Reading by the Creek It was a warm beautiful afternoon in late August, when I was sitting at my teacher, Mrs. Haun’s desk. I was just a child, six years old at the time. I looked at Mrs. Haun as she was dialing my mother’s number she peered back at me with utter disgust. When my mother answered on the other line, Mrs. Haun said “Mrs. Miller , hello this is Mrs. Haun” she paused for a brief moment and began talking again saying “yes Nikki is just fine, I would like for you to come in and have a meeting so I can discuss with you Nikki’s lack of reading. I am available this afternoon, can you come in today” she questioned my mother, then Mrs. Haun said “I will see you this afternoon at 3 o’clock then, thank you”. Then she hung up the phone. She looked back at me and said “your mother will be here soon and she will be very disappointed in you”, I just looked down at my hands which I had crossed on top of my blue jean skirt that mother had me wear. I was so scared that my mother would be ashamed of me for not knowing how to read and that I would be in trouble. The rest of that once proclaimed beautiful afternoon seemed as dark as a cellar. Not knowing exactly what was going to happen. Finally, the time that I had feared had came it was 3 o’clock all of my classmates had already gone home. My mother walked into Mrs. Haun’s classroom where I was sitting in time out, the first thing my mother asked her was “why do you have my daughter in time out” Mrs. Haun quickly said “she is in time out for not knowing how to read anything at all”, my mother was furious at this point, she looked at me and instructed me to get out of time out. She then looked back at my teacher and said “Nikki is only six years old, how can you expect her to know how to read everything you send home. She’s just a child”, Mrs. Haun tried telling my mother that I had fallen behind the other children that were in my class on reading skills all because I wasn’t being raised by both parents and even went as far as telling my mother that I would never have the skills to learn how to read, write legibly, add, or subtract. After hearing all of Mrs. Haun’s negativity about my upbringing , my mother looked at me and gave me and told me that I didn’t have anything to worry about , then she turned her attention back to my teacher. The words that came out of my mother’s mouth I will never forget, she said “I am not sure who you think you are to say that my daughter will never be as good as another student because she doesn’t have two parents raising her, since you brought it up, she didn’t have an option to have both of her parents, her father, my husband was killed two years ago in a car accident, but since you think my daughter can’t or won’t be able to do everything in school as well as another child, I will make sure you regret passing judgment on us or punishing Nikki for trying her best”. Mrs. Haun just sat there in a daze, she almost looked like a deer caught in the headlights of an oncoming vehicle, she started to say something, but my mother cut her off before she could, my mother then thanked her for her time and told her that she would see to it that I would get caught up before Christmas break . Mother instructed me to get my things and wait for her in the hallway that she needed to have a moment with my teacher, I did as she asked. I am not sure what was said between my mother and my