Not a Student

Kellin’s had teaching jobs at other schools before, but this is a new place, and it’s also the first time his job is full-time and not just as a short- or long-term substitute. He’s sure that the rest of the year will be easier, but considering that today is his first day as this high school’s new art teacher, he feels like he has the right to be a little bit nervous. He’s not sure what it is that he’s nervous about, exactly, but he’s definitely nervous about something.

He’s met most of the other teachers before, but there are a few he still doesn’t know yet, and maybe he’s just afraid that he won’t make a good first impression. He wants to get off on the right foot with his new coworkers, because he’ll (hopefully) be working with them for quite a while.

His first couple classes go surprisingly well, though most of it is just introductions. He’s starting to feel more confident, but while he’s walking back from the bathroom during his break period, he passes an unfamiliar dude whom he hasn’t officially met yet but whom he’s pretty sure is a teacher. This wouldn’t be significant at all, if it weren’t for the fact that this guy is young and attractive, and also if it weren’t for the fact that this guy gives Kellin one look before saying sternly, “Where are you going?”

Kellin raises an eyebrow at the guy, stopping in his tracks. “Um…back to my room? Art class?”

The guy narrows his eyes. “Doesn’t the art teacher have break this period?”

That’s when Kellin realizes: this guy thinks he’s a student.

“Yeah,” he says, a knowing smile crossing his lips. “I am the art teacher.”

The guy just stares at him for a moment in disbelief and embarrassment. “Oh, wow,” he says simply. “Sorry. You just looked…young.”

Kellin laughs a little, feeling some of the nervousness from being around this guy start to dissipate. “I get that a lot, it’s fine,” he says casually. “May I ask who you are, exactly?”

“Oh, right,” the guy says, extending his arm out and shaking hands with Kellin. “Vic Fuentes. English teacher.”

Kellin nods, taking the opportunity to fully take Vic in. He’s heard of this dude before, and now that he thinks about it, he can kind of remember overhearing a student from one of his art classes talking about how their English teacher is hot. He’d bet a lot of money that the kid was talking about Vic, and, well, that kid was certainly right.

“Kellin Quinn,” Kellin says. “Art teacher. As you know.”

“Nice,” Vic replies, looking Kellin up and down quickly before adding, “I’m on my lunch break, too, by the way. That’s how I knew that the art teacher was supposed to be on break. I didn’t actually get lunch yet, though.”

“Me, neither,” Kellin admits, suddenly feeling slightly nervous again under Vic’s gaze.

Vic perks up a little. “Wanna eat with me? I could, ah, show you the ropes a little bit.”

Kellin can’t help himself and finds himself nodding again, a tiny smile creeping onto his face. He’s a teacher in his twenties now, but with the way Vic is looking at him and talking to him, he swears to God that he’s feeling like a teenager again.

—

Kellin and Vic become friends fairly quickly, but no matter how many times they see each other, Vic still says, “I swear you still look like a student sometimes. You’re small enough, and your face is all…pretty boy-ish. But you’re also a lot more attractive than most students, so that’s what gets me.” He says this casually, and Kellin can never tell if it’s an attempt at flirting or not. He doesn’t want to get his hopes up, though, so most of the time, he assumes that that’s just how Vic is. He probably shouldn’t even be interested in this guy in the first place.

“Vic really likes you, you know,” one of the math teachers says one day a few weeks later while they’re hanging out in the teachers’ lounge.

Kellin looks at her skeptically, unwilling to believe it. “No way. I always thought he was just nice.”

She snorts. “Oh, no. He’s never that nice to people. He must’ve really taken a liking to you.”

Kellin blushes and looks away.

That’s the conversation that opens Kellin’s mind up to all the possibilities, and once he starts thinking about it, he just can’t stop. He finds himself doodling sketches of Vic in his spare time, whether he means for it to happen or not. There were many things that he imagined might go down at this new school, but crushing on another teacher was not on his list.

It happens while they’re eating lunch together in Vic’s room again, Vic sitting at his own desk and Kellin, comically, sitting at one of the student desks near him. They’re not saying much today, but they keep glancing back and forth at each other, and finally, Kellin can’t take it anymore: “One of the math teachers told me she thought you’d, uh, taken a liking to me.”

Vic raises an eyebrow to cover up his obvious alarm. “Well, you know those math teachers,” he jokes, but it doesn’t sound as nonchalant as he’s going for. “Can’t trust anything they say.”

“So you don’t like me, then?” Kellin teases. “We’re having lunch together, dude.”

At that, Vic laughs a little. “Well, I mean, yeah, but…” He bites his lip. Then, seeming to try to change the subject, he says, “Sitting in that desk, you really do look like a student.”

Kellin stands up and slides over a few feet to the front of Vic’s desk, a tiny smirk on his face. “If I were a student,” he says, “then, legally, I wouldn’t be able to kiss you.”

That’s the final straw for both of them. As Kellin leans forward, Vic pushes his lunch out of the way and pulls Kellin in by the collar of his shirt, the two of them meeting in a sloppy kiss over the large desk. It doesn’t last long, but it’s certainly long enough.

“Holy shit,” Vic says simply when they pull away, his eyes wide and the hint of a smile on his lips.

Kellin’s smirk gets a little bigger as the reality of what just happened starts to set in. “Well,” he says, “it’s a good thing I’m not a student, huh?”