"I don't want to go," Alex complained.
"Well neither do I," Eagle snapped, tired of hearing Alex attempt to wiggle out of accompanying him to the school's yearly parent-teacher conferences. He was hanging out of the window of Jack's Mini slowly following Alex through the neighborhood since he refused to stop walking. "But since I have to go to this thing then so do you, so stop bitching about it."
"You're the one's that's bitching," Alex mumbled sourly.
"Alex John, either get in this car or I'm going to shoot you in the foot."
Alex had never heard his middle name come out of Eagle's mouth and he knew that its sudden appearance was due to Eagle literally being at the end of his patience. It actually frightened him a bit so he stopped walking towards the park where he'd been hoping to hide from his irate guardian.
"I still don't see why I have to be there," he argued even though doing so went against every survival instinct he had. "It's a parent-teacher conference. I'm neither of those things."
"And I am?" Eagle asked and moved as if he was getting out of the car in order to force Alex into it. The teen held up a hand to ward him off and went around to the passenger side door. Slipping into the car, he buckled his seatbelt, crossed his arms, and pouted.
"You're almost my legal guardian," Alex reminded him. "After the wedding you'll definitely be. You have more right to be there than I do."
"This is your school Rider," Eagle snapped, pulling back into traffic with far too much force and nearly crashing into someone else's car. The other driver honked and a threw them a rather rude hand gesture. "I'm not going there without you."
"Why? Afraid?" Alex teased and the glare he received was the coldest he had ever gotten. "Damn, Andy, calm down. All they're going to do is tell you that my grades have improved but they just want to make sure that you understand that my future is dependent on my ass being in my desk every day until graduation."
"How the hell do you know that?"
"What else are they going to say? I haven't even gotten detention in a long time so all they want to know is that I'm no longer a problem. Just tell them I'm under new management. That's all they'll want to hear."
Eagle rolled his eyes and gripped the steering wheel tightly. They rode in relative silence until the man passed the turn for the school.
"You missed the-" Alex began, only to get a very gritty interruption from the driver.
"No! I didn't."
"Then where are you going?"
"Rey's."
"Is Tom coming too?" Alex asked, brightening at the thought. There was no way that Tom's presence at the parent-teacher conferences would be anything less than absolutely hilarious.
"I suppose," Eagle said tightly. "Rey said he wants to get the kid off academic probation and this is the first step."
"Alright then," Alex replied and settled down.
Perhaps tonight wouldn't be a complete loss.
00000
Eagle and Alex started in Mrs. Tibbet's English class which was rather unfortunate because she had never forgiven Alex for his year long absence and subsequent bad grades. She wasn't the kind of teacher that much cared about getting to know why kids were struggling; she just expected you to be in class no ifs, ands, or buts about it.
"He's improving," she told Eagle who had a blank mask for a facial expression. "However, his disciplinary problems continue to be an issue."
"What?" Eagle asked. "He hasn't been in any detention or anything."
"Yes," Mrs. Tibbet agreed, and then pushed her fifties style glasses further up her sharp, pointy nose. "But only because we haven't been able to prove it."
"What about his grades?" Eagle asked, eyeing Alex who had slumped in his chair slightly. "Is he keeping up with the curriculum?"
"For now," she responded coldly. "However, his sudden absences could cause some problems in the future."
"There will be no more sudden, extended absences."
"I've been in school a lot," Alex weakly defended. Eagle bumped his knee with his own, silently telling him to shut up and let him handle it.
"We've been promised that before," she said. Eagle visibly took a deep breath and Alex knew he was trying to be calm. It was hardly Mrs. Tibbet's fault. It wasn't Alex's fault and it wasn't his, but there was nothing he could do expect avoid her probing as best he could and smooth the wrinkles that he was capable of smoothing.
"Yes, well, this time it's true. He's under new management."
Alex had to forcibly hold back a snort of laughter and Mrs. Tibbet lifted an eyebrow disbelievingly. However, the English teacher didn't press the issue. In fact, she completely changed her tune outlining a decent plan that would get Alex back up to par with the rest of the class. She promised that if Alex followed that plan he could possibly pull ahead and his missing year might not ever matter.
He rather liked that idea.
00000
Tom and Wolf were forced to start with Tom's Maths teacher, Mr. Hart, who apparently despised the very air Tom breathed. Wolf wasn't entirely sure why but he knew immediately that this was the teacher that would be the most difficult when it came to getting Tom off of academic probation. University scouts were circling the kid like crazy and an active probation would effectively repel them all.
Wolf thought it was a little early to let the kid off but he did recognize the long term plan. Football was Tom's best shot at a really good scholarship. Wolf didn't have the money to pay for anything except meals and Tom's parents were all but useless in everything.
So it was this or a very long, arduous road ahead.
"His grades are steadily improving," Mr. Hart said as he flipped through paperwork on his desk. The man seemed to be trying to not look at either of them and it was starting to get on his nerves. "However, Mr. Harris has a tendency to use his grades as a means of retaliation so I'm not going to hold out the hope that this improvement is permanent."
