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The bell rings and the kids burst out of the classroom, leaving a mess of sheet music in their wake. Buggy stands arms akimbo for a moment, waiting for his annoyed look to get a reaction. A short laugh track plays, just a few chuckles. With a sigh, he crouches down and starts gathering papers together, muttering under his breath. “Jeez, kids these days! No respect for teachers, no respect for things… back in my day we weren’t nearly so bratty.”
“Funny, that’s not how I remember it.”
Buggy stands up straight, sending a shocked look past one of the close-up cameras. His scene partner steps into the doorway behind him for a bit of melodramatic soap opera framing. Galdino plays a track of hysterical screaming and applause; Buggy keeps his expression controlled as the track goes on, and on, and on. This cameo can’t be that highly anticipated, can it? Sure, he was basically the star of the original show before he quit acting, but he’s been on the other side of the camera for twenty years. Who wants to see one of the top four movie producers of the decade appear on a children’s show?
“The way I remember things,” his old co-star says, stepping into the room, “we were little terrors. Teachers from one year warned the next’s that we were gonna be in their class.”
“Yeah, funny how that stopped after you moved away,” Buggy says, tapping his handful of sheet music into a tidy stack and setting it down on his desk. Finally, unable to avoid it any longer, he turns to face Shanks. “Sean.”
Shanks smiles, a little sheepish. “Hi, Bobby.”
Make-up did an incredible job with him, modernizing the mid-length hairstyle that so many nineties tweens demanded it was unofficially renamed ‘the Sean,’ finding him a leather jacket that resembles the iconic oversized hand-me-down without drawing too much attention to the newly empty sleeve. He really looks like an older version of Sean. No one in the show’s intended audience of 11-17 will recognize him, of course, but this isn’t for them. This is for the original show’s thirtieth anniversary, and the highly anticipated nostalgia boost to their numbers.
Buggy clears his expression of any feeling. Bobby is a goddamned professional, even if he’s just a professional middle school music teacher. He isn’t going to let himself be distracted by an old classmate appearing out of nowhere. “What are you doing here, Sean?”
Shanks tilts his head to one side, artlessly charming as ever. “Can’t I just want to look up an old friend?”
Buggy scoffs. “Not during the school day. I have students to prep for, so…” He waves Shanks out.
Shanks steps closer. “Okay, okay, so maybe I have ulterior motives,” he says in an undertone, a conspiratorial smile on his face.
“Shocking,” Buggy deadpans.
“Come on, just hear me out, Buggy, I—” Shanks’ expression contorts as he realizes what he’s done. “Fuck.”
“Cut,” Mihawk murmurs. He snaps, getting his assistant’s attention. “Get Uta and the kids back in here, reset the bell.” Crew bustle around, getting things in order for the restart of the scene.
“Are you kidding me?” Buggy throws his hands up. “Still?!” Twenty years and he still fucks up the name?!
Shanks buries his head in his hand. “I’m really sorry, folks,” he says to the crew at large. “Won’t happen again, I promise.”
“It better not,” Buggy snaps, shoving his neat stack of sheet music back onto the floor. “And hey, don’t swear like that on set again, got me?”
Shanks stares at Buggy like this is the most absurd thing he’s ever heard. Given the mouth Buggy’d had on himself as a kid, that’s fair.
“I have learned to control myself,” Buggy hisses in his face. “You can do the same for one day.”
Shanks’ eyes dip down; he swallows thickly, then smiles. “Can do.”