My student submitted the most disturbing thing possible

As a high school English teacher and Creative Writing instructor, I’ve just about seen it all. I’ve been doing it for years, and when you do something for years, you run into a lot of the same stuff (especially when it comes to student writing). I’ve had a kid write a story that was just a very slightly altered version of a popular meme. I’ve had a girl submit a story that was secretly about her and how she’s a vampire, a werewolf, and a fairy. I’ve even had students who just refuse to submit anything (although that’s becoming more and more common these days).<br><br>But the one that sticks out most in my mind was a student named Jamie Waterman.<br><br>Jamie was as quiet as a mouse. She was a freshman, and I only had her for one class during my second period Creative Writing workshop. She always wore these big headphones, and I never saw her without a book in hand. She looked to be a little socially awkward, but she didn’t stand out as different from the other students. I’m not even sure I would have noticed her at all if it weren’t for her strange submitted stories.<br><br>Jamie was an excellent writer. I could tell just from reading the first lab that she submitted. She had a way with words, a natural talent for writing, even at fifteen years old. The lab was about describing a place that you remember fondly from childhood, and while most of the students wrote your standard stories about vacationing at their grandparents or on the beach somewhere, Jamie wrote about a room with a desk in it, where she and some other kids in her age range were sitting in chairs, writing. I remember the way she described the desk perfectly—embroidered wood patterns and little carvings that depicted animals playing different musical instruments. It was all very surreal as the students at the desks all seemed to be oblivious to their surroundings. She described the teacher as standing in the front of the room, writing on the chalkboard with long strokes of chalk that sounded out like the ticking of a clock. <br><br>It was all very impressive, especially considering that she was only fifteen. I usually don’t hand out too many A’s to my freshmen, but Jamie would be a different case. I made a mental note of it while reading through the rest of the labs and grading them. She would receive an A.<br><br>The next week, I assigned a different lab. I decided that I would have the class write a character sketch of someone that they knew. I told them to choose someone that they found interesting, someone who they could put a lot into. I even went so far as to say that they could choose themselves if they felt they had a unique enough perspective on life. <br><br>I let the kids work on the lab for the majority of the class, and when they turned them in, my eyes were immediately drawn to Jamie’s paper. From the way that she wrote, I could tell that she had fun with it. I sat in my office grading labs all night, and hers was the last one that I graded. I remember this because the next morning, I was still thinking about the things that she had written.<br><br>Jamie wrote a character sketch of me. It wasn’t incredibly personal, although I did notice that she accurately described the way that I pronounced my R’s like W’s (something that I had when I was a child and still hadn’t grown out of). It was an accurate depiction of my frame, my style of dress, and my teaching methods. She wrote a paragraph about the way that I smiled, describing how I only used half of my mouth. It was all very strange, and even creepy, but it was so well-written and accurate. I couldn’t help but be flattered that she chose to write about me. She must have thought highly of me as a person, and she probably wanted to reciprocate with a good grade.<br><br>She undoubtedly earned another A. <br><br>The rest of the year went by like any other. Jamie was an excellent writer and a great student, always turning her work in on time. I remember being particularly impressed with one of the students when he wrote an incredibly well-done poem about the Apocalypse. He wrote about the way that the earth shook beneath his feet, and how the sky raged with fire. He wrote as though he was being chased by demons—how the shadows around him seemed to move and twist, and how he had to run from the light lest he get incinerated by the flames. I told the whole class how proud of him I was, and encouraged him to submit it to a literary magazine. Jamie wrote a short story about a man who woke up in an unfamiliar room. He had no idea how he got there or where “there” even was. There were two doors on opposite sides of the room and a window in front of him. He tried the doors, and realized that they both opened into the same hallway that just led back to the room again. He tried breaking the window, but it wouldn’t budge. He repeatedly beat against it until he broke his fingers, and still it wouldn’t break. He realized that there was no way out, and eventually, he gave up and sat in the corner of the room, where he eventually died. She wrote about his decomposition and how his body was eventually just a pile of bones and dust. It was an incredibly well-written piece that offered a rather bleak outlook on life.<br><br>She received an A.<br><br>I had her for second period, and second period always stays after for about five minutes to help clean up the room. Usually, this consists of the students picking up their things and chatting with each other. The second period students were always the ones who found the most enjoyment in my class, probably because they got to miss the announcements. I noticed that Jamie always stayed late on Fridays, and she would always approach me while the other kids were packing up. She never really had much to say, she just offered a weak smile and a soft “Have a good weekend, Mr. Kriet.” If I had to guess, I would say she probably had a crush on me.<br><br>Well, one Friday, all of the students filed out of the classroom except for Jamie, who stayed behind with a smile on her face. I nodded at her in recognition, but she didn’t approach me. I asked her if there was anything wrong, or if she needed help with anything. She said no, and that she just wanted to stay late and finish writing something that she was working on.<br><br>“Okay,” I said. “Just give me your lab and I’ll grade it, then you can work on whatever it is that you’re working on.”<br><br>She smiled weakly at me and handed me the lab. It was another character sketch, and she had once again written about me. I felt a little flattered, but also strange that she was writing so much about me. I asked her if she could help me with a little problem that I was working on, and while she copied some notes onto the board from a book that I gave her, I read over her lab.<br><br>This one was different, though. It wasn’t just a standard character sketch. She had written an entire backstory for me. She wrote about how I was an only child, and how my father was a dentist. She wrote about how I had a hard time pronouncing my R’s when I was younger, and that my high school friends used to tease me about it. She even wrote about how I met my wife, and where we went on our first date. <br><br>None of this information was public; none of it could be found anywhere online. I had never told it to her, and yet she wrote it out verbatim from my own memory. How could she have known all of this? I was flabbergasted. I read over the lab several more times, each time more amazed than the last. <br><br>I finished reading the lab, and I couldn’t help but feel a little uneasy. How did she know all of these things? The lab was so well-written that I couldn’t help but feel that it actually was me that she was writing about. How did she know so much about me? Where did she get all of this information from? More importantly, how did she remember all of this information? I couldn’t remember some of the things that she wrote about. At least, I didn’t think I could. <br><br>I read the lab over several more times, each time more and more baffled. She wrote about how I got into teaching because I loved interacting with people. She wrote about how much my father’s occupation bothered me, and how I vowed to become a teacher as soon as I got out of high school. She wrote about my marriage, and how I had been with my wife for almost ten years. All of it was so accurate, and she wrote it all out in her beautiful, flowing script. I couldn’t help but be more and more impressed with each passing sentence. <br><br>As I read the lab, Jamie finished her copying and approached me. She stood in front of my desk while I read the rest of her lab, and I could feel her staring at me. I looked up at her and her smiling face, and I felt all of the blood drain from my body. It was the same smile that she had described in her lab, the same smile that I had given to her on multiple occasions. I read on, still able to feel her looking at me. I swear, the only time that I looked up from the page was when I tried to catch a breath of air.<br><br>I finished reading the lab, and I looked up at her. She was still smiling, and I didn’t know what to say. I was taken aback by what she had written, as it was all so accurate. I didn’t know what to say to her, I just kept looking at her, dumbfounded. I could feel the gooseflesh rising on my skin, and