Peter Parker was excited, and when he was excited, he fidgeted. His knee would bounce uncontrollably, his fingers would tap on whatever surface was nearby, and he would pace if he was standing up or squirm if he was sitting down. And that was how he was right now, sitting in the first class of his junior year. Around him sat his class mates, none of them particularly excited to be sitting in a history class first thing on a Monday morning. He looked around the class room, it was one he had never been in before. It was nothing interesting, all the desks faced the chalk board at the front of the room, and long windows were fitted into the wall on his left, letting in the morning sun which landed on the dull, beige walls. The only unusual thing about this room, was the absence of their teacher.

"Hey, Peter."

Peter looked over to Ned, happy to have his best friend in his first class.

"I've never had this teacher before, have you?" He asked.

Peter thought for a moment. Miss Watson. The name did not sound familiar.

"No Ned." He replied, shifting slightly in his seat.

"Well, I heard that she's super pretty." Ned said, a slight blush creeping onto his cheeks.

Peter made a face, "Dude, she's probably like, a hundred years old."

"You don't know that!" Ned retorted, eager to defend himself.

"Well either way, she's a teacher, man. So, that's kind of weird."

"Good morning class!" Came a friendly voice.

Ned and Peter both jumped slightly, jerking their heads up to see the new teacher, and feeling slightly caught off guard, not having heard her enter the class room.

Peter watched as the teacher, Miss Watson, he presumed, settled some books, a laptop and her coffee on the teacher's desk at the front of the room. Ned had been right, she was pretty. Long brown hair and green eyes, but more than that, she just was pretty. She had a quality about her that just seemed nice.

"My apologies for being late this morning, as many of you are aware, today is my first day teaching at Midtown High. My name is Miss Watson." She smiled kindly at the students in her room, taking time to make eye contact with as many as she could.

Peter noticed that one or two of his classmates blushed when she looked at them. Flash raised his hand. She smiled and nodded his way for him to speak.

"Where's your accent from?" He asked, clearly trying to sound cool in front of the new teacher.

Peter and Ned both rolled their eyes at this.

Miss Watson laughed for a second, not at all put off by Flash's slightly obnoxious tone.

"Well, how about this. Since I don't know any of you, why don't we play a game to get to know each other."

More than a few students groaned and sunk in their chairs, dreading a cheesy ice-breaker game. Miss Watson seemed to be amused by their response. She chuckled to herself before speaking again.

"Don't worry, it doesn't involve much from you guys. The aim of the game is this. Whoever guesses where my accent is from first, wins."

The atmosphere of the room changed so quickly that Miss Watson let out another little chuckle.

"What do we win?" Another student asked.

"If you guess correctly," She began, taking a dramatic pause, looking around the room at the teens, most of whom were struggling to look disinterested, "You will not be given any homework this week."

Immediately the room was filled with excited looks and whispers. Miss Watson motioned her hands for the students to quiet down.

"If you guess incorrectly, you will be given the regular homework for the week."

Something like a competitive spirit entered the atmosphere. Peter looked over at Ned, ready to win.

"Now here is how this will work. You may choose to work in a team or by yourself. Each team or individual will be allowed to ask two questions about my nationality, and then that's it, no more questions for that team." She looked around the room, obviously very comfortable being up the front, holding each students rapt attention. "When I say go, you will have five minutes to break into your teams, or stay where you are if you want to work alone, and write out your two questions. I will explain further rules once the five minutes is up. Does everyone understand?" She looked around expectantly, looking for any confused faces. Satisfied, she simply said, "Go."

Peter and Ned jumped into action, scooting their desks closer together to work as a team. The room was full of the sound of students moving to be with friends, and then the excited voices as they theorised what questions to ask.

"What do you think, Peter? I think she's British." Ned said, leaning in so that others wouldn't hear his guess.

Peter looked at Miss Watson, he wrinkled his forehead.

"You reakon? I don't know. She doesn't seem fancy enough."

Ned looked down right offended,

"How can you say that, she's the fanciest person I've ever met!"

Peter gave him an incredulous stare.

"We had dinner with Tony Stark last night!" He whispered. "And Pepper Potts was there!"

"Yeah, but she's prettier." Ned sighed, leaning his cheek on his hand to look at Miss Watson, who was now sitting at her desk sorting through the notes she had prepared for the class.

Peter simply stared at his friend for a moment, then punched him softly in the arm.

"Come on, man. Let's write these questions out."

Ned blinked for a second, and then leaned in to help think of the questions.

Chloe Watson had been running late all morning, in spite of arriving thirty minutes early for school, she still managed to bustle in to her first ever class five minutes late. Hoping that none of the students would notice her slight panic of being late on her first day, she plastered on a smile and forced herself to move more slowly as she walked across the front of the room to her desk, knowing that they would not respect her if she allowed them to see the panic she felt for being late. She needed to sort through the class notes before she began teaching, but she had no time, desperate for a distraction, she introduced herself, hoping her accent would be enough for a curious kid to bite onto and give her a moment. Today was her lucky day it seemed, and as soon as their heads were down, talking with their team mates or writing down notes, she quickly adjusted the notes and prepared the hand outs for the day's lesson. Taking a sip of hot chocolate, she looked at the time. Five minutes was up, and she felt much more prepared.

