In Front of The Whole Class

Mr. Tiburon gave the assignment to the class and Quinn Compton could feel the fear in the pit of his stomach the moment the words were out of the teacher’s mouth. It was an oral presentation to be done in front of the whole Grade Six class. Everybody had to do it and there was no getting out of it. The question was that if you could spend an hour with any person who ever lived, who would it be? Why would it be that person? What would you want to ask them? What would you want to do together? Mr. Tiburon tried to give examples of things you might want to do. Play ball was his first one, but Quinn got stuck wondering if Mr. Tiburon had ever played ball. It was very hard to imagine him ever playing anything. He was very old and very serious, not to mention very strict. Quinn struggled to pay better attention. Mr. Tiburon believed very strongly that you should stay on task. It was an instant detention if Mr. T discovered that you were not following what he was saying. He did not want your mind wandering, even a little. At the moment, he was suggesting that maybe you might want to have dinner with the person you’d chosen. The trouble was that this made Quinn think about his stomach and how even the thought of standing up there in front of the whole class made him feel like he was going to be sick. He sat in his seat in total panic. He had absolutely no idea who he would choose. When he tried to think of somebody, he got a brain cramp and Mr. T’s helpful examples were making it worse. He didn’t want to have dinner with anybody. He liked eating in front of the TV. Now the teacher was suggesting that you might want to go to a spa with the person. Quinn wasn’t really sure what a spa was. He thought he might have seen a commercial with a lady lying on a bench, covered in towels. He didn’t even like taking a bath. He looked over at his best friend Keenan to see how he was taking the news. He was nodding and smiling and already writing something down. Keenan was a good friend but sometimes he could be kind of depressing. Here was Quinn praying that there was some way he could get out of this, and here was Keenan wishing he was up there in front of the class already. Quinn put his hand up. He had no choice. He knew that this was definitely not something that Mr. Tiburon wanted to see while he was still speaking. Questions were to be asked afterward. It was a very strict rule, but this was an emergency! The teacher went on with his suggestions, ignoring the upraised hand, in the hope that Quinn would remember the rule. But Quinn kept his hand up until Mr. T. couldn’t ignore it any more. “Quinn?” he intoned. It was amazing how long he could make that single word last as he drawled it. It left no doubt how unhappy he was that his strict rule was being defied, that he was being interrupted. Quinn knew how how much trouble he was getting himself in, but he had to do something, and fast! He forced himself to speak as the teacher glared down at him. “May I please go to the washroom?” He didn’t even wait for an answer. He just ran out of the classroom! He really was going to be sick!