Road of Good Intentions

Sixteen different stories of catholic schoolgirls growing up

The stories range from romantic to hard core erotica. All involve teenagers growing and navigating the world.

The stories follow a rough chronological order but can be read in any order. The table of contents has a brief description of each story, with tags.

Thank you to everyone who edited, read, and commented on the stories. Special thanks to storiesonline.net for hosting the original drafts.

If you enjoyed the book, please email me with comments (or if you didn't, still email) at tmax02610@gmail.com

If you enjoyed the book so much that you would like to contribute to me writing more stories, please consider buying me a coffee.

Reader Comments

"Good read" - bikergroshen

"Nice story" - notreal347

"Loved it! Everything you do well was on display." - kelliesfrog

"Creative, odd, sexy, very well done." - Dr_BuzzCzar

"This is a story with depth on several levels." - Fofo_Xuxu

"Excellent writing." - yonian

Table of Contents

Prologue: Ms. Barrett teaches Catholic Schoolgirls Sexual Health

Ms. Barrett contemplates her class of sixteen girls, worried about their future, she changes the curriculum. The lives of the girls will never be the same. - No sex

1: Sarah Receives Answers

Schoolgirl Sarah dreams about what sperm tastes like so much that she decides to learn with a trip to a glory hole. - public, oral, strangers

2: Taylor Tries Again

Gymnast Taylor learns the most important life lesson: always get up again. - public, sport, multiple, smoking

3: Lisa Wants Everything

Lisa covets a classic album and devises a plan to get it, unfortunately it goes wrong - blowjob, implied crime

4: Sally Practices for a Husband

Sally knows that practice makes perfect, so she practices for all the sexual things her future husband may need, but practice takes effort. Will Sally survive the day? - public, vegetable insertions, lesbian, school

5: Principal Saves Mary

Forgotten at home and in need of money, Mary gets into trouble at her job. She turns to Principal Campbell, the only person with time to help. Principal Campbell helps her understand the power within herself. - orgy, prostitution, bondage, lesbian

6: Amara Suffers Betrayal

A minor mystery about who posted the picture that will kill Amara and her mother. - teacher, violence

7: Judith Has a Problem

Judith receives an unexpected royalty cheque, which her parents use and end up in the hospital. Judith crashes her car and ends up in a horrible place. - rape, violence, suicide ideation, salvation

8: Kiera’s Business Opportunity

Kiera gets ready for her sexual online fan site to go live. She discovers some surprising things about her father and mother. - exhibitionism, public, incest

9: Vivian Gives Everything for Salvation

Vivian does everything she can to help, unknowingly including sinful things - blowjob, gangbang, incest, lesbian

10: Morgan Finds Help

Morgan, a chemist, needs help with her drug business. She interviews three candidates over breakfast, where she must find a helper and the traitor. - sexual harassment, bathroom groping, sex, virgin

11: Izzy’s Dream Comes True

Isabella, with the blond hair, decides to find a husband, and she decides that her best friend’s father would make the best husband. - love, implied incest, sex

12: Sam’s Hump Day Doesn’t Suck

Awkward Sam, never call her Samantha, has the best Wednesday of her life when she helps a fellow student. - romance, no sex, lesbian

13: Martha’s Heart Breaks

Lesbian Martha doesn’t fit in at her catholic high school, worse, she likes her best and only friend, even worse, she confesses her love and gets rejected. - drugs, lesbian, mfff, non-consensual, redemption

14: Jennifer Meets a Guy

Strange Jennifer meets a guy who finds her attractive and enjoyable. She brings him home. - love, virgin, gentle, safe sex

15: Bella Helps Family

Isabella, brunette, grows concerned for her older brother's change in behavior and meets the mafia man of her dreams while investigating - love story, first time, car sex

16: Teagan Makes Contact

Teagan participates in a satanic ritual and gets more than she bargains for when something goes wrong/right - incest, violence, horror, supernatural

Epilogue: Father Leon Teaches

Dismayed by what happened to Teagan, Father Leon decides to teach the Friday sexual health lesson - no sex

Prologue - Ms. Barrett Teaches Catholic Schoolgirls Sexual Health

‘How do you teach sex education and health to Catholic schoolgirls?’ I ponder and scrutinize my class. Sixteen girls, aged eighteen and nineteen, sit and stare at me. They come from all over the city to attend our private catholic school. Traditionally, people called this a finishing school; the church now calls it a preparatory or enhanced learning school. I have a full-year lesson plan that specifies how to teach sex education and health, approved by the board of directors. Still, the worksheets of ‘Sex equals Evil,’ ‘Abstinence till Marriage,’ and ‘You need to please your husband,’ do not help my students learn and grow.

