As the beginning of the school day drew nearer, Oliver found himself with his mind on his neighbor across the hall. Something about her was captivating, and he couldn't deny that they'd had an instant connection. There was no doubt in his mind that, with her as a coworker, the course of the school year would prove to be very interesting.
Soon, it was the time the students would start arriving. New could be scary, especially for kids starting school for the very first time, and so it was school policy for teachers to be waiting outside their classrooms to greet their students- and whatever parents might be escorting them- as they arrived. Oliver stepped out into the hallway, closing his classroom door behind him, and immediately spotted Felicity doing the same across the hall. He flashed her a smile in greeting, one she returned, but they didn't have any time to talk because at that moment, kids began filling the halls, and it was time for the school day to start.
Oliver barely remembered to open his classroom door before he was lost in a whirlwind of voice and faces, names and greetings. It was a good thing that there were icebreaker activities in his lesson plan for the day, because he wasn't sure if he would have been able to remember all the names he'd just learned if he'd only had the few seconds he got with his students as they came in the door to try and commit those names to memory. Purely for her own sake, he hoped Felicity was better at this part of the job than him.
"Mr. Queen!" a familiar voice called out, distracting him from his thoughts of Felicity. A moment later, he spotted a familiar curly-headed shape come bolting down the hallway toward him, and then Sara Diggle was throwing her arms around his legs in greeting.
"Sara!" he exclaimed, smiling down at her. "I didn't expect to see you here!" Sara giggled. Further up the hall, Oliver spotted her parents, John and Lyla, coming toward them. They must have been in the process of escorting their daughter to her classroom when she'd spotted him and run ahead of them. Oliver smiled. He'd become friends with John and Lyla over the course of time he'd spent teaching Sara in his previous job at a preschool, and it was a pleasant surprise to see them now.
"Fancy seeing you here," he said when they reached his classroom door, exchanging quick hugs with each of them in turn by way of a greeting.
"Sara was so excited to start kindergarten until she realized that it meant that you wouldn't be her teacher anymore," John said. "It was hard seeing her so sad."
"But then we found out that her new school was the one you were going to be teaching at," Lyla put in. "And we decided to let her find out when she got here. We wanted to keep it a surprise."
"Well, I'm sure Sara is very glad you did," Oliver replied, glancing down at her. She nodded enthusiastically, grinning.
"And JJ's starting school this year, right?" he asked, returning his attention to Sara's parents, who nodded.
"Today is his first day of preschool," Lyla elaborated.
"And speaking of which, we should probably be getting him to it," John cut in. Lyla nodded, and crouched down to put herself at Sara's eye level.
"Bye Sara," she said. "You be good for Mr. Queen, okay?" Sara nodded.
"Bye Mommy," she said, giving each of her parents a hug in turn. "Bye Daddy."
"Bye sweetie," Lyla and John chorused in unison, and then they were off.
"Ready for your first day?" Oliver asked, turning to Sara once more.
"Yeah!" Sara exclaimed excitedly, and scampered along ahead of him through his classroom door. He took one last look up and down the hall for any stragglers, and, finding none, followed after Sara into his classroom and closed the door behind him.
"So, how was your first day at the new job?" Thea asked when Oliver came home to the apartment they shared later that day.
"Pretty good," Oliver replied. Thea's work- running a nightclub called Verdant out in the Glades- made it so that she was coming home from her job when he was leaving for his, and that when his work day was ended, hers hadn't yet started. As a consequence, late afternoon and evening time was when they saw the most of each other. "How about yours?"
"Not bad," Thea said. With a smile, she added, "I got to watch Sara slam some dude's head down on the bar when he tried to get handsy with her."
"Did you have him thrown out?" Oliver asked, knowing that his sister had a policy of zero tolerance for anyone who attempted to interfere with the safety and security of her employees while they were working.
"I didn't have to," Thea replied with a shrug. "He ran out of there like someone had lit a fire under his ass." They both laughed at that. Remembering himself, Oliver set his stuff down on the shelf next to the door, slipped his shoes off, and padded into the kitchen to make himself some coffee, which he needed after spending six hours with a bunch of kids with considerably more energy than him. On his way, he gestured between Thea and the counter where the coffeemaker was, and she nodded. Silent communication of that nature was common between them, borne out of years of a relationship that was much closer than most people would expect siblings who were ten years apart to have.
"Tell me more about your day," Thea said when Oliver returned to the living room with the coffee. "I want to know everything."
"There's really not much to tell," Oliver replied with a noncommittal shrug, taking a seat on the couch beside her. "I mean, kindergarten is a bit of an adjustment from preschool, I admit, but teaching is what I've been doing for the last three years. It's familiar."
"Mmhmm," Thea said thoughtfully, taking a sip of her coffee. "And there was nothing interesting about your day. Nothing that stood out from your usual experience." She sounded skeptical.
"Well," Oliver conceded after a moment, "Sara Diggle is in my class again this year, as it turns out." Thea perked up at that. She adored baby Sara.
"And my new coworker is… interesting," Oliver went on.
"Interesting how?" Thea asked.
"We just seemed to have an instant connection," Oliver replied. "I can't really explain it."
"Well, I bet it'll make your work days very interesting from here on out, won't it?" Thea theorized.
"You know what?" Oliver said. "You're right. I'm sure it will."
