Chapter One Leah and Friends.
Leah was all prepared for her
first day of school as a first grader. She received a personal trainer
to educate her, for preschool, so now she is now going to join all of
her new to be friends in an adventure filled year of reading, writing,
and arithmetic, and horseplay, and childsplay.
On the
first day, her class was remarkably quiet. She was number sweet sixteen
of twenty enrolled students, twelve gals, eight guys.
Let's
meet them: Ladies First; of course everyone knows Leah, then there's
Sarah, Harriette, Samantha, Lillian, Hillary, Ariana, Elizabeth,
Anabelle, Jasmine, Evani, and Katie. And the now fellas: Introducing
Brian, Aaron, Ricky, Dana, Freddie, KC, Henry, and Stanley.
Once
the gangs all in they settle down, and then gets rowdy. First Leah
finds herself in the company of Elizabeth, Hillary, and Anabelle, as the
classroom was setup in tables not desks. Anabelle excused herself long
enough to make her seat seem vacant. Then here comes Stanley.
"You can't sit here, this is a girl's table, go back to the boys table over there." Hillary started.
"You can't tell what to do, you are not my momma." Stanley replied
"I'm your momma now little boy, and I said you can't sit here."
"What you gonna do about it?" Stanley teased
"Is there a problem here children?" The teacher asked
"He is sitting in that girl's seat." Hillary testified.
"No I am not. No one is sitting here. She said this is a girl's table, but I want to sit here."
"Young
man, this isn't your seat, you were sitting over there a moment ago. I
need you to return to it and stay there. Now go back hon."
"See there, I told you" Hillary remarked and stuck her tongue out at him, but the teacher didn't see it."
"Hey she poked her tongue me" Stanley added
"Young man just go back to your seat please." The teacher reiterated.
"That was mean. You're a mean girl" Elizabeth said.
"Shut up, no one was talking to you." Hillary responded Then Hillary noticed Leah staring at her. "What are you looking at?"
Leah.... did not respond.
"Leave her alone, she didn't do anything to you." Liz defended.
"Mind your business nappy girl."
"I'm telling!" Elizabeth attempted to get the Teacher's attention, and then tried getting out of her seat.
"Go ahead and tell, it won't do anything." Hillary said.
"What are you doing out of your seat?" The teacher asked Liz
"She called me nappy."
"(Sigh) It's only the first day, and it's going to be one of those days. I need an aspirin."
"What?"
"Nothing dear. Listen, go back to your seat, and do not pay her attention, okay."
"But she..."
"But nothing, go back, and don't pay her any attention, and you will be fine." The teacher said.
"See, I told you it wouldn't do anything." Hillary reiterated who now has her feet in her chair.
"Hey, get your stanky feet out of my chair!" Liz proclaimed
"I don't see your name on it." Hillary said. She continued. "Don't even bother telling the teacher this time."
Elizabeth attempted to move Hillary's legs from her chair, but Hillary smack her hand.
"Don't be touching my shoes. My momma paid good money for them. Their pretty and you'll dirty them up."
"Ms (Teacher), she hit me!" Elizabeth said as she turned around.
"This is why you must never leave your seat without permission." The teacher said.
"She won't move her feet out of my seat."
They both turn around to see Elizabeth seat is empty.
"They're not there now hon. Why don't you just sit down and relax now, okay?"
"But..."
"And please stay in your seat and don't get up, and ignore what she says to you." The teacher said
"Yes Ma'am"
"Good"
"Nan Nan, you got in trouble," Hillary mocked.
"Leave me alone, don't even talk to me!" Elizabeth responded
"I wasn't talking to you, so there."
(Anabelle Returns)
"I am so glad your back, she's mean. I don't like her." Elizabeth testified.
"She only like that to people she doesn't know" Anabelle responded.
"What is she like when she does know somebody?" Elizabeth asked
"She's still mean, but she goes easy on them, sort of."
"I don't want any part of her, we switch seats right now."
"Whatever, I don't care" Anabelle said
"The Teacher said don't get out of your seat." Hillary added.
"Just ignore her Elizabeth" she said to herself.
The bait and switch was made.
Now Anabelle sat next to Hillary and Elizabeth across from Anabelle next to Leah on her left.
"Thanks, what's your name?"
"Anabelle, but you can call me Ana"
"I am Elizabeth, but you can call me Liz."
"Nice to meet you."
"Are you her friend?" Liz asked.
"Kinda."
"How?"
"Just is I guess."
"How?"
"Please, don't try to understand it, even I don't, it's better that way." Ana replied.
"I
won't worry about it anymore. All that matters is I am sitting next to
my new best friend, but she's quiet she doesn't say much."
Elizabeth looks to Leah, who has been quiet the whole time.
"Hey girl, what's you name? Why you don't say anything?"
Leah with her pretty little eyes matched up with Liz. She wanted to answer, but couldn't manage to release the energy.
"What's wrong? You sad?"
"She doesn't want to talk to you, leave her alone." Hillary added.
