by Tirzah Tyler
My teacher Mrs. Alford was reviewing a lesson on long division when I felt like I was going to cough. I had just come back to school after being absent for three days with a terrible cold. I still had most of the tissues that my mom gave me folded neatly in the outside pocket of my backpack. My nose wasn’t as stuffy now as it had been earlier. I thought I would interrupt all my classes that day, blowing my nose like a honking goose, but I didn’t. I especially didn’t want to interrupt Mrs. Alford’s lesson, because she was pretty strict. I forced myself to finish all the make-up work she had sent home to me so I could be prepared when I came back to school.
Just when my eyes started watering and I couldn’t stand it anymore, I coughed onto my hand. I put down my pencil and unzipped my backpack as quietly as I could to get a tissue. To my relief, Mrs. Alford just kept teaching.
“Jennifer, what answer did you get for number five?” she asked me.
I slowly looked down at my paper. “26.4,” I replied after I wiped my hand.
“Very good,” Mrs. Alford said and continued the lesson.
I sat back in my seat a little bit. Sniffling, I peeked over at Grant Page, the freckled blond boy who always made 100s, and I noticed a confused look on his face as he looked down at his paper. Wow. Even after I had been home sick for three days, I knew something that Grant Page didn’t.
Suddenly, I felt like I was going to cough again, but this time, I didn’t have time to control it. My cough exploded out of me, on both ends. It reverberated off the walls throughout the entire classroom. I felt myself blush.
Mrs. Alford just kept teaching, but Andy Jones, the curly-haired boy who made fun of everything, giggled uncontrollably. Samantha Peabody, the redheaded girl who always sat next to him, covered her mouth while she laughed like a muffled hyena.
I wanted to rip back the carpet, burrow an underground tunnel that led back to my house, and finish the school year in the privacy of my own home. I wanted to visit a time machine and change my history to where I had never, ever coughed during my entire life. I wanted to punch Andy Jones and Samantha Peabody in the nose to make them stop laughing. This wasn’t fair. I wanted all the other seventh graders to know me as the smart girl, not the explosive girl.
Mrs. Alford spun around from the blackboard, her gray hair twirling in the air. “Class, be quiet,” she said. “Let’s focus on the task at hand. Now,” she added, more piercingly.
But Andy and Samantha only laughed more loudly. Even Grant Page was laughing now.
3
Based on the above passage, what is likely to happen next in the story?
A.
Mrs. Alford will send Jennifer to the principal's office.
B.
Mrs. Alford will discipline the students for laughing at Jennifer.
C.
Jennifer will tell her mom that she doesn't want to go back to school.
D.
Jennifer will help Mrs. Alford teach the rest of the lesson.
1 answer
0 answers