* * *
“Nancy!” Johnny whispered as loud as he could while still being able to call what he was doing whispering. She sat just ahead of him, and currently had her back to him while she was listening to their English teacher talk about English.
“Nancy,” Johnny tried again.
Ms. Sniders, their English teacher, swooped her beady eyes around the room from the front of the class.
“Did I hear someone talking?” she asked.
Johnny lowered in his seat and kept his eyes down.
Ms. Sniders was an old, strict woman. She liked her class to be absolutely silent while she taught. She had been known to throw students in detention, make them write extra essays, and even create entire extra projects just because they were found talking in class.
Johnny did not want to have to write any essays or create any projects. He waited while she passed by his desk, looking for another sound from the culprit.
She was a tall, thin woman. Every single student in her ninth grade class had to look up to her, and every single student was also scared to death of her. She had really thick glasses that looked like they went out of style sixty years ago, and the dresses she wore always had polka dots on them.
“I know I heard talking. You might as well come clean now before it gets worse for you,” she said as she stalked down the aisles of desks.
“If there’s one thing we all hate, it’s talking.” Ms. Sniders always included the entire class in on what it was she hated. She passed by Johnny’s desk again, adjusting her glasses as she stared in his direction.
Johnny kept his eyes down to the ground. She must have developed very strong neck muscles by having to keep her head up with those really heavy glasses on. Johnny bet that if she took off the glasses, her head would whip back with the tremendous force of years of straining muscles.
“If the culprit refuses to come clean, if they insist on hiding, in spite of how much we all hate cowards, then I have no choice but to continue the lesson.”
That didn’t sound like much of a threat to Johnny, in spite of the fact that he hated her lessons. She turned her back to them and began to write on the board. It didn’t seem like Ms. Sniders liked being a teacher.
“Nancy!” Johnny tried again.
Nancy turned her head back to look at him slightly.
“Are you insane?” she asked.
“I wanted to ask you some more questions about last night.”
“Now?” Nancy hissed back.
Even though they were both super spies, neither one of them wanted to mess with Ms. Sniders.
“I wanted to ask how you became a spy,” Johnny pressed.
“No, we’ll talk later,” Nancy turned around and faced the front again. But Johnny wasn’t finished.
“Don’t worry, she’s old and probably as deaf as…”
“As deaf as what?” boomed Ms. Sniders’ voice.
Johnny froze. She was standing directly beside him, hands on hips, stern glare directed straight down on him. Johnny thought she had still been at the front of the class; he hadn’t even noticed her make her way over to his desk.
He tried to answer her, his mouth moved, but for some reason no sounds were coming out.
“Out with it Mr. Clunker, we all want to hear what you have to say.”
Johnny looked around the room. All of his classmates, including Nancy, were looking at him. It certainly seemed like they all wanted to hear what he had to say. Johnny wanted to hear it also, because he had no idea what it was that he should say.
“I was just thinking,” Johnny started.
What else should he say?
That he was wondering how someone else managed to become a super spy?
“I was just wondering,” Johnny stammered.
“Yes Mr. Clunker, you were thinking and wondering what? The condition of my deafness?” Ms. Sniders leaned down and sneered in his face, waiting for his answer.
Her breath smelled foul and old, like the air from a long sealed tomb. Johnny actually had an experience with a tomb and mummy, so he knew exactly what that smelled like.
He could do this. Just think of something to say that would get her far away from him.
The problem was that her breath was so bad that it was driving out any other thought that Johnny might have had.
His eyes strayed to the board. Ms. Sniders was writing the chapter homework for the week. It was all Johnny had, so he grabbed it.
“I was just wondering, just thinking if we could move on ahead, beyond the assigned chapter, and do extra work for the week.” It wasn’t great. It wasn’t even good; in fact, it was pretty bad, but at least Johnny had thought of something.
Ms. Sniders looked at him a moment longer. Johnny had to put up with that foul breath for just a few more seconds and then he would be fine. He wondered what it was in her mouth that could take normal smelling air and turn it into such a brutal weapon in the time it took someone to inhale and exhale.
Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, Ms. Sniders straightened up.
Johnny breathed in fresh air. He hadn’t noticed, but he had started holding his breath.
“You were thinking, using all your little brain power to ask me if you could do extra work?” Ms. Sniders asked as she stalked down the aisle and back to the front of the class.
Johnny couldn’t understand it, but a lot of the other students were looking at him with a grim attitude. Why? What had he done?
“As you know class, I don’t believe there is such a thing as a stupid question. You have to learn, the government pays me a meager salary to make sure that you do, so questions are part of your expected job requirement,” she continued.
Johnny had a nagging feeling in his stomach, like he had just done something that he was going to regret. And then, it slowly came to him. He realized what he had done.
“Asking me if you can do more work is, in fact, a stupid question,” Ms. Sniders proclaimed as she looked straight at Johnny.
“Not only is more work encouraged in most classes, it is expected in mine. So thanks to Mr. Clunker, we are all going to do three chapters, instead of one, for the week. We are all very grateful for Mr. Clunker’s insight.”
Johnny started sinking down in his chair. There she went using that we word again. Johnny was pretty sure she wouldn’t be doing any chapters at all.
The grim faces around him turned to angry glares. Johnny tried to smile back weakly.
Nancy just looked at him blankly, and then shook her head. He didn’t feel much like a super spy at that moment.