Senior Prank (9781620957295) (3 page)

Shortly after the big announcement, the bell rang dismissing the students to their second period. For Jose, Lamont and Elvis, this meant chemistry class and Ms. Blossom. She was without a doubt the hottest teacher in the school. Her beauty often sent students into day dreams. Long brown hair, a colorful face and a body that should be in
Playboy
were features that made her a knockout.

Her legs were long and muscular and usually tanned, a result of gym visits. She was in her mid 30's. She wore tight clothing that emphasized her breasts and slim waist.

Elvis describes her with the line from the ZZ Top song that says “She's got legs; she knows how to use them.”

Despite her beauty she was an incredible teacher. She won teacher of the year for the district, county, and state in her 13 years of teaching. Somehow she made the subject of chemistry interesting. However, she was no nonsense in the classroom and had a low tolerance for misbehavior. She wrote referrals like crazy, called parents about misbehavior and demanded that students not test her. Most didn't.

She was sly and knew how to work the system. Once a student threw dye into her fish tank, killing the fish. She told her cheerleaders that “whoever finds out for me who did it, I will make them cheerleading captain for the Clear Lake football game.” With this incentive, one of her cheerleaders came forth with the evidence. The student was punished and expelled from her class. She seemed to be a step ahead of the deviants.

“Good morning students,” said Ms. Blossom. “Welcome. Now you have five minutes to put the notes in your notebook. After that we are moving on. So, let's get busy.” The students copied the terms for pH scale, acids and bases into their notebooks.

Part of the strategy she used to keep Jose, Lamont and Elvis from trouble was that she sat each in a different area of the room. Elvis sat in front of her desk, Lamont on the left, front side of the room and Jose in the right, back of the room. She also learned to limit the amount of times she turned her back so she used an overhead projector so she would always face the class.

“Class,” said Ms. Blossom, “for the next two days, we are going to do a few minor chemistry experiments. I will divide you into teams of three today and we will review the rules for these experiments. If you don't follow the rules it will be an F with no make up. These chemicals can cause damage and even injure people. I don't want any problems. Got that?”

Jose, Lamont and Elvis petitioned to be on the same team. “We'll behave, Ms. Blossom,” said Jose. “We need to pass the class to graduate so we promise we'll be straight up. We'll keep it real.”

“OK, but the first time I correct you guys, it's an F for all three,” said Ms. Blossom. “Do you understand?”

“Yes,” answered Elvis.

“You got it,” said Jose.

“I'm feeling ya,” said Lamont.

After breaking into teams, Ms. Blossom gave a handout explaining the procedure. The first experiment involved determining whether chemicals were acids or bases. It involved the use of red cabbage. She explained the first experiment in detail.

“When you come in tomorrow, we are going to get right to work. I need you to sit with your group,” said Ms. Blossom. “Once everyone is ready to go I will ask you to get your materials. Each group will need a leader, a recorder and materials person. The recorder will record the results for the group. The leader will make sure you are going the experiment properly. The material person will gather all materials, and clean up at the end.

“That's it for today,” continued Ms. Blossom. Just as she finished the sentence, the bell rang, ending the class and sending the students to the next period.

Little did anyone, including Elvis, Jose and Lamont realize that these experiments were going to deliver the basis for a senior prank to remember. It all seemed so harmless at the time, just like hundreds of school chemistry experiments, but what an outrageous concoction it would produce.

The bell rang and the students filed into Ms. Blossom's chemistry class. It was all business. Ms. Blossom was wearing a lab coat and goggles. On each desk were the materials for today's experiments.

“That lady makes me want to be a scientist,” Jose whispered to Elvis. “She certainly makes my temperature rise.”

After taking roll, Ms. Blossom instructed the students to go sit with their other two lab partners. The larger science desks allowed for two three person groups at each desk. Jose, Lamont and Elvis grabbed seats in a choice location.

“Before we start I want to review a few things,” said Ms. Blossom. “Any shenanigans and it's an F for your group. I need each of you to wear goggles and be careful when handling the chemicals. This can be dangerous stuff.

