I got inspired and wrote all of this in one sitting. I'm going to fail my chemistry exam tomorrow but it was worth it.

As always, I don't own SNK or any of its characters.

There's a student in his biology class that Jean really can't stop staring at. It's because of his looks. He had blonde hair which was just above his shoulders and mesmerizing blue eyes.

Yes, he was beautiful. Yet that wasn't really what Jean meant by looks.

He always had this look of absolute boredom. His entire posture depicted an image of exhaustion. Not the type you have after doing something physically demanding but more like even sitting there wasn't worth the effort. Those beautiful eyes seemed always absent and Jean had never seen a single emotion cross through them. He always thought that they could have easily been made of ice.

This student's name was Armin Arlert. He had the best grades in his entire generation but Jean had never once seen him happy about a test result.

Yes, it was his beauty that got Jean to first pay attention to him but it was his looks that made him an ever-present question in the teacher's mind.

He often wondered why the boy was like that. He hadn't meant to stare but soon it was that way every class. Jean simply couldn't shake a thought out of his head.

He is too young to look so dead.

So he began to research. He found out who his old elementary teachers used to be. Luckily one of them turned out to be a friend of his.

"Hey, Connie! Do you remember a blonde kid called Arlert every being in your class?"

The teacher looked thoughtful for a moment before snapping his fingers.

"Yeah of course! He was a silly little thing. He would get all excited every time a new topic would be announced. He was real smart too. I remember he was always reading. He loved it!... Jean?" The other teacher was staring in shock at him.

"A-are you sure we're talking about the same person? Arlert? Armin Arlert?"

"Yeah I'm sure. Why? Why are you even asking?" Suddenly Connie smirked. "Oh, don't tell me you got a crush." Jean's shocked expression turned into a scowl.

"What are you even saying! Of course not!" Connie hummed in response.

"Well you may say that now but the truth is that when you have someone stuck in your head you've already fallen for them." Jean threw a book at his head.

That information had brought more questions than answers.

He used to be… exited about learning? He… loved reading? What happened!?

These questions kept rattling in his head as he gave his lessons. He kept glancing at the blonde who was simply staring at his empty desk.

That's it. I have to do something.

So he made a plan. The blonde always seemed like he didn't care, but would he react to a bad grade?

Jean couldn't just give him a zero but he marked a question incorrectly just to see what would happen.

He gave them to a student to pass them around. "I have a meeting to attend to, so if you have any questions about your grade come see me after school." With that he began to walk away. He could feel his heartbeat increasing.

Please do something. Please react.

Out of the corner of his eye, Jean looked at the blonde as he was handed his exam. He set it down and rested his chin against his hand. For a moment Jean thought he wasn't even going to look at it but he caught those blue eyes hovering over the test for an instant.

There

The boy blinked in the closest thing to surprise Jean had ever seen him express. The teacher could have given a victorious cheer but he only allowed himself a smirk.

Got ya…

After school, Jean had to fight the smirk trying to creep onto his face as he heard footsteps nearing his classroom. He also had to fight his surprisingly fast beating heart.

Am I nervous? Why am I nervous?

And there he was, as expressionless as ever. He silently walked to Jean's desk.

"Arlert." The teacher greeted. He swallowed before continuing. "I'm supposing you disagree with your most recent test result."

The blonde placed the paper on his desk.

"This answer is correct." It startled Jean to realize that he had never heard his voice before. He tried to regain his focus.

"I see." There was silence for a moment. Jean looked at the boy who was staring at the ground. He didn't know what to say but the words simply escaped his mouth. "Do you care about your grades?"

The boy's head raised and the same look of near surprise was on his face again. More silence. He opened his mouth, like he was about to deny something, but stopped. Jean watched him as he closed his mouth. Suddenly his eyes were met by blue ones.

"No." He finally answered. "I don't." Those eyes looked away and Jean released a silent breath he didn't know he was holding. "It would just be stupid of me not to fix a mistake." There was silence once more. Jean watched his face. He had never seen him so closely before.

"I talked with your elementary teachers." His face didn't change but Jean caught sight of the boy's fists clenching. "They told me that you used to be different."

"Why did you ask about me?" His voice was still monotone but there was a slight coldness to the sound.

"You used to be exited to learn. It made you happy, Arlert."

"You have no right to be-"

"Armin." He looked up and to Jean the boy didn't seem cold anymore: he seemed fragile. "What happened?"

Armin stared at him for a long time before something that was not quite a smirk formed on his face. He spoke slowly.

"It was the typical thing: bullies." He looked away as if reliving some distant memory. "They always take it out on the smart ones as if it was their fault they were so dumb." His voice betrayed him, it sounded bitter. "They got mad whenever I smiled when I saw my test score. They got mad whenever I cheered at the new subject we were learning about. They got mad whenever I gasped at the newest adventure of my favorite book character."

Those blue eyes were suddenly on him. "You see, it wasn't the grades that made them angry. It was my enjoyment. The fact that academics made me happy was intolerable for them." He took back the test paper and stared at it. "They would beat me up and laugh and ask 'how does that make you feel?'." Jean felt sudden anger that would later scare him. "I guess that's how they felt when I laughed. Like I was laughing at them. I tried getting bad grades but it made no difference. Like I said; it wasn't the grades. It took some time but I finally understood and I did what I had to do."

He put the test back down. "I stopped caring. I stopped raising my hand at class. I stopped bringing books to school. I stopped smiling when I got good grades. I fought my emotions." He looked down as if suddenly his head had become too heavy to bear. "Soon I found out that I didn't have to fight them anymore. They just stopped. The bullies became frustrated at my lack of response at their offences. They were hitting me and yelling at me. Then one of them actually pulled me by the collar and looked me in the eye and said 'come on! What do you feel!?' and I truthfully responded 'I don't'. After that they never bothered me again. They had broken their favorite toy."

