Peer Pressure

Description: Jinnie just wants to rest. Her Head of Department has some other twisted ideas. Tao is oblivious to all. 

Author's notes: I bet a lot of you can relate to this if you've ever faced a similar situation (such as teachers pressure on me during mocks)

“Good morning!” Tao greets Jinnie.

The mentioned girl grins and greets him back, putting forward a box of cookies she baked for him. They were still just as delicious and delightful to him as they have been for the past two years.

“I wanted to beat you today but damn, traffic.” He wiggles brows as he sits on the chair across her in the staff room.

“Not that you actually can.” She grins and takes one cookie from the box and he hides it so that she doesn’t take no more.

He scans the place around and except for the two of them, the room is empty of a soul.. They were always too early to school. Not that they wanted to be the best teachers, they just wanted to beat each other. 

“How’s it going with the kids?” she asks, going through some notebooks for correction and hears him sigh and rest back.

“Another girl confessed to me yesterday. This is the fourth one. I don’t know what goes around the minds of these high schoolers.” He shakes his head.

“I know right. What did they even see in you?” she tsks and Tao growls at her to which she laughs.

“I’m never going to date a student.” He declares, munching on another cookie.

There was a sense of relief in her, and she smiles more than she should have while staring at him. She loves it whenever he tells her about the sort of girl he will never date and she realizes that she has none of those qualities.

It wasn’t until he raises a brow to warn her about this long enough stare that she reazlies she was lost, and it gets a bit embarrasing.

“Oh...um…did you hear about it? The annual school departments competition?” she tries to change the topic.

“Not again…” he grunts and makes a face. As just he is about to cintue, at the same time the bell rings and they have to go to their respective homerooms.

Both bid each other another short greeting with a slight bow and smile, walking in the opposite directions.

+++

Jinnie was teaching the students about matrices. Majority of them were yawning from time to time and the girls were busy in gossiping while the boys were throwing paper balls at each other. They thought she didn’t notice but a teacher sees everything. Working as one, she has developed a third eye behind her head. 

There was a short knock, and a microsecond later Tao opens the door in haste and heads towards her with strutted steps.

“I needs pins!” he half yells, making her jump in surprise.

“Again?” she sighs and shakes her head. She takes out a box of staples and throws it to him and he catches it in mid air.

He nods with a smile and turns to leave but turns back again with the face like he remembered something else.

“Also the stapler and some papers. Also some sticky notes.” He makes a begging face and she points behind him towards her cupboard.

“Everything you need. I’m coordinated, unlike you.” She shakes her head and Tao makes a face as he grabs the asked-for-stuff and heads out.

When she turns to her class they have long forgotten chatter and paper balls and were whispering and giggling while side eyeing her. She a brow with a playful smile.

“What’s going on?” she asks and they make the playful faces this time.

“Nothing special.” One of the boys put emphasis and looks at the others who look back at him with the same mischievous look in their eyes.

She folds her arms after shutting the cap of her board marker.

“Why is it that whenever Tao comes, you guys always react like that?” she asks, having observed this for long. 

“Not whenever, only when Sir Tao comes to visit you.” A girl says this time and Jinnie can’t help but blush.

“Because you look good together.”

“Shut up. Kids these days…” she shakes her head and pretends to read her class schedule but actually she just wants to hold something to hide her rosy cheeks.

+++

“Do you know what is happening?” she asks Tao during break while sipping her green tea during break.

“What?” he asks obliviously as he is struggling with some colorful papers.

“They ship us.” She tells him and hears a mocking chuckle. “I’m serious. They see us as couples.”

He turns to look at her at a better angle and when he realizes she really wasn’t joking it takes him a minute and he bursts out laughing. She thinks he isn’t taking this seriously and it’s funny to him but only after clear focus did she see him laughing this hard only to hide his face that is red as well. He is blushing about this too. She can’t help but twitch her lips into a little smile.

“What are these for?” she asks when he has seized laughing.

“For the competition,” his face scrunches instantly because he always hated this event. “H.O.D wants me to print out different plans to work on. At least fifteen ideas she said. Like come on, am I Google or what? How does she suppose me to think of fifteen different topics from a wide range of variety?” he huffs.

“At least in Mathematics we have a limited number of topics to work on.” She sympathizes with him.

“You guys still never win though.” He smiles smugly and she regrets having a soft spot for him right now.

“Neither do you. Like seriously, who writes twelve page essays per teacher comparing the Victorian and modern poets?” she makes a face.

“It wasn’t my idea! It was Sehun who suggested that last year!” he retorts.

“And making a giant ferris wheel to explain the circle theorem wasn’t my idea either!”

They blink and sit there quietly for a few moments.

“We tried too hard actually.”

“Yeah. It ended up very stupid. Ofcourse the theatre department won with their blend of the rock band and ballet dancers.” She nods as he takes the cup from her hands for a sip.

“What are you going to do this year?” he asks.

“Definitely not anything related to circles,” she rolls her eyes “I would suggest something such as digital transformations.”

“That’s something different.” He smiles and she feels the compliment genuine.

“Thanks. Hey, why don’t you go for different styles of fiction writing?”

“That sounds great.” He smiles wider.

“Would you suggest it to your Head?” she asks with an equally wider smile.

“Sure I would. You suggested it after all. I can never doubt you.” He replies.

There was another daily short minute of silent appreciation of having each other as best friends. At school. Maybe the only best friends actually.

+++

The preparation for the competition has started. The whole school is in a rush and nobody spares even short glances at each other because there is no time to spare. This time of the year is always so busy and hustling because winning the competition held a reputation. It was like having your name displayed everywhere and finally your hard work was put to a show. Whether it was the sports clubs and their athletic performances, the science department and their weird but always amazing models, or even if it was the geography’s pack who once made the entire map of the world in 3-D print, everyone worked off and created something amazing everytime. Winning the trophy felt like being the top department of the school for that year although everyone was equally talented.

Not just the teachers, even the students worked hard for it. There were often quarrels between competitive teachers over which smart student would go in their team. It was very weird but the departments always formed a family sort of bond at the end.

As for Tao, this is the last thing he enjoys all year round other than the confessions of his teenage female students. He found the concept very pressurizing and non-focused. He felt this wasn’t about creativity anymore, it was all about winning and being superior.

For over a week he hasn’t seen Jinnie. Her mathematics department is busy building another model for the circle theorem, this time the model being our solar system. He tried hard not to laugh when she told him about it with a fed up face. She seemed angry, very angry and disappointed. According to her head of department, bringing up the same concept but with a better and more marvelous example would impress the judges. For all Tao knew, her H.O.D was a very stubborn person, the sort that once he set up a plan – breaking a rock with bare hands would seem easier than changing his mind.

As for himself, his head of department is quite impressed with his idea and Tao felt relieved they were actually working on something this simple yet never tried before. He dedicates himself to it this time, the thought of working for something Jinnie suggested made him excited.

But all in all, he misses her. He misses getting up early and catching the first bus just to beat her to school but failing to do so. He misses talking to her about everything for the first half of the day during break, and t