Welcome to the Spot Writers. This month’s prompt is to write about an unexpected visitor. Today’s tale comes from Val Muller, who in her day job is a high school teacher in America. This fictionalized account is based on at least two real incidents that reminded her that soke students are challenging in the moment but ultimately make the job a rewarding one. It is an appropriate way to end teacher appreciation week.
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By Val Muller
Just 26 hours from now, they would all be on holiday break. It was the typical student apathy and excitement, as before any break–the same behaviors that made her question teaching. If she could just make it through the rest of the day without incident, she could coast into the last day before break.
The intercom beeped, and she flinched. All day, students had been dismissed by parents pulling them early.
“Ms. Smithson?” the office called.
“Yes?” She looked around the room, wondering which of the few remaining students was being called.
“Are you busy? You have a visitor.” A few moments later, a building substitute was there to watch the class. Ms. Smithson cringed. They never sent someone to cover a class.
Unless you were in trouble.
Which, maybe she was.
Did the district do things like that? Did they fire teachers two days before Christmas? She took the fastest route to the office, but she walked slowly. These could be her last few moments of normalcy.
When she entered the main office, she looked around. She had expected to see an administrator standing there with a scowl and crossed arms. But instead, it was just the two ladies from the front desk smiling each other and laughing as they watched her face. And they pointed in the direction of the seats next to the front door. There, a young man was seated. Ms. Smithson did not recognize him at first. He seemed like he might be a student waiting to see the principal, or maybe an older brother waiting to pick up a sibling for an early dismissal. No one on her current roster, anyway.
Then her heart skipped a beat. It was Jason, the Jason she spoke or thought about daily for four years, the Jason so notorious that even her husband still remembered hearing about the boy’s antics and attitude. The number of times he’d gone to the main office, the number of times he’d mouthed off, rebelled, not listened. The time he sent that email.
“Oh,” she managed.
Jason stood, smiling, handing her a gift bag. “It’s chocolate cookies,” he said. “My parents insisted.”
“Thank you. It’s good to see you.” Okay, so chocolate cookies. But why? Did Jason really just come back randomly with cookies for his former teachers?
He seemed to read the question in her eyes. “There were only two people I came to see. You’re one of them.”
He held up an ID tag. “See what I do now?” It was an employee ID tag for the local, national basketball team. “I’m on the press team. I’m not in charge or anything, but this is how everyone starts. For now I just help with scheduling and set up and basically just doing whatever I’m told, but I can work my way up. They said probably when I graduate next year they’ll have something for me.”
Had it really been three years? He was about to graduate college. In the back of her mind, she had given him a fifty-fifty chance of that. It’s not that she didn’t believe in him, but as with so many students, it was just there was so much evidence pushing her to fear the worst.
“Graduating, huh?”
He nodded. Then he pointed to the gift bag. “You think that’s your Christmas gift, but it’s not. That’s just what my family gave you. Are you ready for your gift?”
Ms. Smithson tensed. What could he mean? But already she was nodding.
Jason paused for dramatic effect, then stood up straight, looking her right in the eye. “You were right,” he said. “I mean every damn time, you were right. Use good grammar. Proofread my work myself. Take pride in my work. Be polite. Walk away when my anger is going to make decisions for me. Respect those above me. All thise things I gave you a hard time about, all those things I said I would refuse to do, all that headache I probably put you through, in college I learned that you were right real quick.”
Ms. Smithson paused, taking it all in. Everyone always said teachers really appreciated things like handwritten notes as opposed to anything else. She never understood that, students thanking teachers for merely doing their jobs. But now, she soared in the clouds. All those years of wondering if maybe just for one day he could be absent, wondering if maybe just for today he would cooperate, all those years of not giving up, of fighting the good fight with that small flame of hope that might kindle into something.
She looked up to see the fire in his eyes.
“Thank you.”
The Spot Writers—Our Members:
Val Muller: http://www.valmuller.com/blog/
Catherine A. MacKenzie: https://writingwicket.wordpress.com/wicker-chitter/
Phil Yeats: https://alankemisterauthor.wordpress.com
Chiara De Giorgi: https://chiaradegiorgi.blogspot.ca/