The curriculum, random and disjointed, on thirty-year-old photocopies, can never overstate the danger of pregnancy for a teenage catholic girl. However, modern contraception does offer trustworthy protection, if only they had access to it. Unwed myself, and after a few close calls, I intimately know the danger of unprotected sex. Now, I use two types, and while I ask, men often lie about being fixed. So, pleasurable accidents have happened in lust and loneliness.

Another light has burnt out, so the back corner shadows have grown larger and slightly sinister in my old classroom, like specters that watch what I do and wait to pounce on my girls. I make a mental note to pick up another fluorescent light bar at the store. Only PhD-level academics can figure out the church's requisition forms.

The ‘Jesus on the Cross’ poster appears more oppressive in the shadows. His selfless act of dying for our sins remains a cornerstone of my life. I gladly give my students sleepless nights and long weeks. I have given them my life, too busy to marry or even date, I have my teaching, my girls, and little else.

Behind my grand mahogany desk, I contemplate my class. Sixteen girls, hunched over the old, small, one-piece combo of desk and chair, clumped in groups of two or three, spread out over five rows of four desks. The desks remind me of the ones I had as a catholic school girl. The current white walls brighten the room better than the dull green of my past. Sheltered all their lives, the girls have no idea about the great big world that will take advantage of, use, abuse, and discard them. I must teach them better than my teachers taught me.

I snuck out of the house for my first love to take my innocence in the back of a big red Cadillac. He also took my idea of maturity when he claimed my best friend's innocence and her sister’s before their father chased him out of town.

Now, social media steals innocence and wraps the girl's maturity around the phones they hold in front of parents, teachers, and friends. The magic age grows younger every year, from sixteen in my day to thirteen or even twelve today. I pray for the innocence of these girls and the knowledge to reach and teach them. In my day, only one or two girls from the public system became teenage moms. Now, with so many social media posts extolling the benefits of teen motherhood, public schools no longer shame young mothers. While maybe old-fashioned, babies do not belong in teenagers. Banned in catholic primary school, most did not get phones until their eighteenth birthday. I shudder to think what they watch.

They work on a worksheet about how sex before marriage hurts, but after marriage, sex magically becomes wonderous. Girls have filled out this exact sheet since I began teaching, and I have often wondered who created it. The curriculum, like the classroom, desks, and much of the church, remains firmly rooted in the glory days before women voted, worked, or had opinions.      

Sixteen girls, aged eighteen and nineteen, work, heads down, on the often-photocopied lesson. Some fill it out for the second time.

Does short, messy-haired Morgan believe the message anymore? Did she ever? She questions everything, seeks, and often finds loopholes. Persuasive arguments will not heal her father or return her adulterous mother.

Or Teagan, tall, elegant, with braided brown hair draping across her shoulder and into her lap. Will the rigid rules help her navigate hormones and budding sexuality? Or will the sheets draw lines she cannot help crossing?

The curriculum, unfortunately, doesn't prevent this gaggle of girls from experimenting and having sex. It doesn’t prevent pregnancy or venereal diseases. It shames them. It makes things worse and forces the girls to hide in embarrassment.

The harsh fluorescent lights shine down and give each girl a halo. However, the same light causes haunting shapes to appear and disappear as they write on and move around their desks.

Two years ago, a lovely young girl killed herself while attempting an abortion. A girl I taught with this curriculum. The death shocked the community, school, and church. Not me. The girl's life ended when the sperm met the egg. Abandoned by the boy, outcast by everyone and everything she loved, she didn’t want to die, but how does an unwed, pregnant, young catholic girl live?

Many girls, over many years, have had their potential destroyed by nature's cruel timeline. Each committed the ultimate and irreversible sin of hormones and naivety.

But what can I do?

I love my students, and I want to support them. Do I keep my job and teach the approved curriculum, knowing a girl will die because of it?

After each funeral, Principal Campbell and I go for drinks. We silently sit in the pub and sip our dark red wine in the comfort of each other's presence. Beyond belief, girls still get sacrificed for our way of life, a necessary by-product of our God’s love.

