Francois the Frog

I don't know what possessed me to write a children's story. The baby woke us up at 4:30 this morning and I couldn't go back to sleep and I had this thing in my head about Francois the Frog that had to get out. So here it is:

Last year, when I was in first grade, my teacher was Ms. Hollabaugh. She liked to give homework. She didn’t like to smile. She didn’t like recess. And she didn’t like to wear anything but frumpy, green dresses with puffy shoulders.

For science, we had a frog. We named him Francois. Francois liked to eat. We fed him dead house flies.

My friend Oscar liked math. He said Francois could eat ten flies. He said that was three more than most frogs could eat.

My friend Kaylee liked science. She said Francois was a unique frog because he had bigger shoulders than most frogs.

My friend Keisha liked stories. She said Francois reminded her of a fairy tale about a prince and princess.

One day, Keisha brought some powder to school. She said it was magic fairy dust. She sprinkled some on Francois.

After that, Francois started eating more. Oscar said he could eat fifteen flies. Then twenty. Then thirty.

Francois started to grow. He grew too big for his glass cage. Then he grew too big for our classroom. Then we kept him outside in the school courtyard. He could eat one hundred flies.

The ladies from the cafeteria started feeding him leftovers from lunch. Francois liked hamburgers. He didn’t like fish sticks. He could eat fifty hamburgers.

Then, one day, Francois came back to our classroom for a visit. He was as tall as Ms. Hollabaugh, and she looked nervous. Francois sat quietly in the corner until it was time for recess. We all lined up at the door and walked out to the playground. But Francois and Ms. Hollabaugh didn’t come with us.

When we came back from recess, Ms. Hollabaugh wasn’t there. Francois smiled at us and asked us to take our seats. He looked frumpy and he had big shoulders.

Francois the Frog taught our class the rest of that year, and he never mentioned Ms. Hollabaugh.

This year, in second grade, my teacher is Ms. Hildebrand. She likes math, and science, and stories, and jellybeans.

She doesn’t like frogs.