Blue Tulips

The countdown started quietly, but got louder as the minutes ticked by. Ajla looked across the room, peering at the heads of her many classmates. Even from far away, she could see Tullia’s black hair with the single blue stripe fluttering in her face. It looked like a glittery waterfall, cascading down her scalp. Ajla made herself look away, back at the white sheet of paper in front of her. The black type reminded her of Tullia’s hair. Her mind fluttered back, but she stopped and blinked fast. Slowly, she picked up her pen and began answering the questions.

Page after page turned by, and letters were circled with red ink. She tried not to think too hard about the colors or the smell of the room, the smell of the rotten determination of 200 teenagers to try and win. To try and win it all, when in reality they all knew: it was going to be Ajla or Tullia.

Ajla scooped her brown hair onto her shoulder, but it didn’t stay long. After cutting it to her collarbone, her curls made the hair bounce off anything it touched, even her own body. Ajla set down her pen and pulled it back into a sloppy bun and continued.

Several minutes flew by, but even as the sound got louder, it seemed to get slower. Ajla answered questions with an ease that no one else in the room possessed. Except for one person.

Ajla was on the very last question when a hand with blue-painted nails shot up. Ajla didn’t even look. She circled an answer and her hand floated up as well. Tullia must’ve heard the wispy sound of a sleeve flying through the air, because she looked back. Her eyes met Ajla for a second. They were blue, like the rest of her. Blue hair, blue nails. Navy blue school uniform. Ajla’s was purple, a checkered mauve that seemed grey in the shadows. Tullia had wanted to match with her when school started so long ago, but Ajla had wanted individuality. Tullia’s eyebrows furrowed across the room. She turned quickly back forward as Professor Yeon-u grabbed her paper.

Eventually, Professor Yeon-u made her way to Ajla’s desk, taking the white sheet away. Ajla watched intently as she returned to her desk, put on a pair of brown reading glasses, and began looking at the tests.

Ajla could feel the room getting smaller. Tullia was doodling on the table with her pencil, sketching something with swooping grey hair. Her pencil moved swiftly, feverishly. Not in the relaxed way Ajla remembered. But Ajla forced herself to think of something else. After all, they both had changed so much. Who was she to think of how Tullia was different when she had become a whole new person herself?

Professor Yeon-u continued moving down the pages. She didn’t use the bright yellow highlighter at all on both papers. Ajla recognized it. It was the same one used so heavily on the first exam she took 7 years ago, when she was 10. After that day, she had sworn it would never touch her page again. Then, the studying started. And then she met Tullia. And then…

Suddenly, Professor Yeon-u gasped. Audibly, but quietly, and then only two people heard it.

Tullia looked up from her drawing. Her eyes bugged out of her skull. Ajla looked at Professor Yeon-u as she uncapped the highlighter and moved it in a sharp line across the page. From what Ajla could see, it crossed out a question number.

Professor Yeon-u turned the page, but closed the packet. Whoever’s test it was, the last question had been wrong. Ajla’s heart caught in her throat. She hadn’t looked long enough at the last question, too determined to turn in her test at the same time as Tullia. She glanced down at the blue-headed girl in the front row. Tullia was back to her desk, but scribbling maniacally and rushed. Ajla could tell she was scared, but for who, Ajla wasn’t sure. Surely Tullia knew that Ajla hadn’t done her best, that the test was hers.

Shakely, Professor Yeon-u stood from her desk. The rest of the students in the hall looked up from their almost-finished tests as she made her way down the rows. Face-down, she set one of the tests on Tullia’s desk. Then she walked to Ajla. Again, she placed it face-down. Her expression was hard. Professor Yeon-u made her way back to her desk.

Ajla stared at the packet. She was scared to turn it over. Tullia didn’t turn it over either. Instead, she looked behind her at Ajla. Quietly, she mouthed, “Three…two…one.”

They flipped the packets over at the same time. No score was written at the top of either of their papers. Ajla couldn’t see any bright yellow coming from Tullia’s page. But, Ajla knew it had been on the very last page. Slowly, she flipped through the questions, taking in her precise, red circles. Out of the corner of her eye, she could make out Tullia doing the same thing. But, instead, hers were sharp, grey checkmarks. Ajla smiled slightly, since that was something that hadn’t changed about the two of them: they always answered questions the same.

One last page was in front of them. Tullia didn’t turn around this time. Instead, she flipped over the page quietly.

Ajla gasped.

On the very last question, a bright beacon of yellow was carved across Tullia’s paper. Ajla hastily flipped her own page, shocked by the absence of the highlighter. A perfect score, Ajla thought with much less reverence as she had before. She could feel a weight, like a bag of water, pushing on her shoulders.

Tullia stood up. She grabbed her test and brought it back to Professor Yeon-u’s desk. A single tear was traveling down her face, the same crystally blue as the rest of her. Tullia placed it down and said, “May I please leave the testing hall?”

Professor Yeon-u nodded, and Tullia left the room.

Ajla watched her leave. A tear also fought its way from her eye, hitting the page in a perfect circle on the correct answer. What would happen now?

Ajla knew, of course. She had wrestled with it for months in advance of this important test. If you get a perfect score on the IP test, you get instantly accepted into Aphidet University. If you get one, one, question wrong, you have to take the test again a year later and repeat a year at whatever advanced school you went to. It would also decrease your chances of getting into Aphidet. Most don’t get into an advanced school, much less AU. And those who don’t pass the first test rarely pass the second. Perfection. And now Tullia’s chance was over.

Ajla started hoping against hope that Tullia hadn’t changed so much, that she was still the determined girl she had known. Only three years ago, Tullia had fallen out of a tree. She kept climbing the tree until she made it to the top. Ajla stared at the door, begging Tullia to walk back in.

But she didn’t. Ajla sat at her desk. Eventually, she got up and walked down the steps. A few students turned in their tests. She knew none of them would pass. Quietly, she walked to Tullia’s desk and looked at her drawing.

It was of Ajla. She could make out the features of her face, lovingly sketched. An array of tulips were woven throughout Ajla's hair, and she smiled at the thought of them being painted blue. Ajla looked farther down. Tullia’s pencil was still on the table. She picked it up and put it in her pocket.

Professor Yeon-u looked up from the grading and her highlighting workout to peer at Ajla, who was right in front of her.

“Yes, Miss Chapman?”

“I would like to request a retest for Tullia Andrus.”

“She will already be taking one next year, Ajla.”

“No, now,” Ajla insisted.

Professor Yeon-u pursed her lips. “Retests so soon are expensive, Miss Chapman. How will you pay for it? I know of your…situation.”

Ajla tightened her fists. She had to work hard to get here. Money was definitely a roadblock in Ajla’s education and paying for a retest was more added. But Ajla couldn't back down.

“Professor Yeon-u, I would like to request a retest for Tullia Andrus. Please put the price on Ajla Chapman’s PM list to be paid back as soon as money is available.”

Professor Yeon-u hesitated, but nodded and typed a curt message to someone on her computer. Her mouse clicked the blue send button.

Ajla smiled. “Thank you.”

With a deep breath, she walked out of the door, just as the timer went off.