"What?" Wolf asked, thoroughly confused by that statement.
"Oh I thought you knew," Mr. Hart replied as Tom sunk down in his seat in embarrassment. "He purposefully tanked his grades to piss off his parents. Everyone knows that. He seemed quite pleased with himself back then."
Wolf glared at the teenager to his right and received nothing but a cheeky smile in return. Yes, Wolf certainly believed that Tom was pleased with himself.
"Well, he's not living with either of them anymore," Wolf told the teacher. Mr. Hart eyed him critically and Wolf was absurdly grateful for his military discipline otherwise he may have squirmed. "I don't put up with bad grades and he knows that. He won't pull the same trick with me."
"Ms. Cowley told me about you," Mr. Hart replied. Ms. Cowley was Tom's science teacher, someone that Wolf was very familiar with. He had met with her on several occasions about getting the kid back on track with school. She was newly divorced, just a little bit older than him, and liked to flirt. Wolf rather liked her. "She said that you were much easier to work with than either of the other two."
"Thank you?" Wolf said, confused about how to appropriately reply to that. He wondered what kind of damage Tom's parents had managed to do to their kid's school reputation.
"Yes, well, as long you promise not to engage in a brawl in the chemistry room, I'll be happy to recommend removing Mr. Harris from academic probation."
"I promise," Wolf said immediately, suddenly glad that it was Tom who was the crazy one in this relationship and not himself. Apparently, not throwing violent temper tantrums at the parent-teacher conferences was a good thing.
00000
Mrs. Rothenfeld was old, wrinkled, had three inch thick glasses, and was Alex's favorite teacher in the world. She taught history and she was likely the kindest and possibly the quirkiest person he knew which was saying something. Every now and then he would idly wonder if Mrs. Rothenfeld and Tom were distantly related.
"Where's Jack?" Mrs. Rothenfeld asked the second Eagle's butt hit his chair. He blinked in surprise.
"She's at home, sick. She thinks she may have the flu," he responded. "I'm her fiance, Andy Rosten."
"Ah, yes, you're the new management."
Alex desperately tried to hide a smirk but it was clear that Eagle had picked up on the teacher's terminology.
"Yes, ma'am."
"Well, I prefer Jack," she said. "She's American."
"Yes, ma'am."
"Now, on to Rider," Mrs. Rothenfeld continued, holding up Alex's file in front of her face so that she was basically hidden from view. All they could see was her white hair which was always unruly and stuck up in every direction. "He's doing perfectly fine in my opinion but the asswipe Headmaster insists on monitoring the boy as if he's a criminal with syphilis so I'm afraid I have a very detailed report for you."
Alex was physically hurting in his effort not to laugh at the sight of Eagle's face when Mrs. Rothenfeld let loose with her first cuss word. Mrs. Rothenfeld wasn't one to ever hold back an opinion and since she disguised openness with age-related battiness no one ever called her out on it either.
"Now, on Wednesday January 29th, I dispatched him and several other students to look for the infamous hidden bunker our paranoid wartime Headmaster had supposedly built. You may receive a disciplinary notice about the resulting sledgehammer incident. You can just ignore that.
"On Friday February 14th we did a detailed historical analysis of Valentines day in which Alex offered some very good commentary, not all of it age appropriate but it was hilarious so I let it go.
"On Wednesday March 6th, we had the incident of the spider and the can of hairspray of which the class has decided to never speak of again.
"On Tuesday March 11th, Alex's mobile rang in the middle of my lecture on the Treaty of Versailles. The ringtone was a highly vulgar rap song which I thoroughly enjoyed.
"On-"
It was at this point that Eagle pulled himself together, gathered control of his open jaw, and interrupted her.
"Excuse me, Mrs. Rothenfeld, but can you elaborate on why you're keeping detailed notes on Alex's behaviour?" he asked and Mrs. Rothenfeld lowered her file to answer.
"The Headmaster asked all the teachers to keep a close on Mr. Rider in case he turned out to be, oh what's the term, 'ganged up'. I informed the Headmaster that his request was ridiculous and f**king stupid considering I have better things to do than spy on my students. After all, I'm 83 years old and this school has never been as lively as when Alex and Tom are here."
Alex smiled with an unhealthy level of self-satisfaction.
"Now as nothing but a lowly history teacher I am required to follow the orders trickling down from the administration office. Although, I did tell the Headmaster that wanting to know about what happens in my class would simply end in a migrane. I do suspect that the resulting frustration from handing in my report will be absolutely hilarious."
"Okay," Eagle said sounding so unsure of himself that Alex patted his shoulder in support. "But, um, what about his grades?"
"Oh, those are wonderful," Mrs. Rothenfeld replied. "Shall we continue?" Before poor Eagle could answer the question she had disappeared behind the file again.
"On Thursday March 20th, there was an usual amount of silly string covering my chair and a rather giggly set of pupils. I cannot say that Mr. Rider was responsible for this purple disaster but I must say I thought it a prank well played."
