Marshall and Amelia could’ve never expected this predicament when they stepped into calculus class, their second hour of the day.
Mr. Thompson had assigned the class a pop quiz (who even does those anymore?), much to the class’ dismay. But that wasn’t what had them worried; it was the fact that they had done this exact pop quiz eight times in a row.

“Why do the questions keep changing?” Marshall huffed, his brow furrowed.

“Maybe because you’re not getting them right.” Amelia leaned over his shoulder to tease, laughing at his mathematical despair.

“You’re not helping,” Marshall said as he massaged his temple. What was he missing? There had to be some information he was missing to help solve these equations.

Amelia interrupted the frying of Marshall’s brain. “I already offered to help explain it to you.”

“Your explanation is nothing but nonsense,” Marshall responded bluntly.

Marshall and Amelia had concluded various things about this time loop they were stuck in. One, nobody else in the class was aware. If they even mentioned the loop, they were met with odd stares from their classmates. Two, their teacher was hiding something. Whenever they questioned him about the time loop, he would sweat and say, “No answers until you finish your quiz.” They couldn’t escape by leaving the school building, much less the classroom. Every time they tried, the loop would reset.

It was quite the predicament they were in, and all their efforts seemed to come up fruitless. If only school had taught them how to escape a theoretical time loop.

“My answers aren’t changing, Marshall. You could at least give it a try.” Amelia pouted.

Marshall turned to her with a confused expression on his face, “Wouldn’t the answers changing be a sign that I’m getting them right?”

“No. I don’t think so.” Amelia tilted her head, giving Marshall a slight grin before backing away from his shoulder.

After a few seconds, Marshall sighs. “Yeah, sure. I’m willing to give it a try.” He said reluctantly.

Amelia came back to peek over his shoulder at his paper. After analyzing the answers sprawled in messy handwriting on the test paper, she sat back in her chair.

“It’s the word problem. Your answer isn’t right.” Amelia said matter-of-factly. “Love isn’t a probability. It’s a constant.”

“Are you serious, Amelia? That question doesn’t even make sense.” Marshall put his head in his hand, his frustration marinating.

“Just try it, Marshall.” Amelia urged, rolling her eyes.

Marshall sighed, lifting his pencil and gently erasing his previous “wrong” answer. Under Amelia’s piercing glare, he wrote her suggested answer.

Amelia stood up, walking over to Mr. Thompson’s desk. “Hey Mr. Thompson! When—“

The sound of the school bell ringing interrupted Amelia’s question for the teacher. Wait, the bell? There was no bell before. Amelia turned, watching the students leave the classroom.

“We did it!” Marshall cheered, jumping from his seat with joy.

“You mean I did it.” Amelia corrected him. “It was my answer after all.”

Marshall went quiet.

As Amelia began walking out of the classroom, Marshall sped beside her.

“Say, how did you come up with that answer?” Marshall asked her, his eyes glistening with curiosity.

“Wouldn’t you like to know.” She said, laughing as she spun on her heel and made her way to her next class.