Fawn and Spot Go To School

“Spot!” exclaimed Fawn, at seven o’clock one sunny, autumn morning. “Wake up!”

“Oh, Fawn,” yawned Spot, sleepily. “Leave me alone. I’m tired and I don’t want to get up yet.”

“But Spot,” Fawn insisted. “You have to get up! You have to come with me!”

“Come with you!” exclaimed Spot. “What are you talking about?”

She opened her tired eyes and looked at her friend. Fawn stood in the stall with a backpack on his back and a lunch pail hanging from his neck.

“Oh no!” groaned Spot. “Fawn, what are you up to?”

“I’m going to school,” replied Fawn, quite seriously.

“You can’t go to school,” said Spot. “You are a cow. Cows don’t go to school.”

Spot saw Jenny and Ricky Hansen, their owners, walking up the lane. They too, had backpacks and lunch pails.

“I’m going to school,” said Fawn. “And if you don’t want to come with me, that’s fine! I’ll go by myself.”

Fawn started down the lane towards Jenny and Ricky.

“Look,” said Jenny, pointing toward the barn. “Here comes Fawn!”

Ricky turned around to see what Jenny was pointing at.

“What is he doing?” laughed Ricky. “He looks like he’s going to school.”

“Cows can’t go to school,” said Jenny.

“Tell that to Fawn,” said Ricky. “He has a back pack and a lunch pail with him.”

“And look,” said Jenny. “Spot is coming too!”

The big yellow school bus pulled up beside them. Jenny and Ricky got onto it and before the school bus driver realized what was going on, Fawn, followed reluctantly by Spot, got on too.

“What are two cows doing on the bus?” asked one little boy, as he took the seat that he was assigned to.

“They are going to school,” said Jenny. “They want to learn something.”

“Cows at school,” the boy laughed. “This should be an interesting year.”

“Hey there little boy,” said Fawn. “What have you got in your lunch box?”

“Why?” asked the boy. “Do you want to trade with me?”

“Sure,” said Fawn. “I don’t like the lunch that I have.”

“What have you got?” the boy asked.

“Hay,” said Fawn. “What have you got?”

“I’ve got a peanut butter sandwich and an orange pop,” the boy said. “I really don’t think that I want to trade my lunch for some hay.”

“Well, that’s okay,” said Fawn.

He had noticed that the boy had the same lunch pail as he did and he had a plan.

Just before the bus stopped at the school parking lot, Fawn reached over and picked up the boy’s lunch box. He put his lunchbox in its place.

“Fawn,” whispered Spot angrily. “What did you do that for?”

“I don’t like hay,” said Fawn.

“Oh Fawn,” remarked Spot. “Put it back, you can’t take that little boys lunch. What is he going to eat?”

“Oh alright,” said Fawn, putting the lunch pail back where he got it from.

All the passengers filed off the bus in front of the school.

“Spot,” said Fawn. “Now what do we do?”

“What do you mean, ‘What do we do?’,” said Spot. “You’re the one that brought us here in the first place.”

“Well,” said Fawn. “You seem to know everything so, I just figured that you would know what we should do now.”

“I know what I’d like to do,” said Spot. “I’d like to go home and go back to sleep and forget that this day ever began.”

“Spot!” cried Fawn. “You wouldn’t dare leave me here all by myself, would you?”

“Unfortunately,” said Spot. “I wouldn’t have the heart to leave you anywhere all by yourself. Somebody has to keep you out of trouble.”

The school bell rang. All the children lined up at the doors of the school. Fawn and Spot were among them. A very elderly teacher opened the door and took the attendance.

“Any new students,” the teacher said. “Should report to the Principal’s office immediately. Everyone else is to go to the classroom that you have been assigned to.”

“Looks like we go to the Principal’s office,” said Fawn.

Fawn and Spot found the office about an hour later. Fawn of course, had first checked the whole school out, including the cafeteria.

“The Principal is busy,” said the secretary, not even looking up from under a large pile of paperwork that was on her desk, when Fawn and Spot entered the office. “Just fill out this form and then I will assign you to a classroom.”

Spot filled out her form and, noticing that Fawn was having great difficulty with his, she filled out that too.

“It’s a good thing that you are going to school,” Spot whispered to Fawn.

The two cows were assigned to the Kindergarten class.

“I don’t want to go to Kindergarten,” Fawn said, angrily. “I want to be in Grade One.”

“Fawn,” said Spot. “You have to start at the lowest grade and work your way up. You can’t just come to school and expect to finish it all in one day.”

“What!” exclaimed Fawn. “You mean I will have to spend a few years here!”

“Yes,” said Spot. “That’s what Jenny and Ricky are doing.”

“Well,” said Fawn. “There is no way that I can come to school every single day. I can’t get up every morning at that hour. I need my beauty rest.”

“You should have thought of that before,” said Spot.

“Well,” said Fawn. “I don’t know about you, but I’m going home. School is not for me!”