Fic: Substitute Chapter 1 (part 1)
Jee was being honest when he told Headmaster Pakku he was not expecting any glamour. At 38, he suspected his glamour days were already behind him. Which is perhaps a sad conclusion to come to, but Jee was nothing if not a realist and the most recent events in his life did nothing to make him think otherwise. No. It was not glamour nor glory nor glitter he wanted now, nor anything else that started with “g” - what he wanted now was, mostly, to be left alone and perhaps to prove himself useful in some small way that would not involve any further disgrace or humiliation. Because God knew he had had his fair share of that.
Which is why he didn’t pause or even falter in his stride as he entered the sports wing of Summerfield’s Flowing Creek High School. It was, just as Pakku had warned him, definitely lacking in glamour. In fact, it looked pretty much like every default high school corridor, with sterile, polished floors, walls painted in neutrally cheerful colors and a row of trophies, doubtlessly meant to inspire school pride, locked behind a glass screaming success at every unfortunate passer-by.
His new job. Better get used to it.
“This is the swimming pool,” announced Miss Fletcher, deputy headmistress, waving in the direction of an open door and demonstrating her ability to state the obvious. “Over here are the pool locker rooms. The gym proper is through here. The locker rooms of the football team are directly connected to the stadium. Right through here.”
Jee followed the short, stout blond lady obediently, nodding along and making all the proper appreciative noises whenever necessary. It was a pretty standard layout, really, nothing out of the ordinary. Easy to find one’s way about. Flowing Creek High School was not the biggest as far as high schools went and nowhere near as daunting as some of the schools Jee’d seen in his life, for all its aspiration to appear as one. Of course, Summerfield itself was not as affluent as to sustain exceptionally large schools, so Flowing Creek, probably best described as “average,” fitted perfectly into the landscape, which, in Jee’s humble opinion, should be photographed and put into a dictionary as the perfect definition of “average.”
The last on the list, after an exhaustive tour of all the sports facilities Flowing Creek had to offer, was his office. Or, rather, the office he shared with another gym teacher named Piandao, if the nameplate on the other desk was anything to go by. Another Asian, then. This community sure seemed strong around here…
But perhaps he should not be surprised. The town’s Asian district was uncommonly large - and by being so, it was probably the only thing that put Summerfield slightly above the “average” it had slumped to.
“Go on and make yourself comfortable,” invited him Miss Fletcher, who was definitely not Asian. “This part of the room is all yours. You’ll meet Mr. Piandao once the semester starts. He’s a lovely man. I’m sure you’ll get along like a house on fire.”
“Thank you.” Jee sat himself experimentally behind the desk and tried to adjust the revolving chair so that his knees wouldn’t bump the surface every time he shifted position.
“Do you have any more questions?”
“None for the moment, no. You explained everything very well.”
“I’m glad.” Was it him, or did Miss Fletcher actually blush? “I’ll be in my office if you need anything, Lieutenant.”
After which off she trotted, her high heels clicking rhythmically and probably vibrating in echoes throughout the entire building, deserted for now as it was.
Jee sighed and took a look around.
Right. Right…
And then, without any pointless deliberation - because what good it would do him now that he was here, no good at all, might as well get on with things and deal with it head-on - he started making the little space his own.
***
He visited the school several more times before the semester started, both to finish arranging his stuff in the shared office and to familiarize himself with his new haven, its layout as well as its staff. In next to no time he had learned to recognize the faces of most of the teachers, the cleaning personnel and the administrators who happened to be in the building at the same time as he. Taking care to smile, stop by, introduce himself and chat a little, he was on friendly terms with the majority of them by his fourth visit. That was just how he rolled. Practical. No use being standoffish and even more of an alien than he already was. Jee believed in making the most out of every situation, no matter how miserable, and he could certainly use a friendly face or two. It might just relieve the boredom. Besides, he genuinely liked taking an interest in people and could not function very well without someone to joke and to banter with or - when the mood took him - to whine at. That was one of his more valuable skills back in the Navy, where he was directly responsible for dealing with recruits-freshly-turned-sailors and to serve as link between them and the higher officers.
