Adon Habafren and the Cuadros

My name is Adon Habafren. And whoever created the idea of birds singing in the tranquil morning has clearly never met the Cuadro quadruplets. By 9:01 in the morning, my classroom resembled a monkey exhibit– but the monkeys were on sugar and caffeine. And I was the underpaid zookeeper. 

“Mr. Stoneface! What’s the equation for Newton’s Second Law? I forgot it again.” As Cuadro One, the loudest Cuadro with a missing front tooth, scratched his head as monkeys do, I sighed. Mornings like these remind me why I hate my life. Once upon a time, I dreamed of working at NASA, making rockets– not teaching Newton’s laws to high schoolers. But dreams die hard. And rejection letters killed them faster.

“It’s y equals mx plus b, stupid!” Cuadro Three, the one who looked up from doodling on his notebook, threw an eraser at Cuadro One’s head.

“I’m not stupid!” 

“Yeah, you are.” Cuadro Two snickered.

“SHUT IT!” I rubbed my forehead from my headache. “That’s it. Since the Cuadros don’t remember Newton’s Laws, we will be having a pop quiz today. And I see you, Cuadro Four. No sneaking off to the bathroom.”

“Aw, man.” 

“Everyone, take out a piece of paper. Number it from one to three, and I better not see you doodling on your paper, Cuadro Three.”

“C’mon, Mr. Stoneface, you know you like the little Spongebobs I draw on my paper!”

“Don’t test me.”

Finally, silence. Sometimes, in moments like these, I was reminded of my office in NASA. When everyone went home– no meaningless talking, no distractions, just me and my blueprints. But it reminded me of the rejection I heard back from HR. Complete and utter nonsense– they didn’t know what they were missing. I graduated at the top of my class in high school and in college, studying day and night for years. I did all the internships I could, and I earned certificates from self-studying. And once I left California to find greater opportunities in Georgia, I thought I was on the right track. 

My life was supposed to be high school, college, internship, then a job. That was the timeline that my whole family followed– even from generations before me. My family was made for success. Not failure. My father was an aerospace engineer, my mother a lawyer, my eldest brother also a lawyer, my only sister a neurosurgeon, and my other brother a genius computer scientist. I was supposed to carry out the Habafren legacy, a family of brilliant minds and flawless achievements. But NASA’s rejection letter made me an outlier in our family’s statistics– the one who couldn’t make it. I couldn’t face them after that.

“I’m done!” Cuadro Two slammed his hands onto his desk and thrusted his paper in the air.

“Sit down,” I snapped, yanking the paper from his hands. As I analyzed his answers, I frowned. His answers were simple but, annoyingly, they were all correct. I came to the conclusion that he either guessed or cheated. But before I could grill him for answers, the lunch bell saved him.

“Alright, give me your paper before you leave class. This won’t count as an actual quiz, but every law you get right will be counted as one point of extra credit. Your real quiz on Newton’s laws will be tomorrow.”

On the way out, the Cuadros did their usual farewell ceremony.

Cuadro One was first: “Bye, Mr. Stoneface!”

Cuadro Two threw me a peace sign: “Cya.”

Cuadro Three patted me on the shoulder: “Don’t miss us too much!”

Cuadro Four squinted at me: “You won’t catch me tomorrow.” 

They always left in the same order. Or maybe I couldn’t tell them apart because they were, in fact, quadruplets. 

Once again, I got my silence. And the only thing waiting for me was my cold, simple bologna sandwich. 

* * *

Another day means another day of having to deal with the Cuadros. It was already hard enough to wake up at six o’clock sharp every day, but the quadruplets really tested my patience when I entered the room and saw my whiteboard graffitied with a rainbow army of Spongebobs. I didn’t even have the energy to be angry, I was too far into the semester to be angry. 

With a sigh, I asked, “Who started this?”

Cuadro Two, Three, and Four all pointed at Cuadro One, who merely just shrugged. “You look like you need a little Spongebob energy in your life, Mr. Stoneface!”

I frowned, slightly offended by his comment. “What do you mean by that?”

Cuadro Three pointed his whiteboard marker at me. “You’re the legitimate opposite of Spongebob. That’s why we named you after Squidward’s house.”

“Alright, that’s enough.” I sighed, “Who let you in?”

“Oh, the janitor let us in early.” I kept a mental note to have a word with the janitor.

“Class doesn’t start in another thirty minutes. Get out of my classroom.” I waved them away.

“No.” Cuadro Four retorted. “We have to come early because of our parents, so we had to stay out in the cold for two months straight. They won’t let us stay in the hallways so just let us stay in here… please.”

I rubbed my forehead again, it was becoming a new habit. And after a moment, I sighed, and said, “Fine. But if you guys get too rowdy I won’t hesitate to send you out in the cold.”

