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IMANI
“Good luck,” Allie said, shoving her books into her backpack, then swinging it over her shoulder. She glanced over at Mr. Barnes, who sat behind his desk with his face stuffed in quizzes and exams less than a second after our class finished. “You’re going to need it with him.”
Allie was right. As much as I joked about Allie shaking a little ass for Barnes to raise her exam grade, he wasn’t that kind of teacher. At least, that was what I thought. Who knew anymore? Last night, I had thought that Harvey was the best tech teacher to ever grace Redwood Academy, but I knew better now.
“Thanks,” I said, gathering my books and giving her a small smile while she walked out the door. “I’ll meet you at lunch.”
When she and the rest of the class left, I inhaled sharply and walked up to Mr. Barnes’s desk. “Hi, Mr. Barnes. Can I talk to you about, um … something important?”
Barnes looked up at me, then placed his red pen down, nodding to give me the go-ahead. I had been thinking up something to say all morning to him, but I still hadn’t found the right words. Never in my academic career had I asked a teacher to redo an exam this big. A quiz maybe.
“I know your policy is that students can’t retake exams,” I started, feeling the nerves bubble up inside me. “Is there anything I can do to retake it, Mr. Barnes?” I asked, fiddling with the hem of my shirt and gnawing on my cheek.
As much as I freaking hated myself for sucking up to the teacher and vowing that I’d do anything—and I mean, anything—to get him to raise my grade, I had to do it to get Mom off my ass.
I didn’t think I’d be able to handle staying home every single day until I died.
After inching a bit closer to him, I bit back my disgust. This was how so many girls and guys raised their grade and passed at Redwood; I’d just never thought that I’d be one of them. My goal for this year was to fly by without a grade lower than an A-plus.
Thanks to Poison, that goal had been ruined.
“Miss Abara, other teachers at Redwood might accept something like that, but I’m not like them,” Mr. Barnes said, looking up at me from his desk. He cleared his throat and pulled off his glasses, intertwining his fingers. “It’s usually against my policy to let anyone redo a test, and I don’t do it often.”
“Please,” I pleaded. “I need to redo it. My mom is going to kill me.”
Mr. Barnes arched a brow. “Kill you?”
“Just an exaggeration …” Kinda. “But I really need to redo it.”
A couple moments of silence passed, and I could tell that he was going to say no again, which I couldn’t let happen. He wasn’t like the rest of the teachers here, but … but I needed to try something.
“I can—”
“You can redo it Thursday before school.”
My eyes widened, heaviness falling off my shoulders. “Really?”
“Yes, Imani, really.” Mr. Barnes stood. “You and Allie are both at the top of your class. I was shocked when I graded your exam. It was so unlike you. I’ll give you one chance to redo the test, and whichever test you score higher on, I’ll put that into the system.”
Before I knew it, tears burst from my eyes and ran down my cheeks. I had the urge to hug him. He didn’t know how much this meant to me; he didn’t know that if I didn’t retake this exam for a better grade, my whole life would be ruined.
After wiping some tears, I gave him my best smile. “Thank you.”
When I walked out of Biology, completely elated, Akio kicked himself off the wall beside the classroom and caught up with me, his books by his side. “You asked Barnes to redo the exam we had last week?”
My brows knitted together. “Were you eavesdropping?”
“I, uh … no?”
“Why’re you asking me about it then?” I asked, stopping and turning to face him.
Akio paused, glanced around, then pulled me into an empty hallway. “Did you fail it because of Poison? I told you that if you get too in with them, they’re going to ruin your life. Don’t you want to get out of this hellhole and go off to college?”
“Of course I do,” I snapped, anger rushing through me.
“If you keep hanging out with them, they’ll drag you down.”
Unable to stop myself, I shoved his shoulder. “Then, why do you keep hanging out with them? Why do you keep supplying them with drugs from your work? If anyone finds out about that, they’ll do more than withdraw your acceptance from college!”
