Post by Leo Spitz on Sept 26, 2009 17:03:42 GMT -5
How Laula became Leo's Favorite Student
It could take all of two seconds for an opinion to change.
At the beginning of the year, Leo Spitz thought his opinion about Laula Henderson would never change.
While brilliant, she was in the top five of her class…actually, she was number one, she was not his favorite. The kids that sat next to her were, but she wasn’t.
That didn’t mean he didn’t think of her as one of his kids, but she wasn’t his favorite. She fidgeted and she had actually leapt out of her chair, during class, almost as if she had been startled. When he asked her what was wrong, she twitched a little before asking if she could go to the bathroom.
He handed over the pass and she was gone for about 20 minutes, coming back after the bell rang. He had told her this was not acceptable, and she just nodded meekly, though the entire time she fidgeted in place.
He doubted that he got through with her and today she had been late for class. It was already a bad two days and Laula was becoming a problem student.
He heard the door open and he looked up to see the student he had been thinking about was peeking into the room, before slowly coming in, backpack over her shoulder as she shuffled forward slowly.
“What is it Laula?” he asked, not treating her any differently, even though his patience was wearing thin with her.
“I was wondering if I could move to the front, please,” she explained, her head down, and he pushed out the chair that he had for students.
“Sit and explain,” he stated and she slowly sat down, her backpack sliding down to the floor.
Leo was working on pulling out his seating chart for his small AP class, when he looked up and saw her face. His movements stopped suddenly and his eyes became concerned.
“What happened?” he asked the small girl with the bruise the shape of a pole on her face.
She was 13, was smaller then all his other students, younger by at least two years…and smarter then them all. She blasted her way up and she actually felt challenged in his class, though she never told anyone that.
She, however, was used to having the bruises and the torture that her fellow students put her through.
“Ran into a pole. Wasn’t watching where I was going,” she explained.
What had really happened was the fact that the teasing had gotten too far, with the pushing her back and forth, and she had crashed into the pole, but running into a pole was more believable and kept her parents calm.
“Laula, I doubt you crashed into it. You forget I’ve seen you at your hyperest. You avoided running into me when I turned a corner…and you were only half a foot in front of me. Poles don’t move, which is the only time I’ve seen you crashed into things,” he corrected.
Okay, so it was summer school and two days of real school, but that was beside the point.
“What happened? And tell, me, the, truth,” Leo pressed.
She sighed and hunched over. “The teasing just went too far and got shoved into a pole. It’s nothing, okay? I get teased all the time, so whatever, right? It’s not like anyone likes me anyway…though I probably am to blame for my kindergarten teacher hating me,” she stated, sounding upset, before kicking her foot out.
Leo stared and slowly moved, placing the seating chart on his back desk, where he always was at the end of school.
He sighed and leaned forward, before looking at her. “Laula, not everyone hates yo-…” he began to state when she shot him a look.
“Mr. Spitz, when is the last time someone didn’t try to shove me into the back corner of the room so they wouldn’t have to deal the fidgety girl? What you did?” she responded and leaned back slightly.
Leo blinked and shook his head. “The fidgeting does get on my nerves, but I can’t stop it. I put you in the back so you wouldn’t bother the other students,” he explained and she sighed, pulling her legs up to hug them to her chest, resting her cheek against her kneecaps.
“Yeah, you shoved me into the back. Never mind Mr. Spitz, it doesn’t matter,” she stated, moving to get out of the chair when he stopped her.
“No, it does matter. Every person matters. Why do you want to move?” he asked suddenly.
Laula stilled and sat back. She stared at him and shrugged. “I don’t like the back,” she muttered.
He raised an eyebrow at her and waited. She sighed and rubbed one of her ears, fingers twitching a little.
Leo waited and she sighed. “They keep bugging me. On the first day, one of the kids took a sharpened pencil and poked me through my shirt to my side. They keep trying to get me to react and I won’t, beyond jumping. So, I ran, but that didn’t work, and I tried to hide, but that didn’t work. And yes, I told the office, but they don’t believe me. The kids that go after me are the popular kids. No one is going to believe a nobody over them,” she stated, swinging her foot a little.
Leo stared and sighed, leaning forward. “It’s okay Mr. Spitz…no one sees what they don’t want to,” she murmured softly.
Leo looked up and moved around, kneeling next to Laula. “Laula, that’s not an excuse. As teachers, we should have been able to see…we should believe those who come to us for help, instead of acting like they are invisible, or it isn’t so bad. You shouldn’t be bullied in a place that you should feel safe,” he stated and she stared at him, face blank.
For a moment, he was wondering what she was thinking, before she suddenly hugged him. He blinked and slowly hugged her back. She was shaking lightly and he suddenly realized she was crying.
Laula quickly became his favorite after that day. She was his favorite of the favorites…and it was probably a good thing when she hid in his classroom to avoid bullies, or wrangled extra-credit after school so she could avoid the students that wanted to push bullying to the point where it would end up in more then just a bruise.
So, Leo knew where Laula Henderson lived because he usually drove her home. He got involved in his students’ lives; he made sure they got their homework done and wanted to be the guy they felt they could talk to.
But everyone has favorites and Laula was his.
Besides, she needed a friend and he graded her all the harder since she got help from the best chemistry teacher in the world!
The fact she stared at him like he was insane and then laughed at said comment was usually ignored.
((ooc: I couldn't resist, so I had to type this up. It took me forever, completely distracted me, but after rewriting Laula, she's become my fav, with Leo. I thought it would be cool if they had a strong relationship of a sort, like extended family. So, this came from that.))
