It was just another day at Twinkle Love Elementary. Sally Applebees, an 8 year old girl with blonde pig tails, light pink shirt and a skirt to match, entered her third grade classroom in a single file line much like everyone else.
It wasn’t unlike a typical third grade class. The walls were composed of large concrete bricks, all painted a single shade of greyish white, inspiring prison-like imagery to prepare the students for the real world. There was a brightly colored banner across the top of the old chalkboard with the Alphabet done in Cursive. The floor was comprised of a carpet composed of quadrilaterals of various sizes in cool colors, ranging from dark blue to puke green. To the back of the classroom, was the children’s cubbies, each slot adorned with a paper name tag written and colored by each student, one of the sparingly few expressions of creativity allowed in school (MAYBE outside of art class). To the left of the 6x10 rows of desks was a large window where the sun can pour in and show the children the playground outside, showing them there was something better they could be doing with their time. To the right of the classroom was the door to get in and next to were several posters to reinforce the children’s conditioning. Along with math hints and expectations they touted typical rhetoric like “Reading is fun!” “Math makes you smart!” “We love diversity!” “Good children eat their Ritalin!” “No fun allowed!” Just standard third grade stuff.
In the upper left corner of the classroom, sitting on the teacher’s desk, was the one thing that gave Sally light throughout the school day; Mary Curie The Class Fluffy. She was a turquoise Pegasus with puffy taffy colored hair who mothered three adorable little chirpie foals in green, yellow, and pink.
Every day she greeted all the students by name with 12 times the enthusiasm they had as they marched in single file to their respective seats. The kids loved the cute little fluffy. In the beginning of the year they would enthusiastically say “HI MARY!” But after a while students normally responded “hi” or “hey” as they walked in. Enthusiasm can only last so long if you see the same creatures everyday. Even if it does make the day a little better.
“Hewwo Sawwy!” Mary said as Sally turned the corner placing her right infront of the Fluffy. “Hey Mary!” Sally responded before proceeding to her desk. As the line disbanded to the desks Mary proclaimed the daily mantra she was trained to repeat to the whole class “I hope aww of you aw weady fo anuddah day of wearning!”
Easier said than done.
Math Class; Sally’s least favorite subject (if any of them even were favorable to begin with).
“Would you come up and solve this problem… Sally?” Miss Kleber said, calling on random astudent to solve the problem on the board. Sally couldn’t object, she knew what the consequences would be if she did. They were the same if she gets them wrong, but less severely for complying. Reluctant and nervous, she got up walked to the board expecting to humiliate herself with a wrong answer.
Miss Agatha Kleber was a cold and stern mistress. She was just under 6,0 and wore a long black midi dress that was more appropriate for a funeral. She had dark brown hair that drooped down from her head. In the front, she had 2 long bangs that drooped down like hanging knives. In the back of her head, she had a ponytail that was twice as long, tied together with a large black bow with edges that curved slightly inwards at the top, resembling devil horns from the front. And despite always sitting next to the window and watching the kids at recess with an icy glare, her skin had a ghastly ghost white pallor similar to a corpse.
She had no patience for the wild behavior of children or their lack of understanding of basic math. When she got her degree and license, she was hoping to teach calculus at some place like Harvard or MIT. But we can’t have nice things in life so she ended up in some crappy public school in Who-Cares-ville. It didn’t help her much when her standard method of discipline was hitting students with a baton when they get the wrong answer. Especially since she got fired from her last job when a punished student whispered “harder mommy” prompting her to break his nose in rage, ironically fulfilling his request. but what can you expect when you’re the miserable, decrepit, spiteful old age of 30?
In the duration it took you to read that expo dump, Sally made it to the chalkboard. She took her sweet time walking across the class too. She really didn’t want to answer the question. And when she stood face-to-face with it, she wasn’t anymore ready:
37 x 64
What the hell kind of question is that? You had to be some kind of one billion IQ to figure that out.
“Well Sally? What’s the answer?” Miss Kleber said tapping her foot impatiently, standing only 2 feet from Sally and towering over her like a vulture staring at prey. Sally picked up the chalk stick. She had no clue how to answer it. Miss Kleber did show them how (no duh, she’s a teacher) but Math was not Sally’s strong suit.
“Come on Sally. Everyone else can do it. Why can’t you?” Miss Kleber piped up. She stared down at Sally quivering with the chalk in hand, glaring at her with all the remorseless apathy of a praying mantis, but with none of it’s patience.
Sally froze up. She didn’t know where to begin with this enigma of a problem. Giving in to pressure, she jotted down her best educated guess.
37 x 64 = 567
It… was…
wrong.
“Incompetent.” Miss Kleber said, her voice full of venom. Driven entirely by instinct, she raised her Baton and swung down towards Sally’s Scalp. She flinched and braced for the sudden stinging sensation. But with all her might, Miss Kleber stopped herself mere inches from Sally’s forehead.
