"Okay, let's start. The mood of the excerpt can best be described as..." He looks up over the paper at us expectantly.

"Hopeless! A!" we yell, confident we've got the right answer. All the rain, the sad animals, the gloom--what else could it be? We've eliminated the two crap answers; the attractive wrong answer didn't faze us at all; we--"

He shakes his head slightly and smirks. "No, it's C. Contradictory."

What? We stare at him, stunned. He tries to hide his amusement, but it still manages to sneak out. "It's C," he confirms.

Suddenly, we erupt in argument. "There's no way!" we insist. "That makes no sense! That passage screams hopeless!"

"Does it scream as loud as you are right now?"

"Yes!" we answer without thinking.

He sighs slowly. "How did the story start? In a nice little field, right? A nice, dry, pleasant little field. And then," he says, drawling out the last word, "and then it turns rainy and...yuck. That sounds pretty contradictory to me."

A valid point. He's earned a few supporters, but the rest of us hold fast.

"That happy part lasts for like, two sentences! The hopeless part cancels all that out."

"But it's still there," he says, holding up a finger. He turns to his student teacher, Ms. Thompson. "Let's see what you think."

"She's gonna side with you; you're grading her!"

"No, no, no. Let's just see." Everyone turns to Ms. Thompson gravely. She reluctantly opens her mouth and...

Contradictory. No help there.

"We need someone neutral. Someone who doesn't know what either of us has said," we decide.

"I'll go get Ms. Philbin," he tells us, and with that, he's out the door.

Two seconds pass before we realize that we let him go unattended. He could be telling her what to say right now. This thought paralyzes us with fear of potential embarrassment. Two more seconds pass and he returns with Ms. Philbin in tow.

"He told you!" we accuse.

"He told me I had to read something," she says defensively, taken aback by the intensity with which we're attacking the subject.

"Read this," he says, jabbing his finger at the book, "up to here," another jab, "and answer number one."

He strides over to the window and rocks back and forth on his heels.

"She's gonna say hopeless," we assure ourselves. "She's all over the hopelessness."

"No matter what she says, there will be no gloating. At all. It'll make her feel bad."

We look on in silence as she reads. The tension is visible in the room. After an excruciatingly long few minutes, Ms. Philbin looks up.

"Now what?" she wants to know.

"What's the answer?"

"Well...." Everyone hunches forward expectantly. We're going to gloat, we'll gloat all the way to hell and back. We just have to wait for her to answer the ques--

"I think it's contradictory."

Mr. Adams' face lights up, but he remembers his no gloating rule and quickly suppresses his expression. We, on the other hand, just suffer a collective breakdown.

"How can you think that?"

"It's definitely hopeless!"

"No way, man. No way."

She immediately launches into an argument with us, and the whole process starts up again. While we're locked in this brutal, take-no-prisoners debate, he stumbles across the room and starts trying to usher her out the door.

"Okay, Ms. Philbin, thank you!" He tries to raise his voice over us, but it just ends up blending in.

"No, you can't go! We're not done!"

"Thanks for your help, thank you!"

Once he finally manages to lure her into the hallway, he quickly shuts the door and turns to face us, a triumphant grin plastered across his face.

"Eat it, A.P. class! Yes!" he yelps, flashing a celebratory fist pump our way.

"What happened to your no gloating rule, Mr. Adams?"

He stops, completely serious. "That was only in effect if you guys won."

"Oh, come on! We have to let someone else read it."

"No, no, no. We've got other stuff to do."

"Like what?"

"Like write an A.P. worthy essay." With that, he starts passing out assignment sheets with our latest essay topics on them. "Now let's get going."

---

A/N: Just a little blurb piece about a day in my A.P. English class. I put it in my writing sample for colleges, and figured I'd post it here for kicks. There are a few more things I could write about concerning the class, so if you liked this, let me know and I'll post some more. So, hope you guys liked it, and thanks for reading! :)