"Be quiet! I am not talking to you." said Elizabeth.
"Couldn't ignore me couldn't you?"
"Gosh, she gets on my nerves!"
"It's okay Liz, it's takes some time (about Hillary). Maybe she'll talk when she's ready...or maybe...(about Leah)" Ana started
"What?" Liz asked
Anabelle pulls out a pencil and some paper.
"...We can get her to talk on paper. Say, can you write? Can you draw?"
(Leah nervously and faintly nods)
"Good. Let's see what you got!" Ana challenged as she slid the pencil and paper over to Leah.
Leah
hesitated and took a deep breath and gracefully and slowly picked up
the pencil and traced on the paper. Afterwards she paused, long enough
to make Liz and Ana think she was done, but not necessarily the case.
Anyways Liz grabbed the paper anxious to see what Leah accomplished
already.
"L-E-A-H, what does that spell...LAY-EAH?" Liz questioned"
"I think that spells Leah" Ana corrected."
"How do you know that?"
"I think I have a cousin with that name."
"So is that her name?"
"Let's ask her, is that your name?"
Leah nods slowly again but this time with some warmness
"Of course that's her name, that's a dumb question to ask a girl." Hillary blurted.
"Ohh, I liked how you wrote your name it's so pretty." Liz complimented
And finally Leah managed to say her first words.
"Thank you." Leah said ever so softly with more warmness.
"Oh
my goodness she spoke! You have pretty voice, you should talk more
often, and I like your hair, it's so soft and curly. I wish my hair was
like that, mine is so..."
"Nappy, your hair is nappy! Goodness, why don't you marry her if you like her so much?" Hillary added.
Elizabeth nearly lost her temper but controlled herself.
"Liz, don't let her get to you." Ana encouraged
"Can't you please just tell her to leave me alone?"
"It doesn't work like that exactly."
"What are you going to do about it Elizabeth, you ole nappy haired girl?" Hillary reinstated.
"Oh,
what's the use anyway. I can't tell the teacher, I can't get out of my
seat, and talking to her is doing no good, Maybe I need an aspirin
like the teacher does. That's it! We got to give the teacher some
aspirin!" Liz stated.
"What?" Ana asked.
"She can't do anything until she feels better, and I want to help her." Liz added.
"Do you really think that's a good idea Liz?" Ana asked
"Yeah, my auntie takes aspirin all the time when me and my cousins are playing around, it makes her feel better." Liz testified.
"Where are we going to find aspirin? And how are we going to get it to her?" Ana asked
"Their should be a doctor around here, maybe they have some there." Liz said.
"We have to get past the teacher"
"I know, I wanted to surprise her."
"With medicine, I never heard of such."
"I guess your right, what was I thinking?" Liz ended.
"No, I know you meant well, she'll like you after while."
"You ain't fooling nobody, you were trying to drug the teacher." Hillary added.
"What would you do instead Hillary?" Ana asked.
"What
I do is leave her alone and mind my own business. Can't you see that
she doesn't want to me bothered? She's all edgy." Hillary testified.
"I have to agree with Hillary Liz, the teacher does look like she could snap."
"What do you mean snap?" Liz asked.
"She mean go crazy, berserk, looney, like you." Hillary added.
"I didn't ask you, I was asking Ana."
"Yeah, what she said Liz. But I wasn't really meaning that, it was a figure of speech, but I don't know." Ana added.
"I
am kind of scared of her, something about her is just...i don't know.
If we get on her nerves, she could turn into a monster." Liz said while
suggestively eyeing Hillary.
Hillary responded with a sudden out burst of "BOO!"
"You
don't scare me, just annoy me. I'm worried that she won't let us play
and have fun. I really don't want to be sitting down all day reading
books and stuff." Liz said
Finally the children would get to
see the teacher in action. Though a little shaky, disoriented and worn
she still managed to put enough fear into the class to make them obey
because the whole class thought if they didn't obey she would go crazy.
"Attention
Class, settle down listen to me, I am speaking. My name is Mrs
Crawford, I am your teacher for this class. I have an assistant named
Miss ----, unfortunately she isn't here today. That is why I am a
little stressed today, so please bear with me... (sees Katie's hand up)
Yes dear?"
"Can I be your helper person Mrs Crawford?" Katie asked.
"No
thank you hon, that's sweet of you, I'll be fine. So I need know
everyone's name so let's form a circle on the carpet in the back of the
room near the coat closet. Nice and neatly please."
And the children
did just that, surprising without much incident. Elizabeth managed to
sit as far away from Hillary as she could and coaxed along Leah by
holding her hand nonchalantly. Ana apparently didn't make it to be near
Elizabeth as they were separated by Lilian, Evani, and Ariana
respectively.
Hillary was ironically between Stanley and Freddie.
"Well
Lookie here Freedie, it's 'I don't want you to sit here'. Let's have
some fun. Is this seat taken Miss?" Stanley started.
"Eh, it's a free country." Hillary responded.
