I'm pulling my backpack up over my shoulder, headphones sticking out of the front pocket because I didn't have time to tuck them back in. I'm standing up, and leaving the room, her fat face outlined by the garish red shirt she's wearing.
The door closes behind me, and I don't look back.
This all started on Wednesday.
I'm in English for Complete and Utter Retards, so when we write an essay on whatever book we have been reading (I use the term "reading" very loosely here--remember, English for Retards), the teacher feels the intense and unwavering need to walk us through every single step of the process. It's like being six and watching those condescending shows lumped under the category of "children's programming" all over again.
"Wealth and power corrupt. How are we going to support this statement, class?"
She may as well be wearing a polka-dot dress and have a beehive hairdo, and one of those little pointer things with an apple on one end.
We've just finished "reading" The Great Gatsby. I'm one of perhaps three in the class that actually finished the book, and I read it twice just to make certain that I caught everything the book had to offer. So, our essay topics, "wealth and power corrupt", this is in relation to The Great Gatsby.
The teacher, she's still writing reasons on the board, trying to pry out any evidence of consciousness from the class. Proof that we're sentient beings. She moves on to the next chunk to support her thesis, that wealth and power corrupt. She states that Gatsby (who is both rich and powerful) is a corrupt, bad person.
Just so everyone is on the same page here, Gatsby is very rich, and very powerful, but he is not corrupt, or a bad person, and wealth is certainly not what corrupted him if one were to consider him corrupted. This obviously doesn't fit with the essay (remember the topic? It's okay if you don't. Scroll up, I won't get mad. That's right kids, "wealth and power corrupt."), so, as the only member of the class with a functioning brain, I feel it is my duty to make her aware of this.
"Ms. Tafoya," I begin, using my calm voice, "Gatsby isn't corrupt."
She pauses, and turns, surprised that anyone is talking.
"Oh, stop it. You're just arguing for the sake of arguing."
Here is where I begin to get insulted. Just because I'm sixteen doesn't mean I am lacking in anything, nor does it mean that she has any right to speak to me, to make assumptions about me, like that.
"No, I'm not. Gatsby is a good person."
The Great Gatsby takes place in the 1920's, which, if you were paying attention during history class, was also when prohibition was big. Prohibition, if you are completely ass-backwards, was the 18th amendment that prohibited the sale and/or consumption of alcoholic bevarages. In short, alcohol, beer, wine, liquor, all of it was illegal during this time. Of course, a law falls apart if it is not based on justice, or if too many people disagree with it, so prohibition did not go over terribly well with the general public. People ignored the law, and continued drinking, by brewing their own beer, or importing it from canada, or doing any one of a multitude of other things.
The people who were providing the alcohol (called "bootleggers") became incredibly rich incredibly quickly, because, as I mentioned earlier, no one agreed with the prohibition laws that were passed.
Gatsby turns out to be, of course, a bootlegger, meaning that his money was obtained illegally.
This would make him a bad person if not for his intentions. Gatsby is also in love with a girl named Daisy, and Daisy was in love with him before he went off to the war. Daisy is incredibly rich, so Gatsby believed that he could never marry Daisy unless he was rich, too. The motivation behind his money, the reason he got into bootlegging, was so Daisy would love him.
This, I believe, makes Gatsby a good person.
"Gatsby isn't a bad person because he's doing it for love."
My teacher turns on the bitchy bulldyke tone.
"He's breaking the law!"
I sigh.
"And is the law always right? You've been over this with us--what about the Salem Witch Trials? Was the law right then?"
She scrunches up her face with a look of disapproval.
"You're just being a smart aleck."
"No, I'm not. It was during the prohibition, so everybody was drinking or bootlegging. Gatsby's no more corrupt than anyone else."
"You're not listening to me!"
Here's where I'm confused. Not once did she give me a bit of evidence I couldn't refute.
"I'm not listening?"
"No, you're not, you're being a smartass."
She returns to writing on the board, and by now, I'm fuming. I know I'm right.
"I am not. Okay, look, Gatsby isn't an example of how wealth and power corrupt."
"Well, you didn't raise your hand to disagree with the topic, so just shut your mouth, ok?"
Wait. What the fuck? I'm not disagreeing with the statement that wealth and power corrupt, I'm simply disagreeing with the fact that Gatsby is a bad person because he sells alcohol so a girl will marry him. I think it's an incredibly human thing to do.
"What? But I wasn't--"
"No, you're just being a smart aleck, stop it."
I turn around and face my friend, try to talk to him, but he is no help. She's not worth it, he says. I know you weren't being a smartass. She is just retarded. It's an attempt on his part to get me to shut up, and I hate that, I hate him for it.
Friday, today, it rolls around, and I ask him to sit with me.
"I can't."
"Why not?" I'm confused.
"I told you already."
He doesn't tell me anything though, so of course, I am ignorant.
"No you didn't."
"Okay, well, basically, the teacher says I'm a bad influence on you."
Because as everybody knows, without my friend egging me on there (by telling me to chill out and stop it), without his approval, I can't do anything. Anything I think or feel is a direct result of him, of his thoughts and opinions being fed directly into my brain via a neurotransmitter. He whips it out whenever he gets tired of talking. That's it.
It's less funny and more insulting than I'm making it out to be. The idea that I need anybody else's approval to voice my own opinions; the idea that I am little more than a sponge is disgusting. I am myself, I have always been myself, I will always be myself, and I ask for neither approval nor opinions.
My friend and I are standing in front of English before the bell to be in class rings. My history teacher walks past us. I call out his name and he turns around.
"I'm allowed to have my own opinions about morality, right?"
He walks back over.
"Uh oh. What happened?"
"My English teacher is crazy."
He laughs.
"Well, two things you should know," he says. "The first is that all English teachers are crazy, and the second is that of course you're allowed to have your own opinion."
I smile.
"Thanks."
My friend and I walk into class, and take our seats across the room. Really, I've no idea why we are across the room from eachother.
The teacher starts to lecture us about how we need to work harder, and then makes plans to go over another essay outline, exactly like what we did on Wednesday. Me, I've got an essay to write (not about the topic, mind you, but about morality, because I think that would be the best Fuck You I could deliver at this point), so I raise my hand.
She talks for a while more before calling on me.
"Yeah, if you're just going to talk the whole period, can I go somewhere else and work on my essay? It's distracting."
She gets the pissy dyke voice again.
"No, you can't leave."
Pause.
"What's distracting?"
I sigh, really, I think it's obvious.
"You. You talking all period. I don't see why I have to be punished for having my stuff together. I have an essay to write."
Her fat face contorts into contempt.
"Well, the essay is supposed to be mostly homework anyway."
"Which explains why you're doing it for us on the board right now."
Her eyebrows come together.
"You know what, you're just arguing for the sake of arguing again."
I pick up my backpack and get up out of my seat.
"I don't have to take this shit from you, or anyone else."
And I'm out the door.
I spend the rest of first period writing the best essay introduction I've ever written.