Standing up and making her way to the front and centre of the room.

"Times up. That's five minutes." She announced. She watched as one or two groups hurriedly finished writing their questions. "Pencils down." She said, not un-kindly.

"Okay," She began, now having all eyes on her. "This is how this will work. We will start at the back and move our way forward. Make sure you listen carefully to the questions other people ask, because you are not allowed to repeat questions. If someone else asks your question before you, you may think of another question to replace it. Everyone with me?" She looked around the room, everyone seemed to understand. "You will not be able to guess until everyone has asked their questions. Once everyone is done, you will write you answer on a sheet of paper, with either your name and/or your team members name, and give it to me. I will then let you all know who the winners are, and who will be doing homework this week."

She looked around the room, the kids seemed to understand. But more than that, they seemed happy. She had wanted to focus on not only being a good teacher, but being someone that the kids could trust and even turn to if they needed an adult on their side.

"Let's start with you two up the back." She said, looking at the two boys who seemed to be quite good friends.

Peter looked over at Ned, who had frozen as soon as Miss Watson called on them to provide their questions, his face turning bright red.

"Dude," he whispered, shoving his friends arm.

"Everything okay?" Miss Watson asked, a small crease of concern showing on her forehead.

"Oh, uh, yeah." Peter stammered, "Um, we wanted to know what kind of weather you have in, uh, whatever country, you, uh, came from?"

He looked down at his book, cheeks warming. He hated that he stumbled over his words when he was nervous. Looking up he saw Flash smirk at him.

"Great question." Miss Watson affirmed. "It was a varied climate." She answered him, a small glint of amusement entering her eyes when Peter seemed taken aback by her vague response.

"Oh, um. Okay." He said, unsure of how to respond to her answer.

She was clearly having fun with him.

"What's your second question?" She asked.

Ned spoke up this time,

"Did it snow?"

"Dude!" Peter whispered loudly at him. "That wasn't one of our questions!"

Ned ignored him, staring eagerly at Miss Watson.

"No, it didn't snow." She said, giving him a straight answer, "Okay, good questions. What are your names?"

"Ned and Peter." Ned responded quickly.

"Thank you Ned and Peter." She said.

Miss Watson moved onto the next group, hearing questions, answering them to a varying degree, and asking names. Thankfully, most of the class had decided that teaming up was the better option, so there were only 5 groups in total, including Peter and Ned's.

"Okay, write your answers on a sheet of paper, make sure to include your names, and I will let you know who, if any of you, are the winners. Once you've done this, pull out your notebooks or laptops, and we will begin the day's lesson."

They handed in their answers, Miss Watson looking pleased with some, and amused by others. She pulled out two from the small pile and put them in her pocket.

"I will announce the winners at the end of class." She said. "Now that I know everyone's names and we've all had a little fun, let's get into today's lesson. You may keep your desks as is if you all agree to stay focused on the work that we are going through today." She said as she turned to write down the page number on the chalk board. In the meantime, the students were whispering excitedly to each other at the prospect of being able to sit so close to their friends.

It seemed that Flash wanted to take this opportunity to torment Peter with the teachers back turned.

"Hey, Penis." He whisper yelled across the room.

Peter ignored him, pretending to focus on finding the page in his text book.

"Hey, Penis." He called again. "I know you can hear me."

Peter looked up at him, glaring at him.

"What do you want flash?" He whispered back.

Flash simply raised his middle finger and snickered at him.

"Mr. Thompson." Miss Watson called from the front, a slight undertone of irritation in her voice, but more than that, a quiet authority that Peter had not noticed earlier.

The students froze. Flash was never called out on his antics.

"Care to explain to the class why you're flipping people off rather than finding your page?" She asked, smile completely gone from her face. And if Peter dare say so himself, she looked intimidating.

Flash looked taken aback, no one ever stopped him from teasing Peter. He plastered on an arrogant smile.

"Just having some fun, Miss Watson." He said in his most charming voice.

Miss Watson seemed to glare at him for a moment, the class was frozen, unsure of how she would proceed. She snapped the text book in her hand shut. Peter saw the look that came across Flash's face. Miss Watson was not afraid of him.

"I had hoped to not need to explain the basic life rules to someone who is basically an adult." She said, her tone even.

Peter felt his heart thumping, not a single teacher had stood up for him before. But finally, it was happening.

"If anyone in this class ever bullies or belittles another student, I will have none of it. You will get one chance to improve your behaviour, but after that there will be consequences." She looked around the room, finally settling her stare on Flash. "Do I make myself clear Mr. Thompson?"

"Yes, Miss Watson." He replied smoothly.

Miss Watson frowned, obviously catching on that Flash would be one to keep an eye on. She seemed to decide to let it go and called on a student to read out a paragraph from the text book. Peter simply looked over at Ned, and let out a breath. Ned looked over at him.

"I think I'm in love."

Peter simply rolled his eyes.