The Killer Dog and The Dognappers

Quinn Compton stared at his report card. It was the worst report card he’d ever had. It was the worst report card in his Grade Six class, he was pretty sure of that, although kids didn’t usually talk about their report cards if they were bad, only if they were good. Was it the worst report card of all times? It might be. Maybe he could look it up online sometime, but it really wasn’t what he was worried about right now. He was worried about his mother. He’d been so afraid to show it to her. What was she going to think? What was she going to say? He’d even thought of throwing it away or something like that, but he knew it would never work. She was going to find out sooner or later. So he decided to show it to her and when she opened it and sat there looking at it for a long time, he was so terrified. He felt like he was going to be sick. Then she didn’t do anything. She just sat there with her head down, staring at it. Then he really felt like he was going to be sick. He felt like running away. But he just stood there, waiting for her to do something. He wanted her to yell at him, hit him even, do something, just so she wouldn’t just keep sitting there staring at that terrible report card. Then, finally, she did something. What she did was worse than yelling at him or even hitting him. She cried. It was hard to tell she was crying, because she just kept sitting still, but he could see tears sliding down her face and dripping on to the report card. Quinn had never felt worse in his life. Then his mother did something. She didn’t yell at him or even speak to him. She picked up the phone and started calling the tutors.