Which worked very well up to a certain point. But there really was no use dwelling on it. What’s done is done and all that…
So he strode through corridors, walking himself gradually into this world and taking mental notes of who was a good chat and whom better to steer away from, finding shortcuts, possible sanctuaries, marking where it was better never to venture again, trying to learn as many names and life stories as he could, and generally made himself as much a part of this new microcosm as possible. On the whole, the Flowing Creek veterans were friendly and curious, treating him as a sort of exotic, honorary mascot - “Oh look, Hester, we got ourselves a real soldier!” “Are you going to introduce morning drills, Lieutenant?” “Such a shame you can’t wear your uniform to work, that’d impress the little demons for sure…” - and Jee smiled and went along with it, indulging in the harmless flirting or taking up the jokes, earning himself more points. Of course there were exceptions, people looking down on him, intimidated by him or just plain weirdoes, ever present in any academic institution, but those were easy enough to deal with or to simply avoid.
By the time the semester started and the corridors were no longer safe to stroll through on account of being thronged with noisy, spotty teenagers, he was as much a “one of us” and “a decent chap” as he would ever be.
He did manage to meet all of his fellow physical education colleagues before the first bell of the year split their ears. Piandao did prove himself a decent enough guy, sharp and pleasant if a tad too sophisticated for Jee’s liking - they would probably get along pretty well and not murder each other after spending a lot of time together sharing one tight space. There was one other Asian coach, a pretty woman called Ming somewhere in her early thirties and endowed with the sort of sharp, sarcastic sense of humor that Jee very much enjoyed. Oddly enough, one of her jobs was coaching the cheerleaders - though as the Lieutenant grew to know her better, he started to think that perhaps it was a conscious choice and that maybe Ming had a masochistic streak to her and simply enjoyed having free food for her inner cynic served her on daily basis. Then there were Mike and Rob, the football and basketball coaches, both big, burly black men, the former having an air of a human-sized teddy bear until he got to the field, the latter wirier, skinnier and drier in general, a man of few words if Jee ever saw one. Martha, a muscular woman with visible traces of Mexican blood, somewhere in her forties and looking like everyone’s favorite aunt in a tracksuit, instantly invited him over for dinner to meet her family, whereas Emily, fresh out of college and still a little unsure of her skills as an educator, shied away from Jee’s attempts to strike a conversation, though she did smile and wished him a good year. And Judy with the slight squint, and Chris who spoke as loudly as most people shouted, and John, and Alice…
It was important to know people. To not be a stranger. To root himself and carve a nice little niche he could fit in. Even if he had to do it over and over again.
And while he worked on that, September loomed over his head, doing nothing to relieve the August heat - if anything, it strengthened it with the spirit of frantic preparations for what was to come. It was a busy period and Jee was glad for it. The schedules were prepared and distributed, the tasks assigned, the meetings held. The school was made ready for a fresh flood of teenage shenanigans.
And Jee, as he parked his old green Ford on his newly-given spot by the gym entrance on the first official day of classes, felt prepared to deal with whatever life threw at him this time.
After all, it wasn’t the first school he would be working at, not the first organization in which he was a new face. It would be fine. As long as he wouldn’t repeat past mistakes, it would be fine.
He would make it fine.
***
He saw Zuko The Teashop Waiter in fifth period - the level 2 martial arts class for boys, obviously - until which point his day had been going as well as could be expected given the circumstances.
After three previous periods, during which he was forced to endure witless freshmen stumbling through an attempt to play volleyball, shout at languid juniors to make them start running and fight off flirty senior girls in their own martial arts class, he could bet he had already gotten himself a nasty nickname or five. None of the students apparently expected having a real class on the first day of school - well, tough luck. They just had to grit their teeth and endure, much like Jee himself had done. It was a good way of drawing himself a mental chart for each class and of identifying the types he had to deal with; those who took his classes for credits only and were terrified to death of everything carrying the faintest whiff of physical exertion were easy enough to pick out. Period one and two were full of those and Jee made a note not to treat them too brutally - he was not a sadist, after all. Period three, though, not so much, as it was an elective course and apparently filled with senior girls willing to be entertai--- taught self-defense by a former Navy officer.
