You have probably read and heard of many sorrowful experiences that people have had to endeavor. You must have had to deal with these sad situations throughout your life, and every so  often you might feel pretty downcast about them yourself as you remember these woeful events. However, I can almost guarantee that you haven’t heard of anything as doleful and despairing as the tale of an innocent child named Richard. But incase you aren’t into sad endings, I shall ensure you that this story will have somewhat of a happy ending. Richard was a boy who lived in a faraway village. He was a very nice boy, with a great desire to learn. At home he would always be found reading informative books and trying to come up with innovative ideas. Unlike other kids his age, he would never go outside to play or waste his time doing random things. He would always attempt to make every second of his life productive. Unfortunately for Richard, his family was one that didn’t even have pennies to rub together. Richard was born in a very poor family. His mom worked as a house cleaner at others houses and his dad was jobless, being a disabled man. His brother was autistic and had a severe heart disease, so Richard’s mom was always busy taking care of him. No one was there to help Richard in his education. He couldn’t even go to school for a long time due to the lack of educational options. Then one day, something miraculous happened. It was something that Richard had been desperate for getting all these years. An affordable school opened in Richard’s area.

When Richard was informed of this, he was so amazed, that he thought he was dreaming. However, there was something that Richard would have to do in order to get into the school. He would have to pass a mandatory entrance exam to be accepted. There were hundreds of people in the village who were trying to get into the school, so Richards odds of getting into the school were low. But Richard, didn’t really have much of a choice. He knew that he was the only person who the family could rely on to get the necessities of life. Richard had to get an education and use his knowledge to get some job that would atleast bring his family above the poverty line. At the back of his mind, Richard also knew that this was a great opportunity, and that it wouldn’t come again in a very long time. Knowing all the overarching limits that Richard could take his family past by signing up for this school, Richard courageously went that evening to the board of administration and told them that he was interested in taking the entrance exam. At the time, the man at the desk just looked and Richard and said, “Come for your examination on Thursday, and Richard thanked the man. However, at the time, Richard wasn’t aware of the many problems that this man, who was actually Principal Adams, would cause for him. At the time, he just took the man’s words and used them as if he had a quest that was lying in front of him. Starting that night, he read through books and documents that related to the syllabus that he had been given to study from. It was as if there was a machine inside him telling him to keep on working. Studying was not an irregular practice for Richard, but for those ten days, the way that Richard studied was different from his normal studying technique. He seemed to study with more passion and dedication than ever. His mother used to tell him to take breaks, but he was ruthless. “Don’t disturb me mother”, he would say, “ I must work hard and get into this school.” Finally, the day of the exam came. Richard hadn’t even been able to eat breakfast that morning. All the encouragement that he got was his mother hurriedly telling him good luck before having to go and mop another person’s house. Despite of all these setbacks, Richard confidently took a seat in the examination room, which was crowded with children. The woman who was running the test quickly passed out the exam and allowed everyone to start. Richard felt pretty good about the test as he wrote it. His relentless studying had allowed him to gain a lot of knowledge that came in handy during the examination. That night, when he went home, he told his mother how the test went, and she seemed very pleased. Richard couldn’t think about anything but the exam that night. The following morning he desperately checked the list of people who had been selected for the school and to his amazement, he was selected. At the time, Richard had no idea about the problems he was going to face, but for this short period of time he felt proud and satisfied about what he had accomplished. “Mother, father, I did it.” he screamed, “I got into the school.” His whole family showed appreciation towards his efforts, and at the time, nothing else mattered.

So finally, after what seemed like forever, Richard was given the wonderful opportunity to go to his new college. “Mother, mother”, Richard yelled, “please give me my lunch quickly, I am running late.” His mother chuckled and said, “Ok son, almost done, remember I won’t be home until late this evening so good luck!” “Thanks mother, good bye!”, Richard said excitedly as he left. Richard went to school with very happy and enthusiastic intentions. Sadly, however, all these positive conceptions changed to dismay and sorrow by the end of the day. Richard’s first day started off with a meeting with Principal Adams, the same man who had given Richard the date of the examination. There was a huge line of children waiting to get their schedules for this short one month course. When Richard’s turn in line came, he kindly asked, “Principal Adams, may I please have my schedule?” Adams looked at poor Richard with a greedy grin and rudely blurted, “Do you consider yourself the Queen of England? Take your schedule and get out of my office!” Upon hearing this careless statement from Adams, all the other students started laughing and mocking Richard. Richard, after being thoroughly humiliated from what happened in the office, went into his classroom with Mr. Remora, in hopes that the day would get better, and of course, it just got worse. Mr. Remora was a nice and kind teacher, Richard never had a problem with that. The only problem with Mr. Remora was that he never focused on anything other than history. In fact, right when class started, he handed out history books and said, “Class, you have a huge project on the Mayan civilization due Friday.” Even though Richard appreciated the man’s efforts to inform the students on historical ideas, he didn’t really find himself learning anything else. In fact, Richard found Mr. Remora’s teaching style very unpractical. At the end of class, it was lunch time and Richard hoped that he could at least go through that period successfully, but as you may have already predicted, he was wrong. Nobody let Richard sit at their table. Children made fun of his incident with Mr. Remora that morning and called him a poor duck. Eventually, Richard ended up eating his lunch at the corner of the room. He didn’t even eat much because he had lost his appetite. After lunch, the bell rang and everyone ran out of the school like animals chasing prey. Hopefully, you can now imagine why Richard was feeling sorrowful. He felt like weeping. He still hoped that his situation would get better as the days passed, but unfortunately, this assumption, like many of his other assumptions was also incorrect. After surviving for weeks with Principal Adam’s offenses, Mr. Remora’s history craze, and the constant mocking of classmates, Richard slowly started to lose interest in school and questioned whether his various efforts for getting into the school were actually worth it. As optimistic a person he was, his hopes and liking for the school decreased day by day, and everyday just seemed to get gloomier and gloomier.

