Escape with My Heart

I. Show Me how it Ends

Nearby students laughed as the young woman was pushed into a wall, her shoulder impacting hard with the glossy bricks before she crumpled to the ground with a grimace. She sat there dazedly for a moment as people passed her by—some glanced at her with amusement, some completely indifferent and only the rare few looked on with pity, but no one did anything to help her.

Perhaps she should be used to this kind of treatment after enduring it ever since she was young. Each time never failed to leave her stunned at just how cruel people could be and this was no different. She blinked in surprise as her bag was ripped from her slack hands, her current tormentor opening it to unceremoniously dump the contents out onto the floor of the hallway to be crushed by random onlookers.

"Freak," one boy spat hatefully, the slur followed rapidly by many others that she heard daily.

If only she had the courage to actually speak out against them. Just once she would love to inform them that they should read a dictionary and learn better insults, because these were becoming quite tiresome in their frequent usage. Nonetheless, however, these were still effective against her, but she refused to let them see the hurt she felt. She frowned at them through the veil her dark hair created, trying not to flinch when someone mimicked a kick to scare her.

Bullies were something she ought to have been accustomed to, yes… but it still hurt everything time something like this happened. It had begun when she was only a child—mainly just cruel names and taunts. Everything got worse as time went on though, each day harsher than the last, especially since those same bullies from her childhood followed her into high school. She could still recall the first day her tormentors had become more physical, leaving bruises on her skin that lasted for days, but sometimes words could hurt more than violence alone.

The hallway echoed with the shrill sound of the warning bell and her bag was thrown to the floor with the rest of her things. A few uncaring people walked over her things while others kicked it further from her for good measure as they all disbursed. Once the hall was finally clear, she moved quickly to begin gathering her belongings, her shoulder and chest both aching from the abuse.

The second bell rang before she could get much, signaling the start of classes, and she knew she would be late once again no matter how much she hurried. That in mind, she decided to take her time to collect her things. She would already be reprimanded for tardiness despite any excuses, so there was no need to rush. It gave her a few moments of peace at least. She sighed in resignation as she sorted through the broken disks containing her homework files, though thankfully her plexpad was one of the few things that remained undamaged in the wreckage.

Homework was something she kept backup files for, but a new datapad would have been too expensive for her to replace and far more difficult to explain to her parents. They were unaware of just how difficult school was for her and she was only too grateful for their continued ignorance. They had enough to worry about on their own, especially taking her little sister into consideration. Zoe was the one they needed to concentrate on, because if anyone discovered the toddler, they would take her away due to the ridiculous population laws.

Realistically she knew there was only one person she could confide in. Her older brother would simply drop anything if she contacted him right now and he would be by her side in an instant. He knew quite a bit of what went on during school hours. Josh tried as much as he could to defend her. He protected her as much as he was able, but it was difficult for him to interfere when their schedules were so different. She was a grade above him after all, despite the fact that she was younger. He had a lot to deal with on his own as well and the last thing she wanted was to impose more on him when she was already a burden.

No, it was best not to bother him with this. The damage had already been done anyway and she was nearly finished picking everything up. She would rather her family remain ignorant of this incident. She could endure anything these people threw at her, even if only by the skin of her teeth. She was strong enough. No one can make me feel inferior without my consent. She struggled to remind herself of that fact as she stood, the crumbled remains of her belongings tucked away carefully in her bag.

Most of it was unsalvageable, but there were a few things that she would be able to repair once she got home. She was rather good with gadgets and tinkering, so if anything it would be something to take her mind off of her impending detention for being late to class again.

Maddy Shannon sighed and walked toward the classroom by herself.

The first time Maddy realized there was something different about her was during her first day at kindergarten. She had been so excited to begin, to join her brother Josh and all of his friends even if he was older and would be in a separate class. She had enjoyed preschool very much, because learning was fascinating and she expected that she would enjoy this just as much if not more. She had always been a curious child. She loved nature and mathematics and science and reading—naturally school just seemed to be the perfect place for her to learn everything she wanted to know.

It had been a perfect day in the beginning. Her teachers were all really nice, although they talked really slowly for some odd reason and were reciting a lot of information she had already learned on her own. She figured they would move onto newer things once everyone was all settled in. She had even met a girl who had pigtails just like her own, but Maddy was a bit shy and had never really been about so many children her own age before, so she kept her distance for now.

