Chapter Text
“Come on Max, it’s not gonna be that hard. It’s not like you haven’t been here before. You remember what it’s like,” he thought to himself as he approached the front steps of his old high school on an early January morning, much too early for his liking. But that was exactly the problem, wasn’t it? He does remember what it was like. That’s exactly why he was nervous. The last time he was here hadn’t been bad; he worked as a substitute for the film teacher that had been out sick and all he did was hand out worksheets for some movie that the students were supposed to watch. The time before that though? That had been less than ideal.
Before he worked there as a substitute, he attended the school during his senior year. It hadn’t been horrid, but being the foreign exchange student with an accent that almost no one in that small Southern California city had heard before was…not great. He constantly felt like an outsider, even though he made some friends, but he missed his mom and his sister over anything else, although he had missed them way before he had even left the Netherlands. It had been six years since his graduation, since he decided not to go back home lest he be reunited with his dad, and he still couldn’t shake that feeling, the feeling of longing. Sehnsucht, his German math teacher had called it when Max explained all those years ago, the word somehow more fitting in that language than in English or even Dutch.
Max reached the top of the steps and walked into the office, checking into the substitute sign-in sheet, just like last time, and asked the front desk secretary where the staff meeting was going to be. Normally, he wouldn’t be present at a school’s Monday morning meetings, but he was here for the long term this time around. He’d picked up the job as soon as he could on the substitute portal, seeing that the five-month length of the job opened up the possibility for an internship that would replace the need to do student-teaching. And oh, how he loathed the thought of student-teaching. 600 hours of work without pay? Absolutely. Not. So now here he was, nodding to the secretary and muttering a small thank you as he walked to the meeting.
Max checked his watch as he stepped into the room and realized, a little too late, that he was a little too early. Before he could rack his brain to come up with an escape plan, he heard the school’s principal call him over. “Max! Hello, welcome!” The man stood up to shake his hand as Max walked over to do the same.
“Hi Mr. Horner, nice you see you again.” He smiled shyly as he sat down in the seat across from Mr. Horner as the other man had indicated him to do so.
“Oh no, you’re staff here for the next 5 months, you can call me Christian,” he smiled lightly before he continued. “I have to say, I’m glad you were able to take the job so quickly. I think the kids would have started a riot if they had to see me as their substitute,” Christian laughed this time, but he saw Max’s eyes go wide as anxiety started to write itself all over the young man's face. “Don’t worry though, I’m sure they’ll love you.”
Max let out a sigh of relief, a breath that he didn’t even know he was holding. “Yeah I hope so. I’m substituting for world history though, right? That shouldn’t be too hard,” he tried reassuring himself and hoped that Christian would agree. He was wrong.
“Don’t be so sure Max, history can be tricky sometimes. There’s so many events, dates, and people, that I used to get things mixed up even after 10 years of teaching. Being principal is only marginally easier,” he joked again. “Speaking of administration stuff though, I do need you to head to the computer lab afterwards to pick up your school-issue laptop, that way you can have access to the grading portal even off campus. The lesson plans for the class are going to be on the desk in your classroom, but they’re only for 2 months, you’ll need to write lesson plans for the last three. You should have a good idea of what they should look like by that point.” Christian then reached into his bag on the chair next to him, “and here are your school keys. This one is for the student parking lot gate, this one is for the teacher parking lot gate, and this one is universal for the all of the main doors, except the front gate,” he pointed out all of the keys and handed them to Max before checking his watch. “Oh it’s 6:55, perfect. Staff should be filtering in by now.”
Max took advantage in the lull of the conversation to attach his new keys to his keyring, trying to keep himself busy in order to not freak out about the idea of creating his own lesson plans. For some reason, he hadn’t thought about that being something he would actually have to do, but it made sense. It took him a bit to get the keys in place, and he was putting them in his pocket as he heard his name again. “Max Verstappen! How great to see you again!”
Max knew the voice before he even turned around, the familiar German accent bringing him back to his senior year, a small pang of sehnsucht resonating in his chest before it dissipated just as quickly as it came. He turned around as he stood up, ready to shake the other man’s hand but being pulled into a hug instead. “It’s great to see you too Mr. Vettel,” Max responded as the two pulled apart from their hug. The older man rested a hand on Max’s shoulder, “No no, that is unacceptable. Call me Seb, we’re coworkers now.” He smiled gently as he moved to take the seat next to Max, while a few more people walked into the room and took a seat as well.
Christian was about to get the meeting started, at 7am sharp, just as one last person walked in. “Don’t cry over my absence, I have finally arrived with snacks…and some donuts as well,” the stranger declared. Max snorted at how ridiculously cocky the statement sounded, until he looked up at who had just spoken. He choked on his own spit as the unknown man took off his jacket, revealing some tattoos, and smiled a smile that could rival the very own Sun. He gasped for air as he reached for his water bottle, everyone staring at him. “Yeah, I’d cry over his absence,” he thought to himself as he recovered from the embarrassing scene he’d just caused, a somewhat knowing smile on Seb’s lips as Max looked at the man next to him for some sort of reassurance.