Megan sat down to first period just as the bell rang. Mr. Wilson walked up and down the rows, placing half-sheets of paper face down on each desk as he passed. Megan looked over at the kid next to her – it was that stupid pop quiz she’d taken last week. They were getting it back already? Why now? Her heart sank; she’d been sure she’d have a few more days before she had to acknowledge that grade. And to think she’d actually been kind of looking forward to school for once – why did she have to get this back on only her second day of popularity?
Megan glumly flipped the paper over, hoping she’d at least managed to bluff her way into a D. But when she saw the red mark at the top, she couldn’t believe it: A-. How was that even possible? She’d left two answers blank and she knew for a fact that at least one of the answers she did give was wrong. That meant the best she should have been able to get was a 70. Did Mr. Wilson make a mistake?
As soon as class was over, Megan made her way to his desk. She really didn’t want to ask him about her quiz, but she had to know if he’d seriously meant to mark it down as an A. She didn’t want to be counting on those extra points only to have them disappear at the end of the year. Now all she had to do was hope he didn’t realize his mistake and mark her down for coming forward.
“Mr. Wilson?” she asked tentatively. She rested her fingers on the edge of the desk, as if to brace herself.
“Megan, how are you?” Mr. Wilson said, smiling. Megan tried not to be worried – he never smiled.
“I just had a question about my quiz.” she told him.
“You did very well.” He nodded at her approvingly.
“I just wanted to make sure. I mean, I didn’t actually finish it.”
“I know. But the answers you did give were very good – very insightful.”
“Really?” It was a fill-in-the-blanks paper. How insightful could she have been?
“Some of your answers were a little...unorthodox.” he admitted. “But rest assured, you earned your A.”
“Thank you.” Megan said a little stiffly.
She was still pretty sure something was wrong, but there didn’t seem to be much she could do. She’d already tried to ask her teacher, what else was there? If Mr. Wilson was sure it was ok, she might as well go with it. Besides, she really couldn’t afford to be wasting time trying to talk herself out of an A – how stupid was that? Instead, she left the class and headed to math.
“You’re late, Miss McGowen.” Mr. Lowell said when she walked into the room.
“Sorry, I was talking to Mr. Wilson.” Megan said somewhat distractedly.
She pointed vaguely over her shoulder, as if somehow that would help. Mr. Lowell didn’t say anything, which she guessed was good.
She sat down and got out her book, checking the kid next to her for the page number.
“Any questions on the homework?” Mr. Lowell asked. A hand shot up in the back.
“Number twenty-three?” someone asked. Mr. Lowell wrote it on the board.
“Fifteen.” someone else said.
“Twenty-six.”
There were six questions in total. Mr. Lowell wrote down each problem on the whiteboard. Then, he turned and picked students to go up and solve them. Of course, Megan was chosen to go up there.
She looked at her problem for a minute: 8z + 4x - 6 = 18. Solve for x. She was pretty sure she knew how to do that. Add six to both sides, move the z part to the other side, and divide. Simple, right?
When she was finished, she looked at her answer: x = 24 + 8z all over 4. She nervously walked back to her desk, hoping she didn’t miss anything.
Her problem was fourth, so Megan had plenty of time to look over it. And now that she was seated, she saw that she’d made a mistake; she hadn’t actually finished dividing the second half of the problem. Mr. Lowell turned to look at what she’d written, and Megan found herself slumping down in her seat.
He stared at it critically for just a second before adding something under what she’d written: x = 6 + 2z. Still, he continued to stare. Had he found something else wrong too?
He grabbed an eraser and wiped away the plus sign, changing it to a minus.
“Very good.” he said, nodding at her. Megan just sank down further into her chair.
Megan felt nothing but relief as he finally moved on to the next problem. Still, she wished he didn’t have to spend quite so much time in front of hers. And why had he told her she did a good job? She would have thought he was being sarcastic, except Mr. Lowell wasn’t really like that. Besides, Mr. Wilson had been just as weird.
Megan thought hard as she walked towards her third period class. Why would her teachers be acting so weird? She was so wrapped up in her own little world that she wasn’t paying attention to the kids around her. She walked numbly through the crowd, absentmindedly weaving her way around groups of kids who’d decided to stop in the middle of the walkway.
“Hey, Megan.” somebody said.
Megan looked up. Brian Miller, the kid who’d refused to be her lab partner last week was staring at her.
“Uh, hi.” she said.
“Megan – how are you?” Amy Rockwell asked.
“I like your shirt.” someone else said. Megan looked down. She was wearing an old blue t-shirt – nothing particularly nice.
“Thanks?” Megan said uncertainly.
“See you in class.” someone else told her. Megan didn’t even know who that was.
“...Ok.” she said before hurrying down the hall to her next class.
