As the school Halloween party was just around the corner, the school hall was full of children dressed in different shapes and colours of spooks (鬼) and wonder. Some walked in as princes and princesses, some stepped in as vampires (吸血鬼) and superheroes and some made dramatic entrances as astronauts and historical figures. But one little girl walked in, hiding her face and hoping nobody would take notice of her grey pants and white T-shirt.

Ellie wanted to dress up as a princess that year. Her dad had promised her a few months earlier that her costume would turn a lot of heads. But, as you know, sometimes dads are too busy with their work and forget the small important things while dealing with the big important ones. When Ellie’s dad forgot to save up for her princess costume for the school Halloween party that year, she wasn’t mad at him. However, she couldn’t hold her tears back when the mean kids from her class started making fun of her.

“What are you supposed to be dressed as? Ugly Ellie?” one of the boys laughed quietly. Ellie covered her ears and cried as she heard the kids crying out her latest nickname and laughing naughtily over and over again. Every face around her was unkind and indifferent to her sadness.

Mr. Borges was her favourite art teacher and Ellie liked his classes very much. He would listen to Ellie’s deepest fears and biggest dreams. Ellie lived with her grandmother, but it was Mr. Borges who took the place of her father as her guardian, because her father was too busy with his work.

Just as the boys were making fun of Ellie, Mr. Borges came up to her. He was trying to tell her something. The girl wiped her tears right away and managed to escape the crowd of children, closely following him.

“Wait here!” Mr. Borges said and walked into the supply closet (贮藏室). A moment later, he returned, with a few rolls of toilet paper in his hand. Ellie couldn’t help but wonder why he was holding a few rolls of toilet paper.

“What’s that for?” Ellie asked.

What Mr. Borges did meant everything to Ellie, especially in the field of art.

Miss Baugh taught seventh-grade social studies. She was the kind of teacher that just about everyone has had at least once: frightening. When my friends learned that I was in her class, they looked at me with pity.

Miss Baugh didn’t allow nonsense. She taught us to take school seriously. She had been teaching for a long time and knew how to frighten even the boys who typically behaved badly in the back row. They behaved well in her classroom. I was as frightened as anyone.

But I also had a life outside of school and had just discovered cheap props (道具) for pranks (恶作剧) that I could play on friends and family. One such prop had two parts: an ink (墨水) bottle painted to look as though it had overturned, and a piece of shiny black metal shaped like a puddle (水坑). It didn’t take long to run out of people to fool (愚弄) at home, so I took my props to school.

Of all the people I could have pranked, strangely I chose Miss Baugh. At the beginning of the class period, before she’d returned to her classroom, I was brave enough to approach her desk.

I opened her grade book and placed the bottle and the metal on one of the pages, proudly noting that it truly did look like spilled ink!

Then I went to my desk and waited for the fun. I wasn’t disappointed. When Miss Baugh saw the bottle and the metal, she let out a little cry and looked for something to remove the ink with.

The prank had succeeded way beyond my expectations. But then the realization began to set in that I had pranked Miss Baugh. I began worrying when Miss Baugh tried to remove the ink with a paper towel and discovered that it was just a piece of black metal. She picked up the “puddle”, then the bottle, and examined them.

She looked up. Her eyes searched the classroom. My classmates avoided looking at me so as not to give me away.   

Then came the question: “Who did this?”

After some hesitation, I raised my hand.

“Well, it certainly fooled me!” she laughed.