Jean wanted to say something. He wanted to kill whoever those kids were. The fact that they might be one of the students he gave class to every day drove him crazy. Armin continued and he forced himself to think of revenge later.

"I tried to go back to how I was but I couldn't. The plan had worked too well. I don't care about anything anymore. I don't feel anything."

"You're wrong."

The blonde raised his head almost violently. Jean held his gaze.

"If you really didn't care then you wouldn't have told me this. If you really didn't care then you wouldn't have come at all." Before he could stop himself, he continued. "And your writing! Whenever there are assignments on marine biology your handwriting becomes slanted because you are writing so fast! That's because you like that subject! Because you care!" Jean hadn't even realized that until he said it. It seemed like even his subconscious had become obsessed with the blonde boy standing before him.

The room was silent once again and Armin hadn't looked away from him. Jean thought they had been staring for far too long. Suddenly there was a change in Armin's eyes. Jean couldn't quite point it out but it was there.

"Thank you." He said. "Maybe I'm not too far gone…"

After that, Jean made it a habit to mark a few questions wrong on Armin's tests and assignments. It became a sort of routine. The blonde would come after school and Jean would make him explain the reasoning behind his answers. Jean did this with the intension of making Armin express himself and perhaps regain his passion for learning. It was obvious the boy wasn't going to make it easy but Jean considered himself a stubborn person. Slowly but surely Jean could see the spark in Armin's eyes grow whenever he went on and on about their topic of study. Jean had added many more marine biology assignments and he could tell that the blonde was enjoying it.

Once in a while Jean would bring a snack to these after school "meetings" for both of them. Armin would act like he wasn't touched by it but would always bring something for them the next day.

Jean decided to take it a step further.

"Alright, dim-wits, we're going on a field trip to the ocean."

It had taken him lots of convincing, a few favors, and some begging to get the trip accepted by the school. They lived more than an hour away from the ocean. In the end, it had been thanks to Connie really. He was a friend of the principal and he convinced him. When he asked Connie why he did it (aka what he wanted in return) the elementary teacher smirked and patted his shoulder.

"Oh, nothing. Just to be your best man when you marry Arlert."

Jean sighed in frustration at the memory. He had to accept that he found that kid to be the most beautiful human he had ever laid eyes on. He also worried about him constantly and was already capable of knowing his mood by his handwriting or the slightest twitch of his face. Also every little thing made him think about him, and-

Ok, you've fallen. That's that.

"Well what are you waiting for!? Hurry up and go outside! The bus is waiting!" He yelled to his students. Outside of the bus he took out a piece of paper. "I have made assigned sitting." There was groaning from all of the students (with the obvious exception). "What? Did you think I was going to let you run free and embarrass the school? Well think again." He read off the list and Armin was conveniently sitting at the front next to a student who had called in sick. Everyone took their seats. Jean sat next to the blonde.

"Arlert, I expect full silence as I muse to myself about manatees." Armin's head was leaning against the window, his arms crossed, and his eyes closed. He was the image of pure boredom but Jean knew he was listening. Whenever he would conclude an explanation Armin would give an unconscious little hum and whenever Jean said something that interested him his face would twitch lightly.

Once they arrived, everyone got out of the bus and Jean paired them up with the person they had been sitting next to.

"Arlert, you'll be alone." He made no response but Jean knew him well enough to recognize the pleased look in his eyes. "Give each other space. You will have an assignment based on your observations and if I think two ideas are similar then you fail the entire year. Clear?"

He spent the rest of the day watching Armin. He had the lightest expression Jean had ever seen on his face. He looked at peace. Jean smiled and looked at the ocean.

"This was a good idea." He murmurs. He looked down and saw some shells. An idea occurred to him.

Once they are back in the bus, Jean declared that they are going to write a free style essay that somehow relates to their visit and what they have been seeing all semester. Everyone groaned except for Armin who actually looked content. Jean thought that might just be his greatest accomplishment as a teacher.

After school, Armin stopped by his classroom. He walked into the room in silence and they both just looked at each other. Armin's expression was not quite a smile but it was the closest thing to it he had probably done in years and Jean knew it was his way of saying thank you. Jean took something out of his pocket.

"I got you a souvenir."

Armin's actually gasped when he saw the little shell necklace being offered to him.

The boy took the necklace delicately as if it were made of some precious material. He looked at it with an unreadable expression. Suddenly he hugged it to him and looked down.

"Thank you."

"No problem." Jean began with a smile but Armin interrupted.

"No. You don't get it." His voice almost trembled. "Thank you for everything you've been doing for me. You've showed me that I still feel. That I'm still human. But what you've showed me isn't that I care about learning." He looked up and smiled.

Smiled!

"I care about you."

Jean was so shocked by Armin's face that all he could do was smile back. The biggest and silliest grin of his life. Without thinking he lifted his hand and caressed Armin's cheek.

"You're smiling!"

"Did you even hear what I just said?"

Jean held Armin's face with both hands now and leaned in.

"I heard you, believe me."

Their kiss was soft and so intimate it made Jean feel butterflies in his stomach.

What am I? A teenage girl?

When they pull apart, a bubbly laughter escaped Armin's lips and Jean knew the dam had finally been broken. Tears escaped those blue eyes but there was nothing but joy reflected in them. Jean laughed alongside him and held Armin as he finally let go of his emotions.

I just realized that this story and the next one have one thing in common. Here's a hint: Shell necklaces!