Short Stories

Short Story No.4

I don't like this story, as I wrote it over a year ago, but I thought I'd put it out there anyway.

Word Count - 796

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"Look you know what's going to happen if you don't own up." Mrs Jones growled as her stance went from her normal calm teacher act to angry, stern teacher that only occasionally appears.

"Oh, not again," groaned Amelia, under her breath as we walked into the classroom.

A smirk slowly grew across my face as I saw my handy work was having the desired effect! I had, in my opinion done an amazing job making sure it looked like a bomb had gone off. The room had been ransacked from top to bottom. Chaos reigned!

"Come on own up, who did it?!" shouted Mrs Jones, the now pulsing blood vessel on her head looked like it was going to pop.

The classroom was deadly quiet, the tension in the room could be cut with a knife and we'd only been in there two minutes.

"If no-one owns up by the end of the lesson you'll ALL have a 40-minute detention after school to tidy up." Mrs Jones threatened. As per usual no one said anything, and I obviously wasn't going to say anything. Everyone else knew it was me and kept giving my deadly stares throughout the rest of the lesson, which was spent in the unoccupied classroom next door.

After the lesson Amelia and some others approached me, "Why would you mess up Mrs Jones' classroom, Amy? 40-minute detention! Are you really that selfish? You're so irritating." With that, she turned and stormed off. I do admit I hate being called selfish, they have no clue what I have to put up with.

My father died when I was 9, now I'm 13. I reckon I'm over it, but my mum claims she's still grieving. I think she's just using it as an excuse for her alcohol addiction. I hate being called selfish because that's what she calls me whenever I try to stop her drinking or doing something she will regret, like ripping up the remaining photos of him or smashing the pictures. Without him there, everything seems to be my fault.

Anyway, I didn't feel that guilty about messing up Mrs Jones' classroom. She'd set about 3 pieces of homework last week and to be honest who likes homework? I mean us students don't like it and I'm pretty sure the teachers aren't too fussed about marking it.

Well, there was no getting out of the detention, trust me I'd thought of everything to get out of it and if the 'suck ups' can't get out of it, there's no chance I'd be able to. If I don't leave school when it finishes I miss my bus and my mum certainly won't pick me up. That leaves me no option but an hour and a quarter walk home. NOT what you want on a Wednesday afternoon.

At lunch, my friend Lucy came over, she's probably my closest friend and unfortunately caught up in the detention too. I did feel guilty because she didn't do anything, neither had the others apart from being generally annoying, I guess. Then again Mrs Jones deserved it; she shouldn't set as much homework.

"Amy, are you really going to get us all into detention because of your problems at home?" my cheeks coloured, "I mean I know you're not exactly 'best friends' with everyone but don't you think that all these detentions have gone on too long?" Taken aback by her unusual straight talking, I replied hesitantly,

"Do you really think I should tell Mrs Jones that it was me?!"

Inside my sensible head was saying that I suppose I should stop making others take the blame for things I did. Lucy nodded. I sighed my response, "OK, if you really want me to own up...but only cos it's you."

"I'll come with you if you want me too."  Lucy replied earnestly.

"I can't believe I'm agreeing to this." As I dramatically sloped up the main staircase to the staffroom.

In hindsight I still do kind of regret owning up, who wouldn't? But then again Mrs Jones couldn't leave it alone and delved deeper into why I'd done it. She managed to get out of me how my mum was and suddenly she became a whole lot nicer. I wasn't completely off the hook though. She made me clean the whole classroom at the end of the day. She also put me on report until the end of term, which means closer scrutiny from all teachers AND I had to walk home, in the rain!

The upshot of all of this is, that I'm doing much better in school because now I report to Mrs Jones every Friday lunchtime and we chat about all sorts and sometimes I talk about what happens at home, sometimes I don't.