400 Days of Oppression
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It was the last day of school. The bell rang, signaling the end of another grade and the beginning of three joyous months of summer. Kids flooded from the old, red-brick middle school building like a swarm of ants from a poisoned nest. Smiles were the dominant expression but not the only ones. There were fights, kids making the most of their last opportunity to settle year-long scores, the haunted expressions of those who had received bad report cards and were terrified at the thought of what their parents would do to them when they got home. A mix of emotions from outrage to apathy painted the features of the students who’d learned they needed to attend summer school to complete the grade and those who learned they would not graduate to the next grade no matter what they did.
Notes were passed and dates were hurriedly made. Girls and boys exchanged phone numbers, promising to stay in touch over the summer. There were a few tearful goodbyes from kids who had graduated and were moving on to different high schools. Kenyatta was one of the latter. He turned fourteen this year. He would be entering the ninth grade at Creative and Performing Arts High School in the fall. This was his last chance to tell Christie how he felt about her or he would likely never see her again.