Gullible

Surely, Mrs Blanc did this assignment for her own amusement. She’s always taken me as one to gossip, and asking your students to write a story on what they’ve overheard will obviously include her colleagues. The aging badly woman had a sparkle in her eye as she gave out the assignment, and I swear you would think she was high by that grin on her face as she gathered our work.

I know she knows the “subject” I based my story on is one she must have lapped up. It’ll have got me a good mark, which is what matters. That being said, if I knew she’d be standing at the front of the class, top five stories in hand, I would have chosen the conversation that revealed how one of my classmates likes to dance naked in the rain when his parents aren’t home because, and I quote “it makes my junk feel free and I like to windmill.”

“Now, this is my favourite. Thank you, Amy Woolhouse for making my night." YEP! I should have gone with the windmill tale. That would have given me top marks too. Oh God. I am so dead.

“Dude, I’m in trouble. I’m going to fail English.” I sunk down in my chair. We may have not used real names, but everyone will know who said these words, and he’s in this class. Spike is going to kill me. “Then stop being an ass to Mrs Clark.” Both Spike and his best mate, Tim turned to glare at me. Their blue and brown eyes narrowing on me. “Remind me why you used a conversation of guys in this class again.” My friend, Gemma spoke quietly as I cringed at the bit that’s going to get me killed.

“I am in love with that prune, man. I don’t know why, but I just want to treat her right, love her, kiss her, remove that husband of hers and have a happy life with her.” Mrs Blanc read, making my class laugh hysterically. I put my hands over my face dreading the descriptions to come. Only one person has locked Mrs Blanc outside of the classroom and there he is, glaring at me, flexing his strong jaw. “Because I’m a moron and I was hurt that my crush loves a woman that resembles the hag from Snow White.” I grumbled to Gemma who only laughed.

It's true. Mrs Blanc is ace, she’s lovely despite her nosiness, but she’s hunching over, she’s short, she’s got a wart that would put Yubaba from Spirited away to shame on her cheek. Her nickname to students is haggard wench… something I did neglect to include in my writing thankfully.

I’ve never known such laughter when the line came of Tim saying he thought it was just him, and even more so when the locked door was mentioned. All eyes went to the two studs at the front of the class. So many gasps and comments came directed at the two of them. Both of their cheeks are bright red. The laughter won’t stop. They’re being ridiculed, humiliated and I… am sprinting out the door now the bells gone off.

I might just have to move schools. I might just have to move country. At least if I get killed, they’ll be the only suspects… well, I hope so at least. I shook my head at the thought. I just focused on running to my locker to get my things. English is going to be my only class today. If I stay here, I’m doomed. I had my head in my locker to reach the last of my things when I heard a figure either side of me lean on the locker. “Amy.”

“This is not Amy. This is the new exchange student…” I’m an idiot. I went for an extremely bad French accent and don’t have any names in mind. There aren’t even any exchange students anymore. I heard the two guys’ chuckle. I don’t need to be a genius to know it’s Spike and Time either side of me. I’m just surprised they haven’t done anything to me yet, like slamming my head in the locker. Oh, better move my head.

“Spike, Tim. Hi, what you are doing here?”

  The guys looked at each other before one grabbed my arms and the other went for my legs, carrying me off and out the building. I screamed and shouted for help, but the halls were empty. Maybe I should have waited until after my next class to run off. Spike and Tim forced me to the back of the school fields before they plopped me down on my bum. Great. “Isn’t killing me on school grounds a bit dangerous?”

Spike scowled at me, running a hand through his brownish, reddish hair before sitting down in front of me. Tim stayed standing, crossing his arms. I guess he’s the one going to be stopping me from running away. I’ve known these guys since primary school. I used to play superheroes with them. We’ve drifted apart since we started high school when we were eleven. Now, seven years on and they still know I’ll run the second I get chance.  

“So, English was interesting.”

“Yes, and in my defence; I didn’t think Mrs Blanc would read it out loud. Also in my defence, it’s not my fault you love haggard wench.”

Why do Spike and Tim have to look at each other so often? It’s like they can read each other’s mind and it freaks me out. It always has. “We don’t love Mrs Blanc, Amy.” I scoffed. Of course they’re going to come out with that now. Well, it’s too late. The damage is done.

