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Word prompt: Discipline

Plot generator—Idea completion: A picture is worth a thousand words

Something True

Discipline

Last Winter

After running a hand through his sandy hair, longer and scragglier than most teachers', Mr. Biers pulled an enlarged, mounted photograph out from behind his desk, set it on the wooden easel at the front of the class, and scratched his furry jaw as he paused to look at the image of the Mona Lisa.

Every day, the last fifteen minutes of English Comp was dedicated to on-the-spot writing about a topic of his, Mr. Biers', choice. Today the class was to write about what made Mona Lisa smile.

Bella tapped her pen against her blank paper, she chewed on the cap for a while, and when no ideas came to her, save the scenario that the model's favorite pizza was delivered, Bella walked up to the front of the class to get a closer look at the picture. She studied the eyes, their somewhat sad stare, the lips only slightly turned up, the cheeks not very rounded.

Back at her desk, she wrote that the model wasn't smiling, that da Vinci added the smile in, composed it, shaped it. She wrote that the real question wasn't what made Mona Lisa smile, but rather why she wasn't smiling, why the smile had to be created by the artist. Or maybe the question was why da Vinci was compelled to add a smile where there was none.

Bella didn't answer any of the questions she posed, she just continued to add question after question. Did da Vinci believe that all women should smile? Or, more romantically, did he wish for all women to be happy enough to smile; or maybe just this one woman, maybe he would've loved to have seen one genuine smile from her. Maybe eventually, he did.

…

After the bell, right outside the classroom, Mike took Bella's fingers, leading her through the double-doors to the edge of the lawn, layered with a thin sheet of snow. The whole quad was empty of people. Bella could hear the flag high above them whipping in the wind. Facing her, Mike was acting strange, nervous. He shifted back and forth, added a little jump like he was gearing up for something, pumping himself up.

"Okay," he said.

"Okay, what?"

He blew out a frosty breath. "I want to ask you to the Winter Formal, to go with me."

Bella stammered. It was like she forgot how to speak English. And that would've been just fine, had it been the case. If she'd suddenly started speaking Spanish or French or German, it wouldn't have mattered what she said.

She couldn't go to the dance with Mike. For one thing, Jessica had a mad crush on him, and for another thing, Bella wasn't interested.

"I saw you pick your nose in first grade," she thought of saying, maybe changing his mind, making him see how ridiculous it was for him to want to take Bella out anywhere.

"I'm not going," she finally said. "I have to- my parents..." She rolled her eyes at herself for being unable to come up with an excuse on the fly, but the eye-rolling seemed to work in her favor, as if she had aimed the expression at her parents and not at herself.

"Yeah." He nodded his head, crossed his arms over his chest and raised his eyebrows. "Will you do something else for me?" He didn't look too hurt or insulted. He still looked nervous, though.

"Like what?"

This time there was no pause. He let the words come rushing out. "Like write my essay for Biers? Please? I need the grade or I'm on probation, no sports. No sports, Bella. I'll pay you."

She laughed.

"Seriously, how much?" He reached into his back pocket and pulled his wallet out.

"Just... ask Jessica to the dance, and I'll do it."

Shaking her hand, he told her that was the easiest deal ever made.

"Don't tell her about this," Bella said.

"Why would I? Maybe I suck at English, but I'm no idiot."

That weekend, while her friends were out shopping for formal dresses, Bella sat cross-legged on her bed with her laptop on her lap, writing two essays: one on why cell phones should be allowed in school (his), and the other on why all art has purpose (hers).

Rosalie turned up late that night to show Bella her dress. She slipped into it, and lifted her hair while Bella zipped her up. It was a cream color, a tea color, a lot like the silk tied to Bella's bed. The dress was strapless, sweetheart shaped at the chest, with a thin belt of matching cream-colored, rice-shaped beads circling the waist. From there it fell in Chiffon layers to her mid-thigh.

"You're gorgeous," Bella said. "Royce is going to flip out. He's going to have to push his jaw closed with his hand." Bella swished at the fabric. "Now I wish I was going just so I could get a dress."

"I wish you were going, too. You could tell me what to say to Royce."

"In that thing, you won't have to say a word. He probably won't hear you anyway. Just be careful. You're the non-condom buyer, remember?"

Rose turned toward the mirror above Bella's dresser. "Does this dress say sex? It's not even tight. You should see Lauren's."

"But we're talking about Royce and teenage guys. I'm pretty sure everything says sex to them."

"Come with us."

"Yeah, right."

