The new English teacher was in the room when the students got there the next day.
The boys trooped in with round eyes. It was a mark of their curiousity that chatter stopped at the doorway.
Greg was one of the first people into the room, and he saved a space for his friend by dropping a book on the seat behind him. He dropped the book, turned around, and caught a disconcertingly keen gaze from a pair of blue eyes.
Greg panicked momentarily, and then laughed at himself for such a fit of nerves. He went back to his seat and fidgeted with his books instead, arranging them at exact right angles to the edge of the desk. When he looked up again, the man was calmly having a word with one of the brainy kids in front. Greg grinned ruefully to himself and watched the door.
Toby came in with Colin a few seconds into this cheery interlude. Both stared dubiously at the man at the front of the class and backed slowly into position around Greg.
Toby got the book off the seat and handed it back to Greg. Then he sank down thankfully into the precious seat.
When most seats were taken- except for two in front as was always the case- the new teacher looked around the class and flashed them all a sudden smile.
"Your attention," he said, holding up a hand, "Silence, please. Quiet."
Even the gentle murmur humming under the surface trailed away. Everyone was too intrigued, too focused on what this new teacher would be like. They knew his name, and now they knew what he looked like, but they were still waiting to find out whether they liked him or not.
"Thank you," he said, and put his hand down. The appendage found its way behind his back along with its partner, there to be held in a light clasp. "Good morning."
The boys looked around surreptitiously at each other from the corners of their eyes. "Morning, Mr. Keiler."
Gordon Keiler winced internally. But he bolstered himself and said, "This is a class in English, so I assume you are all taking this subject? No one in the wrong class? I was given to understand that you are halfway through this… book? Good. I'll come back to that in a minute. First, I'd like to establish some ground rules."
He skimmed down the list of names on his desk.
"I'm sure there are certain customs in this school that I will not be following. You may have noticed that I am new," he said drolly, "So basics may be somewhat shaky in terms of class structure. I'll be blunt about how I expect to be treated; you may call me either 'Sir' or "Mr. Keiler'. My preference is 'Sir' but you may choose amongst yourselves. I don't appreciate interruptions when I am teaching. I do like questions, comments and other helpful contributions but you will raise your hand until I give you leave to talk. I expect all of you to take notes and keep them. What else? Oh, yes, on the subjects of notebooks, I have no patience with bad handwriting and scraps of paper. I was told to expect them and I look forward to the day I first behold such a monstrosity with horror."
He paused and took in their awe-struck faces. The sight required all his self-composure to keep from sniggering.
"I talk funny, do I?" he asked intimately.
Pairs of eyes of all colours went wide in shock.
"You can comprehend what I am saying, yes?" he annunciated, nodding his head to encourage slowly encouraging them to respond.
There was dead silence.
"No?" he tried, attempting to provoke any reaction at all.
The boys seemed to be frozen.
Gordon Keiler sighed to himself. This job had not attracted him for any simplicity when he had applied for it and it was growing steadily worse as the minutes progressed. The Lint woman had assured him the class were all intelligent, likeable little people but he was beginning to doubt her reliability.
"Does anyone have any questions, comments or other helpful contributions?" he offered.
One of the boys in the middle slowly put up his hand.
"Yes?"
"We have a paper due next week. Do we still do that?"
Gordon said nothing at first, just continued to watch the boy steadily until he began to squirm in his seat. When he had accomplished that, he said, "I'm sorry, what was your name?"
"Peter Costain."
Gordon raised a mildly rebuking eyebrow.
"Mr. Keiler," the boy amended with a rush.
A very faint smile told him he'd got it right.
"Your paper is still due in a week's time, Costain," Gordon said amiably.
All of a sudden, their suspicions of the new teacher vanished in a hailstorm of groans and moans. Someone even hissed, "Give us a break," to the general public.
Another hand went up.
"Yes?" Gordon allowed, beginning to enjoy himself.
"Are we expected to do research?" A second's hesitation. "Sir?"
"Your name?"
"Greg Symons, Sir."
Gordon frowned slightly and went back to his list. "Gregory Symons?"
"Yes, Sir."
Gordon nodded and answered, "No, Symons, you're not. I understand the change of teacher will confuse matters but the course was set some time ago and I must keep to it. I will go easy on you; I just want to gauge your abilities to think and plan a paper."
A sigh of relief rippled around the class.
Toby nodded once to himself and resigned the next week to struggling over a paper that at least he couldn't fail. Not that anyone ever actually failed English but some people- and he'd been one of them- could come pretty damn close. He damned Sarah to hell for setting the benchmark so high with their expectant father.
The new teacher didn't rest on his laurels after that one, but used the remainder of the time to figure out where they were in the course plan.
When the bell went, he didn't stop them from bouncing out of their seats and stampeding out of the door. He didn't like it, but he estimated that it was just one more compromise. These kids were not going to give him the sort of deference he was used to, but then a short run down a corridor was beneficial in some ways.
Gordon wended his way meditatively back to the staff's room, going over his first class in his head. It had been… less that successful, really.
His students were of the same mind. Greg was a little disappointed with how normal the new teacher looked.
"He's not really exciting, is he?" he sighed.
Colin dropped his books and almost fell over trying to pick them up again. "I think he's cool."
"You would," Greg retorted, "What's so cool about him?"
"He's funny. I got to run, I've got math."
Toby decided to withhold opinion until he'd managed to finish his paper. He felt one could tell a lot about a teacher from the way he graded a paper. Namely, Toby liked teachers who took into account that at least he tried. For the rest of it, he was inclined to think the teacher more interesting that either good or bad.
There was something about those blue eyes, something in the way he held his head.
Gordon Keiler wasn't like any teacher Toby had ever seen in his life. For one thing, he did actually talk funny. He used long words and he didn't talk like a teacher with the slow commands and short sentences. He talked like he was used to having people obey him, no matter what he said.
Those kinds of people, Toby felt, were very interesting.
Greg just said he was imagining it all.
