One fall day in second grade my teacher divided us up for some group project that morning, I forget what. As she assigned groups she also assigned seating at some round tables we had in the room for projects like these (she didn't like us to sit at other people's tables, I don't know why). My group was assigned to the table in back corner, over by the back door/fire exit.
We gathered our things and started to walk over there, when suddenly this horrific stench hit us. It was easily the worst thing I (and everyone else) had ever smelled. Even though we were near the class bathroom it didn't smell like shit. The stench wasn't coming from the bathroom either, it seemed to be coming from the back door. We didn't know what it was, though it did have the distinct smell of sweaty armpit mixed in with it.
Scared and disgusted, we rushed over to our teacher at the front of the room and told her that something awful stunk over there. The teacher snapped that nothing stunk over there, and that the bathroom was clean. We tried to tell her it wasn't coming from the bathroom but she didn't believe us. She accused us of lying because we either didn't want to sit in the back, or didn't want to do the work, but that we had to do both and to go sit in the corner and do the assignment immediately.
Reluctantly we walked back over to the table by the door. As we hit the stench zone we covered our noses with our shirts and tried to breath through our mouths as we worked. Unfortunately that didn't work so well because the smell was that strong. We kept coughing and gagging as we struggled to work, but thankfully nobody vomited.
After a short while the teacher started to walk over to us. Probably to yell at us for barely working and pretending that it smelled over there. I saw her coming and could tell the moment she hit the stench zone. She instantly turned from obviously mad, to disgusted, and a bit scared. She said she couldn't believe we'd been sitting among such an odor all this time and to move away from there right away. We jumped up and ran out of the area instantly, pissed off because she didn't believe us about the stink in the first place.
At this point my teacher called out to the rest of the class that if we needed to use the bathroom or water fountain to use the ones in the hallway instead, and also to not go out the back door under any circumstances. As if anyone needed to be told not to go out to were the smell seemed to originate from (except for maybe the class sped, and probably not even him). Then she went over to the intercom and told the office she needed the principal to come to the class right away. Everyone went silent; no teacher ever called for the principal to come to class. I was scared my group and I would be blamed for the smell, somehow.
After a few minutes the principal came in. My teacher had a whispered conversation with the principal over by the front door. We couldn't hear what they were talking about, but it didn't seem like anyone was about to be hauled down to the office. The conversation lasted barely a minute, if that, and then the principal was gone again.
Minutes later the principal's voice came booming out of the intercom. "Attention all students and faculty! A skunk has been spotted on school grounds." More liked smelled rather than seen, but we finally knew what that stench was. The principal went on to tell us not to loiter outside before/after school and warned us that if we see the skunk to stay away and tell an adult immediately.
The skunk stayed around for several weeks before leaving the area, only to return a few weeks later, announcing it's arrival by stinking up the place. This kept happening for the rest of the fall, and most of the long winter. Between the skunk and lousy weather we barely played outside until spring.