How To Be 15

2

It might have been the fact that Jackie was finding English literature so easy that I wanted to throttle her.

Our English teacher, Mr Fett, to put it bluntly, was a complete tosser. He didn't seem to understand the concept of free time, and that our entire lives didn't revolve around our English work. The 50p budget ring binders that he had given us to put all of our work in were falling apart at the seams with bits of paper with words on that meant nothing to me. 

English was one of the few subjects that I was actually good at, so to be majorly struggling was a huge blow to my ego.

Jackie was sitting on the other side of the classroom to me, as per the seating plan. I suppose this was just as well, because if she was sitting anywhere within 3 feet of me, she would find herself lacking some limbs.

As it turned out, the essay I had spent nights revising for, hadn't turned out as well as I had expected it to. I was hopeful for a B, an A if I was lucky. So my D+/C- made me angrier the more I looked at it.

The knowledge that Jackie had not studied for this at all made me selfishly hope that she had gotten a similar grade to me- which would have made me feel at least a little bit better. But alas, she had gotten a B+/A-.

And I wanted injure her for doing so well.

When the bell rang for break, I stalked out of the room instead of waiting for her like I normally would.

"Jo!" The voice of the person I least wanted to talk to called for me.

I tried my best to be mad at her success, but I knew I was being selfish. I should be proud of her really, and act upon the advice that Mr Fett had red-penned on my essay. Whining and feeling sorry for myself wasn't going to get me an A*, but it was hard to be reasonable when I was so frigging mad at myself.

"What?" I turned around, looking at her bobbing along.

"Who pissed in your Cornflakes?" She asked, not seeming particularly pleased with herself- which surprised me, given her grades.

"Mr Fett. If he tells me to be any more concise I will burn his house down." I fumed, not letting my resent for Jackie's success show.

"He's a knob, Jo. Don't listen to him."

"Honestly, I'm so pissed off. I full on worked my arse off for that."

"I know you did, and you deserve all A*s. It's just one essay."

It might have just been one essay, but for someone who wanted to go into writing as a profession, it was a huge hit.

**********

When I got home that night, I really didn't feel like talking to my family.

But of course, in our household, you never got what you wanted.

"Jo!" Oscar screamed, barrelling down the stairs.

"What are you so excited for?" I grumbled.

After that English lesson, I had been grumpy all day. Jackie had tried her best to cheer me up, but I wanted to be selfish and be mardy for a while.

"I got a B in my physics mock!" He grinned.

Honestly, he couldn't have picked a worse time to do well- and in physics too. I felt a pang of bitter jealousy.

"Well done." I managed to twitch my lips upward.

I wanted to be pleased for him, I really did.

"What's up?" He frowned.