Chapter Text
Color theory wasn’t the most riveting thing to a bunch of highschoolers.
Sure, some were able to fake interest better than others, but you knew the difference right off the bat. The glassy look in their eyes when you talked about primary, secondary, tertiary colors and their complements couldn’t be hidden no matter how hard they tried.
It was understandable. You wanted to get straight into painting too, but they needed to know the basics first and foremost. At least you weren’t as dry as your old art history professor… or, at least, you hoped to hell you weren’t.
It probably didn’t help that the art rooms were connected to the beautiful gardens the high school had on the grounds. Their eyes were want to wander to the greenery that they weren’t allowed to be in until a good week into the semester. Honestly, if you weren’t so good at multitasking, the flowers and plants would have distracted you too, but you excelled at talking about one thing while thinking about another.
“And so, complementary colors are important when shading--” You continued the lesson, keeping your voice as light as possible in an attempt to keep their interest for as long as possible. There were only about ten minutes of this period anyway and then they can book it to lunch.
Out of the corner of your eye, you took in the beautiful flowers that bloomed near your windows and your hand itched to use your pastels to capture them on paper. Luckily you could do just that during your lunch break.
Almost as if on queue, the lunch bell rang and a clatter of chairs popped your attention back to your students.
“Alright everyone, tomorrow we will talk more about shading and color choice, but then we’ll actually crack open the sketchbooks.” You hear a good amount of appreciative murmurs as the students filed out of your classroom.
“I can’t wait for tomorrow!” A happy voice came from your desk and you turned to smile at the owner. Your teacher assistant, a rabbit monster named Tizzie grinned back at you.
Besides the beautiful school grounds and wonderful online reviews, what drew you to this school was how inclusive it was. Your students and fellow teachers were an almost equal ratio of human to monster. The school’s progressiveness really called out to you when you applied for the job.
“I know, you’ve been excited to actually draw, right?” You chuckled, checking around the room to make sure students didn’t leave anything behind. Your humanoid rabbit friend stood to help, nodding very enthusiastically.
“Yeah!! Oh, not like I don’t like the technical stuff too, but I hear a lot of it in my other college classes!” You giggled again as you watched them bounce on the balls of their feet -- their adorable feet, you thought to yourself.
“It’s fine, honey, I understand. Technical stuff is important but --” You lean slightly toward them, as if about to share a secret. “It can get very boring very quick.” The two of you shared a giggle as you stood up straight again. “Anyway, did you want to grab lunch from the teacher’s lounge? I think Robin brought some pound cake today.”
Tizzie gasped. “Gosh!! I love Ms. M’s cake!” If it was possible, they bounced even faster. “Did you want me to grab you a slice?” They were already halfway out the door when they asked.
Laughing, you shake your head. “Nah, it’s fine, go enjoy yourself. But if she’s there, can you tell her that I might have to stay later than normal today?” The two of you carpooled since you lived in the same apartment complex. They gave you a double thumbs up before bounding out of sight. You laugh again at the rabbit’s immeasurable energy before walking toward your desk to grab your supplies.
With the thirty minute lunch break, that gave you more than enough time to at least get a few good sketches of the gardens. You pull up a chair to the nearest window and plopped yourself into it, flipping open to the cleanest page in your sketchpad. Looking out into the gardens, your eyes scanned the area for the first thing that would catch your interest.
The gardens had a few younger students playing around in the safer areas. The high school shared the space with the local elementary and middle schools, so seeing the young children of all kinds laughing and enjoying themselves in the green backdrop was wonderful. If only the rest of the country was like this.
As you continued to look around for something that called out to you, your eyes landed on a man. A very large man. A very large goat man, horns and floppy ears included. Ah, that’s right, you remembered that there was a monster groundskeeper here, but you never actually got the chance to meet him. What was his name? Ashton? No, that didn’t sound right. Asland?
You snorted at your accidental joke. “No no, he’s not a lion.” Though his beard and hair gave him that sort of look. Now you were racking your brain for the name, leaning forward in the chair and staring at the man, as if boring through him with your eyes would make the name pop into your head. He was cute and, unfortunately, your mind automatically thought about how soft he must be. “God, that has to be rude though.” You weren’t sure if calling a grown man ‘fluffy’ was a good idea, even if he was a goat man with fur all over.
Grumbling over your brain drawing a blank, you leaned back into your chair. “What is his name?”
“Asgore.”
The sudden voice behind you made you yelp in surprise and practically fall out of your chair. A loud, joyful laugh mocked you. “Talking to yourself again?” A hand reached out to your arm, helping you haul your ass back into your seat.
Robin grinned at you as you glared up to her. “Don’t startle me like that, asshole.” You muttered, though the smile on your lips contradicted your words. She just grinned bigger. “Wait, how did you know who I was talking about?”
She shrugged lightly, stretching out her back. For someone that was hunched over a computer most of the day, you always envied her posture. It was fine, though, because every chance you got you teased her on the fact that most of her students were taller than her. “Well, you were staring pretty intently at our adorable goat groundskeeper, it was kind of obvious.”
You huff. “I was only staring intently because I couldn’t remember his name.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Seriously, Robin, that’s it. Haven’t even formally met the man, he just really stands out.” You pause, looking at him briefly. He was grinning ear to ear and happily trimmed one of the hedges into the shape of a… dog? You thought at first it was a giraffe because of the long neck but the dog like qualities to it made you think it was just a very artistic dog. You turn back to your friend. “He is adorable though, I’ll give him that.”
“Right?” She sighs dramatically, throwing herself against the back of your chair as you laugh. “You think it’s rude to think about how soft he has to be?”
“God, I was thinking the same thing! I’d want to be his friend just so it wouldn’t be weird if I asked if I could pet his ears.” You both laugh at how terrible you could be.
“I haven’t met him up close, just in passing, but someone that big it has to be a crime to be so adorable…” Suddenly, her eyes got wide.
Your rose your brow. “What?” You chuckled at her. “You remember something you needed to do?”
“No. But that adorable goat man just graduated to adorable and hot goat man.” With a huge grin, she pointed out the window. Letting out a small “Hmm?”, you turned your attention back toward the man of the hour.
And caught him in mid taking off his shirt.
A weird noise caught itself in your throat. Besides the fact that seeing him shirtless answered the question of ‘is he fluffy all over?’ it made you realize he was fluffy in more ways than one. He was built like those mountain men that you saw on those wildlife shows, powerful but not defined. You also noticed that the golden hair that was in his beard was also flecked through his lower abdomen, much like a happy trail. That shirt, as cute as it was with the words ‘Mr. Dad Guy’ on them, did not do his body justice.
You were staring so intently at him as you watched him discard his shirt onto the nearest wheelbarrow, you almost didn’t hear Robin say your name. At what you guess was the third time, you turned toward her. “W-What?” Your voice came out as a small almost croak, your mouth dry for some reason.
“Hm.” She arched a brow. “Seems like you need this.” Reaching out to the table behind you both, she grabbed a bottle of water and held it out to you.
You furrowed your brow. “Why?”
A large shit eating grin plastered itself to her face. “Oh, you just looked very… thirsty .”
On their way back to your classroom, happily full from lunch and cake, Tizzie could hear Robin’s loud laugh and your even louder groan of embarrassment.