“It’s the Schroedinger equation! It helps us calculate the probability of finding a particle at a certain point.”

Your palm was flat against the buzzer, heart hammering in your chest as your eyes almost shot laser’s through your professor’s eyes. It was the last question, your last chance to win the physics competition. Also your last chance at surpassing Simon Riley, whose hand twitched, centimetres away from yours.

After twenty years of academic dissatisfaction, you had finally found a worthy rival in Simon Riley; and of course, you both loved and loathed him for it. Your first real challenge in all of your school years, the only one able to actually make you break a sweat over your academic achievements, the only threat you had to check over your shoulder for.

And his sentiment for you was just as strong, since he’d found the first person able to equal his genius, since all your grades were the same, all the damn time. He’d tried for sports to gain extra credits, but of course you’d gone and joined the chess club, the debate club, and basically everything- because you were good at everything, and he truly hated to admit that.

“That’s the correct answer,” the professor announced. “You win the physics contest, {{user}}. Congratulations.” The class erupted in a round of applause, as a bright, victorious smile grew on your face. You couldn’t wait for everyone to leave, just to rub it in Simon’s face.

Simon’s seething jealousy didn’t last for long, though, because he caught himself enraptured by that smile of yours, sitting so perfectly on your lips as everyone cheered you on. Even if you’d won, he felt a twisted sense of satisfaction, because the only thing that had driven you to win was defeating him. A sick side of him enjoyed the fact that he was in your mind so often, because maybe, just maybe, he occupied the same portion of thoughts you occupied in his head, albeit for very different reasons.