High School Highs and Lows: Spanish Class, Part I

My high school's senior class was so small that we only had ONE Spanish class for the entire school year. One period a day for four marking periods. They crammed the 35-40 of us who needed the credit in one of the smaller rooms of our school, but that made for a fun environment. Our teacher was Ms. Pierce, a lovely buxom sister who could've passed for a classmate if she didn't have the authority to pass and fail us. Either way, she let us seniors be, well...seniors. As long as we did our work, she encouraged us to talk, laugh, joke, and in some cases, argue.

One incident that I and my best friends still joke about to this day happened the VERY first day of classes. My boy Y was involved at the time with a girl who had a best friend that nobody at school liked. This is one of those cases where someone is unattractive inside and out. She was just a loud, obnoxious and ignorant chick, and folks took great delight in clowning her when she got out of line. Bitter best friend was mad because her girl was spending QT with Y, which is what boyfriends and girlfriends do, if I'm not mistaken. So Ms. Pierce decides to have us sit according to last name, and the fun begins. Y's last name was very close to bitter best friend's, and one can assume the feelings of envy, hatred, jealousy and resentment all came boiling up to the surface. As soon as my boy gets ready to take his seat....

"OH NO! OH NO! HE CAN'T SIT BY ME! MS. PIERCE, YOU GON' HAVE TO MOVE HIM!" The room just stops and watches her disintegrate in front of our eyes, and me and my other road dog J are in the back of the room howling laughing because this girl is going off because our boy is dating her girl, and she feels like the third wheel - or in her case, third, fourth fifth and AND sixth (I'm sorry, God. Couldn't resist.). Ms. Pierce, whose cheerful sistagurl voice was reduced to a stunned whisper looked around and said, "Y, would you mind sitting in the back with Chris and J? I know you all are very tight." I kicked my bookbag out of the spare desk next to me and waved him over with the biggest damn grin on my face. We all had a great laugh that day. And that was just the start.

Not long after that bit of comedy, there would be some heartbreak, heartbreak so severe that the classroom would see a big strong dude reduced to a vulnerable, hurting mass of teenager...