Free Testing Kate by Whitney Gaskell

I said shakily. I couldn’t believe it. I was nearly thirty years old, and I was being screamed at and condescended to by a middle-aged prick with a severe case of megalomania. Anger pressed at my chest and buzzed in my ears. “If I didn’t, I apologize. But I thought that’s what class was for. To learn material we don’t yet know,” I added, my anger emboldening me.
    “Do you think you can come into my class unprepared and I’ll just spoon-feed you the syllabus? Is that right, Ms. Bennett?” Hoffman said. He was no longer shouting, but in a way, this new, icier tone was even more menacing.
    “Isn’t that your job?”
    There was a collective gasp from my classmates. Under his breath, Nick muttered, “Jesus, Kate.”
    I don’t know how it happened. I hadn’t meant to say it out loud, I really hadn’t. It was as though the words had been spit out of my mouth beyond my control. Was it possible I had multiple personalities? Specifically, an evil multiple personality intent on ruining my life?
    Sybil, I thought. I’ll call my evil multiple personality Sybil. At least now I finally have someone to blame for all of my bad luck.
    “Are you trying to embarrass me?” Hoffman asked, biting the words out.
    “No! No, of course not…,” I said, willing myself to apologize, although the words stuck in my throat like stones.
    Should I tell him about Sybil? I wondered. No, he’ll just think I’m crazy. Although maybe that wasn’t so bad at the moment. An insanity defense would be apropos for Crim class.
    Hoffman stared at me with his pale malevolent eyes in a way that made my skin crawl.
    “Every year,” he said in a soft, menacing voice, “I have one student who is convinced that he or she knows more about the subject of criminal law than I do.”
    I shook my head vigorously from side to side. No, no, no, that was the last thing I thought. I know nothing about the law.
Nothing.
Less than nothing.
    “And, interestingly enough, every year that student always ends up getting the lowest grade in my class. Something for you to think about, Ms. Bennett,” Hoffman continued. He turned to the lectern, picked up his notes, and then strode down off the teaching platform. No one moved as Hoffman stormed up the stairs, heading straight toward me.
    Is he going to hit me? I wondered, horrified and yet unable to move. Unable to look away.
    But Hoffman was not coming for me, he was simply exiting the room, abruptly ending class early. He pushed open the door and then suddenly wheeled around.
    “Come Monday, Ms. Bennett, perhaps you will be so kind as to take over the lecture. I’m sure we’ll all be thrilled to hear more of your brilliant insights into criminal law.”
    And then he turned and left the room, the door banging behind him.
    No one moved or spoke for a few beats. It was as though we were all expecting him to come storming back into class. But as one moment passed, and then another, and yet another without his reappearance, the silence began to break. A nervous giggle here, a loud whisper there, the thud of a few dozen textbooks closing.
    I exhaled a shaky breath and turned to look at Nick. His face was gray.
    “You are so fucked,” he said, shaking his head from side to side.
    And only then did I realize the extent of my trespass: I’d turned the meanest, most sadistic professor in the school into a personal enemy.
             
    Once again, I was the favorite subject of One-L gossip. After class, as I made my way to my mail folder, I could hear the buzz of chatter surround me as news of my second disastrous standoff with Hoffman spread.
    “He, like, totally took her apart,” I heard a tall blond guy with vacant eyes and a surfer-dude drawl say.
    “It was ugly,” a woman with the sharp, pointed features of a rat agreed.
    I gritted my teeth and pushed through the crowd of congregating students.
    “That’s her,” I heard Rat Girl say. “Is she crying?”
    I paused for a minute, my back stiffening.