Bella's mother knocked and then opened the door. Once she entered, she put a hand to her heart and made this gasp sound, and said, "Oh, Rose," in a way that Bella thought was overly dramatic. "Where's yours?" she asked Bella.

"At the store."

"Do you want me to take you tomorrow?"

"No, thanks."

"Do you need money?"

"Sure."

Her mother said she'd be right back with her purse, and as much as Bella wanted to fake her mother out for money, she couldn't do it. Her mother wasn't working anymore. Bella couldn't figure out if she simply quit her job, or if she also quit her affair, and no way would she ask her. Bella didn't have a reason to believe that her mother understood how much Bella knew about her. They'd never talked about it.

When Bella was old enough to stay home alone she stopped letting herself take notice of what time her mother came home in the evenings, and she wouldn't get close enough to smell her—or if for some reason she had no choice but to get close, Bella would hold her breath for as long as it took until she backed away again. From the age of fourteen until now, Bella wasn't positive if her mother still wore that perfume.

Disappointed in herself, Bella told the truth: she wasn't going to the dance.

When her mother left the girls alone, Rose, stepping out of her dress and back into her jeans, said, "It's so awkward whenever she's around."

"Why?'

She pulled her sweater over her head. "I don't know. There's something really intense between you guys."

Bella smiled, wondering if, like the Mona Lisa, her smile looked painted on too.

...

On Wednesday, Bella's dad dropped her off at school because of the snow. Ducking her head as she got out of the car, her backpack held tight as if it were some kind of cloak that hid her, she didn't lift her face until she was far from the parking lot and well on school grounds. She was a junior. What junior gets rides from their parents? Most of her friends had their own cars. Her parents couldn't afford to buy her one even if they'd wanted to.

She wasn't sure if it had all started with that ride to school, but in every class something went wrong. In History, she stumbled over her own feet. In Intermediate Algebra, they had a pop quiz. In French she noticed a hole in her tights at the knee. But none of it was as bad as what happened in English Comp.

Bella felt her heart jump when Mr. Biers asked her to stick around after class. She had a feeling she knew why he asked this of her, but was hoping she was wrong.

"You know what this is about, don't you?" Mr. Biers asked, leaning against the back of his big desk as Bella sat across from him feeling like the littlest kid in the littlest desk.

"No." She hoped. She rubbed her hands over her thighs, tugging the hem of her dress toward her knees.

"Newton's paper?"

She shook her head. She had told Mike to take the ideas but rewrite it in his own words. Obviously he didn't listen, and it was really stupid of her to think he would.

"All right, well, it's probably best if you don't admit it. I can prove he cheated; I can't prove you wrote it, even though I know it and you know it." He scratched at his jaw. His beard was a little darker than the hair on his head.

Bella sat still. She felt as if she were a part of the desk, the wood, the cold metal.

"I won't take this to Mr. Banner, but there has to be some sort of disciplinary measure."

"Discipline? For something I didn't do?"

Mr. Biers clasped his palms together, bringing his straight fingers to his lips. "Nice try. Look, I could use a TA. It's a volunteer thing, but you might be able to get some credit for it."

"What about Mike? Will he have to TA?"

"Newton?" His eyes widened. Bella had never noticed how blue they were before. "Newton? I need an assistant who can actually do the job, and well, not be more of a hindrance. Mike will have to rewrite the paper on his own for half-credit, or take a zero."

Bella agreed to TA. It was better than the alternative, going to Mr. Banner. Once again, she shook hands with someone. Mr. Biers' hand was warm and more than shaking hers, he sort of held it. He put his other hand over the top of her knuckles. "Listen. If you want to help kids, be a tutor. That's great, but don't do anybody's work but your own, all right?"

"I never do."

"You're good," he said, nodding. "Now go on, get to your next class. But the assisting starts tomorrow at ten after three."

Snow or not, Bella walked home that day with her coat held tight and her hood pulled up. She walked the forest path. Halfway between the road and her house, she sat down on a fallen tree. It was so big she had to lift herself up on top of it.

She pulled out her biology text and started her reading. If someone had taken a picture of her in that moment, they would surely see a girl studying. But in reality, she wasn't reading; she was thinking of changes she needed to make in her life.

When Mike had asked her to write for him, she wasn't at all bothered by the thought of cheating. Sitting on the log with her book open on her legs, she thought something like cheating should bother a person, or in the least make them think twice before agreeing to it. What was wrong with her that she didn't? What was wrong with her that even now, thinking about it, it still wasn't the cheating she was upset about, but the embarrassment over getting caught by Mr. Biers, that even if she didn't admit to it, he knew, without a doubt.