Alfred definitely does not want to fuck his high school English teacher, but it is all he can think about anyway, even though he doesn't have an English class and is not gay.

The story doesn't even start with his English teacher. It actually starts with his computer science teacher, who (while we're clearing the record) he also definitely doesn't want to fuck. Now, Alfred, who is a perfectly normal teenager (aside from his decidedly strange propensity to think about having sex with the adults in his life), is sitting in his class one day when he decides that this computer science class is the worst thing that's ever happened to him. This is really funny given the whole fucking authority figures thing, but again, that's besides the point (and anyway, why do you keep bringing this up?) On this particular day, his computer science teacher is mad at the rest of the class for bombing their assessment.

The important thing to note here is that he is the class's darling. As a matter of fact, he's everyone's darling (except for his previous English teacher's, surprisingly enough). Alfred did not fail this assessment, but, being the darling that he is, he is very close to crying. His computer science teacher likes him (as a student), and he had liked her (as a teacher) at the start of the semester. Progressively she has been getting more and more upset with the class as a whole, and it is starting to stress him out. She is not the type to yell, but Alfred worries excessively about her yelling anyway, so he spends almost all of his time in class trying to please her.

It takes the class failing this assessment and his teacher's subsequent anger for Alfred to realize that he really doesn't want to show up to this class ever again— and it takes precisely that thought to make him feel trapped. Alfred doesn't cry, not even once it's passing period and he's far from her class, but he does let himself freak out a little in what he tries to convince himself is a very teenage way. He should have listened to his parents, who had pressured him to take all AP classes this year. He hates normal classes— the teachers are always so married to their curriculum, and the students always piss them off. Whatever he'd have been feeling from five or more hours of homework a night would surely be more bearable than the stress he is feeling right now, because right now Alfred feels like he is seriously in danger, like things are going to get very rough for him very soon.

On the way to his next class, he passes his former English teacher, Kirkland. "Hello, Mr. Kirkland," he says, because he has Kirkland's elective classes next year, and he's uncomfortable with avoiding anyone he will have to talk to again in the future.

"Hello, Alfred. How are you?" Kirkland asks politely. In the moment Alfred is passing him, he gets this very vivid idea of Kirkland doing something absolutely abhorrent to him (or to a student in general— it's not like Alfred is self-centered enough to think Kirkland would pick him specifically to hurt). Alfred has these thoughts about everyone around him all the time, but this thought is different— it fits with his rapidly mounting anxiety, so he indulges it for a second longer than he should. Just because of this still-fleeting thought, Alfred decides he is going to avoid Kirkland until he can't anymore.

This is a far cry from all of Alfred's high school experience until approximately a moment ago. See, prior to this idea, Alfred had dedicated much of his energy to almost sending an essay he'd written on the treatment of healthcare workers to Kirkland for feedback and then not sending it, and repeating this little cycle of building up courage again and again and again. Kirkland is easily Alfred's favorite teacher of all time. He reminds Alfred of his parents, if Alfred's parents weren't assholes— his parents are both in healthcare and never talk about it, but Kirkland often talks about his years in nursing before he switched to teaching. These stories Kirkland shares with his students, although really rather tiny and irrelevant, are the stories Alfred feels he has missed out on his whole life. Just by talking about healthcare and not being a complete piece of shit, Kirkland has managed to become the center of Alfred's desperate desire for healthy parental affection.

— er, Kirkland usually reminds him of his parents, if his parents weren't complete assholes. Right now, Kirkland just reminds him of his parents. Alfred feels a little guilty about doubting the morals of people who have done nothing to him— Kirkland does, after all, have a family, and more importantly he probably isn't a pedophile— but he isn't emotionally well enough to not be irrational. He is going to avoid the hell out of Kirkland; he'll make a game of it. He won't even think about Kirkland.

…

In all of Alfred's non-computer classes, he is able to calm down enough to have thoughts that aren't, Something really awful is going to happen. What he thinks about instead is if any of his teachers have ever been sexually abused, specifically as children. This is not a preferred thought of his, but… it is statistically probable. Even so, usually Alfred reasons that they must not have been. They all seem so happy, much more content and well-adjusted than Alfred can ever imagine himself being. Alfred doesn't much like indulging the idea that he is one day going to be thirty-five or forty and still upset over what happened to him when he was fourteen, so he tells himself again, It is statistically probable that one of my teachers was—

Well, say this was the case, Alfred reasons. If this was the case and he knew verifiably that one of his teachers, content and well-adjusted, had been hurt as a kid, would that help him? The answer is probably not, because nothing ever helps him; therefore, he should just abandon this thought entirely, because it's not morally proper.

… he keeps thinking about it anyway.

It is Day Two of trying to avoid Kirkland. Each day, Kirkland hangs out in the same wing Alfred's science class is in at the same time Alfred happens to need to go to it. He forgets this entirely, and the first thing he sees upon reaching the science wing is Kirkland. He almost freaks the hell out, but it definitely isn't normal to get anxious over someone that didn't even assault him. Alfred puts his headphones in and walks past Kirkland as quickly as he can.