To be perfectly honest, Jee wasn’t sure which was worse, though the attention of all those attractive young ladies was rather flattering. And there were at least two or three girls who did show some promise and previous experience, plus they did not bat their eyelashes or giggle at him, so it was not a totally lost cause.
The vacant fourth period was a true relief after the morning ordeal and Jee welcomed it with open arms - though actually he would have welcomed it a lot more had he shared it with Piandao or Ming. Alas, he would have to make do without his colleagues, as they both had classes then and he would just have to find away to entertain himself on his own for an hour.
If all his classes were to look like today, he might just use it to sleep.
However, he considered it pretty good going if he only felt the urge to throttle five students per class and did not come close to losing his cool even once, which was a new opening-day record for him. The rank of lieutenant probably helped. News travelled fast, especially in a town like Summerfield with precious little apart from rumors to keep the locals entertained, and most of the time Jee found that the students approached him with varying degrees of respect, the timidly fearful type being predominant. The kids honestly did not know what to expect from him and some of them, he noted, were positively terrified, probably imagining he would introduce army drills and iron discipline complete with saluting. Jee was half-tempted to really bring those in, just to live up to those expectations. Naturally, there were some more cheeky ones who seemed bent on testing him, seeing how much they could get away with, and those were dealt with in a very swift, military manner indeed - Jee hoped they would learn their lesson, but if they didn’t, he saw no harm in making them do push-ups and shouting at them to hurry up for the entire hour until the end of term. It was really rather amusing.
With so many distractions around, it was no wonder that he had forgotten all about the moody waiter from the Jasmine Dragon, but when he did spot Zuko - hair just as shaggy as back in the teashop, wearing a loose, sleeveless red shirt and black sweatpants reaching to just below his knees - entering the classroom amidst other boys more or less his age, but keeping a visible distance from them and not joining any bawdy conversations, Jee found himself staring.
Part 2
Or you can read it in one piece on FF.net
Which is why he didn’t pause or even falter in his stride as he entered the sports wing of Summerfield’s Flowing Creek High School. It was, just as Pakku had warned him, definitely lacking in glamour. In fact, it looked pretty much like every default high school corridor, with sterile, polished floors, walls painted in neutrally cheerful colors and a row of trophies, doubtlessly meant to inspire school pride, locked behind a glass screaming success at every unfortunate passer-by.
His new job. Better get used to it.
“This is the swimming pool,” announced Miss Fletcher, deputy headmistress, waving in the direction of an open door and demonstrating her ability to state the obvious. “Over here are the pool locker rooms. The gym proper is through here. The locker rooms of the football team are directly connected to the stadium. Right through here.”
Jee followed the short, stout blond lady obediently, nodding along and making all the proper appreciative noises whenever necessary. It was a pretty standard layout, really, nothing out of the ordinary. Easy to find one’s way about. Flowing Creek High School was not the biggest as far as high schools went and nowhere near as daunting as some of the schools Jee’d seen in his life, for all its aspiration to appear as one. Of course, Summerfield itself was not as affluent as to sustain exceptionally large schools, so Flowing Creek, probably best described as “average,” fitted perfectly into the landscape, which, in Jee’s humble opinion, should be photographed and put into a dictionary as the perfect definition of “average.”
The last on the list, after an exhaustive tour of all the sports facilities Flowing Creek had to offer, was his office. Or, rather, the office he shared with another gym teacher named Piandao, if the nameplate on the other desk was anything to go by. Another Asian, then. This community sure seemed strong around here…
But perhaps he should not be surprised. The town’s Asian district was uncommonly large - and by being so, it was probably the only thing that put Summerfield slightly above the “average” it had slumped to.
