Once Again

He gazed at the stars. He had always liked the stars. He did not know why, but he had always had a strange attraction to them. They represented something special to him. He was always trying to touch them, he knew that no matter what anyone said, it was possible.

"Bedtime, Dave." His mom chirped from downstairs.

"Yeah Mom." He replied

"Have you done all of your homework?"

"Yeah, I have"

"Goodnight, Dave"

"G’night Mom."

He drifted into sleep that night thinking of the stars that were outside his window. He dreamed about being the first man to ever set foot on a star. He had always been told that stars are remarkably hot balls of gas that will kill people who come too close. He ignored all of those people. Once he set his mind to something, he would not give up until he accomplished it.

"Wake up Davie." His dad said lovingly.

"5 more minutes." Dave pleaded.

"No son, its time for you to wake up, now hurry or you’ll miss the bus."

"But I wanna miss the bus and school."

"Come on, Davie, you know how important school is. If you don’t go to school you can never reach the stars, Davie. All of your heroes went to school and I’ll bet they never complained."

"Yeah, Yeah. Okay I’ll go. But you can’t use that reach for the stars excuse for another week."

His dad laughed and agreed.

**********

"Class, take out your homework." Said the teacher.

After the initial shuffling of papers, all students produced a sheet with four pictures on it. Each picture was supposed to represent dreams and goals of that person. The teacher walked around and collected these sheets and began a quiz activity on what they had learned. The room was split into two groups and the teacher asked questions to each one.

"This is your question group one, what branch of government makes the laws?" the teacher asked.

Dave’s hand shot up.

"The executive" he said.

"No, I’m sorry, group two?"

Another student, named Anthony, raised his had.

"The legislative." He said

"That’s right," the teacher said

"But I thought you asked which branch enforces the laws." Said Dave

"No, I asked which branch makes the laws." The teacher replied

"But I knew the answer, I just heard the question wrong."

"Sorry." the teacher said.

It continued like that for the rest of the day and Anthony took over, leaving Dave sputtering. Then at lunch, Anthony and his friends came over and started making fun of Dave. They laughed at him and poked fun at every aspect of his life.

Dave the got so angry that he got in a scuffle with Anthony. Anthony was exonerated of any wrongdoing and Dave got stuck with the sour end of the deal. At least, that’s what Dave thought. In reality, both were punished equally and fairly.

That evening when Dave was walking home from his bus stop he met a young man on the street.

"Hey kid, you look like you’re mad." Said the young man.

"Who are you?" Dave asked.

(to be continued)