Outside, Zoe looked at the teen in front of her. She had spent so much time here, Zoe wondered if they should put her name on a plate on the bench. She hoped her granddaughter wasn't like that when she got to be a teen. "What did you do this time, dear?"
"Nothing," the girl insisted. "Teachers just don't like it when you tell them they are wrong."
Zoe groaned inwardly. "That's because they are in charge of the class..."
"Why should that matter if they are wrong?" She insisted, as fiery as her red hair. "Fine...let's say they aren't....why can't I express a different opinion than what they want to teach? Are we all supposed to believe there is only one way to think about a subject?" She plopped herself down on the bench in her usual spot and continued her rant about how school was there to destroy independent thought, not encourage it.
An hour ago, this had been Rosemary Finch...the school librarian. Famously anti-technology, refusing to have anything to do with the computers in her library or learn more with them than ordering new books, with a tendency to dress like a stereotypical shushing librarian from a movie. But now, she was Rosemary DeVries, voracious bookworm and anti-establishment advocate, always challenging the teachers with something she'd read. Zoe had heard one of them remark that if they had to put up with her for another three years, they'd leave the profession entirely.
Zoe let the girl vent until she calmed down and then sent her in to see the Principal. As the door closed, she relaxed. She had been a bit of a troublemaker herself at that age...How did Rosemary even succeed in getting a teacher to send her to see the principal after last period? She was truly a piece of work.