The Cuadros agreed. For the first 5 minutes, they surprisingly kept quiet and did their own thing. Cuadro One was scrolling on his phone, Cuadro Two was looking over One’s shoulder, Cuadro Three was scribbling on Cuadro Four’s hand, and Cuadro Four was making comments here and there. But in the sixth minute, Cuadro One started showing videos to his brothers, and they laughed loudly. They made funny faces at each other, and did some incredibly weird dance moves, and the volume in the classroom increased again. It was incredibly obvious they enjoyed each others’ company.

I found their actions completely absurd– I had never interacted with my siblings like that. We kept to ourselves, locked away in our rooms and slaving away to be at the top of our class. We barely talked to each other– the only times being at each others’ graduation and simple greetings and farewells to each other. I never, ever laughed with my siblings. Or watched something with them. Or draw on their hands. The warm scene made me confused.

Their loud presence annoyed me, and I was bothered that I couldn’t distinguish the tickly feeling in my chest.

* * *

We were finally in the part of the semester where I was going to teach the kids about aerodynamics, arguably the most enjoyable part about my job. The Cuadros have been regularly coming into my classroom early, which annoyed me at first, but I couldn’t care less after a few weeks. They started to come in for lunch, too. Even making fun of my lunch that was the same every day. But I was unfazed. Telling them to leave was like telling a rock to move. I was able to tune them out at that point, so I couldn’t be bothered.

“Settle down, Cuadros.” I raised my voice over the boisterous mob of students, and their conversations halted. “Today, we will be learning about aerodynamics. But before we do that, does anyone remember Newton’s three laws? And no, Cuadro Three, whatever you’re thinking, it’s wrong.”

“Hey, I wasn’t even going to say anything!” 

I sent Three a look, and took a peek at his notes, expecting a page filled with Spongebob characters, but instead, it was filled with small doodles of sandwiches. Suspiciously similar to my daily lunch– my bologna sandwich. “Maybe if you stopped doodling in my class, you would be able to answer my question. Moving on, does anyone remember?”

I was expecting to see one of the smarter, quieter kids of the class raise their hands, but before they did, Cuadro One opened his mouth, but I cut him off. “Cuadro One, if you say something stupid, I will send you out to run ten laps around the school.” 

“Don’t worry, Mr. Stoneface, I got you! I know you’d miss me if I left for even five minutes,” I rolled my eyes at his comment, then he said, “F=ma?”

I was… stunned, to say the least. I never expected to be alive when Cuadro One got an answer right. “Uh… yes. Correct.”

“Weren’t the other two like… the thing where an object stays at a constant speed and…” It took him a moment, but he answered with his fist hitting his other fist, “If something hits something else, it moves?”

Although his answers were very simple, I was impressed by him remembering the laws we covered in the beginning of the class. I had no hope for him as a student, but that little act he did just then gave me a little hope– no. It was too soon to have hope in Cuadro One.

“See? I got you!” He shot me with some finger guns.

I sent him a soft glare, and he put his arms up in surrender. “Cuadro One’s answers, albeit simple, are relevant to what we will be learning today. Does anyone know the four main principles of aerodynamics?”

It was a rhetorical question, but Cuadro One clearly didn’t get it as his hand shot up in the air again, responding, “Gravity!”

“Don’t make me lock you outside,” I sighed, but felt something tug at my mouth muscles.

“Yeah, stupid,” Cuadro Two threw his eraser at his brother, “It’s actually weight. The other three are lift, drag, and thrust.”

I was taken aback by his answer, “How do you know that?”

“Because he’s a nerd.” Cuadro Four spoke up, and the classroom giggled.

Cuadro Two ignored his brother, “It’s literally the most basic terms of aerodynamics. If anything, you’re just an idiot.”

“At least I don’t stay up at night, obsessing over the physics textbook.”

“It’s lowkey fun! It’s better than doom scrolling on Tiktok like you do.”

“Like you don’t–”

“Shut it,” I snapped, “Let’s move on.” The two stopped their petty arguing.

And as I went back to teaching, I couldn’t help but remember Cuadro Four’s comment about Cuadro Two reading the physics textbook. And Cuadro Two admitting that he liked physics was new. It was a wild revelation, but they didn’t fail to make me sigh as they monkeyed around in class again. 

But it surprised me even further when Cuadro Two came up to me after class, asking where he could learn more about aerodynamics. I recommended my favorite introductory book about aerodynamics, and I couldn’t miss the sparkle in his eyes.

* * *

Cuadro Four was the only one to come today. The rest were apparently sick. It was really remarkably quiet that day. It was… peculiar. The pleasant, ticklish feeling wasn’t there the entire day. I didn’t feel like teaching, but I wouldn’t tell that to my class. 

Cuadro Four was on his phone the entire day, seemingly bored out of his mind. He snuck out less as the semester continued, but he did today, and I let him. I wanted my students to learn and excel in physics, and I knew he wasn’t going to get anything out of today, so it wasn’t worth my energy and time to stop him.

However, he surprisingly came back early that day. He usually came back in thirty minutes when he snuck out, but for some reason, he came back in five today. But, he had snacks with him. A whole armful of them. 

“Who wants snacks?” Cuadro Four smirked at me.

