and maybe he also... nevermind. Let’s just get this over with. I stare at problem 63 for a good few minutes, furrowing my eyebrows and scratching my head as if my brain is hard at work trying to crack this problem. But it’s not. My mind is somewhere else. It’s thinking about that lasagna I had for dinner last Sunday. It’s thinking about that time I messed up the one line I had in the fourth grade operetta. It’s thinking about anything but math. Without even lifting up my pencil once, I decide that I’m done with math. I hate trying new things.

– Zander Zhang, XII: flash fiction