Late Assignment

As I'm sitting in my 6th period English class, listening to music and minding my business, I'm having trouble trying to stay awake. I didn't get much sleep last night, because I'm trying to get all my grades in before the second quarter is over. If I fail this quarter, my mom will ground me for forever. She took my phone and tablet last time just for making a C, but it was close to a B! I'm not done with all my assignments, though. I'm startled by the loud, obnoxious sound of the school bell dismissing us to our last period. "Miss Fugate, can I speak to you for a moment?" Ms. Baugh calls to me as I'm trying to leave the classroom.
"I wanted to check on the 4-page allegory essay that you have yet to turn in? Is it finished yet?" She asked me with a concerned look on her face. I sit there and think to myself, "If I tell her that it's done, and I just didn't bring it today, maybe she will give me until tomorrow to turn it in to her".
"Yes ma'am! I stayed up all night to turn it in to you. Let me go grab it from my backpack," I said lying straight through my teeth. I put my backpack on the desk and grabbed my folder, making it seem like I'm looking for my essay. "I can't seem to find it," I say as I'm looking for nothing in my folder full of papers. "Dang! I must've left it on my desk at home. Is there any way I can bring it in tomorrow?"
"I gave you this assignment a week ago. Tomorrow is your last deadline, Jelyce, after tomorrow you will not get another chance to finish this essay," she said with an angry tone. She went ahead and let me go to my last period; but of course, I fell asleep in that class too. I finally get home and walk into my room, ready to just throw my stuff on the floor and plop down on my bed with no regrets, but I know that I can't. I need to go ahead and write this essay so that my grade doesn't get any worse.
English isn't my best subject, if you know what I mean. I don't know how to properly start it off. Do I start with "Once upon a time..." or should I start with a question? As I'm sitting at my desk, trying to think of intro to this essay, I'm slowly starting to drift off to sleep. I'm trying my hardest but it's hard when you're going off of 2 hours of sleep. My head falls on top of my computer, falling asleep on the 5 words I have typed on the document. My mom came in the house panicking and screaming trying to get me to come downstairs.
"Jelyce! Help me, now!" she's yelling to me at the bottom of the stairs. I run downstairs at the fastest speed I can go. "What's going on? Why are you home from work so early?" I ask terrified from her random panic. "Help me board all the windows and the doors; we are not to leave the house, and no one is allowed in!" she screams at me. I want to ask her why we are boarding the house up, but she looks too scared and freaked out for me to ask her any questions. I just do as she told me: board the windows and doors so no one can leave or get in.
As we finish, she sits on the couch with her face in her hands. I finally built up the courage to ask her what exactly is going on. "So, why exactly are you home early, and why are we locking the house down with wooden planks? You're scaring me," I ask terrified. "I was in the hospital trying to finish my last patient's chart," she starts explaining to me with a shaky voice, "And I saw a glimpse of your father. I thought it was all in my head at first, but I looked again and saw him standing around the corner staring at me with the creepiest smile on his face.
My father tried to kill us 3 years ago, charging at us with a knife but we called the cops just in time. He was sentenced to 10 years with possibility of parole. It didn't seem fair to us, and we didn't want him to find us if he did get parole, so we moved to California, far away from him. There's no way he's out this early though... Could it? "Mom, are you sure you saw him?" I asked worried. I know she's telling the truth, but I don't want her to. Can she just tell me it's just all a prank? This is the last thing I need right now.
"He followed me here. I saw his car a few cars behind mine." She said. I can't do anything but pace back and forth in the living room as my mom sits on the couch crying. What are we going to do? If we call the cops, they aren't going to do anything about it. They're just going to say that he's not causing us any harm. They did that last time, before he tried to hurt us. You don't know how much it hurts to have your own father want to harm you, take you off this earth, and not give you the fatherly love any daughter deserves.
As I'm pacing around in panic, I'm thinking about looking out the window making sure that nobody's outside the house. I peek through the blinds by the front door and see my dad standing about 15 feet away from the window, waving with a conniving smile on his face. I scream and fall back on the floor in panic, not knowing what to do. "Mom, he's outside!" I tell her shaking. She goes to the kitchen and grabs a knife then grabs me behind her slowly backing us into the hall closet. We sit in the closet quietly, not knowing what else we can do but cry and stay quiet.
"Did you get all the windows Jelyce?" she implored to me with tears falling down her face hoping my answer is going to be a yes. I'm trying to think to myself if I did do all the windows, but I'm starting to remember that I didn't get the one in my room... "Yes, but-" I'm starting to say before she quickly interjected "Which one did you forget?". We slowly walk out of the closet and up the stairs to my room.
"We're all out of the wooden planks," she says dejected. We hear a loud crash coming from the bathroom. We race to my room to check if the window is closed and locked. It was wide open, meaning he was now inside the house. We quickly close the door hoping to lock it, but my mom forgot that she took the lock off my door last year. I quickly place my foldable chair under the doorknob trying to make it hard for him to open the door. As we hide under my bed, we watch the doorknob twist and turn as if someone was trying to get into my room, but we already knew exactly who it was. I cover my mouth, trying not to make a sound as tears trickle down my face.
I'm lying there on the floor hoping the chair is enough to hold him back. Maybe when he notices he can't get in, he will finally leave and stay away from us. My hope wasn't enough to keep us safe. We start to hear the door bang over and over again. My mom starts holding me, apologizing that she couldn't keep me safe, and telling me how much she loves me. He finally bashes the door in and raises the bed. Me and my mom scream at the top of our lungs.
"Jelyce! Jelyce! What is wrong with you? Stop screaming!" I hear my mom say to me shaking my body waking me up. "Mom? But-" I start to say confused realizing it was all a dream... I look up to see if there was any news about my father's release, but there wasn't. I have never felt so relieved in my life. "I didn't mean to fall asleep." I look at the time, and it had been three hours since I arrived home. I couldn't believe that I actually fell asleep in the middle of trying to write my essay.
I stayed up an extra 2 hours finishing my essay and felt a huge rush of relief over my body. I laid down and went to sleep at a normal time instead of staying up all night again. I made it to my 6th period class and approached Ms. Baugh with my essay. "Well look at you!" she says with a big smile on her face, "You made the right deadline this time!"
"It will never happen again." I meant that when I said it. If I would've turned in my assignments on time, I wouldn't have been so tired and had a terrible dream like that. I'm pretty sure I learned my lesson..