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Ingrid loved summer session. There were no students, lax hours, and, somehow, the other faculty was even more at ease with each other.
They’d go out for happy or order lunch in and, despite the mountains of lesson planning and paperwork, it was all around a chill time.
It was very ominous, therefore, when Principal Byleth gathered all of the teachers together for a special meeting.
It was bright enough outside that they kept the lights off -- which made Byleth’s entrance even more dramatic. The door was covered by a sunbeam, and they were using their principal’s walk.
Trouble was brewing.
Ingrid was on the other side of the room from Sylvian, but snuck him a raised eyebrow. He shook his head. Don’t know either .
Dorothea, however, seemed positively amused.
“Someone,” Byleth started, holding a ruler and a manila envelope in each hand, “left their underwear in by the copy machine.”
To prove their point, Byleth stabbed the inside of the envelope with the ruler and retracted it with a pair of cotton panties hanging from the tip.
No one said a word.
Dorothea feigned shock and covered her mouth with her hands, and most of the male teachers’ eyes went wide.
“Look,” Byleth continued, sighing. “I really don’t care what any of you do in your personal life. But please, please don’t contaminate shared spaces. For goddesses’ sake, keep it in your own classrooms, please?”
Ingrid stifled a laugh -- that sex on school property was fine as long as it was in their respective spaces was incredibly Byleth. They’d always had a loose leadership style.
Still…
“I don’t need to know who it is. Just don’t let it happen again. Meeting over.”
The teachers filed out back to their respective rooms in silence.
The next week, therefore, was filled with questions about the mystery bangers.
It happened in the hallway. Claude, who had been amassing a ridiculous amount of pool noodles, threw one at Sylvain and pretended to joust.
“Sure it wasn’t you, Gautier?” he yelled, taking a hit to the shoulder.
Sylvain, who’d gotten a faceful of noodle, laughed. “Can’t have been me, I wasn’t here that day.”
Claude wasn’t convinced, but let it drop.
In the lunchroom, Dorothea fielded accusations with ease.
“Felix hasn’t so much as looked at me this semester.” Hilda had asked her about the student’s shipping wars, and Dorothea had feigned hurt. “Are you sure it wasn’t you and Mari?”
“Pfft. Mari doesn’t look at me either. I wish,” Hilda replied.
Ingrid walked in as Hilda was laying out the rather complicated history between her, Marianne, and Claude.
“You know, Annette has been suspiciously quiet…” Ingrid said offhandedly, heating her lunch in the microwave.
“No!” Both Dorothea and Hilda exclaimed.
“She’s stealing Felix from me?” Dorothea said, at the same time as Hilda yelled -- “They’re finally together?”
“Just saying.”
A few teachers cornered Felix as he walked through the front doors the next morning.
“So Felix,” said Dimitri, who was already beginning to psychoanalyze the man. “Heard something interesting yesterday.”
“And what’s that?” replied Felix, eyes narrowing.
“Cut to the chase Blaiddyd,” chimed Leonie. “We know it was you Felix.”
“What was me?” Felix questioned curtly, face beginning to frown.
Everyone took a half step back as Dimitri opened his mouth. “So you and Annette huh?”
Felix stopped in his tracks and glared Dimitri down. “I will cut you,” he said, stomping off to his office.
Sylvain, Dorothea, and Ashe who were hiding around the corner, came out.
“I don’t think it’s him,” Ashe said.
“No, I don’t either,” Sylvain added.
They had a pool party at the end of the week.
By then, the accusations had turned into a fever’s pitch, and Edelgard had taken command and put together a council of teachers who set out to find the truth. Hubert, Bernadette, Claude, and Lysithea, all of whom had alibis or enough reason not to be accused, sat in lawn chairs at the top of the pool.
“Let’s get to the bottom of this,” said Claude, and half the teachers snickered.
“First piece of evidence. The underwear. We all only saw it when Byleth took it out.” Bernadette had memorized the script and practiced enough times that her voice didn’t falter.
“Second, we know it had to have happened over the weekend. That meeting was a Tuesday, and only a few people were here on Monday. And it definitely wasn’t Mari and Hubert.”
Hubert remained stoneface, and Marianne shook her head quickly.
“Third, look guys,” Lysithea reasoned. “It’s perfectly healthy to have sex.”
“So with all of this evidence,” Edelgard said, bringing a pool noodle above her head for emphasis,” who is it?”
The conversations continued during the party. They brought out a grill and set a volleyball net above the middle of the pool, and let each group talk. At the end of the party, everyone would cast a vote. ANyone uncomfortable could opt out, but no one did. It was far too amusing.
Ingrid, who had been avoiding Sylvain, finally stole a moment.
“So what are we gonna do,” she whispered while making a plate of hotdogs.
“What do you mean?” Sylvain asked, reaching for the condiments.
“You know what I mean. No one actually thinks it was Annette and Felix anymore.”
“Who else could it have been?” he shrugged.
Ingrid sighed. “The ONE time…”
“The one time what?” asked Felix, who had come up on the other side of Sylvain with a plate of chips.
Ingrid almost jumped out of her skin, and Felix did a double take, side-eying Sylvain, then Ingrid.
“Oh, I see…. He smiled, quickly walking away before the pair could grab ahold of his arm. “Hey Annette…”
Ingrid and Sylvain looked at each other.
“Fuck.”
“That’s what got us in this mess, idiot.”
“Fuck.”
Two weeks before:
“Oh my god, someone’s coming,” Ingrid whispered.
“I hope it’s you,” sylvain replied.
“No, dammit, I mean someone’s in the building. Quick - hide in here.” She pulled them both in a closet right as the door to the teacher’s lounge opened.
Annette came into the room whistling, but stopped short when she turned on the lights. “Oh… lord,” she said.
She must have seen something, because Ingrid heard the sound of scuffling and then Annette quickly leaving the room.
Just as he made to open the door of the closet, Ingrid grabbed Sylvain’s arm.
“Oh shit,” she said, elbowing Sylvain.
“Ow, what?” he said.
“She found my underwear,” she said, face redder than Sylvain’s hair.