Just as the days seemed to get worse and worse, Richard came across a new person on the morning of one fine day. He saw the person as he walked to class, and the person looked pretty nice, so Richard thought he should try communicating with him. “Hi”, Richard said softly, “What’s your name? My name is Richard.” The boy looked at him as if he was waiting for Richard to converse with him. “My name is Charlotte”, he said confidently, “Are you also in Mr. Remora’s class?” “ Yes, I was just going there”, Richard replied. Upon entering class, Richard and Charlotte both took seats next to eachother. They worked together on the history assignment that Mr. Remora had given for the day. During class, as they worked, they also had a friendly conversation, and came to realize that they actually had a lot in common. Charlotte was also a person who had an interest for studying, he was particularly interested in physics and chemistry, so he wasn’t that happy about having someone like Mr. Remora as his teacher. Charlotte, however, wasn’t in as bad a situation as Richard. In fact, his family was quite rich and both of his parents were making stable incomes. Despite all this, he was still generous enough to talk to Richard unlike all the other selfish students. After class, they found a good spot to eat peacefully and stayed away from the others. After school, they spent a few hours working on the tedious and boring history homework assigned by Mr. Remora, but after that they had fun just talking to each other about life. By the end of the day, its safe to say that Richard and Charlotte were very good friends. They stuck around for eachother, no matter how much anyone teased them. They were just happy to have each other. If anyone was benefited most by this friendship, it would be Richard. This was the best time he had experienced in years, because he finally had someone to relate to, and I am proud to say that Richard’s life gets better from this point on.

The days passed, and everything seemed to be going well for Richard as he worked and maintained his friendship with Charlotte. Then, one day in history class, everyone was told that there would be a finals test in five days. Richard and Charlotte weren’t startled by the test, they were startled when they heard that the test would be on all subjects, when the only thing they had practiced was history. The whole class was shocked. People could hardly believe what they were hearing. In fact, it is said that one kid got so scared that he left the school and abandoned his home to avoid having to study and take this test. However, both Richard and Charlotte knew that they would have to ignore the hardships and take the challenge. The moment school was out, both of them went to the library to study the syllabus. They tried looking through books that would be beneficial. Mr. Remora didn’t even provide a study guide, Richard and Charlotte had to choose what they thought was important to study. They made any and every attempt to make all their studying time count. They both knew that they would have to take this test very seriously, so that their hard work wouldn’t go waste. Sometimes, they even went as far as staying up at each other’s houses to study. It can be said, without a doubt, that these two children studied with more dedication and passion than anyone else at the school. Finally, when the day of the finals came, Richard felt more confident than ever, but he couldn’t help but notice that his friend, Charlotte, had a fever and couldn’t make it to school. The person who had been so nice to Richard, the person who had aided Richard in the darkest of times, couldn’t manage to come. Richard could feel his heart breaking.  Unfortunately, there was nothing that Richard could do about this. He tried to keep Charlotte’s absence out of his mind as much as possible as he went into the testing room. He tried his best on the test and hoped that he would get a good score. That night, Richard went and told his mother all about the test, and how Charlotte couldn’t show up. His mother comforted him and said, “ I know that you did well on the test. Don’t worry about Charlotte, he will be fine.” That night was a hard night for Richard, but he woke up and found some awesome news. Just as Richard’s mother had predicted, Richard ended up received a very creditable score. In fact, he got the best score in the school. Even though Richard, was still sad about Charlotte, his whole family was proud of him. Even Richard was quite proud of his ability to make the most out of his resources. It finally felt like all his efforts were coming to fruition. Even though things weren’t perfect just yet, Richard now knew that he had a better chance of being successful than anyone else in the village.