Saturday morning sees Bella with her notebooks about magic all in her knapsack, her medallion safety-pinned by its chain to her bra just in case she trips the wrong way, waiting with Charlie for pickup for the Avalon trip.
"I'm not sure. Maybe teaching or - I don't really know."
"I recommend avoiding math. Teaching it, learning it - whatever. Don't be like the nerds."
"Maybe you can teach some kind of not-magic course at my school when I start a school. I'm planning to be specialized, but maybe not that specialized."
"That'd be at like - university level though, wouldn't it? That might be a little much for me."
"Maybe, I'm not sure. It could wind up being the sort of school kids show up to afternoons and weekends, like, I don't know, Hebrew school."
"Oh. I don't know."
"University is more likely though. Well, trade school sort of thing."
"University level would give you the ability to not have to do as much work to be the same level of selective. It's already common practice to see grades and essays and talk to teachers about it."
"Well, yes, but I'm not sure I can call someone's English teacher and be like 'hello, can you tell me if Tom Jones is the sort of person who will carelessly handle or deliberately misuse phenomenal cosmic power?'"
"Good point, but it's not like you can do that with someone who's 12, either. Since they haven't settled as who they are in the slightest yet."
"Yeah. So, university is probably more likely and then I have entrance essay questions like 'what would you do with three wishes'."
Darren snickers. "I bet lots of people put 'World Peace' on there without any expansion on it. Technically the world's at peace if everyone's dead or brainwashed, with wishes you should be very careful of what you're getting."
"So I have a minimum wordcount and specify that the genie is kind of a jerk."
"Or maybe not a jerk per se, but the genie will pick the simplest way to produce your wish."
"Aha, so you have to be very specific but it will not be out to get you."
Darren giggles. "If you're going to add a bar for competence, some kind of puzzle would also help. Since I think magic's kind of like a huge puzzle. With math."
"Logic puzzles," she almost joked riddles but Angela doesn't know, "and specificity-requiring genies, maybe short-answer ethics questions with a 'justify your answer on the back' part. And I will charge tuition but if I can afford to I'll give scholarships if people agree to do something of social value for some period of time with their educations."
"It'll be like a normal test to get into college, like the ACT or SAT - except with ethics. And logic."
He giggles. "That's perfect, I support this and will help you make it."
"They're planning to make standardized tests together," whispers Savannah to Angela. "They'll probably elope in a week."
Bella laughs into her hands.
"Shh, details. They move quickly, they can't let a silly thing like age get in the way of standardized testing."
"We do not have to elope to write standardized tests," says Bella primly. "We aren't even writing them yet! They won't be useful until I'm ready to open my school."