Maddy was happy to just observe everyone else—to get a better idea of how she was supposed to behave in order to make friends. She had been too quiet during preschool and she had not liked being alone so much, so she was determined this time to get it right. She wondered if children her own age were always this… loud and anxious though. Or maybe it was only because today was the first day of school.

The teacher was a pretty lady with brown hair. She introduced herself as Mrs. Carlson and then told them all to select a seat from the many in the room. She had them all write their names down on a small slip of plexipaper as their first project, to be placed on their respective tables to signify who each seat belonged to.

Maddy had felt rather grown up, knowing that the chair she had chosen was meant for her alone once she labeled it. She was disappointed when most of the tables filled up quickly, but she choose one near the front of the room next to a boy with glasses and a the girl with pigtails. She smiled at them as she sat, but they were too immersed with their project to notice. She took her time with her own and carefully scribed her name with neat writing like her mother taught her.

It had pretty curls and curves and her tongue poked out of the corner of her mouth as she tried to get it right. She took longer than the others at her table and when she finished she realized why; their handwriting was different. It was scratchy and shaky and not at all meticulous as hers.

The girl with pigtails, Ceciliaaccording to her new place card, raised her hand once they were all done and she spoke loudly when the teacher called on her. "Mrs. Carlson! She's doing it wrong!" she huffed angrily, throwing a smug look at Maddy when the teacher came to look.

Maddy bit her lip uncertainly, wondering what she had done wrong. She set her pen down, worrying her bottom lip as she studied her name. It looked fine to her.

"Oh my," Mrs. Carlson said in surprise and a large smile broke out on her face. "Well done, Maddy! You have very pretty handwriting," she praised and Maddy felt the worry fade away as she beamed a smile back. "I must say, you are the first five-year-old I know who already knows cursive. Keep up the good work."

As Mrs. Carlson moved to the next table to help a boy who had been struggling, Cecilia crossed her arms with a frown and glared at Maddy for a moment before she turned away. Maddy was still unsure what she had done wrong, but she had a feeling that Cecilia didn't like her very much.

The last hour of class was story time.

Mrs. Carlson had chosen a book to read and after beginning it herself, she began allowing the students to read a page a time. It was a pretty simple book, one of her favorites in fact. Maddy had read it several times with her parents and brother, but some of the other children seemed to be having trouble with it. She frowned as they stumbled over the words, whispered the sentences in unsure tones or even just stared at the pages uncertainly.

A few of the others in the audience laughed as they struggled to read, snickering among themselves before stifling the sound when the teacher gave them a stern look and offered the reader a word suggestion.

Maddy felt confused by the whole thing. She just couldn't understand why reading the book out loud was so difficult or why anyone was laughing. During her own turn, she read the page with enthusiasm. She refrained from making the silly faced and voices her brother and father did when portraying the pirates, but her voice got faster and faster as she read the exciting parts. She finished quicker than the others and by the end the teacher was smiling encouragingly. She returned the book and hurried back to her seat, eager for the next half of the story.

"Show off…" a boy who had been laughing earlier sneered when she sat down.

Maddy winced in confusion and sank lower in her chair as the others at her table laughed in agreement. She held her hands in her lap and bit down on her bottom lip as she tried to figure out what she had done wrong. She only did what the teacher asked her to do. She bowed her head and tried to ignore the glares being thrown her way.

The next day at school no one would acknowledge her. She tried to talk to her tablemates, but Cecilia only turned away while the boy kept his head down. Mrs. Carlson was all still nice and seemed happy when she turned her work in within moments of it being handed out, but the rest of the classroom all seemed to be whispering and laughing whenever she neared and pointing at her.

Maddy suddenly realized that kindergarten was no better than preschool… it was worse. She kept to herself for the rest of the day and only when her parents asked her what was wrong did she learn why the other children were acting so strangely and oddly mean to her. She was special, they explained. She was very bright for her age and the other children were just learning most of what she already knew.

It was upsetting, because Maddy didn't mean to be smart or to come off as superior. She only wanted to learn and possibly make a few friends. Josh offered to share his with her, but she wanted friends of her own and she just didn't understand why no one wanted to be her friend.

That was the first time she ever crawled into her brother's bed to cry.

It escalated year by year, the subtle teasing and cruel remarks eventually becoming more and more creative. Maddy was well known to every single one of her classmates. She had no friends to speak of and yet everyone knew all about the know it all that all the teachers adored. Her peers hated her for it. She was far from the animated girl she had once been though, the one so eager to make friends and go to class.

