501 English Verbs.pdf < Popular ⇒ >

Mariana had a deadline. Her ESL certification exam was in 48 hours, and she hadn’t touched the legendary 501 English Verbs.pdf since downloading it three years ago. The file sat on her desktop like a digital paperweight.

“Wait!” she screamed. “I drink. I drank. I have drunk . I had been drinking . I will have been drinking for three hours by noon!”

She opened the PDF. Page one: “To be: am, is, are, was, were, being, been.” Simple. She yawned. By page 30 ( “To catch: caught, catching” ), her eyes glazed. By page 112 ( “To spring: sprang, sprung” ), she was dreaming of irregular past participles dancing the cha-cha. 501 English Verbs.pdf

“Begin.”

The void shattered. Mariana woke up slumped over her keyboard, cheek pressed against the keyboard, drooling on page 401 ( “To wring: wrung” ). The PDF was still open, harmless and static. Mariana had a deadline

“Welcome to the Conjugation Coliseum,” said the V. “I am Verbius. To return home, you must correctly conjugate any three of the 501 verbs in all their forms—past, present, future, perfect, progressive, and perfect progressive.”

Verbius paused. “Acceptable. Next: .” “Wait

Verbius snapped his stick-figure fingers. A giant screen appeared with the word .

Verbius raised a tiny hand. “Enough. You have passed.”