“Go on and make yourself comfortable,” invited him Miss Fletcher, who was definitely not Asian. “This part of the room is all yours. You’ll meet Mr. Piandao once the semester starts. He’s a lovely man. I’m sure you’ll get along like a house on fire.”
“Thank you.” Jee sat himself experimentally behind the desk and tried to adjust the revolving chair so that his knees wouldn’t bump the surface every time he shifted position.
“Do you have any more questions?”
“None for the moment, no. You explained everything very well.”
“I’m glad.” Was it him, or did Miss Fletcher actually blush? “I’ll be in my office if you need anything, Lieutenant.”
After which off she trotted, her high heels clicking rhythmically and probably vibrating in echoes throughout the entire building, deserted for now as it was.
Jee sighed and took a look around.
Right. Right…
And then, without any pointless deliberation - because what good it would do him now that he was here, no good at all, might as well get on with things and deal with it head-on - he started making the little space his own.
***
He visited the school several more times before the semester started, both to finish arranging his stuff in the shared office and to familiarize himself with his new haven, its layout as well as its staff. In next to no time he had learned to recognize the faces of most of the teachers, the cleaning personnel and the administrators who happened to be in the building at the same time as he. Taking care to smile, stop by, introduce himself and chat a little, he was on friendly terms with the majority of them by his fourth visit. That was just how he rolled. Practical. No use being standoffish and even more of an alien than he already was. Jee believed in making the most out of every situation, no matter how miserable, and he could certainly use a friendly face or two. It might just relieve the boredom. Besides, he genuinely liked taking an interest in people and could not function very well without someone to joke and to banter with or - when the mood took him - to whine at. That was one of his more valuable skills back in the Navy, where he was directly responsible for dealing with recruits-freshly-turned-sailors and to serve as link between them and the higher officers.
Which worked very well up to a certain point. But there really was no use dwelling on it. What’s done is done and all that…
So he strode through corridors, walking himself gradually into this world and taking mental notes of who was a good chat and whom better to steer away from, finding shortcuts, possible sanctuaries, marking where it was better never to venture again, trying to learn as many names and life stories as he could, and generally made himself as much a part of this new microcosm as possible. On the whole, the Flowing Creek veterans were friendly and curious, treating him as a sort of exotic, honorary mascot - “Oh look, Hester, we got ourselves a real soldier!” “Are you going to introduce morning drills, Lieutenant?” “Such a shame you can’t wear your uniform to work, that’d impress the little demons for sure…” - and Jee smiled and went along with it, indulging in the harmless flirting or taking up the jokes, earning himself more points. Of course there were exceptions, people looking down on him, intimidated by him or just plain weirdoes, ever present in any academic institution, but those were easy enough to deal with or to simply avoid.
By the time the semester started and the corridors were no longer safe to stroll through on account of being thronged with noisy, spotty teenagers, he was as much a “one of us” and “a decent chap” as he would ever be.
He did manage to meet all of his fellow physical education colleagues before the first bell of the year split their ears. Piandao did prove himself a decent enough guy, sharp and pleasant if a tad too sophisticated for Jee’s liking - they would probably get along pretty well and not murder each other after spending a lot of time together sharing one tight space. There was one other Asian coach, a pretty woman called Ming somewhere in her early thirties and endowed with the sort of sharp, sarcastic sense of humor that Jee very much enjoyed. Oddly enough, one of her jobs was coaching the cheerleaders - though as the Lieutenant grew to know her better, he started to think that perhaps it was a conscious choice and that maybe Ming had a masochistic streak to her and simply enjoyed having free food for her inner cynic served her on daily basis. Then there were Mike and Rob, the football and basketball coaches, both big, burly black men, the former having an air of a human-sized teddy bear until he got to the field, the latter wirier, skinnier and drier in general, a man of few words if Jee ever saw one. Martha, a muscular woman with visible traces of Mexican blood, somewhere in her forties and looking like everyone’s favorite aunt in a tracksuit, instantly invited him over for dinner to meet her family, whereas Emily, fresh out of college and still a little unsure of her skills as an educator, shied away from Jee’s attempts to strike a conversation, though she did smile and wished him a good year. And Judy with the slight squint, and Chris who spoke as loudly as most people shouted, and John, and Alice…
It was important to know people. To not be a stranger. To root himself and carve a nice little niche he could fit in. Even if he had to do it over and over again.