I don’t know how it happened, but suddenly my classroom was turned into snack time as Cuadro Four handed out bags of chips from his mountain of snacks. He apologized with zero guilt in his tone, but with a simple sigh, I continued the rest of class. I should’ve known better. Any day with the Cuadros– or in this case, a single Cuadro– would be loud. The ticklish feeling came back again as I resumed teaching over the choir of crunches. 

The rest of class went on quietly, and the lunch bell finally rang. All the students hurried out of the class, discussing what they were going to have for lunch. I grabbed a hold of my brown paper bag on my desk, and reached for the plastic bag that contained my bologna sandwich.

“Hey, Mr. Stoneface.” Cuadro Four spoke up from the back of the classroom.

“Yes?” 

Without another word, he dumped the rest of the chips onto my desk.

I furrowed my brows and frowned. This type of behavior was unusual, even for Cuadro Four, “Why–”

He shoved something in my hand before I could say anything and paused for a brief moment, scratching the back of his head like he had something to say. But, instead, he just muttered, “Bye,” and zipped out the door.

I looked at what he shoved in my hand, and it was a sticky note saying, “From the Cuadros.”

And once I looked down at my desk again, I realized that he and his brothers left the chips for me. I got that ticklish feeling again. I recently labelled the feeling as somewhat pleasant. It tickled a lot as I looked at the mountain of chips, remembering Cuadro Three’s doodles of my daily lunch all over his notebook.

* * *

Finals week was finally rolling around, and I was ready to call it quits for two months. The Cuadros were stressed, but that didn’t mean they were any quieter than usual. After having them in my classroom for months now, I realized that the Cuadros were not as dumb as they looked. Cuadro Two was, of course, the best at physics and math. Cuadro Three was surprisingly good at history. Cuadro Four was good at English by some weird circumstance. And Cuadro One was… Cuadro One.

One day, Cuadro One and Cuadro Two were arguing about something that I didn’t bother paying attention to, but they finally stopped with Cuadro One groaning. 

With one sigh, Cuadro One spoke up, “Yo, Mr. Stoneface?”

“What is it?” I didn’t look up from the papers I was grading.

“Can you… Can you go over the hand trick to figure out which way the current flows? I don’t get it.” His voice sounded a bit defeated. 

I looked up, and I could tell he wasn’t joking. He was serious about learning. And that led me to my answer, “Sure, kid.”

“Actually, could you teach me too?” Cuadro Three set his notebook on my desk. “I need to doodle it out to remember.”

“I could use some review.” Cuadro Two dragged a chair over to my desk.

Cuadro Four was silent as he joined us. 

“Okay, listen up, Cuadros. If I see you guys getting this wrong on the test, I will question the purpose of my existence.” That elicited some chuckles from the four, and a small smile from me, “So, when you first look at the problem, you have to identify which way the current is moving. That direction will be where your thumb will be facing, and then…”

* * *

The bell rang, and it was finally over. The students finished up their finals, and surprisingly the Cuadros finished before the bell rang. I was looking forward to not seeing the boisterous quadruplets for two months. I sat down at my desk as I saw my students leaving for the break, but the Cuadros stayed behind.

“Is something the matter?” I asked, folding my hands together.

“No,” Cuadro Two started, “We just wanted to give you some things before the break.”

Cuadro Four set a large, brown bag with the hand-written words, “HAPPY CHRISTMAS TWAT,” on it. I gave him a pointed look, and he shrugged, “Wasn’t me.”

With a sigh, I took the bag and reached into it before Cuadro Three stopped me, “Don’t open it here. Open it when you get home or something.”

I reluctantly agreed, and gave my farewell, “I hope you guys change for the new year. Hopefully a calmer crowd.” 

They exchanged a look. “Yeah, for sure.”

* * *

When I got home, I peeked into the gift bag and saw an envelope with Squidward on the cover, a twenty-five dollar Subway gift card, and a figurine of Spongebob. I slowly tore open the envelope, making sure that I didn’t rip it, and read the letter, which said:

To Mr. Stoneface,

Thanks for not expelling us! And for being a decent AMAZING physics teacher!! Even though you got at us all the time, you let us goof around all the time. We know we grew on you! Anyways, we’re heading to California after this break, so don’t miss us too much. Eat better sandwiches! Take care.

From,

Diego, Mateo, Franco, and Alonso Cuadro

I read the letter a couple times before finally coming to terms that they were actually leaving. Or they were messing around and they were actually coming back. But… I had a feeling they weren’t joking around. And that ticklish feeling dropped to my stomach, creating an unpleasant feeling. I was confused at first, I thought I was going to be ecstatic that they were gone. But I realized that they weren’t going to come into my classroom anymore. They weren’t going to sidetrack the class by talking about random topics. I wouldn’t see any more Spongebobs on quiz papers. I wouldn’t have extra chips for lunch. 

A droplet fell on the letter and, out of confusion, I looked up. Was my roof leaking? But there was nothing from the ceiling. And I started sniffling. I finally felt my face, and I realized that I was crying. I never cried before. And it finally hit me.

You never know a good thing until it’s gone.