Maddy had grown increasingly shy and withdrawn during school hours, her fascination with the whole school environment slowly dwindling until she actually dreaded the moment she would step foot inside the crowded hallways. Even though school itself held no appeal, she was still as enthusiastic as ever about learning though, dedicating most of her free time to the library when the other children played. She still participated, raising her hand and answering questions without needing to be prompted, but she counted the minutes until she could return home again.

At home Maddy was a bit quieter than usual, but just as open with her family as she had always been. She never mentioned the fact that she sat alone at lunch or that all of the librarians knew her by name. She felt better at home though, even though she kept the loneliness to herself. Her brother still read books with her almost every night and he still made strange voices and acted out the scenes. Her father sometimes joined in to play the dashing hero on nights he stayed home with them. Her mother helped to create costumes and props out of things lying around the house and continued to help her with her writing and other studied that interested her.

Maddy eventually came to the slow conclusion that perhaps she could live without the friendship of her schoolmates. Cecilia and the others would never be as obnoxiously funny as her brother or as ingenious as her parents. She was content enough with her parents and her brother.

Compared to her family, friends just seemed overrated.

Maddy was only eleven when her sister was born. Her mother had to go spend some time with relatives in the country for the duration of the pregnancy, under the guise of taking a well-deserved one year sabbatical from her work at the hospital. It all had to be done very discreetly, because no one could know that her mother was pregnant.

If that information made it to the ears the authorities, Population Control would have demanded the child be terminated like some… some pest. They would have killed an unborn child just because of a stupid law that prevented families from having more than two children.

It would be eight long months before the baby would be born. She and Josh had not seen their mother since the news was first announced. She left that night and called regularly, but the house felt decidedly empty without her presence. Her absence is what prompted Maddy to do some extensive research on the population laws.

A Family is Four. A ridiculous slogan, one that Maddy had come to despise after even just the barest delve into the laws from the school computer terminals in the library. She was paranoid enough not to use any of her own equipment to study anything, lest it lead back to her family—the school terminals would provide a bit of anonymity… after she disabled all of the security cameras.

It was actually as easy as watching the principal input a code and mimicking it in the software, no one the wiser. If the police kept track of people looking into those laws, especially in regards to punishment and what would happen to the child if it were discovered, she made sure not to be one of them.

As the due date approached, Maddy and Josh were left in the care of their grandparents while their father went to go stay at the hidden safe house so he could be there when the child was born. It happened on a Tuesday. Her uncle had delivered the baby himself—another doctor, just like the rest of the family. And thankfully one who specialized as an obstetrician. The baby was a girl and was given the name Zoe Eliza Shannon. She was only five pounds and four ounces.

It was three more months before either Maddy or Josh actually got to meet their new sister. She had to be smuggled into the city in order to keep her from being discovered. Zoe was the most precious little thing that Maddy had ever seen. Her hair was just a small tuft of black, her face rounded and her arms and legs wrinkled with baby fat. Two dark brown eyes glittered up with a sleepy curiosity and Maddy fell in love with her instantly.

Josh only stared down at her with a frown. "She looks… squishy," he said, wrinkling his nose.

Maddy elbowed him in return. "She's perfect."

No one could ever know about Zoe. She would be taken away if anyone knew about her and none of them ever wanted to be parted from her now that she was part of their lives. Zoe had to be protected, had to be raised inside of their apartment. She could never know more than the faces of her family. She would have to sleep in the same bed as their parents, would have to be kept completely isolated for as long as possible.

Maddy swore her brother to absolute secrecy, even though she knew her parents had done the same eight months ago. She knew what happened to the children who were confiscated by the government. She was very astute for an eleven year old and after her little research project, she probably knew more about the population laws than her parents did now.

Unwanted children were not just taken away and placed into homes or orphanages, not even with foster families… they were placed into concentration camps with the thugs and thieves and murderers that the government had no idea what to do with.

Rebreathers were considered a luxury item not to be afforded to the camps despite the necessity of them to purify the air. That meant there was no protection from the poisonous, miasmic smog that clouded the skies and polluted the atmosphere. Most of the younger children died from too much exposure, their lungs giving out before they were old enough to get away from those places.