00000
Tom was engaged in an all out battle with the vending machines, which included angry mumbling and strange faces, when Eagle and Alex popped up next to him. People were milling around like crazy, going from one teacher to the next and getting lost each time. Others were leaving, having finished all their appointments for the night. However, they all skirted around the teen with his arm up the vending machine trying to knock loose the Pop Tarts he'd paid for but not received.
"You'll never reach those," Alex said and began taking off his belt.
"If you streak through this school, I'm leaving you here," Eagle said looking annoyed.
"Move," Alex said, completely ignoring Eagle in favor of ordering Tom around. Tom removed his arm from the vending machine and stood back, giving Alex room to work. The blond folded his leather belt in two, slipped his arm into the machine, and used the belt to bat down Tom's snack. He handed a very happy Tom his Pop Tarts in less than ten seconds.
"Where's Rey?" Eagle asked.
"We were meeting with Ms. Cowley and she asked to talk to him in private about something important," Tom replied. "I'm sure he'll be here in a second. Are you guys done?"
"Yeah, we just had Mrs. Rothenfeld," Alex said.
"Oh! I love that crazy old bat!"
"I'm sure you do," Eagle said, blithely thoroughly annoyed. This had been the strangest night he'd been through in a long time. He was, however, glad to think that Alex was moving past that year long absence and doing fairly well in school. Jack would be pleased with that news.
"Did you get all the signatures you needed to get off probation?" Alex asked, reaching over and taking a piece of Pop Tart straight out of Tom's hand. It was a testament to how comfortable they were with each other that Tom didn't even react; Eagle had seen him bite at people who tried to take his food.
"Almost," Tom said. "Ms. Cowley wanted to talk to Rey first."
"About what?" Eagle asked, looking at his watch. Jack was home alone with a fever and he had promised he'd stop and get some medicine on the way home. He was anxious to leave.
"She didn't say," Tom said. Eagle brushed past him, clearly retracing the steps he'd taken when he'd been in Ms. Cowley's room to talk about Alex. The boys followed.
"It's rude to barge in on other people's meetings," Alex told him and Eagle completely ignored him. When they reached the classroom Eagle sprang the door open and they were all immediately assaulted with the unpleasant view of Wolf and Ms. Cowley snogging. She was sitting on her desk, legs wrapped around him, and his shirt was completely unbuttoned. They broke apart at the sound of the door and when Wolf saw who was standing there he tried desperately to get the buttons back into their appropriate holes and was failing miserably.
"Oh my god!" Tom shouted, looking mortified. He clasped his hands over eyes. "My eyes! They burn!"
"Tom!" Wolf shouted back, looking equally mortified. He was clearly about to explain but Tom suddenly took off down the corridor shouting, "My eyes! My eyes! Oh my god! EWWWW!"
Alex descended into completely uncontrollable laughter as Wolf followed his ward leaving his snogging partner standing in the classroom all by herself looking as if she was both pissed for being ignored and embarrassed that two of her students had caught her doing what she'd been doing.
"That's highly unprofessional," Eagle admonished which only made Alex laugh harder. He was past the point the of making any noise and was trying desperately to stop in the hope that he would be able to breathe again.
"Excuse me?" Ms. Cowley asked defensively, flipping her mussed black hair over her shoulder. She looked like the quintessential mean girl, something Alex didn't find funny which meant he could breathe again.
"Why didn't you just ask him out and do all that snogging crap off campus?" Eagle continued and Alex wondered when he'd gotten so prudish. He'd been in caught in that same position with Jack by both Tom and Alex a few times before. The first time it had happened Alex had put dye in his toothpaste with had turned Eagle's teeth orange for a few days. Jack had been so busy laughing at him they hadn't been able to snog until the dye washed off.
"I hardly have to explain myself to you," she snapped. Alex wondered if she was aware that Wolf and Eagle were good friends and not just connected through their respective wards. He didn't think she did.
He spotted a piece of paper on one the student desks which he recognized as Tom's removal from probation form. Grabbing it, he saw that Ms. Cowley had yet to sign it. She was the only teacher who hadn't.
"You need to sign this Ms. Cowley," he said, handing it to her. She snatched it out of his hand, signed it, and thrust it back without a word. Alex pocketed it and left wondering where Tom and Wolf had run off to.
00000
Alex found the two runaways standing under a completely random streetlight in the car park. Tom looked disgusted and defensive; Wolf looked embarrassed.
"You can't date my teacher!" Tom exclaimed just as Alex drew level with them.
"We aren't dating," Wolf said. "It just sort of happened."
"Well, you can't just happen with my teacher either! School's difficult enough. Keep everything in your pants and mouth and keep hands to yourself!"
"Alright! I'm sorry."
"And I lost my Pop Tart because of you! You owe me a new one!" It was at this point that Eagle came to a screeching halt in the Mini not four inches from Alex's toes.
"All of you get in this car right now or I'm going to shoot you!" he yelled through the open window. They looked at each other in surprise but they all followed the order regardless. The ride back was completely silent and more than a little tense. However, Alex was lounging in the front seat, perfectly content. Despite his earlier reservations, he'd had a perfectly enjoyable and entertaining night.
He wondered if he could get Eagle to go to more school functions.