Creative Writing

The Dog Ate My Homework

Prompt: It's a random day! Make your own prompt and follow it.

"No, I swear Ms. Wright! My dog really did eat my homework. I had to go to the bathroom and when I came back, my dog was chewing my nearly finished English assignment on my bed. I tried to grab it and take it away from him, but Sparky ran around in circles and I saw him actually swallow it!"

"Come on, you can do better than that excuse," Ms. Wright shakes her head.

There was no point in arguing now. I had stressed all night over having to tell my teacher this story, and I knew she would never believe me in a million years. I thought of sending her an email to let her know about this predicament, but I thought that maybe—just maybe—she would find me more believable if I told her in person. I usually don't turn my homework in on time or sometimes not at all, so I get where she's coming from. But I swear—it did happen to me! Figures, the one paper I did understand was digested by my (breed). Now that I think of it, I should have been recording instead of chasing my dog, so I could have had proof in front of my annoyed English teacher. Or maybe I should have brought her a sample of my dog's feces in a plastic Ziploc baggie. Then she could have seen the shreds of what was my homework.

I heard her words repeating themselves over and over again in my mind. 'Come on, you can do better than that excuse...' ugh. An excuse she called it? Well fine, challenge accepted. I am going to do better than that excuse. 100% better, actually. I'll make up my own story of why I wouldn't be turning in the work for today. An elaborate story as to what happened to my homework. I cleared my throat and took a deep breath. Time for all of those Improv classes to pay off.

I scratched the back of my head. Pulled down the hem of my shirt. "Umm... so, you see Ms. Wright..." my eyes landed on a girl's wrist tattoo: flames licking the porcelain skin.

"A fire!" I yelled accidentally.

Wright rose an eyebrow quizzically at me. "Excuse me?"

"Yeah... I was working so hard on my homework, but I fell asleep because I did so much, you know? I woke up to smoke stinging my lungs and my nose. The fire alarm was blaring above me and I could barely see a thing. I ran outside to save myself without thinking about my precious half-done homework. After the firefighters put out the fire, my parents were informed that the fire was caused by some stack of papers catching fire after going into the space heater. Later, I found out that the papers were my English papers. I'm sorry Ms. Wright. I didn't want to tell you about the fire and my house burning down to nothing but ashes, because I knew you wouldn't believe me." I hung my head, disappointed by my story-telling skills that have dulled over time. Surprisingly, I was caught off guard by being crushed into a hug by long arms and a busty chest.

"I'm so sorry dear." Ms. Wright said, choking back tears. Then she held me by the shoulders at arms length. "Now only if your English essays were that creative."