Natasha woke up the next morning in a cold sweat. She'd had one of her nightmares again - the one where she studied for hours for a test and performed perfectly, then received her report card and got zeros on everything except one class that was an automatic pass. Natasha checked the report card on her desk to make sure that it was still all As, then quickly got dressed and hurried down the stairs to get started on her work, intent on not making her nightmare become a living-mare. She checked her to-do list and groaned when she saw that she had an additional Geometry class first thing. She clicked onto the class website and hit "join".

"Welcome Natasha Summerville," an automated voice said as a loading circle of math signs spun in the middle of the screen. Then Natasha was allowed into the call, a good seven minutes early.

"Natasha, early as usual," her teacher, Ms. Slate, said happily. Natasha might not have enjoyed these early morning classes much, but she loved Ms. Slate. She was young but serious as well, nothing like the unprofessional Savannah. Natasha had an afternoon full of extracurriculars the day before, so she hadn't been able to catch up with Amethyst, but she hoped that Savannah Calibri didn't leave too bad of an impression on Amethyst. The school itself was, actually, a really good school. They just needed to change up the staff a little.

"Hi, Ms. Slate," Natasha replied. "Is anyone else here yet?"

"Just you," Ms. Slate told her. "Any problems with last week's homework?"

"Not in math," Natasha said, stating the obvious. "Though I was confused on prompt five on the poetry homework."

"Natasha," Ms. Slate said with a sigh. "You know I'm not supposed to discuss homework from other classes while I'm teaching."

"But you're barely teaching," Natasha protested. "Besides, class doesn't start for another seven, er, six, minutes and I'm the only student here. Please?"

"Well...fine," Ms. Slate relented. "Get out your homework. We'll go over number five together."

And so they did. Ms. Slate helped her through three prompts on the poetry homework from Natasha's other class with Ms. Slate before the rest of the class arrived. Then she had to wrap up and begin Geometry. Natasha, a math wiz, focused back on her poetry homework instead of listening to Ms. Slate. After all, she knew everything they were going through today. She had finished half a poem by the time they finally started doing exercises and Ms. Slate called on her to answer a problem.

"Natasha, do you have an answer?"

"Oh, um, one second." Natasha scribbled down the question as Ms. Slate explained to the class the formula, then showed her own answer once she was done. "The angle of BAC is 89 degrees," she announced.

"Thank you, Natasha," Ms. Slate said with a smile. "Now, who can explain why?"

Angel Calar raised her hand and Natasha turned back to her poem. It read:

The snow

Falls from the sky

White as a cloud

Makes you want to fly

Natasha grimaced as she read it back to herself. The cringe factor was extreme, but what could she do? At least she'd get at least an A on it. It wasn't great, but Ms. Slate took her own opinion into account when grading, she graded strictly off the rubric she gave to every student. Natasha's poem rhymed, flowed, and described. So what if it was cheesy? She'd still get a good grade.

"Alright class, it's time for our break," Ms. Slate called a little bit later, clapping twice. "I'll see you all back here in 10 minutes. Now shoo!" Natasha hung up and fiddled with her computer settings while she waited. And then Amethyst's alarm rang.

What do you think about Ms. Slate? What about Natasha's poetry skills? Read more in the next chapter!

~ writesthetic