Likewise there was no protection from the radiation from the sun or even just the cold of the night. It was a death sentence to be sent there. In the minds of the politicians who wrote the laws, sitting on their high and mighty pedestals within the safety of a hyperbaric dome—where they could actually breathe filtered oxygen—they were doing what was right to control the population.

Maddy had to wonder if all that oxygen therapy had gone to their heads, because she was only eleven and even she could see that it was just senseless murder. Unfortunately anyone who stood against the laws or the people who wrote them were either imprisoned as traitors under trumped up charges or assassinated under the guise of protecting the peace. Either way it meant one less person to use up valuable resources.

Everyone knew about it, but no one could do anything to stop it.

Maddy felt for those imprisoned and punished for the crime of simply living, but she swore to herself that her sister would have a better fate than that. She would protect her forever. She only wished she knew a way to keep her family safe.

Maddy ended up sharing a class with her brother during middle school and things seemed to get better. Apparently her teachers believed she was unchallenged by the same curriculum her peers were doing, because they asked her to take some assessments and she had somehow managed to test out of her own grade level to be placed in several higher courses.

School was much more comfortable with Josh by her side and she actually began to enjoy it on most days. She usually sat with him, slowly beginning to open up to some of his friends. They were nice to her and they never once called her names. She still kept to herself for the most part, but it was nice to speak with other people for a change.

Taunts still happened regularly and she was still teased and ridiculed for being smart. She just found herself not caring quite as much as she used to, because there was only so much her tormentors could do when she had her brother and his friends looking out for her. She was protected and it felt wonderful, even if the others were only doing it for the sake of her brother.

The teachers were the worst part about school though. No longer was she praised for her ability to absorb and apply information—she always tried her hardest to please them, but it seemed as if each attempt only made them angrier with her for some reason.

Mr. Gale, her science teacher, was the only one who tolerated her. He graded her fairly, although he did mark her down for disturbances in his classroom. She knew it was unfair, because she was never the one who actually caused the disturbances. She just somehow always managed to end up with a pile of notes on her desk with various insults written on them or someone would drop something cold and slimy down the back of her shirt to make her jump and shriek.

It was never her fault, but she got punished for it anyway.

Josh had definitely become her rock. He never said anything when she approached his bed, unable to find the peace of mind to sleep in her own. He would just move over, pushing himself against the wall to give her some room to join him and he would hold her all throughout the night. She always fell asleep instantly, because she felt so safe in his arms.

Maddy didn't know what she would ever do without him.

Maddy knew something was wrong as she rubbed absently at her chest, unable to pay attention to her history teacher. Her chest ached a bit, though she easily dismissed it as lingering pains from being pushed into a locker this morning. She sighed heavily, sitting low in her chair as the instructor rambled on monotonously about the Great Famine of 2125, only to frown as someone threw a note on her desk.

As much as she just wanted to ignore it, Maddy knew she would be in trouble should the teacher spot it. Being discreet and quiet, she took it in her hand and unfolded it. It was another crude drawing, just like the one she had found written on her own locker this morning, but this one was a bit more disturbing.

Do yourself a favor, the choppy, awkward script proclaimed, complete with an illustration of a stick figure with a noose around its neck.

It was not an odd occurrence and even the contents were becoming something of a commonplace. She received at least one a day most weeks and each time they were getting more and more difficult to simply overlook.

Maddy crumbled the note in her fist without a second thought, crushing it completely and resisting the urge to throw it right back. Her eyes burned as she stared straight ahead, not acknowledging the snickering around her from her classmates. Her heart pounded as she tried to control her breathing, sinking even lower in her seat as she bowed her head.

In her attempt to control her emotions, Maddy forgot all about the pain in her chest.

During the summer between eighth grade and their freshmen year of high school, Josh had developed an interest in music. He bought a vintage guitar with practically his entire savings account and began the tedious process of teaching himself to play. He was terrible at first and Maddy had to force herself to sit patiently through hours upon hours of missed chords and loud screeching, but he certainly began to improve as the summer progressed.

By July he had even managed to become good at it, so much that he went out to purchase some tab transcriptions in order to learn actual songs. Josh had even managed to gain some new friends during those few months, all who shared his newfound interest. They were likewise teaching themselves how to play their chosen instruments and soon Josh began leaving the house daily to practice with them elsewhere.

It was nice at first if a bit strange, the quietness a bit startling after a whole month of constant strumming and fumbling. It wasn't until Josh started staying out later and later that it began to get a bit lonely without his presence.

