Jason reorganized his desk to get it all set for tomorrow morning, making sure it would be one less thing to worry about. He tried to get his classroom back into some kind of order at the end of every day, those little punks could be a handful enough as it was and he wasn't going to let some stray papers take up his attention.
After that he cleared off the board and began to write down the next day's lesson on it, they finally got to the part of the semester where they got to discuss all the underlining symbolism and meanings of Shakespeare, his favorite part of the year. That and he got to make the two most trouble making kids do the balcony scene as pay back.
Knock. Knock.
"Excuse me, Mr. Todd?" A voiced from the door caused him to turn around in the middle of writing a sonnet on the side of the board.
"Hello?" He said confused, looking over at the well-dressed man standing in his doorway with a sheepish smile on his stupidly gorgeous face, looking around as if to see if the coast was clear.
"Um, am I early? Or late?" He asked, still not full stepping into the classroom. "I'm Dick Grayson, Damian's father?"
"Oh, yes, of course, no, you're perfect." Jason said in a rush as it clicked and he put down the chalk, freezing when he realized what had come out of his mouth. "ly on time, right on time." He quickly added, gesturing for him to come in.
Dick strode in with a huge smile on his face, Jason was sure he had realized what kind of idiot he was, how nice. He decided to blow past all that and get down to business.
"I'd offer you a seat, but as you can see, they are for smaller humans." Jason joked, gesturing at the student's desks.
Dick laughed softly, saying it was fine and just leaned back on the desk top of one of the desks in the front row, giving Jason his full attention. Jason gave him a sad sort of smile.
Damian was one of his best students; never a trouble maker and Jason could smell the potential to be one on the boy; an efficient student and always kept to himself.
Now usually, Jason wouldn't worry too much about his sort, but it started to come to his attention during the few times Jason had yard watching duty, that the other students didn't seem to care much for Damian as he did. He talked to the boy about it, cornering him in the halls a few times and even holding him after class once or twice. It was always the same, though, he claimed nothing was wrong and he was perfectly fine. Jason could understand he didn't want to be a tattle tell or seem like he couldn't handle his own problems, but Jason saw the road it could lead down and wanted to get the kid help before it was too late. So he did the only thing he could think, he involved the parents.
"I know I didn't really give you a reason for you and your wife…who didn't seem to make it, to come in today-" Jason started off before Dick cut him off.
"I'm not married. It's just me and Dami." Dick explained, nodding for him to continue.
"So his mother is…?"
"I actually adopted him on my own; it's sort of a complicated story." Dick laughed a little awkwardly.
"Uh huh…" Jason hummed, scooting a pile of note cards off his desk and into the trash.
"What was that?" Dick asked curiously confused.
"My note cards for dealing with this; it was rather heavily based on there being two of you and or a different situation, so thanks for that." Jason said, partly hoping this guy knew when he was joking, there was a reason the other parents did not like him. Thus the note cards to keep away from such sarcasm.
Luckily, Dick just laughed at him, excellent, it was going well so far.
"Heh, alright, that aside." He raised a brow at Jason to see if another joke was coming. "What was the reason? He's not failing is he? Cause I find that hard to believe."
"No, far from that, that kid is pretty close to teaching this class…and better than me…" Jason said, only a little begrudgingly…a smallish amount.
"Then what is it?" Dick asked, starting to look concerned.
"It all started about um…two months ago?" Jason had to think back on when the project had actually been, they had done a lot since then. "The class was supposed to do a report on their favorite folk tale and do some research on the symbolism and the background from where it came from."
Dick nodded along, recalling the project and helping Damian pick out a good one, because the boy didn't actually get to grow up with fairytales read to him at night.
"Well, the one he chose came from a region I have never heard of." Dick tensed for some odd reason. "And when I looked up the tale, it was heart breakingly beautiful." He sighed dreamily, clearing his throat when Dick just stared at him. "Right, anyway, it was clearly something close to Damian's heritage, which the students seemed to become uncomfortable with. Now I'm not sure if he's said anything to you…"
Dick shook his head, Damian didn't talk about school much, he thought it was a waste of his time. And he had mentioned that he could teach most of his classes save one, though he never mentioned which one.
"Well, I've noticed some of the students picking on Damian about it. Kids don't actually listen when grownups talk politics or about the news, they just hear country names and the word ter…well you know." Jason muttered, not actually wanting to say it. "While I haven't exactly caught any of them bullying him or calling him anything, I've been here long enough to know what is going on. I have asked Damian about it and he insists everything is fine, which is bull-" Jason clamped his mouth shut, cutting himself off. He got in trouble enough for cursing at staff meetings.
"Any who…" Jason continued. "I just wanted to inform you about what might be going on at school; I know what bottling that kind of stuff can do to a kid. Especially with a temper like that."
Dick's brows went up. "What has he done?"
"He did punch a locker once, I caught that, it dented in, it was awesome." Jason grinned, cause it was. Dick's face morphed into utter confusion so Jason had to back pedal. "I mean, terrible?"
"So…you think he's getting bullied?" Dick asked, ignoring Jason's odd behavior for a teacher.
"I suspect it. There's nothing I can do about it either, not unless I catch them red handed or the student comes forward. Since neither of those things has occurred yet, I thought the best course of action would be to inform the parents, ergo, you." Jason explained.
