Fishing Line, an Old man, a 17 year old girl, a 17 year old boy, his mother, his teacher, a car, a scarf, an anonymous phone caller, a bible, a silver necklace, a lettermans jacket, an empty bottle of anything, a picture of a woman, an old baseball cap, a designer purse, a bottle of expensive perfume, a cell phone, a new pair of tennis shoes, and a pair of sunglasses.
If you do it, you get +100 respect points, and if I ever meet you, a hug
The story so far:
In his 25 years as a high school U.S. History teacher, Rich Marshall had thought he had seen and heard it all. Cloverdale High School had hired him during the spring semester after all, an unusual move. Most school districts took your application and waited until mid-June to start calling applicants for interviews. Rich, however, had been called for an interview in February.
It just so happened that Cloverdale had a little scandal to clean up after way back when. The current social studies staff had one gentleman in particular who happened to have an affinity for giving high marks to teenage girls who otherwise were failing in all other subjects. The fact that most of them happened to be drop dead gorgeous for their age had nothing to do with it, of course.
The otherwise outstanding staff member, a Mr. Greenhorn or Greenborn...(Rich couldn't exactly remember at the moment) must have thought he had the winning lottery ticket - a taxpayer-funded farm league system of incoming female recruits just ready for an easy "A" in exchange for some extracurricular tutoring outside of class. As all good things eventually come to end, so did this masquerade.
So far as the story had been related to Rich, old prof Greenhorn had given in to the urge to extend his kind tutelage to the daughter of a local city councilmen (Rich couldn't help but think of the first time he watched The Graduate while listening to this tale in the teacher's lounge). So as it turned out three months later, old man "Greenlust" was sat down with the young lady in question, her parents, and an all-star cast of local politicians and lawyers. Wouldn't you know it, but this dedicated public educational servant felt the sudden need for an early retirement two days later. As the first applicant for the upcoming school year's positions happened to be Rich, it just so happened that February wasn't such a bad month to be hired after all. Welcome to Cloverdale, friend...feel free to never follow in your predecessor's steps!
Then there was the time in 1992 where Rich and his best friend/colleague Saul Boussen (biology teacher on the other side of campus) had accidently saved the school from a shooting incident. It had taken Saul a little while longer to catch on than Rich, but he couldn't deny that Saul was a little more feared by the kids than himself and thus instrumental in stopping what could have been a tragedy. Having Saul there at the time when Rich decided to go for the gun was indeed encouraging. "How did you muster enough courage to go after the gun like that without soiling yourself?", Saul had half-joked with him later after it was all over. "I guess I didn't have time to think about it," replied Rich. He didn't have the heart to tell anyone that he believed Saul was right behind him ready to back him up and take out the would-be pre-pubescent assasin. So Rich let it go and received his special recognition and 15 minutes of fame.
He had been through the 80's with it's overextended justifications of premarital teenage sex, hedonistic lust for money, and what the kids had called "rap". He had married Linda during these years. Two years later, they had had Connor and Familia Marshall needed to move from the city out to the countryside in a 4 bedroom that would have made The Douglass' from Green Acres envious. Connor himself went through school, graduated, and now lived in Des Moines and was talking about marrying his girlfriend. "Am I really this old now?" Rich would ask himself.
The 90's saw the cultural revolution of the 60's played out in his classrooms through increased marijuana use & some weird combination of punk/metal. While the kids were getting harder to control...things were still relatively calm. The early 21st century produced kids who knew more about the internet and technology then he could ever have imagined he could learn in a college course.
So all in all it was an easy life. He worked 9 months out of the year and got 3 off. He only had to visit the in-laws during the summer and got to attend unlimited high school sporting events free to pass the time. In exchange he got a paycheck and a reputation as a stable educational professional. He didn't flinch easily and made a name amongst others in the community. All in all, he thought Cloverdale High got a pretty good deal out of hiring him in mid-spring. There wasn't much that impressed or scared Rich Marshall in his 25 years as a high school teacher.
