janissa's show-and-tell

We had show-and-tell today. I brought Alicia, the old ragdoll mum had given to me when I was little, the one I can’t sleep without. She’s got lots of stitches everywhere and she’s really old and dirty, but I took a lot of trouble to get her cleaned up today, so she looked real pretty.

"Would anyone like to go first?" Our teacher asked in her sweetest voice. She's real pretty too, our teacher. Kiden, who is teacher’s pet and a nasty sneak, volunteered as usual. Our teacher gave him a big smile. He’d brought his thickest encyclopedia.

"It contains,” He pushed his spectacles up his nose, “It contains all the information in the world.” And his chest swelled to the size of my ape-man neighbour next door.

"I bet a buck that it doesn’t say that you wear Pooh-Bear underwear," Archie commented. Little Lou giggled, but 0ur teacher was very shocked.

"Archimedes, what a thing to suggest!" And she made him stay back during break. Archie’s real name is Archimedes, and Mike’s real name is Michelangelo, but they don’t like their fancy names so we have to call them Archie and Mike or they’ll thrash us.

Then she made Archie go next. Archie’d brought his pet mice. He showed us how he fed them and made them exercise. We all thought it was pretty cool, so Mike told Archie to let them out. The teacher suddenly jumped up and shouted, "No, no, please dear, don’t do that!"

I expect she was trying to sound nice, like she is most of the time, but then Archie had already let them out. Little Lou, who’s a real scaredy-cat, stood on her chair and screamed, and everyone took the cue and dived under the chairs and tables to catch the mice.

The teacher stood up and she looked really annoyed, and we would have gotten the message, but everyone was in a glorious mess now so nobody could really be bothered, except Kiden, who is teacher’s pet and a nasty sneak. It was great fun, but a couple of mice don’t really stand much of a chance against a class of first-graders so we had to go back to our seats after a while.

Our teacher smiled sweetly around the class, except it looked more like those smiles you have to put on when Mum asks if the vegetable tastes good. “Sara dear, why don’t you go next?” Sara is really rich so her dad can buy her lots of toys and stuff, and she likes nothing better than to show them off, but she can be a great fibber too. Today she brought her newest toy robot and got it to do all sorts of really cool tricks.

Mike asked if he could play with it for a while and Sara said no, he would definitely break it with those clumsy hands of his, and then Mike reached out and touched it. Sara yelled at him not to touch it and kicked him, and then Mike punched her in the nose. Sara said he shouldn’t hit a girl, it just wasn’t done, and then Mike said he’d do it again, but then our teacher came up and separated them, which was a real pity. She told them that she was really disappointed in them and she was sorry to say that they would have to stay back at break too.

Mike went next. He’d brought his boxing gloves, which he said he’d use on Sara later. Then he tried to show us some moves he’s seen on TV, but Archie said they were all wrong and he would show him the correct way, but he didn’t get to, because the teacher told Mike thank you and what a wonderful presentation he’d given and asked him to sit down. Maybe the class was too hot and she wanted to let us off early, because I noticed she was starting to go a little red and sweaty.

She looked around the class again and picked Janissa dear, that’s me, and said it was my turn. I showed the class Alicia. I told them about every stitch on it and how Aunt Fannie’s dog had nearly torn her to pieces, but then Aunt Fannie managed to stitch her back together again, and it was my most precious toy.

Our teacher said that it was very sweet of me and smiled, but then Justin whispered, "Baby, baby, baby!" I glared at Justin and told him I would get back at him at break. But I don’t hit him very hard because he’s my best friend. Our teacher was very shocked, "What an unlady-like thing to say, Janissa!" And then she told me and Justin to stay back during break.

Justin had brought his father’s chef hat, because his father’s a chef at the most famous restaurant in town and he wants to grow up to be a chef too. He likes cooking and he’s quite good at it too. Alison laughed and said it would go well with her show-and-tell. Our teacher told her to go next.

Alison’s a real sport – she never cries and plays all sorts of tricks to get us out of quizzes, and she can get top in class without even trying. It makes Kiden really mad. She had this pair of teeth, “See?” She explained. “And if you put it on,” She opened her mouth really big and it fit in perfectly, “id looksh boshidively shcary. Berfect for Halloweensh.” Then she got out a bright green wig, thick-rimmed glasses like daddy’s and a big red nose like Uncle George’s, and put those on too. After that Justin dunked his chef hat on her. She looked awfully funny. Then she walked around the class, snapping her teeth in people’s faces, and we all laughed till our tummies ached, but then Little Lou started crying, because she thought it was really scary and she was going to have nightmares about it, but it made us laugh even more. Our teacher put on that funny smile again, and said that Alison was to stay back during break because she had disrupted the class.

Then she turned to Little Lou, who was bawling her head off, “Really, Louise, what on earth are you crying for? Please go up and do your show-and-tell.”

“I-I d-didn’t b-br-bring m-my –” and then Little Lou started crying again. Our teacher made her stay back during break too.

The teacher was quite red already, so she must have felt really hot, because she dismissed us for break right then. But when no one moved, her face got even redder, and she asked us why we weren’t going. “But miss,” Alison raised her hand, “you told us to stay back during break.”

The teacher suddenly looked like Mum when you don’t finish your vegetables. Then she started shouting at us, but we didn’t understand a word of it. She told us all to get out of the classroom, even Kiden, who usually stays in class to do revision.

We were all very confused, because we had been really obedient, and we really didn’t do anything wrong and she should have been very happy with us but she’d gone ahead and scolded us anyway.