John closed his eyes as he listened to the ringing go on and on as no-one picked up the phone
"Please Sherlock, answer the damn phone."
But lo and behold it went to voicemail instead "Sherlock, call me back, I'm in a fix right now and I could really use some advice." John grunted after the beep of the voicemail tone then hung up.
"Argh! Bet he's playing with that bloody dog and didn't hear the phone." John grumbled to himself as he stuffed the phone in his pocket and turned to head back to the hall because there wasn't anywhere else he could go and he did have a class now that he had to deal with.
However as he turned, still with an annoyed look on his face, he met a student who had gone to find him and they shrieked as they saw the expression on his face and then ran off.
John sighed and rubbed his face, leaning against the wall "Great. I've only been here five minutes and I'm already scaring children. Thank God Sherlock isn't here or all the children would have ran away."
He was just forcing himself to calm down when he felt a tap on the shoulder "Mr Maddens?" it was the lady from earlier, the one who had helped him sneak into the assembly.
John forced himself to not look like he hated everything and turned to face the lady.
"Are you alright? You seem a bit…off."
John panicked a little internally. He clearly wasn't acting very like Paul Maddens if people already suspected something was off.
"Yes." John pulled a sad expression "I just…had a bad weekend. I lost my…grandmother and it's been hard on me." He lied
The teacher's face filled with sympathy "Oh I'm so sorry Paul, I had no idea." She put a hand on his arm which John pretended to appreciate.
"It's alright." He replied
"You should have said something. I'm sure Mrs Bevan would have understood if you took some time off."
John shook his head quickly "No. I need to get my mind off of it. I'd rather be doing something." That was true for when he actually was going through a tough time, he needed to keep busy or he'd lose it. That was what he did after Afghanistan to keep himself sane before Sherlock came along and there was never really a spare moment to think about it.
The woman smiled "Alright then but let me know if you need anything."
She then turned away and was caught by another teacher who started talking to her and John caught a name. 'Miss Rye'.
Well that was one more name he knew.
John was about to head back to the hall when he heard the chatter of children filling the hall and multiple children suddenly came up to him. John just stared stupidly at them for a minute before realizing he had to lead them back to their classroom.
"Right. Well back to class then." He said as he started walking down the hallway, hoping that he'd just come across the classroom because he didn't know where it was.
Some of the children giggled and John stopped walking "Mr Maddens you're going the wrong way."
John turned to see the children watching him with grins on their faces, clearly finding this funny.
"Of course. I was just joking." John replied and headed the other way, walking slowly down the corridor and looking at each classroom door closely, praying there would be a sign and thankfully he soon found one which read 'Mr Maddens' class' on the door.
"Here we are." He opened the door and let all of the children inside, feeling nerves rising up in him as he noticed how many there were; at least 20.
Oh boy he was way in over his head.
No sooner had he sat down at his desk and put his bag down that the children decided to run riot, throwing paper, standing on the tables and shouting.
John just stared in disbelief. Since when were children so disrespectful? He was still and quiet for a moment then decided he should probably intervene if he didn't want to lose Paul his job.
"Uh, children…" John stopped. He sounded like a fool who had no idea what he was doing, which frankly was what he was but he wasn't supposed to sound like it.
"Uh, kids…" no, that was weak too.
"Everybody, sit down now and be quiet!" he ended up saying loudly, his years in the army making it easy for him to be able to be heard over the children who instantly stopped what they were doing and sat down and became quiet.
"Thank you." John rubbed his face, taking a brief moment to glance over the classroom, noticing lots of brightly coloured displays on the walls with some of the children's work and some educational posters with information on simple primary school things like Division and Nouns.
This was when he realized he had no idea what he was doing...again.
John had never taught anyone anything in his life, asides teaching Sherlock a few things like how not to get punched in the face everytime he talks to a woman, but teaching children things like how to read and write, he had no idea what to do.
"So, who would like to tell me what we're learning about? Just so I know you've all remembered." John asked in hopes that would help if he knew what the children were supposed to be learning.
"We've been learning how to write stories Mr Maddens." A girl wearing a striped hat spoke up.
"Of course, thank you-" he looked around for a hopes of learning the children's names and he relaxed as he saw a seating chart on the desk "Sam." He finished then noticed the hat which he was quite sure shouldn't be worn inside "Would you mind taking your hat off whilst you're inside please Sam?" he asked and the children gasped.
"But Mr Maddens Sam never takes her hat off!"
"It's lucky!"
"You can't do that!"
John could tell that he'd sparked a nerve with the children and instantly backed off "Alright, sorry, I forgot how important it was to Sam." The class seemed to let John of, much to his relief as he didn't know what he'd do if they suddenly hated him which he knew would just make this task even harder.
"Okay, well why don't you all work on your stories and I'll get planning the nativity then?"
A cheer showed that he'd said the right thing and John smiled in victory then proceeded to search for the children's workbooks which for John's sake were in plain view which avoided an embarrassing potential of having to ask the class where they were.
"Here." John said to himself as he walked to the front of the class again before suddenly realizing that he didn't know the children's names well enough to hand out the books without looking at the seating chart which would look suspicious for a man who was supposed to have worked here for two years and would definitely know their names off by heart.
"Why don't you all come up and get your books, I just need to make a quick phone call." John suggested, placing the stack of books on the front desk then pulling Paul's phone from his pocket "One moment." With that he left the classroom and leaned against the wall outside.
"Come on Sherlock, pick up." John said under his breath as he tried Paul's home number again and this time much to John's relief he soon heard his flatmate's voice on the other end of the line.
"Aren't you supposed to be teaching, John?"
John sighed, rubbing his head "Yes but I'm in a little fix…"
"A fix? What kind of fix? Not our kind I hope."
John sighed "No, there's no psychopath murderer in the school or anything-" he paused, lowering his voice "I…Paul has been nominated to do the annual school nativity."
John could practically hear Sherlock's thought process as he took in what John had told him "And why should that effect you?"
"Because right now I am Paul, Sherlock!" John snapped then took a breath "Look, I'm an army doctor, you're a detective-"
"Consulting detective." Sherlock corrected instantly
John grunted in irritation "Shut up. Anyway my point is that neither of us are qualified to take care of children, let alone plan a bloody nativity play, but I need your help. I can't do this by myself."
Sherlock sighed "But I hate children."
"Sherlock please." John was begging now "For me."
An irritated sigh from the phone showed that John's persuasion was successful "Fine…I'll be there soon." Sherlock muttered then hung up before John could even thank him.
John turned the phone off and put it back in his pocket then returned to the classroom where the class was quietly writing away.
Sherlock wasn't exactly the ideal person to help him but he was John's only hope right now.
Besides, he couldn't be that bad with children could he?