"Did you just say, ergo?" Dick half laughed.
"Someone ought to." Jason countered.
Dick let out this sort of breathing laugh as he dropped his head, absorbing everything he learned.
"I know it's not the thing you want to hear your kid is going through, but it's best to nip this kind of thing in the bud." Jason said, wishing he really could do more about this, stupid restraints.
"No, thank you." Dick mumbled. "He would never talk about this, even with me if I didn't force it out of him. He's been having a rough couple of months and never talks about how he's feeling. Getting him to open up is harder than…" Dick trailed off, deciding against whatever example he was going to say. "Thank you though, for bringing this to my attention, I will definitely try to get him to talk about it."
"It's my pleasure; I like your kid…in a not strange sounding way." Jason quickly added, another thing he got in trouble for a lot, phrasing. "He's a good kid, I'd hate to see him go down the wrong road."
"Have you seen it a lot?" Dick asked, looking back up at him, his pretty blue eyes peeking through his black bangs.
"Once…but luckily he got off it eventually." Jason smiled lightly, clearing his throat, checking the time. "I think that's all I have for now, if you ever want to talk about he's doing, feel free to contact me." Jason smiled, trying to act like the professional he was supposed to be.
"Right…of course." Dick got up off the desk and reached over to shake Jason's hand. "Thank you so much, once again, I'm glad Dami has someone like you looking out for him."
Jason took his hand and winced at how firm it was, did this man not know his strength or did at some point did it seem like he was insulting him or his son?
"Are you attacking me right now?" Jason said before he could stop himself.
"Oh, sorry." Dick grinned sheepishly, like this happened all the time. He was about to pull away when Jason decided to challenge him and return the pressure. The look on Dick's face told him he had made an impression. "Wow, you sure are strong for an English teacher."
"Ha!" Jason laughed as they released. "Well this is Gotham, you never know. Mild mannered teacher by day, vigilante by night~" He joked, cocking his head confused when Dick tensed up.
"Ha...ha…yes, that would be crazy." He said nervously, averting his eyes. "Ahem, so right, thanks again, I'm gonna go grab Damian now, yep." Dick explained.
"Alright?" Jason laughed a little, not sure what that was about, but he was sure that Dick was by far his favorite parent who didn't jump down his throat when he brought something up about their child.
"Oh, um, would it be okay to give you my personal cell? In case something happens?" Dick asked, snapping out of his little weird stint.
"Um… I don't see why not?" Jason blinked confused, he was pretty sure they had that on file in the office in case of an emergency.
Dick's smile lit up the whole room and Jason had to blink again just to readjust his vision. He picked up a pen from off the desk and picked out one of the useless note cards from the trash and scribbled his name and number on the blank side. He folded it up, this strange kind of smirk coming across his face as he slipped into Jason's vest breast pocket.
Jason could feel his face grow warm as Dick's hand lingered over the note a moment longer than would be necessary. Oh gosh, had he been flirting? He was gonna so save that for the next parent teacher conference, not when he was telling the guy that his son was getting bullied. He couldn't be sure, but it felt like Dick was definitely flirting with him now.
"Um…cool." Jason blurted, Dick laughed lightly as he took away his hand.
"I'll be in touch." Dick smiled, leaving the room and walking down the hall before Jason could snap out of what just happened.
"What the fuck?" Jason asked his empty class room.
"Language, Todd." A voice startled him, he looked at the door way and saw Damian leaning against it looking bored.
"Hey, hey, I'm the grownup here." Jason argued, knowing it was stupid the moment he said it.
Damian didn't look impressed; he merely looked down the hall the way Dick had left. It was like he was making sure the coast was clear, must be a family thing, before he walked up to the teacher, looking at him and yet Jason still felt like he was being looked down upon.
"If you do decided to enter a physical relationship with my father." Jason sputtered indignantly, had the kid seen the whole number thing? Also why was a thirteen year old saying such things to him? "Just know our relationship shall remain the same, educator and student." Jason wanted to interrupt but was too startled when the small boy reached up and yanked him down to eye level by his tie. "But if you do anything to upset him, you may never have to see him agian, but you have to see me and I do in fact know where you live."
Jason suddenly recalled the locker incident and imagined his face as the locker.
"I'm glad we understand each other." Damian said, releasing him and straightening out his uniform calmly like he didn't just threaten his teacher. "Have a pleasant evening, Todd."
"Dami~! There you are. I just left here, you goof." Dick popped his head into the room, all cheerful and happy to have found his son. "Come on, we're gonna pick up dinner on the way home."
"Coming." Damian said, not in the same kind of monotone he'd use in class, it actually sounded like it had some life in it. He threw a smirk over at Jason before going to his father.
"Goodbye Mr. Todd~" Dick called, not noticing the gaping look on his face.
Jason made eye contact with Damian, who gave him some kind of back off look before he cleared his throat and recomposed himself.
"You can call me Jason." Jason offered, grinning at the fuming look on Damian's face. And he was supposed to be the adult.
"Okay…Jason!" Dick grinned like he had won something and ushered his child out of the room, starting to talk animatedly about something out in the hall, followed by Damian groaning loudly.
That went far better than Jason could have possibly planned it.