Give Me Back My Prompts - 1. 546 - Mistaken Identity

“Just slowly rub it in, why don’t you!”

Ewan laughed heartily, and slapped his friend’s shoulder. The other guys in the common room had fallen about in similar fits of giggles, and Jim was becoming so red in the face it was a wonder he was still able to draw breath.

“Oh dude, your face.”

“Shut up,” Craig whined, shifting his weight from foot to foot, looking decidedly uncomfortable. “You guys are horrid.”

“We weren’t the ones flirting with the new teacher,” Jim pointed out, having regained full control of his lungs.

“I was not flirting!” Craig huffed.

“Sure….” Ewan rolled his eyes at his best friend and shook his head. “Because I normally bat my lashes at members of staff and ask them to join us playing basketball.”

Craig glared at him. The incident had been a whole week ago, and he really hadn’t been expecting his friends to hold onto the moment of sheer humiliation and use it against him again. Having salt rubbed in a raw wound was bad enough, but to feel the hot shame anew all over again was worse.

“I didn’t know he was a teacher!” Craig snapped, and stormed out.

“C’mon dude, we’re only teasing….” Jim called, but Craig didn’t bother to stop.

He snarled at some nameless first year who got in his way, stomped down the corridor, and banged the door open in a manner which would have got him into terrible trouble had anyone seen as he exited into the fresh air. The whole thing had been damn shitty luck as far as he was concerned, and it wasn’t hit fault the new teacher had started on a non-uniform day, and that he looked so incredibly young.

“Shit….” Craig scuffed the ground with the toe of his school shoes as he muttered.

He’d been walking with Ewan to the common room when they’d rounded a corner to find a group of deeply impressionable fourth year girls fawning over the new teacher. Ewan had said something, Craig hadn’t responded in time, and then he’d had the piss ripped out of him again by all his friends for a ten minute mistake.

Since he’d come out at the beginning of the year, all his friends had been remarkably cool with the fact the boy they’d known for the last seven years was gay, but that didn’t mean Craig hadn’t been incredibly careful around them. He’d not said anything when he’d seen guys he liked, ignored the eyes across the skate park given to him by a skinny gorgeous boy in ripped up jeans who went to another school, played every single situation safe and close to the chest. But it was February now, graduation was a scant four months away, and Craig was sick of hiding so much about himself. So when he’d seen the new boy standing on the tennis courts in jeans and a slightly rumpled button down shirt, looking a touch lost, Craig had bounced over to say hi.

It had been an easy sort of conversation, and in hindsight Craig realised he’d done almost all the talking, introducing himself, making small talk, feeling that finally there might be someone who could lift his final school days from the miasma of celibacy and boredom. He hadn’t noticed anything much, other than the way the other young man smiled at him, the glimmer in his dark chocolate eyes, until there was a greeting from a teacher, and the person he’d been speaking to turned with a nod, accepting tea and a freshly printed staff badge. Craig had blushed hard, turned away, and thought perhaps the earth might open up and swallow him to save him from the embarrassment of what he’d done.

“Bollocks!”

“Careful there, someone might hear you.”

Craig span around so fast he made himself dizzy, and gaped at the new teacher, the man he’d thought was a boy, who leant back against the brick wall, one hand in his pocket, the other cradling a cup of coffee like it was the elixir of life. He made to back into the door, but stopped when he realised the new teacher wasn’t glaring at him, or even looking at him, but staring out into the blank middle distance with an expression of hopelessness.

“Sir?”

“Craig, isn’t it?”

“Yes sir.” Craig arched an eyebrow at the new teacher, skimming his staff ID for his name. “Mr Hill?”

“Ye Gods, I sound like my father.” He shook his head gently, his expression perplexed. “Thank you for talking to me the other day.”

“Sure...um.” Craig frowned at the new teacher. “You know I thought you were a student?”

“Sometimes I wish I was, this teaching business is harder than it looks.”

“Sir?”

“Greg, actually. You weren’t the first to make that mistake. When I came for the interview the receptionist thought I was a student transfer. She tried to send me to a tutor group.”

“You’re kidding?” Craig gaped at him.

“I wish.” Greg Hill looked sideways at him and sipped his coffee. “How old do you think I am Craig?”

Craig had learnt, long ago when he was still a boy and teachers were bigger and scarier than there were now he was a senior, never to answer such a question. He shrugged.

“Twenty-two. You’re eighteen, right?”

Craig nodded.

“Fuck. How am I ever going to get through this?”

Craig suddenly felt sorry for the young man. Greg drained the rest of his coffee as though he had a grudge against it, and placed the cup on the floor with exaggerated care. Craig got the feeling he was out here hiding from the world, which gave them something in common at least. Greg glanced over at him with the sort of smile Craig had hoped to see from someone, someday, and he blushed.

“You know I fancy you, don’t you?”

“Yes,” Greg replied, his smile un-fading.

“Four months until graduation,” Craig offerred.

The new teacher laughed gently, reached out a hand and gripped his shoulder for a heartbeat before retreating.

“I’ll wait. Come keep me company of duty tomorrow in the playground, and you can fill me in one everything a guy needs to know around here. OK?”

“Sure thing.” Craig straightened his blazer and tie, then gave Greg Hill his most winning smile. “After all, prefects are supposed to help out the staff.”