Bethany S Shepard

This is a clip from the book I’m working on. It’s a comedy kid’s book. The main character, Jack, is 11. In this scene, he is really bored in his class, and he’s daydreaming. He wasn’t paying attention. He doesn’t like school at this point. By the end of the book, he’s had a change of attitude. He learns to appreciate school and the other things in his life. ...hail to the bus driver, bus driver, bus driver. Hail to the bus driver, bus driver man. Hail to the.. “JACK!” The scream came from the front of the class and startled me out of my day dream. It was like a vortex of mad and crazy ideas that was spinning about four feet off the floor in the middle of the room, just to the left of Nadia Zielinski’s curly haired head. Her head was an explosion of dark Italian curls with reddish highlights. “JACK!” The scream came again, this time with an added sting of frustration that was all the teacher’s own. A couple of the kids in the rows next to me let out a low-level laugh. “Yes, Mrs Cuzzbetson?” I enquired, wearily. “What is the answer?! I am not repeating myself for the third time, young man. I expect to be impressed. Tell me. Now. Quickly, Jack”. “Uhhhhh…” What on Earth could the question have been? It’s a math class, so it’s probably about numbers. But what? With numbers, the possibilities could be endless. Oh wow. This was bad. The vein on Mrs Cuzzbetsons head was throbbing. How much time had passed? Anything was better than nothing and that angry purple face up front. “Um. Yes. Is it, beef?” Shrieks of laughter filled the air. I couldn’t help but feel victorious that I had raised the roof on this mundane Monday math lesson. The pride in my chest swelled, and as it did so, stretched a broad and toothy grin across my handsome face. I bathed in the glory of this victory and thought to turn and thank my subjects for their raucous response, but as I glanced at the front, I noticed something wrong with Mrs. Cuzzbetson. Her eyes had sunk into her head leaving only dark voids. Her bottom lip slowly descended, the mouth drawing menacingly downwards causing her face to become increasingly more frightening with each passing second. I, and everyone else in the room, knew that all sense of humour had been unanimously banished, leaving only desolation and destruction in its wake. Oh man. This is going to be the stuff of nightmares.