Since the last funeral, my standard glass of wine before bed has grown into a bottle, while my sleep has shortened to four hours on a good night. At confession, I talk to the priest about my concerns and questions. Did God want me to do this? And if so, why? I received only silence and absolution.

I contemplate sweet, young Sarah, blossoming into a beautiful, brave girl. Little wrinkles cross her nose like when she stared at me as a baby. The image of her funeral bursts in front of me. Flowers, crying parents and friends, and questions, why? How do I offer condolences to my closest friends, her parents, knowing I failed Sarah? Can I hold her father’s hands and lie about how the world will go on? Hug her mother while her tears soak my neck and black dress. Could I show up on Monday and not rip up the useless curriculum? Or do I just continue to teach like every other time?

What about Mary's funeral? Her dark personality joined us from public school in the fall. How do I do the same with her parents? Eyes down, hands clasped together in front, sympathy for their loss, while my heart burns at the injustice. Why didn’t I know? Why didn’t she confide in me, the priest, someone, or anyone?

I scrutinize the class. Will one of these girls, or one from my younger class, cause another night of wine and solace with my principal?

If I quit, a different teacher will teach the useless curriculum, and another senseless girl's death will still happen every couple of years.

To stop the sacrifices, I have tried different approved tactics over the years. I put the fear of God into them, but the message rang false - God means love.

I talked about the pain of sex before marriage. That worked better before social media. Furthermore, I enjoy a night of sweat and body fluid exchange. I explained how boys will use and abuse them, how men don’t love them, and only their husbands can love them properly, a lesser sin for the greater good. Yet, every four to five years, a young girl leaves this world at her hand or one of her well-intentioned friends.

How can I keep doing this?

The volume in class grows as girls finish the useless worksheet. I wait for just the right level before calling everyone to attention. The next lesson instructs about God's love and how all teenagers remain nasty and devil-infested creatures until marriage. I scrutinize the useless message. Can I hand this out?

In dismay at my failing faith and failure as a teacher, I ask in exasperation, “Does anyone have any questions about sex, your health, or anything involving boys?”

I haven’t asked that question since the first day of the first class I taught. The same silence answers me. Then, I accepted it meant no questions, but now, I knew the embarrassment held their tongues.

Still desperate to do anything to change the outcome for the poor sacrificial girl in this class, I bend the rules: “Grab a blank sheet of paper and write a question about your health or sexual health. You do not have to put your name on it. I will collect, read, and answer them.”

Instantly, the noise level rises with pens writing on paper. This excitement reminds me of why I began teaching in the first place.

I glance around the room to study my girls, my beautiful teenagers, hunched over their desks. Long blonde, brunette, and black hair cascade down over the desks. Such a pleasing sight, diligent, confident, impressionable girls, all writing questions.

Vivian appears confused as she tries to write her question. Her thin body hunches awkwardly, while her tongue sticks out, and she carefully prints on the page. Does Vivian know anything about sex? Does she know the meaning of the word sex? She must, at eighteen, she must know.

Wait, what if they ask questions about obscure sexually transmitted diseases or specific anatomical structures of the male reproductive organ? What have I done? I know the basics about sexual health, but not everything. I suppose I can search for answers on my phone.

But what if I contradict Catholic doctrine? Oh, I may have made a grave mistake.

As the girls finish, no one speaks. The bright classroom stays silent like a church during silent prayer. Typically, girls turn to talk after completing a worksheet, but now, thirty-two eyes stare at me. Even impulsive Samatha remains quiet, and she never sits still.

I nod to our class suck up, Martha, to collect the sheets. Martha quickly and quietly moves around the room, collects the papers, and proudly deposits them on my desk.

The girls sit taller, expectant of my sage answers. I worry about what they wrote, strange sexual positions, or exotic sexual dysfunctions.

The first question shocks me, and without forethought, I answer immediately, “You cannot get pregnant by kissing a boy.” Judith, Sally, and blond-haired Isabella visibly relax.

Martha shoots her hand up!

“Yes, Dear?”

She sticks her small chest out in pride, her pink lips form an ‘I told you so’ smirk, “But you can if he sticks his tongue in!” our class want-to-be-genius, Martha, states with great authority.