Megan slunk down into her desk, desperately trying not to be noticed. Once class actually started, all the weird comments finally died down. What was that all about? Megan wondered. Surely it wasn’t part of her popularity, was it? Megan sighed to herself – this could get weird really fast.
When lunch finally came around, Megan hurried out to the cafeteria as fast as she could, finding Jen already seated. Good – she wanted to talk to her actual friend before any of their new group got to the table. Things were weird enough already; she didn’t want to start making them suspicious with what she had to get off her chest.
“Has anything kind of strange been happening to you?” Megan asked, not even bothering with a hello.
“Not really.” Jen shrugged. “Why?”
“I just got an A on a quiz that I didn’t deserve.” Megan said quietly; she didn’t want anyone to think she’d been cheating. Even if Mr. Wilson didn’t seem to think it was a problem, Megan didn’t want to risk it.
“Lucky.” Jen mumbled.
“No – that’s not it. I mean, I can’t figure out how it’s even possible – you should have seen the answers I wrote! And then in math, I totally messed up the problem and no one cared.”
“Why would they care? It’s just math.”
Megan sighed – Jen obviously didn’t understand.
“What are you girls talking about?” Tara asked, sitting down beside Megan. Karen was right behind her. So much for this conversation, Megan thought bitterly.
“Oh, just about how smart Megan is.” Jen rolled her eyes.
But Megan wasn’t smart – that was the problem. She wasn’t dumb or anything, but she wasn’t the genius Jen was making her out to be.
“That’s not it!” Megan snapped, getting annoyed.
Why wasn’t Jen taking this seriously? Couldn’t she see the potential problems here? If it started to look like Megan was cheating her way through class, she could get suspended – maybe even expelled!
“Why? What’d she do this time?” Tara asked Jen.
“She was just telling me about how great she did on her quiz.” Jen told her. “The last quiz I took I probably failed.”
“But I should have failed too.” Megan insisted. Jen just laughed.
“When was the last time you failed anything?” Karen asked.
“Umm, Tuesday?” There had been an English test she hadn’t bothered to study for.
“Really?” Jen looked confused for a minute. But Tara didn’t.
“No teacher would fail you.” she said confidently. “And even if they did, who cares? You’re the most popular girl in school.”
“Yeah, you might not do great on every single test, but there’s no way they’d let you fail the class.” Karen added.
“Wait, what?” Megan blinked. She stared at them, her mind suddenly racing.
“Megan, get real.” Stacey told her. “They only hold back the losers. You’re way too popular not to graduate.”
“No, that can’t be right...” Megan trailed off.
This couldn’t really have anything to do with her wish, could it? She’d wished to be popular, sure. But she was pretty sure there was no way she could ever become popular enough for her teachers to care. So what was going on? Her wish had been so simple! Could that genie really have messed something up? Well, when she got home, she was certainly going to find out!
She made it through the rest of the day, each class just as weird as the last. She was called on to read in English – she did wonderful. And her science teacher congratulated her on the beautiful diagram she drew on the board. Megan did her best to look grateful, but really, she wanted to scream. These were the simplest things in the world – why would anyone think they were impressive feats? She ended up finishing off the day with her hand propping up her forehead as she stared dejectedly down at her desk.
As soon as she got to her room, she ripped the cork out of the bottle, demanding an explanation.
“Of course it has to do with your wish.” the genie told her. “Remember? You wished for everyone at school to think you were great. That includes teachers.”
Megan thought back. It had only been two days ago, but it seemed like a lot had happened since then. Had she really wished for everyone to like her? She had to admit, it did sound like something she’d say. But of course she didn’t mean it like that – who would want their teachers to like them? She’d never heard of anyone who was both popular and liked by teachers. Megan thought for a minute.
“Well, can you fix it?” she asked hopefully.
“Of course. Is that what you want?”
Megan opened her mouth to say yes, but stopped herself just in time. “No strings attached?” she asked instead.
“What do you mean?” he asked neutrally. Megan noticed he didn’t bother to answer the question.
“It’s going to cost me a wish, isn’t it?”
“Of course.” He said it like it should have been obvious.
“What am I going to do?” Megan wailed. “I can’t be teacher’s pet in all my classes! I won’t have any friends then!”
“Why not?”
He had the nerve to actually sound bewildered. But Megan wasn’t buying it; she just glared at him.
“Because everyone will be too busy making fun of me.” How dense was he?
“No, they won’t.” the genie told her, trying to keep the grin off his face. He wasn’t all that successful.
“Oh? Why not?” Megan snapped.
“Because you’re the most popular kid at school – who would make fun of you?”
This time, he couldn’t contain his smirk. He turned away slightly until he could compose himself.
“You did this on purpose!”
“I’m only here to help.” he said innocently. But Megan could see he knew perfectly well it wasn’t what she’d wanted.
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