He Who Laughs Last Laughs Sweetest

I have a plan. A plan for revenge. Ahh...revenge is so sweet. It seems like only yesterday that I was pranking Mr. K with those cat pictures from My Cat Hates You. I can't remember exactly what I was getting even with him for, but it sure was sweet.

My hall pass has been missing since before Christmas break. It was a brown plastic rectangle with my name in white sunken letters. Truth be told, it was the name plate I ripped off my door from Lower Basementia. Hey! Nobody else was going to use it! It was handy to set on the desk, and send with a kid down the hall. No passes to write and date. If it was left somewhere, it was returned. It was my NAME, you see. So it always came back to me.

There is a kid in my 2nd Hour who asked how badly I wanted it back. This was after it had been missing for a couple weeks. He said he knew where it was. I told him to bring it. The next day, he said, "What's it worth to you?" I told him I might have a small reward...such as a big 'Thank You'. He was not impressed. So every couple of days now, he brings up my hall pass. The way he acts, he has it hidden somewhere. I'm a fairly good reader of people. Teachers have to be. Now one of his cronies has also started asking about the reward. They are in cahoots, those two. The one said that if I give them the reward, they will give me the hall pass. I said that if they give me the hall pass, I will give them the reward. We are at an impasse. I have progressed from the Thank You to a pack of gum. They are holding out for more.

Just Thursday morning, I told them this was starting to smell like extortion. They replied, "What's extortion?" Those wacky freshmen! I refused to feed their thirst for knowledge. I have plenty of dictionaries in the cabinet.

Also Thursday, 7th Hour, a known troublemaker came to class and said, "Oh, I have something for you." He reached into his pocket and pulled out my Basementia pass. What a thoughtful thing to do! I told him, "You know, I thought that kid had it! Just the way he acted. It was in his gym locker, wasn't it?" I told him the kid's name. He said, "How did you know that? I was looking in his gym locker for some deodorant, and there it was!" Aha! My psychic powers are still strong! So I swore that class to secrecy. They are mostly juniors and couple of seniors. They will not be telling any freshman of my dastardly plot. I paid the finder a fee of one cold bottle of water from my mini-fridge. He was pleased. He had not even asked for anything.

I'm going to offer a very special reward for the return of my hall pass. All the while, it will be snuggled in back of my bottom desk drawer, under some boring forms. And I will watch the little extortionists squirm. I will watch them go from a panic over losing the very thing that will bring them treasure. Then I will do some extorting of my own. I will tell them that since they seem to know an awful lot about my hall pass, I'm turning their names over to the principal for taking my personal property. I think I can get him to play along. He's done it for a bus driver, except the girl they were pranking burst into tears, which kind of backfired on them, but I don't see these two hardened criminals squirting out any saline.

I can't wait to put my plan in motion. I think next week will be good. Friday, I upped the reward to a 20 oz. bottle of soda for each extortionist. It was their suggestion. Little did they know, they no longer had my personal property which they are trying to charge me for. After the Hillmomba Idol Contest on Friday night, one of them came over to my section of the bleachers to visit me. I said, "Where's my hall pass." He told me to wait a minute. He went to consult with his crony. When he came back, he said, "It has been moved to a more secure location. I do not have the combination to the safe. We will get you the picture on Monday."

Suuuuure you will. Heh, heh. There is no more secure location than in my bottom desk drawer under some boring forms.