In that moment, Miss Kleber remembered something very important:
Hitting children is against the law, and if you break the law, you go to jail. And if you go to jail, you can’t teach math anymore. and if you can’t teach math anymore, you’re broke.
She couldn’t take anymore chances. Especially after than incident at her last school. So physical punishments for the students were off the table.
Psychological on the other hand…
her arm whipped straight around 180 degrees and struck Marie Curie on the back
THWAP!!
“EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEHHHHHHHH!!! WOWSTEST HUWTIES!!!”
“NO!” Sally cried out in shock. Mary’s baby’s made scaredy-chirps and peeps from the sudden loud noise and panic from their mother.
“Look what you did.” Miss Kleber said to sally in a patronizing voice. “Your incompetency hurts the ones you love.”
“Bu… But…”
“Maybe if you studied harder you could’ve prevented such pain. Imagine if you were a grown-up driving a truck full of fluffies. What if you didn’t know how to calculate how fast you’re supposed to go?”
She leaned forward, directly in Sally’s face. “What if you smash into the side, kill yourself instantly while the fluffies you swore to protect burned alive slowly while there was nothing you could’ve done except use. Your. Brain!”
Sally was at a loss for words.
“Incompetent people will be the death of our society. Today it’s fluffies, tomorrow it’s the world. Sit down.”
Sally sulked back to her desk. She hung her head down low with water swelling up in her eyes. The other students glared at her with momentary hate for what she allowed to happen. Miss Kleber may have been the one to do the deed, but every one of them still had power to prevent it by not answering wrong and behaving. So every wrong answer was a failure to protect Mary Curie and her foals on the part of whatever student it was. There was nothing illegal about abusing fluffies either since they’re just biotoys.
This happened every time someone got an answer wrong. But no amount of beatings make it any less painful to watch.
Sometime Later
Miss Kleber continue the class as normal. The students were extra attentive after witnessing Mary get slapped like that.
“And so children, with the nine lines, you can see why multiplying any number by 10 will alway-”
Her gaze drifted away to the back of the class. She saw Chad Tigerhawk with his feet up on his desk, looking at his phone, chewing gum, and worst of all… he had a HAT in SCHOOL! A baseball cap turned backwards! An obvious sign of defiance towards her authority. Miss Kleber froze in shock, her baton slipping out of her hand at the sight of Chad and falling to the floor.
Without saying another word, she walked towards her desk, swiped the green foal without stopping and proceeded towards Chad’s desk.
“NUUUUUUU!!!” Cried Mary. “NU TAKE BABBEH FROM MAMA! BABBEH AM TOO WITTEW! NEE HUGGIES AN WUV!!!”
Miss Kleber ignored the frantic cries of the foal’s mother. She needed to teach Chad a lesson.
She stood at the foot of Chad’s desk. The frantically squealing baby at Chad’s Eye level.
“Chad.” She said
Chad looked away from his phone.
“huh?”
“Be a dear and reorient yourself in accordance with the Good Ritalin Student poster.” She uttered through a very unfriendly smile. “Feet on the ground, hands on desk, no phone, no HAT! and looking at the board.”
“Up yours you stupid cow.”
She held the foal close to his face, her thumb on it’s leg, ready to snap it. The pressure was still enough for the little fluffy to make scaredy chirps and peeps.
The other students looked on in horror and anticipation, hoping Chad would do the right thing. Mary couldn’t see what was going on, but the scaredy chirps sent her into a panic.
“PWEEEEAAASE TEACHEW MUMMAH! PWEEASE GIB BABBEH BACK TO MUMMAH! BABBEH AM SCAWED! NEE TO BE WIF MAMAMAA!”
Chad looked at the squirming foal. After a brief moment of silence, he looked up at Miss Kleber and said
“Yeah that shit’s not gonna work on me. I don’t give a fuck about these lil’ faggots.”
Miss Kleber’s eyes widened. Her glare was downright psychotic and her breathing increased. Not only did he defy her, but he said three. Three… THREE BAD WORDS in a single sentence!
Without thinking, she took her thumb off the little green foal’s leg…
…and snapped it’s neck.
She dropped the foal on it’s desk like it was a piece of garbage. It’s final act, was defecating in a little pile on his desk.
“ugh what the hell?” he exclaimed.
“Oh dear.” Miss Kleber said in her fake concern voice. “Look what Chad did, everyone!”
The class erupted in angered screams and insults towards Chad. As she walked nonchalantly to her desk. It affected him more than the death of the little chirpie foal.
He didn’t care about the fluffies, but he did care about being the cool popular kid. This didn’t really help and she knew this.
“Now quiet down everyone!” She yelled. The students turned towards the front to find Miss Kleber holding the baton above Mary. She laid there quivering with her hooves over her eyes like it would do any good.
Immediately everyone stopped berating Chad and she continued her lesson as normal.
It was just another day at Twinkle Love Elementary. Every day like this, ever since Miss Kleber introduced Mary Curie and her Seven foals to the class.