It was a lovely spring afternoon. My classmates and I were playing happily on the playground when I let out, “Ow! Ow! Something in my shoe is biting me.”
Everyone was shocked by the cry. They took me into a classroom and were about to take off my 1. “Which foot is it?” one asked. “Let us have a look.”
Suddenly, I remembered the holes in 2 socks. My family was very poor during those years. I wore welfare socks, which cost only a little, but those 3 welfare socks didn't last long. They soon had 4 at the bottom.
I refused to take off my shoes. I 5 stand others seeing the holes in my sock. I tried to hold back my tears. Yet, each time the thing 6 my shoe bit me, tears raced down my face.
My teacher, Miss Diane, hurried into the 7. “What's wrong?” she asked.
“Something is biting her right foot, 8 she doesn't let us take off her shoe.” one of my classmates answered.
Miss Diane lived next door to me. She 9 everything about my family. She put both hands on my shaking shoulders and 10 into my painful and hopeless eyes.
“Oh, yes, it must be a sock-eating ant,” she said, as if she had 11 seen the thing inside the shoe. “I had a bite from one of those ants. By the time I got my shoe off, it had 12 almost the whole bottom off my sock.” My classmates nodded while they were listening to the teacher 13, although they all looked a little puzzled.
Miss Diane took off my right shoe and sock and shook them over the dustbin. Two red ants14it.
“Just what I thought. The ants have eaten part of her sock.” When she stroked an alcohol cotton ball on the bites, she added,” You are such a 15 girl to take so many bites.”
The alcohol felt cool on the bites and a little girl's pride was saved by the “sock-eating ant” story.
