A Bad Case of F's

It's a short story about a gril named April having a huge problem with her grades and ends up paying for it until she can get her grades back up.

It was a normal Sunday evening. My sister June and I had gotten our report cards on Friday. On Sunday, every six weeks, I dreaded the moment that I would shakily hand over the folded piece of paper to my parents.  Hopefully, today would be different. It was only the first of all the six weeks, so I couldn’t have gotten bad grades.

            “April! June!” my mom called from downstairs, “I need your report cards!”

            “Coming!” June shouted back happily.

            As always, June flew down the stairs because she wanted to hear right away how proud Mom and Dad were. She always got good grades and she was way overconfident about getting “All A’s”.

            Instead of going down, I simply ignored my mom and continued looking up at the blank ceiling from my paint covered bed that looked like a tornado had blown right over it.

            “April! I need you too! June got good grades again. Did you?”

            I peered out of my door and down the white carpeted stairs.

            “I’ll be down in a minute! I have to find it first!” I lied. The paper was sitting patiently in my front pocket where it had been all weekend.

            As slow as I could, I emerged from my disastrous hiding place and out into the crystal white house. There was no way I could mess this up. I trudged down the stairs and flopped onto the couch in the living room. Ever so carefully, I slipped the report card out of my pocket. I unfolded it and handed it to my dad, catching one quick glimpse of the crisp paper. At least I got an A in art class.

            “Again April? Really? You got an F in every subject.” Dad sighed. “Go back upstairs. Don’t bother each other.” We did what we were told.

            I lie in bed and drifted to sleep, not looking forward to the school that tomorrow brought.

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            Waking up was a slow process for me. As I usually did, I flung on any clean clothes I could find and snuck downstairs, trying not to wake up June. I heard a horn honk outside and I rushed out the door, snagging my backpack on the way out.      

            I hurriedly sprang on the bus and flew down the aisle, not looking at anyone I passed. I hunched down in the last seat with a girl in my English class named May and her best friend Boo.

            We all call her Boo because she was born in October and because of her appearance.  She had a short, badly cut hair cut with pointy ridges and spikes sticking out everywhere. Along with that, she had pure white streaks running down her short hair. Her teeth were never dirty in school because she never ate with us. She always looked pale and always wore everything in black.

            May was a different story. She always wore dresses imprinted with her favorite flowers and childish sneakers. She had long blond hair held up in a large bow that matched her green eyes. She was a perfect student and a great athlete.

            After a few bumps, we were at school. I turned to say goodbye to Boo and May, but stopped when I saw Boo’s face. She was giving me one of her rare smiles. They were tiny and easily missed, peeking out through the corner of her mouth.

            I then hurried off the bus and joined the wave of kids entering Central Peak Intermediate. All through my first class, I kept my head down. At the end of class, the teacher handed out last week’s graded papers. I got seven back with seven F’s at the top.

            The bell rang and I rushed out the door and into the bathroom to wash my hands. I like to draw on my hands in art class and I had to wash off yesterday’s markings. As I left, I shot a glance in the mirror to get a better look at my appearance. In the middle of my forehead, there was a huge red F. On the rest of my face, multiple other F’s in all kinds of colors appeared.

            For the rest of the day, these F’s kept coming. By the end of the day, my whole body was a rainbow of F’s. Just as I was about to exit the school, I saw the smartest kid in school. Her name was Autumn, but we all called her Rush because she got her homework done ahead of time. Maybe she could help me with my problem.

            “Rush!” I sprinted up to her. “Rush you have to help me. I don’t know what’s happening.”

            “Well, it looks like you have a bad case of F’s. I can help you, so follow me.” She started to walk to the library, and I decided that I should follow her.

            “Your cure is getting A’s on all of your papers instead of F’s. For every A, and F will disappear.”

            We split up and arrived back at the library table with dozens of books. First we looked at math, then science, reading writing, English, and social studies. By the time we were done, it was almost 6:00.

            “Thanks Rush!” I yelled as I zoomed out of the library. I had to get home.

            I arrived home and jumped into bed right after dinner. I continued this routine for the rest of the week. Saturday and Sunday, I met Rush at the Central Peak Public Library to study more. The following week, we studied every day but Friday. On Friday, I had a test in every subject.

            I took all the tests with confidence, but all weekend, I waited for Monday to see my test results. By the end of Monday, I had gotten all of my tests and each one was an A. My F’s were completely gone.

            During those few weeks of studying, I learned that grades are really important. Not only did they help me in school, but they also helped a nobody like me get a new best friend named Autumn Rush.

 

Author's Note

This was a school assignment, so it's not my best work.