But there was something that scared Rich now. It wasn't a wanna-be gang banger trying to disrupt his class or the threat of a parent pissed off because little Johnny was given his first C and now wanted to sue the school district. It wasn't the threat of a gun being used on campus or that he would fart one day during a lecture in front of one of his classes of 30+ students. As Rich Marshall was now the same age as the man he had replaced so many years ago in that chilly February, something changed his perspective on everying. After his 25 years of dealing with Salt Lawns finest sarcastic adolescents at Cloverdale High School, he had finally found something which scared him...a paper.
For 25 years Rich had given out an assignment that his juniors write a historical term paper from the point-of-view of 1st person. The guidelines were simple: you could be anyone from any time period covered during the semester as long as you wrote from the vantage point of someone that participated in that event. Papers had to be at least 5 pages in length. This year, Rich had given out the same assignment and a majority of the kids liked the assignment. Some even asked if they could write more than 5 pages for extra credit. Most kids waited until a week before the end of the semester to turn in the paper.
This year was different. This year someone had attached a picture of an old angry woman to the paper. This year someone had turned in the paper early...way early. This year someone had turned in the paper the very next day to be exact!
The paper lay on Rich's desk. He sat there staring at the title "PERFUME FOR YOU". There was no name on the paper. There was no date. But from looking at the cover the pages looked like they had come from the shelves of the paper section at Office Depot just yesterday. For the first time in his 25 years teaching at Cloverdale High School, Rich Marshall was scared.
The paper read:
The Old man looked forward, seeing the girl and boy, both aged 17, hold hands. He gripped his fishing line, ready to choke both of them to death. The boy was wearing a lettermans jacket, the girl a scarf and silver necklace, which sparkled in the moonlight.
He walked behind them, slowly and steadily. As he got closer he saw the boy was also wearing a pair of sunglasses. The old man pulled the fishing line tight and slowly waited until the couple put their heads together. Just then, he striked and started to choke them.
In the background, a car was coming behind the couple and the old man. The old man finished with the couple, and took the girls bag. In it, it contained a bottle of expensive perfume, a cell phone, a bible and a designer purse. On further inspection, he noticed the boy was wearing a new pair of tennis shoes and an old baseball cap, and also took this for himself.
The car drove closer, and the driver noticing the couple, stopped and got out. It was the teacher of the boy. Quickly he called the mother, as they were close friends. He didn't know how to break it to the mother, but that he did. He looked in his car and quickly made a glance at the picture of a woman, his wife.
The girls cell phone rang, and the old man saw it said "no number". And anonymous caller then, he thought to himself. With that, he chucked the phone away and strode off into the darkness. The phone clattered onto the ground, flipping open upon impact. The thin, reedy voice that came through, was ignored as it shouted, "I know what you did; you won't escape justice!" Pulling out his own cell phone, the teacher phoned in to 911 and informed them of the murder.
I watched as my accopmplice finished garroting the two teens with the fishing line and slunk off. Once the teacher discarded the phone and pulled out his own to dial 911, I Quickly turned back to my own cell phone and dialed the same number. I reported a murder and gave the innocent's license plate number, informing the operator that he was making a similar call to remove suspicion from him. Telling the calm voice on the phone that I feared that the killer would see me and come at me and, therefore had to leave; I hung up and slunk away, using the bushes as cover. Throwing my cell phone into the river to prevent them tracing my through it, I met up with my partner and headed off.
Rich looked up from the paper. He was wondering what it meant, it scared him so much.
Could one of his students be plotting murder? Could it be Virginia tech all over again. He had heard that the shooter there had turned in some disturbing stories himself. Rich was thinking about whether he should inform security of this odd paper; he decided to sleep on it. He walked out of the school and started driving home.
"Who would write such a thing?" He thought
Could it be young Bobby Thornton, the class clown? Or possibly Jackie Johnson- the girl who always seemed down?
As he crawled into bed that night, he couldn't help thinking about it. He dreamed that one of his students, came in with an AK-47 and started mowing people down.
he decided to talk to school security the next morning about it: better safe than sorry.
are pregnant 