…

Day Three of trying to avoid Kirkland: he has computer science again, and he walks around the school during his passing period just to avoid getting to his class too early. A minute before the bell rings, he turns into his wing and is met by Kirkland, who for whatever reason is standing right outside his computer science class today. It is what people who aren't three mis-steps away from having a panic attack might call "a double whammy".

Alfred's really starting to doubt that he'll be able to handle the elective classes. He'll have to deal with his trauma eventually, but whatever— he'll just get institutionalized when he's in college. He probably won't even make it to college anyway.

…

On Day Four, Alfred goes to his counselor and requests a schedule change for the following year.

"Okay. What do you want instead?" His counselor asks him.

"I don't know. An off-block. Or to retake algebra. It doesn't really matter to me— I just want something else."

"Why do you suddenly not want to take CFF or REW? You were so passionate about these classes— we talked about them, remember? You said you liked English classes because you found them more challenging than other courses."

"I just don't want to be challenged. Besides, Contemporary Fiction and Fantasy just takes us through Orwell and Harry Potter, not anything like Pratchett or Kafka, and Research and Essay Writing shares its topic with every non-science AP course ever," says Alfred, purposely extending the titles of the elective English classes to aid his point.

"Not math."

"Math is a science."

"Huh. Alright. Are you sure you don't want to wait a little longer, Alfred? You can always change it next year, before the semester has properly set."

Alfred hesitates. "I guess waiting sounds nice."

…

Day Five: Alfred is standing outside, waiting for his parents to show up. It has been half an hour, and only now does his father text him, Can you stay with one of your friends until we can get you? We're paying some guys to move furniture and they just got here.

Alfred's one remaining acquaintance is long gone, and it's too cold for him to feel like walking. However—

"Evening, Mr. Kirkland. Do you mind giving me a ride home?" As soon as he says this, he has to repress the dramatic urge to clamp his hands over his mouth. He would rather walk, or he would rather that he'd rather walk… something like that.

Kirkland slows. "What town do you live in?"

Alfred tells him the town and the neighborhood. Kirkland nods and then says, "Alright. I can take you— it's on the way to my son's lacrosse game. Why is it, exactly, that you didn't already have a ride?"

"My mother's car broke down," Alfred says, just so Kirkland believes it is the car and not his parents that are unreliable.

When he first gets in the car, all Alfred can think about is how it's going to be all his parents' fault if he gets molested (again). It takes a while to recognize the pressing silence of the vehicle. Kirkland seems wholly unwilling to turn on the radio, and Alfred has never been one to leave his headphones in while around adults. He scrambles around the corners of his mind for a conversational topic before settling on, "Sir, would you recommend going into healthcare?"

"Me? No, of course not— well. It depends on how you get into it, and what job you end up doing. I wouldn't recommend becoming a nurse, but I used to hear that anesthesiologists made good money."

"Oh," Alfred says. "Both my parents are nurses. We've had a lot of people in healthcare in our family— I want to be like them."

"Alfred, I— much of my family was the same, and I went in for the same reasons. It chewed me up and spit me out. I'm not saying you should completely abandon the field, but you should definitely ensure that your passion is not limited to following the footsteps of your family."

"Yeah, I know. It's a lot of commitment if it ends up not working out."

"Yes, very," Kirkland murmurs.

Just before they can properly lapse into silence again, Alfred says, "Sir, would you be willing to read my essay on the problems healthcare workers face? I-I wrote it a while back for one of my classes, but I'm really rather passionate about it."

"I would be happy to read it if you sent it to me, but I think your parents could probably give better feedback than I could."

"They're usually pretty busy."

"I see," Kirkland says. "If you send it to me, I can take a look. I'll try to help you the best I can, Alfred."

"Thanks." For a moment, Alfred worries that Kirkland is going to read his essay and disagree with his points and hate him forever. Then he just thinks about how much he definitely does not want to fuck Kirkland; he would like it if Kirkland would just read his essay and keep on being a good person and telling stories about healthcare so Alfred could continue to adore him forever.

Kirkland drops him off and drives away. Alfred thinks, Kirkland has not outed himself as a massive pedophile or rapist to me. Huh.

…

So actually, the trouble with Kirkland and everyone else is that Alfred really, really doesn't want to fuck his mother. It's just one of those porn categories he's never been into. Unfortunately, Alfred's mother was the first person to ever give him any sort of sexual attention, and Alfred finds that he still has not forgotten his first. He hadn't latched onto the "incest" bit; he instead gravitated toward "being taken advantage of by an adult that could easily ruin your life if you rejected them, but you won't because you're stupid and you fully deserve what's happening to you". Also because of his mother, pretty much every adult in the entire county has the ability to ruin his life, but he only has his fears about adults he sees over and over again.

When perfectly-normal-teenage Alfred is doing "perfectly-normal-teenage things", he tends to think fear is pretty hot. In fact, he cannot recall a time where he has ever thought of anything except pure fear and disgust while doing these "perfectly-normal-teenage things".

