There's a Sucker Born Every Minute
  |
|
|
Youth Sections
"The Braves Arise " |
|
 |
|
|
“There’s a sucker born every minute”, I think as I walk away from poor Joshua, covered in soap scum.
“I’m sorry, Gopal! I’ll never do it again”, says Joshua, struck with horror. That should teach him for eating my cookie. Many say I am mischievous; I disagree. I embarrass or trick people for vengeance, not fun or amusement. I do not pull pranks; I am just master of foolery. Anyone could be my next victim, no matter how much I love them (with the exception of my parents, of course). My life is perfect. I own the island of Kipawishi. I have invested greatly in companies as big as Facebook and Wal-Mart. I find myself back at home sitting on my basement sofa, writing in my journal: “Next time Joshua will think twice before he eats my cookie! That was baked by the best bakers in Italy. It costs a surprising amount of money for a batch of those.” Remembering I have to feed my shark, I drop my pen and rush to the small crawlspace area of my basement. I pull a strand of cement off the wall and the whole wall opens. PAUSE!! At this point, you must be thinking I am a person who lives his life of prosperity in secret. Well I’m not. I’m not Batman or Spiderman. My parents know everything of my life, except where the entrance to my lair is. I kept that a secret to them because they would mess everything up. I kept my exit away from my room as I knew their focus would be there. They have also searched every other part of our house, pulled every book on a shelf, taken down every photo. This is the one place they haven’t looked. RESUME!! I crawl through where used to be a wall and suddenly drop 20 feet down onto a trampoline. Next, I hop onto a 10 meter diving board and jump into the water without making a splash. I had flipped and twirled so many times that now I am in the water, I am dizzy. Suddenly, my shark approaches, looking more vigorous than ever. He calms down quickly. I was scared for a second that he actually was going to eat me. I feed him 30 fish and exit the pool where I am greeted by my pet bear. The pets are also a reason why I don’t let my parents in this place. I have eight pets. My parents would be scared to death, swimming next to a shark. I have been losing a substantial amount of money in the past year. Hey, pet sharks aren’t cheap. I view my 72’ flat screen T.V. to see who made fun of me behind my back. “Gopal’s got anger issues!” booms the T.V. “Who was that? Jake? Oh he is going down!” I say to myself. Now just what should I do to get revenge? It should be something slight because he talked behind my back, not in my face. I should…. Hmmmmm….. How about I tie him to a chair? No that was used a long time ago. I’ll do the next step… The next morning, Jake sat on his chair. ”Jake, can you come here one minute?” said Ms. Berkley, my Social Studies teacher. “You have to get your grade for that test we took yesterday.” As Jake started to get up, his chair rose with him. He pushed down his chair but it wouldn’t budge. I snicker at his efforts and grin in accomplishment. Super-glue is a friend of mine. That was a good one! Jake turns back to me and said,”Ms. Berkley, Gopal Super-glued me to my chair! I bet he heard me make fun of him.” “Is this true, Gopal?” replied Ms. Berkley. “No, and he made fun of me!” said Gopal. “Is this true, Jake?” said Ms. Berkley. “Yeah, but that’s not nearly as bad of super-gluing someone to a chair!” “I didn’t do it!” Gopal lies. “Yes you did!” “No I didn’t!” “Is this true?” chimes Ms. Berkley. “Okay, guys, listen up! Is any of this true?” “I did make fun of him yesterday” admits Jake. ”Do I get detention?” Ms. Berkley nods her head. “Ugh!” Jake walks to the office, falling backwards onto his chair every three seconds, needing assistance from a teacher to get him up. And I think, “There’s a sucker born every minute.” The students, seeing all that happened, are silent, but in a split second, they all start laughing like hyenas; cackling and howling fills the room. You can hear somebody snorting like a pig and rolling people banging into desks. I would laugh, but I’m too busy running outside. I find myself at the old, leaning sugar-maple tree. Everybody (except me) avoids this tree because of its towering heights, it’s leaning, and they fear it’s going to fall on them. Hear the bell ring. Good! While everybody is at lunch, I am climbing the tree, step by step, until I reach the top. I stand on top of a wide metal circle. It suddenly opens, and a split second later, I’m on a slide on the inside of the leaning trunk. No one would expect that the reason why the tree is leaning is because it contains a hundred-foot slide. I pass my swimming pool and crawl through the tunnel that leads to the lair in my house. I feed my octopus and tarantula and exit the lair and enter my room. “Mom!” I yell, “I’m home!” “Okay, now come and eat the sandwich I made for you!” She yells back. “What kind?” I question. “Turkey and lettuce, just come down” “Ugh!” You can probably tell I don’t like turkey and lettuce (because of the lettuce). I quickly take the turkey out and eat it plain. I keep the rest for