"Come see me in my office" sounds ominous even when delivered pleasantly. It's especially nerve-wracking to the ears of a 9th grader without a history of ever being summoned by a teacher.

But when a teacher asks you to come see her, you go, no questions asked. It didn't help to calm my nerves that she wasn't in the faculty room when I finally stepped inside. And other teachers who knew me also had this look wondering why I was there.

Thankfully, it wasn't long before Ms. Hermosa arrived. Her memory will forever be etched in my mind. She's diminutive - maybe four feet five inches tall - graying hair, even when she wasn't THAT old, held in a messy bun, brown skin, very thick glasses, and a cheery smile on her face.

Upon seeing me she hurried towards her desk and motioned for me to come closer. She pulled open her drawer and extracted a teacher's publication with a red cover. Right now, that's all that I remember of that. She said, "I have good news for you." I think my face registered something else so she pulled out a sheet of paper that marked a page in the magazine.

Surprise!

And voila! It opened to a story - my story - which was submitted as a final requirement for her English creative writing class which I took the previous semester. Oh wow! My first published work.

Then she was instructing me to go over to the publication office to get my honorarium. In my head I was thinking "And I get paid, too?"

I should've been ecstatic and jumping for joy with this news. I heard Ms. Hermosa say she submitted what she thought were the best stories from our class to the publication. And they accepted mine and I think one other student's.

Of course it was exhilarating news! Imagine some class requirement ended up being published. But here was my dilemma - that story was a farce. Or at least, it didn't exactly comply with the instructions given.

That look of pride she gave me as she handed the publication and address shook my knees even more. Should I tell her the truth?

So why did her good news eat me alive instead of make me joyous?

Caught in a bind

The instructions for that final requirement was to make a storybook based on something that was REAL. We had to find someone with a disability - blind, crippled, deaf - and use their circumstance for our story suitable for a young audience.

That meant interviewing who was any of that, asking them to relate their story then turning it into my project.

Other than writing the story, we had to do the illustration ourselves. Those were the days when everything was done by hand, no computers, no fancy tools. Just pencil, and coloring materials, plus a sketchbook to serve as our storybook.

We did have a neighbor who was a polio victim. But he was way, way older than myself and quite reticent, too. I was also extremely, painfully shy. How do I go about asking someone something so personal - how did it happen and how he coped with the disability?

But it was a requirement I could not NOT submit. It would make up the bulk of my final grade. And I did not want to fail. So saying the dog ate my work was just not going to cut it!

I psyched myself for days. But I never got the nerve to go ask that neighbor about his story that I could turn into my book.

Creativity at its finest

Grasping at straws because my deadline was looming, it finally hit me. What if I just made up a story? Teacher wasn't going to go out of her way to verify details, so it would not matter if I just invented a story.

Inspiration and deadline pushed me to work hard, burning the midnight oil to complete it on time. What I do remember from that time was how easy making up the story was for me. The words just flowed. And while drawing wasn't my strong suit, somehow I managed to illustrate it just right.

My hands were shaking when I turned over the project. And I prayed so hard to pass and not be caught with my "lie". Pass I did, and with flying colors.

I went to the publication, collected my honorarium of 150 pesos (a huge amount for me) and remember walking out the premises staring at the magazine and feeling the weight of the money in my bag.

I did good, even if I technically did not follow instructions. My heart swelled with pride.

No, I never had the courage to tell Ms. Hermosa the truth. I don't know if it would've mattered. It was a creative writing class anyway. And I was just being that, creative.

She has since passed on. And when I think of her, I will always remember that story, her guidance and most importantly, her belief in my ability to write.