Now, here's the trouble (forget that we previously defined the trouble as Alfred's unwillingness to have sex with his mother): When Alfred is not busying himself with private activities, he is still a perfectly normal teenager. He might be rational enough most of the time not to define his constant state of fear and anxiety as "hot", but he still associates it with sex, which he thinks about more than he would like to. Alfred tries not to fantasize about other people because that would be wrong, but when he's passing by adults like Kirkland, he usually cannot refrain from thinking about the reprehensible things he personally would define as "sex". So, yeah, he may not be fantasizing about his favorite teacher, but he is relentlessly preoccupied with the idea that he could very easily be taken advantage of again, and there are only so many adults that could do it in the non-violent manner he is so spoiled with.

When his mother comes into his room, he doesn't think in such complicated terms. Instead, he just lets the shame wash over him. He is older, he should know better. People would believe him, but they wouldn't help him like they would have if he had just told someone when it was starting.

By the turn of the semester, Alfred's more or less abandoned the whole "being extremely afraid of Kirkland" thing; the car ride had managed to convince him of Kirkland's moral standing. After winter break, he gets assigned to a different computer science teacher. This eases his anxiety until he fails the first exam of the year.

She asks him to stay behind, so he does. He's the only one that failed this exam, she says, even though he had "excellent" grades in the past semester. While she's speaking, she gets out from behind her desk and steps awfully close to him— they are only a couple inches apart. Alfred tunes out what she says after that, but he leaves the room as quickly as he can after she's done talking.

Just like that, she has power over him. He's absolutely batshit, or maybe just afraid.

…

Things with his mother get more complicated, too, because for a while she just treats him very nicely. She takes him along to various stores and such and buys him things. Alfred always gets exactly what she suggests because he wants badly to please her, but they're still nice things— vintage movie posters and books and every other material item Alfred had ever thought to want, as well as many things he hadn't— and soon his room is crowded with items that make him doubt whether or not the abuse ever happened in the first place. He remembers everything she's done, but poorly enough that he can only wonder if this has all been some horrible dream.

The thing that kills him the most is that the things she suggests are things he actually enjoys. The movie posters are all of movies he's watched and rewatched, the books never fail to be entertaining. She really is so kind to him; he is uncomfortable with calling himself "abused".

…

You write your story in a very defensive manner, but nobody is accusing you of anything. What you went through was bad, and you're really young. These sorts of things would mess with me, and I'm way older than you are. It's okay. You were conditioned to think that way about the adults in your life, and a few months of someone being nice to you doesn't change that (especially not when the abuse is still ongoing).

Do you have a favorite teacher/counselor/minister, an adult you can trust? I think you should tell them about your mother. They can get you the help you need to put a stop to the situation you've found yourself in. You are being abused, and nobody should have to live with something like that.

Alfred, guiltier than ever, had written to an online forum about everything— his teachers, his mom, all the thoughts. This is the most detailed response, but all of them say basically the same thing: it's not his fault, but he needs to take action and tell someone. After his meeting with his counselor (in which he had arranged to have off blocks rather than Kirkland's classes for the upcoming year), Alfred reads all the responses again, just to delay returning to his computer science class. All of his friends had hated it when they'd taken it the year before, to the point of skipping it numerous times; Alfred, who had never skipped classes for fear of his parents being mad at him, had never understood this.

The familiar dread settles into his stomach— the same dread he feels when approaching Kirkland even now, the same dread he feels when he gets in the car with his mother, the same dread he feels when he goes to his room. He gets it now, his friends' hatred for computer science, but he doesn't really talk to them anymore and it doesn't really matter that he understands. They had been classmates, people he was prevented from having an actual friendship with by his parents. Even if he had always hated computer science, this would never have changed.

What Alfred is more pressed with is how, exactly, he's supposed to tell an adult. He doesn't want to live with this dread anymore and he has no friends to keep a secret, so it seems natural that he should do what everyone everywhere is always urging him to do— but he can't tell Kirkland because he doesn't want Kirkland to think less of him or associate him with abuse, ditto his counselor. He is convinced he means nothing to them, that they won't remember him at all as soon as he's graduated, but he'd prefer this to being another mandated report. So, since Alfred can't tell the only two adults in the school that he actually likes, this leaves all his other teachers. He can't tell them because he's spent so much time not standing out in their classes. They have never considered him, and he worries that if he gives them an idea of the sort of person he is— that is to say, one incredibly vulnerable to abuse— he would be opening the door to all of it happening again.

Alfred slips quietly into his computer science class, sits down before his teacher can really look up. She hasn't done anything nearly so untoward since, but he worries about it happening again, even on the days where he has done nothing to upset her and even though he's definitely never going to be in a room alone with her ever again. Fucking compsci, he thinks. This shit is ruining my life.

A/N: I feel like it's the fanfiction tradition to write things that could absolutely ruin your life, but (especially for this fandom) it is a little difficult to stay in character while doing it. This is part of the reason why I stopped writing these high school AUs, specifically regarding one's mother, for about a year— they helped, but there's no real reason for them to be in the Hetalia fandom and I was churning out way too many of them. Well, I really needed some help.

Anyway, a review would be pretty cool. If you're still reading after all these years, that's pretty hot. Cheers.