I’ve had experiences with ops - a tattle tale- way before it became the latest meme on twitter. It all started when my second grade teacher Mrs. Saunders had given the groaned filled class a worksheet to complete. The room was instantly filled with silence. You could only hear whispers and pencils scratching on the desks. My friend at the time-in all honesty we were more like acquaintances- Julia sat across from me, because it had became very quiet, it was natural that sending notes would be our form of communication. Julia whipped out her old, wrinkled, dirty red folder and scrawled on the backside a very important question, “Who do you like?” As an eight year old, this was a very important secret you didn’t want getting out. I quickly wrote down, “Chase.”  After she had glanced at the writing, she looked at me with a mischievous glint and mouthed the words, “I’m gonna tell him,”

I knew I shouldn’t have told her!

I sat there thinking what I should reply with, snatching her folder back, I wrote in the best cursive I could muster, “If you do, I’ll kill you.”

After looking at the paper, she sat there and stared back with a blank face. For the rest of the day she didn’t look or speak to me.

Good now she’ll know not to mess with me.

At the end of the day, after I stuffed everything into my backpack, my teacher called me over to her desk. She asked me,“Why did you tell Julia you were going to kill her?” That’s when it clicked why she was acting unusual earlier; what shocked me more was that she took the note seriously. I was about to open my mouth and deny it, but before I could mutter out a word, Mrs. Saunders pulled out the folder. I stood there not knowing what to say. She shook her head at me in disappointment, and handed me a half sheet of paper. “Hand this to your parents today and make sure they sign it. Return it to me tomorrow.” I instantly started panicking.

What’s mom gonna think when she reads this?
I felt my stomach twist and turn.

After the rather short bus ride home, I walked home feeling anxious.

“Maame, how was your day at school?” Mom called distantly. I walked towards her voice.

Should I tell her what happened?

My voice wavered from my nerves,“Great, my teacher gave me this for you to sign.” I shakily reached into my backpack and pulled out the half sheet of paper. I shoved it at her and quickly sprinted up the stairs. When I reached my room, I plopped down on my bed and sighed with relief, pleased that I escaped before my mom fully scanned through the paper. While I was laying down -assuming I had falling asleep- I heard a very outraged African woman call for me, “What is this about you being suspended for two days?!” I heard muffled stomping through the wall until my door slammed open.I sat there silently staring back at her. All the sudden I felt this overwhelming urge to cry, which is exactly what I did. “Oh Maame, you don’t have to cry, it’s okay.” She calmed down significantly.

Reaching over, she dried my tears, “I’ll go to your school and try to get everything fixed out OK?”

Quickly getting up, she rushed out of the house and drove to the school. I stayed home the whole day waiting for my mom to come back. Three agonizing hours later, my mom returned. “The principal said that she will drop the suspension since you have never caused any trouble in class, but that doesn’t mean every time you get into trouble, I’m going to go to the school. I only did this time because you didn’t mean it, but the next time you do something like this I will not save you.” She stood there heaving from her little speech. 

“Thank you mommy.”