“No, Stupid, he needs to use his dick and squirt into your mouth to get pregnant!” Sarah, our actual class genius, sneers at her.

“Sarah, Martha, girls, you can only get pregnant if a boy, a man, ejaculates into your vagina.”

‘How do they not know this?’ I think and stare at the poster of Jesus. ‘Give me patience and help me teach.’ Have I done such a poor job teaching that they do not even know the basics?

“You mean pee?” Sam shouts out.

What? A mechanical wizard with useless parents, she knows how to repair a car engine, yet does not know the difference between pee and semen.

“No, Sam, ejaculation does not mean peeing.”

Her head, with a small grease stain under her left ear, tilts to the side, and she opens her mouth to ask another question before closing it.

I squint around the class. How? Instead of difficult questions, they do not know the answers to the basic ones. The lesson plans have failed them. I have failed them!

Now what? Do I ignore the curriculum? It will help this group until the board fires me. What happens to the next group?

Our star gymnast, Taylor, vibrates in her seat and leans forward. She always struck me as intelligent and thoughtful. How does she not already know?

I inspect the stack of questions. I will answer these while I ponder the problem.

The next sheet emphasizes my fear.

“You cannot get pregnant if a man ejaculates in your anus. Only in your vagina.”

Next question.

“You cannot get pregnant from a sex dream.”

Sarah sighs, which causes me to want to comfort her and explain that I had sex dreams at her age. I heeded the anonymous trust the girls placed in me and gave no hint that I knew who wrote each question based on their handwriting, spelling, and grammar.

“Class, sex dreams happen at your age.” I hope the general statement helps Sarah enough.

Wait, did I just contradict doctrine? Many girls have sex dreams, especially when hormones flood the body. But does the church condone sex dreams? I will have to ask the priest before I say anything more.

I scan the rest of the questions. All but one follow the same theme.

Glancing around the room, everyone silently waits for me to speak. In most classes, Amara, our foreign student, habitually stares out the window at the trees, not paying any attention, but now, her mocha skin flushes, and she nods at my answers.

“You cannot get pregnant by cucumbers, or carrots, or dogs, or hair brushes, or anything else you put in your vagina. You can only get pregnant if sperm enters your vagina.”

Hands shoot up to inquire about more. I don't want to know their follow-up questions. I motion for them to lower their hands while I ponder the last question.

This question demands a response, but I pause and gather the strength to proceed. Kiera, who usually plays on her phone, has shifted sideways and strains to hear more. Her perfect face holds interest instead of the regular vapid expression.

I read it out loud, “My sister gets pain when she pees after Dad’s penis went in her cunt.” I take a moment to muster more courage and state, “Please use the proper term, vagina, not cunt,” before I continue to read the question, “Does my sister have the devil in her now? How do I perform an exorcism?”

I stare at the back wall and avoid the writer's wide gaze, before I answer, “Your sister does not have the devil in her. She has a venereal disease. She needs to go to a doctor to get treated. The person who asked about this needs to talk to Principal Campbell or me. Soon!”

I fall backwards into my chair, stunned. Lisa’s father chairs our school board. The board will fire me over this.

I grab the worksheet on ‘How God's Love Will Fill Your Urges’ and hand it out.

Book-smart Jenny writes quick, with a pink-lipped smile, while her classmate, world-smart Isabella, copies off her sheet. Does this useless sheet help Jenny become more world-smart? Does it help brunette Isabella become more book-smart? The curriculum fails everyone equally, almost like someone designed it that way.

Thankfully, the worksheet requires the rest of the class time. The harsh bell rings and the girls leave, louder and more animated. Unfortunately, Lisa doesn’t stay to talk.

As suspected, the PA system politely demands that I join Principal Campbell in her office.

With trepidation, I pause before entering her cluttered room. I move a pile of papers and sit like a little girl in trouble. I have no idea how she will react to my health class today.

I force myself to sit straight and resist the urge to comfort myself as she shifts papers around her small desk. I remember when she hired me decades ago. She gave me eleven commandments, ten I knew, and the eleventh commanded me to follow the board-prescribed lesson plans.

Over the years, we have always supported each other. As two unmarried women, we have leaned on each other during horrible situations. All the funerals, molestation scandals, counseling girls during parent divorces, and even once, we helped hide a young girl when her mom tried to steal her and return to Eastern Europe.