Maddy was not like him. Her brother could waltz into a room of strangers and leave moments later with a handful of new friends. She had no friends; she had acquaintances, ones that she was not particularly fond of even. She was alone and she felt it more when he was not there to keep her from remembering that fact. She did not like this feeling, like she was being left behind.

Josh had just always been there; he was always there when Maddy was upset or even just bored. He made everything better, even when she didn't ask him to. She knew it was selfish of her and unfair to him to want him beside her all of the time, but this new feeling his absence invoked was awful.

This feeling of being left behind, of being forgotten, only continued to grow and it was not something she could make disappear. He would never try to hurt her intentionally and she knew that, which is why she tried not to let him know just how much it upset her to watch him leave every day.

Maddy instead attempted to keep her mind occupied and dedicated her days to helping her sister. Zoe had no friends of her own to spend the summer with either considering she had never been allowed out of the house and only a select few even knew about her existence. So Maddy brought out all of the books she and Josh used to read together to continue on the tradition.

In regaling the toddler with enthralling tales of pirates scouring the open seas or princesses locked away in towers to be saved by a handsome price, Maddy found some solace. She even used dramatic voices and dug out the old props to put on a show.

Zoe seemed to enjoy the book as much as she did. She was quite the intelligent child and though it would be a long time before Maddy could begin teaching her sister how to read, she decided to teach her the alphabet and some basic phonics. It felt nice to teach her sister, to be someone who she depended on just as Maddy depended on her.

It almost felt like she was needed.

Everything only just continued to get progressively worse during junior year.

Josh had begun dating his longtime friend, Kara. She was one of the lead singers in his new band and she was a nice girl who seemed very carefree and confident. She had never participated in the bullying before either, so Maddy was a bit at a loss of why she disliked her girl so much.

It could have been because she was distracting Josh. His every thought seemed to revolve around Kara now. The other girl was steadily stealing away all of the time that Maddy and her brother usually spent together, taking way the only moments that weren't already consumed by his music. He was so distant lately and every other word out of his mouth was either about his new girlfriend or how well his band was doing.

Maddy found herself floundering without her only confidant. She barely even saw him at school anymore as it was. She had tested out of another grade level and they were separated once again by drastically different schedules. She had already lost whatever peace the last year had brought her.

No longer surrounded by what little protection her brother could spare, she was regularly shoved into lockers or walls and tripped while she was walking. Her property was regularly defaced and she discovered crude comments and notes more often than usual. Worst of all, people seemed to take perverse pleasure in stealing her homework and ruining it.

The young woman had only one consolation in this entire desolate place and his name was Logan Reed. He knew Josh through their band and she had met him one night when he came over to practice a song. He was always so nice to her. He often smiled at her when he saw her in the hallways and sometimes if he was nearby when it was happening, he would tell people to leave her alone or help her gather her belongings that had been strewn along a hallway.

Logan was older than her, but not by much. She thought he was very handsome and smart and she liked talking to him. Some days he was the only person to talk to her and she eventually found herself imagining what it would be like to kiss him.

Maddy was only fifteen and he was her first crush after all.

It was just a cough.

Maddy rubbed at her chest as she tried to study. Her mother was working late in the hospital and her father was passed out on the couch in a dead sleep so he could be ready for his own graveyard shift at work later on. She had no idea where her brother was, though suspected he was either busy with Kara or his band—possibly both—somewhere.

Zoe was the only other one in the house awake at the moment, but she was busy eating the meager meal that Maddy had been able to prepare for her. It was usually just the two of them most nights and though Maddy enjoyed cooking, it was difficult to please a child with the flavorless protein concentrate and synthetic seasoning. She tried her best to make it edible, but she thought her sister was just humoring her as she took a big bite.

Another cough coursed through her and Maddy felt a strange pain surge through her chest. She figured she had just made herself sick with the crying she had done after school—it had been a particularly bad day and she could not have stopped the turbulent emotions from breaking free if she tried. Today was not even the first day for her to fall apart. All throughout the week she hid in her own bed and cried silently beneath the covers.

Maddy was beginning to feel more and more helpless every day. Everyone else was too distracted to notice. It was okay though, because the last thing she wanted was for them to get involved. Her family was struggling. She could see it every day in the way her parents greeted each other and how her brother was always absent. It would only become worse if they had to deal with her problems on top of that.