Buttercup, my elephant (he’s a vegetarian). I come back home for lunch because the school lunches are nasty. If I bring a lunch, it will get cold by the time lunch starts. I get back to school and see that people are already looking for me. I climb down the tree and quickly hide behind it. When nobody was looking, I ran behind a person looking for me and said, “Yes” “AAAAAAHHHH” she yelped “Gopal, you scared me. By the way, where do you go every day?” “I eat my lunch outside!” I yell. “You’re not allowed to!” “But I still do!” Shelly is so annoying. She is tomorrow’s victim. The question is only how do I embarrass her? I get home the fast way; through the tree. When I get home, I plan out how to get back at Shelly and Shekar. Tricking Shelly will be easy; she’s always trying to get people in trouble. I will trick her into “making other people get in trouble” by telling her that somebody put gum in her hair. She will tell the teacher, though the teacher won’t believe her because the accused kid would be the shyest kid in the class. Who would put the gum in her hair? Me, of course. The next morning, Shelly walks into the classroom, with a smirk on her face. I could tell she was just waiting for someone to do something bad so she could get them in trouble. Suddenly, a girl in the front row starts laughing. Shelly, confused looks behind her and stares at the girl, confused. The girl finally says, “You have something in your hair.” “What? What do I have in my hair,” Shelly exclaims. “Gu- gu- gum!” says the girl as she starts laughing their stomach out. Other classmates start laughing. Then, I approach Shelly. “Shelly,” I whisper, “I know who did this to you” Shelly’s face lit up, changing from the brink of crying into the smirking grin of hers. “It is Ronnie” At this point, I was biting my lips to keep from laughing. Shelly goes up to the teacher and accuses the very shy Ronnie of putting the gum in her hair. For once, Ronnie, the shyest kid in the class, is talking, and even sometimes yelling at Shelly. Finally Shelly gets extremely angry and starts to yell in Ronnie’s ear. She throws her books on the floor in frustration. “Shelly,” booms Ms. Jordan, our math teacher, ”Go to the office right now” And I think, “There’s a sucker born every minute.” Suddenly, this kid named Shekar spills some Oreo ™ crumbs on my desk. My face turns red. Why does everybody have to irritate me? I need to strike revenge quickly. I really liked the idea of super-gluing somebody to a chair, but that would be too obvious that it was me because most people think I super-glued Jake to his chair. Maybe, I can put paint on his chair. Yes, that would work. The chairs are red, so Shekar would never notice the red paint on his chair. I am excused to go to the bathroom, but I go to the abandoned locker #312. I open the locker with the combination 6-32-17 and hop in. People always wondered why that locker was so big. They also wondered how it was indestructible. There is a steep drop vertical and I land on a trampoline. I grab the red paint and jump on the trampoline. I fly upwards and out of the locker. I rush to the hallway and pull the fire alarm. Everybody goes outside. I quickly slather Shekar’s chair with red paint and rush outside. It was freezing out. My frantic teacher meets me by the main door. After 10 minutes of her talking about how scared she was when I was in the bathroom and the fire alarm went off, we were allowed to go back inside. Everybody rushed in, wanting to get into the warm, cozy building. Shekar was about to get into his chair when somebody nudged me from the back. I ran into Shekar, pushing him out of the way unintentionally, and found myself sitting. Not on my chair, but on Shekar’s! As I get up, everybody starts bursts out into series of guffaws. There, I am, in the middle of the room, red paint on my butt, thinking, “There’s a sucker born every minute, and I am one of them.” |
|
 |
|
 *Shyan Koul is a 12 years old, 6th Grade student from Andover, Massachusetts, U.S.A. His interests are story reading, music and travel. |
|
|
|
|
| Copyrights © 2007 Shehjar online and KashmirGroup.com. Any content, including but not limited to text, software, music, sound, photographs, video, graphics or other material contained may not be modified, copied, reproduced, republished, uploaded, posted, or distributed in any form or context without written permission. Terms & Conditions. The views expressed are solely the author's and not necessarily the views of Shehjar or its owners. Content and posts from such authors are provided "AS IS", with no warranties, and confer no rights. The material and information provided iare for general information only and should not, in any respect, be relied on as professional advice. Neither Shehjar.kashmirgroup.com nor kashmirgroup.com represent or endorse the accuracy or reliability of any advice, opinion, statement, or other information displayed, uploaded, or distributed through the Service by any user, information provider or any other person or entity. You acknowledge that any reliance upon any such opinion, advice, statement, memorandum, or information shall be at your sole risk. |