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The day started out normal, just like any other day. Kids arrived at school and the ones who had math class first period filed in half asleep and so not ready for numbers this early in the morning. Len was literally worried that one of them who was barely dragging himself across the room might pass out at any moment, land on the hard tile, crack his head open, and then have to be rushed to the emergency room. And worst of all, as the teacher of the class their son almost died in, Len would have to talk to the parents about it.
He really hated dealing with the parents. Just in general, really. Whatever happened to the good old days when parents used to always side with the school and the teacher instead of treating their kids like special snowflakes that could do no wrong?
Raymond was much better at dealing with parents than Len was. He even enjoyed it! Then again, Raymond was made out of sunshine and puppies, so of course he would. He would also be the first one to tell him that he was being unfair about why he disliked dealing with parents. He would say it’s a good thing that these days parents are willing to stand up for their children and be advocates for them. Schools weren’t always right in their assessment of issues or the way they doled out punishments, after all.
But, thankfully, the kid made it to his desk before collapsing and beginning to drool on his bookbag, which he was using as a pillow, so Len would probably not have to deal with his parents today. Unless, of course, when class started he refused to wake up.
Len didn’t have a lot of time to contemplate about that, though, before the bell rang, loud and piercing and causing Len to wince a little bit and the students who were trying to nap jumped and groaned.
“Alright, nobody get excited…” Len said as he slid over to his computer to do attendance and check a few things.
His only response was a collective sort of groaning sound, but it was the usual response this early.
“Mr. Palmer, what are we doing today?” Amy called out from the middle row. She tended to catch onto lessons quickly and this sort of question from her usually indicated that she was hoping they’d move on to something else because she already understood what they’d been doing so far.
“Same thing as yesterday; inversions,” Len answered, knowing it wasn’t what she wanted to hear. Or what anyone else wanted to hear, either, judging by the whining. But some of them needed the extra practice. Those scores on yesterday’s homework proved it.
Still, Len paused in what he was doing to give them all a look. He was about to inform them about the importance of practice when suddenly there was a loud BOOM from the hallway.
“Christ!” Len usually wouldn’t yell like that, but that had been really loud.
He practically leapt out of his chair in an attempt to get over to the door. He thought he might have shouted at the kids to huddle at the back of the room, worried they might be under fucking attack, when he noticed that the hallway was far from empty.
Lots of students were already in the hall and several were still running out of the classroom across the hall from Len’s, which had smoke billowing out from it.
“R-Raymond!” Len called, trying to make his way through the throng of students who’d clearly come out of their classrooms to watch, along with their teachers, in an attempt to get to the room that had the smoke pouring out of it.
“Let me through! Where’s Raymond?” Len insisted, frantic enough at not seeing his husband that he was having a difficult time not just shoving kids out of his way roughly. He wasn’t doing that, yet, but the restraint wasn't easy.
Thankfully, the other teachers chose that moment to realize they had jobs to do in emergencies and began to take charge of rounding the students up and helping the ones who’d come out of the classroom.
Len darted inside the smoke-filled room, because he still didn’t see his husband. He knew better than to go into a room filled with this much smoke and not even knowing if there was a fire in there, or if another explosion might happen soon, with nothing to protect himself from the smoke or potential heat and fire (or shrapnel…exploding beakers were dangerous, too), but his husband!
He had just been about to try to pull his shirt up over his nose when he literally collided with a tall, solid object.
“Raymond!” Len said, tone somehow both frantic and stern at the same time, willing himself to be right, as he reached out and grabbed firmly to two broad shoulders.
“Y-yeah, it’s me. Sorry...this isn’t, um...as bad as it seems?” Raymond said, coughing and wheezing a bit.
“Not as bad as it seems?? Your classroom is on fire!” Len growled, but he put his arm around his husband and led him back out, glad that he wasn’t too disoriented to find the exit.
The hallway air was tainted with smoke but it was still much cleaner than the classroom’s.
“Not on fire! Just...really smoky…” Raymond said, still coughing, although not wheezing as much. He rubbed at his eyes, red and watering from smoke irritation.
“Raymond…” Len rubbed at his back, and guided him to Len’s classroom where he could grab him a bottle of water.
“No, wait, I have to make sure all the kids are out…” Raymond said, trying to turn around.
“Someone’s already doing that,” Len said, grabbing him the water bottle and handing it to him with the instruction to, “drink.”
“But, they’re my responsibility and I’m the one that took attendance…”
“Drink,” Len insisted.
Raymond sighed but he did what his husband told him to, knowing by now that it was just easier that way.
“You took attendance, so that means it was sent to the office. They know who was in your classroom and someone will make sure everyone’s out,” Len insisted, even though he knew that wasn’t foolproof...or even how it really worked. It was true that the attendance would be checked at the office, but the teacher is the one who is most familiar with the faces and the names together and it would be ideal if Raymond was the one to make sure everyone was out of the classroom.
Len just...didn’t want him to do anything else right now, as selfish as that was. He knew it was wrong, their priority should be the children because... children . But, Raymond was his husband and he was still coughing and his eyes were still burning and…
“What the hell happened?” Len demanded, after making Raymond take a little more water.
“Okay, well, there was this really cool experiment I thought we should try and I was just showing the class the finishing touches when--”
“Oh for...Raymond, you had better not be about to tell me that you blew up your own classroom,” Len frowned at his husband, although he had to admit this wasn’t very unexpected. He’d blown up their kitchen and their garage more than a few times. And Mick’s shed. And Lisa’s backyard didn’t really survive that fireworks fiasco unscathed but that was partially Mick’s fault. Lisa blamed Len, though. Of course.
“Well, I didn’t actually blow up the classroom. I mean, it’s still there and everything should be reasonably intact…” Raymond defended.
“Reasonably intact…” Len narrowed his eyes.
“Well, the stuff we used for the experiment is probably mostly unusable, but the table should be fine and I don’t think anything else would’ve been damaged. Like I said, it’s just really smoky, no fire,” Raymond said, and smiled brightly like he was commenting on the nice weather they were having today.
“...Are you trying to get fired? I realize teaching science to high schoolers wasn’t your first choice, but I thought you said--”
“Len! Len, no, I’m not trying to get fired. I like teaching here. It really was just an accident,” Ray did his best to reassure his husband. It was true, teaching a high school science class wasn’t Ray’s first choice...teaching a university science class was. He’d even been accepted at the local university to do just that, but...he’d turned it down and told Len they just didn’t have any openings. He knew he shouldn’t have lied, but his husband would’ve insisted and...well, Ray had decided he’d liked the idea of teaching in the same building as his husband, right across the hall from each other, and annoying each other in the teacher’s lounge.
He’d tell Len about his deception one day, but...not today.
“Well, you’re going to get fired if you have too many of these accidents,” Len said, pretending to be exasperated with Raymond because...the way his husband was looking at him was threatening to make him blush and he didn’t want that. Certainly not in public.
“Mr. Palmer?” Ben, the sleepy one, had come up to them. Apparently the crisis in the science room wasn’t so interesting anymore now that the teachers had most everything under control at this point.
“Yes?” Len asked, raising an eyebrow but keeping a hand on Raymond so he couldn’t frolic off to the science room before it was aired out and inhale more smoke.
At least they both hadn’t answered at the same time. When they were together that did happen sometimes and it tended to cause no small amusement to students within earshot.
“Does this mean we don’t have to do inversions today?”
Len frowned. He was tempted to give them all extra homework. Raymond included, with the way he was snickering.