Dear Auntie,
Please ignore the Bad Person Sirens ringing in my ears. Well, I was struggling in one class this pass school year. I found out my teacher had a son had from a different school and saw him in her office at the end of the day. We became casual friends, mostly hanging out for about ten minutes after school.
Let's just say my grades improved on the next test and two wrong answers were marked correct. When his mom handed me the paper she winked and said "good job." I never mentioned my false positives to anyone. (Cringe!) The boy became very, very interested in me and started calling me every day. I would take half his calls and listen to his never ending blabber. He became clingy and hard to shake off. By now his mom was giving me much needed extra help and writing me good recommendations for programs. So I couldn't tell him to shut up and stop calling. Thank heavens school ended meaning I had an A in the class and wouldn't have to deal with him any more. I felt terrible about everything and often wanted to come out, but never had the courage.
Now the boy will not leave me alone, tried to scare off my friends, is very rude, clingy, and almost ruined the party I invited him to out of guilt. He obviously likes me, he even gave me a heart diamond necklace for my birthday. (AHHH!) He keeps scaring my long time crush and is impossible to get rid of. I feel indebted to how his mom helped me and don't know how to fix my wrongs. Is there any way I could get rid of my A?
Bad Person Sirens? What Bad Person Sirens? I can't hear those Bad Person Sirens at all... and that's probably because any minor sound they might be making is drowned out by the much louder, longer, and more insistent wail of the Ethics FAIL Sirens your teacher set off when she used her academic authority for nefarious purposes. Ugh, ugh, ugh. I mean, as awful as I feel for her, and her son, and this whole, crap-tastic situation—and I really do, since there are probably few things worse than realizing, as a parent, that your kid is an impossible-to-like loser—the fact that she compromised the integrity of your education in order to buy her son a friend is just wrong.
Wrong as balls.
And though it's true that you became complicit in these shenanigans by not speaking up, the blame for this mess really falls squarely on her shoulders. She's a grownup, she's a teacher, and she put you, who is neither of those things, into an ethical quagmire that would leave somebody even twice your age feeling tortured and torn. Yes, she "helped" you—but geez, did her help ever come at a cost. And not only that, but the major imbalance of power between student and teacher—and kid and adult—also made it extremely difficult, if not impossible, for you to speak up or stop what was happening. The only good news is that her willingness to bend the rules apparently extends only to morally iffy encouragement, rather than actual extortion. (Or at least, I assume you would have mentioned it if she'd started making demands, issuing threats, or leaving severed horse heads in your bedsheets.)
But don't worry, you're not getting off scot-free—because your penance is the awful-but-necessary conversation you're about to have with her son. Call, write, or meet him, and say some version of the following: "I think we need to stop talking for awhile. I can tell that you're interested in me as more than a friend, but I don't feel the same, and your behavior is making me uncomfortable. Please don't call me anymore." (Also, give back the necklace; it'll add to the impact of your message, and it's only right.)
The mom/teacher thing, however, you keep to yourself; it's his clingy and rude behavior that's the problem, and it would be one regardless of his mom's academic string-pulling. And as understandably guilty as it makes you feel, you do have the right and the ability to distance yourself from her son without having to get into the more-complicated question of your unethically-obtained A.
And as for that A, in this case, I do think it's best left alone. Let it be what it is: one mistake, one class grade, one worthwhile lesson learned about the value of earning what you get. And since you do feel indebted to your teacher (and since her reasons for doing what she did are so human and sympathetic and sad) then this can be the favor you do her: keeping a secret that would negatively impact her life much more, and much more seriously, than it would yours.
Which, by the way, is why she won't be saying anything about it, either.
What would you do in this awful situation? Tell us in the comments! And to get advice from Auntie, email her at advice@sparknotes.com.
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