The Test

The Test

“I really need to pass this test.” Quincy thought to himself as the facilitator distributed the scantron sheets. Everything rode on his passing his EMT medical exam.He had a job interview the next day, and needed to land that job to keep his room at the halfway house.

Growing up with dyslexia made it difficult for him to read and retain knowledge in a timely manner so he had resigned himself to studying for the test sixteen hours straight before he was due to take it. He looked around the room at the other prospective EMT’s. They were all at least twenty years younger than him, most likely headed to the fire academy. He knew he couldn’t do that. He was older, washed up, past his prime, but if he passed this test there would be a small glimmer of hope in his hopeless world.

He hunkered down at his table and began answering the questions. He couldn’t remember if hypothermia was when the temperature went down in the body of if it was hyperthermia! It must be hype to go up, he thought.

The other students had finished and he was the last person there and he still had twelve unanswered questions. He panicked and sped read through the rest of them and dashed off the answers.

The passing score was 75, he waited tensely as the tests were scored.
“Quincy Dobson.” called the facilitator.
“Yes?” he stood at the table.
“Congrats, you got 76.” she said with a smile.
Quincy’s face transformed from worried to smiling in the slow realization that he still had a shot at attaining some kind of success in life. He took the results, said thanks, and broke into tears of joy as he walked down the cold streets of Detroit.