“Today's lesson is about acids and bases. You will learn how chemists used the pH scale to describe acids and bases. The p stands for negative logarithm and the H for hydrogen. It is a scale that runs from 0 to 14. 7 is neutral. Less than 7 is acidic and more than 7 it alkaline.”

Elvis called his group the mad scientists. They positioned themselves across from probably the smartest threesome in the class. Jose led their positioning. In all the years of school he had learned that sitting next to the smartest kids in the class in group work usually meant an easier time and better grade. He'd simply mimic their actions, copy their work, or at worst ask them what to do.

The group on the other side was led by Missy Pulston, probably the top student in the class. Missy dropped out of the Advanced Placement and Honors classes because as she said “they were too hard and too much work.” She always seem to want to take the easiest route and being the brain of the class – even in a class of average – was a boost for her ego and income.

Theory also had it that her parents rewarded her with $100 for every A. She knew that AP or honors classes were C's with no reward. She spent her money trying to look good with the latest clothing styles, lots of make up and mostly shoes. She loved shoes. She had what seemed like a million pairs, almost a pair for each outfit. She was the ultimate preppie, and checked her phone constantly for messages. She never met a mirror she didn't look into check herself out.

Missy was considered good looking, but because of strict helicopter parents, she didn't date much. Boys feared her dad. Word had it that one time when her date showed up to pick her up, her father made sure the young man saw his gun collection. The father told the youngster “he ain't afraid to use them on any young man that does my daughter wrong.”

One of her partners was Hian Nguyen, an immigrant of two years from Vietnam. He was a smart child but troubles with the English language often confounded him and became learning barriers. After two years he was still learning the language. He managed A's but, unlike Missy, had to work for them. He was reserved, and like most Asians spoke little, and didn't cause any trouble. Marie Adams rounded out the group.

Marie was the typical average student. She was happy making C's, had little regard for her future, and didn't say much. She simply did the minimum. She didn't fit into any of the school's cliques. She seemed to prefer her iPod over socializing and certainly over studying. She looked forward to “getting out of this hellhole, just to get away from all the stuck up kids in the school.”

First, Ms. Blossom put some red cabbage in her blender. She added some water and ground the mixture into a red liquid. It was all shook up. She asked each group to come a get a flask full of her potion.

“Now take your bottle marked vinegar and pour a half cup into one of your clear flasks,” said Ms. Blossom, moving things at a pace that discouraged any misbehavior.

“Then add 5 milliliters of the red cabbage mixture and stir. Now note its color. Then on the answer sheet write what color is this mixture. Leave the pH answer blank. We'll do it later.”

Next came similar instructions. Students mixed a half cup of ammonia and the red cabbage, and recorded its' color. This was followed by a mixture of one teaspoon of baking soda, one half cup of water and a teaspoon of the red cabbage.

“This is cool stuff, “said Jose, as he wrote down the first three answers of red, green and blue. “Elvis, I'll give you fifty bucks to drink one of…”

No sooner had the words left his mouth than the loud bellowing of the school fire alarm filled the air. As was custom, the students had to vacate the building.

“Don't touch anything,” said Ms. Blossom, “leave it all there. Now you know the procedure. Stay together as a class, go to the teacher parking lot and wait.” In her haste, she forgot to lock the room.

After 10 minutes, clearance was given and the students headed back to class. Elvis, Jose and Lamont went ahead of the class, discussing how they could mess with Missy and Hian. What better way was there get revenge on them than watching them do something wrong? They discussed tossing in some of their own liquids into one of their mixtures. Elvis had some Brut cologne, Scope mouthwash and chocolate milk in his backpack.

“Jose you go ahead, and dump that stuff into their glasses,” instructed Elvis. “I'll slow the class down on the steps, so you can get back and nobody will know.” He ran into the room, opened Elvis's bag and dumped two capfuls each of the Scope, Brut, and chocolate milk into their desk mates' ammonia cup. He ran back to his class which as that time was finishing their ascent up the steps to the second floor.

Ms. Blossom, still in her white lab coat, went ahead to unlock the door. She inserted the key, realized she had left the door unlocked, but thought no harm, no foul.

