Life in school had always been my favorite part of growing up. There were a lot of beautiful memories created and a lot of people we shared them with.
When I saw this week's Edition topic, I smiled, because it actually made me go down memory lane. Some things are worth forgetting while others are meant to be remembered forever.
How was I like in school?
Well, I wasn't the stubborn type certainly and I also wasn't the most jovial or engaging student. But one thing I know for sure is that I was very smart, not enough to classify as a nerd but enough to be always on top and be the senior prefect.
I was the kind of student that every other student looked up to. Everyone was my friend, the crazy ones, the stubborn ones, the class clowns, the very silent ones, the talkatives, the religious ones, and the bad boys. In as much as I didn't consider all of them my friends, there was just something in me that brought them closer.
Before long all the teachers were my friends too, they had high hopes and expectations for me, even the principal always took me to his office and we'll talk for hours and exchange ideas, he'll ask my opinion on how to handle some cases and I'll give him my idea.
So for someone like me, I rarely got in trouble. The only thing I usually got punished for is if the whole class is making noise and I don't do anything about it and it happened a lot of times because I was the kind of person who believed that school wasn't just a place for just study but also for fun.
I also was crazy about football, to the extent that we'll extend break periods so we could have enough time to enjoy the game of football. Of course I got away most times, but not everytime but those were minor troubles.
Then it happened...
Well, there was this incident that happened, that up till now I can't forget. You can classify as the one major trouble that I was eventually involved in.
It was a normal school day, ok let me say a stressful one. We had classes back to back since around 8am to 1pm, excluding the short break. Then at 1pm, our boring physics teacher came into class and started a lengthy lecture on electromagnetic spectrum or so.
Everyone disliked this teacher mostly because he was boring, we hardly understood anything he taught and when he gets angry, he stammers so badly that the whole class would go into laughter.
Then on this day, he'd forcefully decided to use our long break which was supposed to last from 2:00pm -3:00pm because we had a lot to cover and he'd missed previous classes due to an illness. We had protested but he used his teacher superiority against us.
Everyone was angry, no break meant no football for us, but he kept teaching without caring about how we felt. Then he asked someone to open the textbook and read some definitions out for him, the person refused claiming she couldn't read. Frustrated, he turned to the less troublesome student which was me, to read it out to the class.
To his greatest surprise and mine, I refused. I could see the shock on his face, he couldn't believe it. He asked me again to read it , but I still said no. Then threatened to throw me out of class if I still refused. Typically, that was exactly what I wanted, enough free time for me to go play football. So I said No again, this time more determined than before.
His face just went red in anger, and then he started to flare up, which made everyone laugh because he was stammering uncontrollably. When he'd had enough, he asked me to leave the class, which I gladly did.
As I was leaving, happy and proud of myself, before I got to the door, I felt a sharp pain at my back, before I knew what was happening more and more pain started to hit me. There he was standing in front of me, two canes in hand swinging them directly at me.
He didn't care what part of me he hit, he kept beating me. I kept using my hand to cover my face and avoid a deadly blow, but even my hand couldn't help it. One swing hit me on the forehead and I furious.
I stopped blocking his blows and lunged directly at him. Pushed him with one hand and dragged one cane with another. The force sent him back some few steps as the cane left his hand , then I attacked. I started throwing deadly strokes with the cane. He kept blocking but some hit him, one hit a fatal point and I was hungry to go for the kill.
But before I knew it, strong hands held me and forcefully took me to the teacher's staff room where I was made to kneel for hours. After which some teachers took turns in dealing with me mercilessly. Then I was threatened to either be expelled or stripped off my prefect role.
Then, the principal sent for me. At this moment, my heart was pounding really hard. This was where my verdict would be delivered. I could barely walk but I made it to the principal's office where I met him talking with another student.
He dismissed the person, pulled his glasses done and starred at me. Then he spoke, he had to be the most eloquent speaker I've ever met, he talked about what I'd done wrong and asked me when I started becoming a miscreant.
He looked at me, then asked to hear my own side of the story. I could barely speak but I did, I told him every thing that had happened and stressed on how much the students hated the teacher. Surely, I was at fault.
Long story short, I didn't get expelled, my prefect role also didn't get stripped. Instead the teacher was relieved of his duties some few week later. From that day on ward, I learnt my lesson and never allowed myself to be moved by peer pressure again.
Thank you for reading this, if you enjoyed it or it connected to you in a way, I invite you to drop a comment I'll be glad to reply❤️