“It’s true, we were talking about who I actually like and we realised someone was listening, that you were listening so thought we’d fool you.” Tim told me. I’m not sure whether to believe him. I waited for him to puff out air to blow out his side fringe, a sign of him lying. No, Tim’s dark hair stayed put. I clenched my teeth. “If that’s true, why not say anything?”

“Because we didn’t think you’d be so gullible.” Tim told me and I threw my long auburn hair over my face in embarrassment. I groaned. How had they forgotten how gullible I can be? My brother told me having an outie bellybutton meant I was an alien and I believed him… I wasn’t even as young as I’d like to say, when I bought that lie.

“Any chance everyone else won’t be so gullible?” I finally asked pushing my hair back to look at the pair. Their eyes are both cold as they look at me. Yeah… They think the same as me, they all believe those words I heard. “So, now what?”

“I for one am going to do damage control with Imogene. She’s the only one I care about. Unlucky for you, I can’t say the same for Spike.” Tim answered before running off. I got up to go but Spike quickly got up and stopped me from running away. I gave him my best innocent smile. “In my defence, you shouldn’t have forgotten I can be really gullible.”

Spike rubbed his eyes with his free hand, keeping the other holding my arm. Spike is my crush. I only started having feelings about him this year. I’ve always been attracted to him, but he’s always been annoying. I don’t like the whole bad boy personality he’s gained. However, this year he seems to have stopped. He’s gone back to being the guy I knew who was kind and friendly, didn’t pick on people or slack off. I don’t know what turned it around, but the change I saw made me like him, it made me like him a lot.

“So, there’s a few things we can do to help me.” Spike started. I feel bad. He looks beyond fed up. He can’t look me in the eye. I can’t believe I believed what I heard. Maybe if I wasn’t so gullible I would have used the windmill tale, or maybe the one where I found out a teacher used to play football before he skidded into a goal post and broke his ding-dong. Ouch.

Apparently, there’s four things I can do to help Spike get passed this humiliation. None of these options are particularly great.

The first, bring humiliation to someone new so he’s completely forgotten about- I am not doing that. I may be a gullible idiot, but I’m not a horrible person. However, if I were to humiliate someone; it would be Janet Barlow. I’m not doing it, but if I chose to, I would probably publish her juicy chapters of her diary her brother and my ex told me about. Janet is the reason we broke up last year, told him that I kissed a bunch of other guys. Some would say I hold a grudge and I do. Oh, I definitely do.

Second, humiliate myself- it goes without saying that, that is not happening. I just hope that Spike and Tim don’t decide to take it upon themselves to humiliate me. I feel rather humiliated just knowing how gullible I was to believe those words they said to play a joke on me. I guess karma really is a b.

Third, get in an insane amount of trouble- if I am going to do one of the four, it would be this one, purely because I have always wanted to start a food fight. Although, when I’ve imagined that, I never actually got in trouble. I don’t want to get in trouble. I want to be a police officer in a few years, how can I let myself get in trouble?

Finally, the one I would never do or even be tempted by, burn the school down- I really think Spike must have been messing with me for that one. I mean, I know someone did try a while back, but it’s a good thing it failed, and I don’t think relighting a flame is a good idea.

One thing I am doing is talking to Mrs Blanc about my work. It’s unfair for her to think those two young studs, young enough to be her grandsons are in love with her. It’s not fair for them either obviously, but in my defence, they shouldn’t have played that joke on me. “Ah, Amy; I was expecting you to drop by, come in.”

I waited until the end of the day to go and talk to Mrs Blanc, mostly because the school has gone crazy since the fake revelation that Spike and Tim are in love with the best English teacher at our school. The woman’s been walking on air since, talking and laughing with our other teachers about it. My work has created a ripple effect, rumours have begun and yeah… how have those guys not killed me yet?

“If this is about your story, I know what those lads said was complete rubbish.” Mrs Blanc smiled slyly at me. Great. She knows I was being gullible and is finding that amusing now. “You do? Why did you read it out loud then?” I asked taking a seat opposite the woman whose eyes are sparkling with mischief. I feel like there are many shades of this woman no one here will know about.

