all the way to ten. If it were twenty-four plus ten, that would be pretty easy. Thirty-four. No problem. But then Christopher figured out something. Just add ten and take off one. That made sense. That was easy. His big green pencil put down the answer.
24 + 9 = 33
He couldn’t believe it. He got the first two right. If he could just get one more, that would be three of seven. Three plus seven is ten. Ten minus seven is three. He looked at the next problem. It was a money problem.
If you had two nickels, one dime, and one quarter, how much money would you have? ______ cents.
Ms. Lasko always liked to challenge them on the third one. And normally, this was the time Christopher would feel stupid. But not this time. Christopher realized the money was just numbers. And if he could add two numbers, he could add four numbers.
45 cents!
Christopher was so excited, he almost jumped out of his chair. He never got the first three on a pop quiz. Never.
36 - 17 =
Ms. Lasko was being smart again, but he knew what to do now. Thirty-six minus sixteen minus one.
36 - 17 = 19
Slowly, he got this feeling. A small, quiet hope that maybe, just maybe he could get a perfect for his mom. He never got a perfect on a test. Not in any subject. Not in his whole life. His mom would buy him Froot Loops for a year.
If you were at the baseball game for 1 hour and 6 minutes, how many minutes is that?
This was Ms. Lasko being nice again. Any kid could look up at the clock and count around the clock face if they wanted to. But Christopher didn’t need to. Sixty tick tick ticks. With six more.
66 minutes
Two more to go. He wanted that perfect so badly. He wanted his mom to be proud of him. He didn’t even care about the Froot Loops. He looked at the next problem, tap tap tapping the green pencil.
There are 91 people on a boat, but only 85 life jackets. How many more life jackets are needed?
Christopher took the numbers out of the words and saw ninety-one minus eighty-five. And this time, he didn’t even need to do ninety-one minus ten and add four. He didn’t need to do anything. He just understood.
6 life jackets
The last question. Christopher could barely bring himself to look. He only needed one more answer to get a perfect. Brady Collins got them all the time. So did Dominic Chiccinelli. Kevin Dorwart. Even Jenny Hertzog. But this was his.
Bonus Problem:
12 x 4 =
Christopher’s heart sank. He had only started to learn multiplication before he went to the woods. There was no way he could figure this out. So, he just thought about the number twelve. And how there were twelve people in the jury box in his mom’s old movies on Friday nights. And how if there were four movies, that would be four sets of twelve jurors. And how that would be forty-eight jurors.
Christopher stopped breathing.
The answer was forty-eight.
He knew it. Like the moment he learned how to tie his own shoe or know his left from his right (your left hand makes an L!). His mind went CLICK. Everything in his brain that had been cloudy was lifted.
Bonus Problem:
12 x 4 = 48
Christopher had to make extra sure he would get that first perfect, so before he put down his pencil, he went back over the whole test. He did each problem again. And when he got to number three, he stopped.
If you had two nickels, one dime, and one quarter, how much money would you have?
It didn’t even occur to Christopher the first time through. This was a math test after all. Not a reading test. But there were so many letters. And he realized he didn’t switch his letters back. Not once. He had read the sentence without even sounding it out. He thought there must be something wrong, so he read it again.
If you had two nickels, one dime, and one quarter, how much money would you have?
45. Or forty-five. There were so many e’s. Seven, to be exact. But that didn’t stop him. And nickels didn’t look like…
ncikels
They were nickels. And one quarter was one quarter, not…
Qautrer
His chest was pounding now. He looked up at the posters around the room. The ones that had given him trouble all month.