Summary: After a lot of budget cuts in the education system the high school and middle school have to merge to become a large 'academy'. This means that the teachers in the district finally meet each other - and a romance between high school psychology teacher Logan and middle school art teacher Patton begins. Being best friends with Patton's son sure helps romance begin.
Most of my humour is badly referencing Vines don't mind me - also I know Patton's son is Virgil again but ssshhh I just love Child!Virgil and Dad!Patton combined.
Words: 1459
"When did you come out to your friends Mr Holmes?" Virgil Starr said, looking up from his sketches to the psychology teacher he often spent his lunches with. Virgil was an anxious and introverted freshman so often escaped embarrassment by keeping his favourite teacher company where they talked about anything ranging from Doctor Who to the forced sociability ingrained in Western society and its correlation with social disorders. It helped that both of them were LGBTQ too, Virgil being homoromantic asexual and Mr Holmes greyromantic pansexual.
"Oh, I didn't figure it all out until college." Mr Holmes mumbled, flicking through emails. This evening he had to stay late, and not to finish marking like he usually did but rather to take part in Teacher Initiation Evening. And this evening was important as the middle school had merged with the high school, so middle school teachers joined in too. The middle school children had joined the school too, Mr Logan Holmes had already had the joy of teaching sixth grade and having to put up with them trying to learn math. "There's no pressure to tell anyone your identity unless you're comfortable Virgil."
"Yeah I know, I know..." Virgil laughed, sighing just to show he was happy. He enjoyed these moments in the school day where he could be alone, and Mr Holmes treated him almost as a friend or family rather than just another A+ he needed to give. "You excited to meet the new teachers Sir?"
"Oh you know we both hate social interaction..." Logan mumbled, giving the student a smirk. Virgil looked like he was about to say something in response before the bell rang, indicating the end of lunch and the start of both introvert's classes. "See you tomorrow Virgil."
"See you tomorrow Sir."
*****
Teacher Initiation Evening was always a relatively big deal for the entire school. The principal, Mr King, was very creative and wanted all the teachers to get along so organised bonding activities every year. Once it was a school sleepover, another was a bake off and talent show, but one event stayed every single year and was the reason for the Teacher Initiation Evening's acronym - the TIE race.
Logan sighed to himself, taking off his tie as instructed when he walked into the auditorium. He looked around for any of his familiar introverted teacher friends but they had unfortunately all feigned sick that day so Logan was officially alone at this event. Mr King sat on the stage with a wide smile, watching the many new teachers all chat to each other over cups of coffee like how normal adults socialised. This false fallacy of a mature meeting event will soon be squandered.
"TIE time!" Mr King screamed through the megaphone someone gave him as a Christmas present last year, and rumour has it that person has since regretted that decision. "Now things are going to be a little different this year as we have the new teachers from Gainesville Middle School - so instead of randomly assigning people I now instruct you to pair up middle school teacher to high school teacher. And this time there will be no groups of 3!"
Unfortunately Logan could repeat the instructions for the TIE race like he could the Sherlock pilot script. It was a mix between a treasure hunt and a bonding exercise where two (or sometimes three) teachers were tied together by a tie usually around the wrist and given a list of items to find. The winners got bragging rights and whatever other teachers wanted to pitch in as a prize for the game. Logan had never won of course, and never cared to win as he was usually tied to a friend who didn't mind taking a walk around school rather than finding anything.
"Hi, do you have a partner?" A man with blond curly hair bounced up to Logan with a smile. He seemed to have flowers in his hair and rainbow paint all over his clothes like a child who'd just walked out of Kindergarten. Logan didn't recognise him at all, he must be a middle school teacher.
"Logan Holmes." Logan mumbled, beginning to tie his wrists to this excitable individual and praying he won't regret it. The teacher seemed happy with this outcome and receptive in the tying, offering to help but after 5 years of this game Logan was a professional at trapping himself to people. "I'm a psychology teacher and newly a mathematics teacher too, damn budget cuts. Are you... botany?"
"Close - art! And I'm Patton." Patton smiled wide just as Logan finished the tying, then he started running. Usually non-gym people avoided being partnered with PE teachers for the reason that they ran fast, but this Patton seemed to beat the speed of sound. "First on the list is pencils saying 'Justin Bieber is my bae'... Who owns those?"
Logan eventually caught his breath and grounded the art teacher to a halt. "It's not a teacher that owns them, they're part of the supply pencils for the English department. So students don't steal spares." Patton smiled at Logan expectantly, hoping he'd tell him the way to the English classrooms. To avoid being dragged and feeling like he's about to fall face first due to the speed Logan didn't verbally tell Patton where they were going, only walked. But Patton seemed to follow just as happily, asking Logan about the school and the other teachers and the students.
After almost an hour Patton and Logan had successfully found everything. They weren't the first as Patton got very distracted when he saw a racoon out the window and was determined to find his trash-baby and take a photo... Logan had no power to refuse this detour. At least the TIE race was the last activity of the evening so when Logan was untying himself from Patton he was mentally preparing himself to go home and read to his heart's content. "See you later Mr..." Logan paused his thought and looked at Patton, remembering he never asked Patton for his surname.
"Starr!" Patton cheered just as he was released, then he heard the shout of his previous middle school teacher friends. "See you later Lo!" And just like that Patton disappeared in the crowd, Logan holding his dark blue tie and looking lost. There was one thing he knew - he recognised the surname Starr.
*****
Luckily Patton told Logan everything, including his new classroom. So before school Logan nonchalantly made his way to the art corridor, knocking on the door and expecting Patton to be covering his hair in daisies or painting on his clothes. What he actually saw was very unexpected - Patton jumping up and down and ruffling a happy but slightly annoyed Virgil's hair. Virgil rolled his eyes before spotting his favourite teacher. "Hey Mr Holmes, see you've met my Dad."
"Hey Holmey!" Patton screamed, waving his hand frantically with as wide a smile as he saw last night. "I can't believe you're the teacher my son keeps talking about! You're a real inspiration to him y'know? I feel like you're part of the family already!"
It didn't take long for a conversation to arise between the three men. Logan hadn't had the chance to talk to Virgil about his family, but turns out he was adopted by his old art teacher in 7th grade after not having lunch for an entire fortnight. And now in 9th grade Virgil was a little more confident, although introverted, and cared about his only father with his entire being. Having Logan was like having a second father that shared his introverted and nerdy tastes while all he shared with his 'real' father was a love of art.
But soon the three had to go to their own lessons or classes. Virgil and Logan walked out together as they were going to similar areas of the school and had a chance to chat just then. "Now Mr Holmes... I'm not meant to tell you this because my Dad will kill me with hugs but - My Dad thinks you're the most attractive teacher in the school and that's why he chose you for the TIE game. He told me about that too, yeah."
Usually knowing such an extroverted soul had a crush on him would make Logan roll his eyes or even scowl, but not this time. Instead this time he just acknowledged that fact had laid down and accepted it without disgust of that possibility happening. It would be nice to spend more time with Virgil, and Patton's joy was endearing in some way. He would even go as far to say Logan would like the idea of taking Patton out on a date.
"Well, we'll see what happens..."