The Lucky Chair

A Science teacher discovers that one of her chairs gives better test scores and quizzes.

In Room 214 of Lincoln High, the Advanced Placement Biology class had a peculiar legend: the "Lucky Chair." It was an unremarkable plastic seat in the third row, second from the window, yet it held an almost mythical status. For three years, every student who sat there scored higher on exams than anyone else in the class—often without cracking a textbook. Whispers of its power spread, and students vied for the spot, claiming it brought them inexplicable clarity on topics like cellular respiration or Mendelian genetics.


The teacher, Ms. Harper, a no-nonsense biologist with a penchant for data, initially dismissed the rumors as teenage superstition. But the pattern was undeniable. In 2022, Sarah Kim, who admitted to skipping most study sessions, aced the AP exam with a 5. In 2023, Raj Patel, notorious for dozing off, outperformed even the class valedictorian. By 2024, the chair’s reputation was ironclad, and students like Mia Chen, who snagged it last, reported “feeling” answers during tests, as if the chair itself whispered Krebs cycle details.


Unbeknownst to all, the chair’s magic stemmed from an unlikely source: Ethan Wu, a student from the class of 2022. Ethan was a biology prodigy, so overprepared for AP Bio that he’d mastered the curriculum before the school year began. Bored during class, he turned to an eccentric hobby: he’d sit in the third-row chair, running his fingers along its edges, mentally projecting his knowledge into it. He’d visualize ATP synthesis, DNA replication, every concept, willing the chair to “absorb” his understanding for future students. Ethan, a bit of a mystic, half-believed he could imbue objects with intent, though he never told a soul. He graduated, leaving the chair behind, its legend quietly taking root.


Ms. Harper, ever the scientist, grew curious. In the fall of 2024, she decided to test the chair’s supposed powers. She began moving it around the room, assigning it to struggling students. First, she placed it at the desk of Lucas Reed, who’d been flunking quizzes. Lucas, skeptical but desperate, sat in the chair for a unit on ecology. To everyone’s shock, he scored an 85 on the next test—his highest ever. Ms. Harper then gave the chair to Aisha Khan, who’d been stumped by protein synthesis. Aisha’s next exam earned her a 92, and she swore the chair “vibed” with her.


The class buzzed with excitement, but Ms. Harper wanted proof. She devised an experiment. She replaced the Lucky Chair with an identical one from another classroom, telling no one. The next student assigned to it, Tyler Gomez, bombed his test, reverting to his usual low scores. When Ms. Harper swapped the original chair back, Tyler’s scores spiked again. The chair, it seemed, was no placebo.


Determined to unravel the mystery, Ms. Harper dug into her records, tracing the chair’s occupants back to its first miraculous year. She cross-referenced seating charts with test scores, narrowing it down to the fall of 2021, when the pattern began. One name stood out: Ethan Wu.


He’d sat in the chair for the entire year, consistently scoring perfect marks. Curious, she tracked him down through a college contact. Ethan, now a sophomore studying neuroscience, laughed when she called. He confessed his odd ritual—his attempt to “encode” biology into the chair, though he’d never expected it to work.


Ms. Harper hung up, staring at the chair. She didn’t believe in magic, but Ethan’s focus, his sheer mastery, had left an imprint—perhaps psychological, perhaps something stranger. She decided to keep the chair in rotation, letting it work its “magic” for those who needed it most.


As she locked up Room 214, she smiled, wondering what other secrets her classroom held.