🏫Good Time🎙 (Day 3 of titling a story after an Owl City song)
I have never been so nervous in my life. I regret agreeing to this, I should have just told her I couldn’t do it. Sure, she’d have gotten upset, but she’s one person. Here, the eyes of practically everyone in school are trained directly on me. I wish I’d at least gotten time to practice!
Well, I’ve finished tons of English essays under pressure and passed with flying colors. How hard can giving one little speech be? After all, it’s not as if I’ll be getting graded on this.
I remember the last words she spoke to me this morning and draw in a deep breath. It doesn’t have to be perfect…
I clear my throat. “Fellow students of Ariella High, I’m sure you’re just as thrilled and excited as I am that another school year is coming to an end. Overall, I would like to say that…”
All at once my mind blanks out. Shoot. I knew this would happen! What should I say next?
A whole few seconds have passed, I’ve been hesitating for too long now, so I rack my brain and hastily finish, “… that I believe we all had a good time this school year.”
There’s silence for a moment.
Then one kid calls out, “That’s it? That’s all you’re gonna say? But so much crazy stuff happened this year!”
“And we did NOT have a good time!” some girl adds disdainfully. “This was honestly one of the WORST school years ever!”
“And why do you say that?” I ask, wondering if this prom speech is about to turn into speech and debate.
“Valerie- do you not remember what happened when school started?” one boy demands. “Practically everyone got food poisoning from the cafeteria lunch and school got cancelled for a week!”
“And that day when some freshman brought her dog to school and it ran around biting people!”
“Don’t forget about the time when all of us Juniors got a prank email telling us it was Pajama Day. Do you have any idea how embarrassing it was arriving to school like that?”
More and more kids begin angrily recalling the year’s events.
“Mr. Lee got bitten by a poisonous spider and his substitute gave us all triple the amount of homework! For six months!”
“The janitor got fired because people spread rumors that he was doing drugs!”
“Cockroaches infested a bunch of the portable classrooms!”
“That motivational speaker who came here last month turned out to be a kidnapper!”
“The classroom elevator broke down while my friend was inside and she was stuck in there for two hours before they fixed it!”
“How can you possibly say this was a good year?” the girl from earlier asks me, hands placed on her hips. “Well? Tell us, Valerie!”
“Um… well, I-“ I stare into the crowd, struggling to think of a response. They’re right about all that stuff happening. This year WAS pretty bad. But, what was it my sister always says? “There’s always a silver lining”?
“She can’t think of anything,” one loud, tall boy jeers rudely, “There was NOTHING good about this year and she knows it. This year sucked and so does this school.”
A jab of anger hits me, which is understandable considering our principal is my uncle. “Now, wait just a second,” I say, raising my chin. “Just because a lot of not-so-good things happened this year, doesn’t mean nothing good came from it. After the food poisoning episode, the lunch ladies realized where they’d gone wrong and put real effort into changing the food- to the point where almost everyone now agrees it’s better than any school food they’ve ever had. And no, Luke, that girl’s dog was NOT biting anyone. It just licked a few people and then got picked up by the girl’s mom without much trouble. And Jamie, falling for a prank message is on you- you should have checked who it was sent by, like a lot of other Juniors did. What happened to our janitor was terrible, but I think it taught us all an important lesson about how harmful spreading rumors can be. Besides, after his name was cleared he got his job back. And yes, I agree that the cockroach thing was gross, but remember this was our first year ever using the portable classrooms. The teachers learned from the incident really quickly and found effective ways to keep their classrooms clean after that. Also, finding out that Darwin Schmidt was a criminal is exactly what gave our school the push it needed to up its security, the same way the elevator incident convinced the staff to reevaluate its safety and have it rebuilt so that it’s more secure, and stable. This school may not be perfect, not even close, but it is a school that learns from its mistakes and does all it can to correct them. And think about it- if all these seemingly bad incidents led to the school gaining better security, better hygiene, better security, and better safety- then that proves they’ve done more good than bad. No matter what we face, I believe Ariella High will continue to grow as a school and ultimately become a better place for it. And that is why I believe that, in the LONG run, we did have a good time this year.”
A long silence hangs in the air.
I hold my breath. Did I really just say all of that? This doesn’t feel real…
Then… there’s applause.
***
I heave out a huge sigh of relief as I leave the stage, away from all the eyes and finally having a moment to myself.
Honestly, they were right about one thing; a lot of crazy things have happened this school year. But really, the craziest thing of all is the fact that no one realized I’m actually Valerie’s twin sister, and that I only agreed this morning to take her place as the speech-giver after she unexpectedly got sick.