"What? You're not gonna tell me to not to sit here?" Stanley asked.
"Nope."
Stanley is thrown off by Hillary's unusual reaction, but tries to keep cool.
"Well, then I guess you must want me to sit here."
"No, not really."
"Well too bad. I'm sitting here."
"Fine by me."
And so Stanley took his seat to the left of her and Freddie did likewise to her right.
And then Freddie leaned over to Stanley and whispered. "Girls are weird."
"They sure are Fred, and this one is the queen of weird, she's probably a psycho." Stanley replied.
Meanwhile Elizabeth saw the situation.
"Wait a minute, why is Hillary letting that boy sit next to her, I thought that she didn't like him?"
Ana,
overhearing Liz responded. "If there is one thing Hillary does is she
likes to confuse people and mix it up, so she cam be the element of
surprise and no one can upstage her."
"Wow, Ana, you and Hillary are so smart. Can anyone out smart her?"
"I don't think it has been done, but it's bound to happen sometime."
Then the teacher continued. "No talking please, I need quiet thank you."
After a considerable pause from everyone she continued, and went into character.
"Whose knows how many student's there are in here?"
Suddenly a bunch of answers were blurted.
"10!" 100" "A million!"
"Raise your hand please."
Then the students who blurted out answers raised their hands. Ms Crawford pointed to one of them: Ricky.
"We have a 100 kids in here." Ricky answered.
"100? How did you get that number?" Ms Crawford asked.
"I counted."
"You counted? You know how to count to One Hundred?"
"Yes Ma'am"."
"Well,
that's very good, but I don't think we have that many students in my
class (under her breath) thank goodness. (Normally)Why don't we count
to find out? Alright everyone let's count starting to the right of me."
And
so Ms Crawford stood up and stood outside the circle and gradually
walked around and touched each child as the class counted. And they of
course they reached the number 20.
"Twenty. Very good class. As you
can see we don't have 100 students because that number is a very big
number so we would have a lot more students in here than 20. Does that
makes sense young man?"
"Yes ma'am" Ricky said.
Still Standing Ms
Crawford continue. Hmm, let's see how many girls do you think we have?
And raise your hand. Whoever can get the correct answer gets a
Starburst."
The class was tickled by the potential reward, because
Starburst tasted really juicy, and children liked that. The class the
majority that wanted to participate started counting and then hands were
raised, and it was a matter of picking the lucky student. Ms Crawford
first found Harriette's hand, and she answered.
"I counted thirteen girls Ms Crawford."
"Thirteen, that sounds pretty close to what we have but I don't think that's right."
Elizabeth's hand stayed up, but she didn't seem to recognize her. She wanted so bad to answer. So she started to whisper...
"Mrs Crawford, I know, I know, please, pick me..."
"How about you?" Mrs Crawford recognized Ariana.
"Twelve?"
"Very good young lady, we do have twelve students in our class. Here what flavor you like?"
"Any one would be fine" Ariana responded.
She took the flavor raspberry and complimented "Thank You Ms. Crawford."
"You're welcome." The teacher responded.
"Did you see that? She ignored me, and I had my hand up this time." Elizabeth complained.
"Yeah, I looked like she didn't want you to answer." Ana responded.
"I don't think she likes me."
"Did you have the right answer?"
"Yes, I know there are twelve girls, and eight boys."
"Try again, maybe you can answer if she ask how many boys there are."
"Alright, who can tell me by raising their hands how many boys there are?" Mrs Crawford asked
"Bingo. Go for it girl." Ana cheered.
And Elizabeth came back for round two with both of her hands raised in the air.
Harriette interjected. "Excuse me Ms. Crawford, I counted Thirteen. Why is it twelve?"
"Well let's see...who all did you count?"
"Me and everyone else." Harriette answered.
"Who is everyone else? Why don't you count and we will see."
"And
so Harriette started with herself then when to her right to Anabelle,
Ariana, Evani, Lillian, Elizabeth, Leah, Katie, passes about two boys,
Sarah, Samantha, passed the huge female gap, then to Hillary sandwiched
between two boys, then Jasmine to her left...
"And that was twelve, but then I thought to count you because you're a girl too, right?"
"Why
yes, I am. My that's thoughtful of you to think of me, but I am not a
student I am the teacher, so that's how you got thirteen. Well I guess
that warrants a Starburts. Here you go."
"The Teacher is not a girl, she's a woman, and she didn't wait to be recognized by her." Liz complained.
"Yes I saw that. She got a freebie on that one. Stay Alert the boy question is coming back." Ana replied.
"Now let's get back to how many boys we have." The teacher reinstated.
Once
again Liz hands went up (among others), right in front of Ms Crawford's
field of vision. And Ms. Crawford turned around and saw Hillary who
was actually stretching, and picked her.
"How about you?"
"Eight...there are eight boys."
"Very good...young lady...what's you're name?"
"Hillinda."
"Okay Hillinda, what flavor would you like?"
"Cherry"
END OF SELECTION
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