Principal Campbell remains a beautiful, dynamic woman, only slightly showing her age with more conservative dress suits and more pronounced crow's feet in the corners of her eyes. Like the school’s rock foundation, she supports her teachers.

“One of your students informed me of what you said in class. Did you say to use a cucumber to avoid getting pregnant?” Principal Campbell jumps straight to the point.

Stay calm.

My nerves jump, my head throbs with my heartbeat, and I clasp my hands together, “No! I said that a girl can’t get pregnant from a cucumber.” A metallic sweat scent overpowers the paper and musty smell of the small room.

I must stay calm. I do not want Principal Campbell as my enemy. She doesn’t know. She stares at me with disdain, a face she has perfected over the years. She gets a lot of practice as an all-girls school administrator dealing with the daily stupidity of both parents and students.

I launch into my prepared explanation. “I asked the class to write down an anonymous question.”

She scowls and interrupts me, “Is that part of the approved course curriculum?” Principal Campbell takes her job seriously and cares deeply about our little pupils.

“The curriculum states the girls can ask questions, but nothing about how they can ask them.” After twenty years, I know the curriculum almost verbatim.

“So, why did you say that to the class?” She scowls at me and dares me to justify my unjustifiable actions. She knows me well, but still needs to read the questions herself. I still doubt the girl’s ignorance, and I read the questions.

“I think you need to read these,” I say as I hand her the questions.

At first, she stares at me, then down at the sheets ruffling in the cool air from the air conditioner. She leans back in her chair and rubs her chin. Twenty years ago, countless wrinkles ago, she might have ignored the sheets and continued grilling me about the class. Instead, she leans forward and snatches them from the desk.

Her eyes narrow as she flips through the pages. The lids grow closer together, almost closed, until they spring open, and she shouts, “You can’t be serious!” She throws the papers neatly on her desk. A stray paper from a pile at the corner of her desk flies up and flutters to the floor, which joins other papers scattered around the desk leg.

“How would they know?”

“They have the internet!”

I lift one eyebrow to still her body. Her fingers, with red-chipped nails, have minor cuts and rest on the table, on either side of the answer stack. She stares at the pile, and the back of my neck grows cold as sweat evaporates. Goosebumps rise on my arms.

“They have family. They have friends,” she mutters, deflating with each word.

I allow the silence to linger. Rarely has this stern administrator shown defeat. Over the years, she has encountered and dealt with so much crazy stuff. The girl’s ignorance succeeded, where even the most pious do-gooder failed. This stoic woman slumps down into her chair and holds her head. “What can we do?”

The air conditioner rattles in the background while I tentatively reach forward to comfort her before my hand stops and retreats. “Officially, what I did today. But we both know, while I technically followed the curriculum, the board will not agree.”

I sit straighter. I have figured out a solution, but I must lead Principal Campbell towards it. A sweet lilac smell grows in the room, my favorite body wash that Principal Campbell enjoys. From the paper stack at the corner, another piece of paper flutters to the floor as the air conditioner grows louder.

She picks up and shakes the sheets. “They would if we showed them these questions.” Not wrong, but incomplete. Those sheets shine a light on the ignorance of our girls.

“They won’t understand. They will use the sheets to fire me, and maybe you, citing incompetence at best, sexual predation at worst.”

Her head slumps onto the desk, hands covering it, defeated by sixteen questions on sixteen sheets of paper written by sixteen innocent teenage girls. A metallic sour odor overrides the musty paper smell of the school detention room, her office. The hallway grows loud with students between classes. Sweet, defenseless girls, who have looked to us for protection, to shield them from the horror of the world. Their parents trusted us to teach them everything necessary. We have failed in one crucial aspect: sexual education.

“Did you read the last question in the pile?”

She hasn’t. She slumps a fallen husk, not an angry, vengeful angel. “Why bother?”

“Just read it.”

She has taught me almost everything I know about teaching and has likely forgotten more than I will ever know. Still, the impossible situation holds her head to the table. She understands our failure. Thankfully, Principal Campbell does not hate the messenger, does not hate me for exposing the girls' ignorance.

“Please.”

As if holding the world, she lifts her head and peeks at me. All those nights drinking wine after all those funerals have broken her as much as me. Deeper wrinkles appear beside her eyes. Her wide-eyed gaze holds hope but also a threat. If this does not solve the problem, if everything stays the same, I will have to pay for the wine.

