Touched by Angels Page 0,15

said, "is there a problem?"

"I don't have any paper. I wanted to borrow a piece from Denzil."

"Get your own paper, woman," the black youth protested. "What do I look like, a friggin' Wal-Mart?"

"I loaned you paper last week." Yolanda's dark eyes snapped with outrage.

"That's because you were lucky enough to have me sit next to you. I never said nothin' about paying you back."

Yolanda's mouth thinned, and it looked as if she were about to explode when Suzie Chang saved the day.

"I have an extra sheet she can use," the Chinese girl volunteered shyly, tearing off a clean page from her tablet and passing it across the aisle to Yolanda. The Hispanic girl grabbed it and glared at Denzil as if to say it would be a cold day in hell before he got anything from her again.

"Thank you, Suzie," Brynn said, eager to return to the writing assignment.

"What are you going to have us write about this time?" Emilio asked. "Not something stupid, I hope."

Teaching the value clarification portion of the class had proved to be the most difficult for Brynn. She wanted to make this as interesting and as much fun as she could, but she often found herself on a completely different wavelength from her students.

The incident with Emilio in the hallway was a prime example. The teenager had actually expected her to lie on his behalf. Emilio didn't understand why she'd told the truth about the knife. He'd missed three days of school and consequently blamed her. He saw nothing wrong with his own behavior but seemed to feel that she'd been the one to betray his trust.

It had taken the better part of another week for his sullen mood in class to disappear. She wasn't sure even now what she'd done to get back into his good graces. Whatever it was, she was grateful. Emilio was a natural leader, so his attitude was quickly picked up by the others in class.

Ever since the incident with Emilio she'd been subjected to an attitude of mistrust. It was as if she'd fallen from grace in the eyes of her students.

"First off, don't put your name on the top of the page."

"You don't want our names?" This clearly came as a surprise since she'd so often instructed them to remember just that.

"No names," she reiterated. "Now I'd like each of you to write one hundred and fifty words."

"We gotta count them?"

"That's about a page and a half," Brynn explained. "The subject of your paper is this: If I could kiss anyone in this classroom, who would it be, and why."

For a moment the entire class looked at her as if they couldn't believe what she'd said. Someone smothered a giggle and catcalls echoed across the room.

It didn't take anyone long to get involved in the project. Soon heads were bowed over the paper, and her students wrote feverishly. Brynn liked to involve her students in some type of writing assignment, often on a daily basis. She did this for a number of reasons, but first and foremost was an effort to require them to clarify their thoughts on certain subjects. She attempted to balance a serious topic one day, followed by a lighter one the next.

Although she'd been teaching the class for a number of weeks now, whenever they were asked to write, her students put up a royal stink. Often they bombarded her with silly questions or employed other delay tactics in an effort to forestall the assignment.

Not this time. Looking at them now, writing as fast as their hands would allow, one would think the first student finished would be excused for what remained of the quarter.

"When you're done writing, please bring the papers to my desk." The class was both cooperative and silent. The cooperation part was a welcome relief. Brynn was beginning to feel like a salmon swimming upstream. Every inch was a struggle, every day a challenge.

One by one, her class delivered their papers to her desk. Before long Brynn had accumulated a tidy stack.

Curious whispers followed.

"Aren't you going to read them?" someone asked.

"I will later," she promised, as if this were a normal assignment.

"Wait a minute," Emilio said, slouching down on his seat. "I gotta right to know how many women want me."

Several of the girls booed, suggesting he wasn't the one on their list.

Emilio planted his hand over his heart and looked deeply grieved by their lack of appreciation for his obvious charms.

"Did anyone put me down?" Modesto demanded. "Emilio's got