Prospering As A Cheater

I was a pretty clever math student when I was in eighth grade. My friend down the street was not. This was unfortunate for him, since he was on the basketball team, and the potential for him failing the class and suddenly not being on the basketball team was a very real one. He needed my help to pass the class and keep his hoop dreams alive. And do you think that he asked me to tutor him? That suggestion would have been dismissed in a heartbeat, so the only other option available to us was cheating.
At first I was nervous about getting involved in such a tawdry little scheme, but my conscience was soon overridden by my desperate need to fit in. By helping my basketball buddy and, as I learned just before we put the plan into action, his girlfriend, I was insinuating myself into "the popular group." Yes, I was cheating, but I was also helping a friend in need and elevating my own social status. Shut up, conscience.
The setup was easy enough: I had Algebra fourth period, Mister Round Ball hat it seventh. All I needed to do was to write down the answers to the test on a piece of scratch paper, then pass that scrap of paper to those in need at lunch. From where I was sitting, it all appeared to be seamless, and for two months it was.
Miss Stiffler was our Algebra teacher. I liked her. I liked Algebra. And I wasn't completely comfortable pulling the academic wool over her eyes. I needn't have worried. She was watching the progress of her struggling students in the afternoon with equal amounts of pride and skepticism. Miss Stiffler was no dim bulb. There was a simple enough way to check her suspicions: Two different tests, one for fourth period and one for seventh.
It would be nice to say that my friend and his steady were clever enough to look at the problems to see if the answers I gave them bore any reasonable connection. Upon uncovering their malfeasance, it would be nice to say that they would forget immediately where they had acquired the answers in the first place. No such luck. They copied the wrong answers and then rolled over on me like Beethoven. I was called out of my seventh period PE class and had to sit there in my gym clothes as Miss Stiffler poured out her displeasure and disappointment on me. How could I? Why did I? Didn't you think? No, no, and no.
The punishment, she decided, should fit the crime. With basketball season all but over, it meant that my friend and his gal pal were available after school for extra help in Algebra. Yours truly would be coming by during this time to assist in the tutoring process. Just desserts. For two weeks I answered questions corrected mistakes and became increasingly bitter. On the last Friday of my sentence, there was no scheduled tutoring, but Miss Stiffler found me something to do to fill up the time I owed her. She was on the social committee, which meant she helped coordinate the dances that occurred every so often in our gymnasium, which meant I spent an hour decorating the basketball court with crepe paper in preparation for that night's soiree. I was making it pretty for all the popular kids to bring their dates and experience all those things that I had dreamed about back when our scam began. This did nothing to alleviate my bitterness. I went home that night and watched TV. Alone.
It was only later that I learned that the really cool people didn't go to those dances at all. And most of them were pretty good at Algebra. Go figure.