Excerpt from My Novel Real Principals Have No Class

Sometimes working in the school alone could be a little creepy. One day I walked in the front door and looked down the hall to my right. I noticed a stick lying on the floor. I turned left and went into my office. Later I came out and noticed the stick had moved. Now it was on the wall. Closer investigation revealed a very sick snake.
I screamed. Then I called my father, who lived in the house next door to ours. “Dad, there’s a snake in the hall over here—will you come help me get rid of it?” I begged. My dad was probably more afraid of snakes than I was, but he obligingly came in with a long stick and ushered the snake out the door.
That wasn’t the only time we were invaded by snakes. Another time I had given a group of people from the state’s Forestry Department permission to use the auditorium for a meeting. The next day when the group leader returned the key he said, “When we opened the door, a three-foot rattlesnake met us, and then slithered down the hall and under the water cooler.”
“Thanks for telling me,” I said. “I’ll be a lot more careful when I’m reaching into boxes or cluttered corners.”
I called the superintendent. “Terry, there are snakes in this school. We’ve got to do something about them,” I begged. He just laughed. I guessed that there wasn’t a lot that could be done at that time. The old school was full of places where snakes could crawl in and make a home.
The snakes didn’t bother me nearly as much as the space heater in my office did that winter. Every winter morning when I came in I lit the heater with a match. One cold day I struck the match, held it to the heater, and heard a loud whoosh! Then my face felt warm from the bright orange flame that had flared briefly before it retreated into the depths of the heater where it belonged. I touched my hair and discovered it was slightly singed. Oh my gosh! I could have been killed! I thought. They don’t pay me enough for this.
If the pay wasn’t what I felt I should earn for the work that I did, there were other compensations. Some winter nights I would work in my office until after dark. I was so absorbed in my work that I rarely thought about being alone in the isolated old building. Only when the front door opened and I heard steps approaching my office did I feel the hair start to rise on the back of my neck.
Then a friendly and familiar face would appear in the door to my office. Often, it was Juan, with a smile on his face and a package in his hands. Juan lived in a mobile home near the school with his wife and son, Stephen, a student at Baker. Juan was proud of his son and loved to stop by and chat with the principal about his boy.
“Anything I can do for you today?” he always asked. “I brought a package of crabs that that I just caught over at the bay. I’ll bring you some mullet tomorrow.”
“Thanks, Juan. I needed something for supper. I’ll make some crab cakes. And you know how Tony loves mullet. I’ll fry some for him tomorrow night.”