The last lesson of the last term of the final year had arrived.  Three
boys sit by the lab bench chatting over the flame of the Bunsen burner
as the teacher droned on in the background.  Two of them are staring in
disbelief at the third.

"You're kidding!"

"Nope."

"But everybody's had it at least once."

"Not me."

"What never?"

"Never."

There is a pause as the two try to digest this,  then one of them says
"Strike back?"

Another pause.  They all know what this means.  A sharp tap on the gas
pipe, and the flame burns back down the barrel of the burner.  When it
reaches the air hole the resonance of the pipe gives rise to a piercing
whistle.

"You know he'll do all of us?"

"So?"

They exchange glances for a moment, then...

WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

The whole class looks round.

"You three! Turn that off and get up here!"

They troop to the front as the teacher reaches for the wooden
blackboard compasses.

"Over the desk"

They bend, as insolently as only a teenager can, one nervous, the other
two, experienced, knowing what to expect.  The slow footsteps of
teacher trace his path around the desk.

"Ummph!"  Step.  "Sssssss!"  Step.  "Ah!"

Three times the teacher passes along the line.  Three blows on each
pass.

"Now, are we all agreed?  Nobody strikes back a Bunsen in my class."

There is a ragged chorus of "Yes sir."

"Right.  Off you go."

They troop stiffly back to the bench.  Strangely enough everyone looks
satisfied, as if they have somehow restored the proper order of the
world.

Alex Birch email

This is a nice and very credible little tale to which I can totally relate. It must be an international standard for boys to push the limits in chemistry class for my school was just the same. The peer competition to 'break in the virgin' also rings very true and the whole story is told with economy and skill. Very nice indeed.

Hal email

Nice story. I sincerely wish that I knew what a "wooden blackboard compasses" looked like. So I attempted to "Google" it. I came up with this:

"The most prominent type of surveying compass was the plain compass. It was made of walnut, applewood or mahogany with wooden sights that fit into square holes at each end of the main plate. Compass cards were usually made of paper, and the jacob's staff or tripod holder consisted of a separate piece of wood approximately one inch thick attached to the bottom of the main plate of the compass."

This gave me an idea but I am still lacking what a "wooden blackboard compasses" looked like. I get the feeling that it was a straight piece of wood and it was used like a paddle. Maybe, this was something common in most schools but I just have never seen one. The only reason that I spent so much time on this, is because I love word pictures. I want my mind to see the picture that my eyes are seeing as I read the words. I also realize that a lot of the writers were not born and went to school in the USA. So this might be a common item in the land of the writer. Moving past that, this sure triggered my old memory cells and Chemistry class of many years ago. I had to take a second and smile at that point. Now, I will have to Google this and hope that I find who wrote this fine story. I want to read more by this writer. Just to be clear, that fact that I did not know what a "wooden blackboard compasses" looked like did not effect my score of this work. I do my best to judge a story in this contest on the merits of the story, without knowing who wrote it. I think that is what I did with this story. Now if the writer of this story wants to email me, I would welcome it.

SirHal

John Benson email

Ah, school days that never were, the willingness to be naughty just to 'get it,' 'cause every boy should 'get it' sometimes. This story has nice detail. I could almost see and smell and hear the classroom. And I wonder what these boys did that summer, whether they ever got together and relived the memory and disciplined each other.

--johnb