How Far We've Come

Chapter 17

    Days passed and Mrs. Bendich only seemed to get worse. The ten or fifteen page packets we had received on day one increased in size until they were now 25 pages long. They were so obviously busy work, like a graded word search, but we had to do them anyway because she was the teacher and we had to do what she said.

    The only thing I was looking forward to in that class by then were the presentations. Jessica and I had spent hours working on ours, including various activities and polishing up the information. I had always wanted to be a teacher, but with the pay and difficulty, I wasn't able to pursue it. So when activities like this came along, I took full advantage of them.

    Unfortunately, our presentation was farther down the list, so we had to sit through multiple presentations before ours. But, our scheduled day began approaching and I became more and more excited. Finally, it was the day before our presentation. Lina and Clary were going to present.

    "I'm so nervous," Clary admitted. "But, not for the reasons you would think."

    I tilted my head to the side, confused. "So why are you nervous?"

    "Lina and I forgot to print our notes," she explained. "So if the other group finishes early enough and we have to go, we're screwed."

    I bit the inside of my cheek. "Oh that's a bit of bad luck," I sympathized. "Tell you what. If you get picked, Jessica and I will volunteer instead. We've been working for days and we're completely ready."

    Clary threw her arms around me. "Thank you! You are seriously the best friend ever. But, let's just hope that it doesn't come to that."

    I nodded. "Let's hope." But, the other group had a pretty quick presentation and, soon, it was Clary and Lina's turn to go. Remembering what I had told Clary, I raised my hand.

    "Um Mrs. Bendich? Can Jessica and I go instead?" I asked, putting on my best good-student face.

    Mrs. Bendich gave a heavy sigh, like all her worldly problems were because of us. "Fine. But they will have to go tomorrow." She gave Clary and Lina a pointed look as they quickly nodded.

    I pulled out my note sheet and took a deep breath. We could do this. I looked at the clock, surprised to see that there were still 25 minutes left in class. If Jessica and I didn't drag our presentation on for 25 minutes, Clary and Lina would have to go. Luckily, I had some up with the idea to include a Circulatory System Jeopardy at the end of the presentation, with twenty questions. That ought to fill up the time.

    I began explaining my part, letting Jessica take the lead for her slides. It went on pretty smoothly until we reached the section about heart-related diseases.

    "A common heart condition is one that needs a pacemaker-"

    Mrs. Bendich interrupted me, "Oh I had that one! It's very painful. The heart either beats too fast or too slow, so a pacemaker needs to be installed to keep it beating the right pace. It's a long surgery, and like I said before, very painful."

    I pursed my lips and gave a curt nod. "Yes, that about covers it. The next condition is Atherosclerosis-"

    "Oh I had that too!" Mrs. Bendich interrupted again. Then she went on to explain the disease for a whole five minutes. It was torturous.

    After she finished, I took a deep breath and counted to ten, willing myself not to get angry. "So, since that pretty much covers the diseases, as you can see on this next slide explaining them," my eyes narrowed and shifted to where Mrs. Bendich was sitting. "We can go on to Jeopardy."