Pay Attention, Mr. Iero (Frerard)

22 - Just Pretend

Before I had the chance to ask Professor Way about the conversation he was having with another staff member (presumably one higher up than him) he had already hurried off back to his classroom. Shit. This was bad. Had we been caught by the school? Right as we had just started to make up from my cheating incident? This was not happening...

After giving up on talking to Gerard, I circled around the halls, looking for the other staff member from the conversation, but he had entered some sort of office space that definitely was off limits to me. Besides, what was I going to do? Tell him it was all a big misunderstanding? That us confessing our love alongside the bathroom urinals was just something completely out of context? Maybe the guy would take a bribe to keep quiet? Not that I had much money...

I soon realized as I stood awkwardly outside the closed door to who-know-whose office that I had no chance of bettering the situation. All I could do was hope it wouldn't turn out as bad as it sounded. Sure, Gerard was most likely in trouble for being caught being romantically involved with me, a student, which was totally against the school rules here, but hey, maybe he'd get off with just a warning...? Maybe...?

I decided I'd best be off to my dorm again. At this point, even though I did want to talk with Gerard, I didn't feel comfortable going back into his class after overhearing the not-so-good sounding conversation he had had with someone- not to mention I didn't need the entire classes' eyes on me again after having bursted out of the classroom previously. I had probably already embarrassed myself enough for the day.

Back at the dorm I found Ray once again, who immediately looked up from his desk at me.

"Hey," I said casually, throwing my stuff down and taking off my hoodie. "How'd your day go?"

"Nevermind my day," he spun around in his desk chair, "I wanna know how yours went. Did class go okay? Did you talk to Prof. Way at all?"

I sighed, "Well despite me having a breakdown and running off to the bathroom, it went pretty good. Him and I made up."

Ray's eyes widened, "You already made up? You mean he forgave you?"

I nodded, "I'm just as surprised as you are. But we agreed to take things slow for now though. Get back on track towards a healthy relationship I guess".

Ray was smiling ear to ear, "That's greats news! I'm so happy to hear it, Frank. But I hope you learned your lesson. No more being reckless around people you're close to".

"I know, I know," I sighed, crawling under the covers of my bed and slipping my earbuds in to chill for a while.

Ray went back to writing studious things down in his notebook as he read his assignments. I watched from a distance, listening to music quietly for a while in the safety of my own warm bed. It wasn't long before I pulled out an earbud to ask Ray something... hesitantly.

"Hey, uh, you remember what you were telling me when I first started talking about Prof. Way? You know, how it would be super risky for us to be in a relationship and all that?"

Ray didn't look up from his work, "Trust me, I remember. I told you it was dangerous for him because he could lose his job. But I know you two are practically inseparable now, so I'd imagine taking that risk is worth it."

I bit my lip, debating on whether I should bring up what happened just yet, "You think he'd actually get fired for something like that? I mean it can't really be that big of a deal, right? Surely, a warning or something would get the point across. Maybe a pay deduction or some other scholarly punishment?

Tapping his pencil, Ray considered this, "Well from what I remember reading previously, it was considered to be a pretty serious offense in their rule book. They don't take that sort of stuff lightly here I guess. The school wants to keep up their high reputation and avoid anything that could harm their status. Although, I don't think you two are doing any harm. It's not like he's raising your grade to pass you just because he likes you or anything right?"