By Jess Welker
Hunched over her desk, Snowfall shielded the fairy with her hands. The fairy perused the math problem on the sheet of paper then tapped a tiny hand against Snowfall’s palm.
Tap-tap-tap.
Snowfall wrote the number three.
Tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tap.
Snowfall added the number six.
Tap-tap-tap-tap.
Snowfall finished with the number four. She glanced with some concern over the answer. Three hundred sixty-four seemed too big for the question, but the fairy was already pacing around the next problem, hidden in the shadow of Snowfall’s cupped palms.
“Beetlebug, eyes on your own test.”
At Miss Applehawk’s voice, Snowfall looked up. From the next desk, Beetlebug frowned at Snowfall’s hands. Snowfall shifted, blocking the other girl’s view with her shoulder.
“I think she’s cheating.” Beetlebug crossed her arms.
The teacher strode between the rows of desks toward them while the other students took a more-than-welcome break from the math test to watch.
Snowfall’s arm tickled as the fairy scurried along its length and dropped into her lap. The tickling continued toward her knee and then disappeared. Snowfall knew the fairy was clinging to the bottom of the desk as they had planned in case of suspicion.
“Everyone to your own work,” Miss Applehawk said, and twenty heads bowed back over their desks with only occasional peeks back. The teacher crouched beside Snowfall’s desk and spoke softly. “You’ve been studying at home, haven’t you?”
Snowfall nodded. Her parents drilled her math facts every evening.
“Then there’s no reason for anyone to accuse you of cheating, is there?”
“I want to score high. I don’t want to do summer school.”
“Your math scores have improved a little each week, and it’s certainly enough to keep you out of summer school if you score similarly today. Try not to feel anxious just because this is the final test of the year. Take a deep breath, relax, and do your best.”
Snowfall nodded and obeyed, minus the last part.
When the teacher walked away, the fairy crawled back up onto the test and gave Snowfall the next answer. Snowfall accepted it, as well as the final fifteen answers.
After the students turned in their tests, they spilled outside for lunch. Snowfall sat apart on a fallen log because she had business to transact. The fairy alighted on the log beside her and held out her hands expectantly.
“I have them, don’t worry,” Snowfall whispered.
Out of her lunch box, she pulled four pristine sugar cubes. At half a penny each, they had cost her two weeks’ worth of her meager allowance. Eyeing the treat, she wondered if the fairy would mind if she took a lick first. But the fairy bounced up and down, and, in her excitement, the sound of tinkling bells filled the schoolyard.
“Shh!” Snowfall glanced around, but the divided groups of eating, running, and shouting children ignored them.
When the fairy produced a knapsack, Snowfall loaded it with the cubes. Only two fit comfortably, and she had to wedge the remaining two in.
“There you go.” She thought she heard a seam pop in the stretched-out bag.
The fairy bowed. Snowfall hesitated, then bobbed her head awkwardly in return. The fairy hefted the knapsack’s strap over her shoulder and took flight, wings whirring. She struggled to stay aloft, barely clearing the long green, spring grass. Suddenly, a less-than-strong crosswind brushed across the meadow, and she plummeted.
Snowfall started up, but the plucky fairy rose again and continued her course toward town.
Games and activities multiplied throughout the afternoon, a happy portent of long summer days to come. When two of the littler boys rang the bell for the last time, twenty-three voices cheered, and the children streamed toward the door.
“Snowfall,” the teacher called. “Wait a moment.”
Snowfall approached Miss Applehawk’s desk with trepidation.
Had Beetlebug watched the lunchtime exchange and tattled?
The teacher handed a sealed letter to her. “Take this to your parents. It’s my recommendation for summer school.”
“Summer school?” Tears leaped to Snowfall’s eyes. “You said I was doing better.”
“You were, but your math score today—”
“I didn’t cheat!”
“I know that.”
“But if I did so well, why are you making me do summer school?”
Miss Applehawk pursed her lips. “You didn’t do well.”
“Yes, I did.” Desperation plus confusion carried Snowfall’s voice higher than the burdened fairy had managed to fly. “You’re lying.”
Ignoring the accusation, the teacher pulled Snowfall’s math test from the top of a pile and placed it in front of her. “You failed the test. All twenty answers were wrong. For some reason, your progress from the past few weeks didn’t stick. You need more practice.”
Through watery eyes, Snowfall stared at the red ink scrawled over her math test.
It didn’t take a student with a perfect score to calculate that she had been cheated out of four sugar cubes.
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