Things Change by Patrick Jones

Author:Patrick Jones
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
Published: 2009-09-21T16:00:00+00:00

I was on the computer, responding to an E-mail from Paul about plans for the Valentine's Day dance, which was under a month away. I knew he hated dances, and anything "formal and normal," as he called it, but this was special to me. Two and a half years, and I'd never been to a school function like this. I wanted to see how the other half lived.

"Are you listening to me?" My mother's voice raised on each word, no doubt made louder by the silence of my response. "I asked you, young lady, have you seen this?"

She brandished my third-quarter report card like it was a rock she was going to bash over my head. I knew this was coming. I can't say that I blamed her for being upset with me. She wasn't the only one concerned. My teachers, in particular Mr. Taylor, were worried about my falling grades. I knew there was no way I could make them understand that pleasing Paul was more important to me than passing every class with straight As.

"Paul! Paul! Paul! Is that all you can think about anymore?" I could tell she was furious. Normally, when she was raving like this, she left a trail of smoke behind her, like a jet engine; but she must have run up to my room between cigarettes.

"Are you going to say anything?" Her impatience was evident, if not unexpected.

My new approach to her query bombardment was to wait until the final question. That way, I could maybe get away with ducking a few of the questions I knew she wouldn't like the answer to, or questions that I just couldn't give a response to, for both our sakes.

"I am talking to you, young lady." She was shouting at me, but I was letting the words bounce off of me without leaving a mark. I guess Dad was toughening me up after all.

"What has happened to you, Johanna Marie?" My mother followed me as I got up from the desk and headed over to my bed. There was no place for me to run. I was trapped, but she was the one acting like the caged animal.

"Please, just leave me alone." I said it through tears, the words grinding out through those teeth my parents paid to have straightened. That is when they were happiest: when they were straightening me out.

"No, I will not leave you alone, not until I get some answers." Her voice was down one decibel, now only audible within a one-square-mile radius. She tossed the report card down in front of me. "Are you ready to explain this to me?"

"Mom, I know. I need to do better." I almost laughed as I thought of all the happy households where my classmates were bringing home report cards worse than mine and getting hugs. It was that my report card didn't have the As stacked like firewood. There were only two of them; but they were surrounded by two ugly B's that buzzed in the middle and a C in physics sticking out like a broken thumb.

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