And while he worked on that, September loomed over his head, doing nothing to relieve the August heat - if anything, it strengthened it with the spirit of frantic preparations for what was to come. It was a busy period and Jee was glad for it. The schedules were prepared and distributed, the tasks assigned, the meetings held. The school was made ready for a fresh flood of teenage shenanigans.
And Jee, as he parked his old green Ford on his newly-given spot by the gym entrance on the first official day of classes, felt prepared to deal with whatever life threw at him this time.
After all, it wasn’t the first school he would be working at, not the first organization in which he was a new face. It would be fine. As long as he wouldn’t repeat past mistakes, it would be fine.
He would make it fine.
***
He saw Zuko The Teashop Waiter in fifth period - the level 2 martial arts class for boys, obviously - until which point his day had been going as well as could be expected given the circumstances.
After three previous periods, during which he was forced to endure witless freshmen stumbling through an attempt to play volleyball, shout at languid juniors to make them start running and fight off flirty senior girls in their own martial arts class, he could bet he had already gotten himself a nasty nickname or five. None of the students apparently expected having a real class on the first day of school - well, tough luck. They just had to grit their teeth and endure, much like Jee himself had done. It was a good way of drawing himself a mental chart for each class and of identifying the types he had to deal with; those who took his classes for credits only and were terrified to death of everything carrying the faintest whiff of physical exertion were easy enough to pick out. Period one and two were full of those and Jee made a note not to treat them too brutally - he was not a sadist, after all. Period three, though, not so much, as it was an elective course and apparently filled with senior girls willing to be entertai--- taught self-defense by a former Navy officer.
To be perfectly honest, Jee wasn’t sure which was worse, though the attention of all those attractive young ladies was rather flattering. And there were at least two or three girls who did show some promise and previous experience, plus they did not bat their eyelashes or giggle at him, so it was not a totally lost cause.
The vacant fourth period was a true relief after the morning ordeal and Jee welcomed it with open arms - though actually he would have welcomed it a lot more had he shared it with Piandao or Ming. Alas, he would have to make do without his colleagues, as they both had classes then and he would just have to find away to entertain himself on his own for an hour.
If all his classes were to look like today, he might just use it to sleep.
However, he considered it pretty good going if he only felt the urge to throttle five students per class and did not come close to losing his cool even once, which was a new opening-day record for him. The rank of lieutenant probably helped. News travelled fast, especially in a town like Summerfield with precious little apart from rumors to keep the locals entertained, and most of the time Jee found that the students approached him with varying degrees of respect, the timidly fearful type being predominant. The kids honestly did not know what to expect from him and some of them, he noted, were positively terrified, probably imagining he would introduce army drills and iron discipline complete with saluting. Jee was half-tempted to really bring those in, just to live up to those expectations. Naturally, there were some more cheeky ones who seemed bent on testing him, seeing how much they could get away with, and those were dealt with in a very swift, military manner indeed - Jee hoped they would learn their lesson, but if they didn’t, he saw no harm in making them do push-ups and shouting at them to hurry up for the entire hour until the end of term. It was really rather amusing.
With so many distractions around, it was no wonder that he had forgotten all about the moody waiter from the Jasmine Dragon, but when he did spot Zuko - hair just as shaggy as back in the teashop, wearing a loose, sleeveless red shirt and black sweatpants reaching to just below his knees - entering the classroom amidst other boys more or less his age, but keeping a visible distance from them and not joining any bawdy conversations, Jee found himself staring.
Part 2
Or you can read it in one piece on FF.net