Gabriel's 'sickie' bust

In Grade Nine, or Standard Seven as it was known back then, I once did not do an English assignment and figured the best thing to do was to put on an Oscar worthy performance of a gravely ill person.

 

Putting to shame professional actors, my “sick man” performance was convincing enough for my class teacher and the school secretary, who both agreed that I should go home and get much needed rest time. 

 

All according to plan so far…or so I thought. On the final stretch, less than a block away from the school, where I was going to wait for the bus to take me home I was met by the worst sight of all. An approaching two-tone “volksie bus”. As instant as a lightning strike, my stomach knotted tighter better than a mountaineer’s safety rope line. There was only one person that I knew who drove a two tone volksie bus, in the 90s nogal. The school headmaster.  

 

With nowhere to hide I had to dig deep into my award winning “sick man” performance for the last time. This time for the headmaster. 

 

He pulled up alongside me, wound down the window and asked politely: “What’s wrong?” I answered sheepishly: “I’m not feeling well sir, so I have to go home.” He was very understanding, which was very unusual, out of character and somewhat unsettling for me…which made me “really” sick. 

 

“Ok! Hop in…I’ll drop you off at home” he said. We all know that’s a “Headmaster’s Lie Detector line”, to test the validity of your story. I stuck to my story, got in…and loaded the car with my innocent, teenage ignorance as I thought I was off the hook…AND I get a lift home from the headmaster. It definitely doesn’t get better than that. That is like winning the lottery two weeks in a row. 

 

Since I’m not a gambling person I couldn’t read the headmaster’s poker face off the rear view mirror.  You see I was hoping that he would drop me off outside my house and drive off back to school. However he had a quick “Maths lesson” for my mom…because my story was not adding up for him and he wanted to get to the square root of the problem. 

 

That is when my luck ran out, as this was breaking news to my mother that I was so gravely ill. I was not scolded by the two…for now, but received something much worse. “Time out”! In the old volksie bus, while the adults chatted freely and openly about my school performances, behaviour and general conduct, just outside the front door while I sat in the volksie peeping through that small triangular “window of shame”.   

 

Yes, I was busted big time! I went back to school, carpooling with the headmaster and was received by massive chorus of laughter from my classmates as I walked back into that dreaded English class. As if I had not suffered enough, I was forced to tell the tale in front of the whole class. My punishment: to clean up my act by picking up litter around school for the whole week and detention on a Friday afternoon. 

 

- Gabriel

 

Here are a few of your stories: 

 

Jenal says she took sick leave and went to visit her boyfriend. She told her family she was going to work and left home the same that morning. She was on cloud nine until 15h00 when she started getting calls from her mum, her sister and then the office. They all wanted to know where she REALLY was! Busted! A friend is to blame after she called Jenal at home to check how she was feeling and that's when her mum found out she'd bunked work! 

 

Chrystal says, "I was naughty at school. I would tell my mother I was going to school and I would enter the front gate all dressed up in my school uniform with my casual wear either under my school clothes or in my bag and walk straight to the back of the school and walk out the back gate. My mom found out at the end of the year on my school report of how many days I was absent. Damn school report!" 

 

Farren-Jade says, "When I got my car, I went to school with a "friend" of mine and didn't want to go to school. So we pretended to be sick and went to the Pavilion but then my father phoned me. NOT a good ending!"

 

Have you ever been bust taking a 'sickie'? Share your story with The Breakfast Stack in the comments' section below.