She ruffles and glances through the sheets. She reads the last question. Fire fills her body, lifting her. Righteous vengeance has arrived to solve the problem, and she asks, “Do you know who wrote this?”

“Yes, but before I tell you, I want you to know I have a plan for the class. I just need your help.”

I have taken my first step toward the solution. Will she?

“Tell me!”

The cracks in her eyes have fused, and our world shifts. The rattling air conditioner increases in tempo until it suddenly stops, and silence descends. The room grows stuffy as I swallow the bitter taste and answer her, “Lisa.”

Her fists open with her eyes before she leans onto her desk and squints at me. While a thin woman, her passion makes her appear more significant. Red cheeks and a red-lipped sneer, her eyes lay in shadow from the overhead lights. The body casts a dark shadow over the stack of answers. A halo of light surrounds her head's shadow on the desk. Her white hands appear dark with only the tips of her fingers outside her shadow. “The board will not interfere. You do what you need to do.”

Sweat tickles my cheek as a chill runs up my spine.

“Wait till Monday, but spend the weekend preparing,” she says, sits, and turns away. Quietly, I stand and slip out of the room.

I stride from the office, inhaling cheap perfume, mint gum, and sweet onions. Mrs. Foley stands in the middle of the hall, holding orange sheets for the girls. The pious, well-meaning woman often stands in the hallway, uniquely allowed because of her high status in our community and church. As one of three school board members, she controls my boss.

“Good day, Mrs. Foley.”

She squints at something three inches to my right. I peek backwards at old lockers and the air.

“Do not do this,” She scowls and narrows her eyelids.

I find her strange on good days. She shakes her sheets at me, still staring over my shoulder. I peek for a spider or a fly. The orange sheets flap and cool me in the suddenly stifling hallway. Instinctively, I grab a sheet as my heels click down the hall, away from her.

Our interactions often leave me confused and worried. This meeting makes the top three, although not as bizarre as when Lisa’s dad first arrived at our school. The brown-suited, balding, slight man strode into the school with a leather file folder and his young daughter's hand. Mrs. Foley pointed at him and hissed like a cat, “The bearer of light.”

He grinned, “Mrs. Foley, it’s a pleasure to meet you.”

Hissing, she stepped closer, and I moved between them. Mrs. Foley’s frail body vibrated while she pointed, “The fallen one.”

Lisa’s dad grinned with only his lips and tried to shake her hand, but Mrs. Foley spat and hurried away, muttering, “Corruption, deceit, lies.”

Except at board meetings, they never interact. Mrs. Foley always rushes away. I often imagine her rants at board meetings. Principal Campbell has never talked about board meetings between the two of them. She always begins to say something before she closes her eyes and shakes her head. I want to press for details, but she remains my boss, who once fired her secretary for calling during a funeral service.

Given Lisa’s question, possibly Mrs. Foley knows something we don’t, although Lisa’s dad has only shown kindness and understanding around me. Did he commit incest? Would Lisa lie, or maybe misunderstand the situation?

Unread, I neatly fold Mrs. Foley’s flyer and slip it into the recycling bin around the corner. Coffee gets me through the health classes for younger grades. I manage to muddle through the day. My body moves on autopilot while my mind swirls with ideas for Monday's health class.

I work all day Saturday, reading everything I can on health and wellness. My knowledge of modern women’s health and issues elapsed twenty years ago.

New lesson plans take shape. From dusk to dawn, coffee and ideas make me a young teacher again. Sunday morning, my body reminds me of my age. By noon, eyes watering, mind foggy, and no longer able to smell my coffee, I straighten my lesson plans and place them in a folder for Monday morning.

Opening the fridge for the third time, and somehow not finding anything new, I have the sensational Italian bistro deliver my favorite hot Italian sandwich. I write notes about possible future lessons while I nibble on the sandwich and ignore the mustard drops.

Sunday afternoon, Principal Campbell calls an hour into lunch with my sandwich barely touched, and has news from the board meeting. I almost cried when the board rejected the proposed curriculum changes but agreed to the new Q&A format. As expected, Mrs. Foley opposed everything, Lisa’s dad approved everything, while Father Leon took the middle ground.

All my work lies useless on the table. The lack of sleep catches up to me, so while I almost scream at Principal Campbell, I hold my temper and focus on the positive. I can at least answer the girls' questions.

