Today’s post is written by a guest fabulist, David, who turns Aesop’s tales into advice for high schoolers.
This is a true story called “The Bully and the Nerd.”
Happy Hollywood criminals.
Leo Creepizoid, who goes to my school but that’s not his real name, needed $100/week to support his Doritos-and-beer habit. Instead of finding a McJob, he decided to rob the visiting girls’ basketball team at Friday’s game. He asked Paisley Fresh, which isn’t her real name either, for help.
“Paisley, Paisley, Paisley,” Leo said, leaning against the locker next to hers. “What say you sneak into the girls’ locker room tonight and grab any cash or electronics you find, and we be like Bonnie and Clyde, babe? I’ll stand by the gym and be your big handsome lookout. If you get caught opening somebody’s locker, just use your gorgeous girliness to play dumb.”
Paisley thought that sounded like a good idea. Or maybe she was too timid to tell Leo to get lost. It’s hard to say what her motivation was. Paisley’s usually smart, but the Kayleys had been giving her a hard time lately so maybe she wanted to get in with the cool crowd. Also, Leo had been circulating a selfie that looked like this:
(Yeah, okay, I exaggerated his Doritos-and-beer habit. It’s actually a protein and Gatorade habit. But he’s still a creepizoid.)
Whatever made her do it, Paisley shrugged and smiled and said, “Okay.”
That Friday, after the Shawville team ditched their possessions in the girls’ locker room and went into the gym to play ball, Paisley snuck in with a pair of bolt cutters and stole everything worth stealing. She scooped fifteen phones, two iPads, twelve wallets, a MacBook Air, a Surface, and a pound of jewelry. She ran out to the parking lot, where Leo stuffed the goodies in his car.
Paisley leaned against Leo’s rusty Nissan, out of breath and excited by her crime spree, all sweaty behind her glasses and cardigan, and she said, “So what do you want to do now, Leo?”
She thought it would end like this.
“I wanna get the hell away from you, sucker,” Leo said. He took off with the stolen goods, leaving Paisley alone on the pavement, ashamed and sad and empty-handed except for a flip-phone Leo didn’t think he could sell.
And the moral is: You can’t trust a criminal. If the surveillance camera catches you tearing down the hallway with your arms full of loot, the ringleader with the nice abs isn’t the one who’ll get expelled. Duh.
But it ended like this.
That’s right, Paisley got caught on camera and had to pay back everything she stole. Leo denied having anything to do with it. “The girl’s nuts,” he said. Paisley was expelled from school, forced to do weeks of community service, plus three girls from Shawville beat her up the next Sunday. Her rep was ruined – although lots of other creepy guys started asking her out because they figured a girl who steals for Leo is probably up for anything. Her whole year was blown, all because she thought she’d be special in some creep’s eyes.
Don’t make her mistake. If you’re a nerd and some badass or jock or Mr. Popular says you’d make a great team, they’re setting you up. Every nerd wants to believe Mr. Excitement might fall for them. But he doesn’t. He falls for the hot chick. He’s just using you, nerd. Don’t give him the satisfaction.
Don’t be a Paisley. Practice these words in front of a mirror: “No, I don’t think so. Bye.”
Say it again: “No, I don’t think so. Bye.”
The end.
Aesop’s Version: The Lion and the Wild Ass
You can’t trust a predator.
A Lion struck a deal with an Ass to form a hunting team. “You use your speed to chase the prey my way,” said the Lion, “and I’ll use my strength to pounce on it.” For reasons only Aesop understood, this seemed like a good deal to the Ass, who chased a few antelope in the Lion’s direction, where they were severely pounced.
The Lion divided the carcasses into three equal shares. “I’ll take the first share because I’m King,” he said. “I’ll take the second share because I’m an equal partner in the hunt. And I’ll take the final share because I’m bigger than you and you’re an ass.” And with a roar, he sent the stupid Ass on its way.
The moral is: There is no honour among thieves. That’s just a Hollywood myth.
A word about the guest author:
A recent photo of David.
David goes to L_____ High School. (David is fond of 19th century novels.) His favourite subject is Ethics. He is not afraid to sling stones at bullies.
He knows my Friday Fables are for writers but he doesn’t care. His fables are for high school students. His advice to writers is: “Just write, man.”
Catherine Austen 