“Payback on Spike for one, his locking me out of my classroom got me in a lot of trouble with the head teacher. As for you, call it a lesson that you can’t believe everything you hear. I mean, Amy, those boys saying they want to spend a life with me when I’m just shy off my retirement.” Mrs Blanc sighed. “I fear that you would believe that I came from Jupiter if I told you as much.” I bit my tongue from saying anything. That joke has often been spoken between students; except we say Venus.

“No one actually believes what those boys said, Amy. Everyone is just finding amusement from the story. It’ll pass. I wouldn’t worry about it.”

I feel stupid. I feel utterly moronic for believing the words I heard, writing those words down. Once the teasing on those two lads dies down, the teasing is going to land on me, damn it. Why didn't Gemma tell me they were messing with me?

Instead of heading home after my talk with Mrs Blanc, I headed to the park opposite my house, the one I used to go to when I was a kid. My brother, Will stopped me from going for a while though since he told me the park was infested with bugs that would drain the blood from any body part that touched the equipment. It’s safe to say I feared bugs for a long time after that, even though my parents reassured me he was lying and just didn’t want to be responsible for watching me play outside.

I sat on the swings, questioning all the things I’ve overheard when finding my subject for that story. How can I trust myself in this life if I believe everything I’m told? I groaned, throwing my head in my hands. I heard a chuckle in front of me. “Strike how you can make it up to me, you’re clearing beating yourself enough.” Spike moved to sit on the swing by me, something we did a lot together growing up since he lives on the opposite side of it. “I’m sorry, Spike. I’m…”

“A gullible idiot, I know.”

“Did Tim sort things out with Imogene?”

Spike laughed. “Yeah, although she isn’t half going to bully him about it when she sees fit.”

I nodded with a small smile. We fell into a comfortable silence, watching boys and girls play together, the girl bullying the boys which brought back memories. “I was thinking, maybe to save myself from any other embarrassment and for the sake of the student body, maybe I help you establish what’s true and what’s not. I’d hate you to be murdered when I could have helped you.” I rolled my eyes at Spike’s cheeky smile. I gave him a side look. “So, you’re not planning on killing me?”

Spike let out a breath. “Not today. So, how about it? Want my help?”

I do. I desperately do. Like Spike said, I’ll probably end up murdered if I don’t realise what’s true and not. Yes, I know I could just keep my gob shut, but one day there will be something too good to keep quiet about and I will fail at trying.

“Okay, so lets go through what you heard over the story writing period.”

Windmill story- False, although Spike didn’t half laugh at that story.

Teacher breaking ding-dong story- True, ouch.

Student wishing he was a cat- false… I don’t quite buy that conclusion.

Teacher thinking about transitioning to a different gender- true and good for them.

The three worse ones that really made Spike laugh at me uncontrollably because of the ridiculousness of them and me believing them are as follows:

One, I overheard my brother, Will claiming how he was responsible for the bank heist from four years ago… he was sixteen. Thinking about it, he’s not smart enough to pull that off.

Two, I overheard a girl say her sister had triplets and they all had different dads. Thinking about it, why would you even check if they had different dads?

Three and probably the most embarrassing, a guy claimed to be the love child of King Charles and Kate Middleton. Thinking about it, one, gross and two, I’m a gullible idiot.

“Stop laughing at me. Please. It’s humiliating.”

I’ve never known Spike to laugh so much, so much that he fell off the swing. Good. “Yeah. It is. Oh, how I would have loved the royal adultery to come out.”

I shook my head and sighed. “Are you going to help me? Or are you going to just roll on the floor laughing at me?”

“Can’t I do both?”

I rolled my eyes at Spike who stood and moved to wrap his arms around me from behind. “I’ll help you, you adorable but gullible idiot. The amusement will more than pay for that stunt you pulled.”

“Good, I’m glad.”

“Besides, it’s my fault for forgetting you’re so gullible.”

I looked back to Spike glaring and sticking my tongue out. He only grinned brightly at me. If he is going to help me, this will be a turning point for me and hopefully a rekindling of our friendship, preferably, something more.

“Thank you for admitting that.”

“In my defence, you shouldn’t be so nosey.”

That is true. Nosey and gullible is a bad combination. Well, hopefully it’ll just drop down to nosey now because, in my defence, the world shouldn’t be so interesting.