“Everyone back to their desk area and with your group,” she said. “Now we are going to discuss what the color means on the pH scale. As I said previously the scale runs 0 to 14. The colors and their pH level are 2 for red, 4 for purple, 6 for violet, 8 for blue, 10 for blue-green and 12 for green. Now you have to take your colors and list the number that corresponds with that color and put them on your answer sheet.”

However, Missy's trio had a slight problem. The ammonia based glass had turned colors. It didn't match any of the colors of other people's mixtures. Instead it was a brownish mixture. So Missy took the glass held it up to her nose and smelled it. She held it up to Hian, who begrudgingly took a whiff.

“Looks like something ghetto,” quipped Lamont. “Looks like preppie girl messed up.” Silence then filled the air.

Then, about 30 seconds later both Missy and Hian started acting strange. It was as though a spell had been placed on them.

“Yo homey what happened to our mixture?” said Hian, “Ya feeling me, dog; it ain't right. That stuff is brown like my homey over there, Lamont. Know what I'm saying? Looks like sumthin you'd find in da toilet. You know what I'm saying? While we wuz chillin', sumthin' go bad. We've got to keep this on the DL.” It came out as ghettoese, something you'd never hear out of him.

Missy then started her bazaar behavior. “This is like like real strange,” she said, in with a valley girl accent. “We were like supposed to have a green glass and we got brown. Oh my God, gag me with a spoon. This is gross. Duh. We were like doing something like wrong. I got to tell this to my BF. This is makin' me sick.”

Jose, Elvis and Lamont looked at each other in stunned silence. They couldn't believe the way the pair were speaking.

“Hey, Missy, you okay?” said Lamont. “You ain't talkin' right. You sound like one of those valley girls. Hian, you tryin' to be a brother or something? You need to step off and chill.”

“Dog, we just chillin',” said Hian. “I gotta give my peeps a holla and tell them about this mixing is tight. This is off the hook.”

“Hi, you sound like ghetto,” said Lamont. “You feeling okay?”

“Duh, looks like we like did something like not right,” Missy answered.

Jose, Elvis and Lamont sat in disbelief. Here was Miss Preppie dumbing and Hian, who hadn't said 10 words the first four weeks of school, rambling like some angry thug. Marie Adams grabbed the paper the group had to fill out and asked Jose for help.

She realized they had fallen behind in their work.

“Jose what are the answers?” she timidly asked. “I just want to make sure we are right. I'm not sure what these two are trying to prove.”

“Wow,” said Jose, “Missy's group is asking us for help. Maybe there is hope for us dummies. Write this down – me helping Missy. Man, that's all right. It proves that once in awhile, the kid's got game.”

After about 10 minutes of silence at which time they seemed to be rambling in their new personalities as they completed the rest of the worksheet, Missy and Hian returned to normal. Missy asked Marie if she had finished the form. Marie said they still had to do two more items and they should get them from Ms. Blossom's large desk in the front of the room.

“What was that act by Hian and Missy about?” Elvis asked Lamont and Jose.

“Were they playing games or just being goofy? Or just maybe,” he continued, dropping off to a different thought.

“Lamont, I need you to do me a favor,” Elvis directed at his fellow lab partner.

“Ask if you can see their brown mix and when they're not looking take a quick snort.

If they see you, tell them I need it to be able to complete the assignment.”

“Sure,” offered Lamont, seemingly not making a connection between the brown mix and the behavior of Missy and Hian. He then he reached over and asked Missy to use their brown glass. Turning his back to everyone, he took a deep five second sniff, then put the glass down. Then everyone went to silence while Jose and Elvis finished the experiments and completed their form.

Ms. Blossom headed their way to check on their work. Just as she arrived, Lamont started blurting out some scientific language that nobody knew he possessed.

“The theory here is that natural substances of the cabbage have the property to change color because of the acidity of the environment,” he blurted out. “One can exploit the properties of the indicator to determine the acidity of the vinegar. We can conclude that the acidity of the concentration is related to the concentration of the hydrogen atoms present. Scientific experimentation has an amazing propensity to separate theory and fact.”