Abandoning her studied for a moment, Maddy washed her face for any lingering traces of tears for the third time and retrieved a bottle of pain medication from her mother's medical kit. She took a few pills with a sip of water, sighing when she realized that she had managed to work her way through almost half of the bottle already. She had been taking these pills almost every night, so it should not be surprising. If she had better control of her emotions, maybe she wouldn't be in pain so often to need them.

Glancing at the mirror, something caught her attention before she could walk away. Her shirt had shifted enough that she could see the bruises on her chest. She winched s she touched the tender skin, the deep tissue bruises obviously attributed to her bullying. She was being pushed roughly into walls and other solid objects hourly after all and her shoulders and her back were all just as bruised. She hardly had a chance to heal before more were added.

Maddy was sure they would go away eventually. She just needed to keep them covered until then.

Maddy first saw the advertisement when she was looking through a science magazine on her plexpad. It took up three whole pages of the magazine, bedazzling with bright flashing colors and bold lettering that caught her attention as it was meant to. She had seen the advertisements for Terra Nova before. Everyone had.

Terra Nova was the last hope that humanity had for survival as a species. It was the last hope the whole world had. Each year Hope Plaza offered a lottery that would sponsor the winner and their immediate family to go through the time fracture as opposed to being recruited by the government.

The time-space fracture was discovered here in Chicago by some scientists who had been conducting subatomic experiments less than ten years ago. It had redefined science itself and turned reality into one real life science fiction novel about time travel and alternate realities. The portal led to eighty-five million years into the past, to the alternate time stream of an amazingly pure world free of the pollutions that damned this one.

Going to Terra Nova was the ultimate dream for anyone. There was not a person alive on this earth who did not crave to go there and Maddy was no exception. So few people were ever actually chosen to go there—the population of Terra Nova had yet to even reach one thousand and it probably wouldn't be there until at least two more pilgrimages were sent through the portal.

Most everyone went had to be recruited. Her mother even recently said she spotted the recruitment people asking for personnel files at the hospital. They were searching for doctors, scientists, farmers, military officers… people with practical skills and knowledge to help provide the new building blocks for recreating civilization. The random lottery was the only chance the masses had at going there, even if it was a slim margin of hope.

Maddy knew that her parents applied to win the lottery every single time a new pilgrimage was announced. There had been nine to go through the time fracture and the Tenth Pilgrimage was set to go through within the next year. Six months before that the recruiters would select their people and the lottery winners would be announced, so people had time to go through intensive psychiatric evaluations and medical tests to ensure everyone was… adequate.

This advertisement was different though, because it had nothing to do with the lottery.

It was a contest.

SOLVE THIS EQUATION FOR THE TRIP OF A LIFETIME!

The Weaver Corporation is celebrating their success of winning the security contract for Hope Plaza by sponsoring one lucky family for the ultimate, all-expense pin trip to Terra Nova. The winner and their family will enjoy special accommodations in the colony as well as many other prizes.

To apply, simply fill out the form and follow the instructions below. Submit your finished equation by the deadline and the contestant who either solves or is closest to solving is our winner! Good luck to all applicants.

No purchase necessary. Legal residents of the 67 United States of the age majority in their jurisdiction of residence at the time of entry only. Ends 5/1/2149. To play and for Official rules, including odds and prize descriptions visit the Hope Plaza or the Weaver Corporation official websites. Void where prohibited.

Maddy was instantly intrigued by it.

Each issue of this magazine always had little equations n them. Some were for contests with small prizes that most people couldn't afford, but many were just mind exercised for fun. Some were even designed to be unsolvable. She usually played around with these equations anyway as a way to keep her mind occupied. It was calming on days she just felt the world was going to crumble around her.

Many times when the next issue came around with the answers and results, Maddy was either correct or very close in her deductions. Even on some of the more difficult puzzles. She was good with numbers and theorems and puzzles. Sometimes it felt like all she had, expect for a lot of old books and a penchant for talking too much in ways that annoyed everyone around her.

This equation would definitely take her some time to figure out, though she supposed it couldn't hurt to enter. There was not a lot of information supplied to help solve it and she had never seen one so complex before. She doubted she even stood a chance against the millions of people who likely subscribed to the magazine too, people who were probably smarter than her, but she was of the age majority, just eligible to enter, and she really did trying to solve these puzzles.

It was a nice dream, no matter how unlikely it was that her solutions would be the most accurate.