IN THE FUTURE

Will had his pencil poised and ready.

The teacher's eyes swept over the class, and then she continued speaking. "For those who continuously forget how the spelling test goes…" the teacher's eyes lingered on Will. Will privately rolled his eyes. Why did he, out of all the people, have to replace an idiot like Cubby?

The teacher continued, "…I shall explain the procedures. I will say the word, put it in a sentence, and then I will repeat the word. Then I will move on to the next word. Please raise your hand if you do not understand." No one raised their hand. Finally, the teacher looked over her list of words and started the spelling test.

"Eligible. Please make sure your writing is eligible. Eligible," the teacher said slowly.

Unfortunately, Will did not know how to spell "eligible". He tapped the boy in front of him on the back and whispered, "Excuse me, how do you spell 'eligible'?"

The boy stared at Will like he was paranoid. "Why should I tell you?" he said, and then turned around.

Will frowned. He would have to guess. So he carefully and neatly printed elijibel. Then, he waited for the next word.

"Marauders. Bands of deserters became marauders, preying on the indigenous people. Marauders," said the teacher.

Again, Will had no idea how to spell this. So he tapped the boy on the back again, only to receive a furious glare. So Will guessed again. He neatly printed meroder.

There were twenty words in all, and Will was sure that he'd gotten at least a tenth of them correct. He checked his paper over, made sure his name was on it, and gave it to the teacher. The teacher gave it back right away. "Your name is spelled incorrectly, Cubby. I believe your name is Cubby, not Will." She thrust it back into Will's hands, obviously wanting him to correct his name. But Will didn't move.

"My name is not Cubby!" he shouted, thrusting the paper back to the teacher. "It's Will!"

The teacher's eyes narrowed. "Detention today after school, Cubby." Just then, the bell rang.

Will, who did not know what 'detention' was, left the room sulkily. Detention sounded like a punishment. He didn't deserve to be punished! As Will was heading toward the bathroom, the dark-haired boy who had told him about the security cameras caught up with him.

"My name is Matthew, by the way," the boy said. "Detention with the reading teacher is the worst; she makes you do lines. Somehow you always manage to get detention from her," Matthew said, looking sympathetic.

Will felt a rush of gratitude for Matthew. At least someone wasn't rude here. "What's detention?" he asked, feeling stupid.

Matthew looked taken aback. "Er…I've never known someone who's forgotten what detention is," he said with a laugh. "Well, it's a punishment given to students who misbehave. You usually have to stay with the teacher during detention and the teacher makes you do an extra homework assignment. If you get detention from the reading teacher, you're most likely going to be doing lines or writing an essay."

Will sulked even more. So he had to stay after…school? He was in a school? And had to do lines or write an essay? The pride that had come from gym class vanished. This place was horrible! Detention, rude people—it all added up to a horrible day.

Matthew looked around. "The bell rang about two minutes ago, Cubby, you'd better hurry on to your next class!" Matthew hurried away, clutching his books tightly.

"Er…what's my next class?" Will called after him.

"I believe you have band next! Room 146!" Matthew answered, and then disappeared into one of the other classrooms.

Will frowned. Band? It sounded like a class that was really easy to fail in. Will quickly hurried to find Room 146. Surprisingly, it wasn't hard to find. Will opened the door, wondering what was next.