Disappointed to have wasted so much time on new lesson plans, I treat myself to a bottle of wine and a silly romantic movie. I fall asleep after only half a glass.

Izzy’s Dream Comes True

Every day, God blesses and guides my actions to keep me on my life’s path. My family loves and supports me, my classmates love and support me, and Jennifer, my best friend, helps me navigate the world while I wait to fulfill my dream, my life’s goal, to marry a handsome, supportive man and have many children. Four years away, maybe as little as three, if God wills it.

The walk through the brown school hallways with dark blue lockers and light blue classroom doors reminds me to stay patient and calm. This school has taught generations of girls how to please their husbands and raise the next generation. My grandmother and mother attended the school, and their lockers still have hearts they drew for their husbands. The marks faded, but I can still see them because I know where to look.

The old lady stopped me. She appears at our school to give great talks about our role in the world. I forgot her name, Mrs. Something, but it doesn’t matter; she has an essential position in our school, and I feel privileged when she talks to me. Her talk about finding the right kind of man to marry sent me on the path to my current dream.

“Excuse me, young lady, I need to talk to you,” she said and stepped closer. Her old lady odor of lavender and rose overwhelmed me. Her bright red lips frowned while she stared at my forehead. I wanted to rush away, but stayed out of politeness and serenity. Father always said that I must listen to my elders.

“Your teacher leads you onto the road to hell!” The lady said.

“I knew it. Mrs. Waters's math lessons are too hard for us,” I nodded and said, “Maybe you can stop the impossible math. I don't need math. No wife needs math.”

“They overruled me on the committee. Health class will lead you to ruin,” the intelligent lady said, which didn’t make much sense. I like health class. I have already learned so much, and Ms. Barrett knows everything about everything.

“Health class, but I like health class,” I say in confusion. I've learned more in the last three classes than the rest of the year combined. Maybe the lady means a different health class.

She stepped closer, her blue hair at my eye level, while her gaze fell on my chin. The lady appears non-threatening in her bright white with yellow and blue flower dress and matching shawl, holding a brown leather purse in front of her, but I involuntarily step back before I force myself to step forward.

‘She is wise. You need to listen when she speaks,’ Daddy's words echo in my mind. Daddy knows more than even Ms. Barrett.

She shakes her finger inches from my nose, “The road to hell is paved with good intentions.”

I nodded. I knew that. Everyone knew that. The lady’s bright cheeks smiled before she turned and clacked down the hall.

I love our kind health teacher, but what if she leads me away from the righteous path? She called Bobby human, while Daddy called him a dog, which confused me. Daddy, a man, knows more than Ms. Barret, so I trust him more. And because animals cannot get a woman pregnant, that means I can practice sex with Bobby. My brain hurts when I try to think about this stuff. I need a husband like Daddy to help me sort everything out. Maybe I need to stop practicing with Bobby and find one. Lisa said that I could legally get married at my age. I don’t want to wait till I finish high school like Mommy wants. But I don't know, my head spins as I walk to class.

As usual, I arrived first and chose my favorite seat at the back and middle.

Sarah entered, chin down, eyes up, in a flush of half smiles. She needs a strong man to tell her what to do. Martha followed close behind, her gaze on Sarah's ass. She needs a man to get her off the lesbian path and back on God's path. Vivian slipped in, chin up, eyes down, hands in front of her body. She needs an intelligent man to guide her and tell her what to do.

I stared at the picture of Jesus. I want my husband to have stylish short hair and no beard, although a mustache might look ok. However, I will take whatever God provides.

Ms. Barrett asked the class to write down a question. I love this new question format.

Should I stay in school or find a husband? School or husband? School has no use other than to pass the time as I wait for a husband. However, do men like stupid women? Vivian can barely spell her name, and men always ask for her help. So, school likely doesn’t matter. But Mom wants me to stay, and Dad has not said anything. I need to ask. Ms. Barrett will know what to do. Although she stayed in school and doesn’t have a husband. I bet she regrets her choice. But how do I ask it? A person can get married and attend school, so I need to know which to prioritize. I like school, though not math, and all my friends go here. I can’t ask, ‘Marriage or School?’ No, that makes no sense. Ms. Barrett will say both.

“Is everyone almost finished?” Ms. Barrett asked the class.