TIFU for being an extreme goody two shoes and could have died due to it

This happened back in middle school, but it was suggested that I post this here. Basically for as long as I can remember I was an extreme goody two shoes. To a stupid degree really. I hated getting in trouble but also really hated being late to things and tended to have tunnel vision when it came to my routine thanks to my at the time undiagnosed autism.

This particular day I walked to school as I always did only to find my usual path was blocked. By what you may ask? Police tape, complete with cops and cop cars. No biggie. I lived in a big city, that was pretty common. I’d just go a few streets over and go around. I always left plenty of time to get to school and arrive early so I was in absolutely no rush.

Only my plan didn’t work out that way. Why? Because when I tried to go around I only found more police tape. So I tried again. And again. Everywhere I went was more police tape and more policemen.

Now a smart person might have talked to the cops and asked what was going on or maybe tried calling their parents or the school. I, however, was not a smart person. Not when it came to real life skills, anyway. And not when time was ticking down and I might ACTUALLY be late for school.

So what did I do? Stupidity and panic riding me like a fat kid on a too small pony, I waited for a cop to look the wrong way, ducked under the police tape, and ran as fast as my little legs could take me. Like a true, absolute, mother fucking idiot.

Some cops yelled at me, one broke the line to chase. I don’t know how I didn’t get caught cause I was a fat kid myself and I had absolutely no stamina, but somehow whoever tried to catch me was worse.

By miracle of all miracles, I did it. I made it to school with two minutes to spare. In all my sweaty, red faced, over excited nerd glory, I joined my friends while smiling proudly at them all as I announced much too loudly that I had made it despite thinking I was going to be late.

They looked at me like I was insane, and at first I didn’t get why. Then I finally got off my high pony and realized everyone wasn’t excited to be on time (obviously, no one ever was, I was the only freak like that) or had the usual exhausted school blues. Instead everyone looked incredibly nervous and scared like I had never seen.

Once it hit eight o’clock the principal held a megaphone to his lips and announced, “we’re going to see if we can get to [nearby elementary school a street over]. From there, we’re going to try to safely release everyone to their parents.”

In no time at all the teachers corralled my confused nerdy ass along with all of the other middle schoolers into multiple single filed lines and marched us down the street into the elementary school. They did the best to reassure us that everything was okay as one by one, we were released into our parents’ care.

My parents were at work at the time. Usually that meant one of them would have to leave work and come get me for me to be released. Due to the nature of the emergency, the fact I lived so close, as well as the fact that I was a well known to the staff as a goody two shoes that would follow instructions no matter what, I was just allowed to leave without a guardian instead. This time I did choose to be a little bit “bad” and not take the quickest way home, just in case some of those same police officers who saw me duck under the police tape saw me.

At the time I was so disappointed that all of my hard work to be on time hadn’t been worth it. That night I learned how much on an idiot I was because a disgruntled worker nearby had apparently made in a bomb threat. The location? Basically right on top of my school. While there hadn’t actually been a bomb in the end, if there had been, my goody two shoes ass would have gotten myself killed for it. (Side note: my principal also got in trouble with the higher ups for this. Why? Because they said after taking us to the elementary school he should have just kept teaching us there somehow. Crazy.)

Did I learn anything from this? I would like to say yes. Sadly I can think of three other times right off the top of my head where my desperation to be on time later on caused me to do the exact same thing, just in different scenarios (snow storm although that was the school’s fault, flood, and a school incident where the teacher even called me an idiot for that one). So probably not. Thankfully I’m no longer in school so I can at least say I won’t make any more of the same mistakes.

TL;DR I was a goody two shoes who couldn’t be late for any reason. Couldn’t get to school because of police tape but in my mind, being on time for school mattered more. Ducked under police tape and ran from police to get to school on time only to be sent home. Found out they blocked the way to school because there was an active thankfully not real bomb threat.