On My Side?
Professor Oh and ILuhan POV:
"As a teacher, I have to report abuse, even if I don't want to. I am bound by law."
"You can't. You can't do that to me. Don't just think you can step in a ruin my life." Professor Oh stared at me,
"Who's abusing you."
"I'm not telling you."
"Tell me and I might let it go, for now." Somehow I ended up going to the chemistry room. I had to get my things in the first place, but I wanted to hear Professor Oh's excuse for touching me.
"First you tell me why the hell you were touching me."
"You make it sound as if I was doing something wrong." We were having a serious conversation and the tension in the room was high.
Still, no sign of emotion was on his face.
It was a joke to him.
"You were doing something wrong. Teachers are permitted to teach, not touch their students. So I suggest keeping your hands off me."
"I was simply taking your temperature. The nurse said you were feeling dizzy and she had to leave early. 5th hour is my lunch so I offered to watch you. I walked in and you looked warm so I felt your forehead to know if I should wake you and send you home."
"Except you pulled down my sleeve."
"Like I said, I am bound by law to report abuse. I will not let something like that go when the safety of my student is on the line." I rolled my eyes. My arguments were good, but his were perfect. He never stumbled once over a word, letting everything roll off his tongue in ease.
"Like you give a damn about my safety."
"I do."
"You don't." I sat forward, leaning in over his desk to get close to his face.
"You're just like everyone else. You're the same as every teacher here and blend in perfectly with the students."
"I don't understand."
"You're on their side, Professor Oh. So jus let me be miserable because I know you get joy out of it."
"I don't get joy out of your misery."
"Tell me something, why do you keep up the act? Just laugh at me already. Get it out of your system and leave me alone." I was gritting my teeth in anger, I'd never spoken to him this way before.
"Professor Oh!" A teacher came running into the chemistry classroom, flailing her arms while interrupting our argument.
"Did you hear about Lee Kibum?"
"No I didn't, he's one of my students, what happened?"
"He was jumped after school and is in the hospital now."
"Oh my." Somehow, professor Oh didn't seem as surprised as he should have been.
"Give my regards to him, but I have business to take care of."
"All of his teachers are to report to the police and speak with them."
"Sure, but right now I'm in the middle of something." He didn't even ask how he was doing.
"We're being called tomorrow during the day, excuse me." The teacher quickly left, sensing some tension in the room.
"Are we finished?"
"That's up to you." I got up to leave,
"Then we're finished. And I don't want to continue tutoring."
"You have to, it's the only way you'll pass." He was right. The only way I'd pass is if I had extra help, and he was the only one who would give me the help I needed.
I hated that I needed him.
Well..
I hated that I needed his knowledge.
"I'll be here tomorrow after school, same as last time."
"Fine." Only because I needed to pass, I reminded myself.
"And Luhan," I stopped in the doorway, not turning to look at him because I didn't want to see his face.
"What."
"I'm on your side more than you think." Mysterious. That was the word. The way he spoke to me was often mysterious, but not the creepy kind. More like.. He had more to what he was saying than what he was actually speaking. I couldn't figure him out.
So was he on my side then?
Maybe he was mocking me.
Professor Oh was hiding something.
Without saying another word, I left.
As I thought about the earlier events, I saw that I did blow them out of proportion.
Taking my temperature: normal.
Looking for abuse marks: normal.
Covering me with his lab coat:
...Not normal.
But I suppose if he thought I was sick and thought I shouldn't be cold, then it was a little more normal.
But just a little.
It made me angry that Professor Oh always remained calm because then when I looked back on our arguments, I saw that I had acted like a complete doofus. Overall, my intelligence put me at a 95% correct rate. Professor Oh, the tyrant of tyrant-land, was 99.99% of the time right, and it pissed me off, so. ing. Much.
Even the 1% was most likely just an error that was made by what ever calculating machine I had used to acquire his percent rate.
I wondered how he became the way he did. Had he always been egoistic and arrogant? My guess was yes.
No one in the world could develop his level of arrogance unless they were born with it. Professor Oh walked like he owned the school and talked like he knew everything. He was different from the rest and did stand out, but only because his hair was fake and his ego was soaring.
He was so weird, so rude to me one minute then strangle kind the next.
"I'm on your side a lot more than you think."
He didn't hate me after all?
Was I the one that hated him so much that I hadn't realize the feeling wasn't mutual? The warm, fresh autumn air blew through my hair as I stepped outside the school. Even though it wasn't sunny, rather cloudy actually, I thought the world looked beautiful with colored leaves.
"Oh !"
I realized I had work at 5:00 and began running home to change, leaving my worries and problems at school where they belonged.
It's raining.. I looked outside my work window and watched as umbrellas sprung up everywhere. Someone came inside the doors, dripping wet. They were probably caught in the rainstorm. I smiled and grabbed a menu, walking to the customer.
"Hello, how can I help yo-"
Damn it anyways.
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