Taste Testing [OPEN)

[Damien Gregory Hawkins]

The man didn't miss the persistent looks his drink of choice was getting. He smirked, held it out in front of himself and shook it slightly. "What, you want one too? I'm afraid that would get me fired, Michigan." And possibly incarcerated. Actually, he was probably breaking some rules set down by the school board right now. He didn't bother to think on it though. No, most likely Nicki was just reacting to the strangeness of seeing a person like him in a completely different environment. Students were always weirded out when they saw their teachers doing non-teacher things, right? Well, that's what he remembered hearing, anyway.

He hadn't ever talked to any of his students outside of regular school hours, come to think of it. He liked shedding his teacher title too much to get involved with any extracurricular activities. Even if he did opt to coach a team, he'd still be Mr. Hawkins. Well, Coach Hawkins. Or, if he were to advise a club he'd be back to Mr. Hawkins. No, it just wasn't worth it. He didn't mind this casual conversation, but he had a feeling as soon as it became enforced he would want to get out. Damien valued his freedom too much to willingly take on more responsibility. Resisting authority and structure had always been a touchy thing with Damien. He didn't do it consistently enough to fit under any particular label. Still, his combination of pride, laziness, and intermittent rebelliousness made reaching others' expectations difficult. He was perfectly content with his life, though. As long as he was happy nothing was going to change.

Sitting back in his chair, Ian decided that he really should go out this weekend. Duke would probably be game. They could discuss Ian's life choices over something stronger than Budweiser. For now he was content to sit back with this freshman and pass the time.

Lecture and rant were not the same thing. Damien raised a quizzical eyebrow at the freshman. He immediately realized what he'd done and smiled. "See, there I was responding to what you had said with puzzlement, becuase I disagree. A lecture is meant to teach; a rant is a tirade to let off steam." He shrugged, letting Nicki make of that what he would.

[Nicki Burne Michigan]

Nicki smiled, his eyes lighting up at what he assumed was a joke. ”Ah, and we wouldn't want you to get fired, now would we?” he asked, trying to speak like he was a sophisticated adult, or something along those lines. He tried to hide the smile, but his failed attempt just made him giggle. Nicki wasn't good at being serious. At least, not when he was happy. When he was bored or angry or, really, anything other than happy, Nicki could be quite serious. Just not right now. He stopped laughing, covering his mouth with the back of his hand, which was hidden under his too-long sleeve. ”Anyway, I don't like alcohol. It's...” He stopped for a moment, pondering the right word. It wasn't bad. In fact, some types of alcohol, he kind of liked. He hadn't actually tried beer before, so he couldn't say anything about it, to tell the truth. If the freshman knew Damien like a friend, maybe he would have asked to try some, but the older man was Mr. Hawkins to him, and always would be. He couldn't ask your teacher if you could have a taste of the beer they ordered. He had asked his parents that a lot, but some adult that he didn't know very well? It was out of the question. ”... undetermined,” he finished, the adjective not fitting in at all with the rest of the sentence.

Nicki didn't really separate school and outside life like Damien did. For all he cared, they could be doing exactly the same thing that they were doing now in a classroom, it really didn't make that much of a difference to the kid. He had no sense of time and place, right and wrong, or even social protocol. The only thing he really had a sense of was personal space, and that was only there because he hated being touched. If Mr. Hawkins ever coached a club, Nicki would probably join it, no matter how much he hated teams. Well, only if Damien suggested he should, that was. He would never participate in team anything by his own free will, but he liked the teacher enough that he would listen to what he had to say. Now, he could tell Damien all of this and maybe give him an incentive to coach something, but Nicki honestly didn't know what was going through the man's head, no matter how much he seemed like an alien and therefore had the potential of possessing telepathy.

”But there's no difference!” he protested, completely ignoring Damien's clear explanation of the different between a rant and a lecture, proceeding to explain his own point of view. ”Teachers are always angry when they lecture kids, 'cause we're so damn annoying!” It was true, wasn't it? Students had no respect for authority these days. And in Nicki's mind, the “therefore” was that teachers must always be annoyed when they were in the school building. Therefore, in school, there was truly no difference between a lecture and a rant. Okay, so it was really messed up logic, but at least it was logic in the first place.

[Damien Gregory Hawkins]

Damien laughed dryly, looking at the clear amber liquid in the bottle. After this one he'd be done. This was a restaurant, not a bar. The man considered what being fired would actually do to him. It may trigger a jump start in ambition and actually cause him to go somewhere with his Ivy League education. On the other hand... he did have some semblance of loyalty to Sabal Palm. He was starting his fifth year at the school, and had thus seen an entire class come in as freshmen and graduate the previous year. Besides, it wasn't like you saw qualified, competent avian shifters walking down the street everywhere you looked. He wasn't invaluable enough to not get fired, but he cared enough about his job to not go out of his way looking for a pink slip. He didn't want to abandon his students to figure out the air for themselves.

The freshman's thoughts on alcohol made him laugh again. No, it wasn't the wine and beer taking effect. It took something a lot stronger than that to cause any noticeable change in Ian. He had been drinking seriously since he was 18, and experimentally before that. Doing the math quickly in his head, Ian came up with 17 years. He knew his favorite drinks and which mood they were best suited to, which ones made him gag, and what his tolerance level was. There was very little left undetermined for Ian.

Damien threw up his hands in mock exasperation when Nicki refused to give an inch of ground on this point. "No, lecture and rant are not the same. Check any thesaurus for related terms for either word and you will not find the other one." Did anybody own a thesaurus anymore? Damien did, but he was a crotchety old teacher. In any case, they had computers. He could go on Thesaurus.com. Yes, there was such a thing.

Nicki's follow up argument had some credibility though. "That they are," he said thoughtfully before aiming a friendly punch at the freshman's shoulder.

[Nicki Burne Michigan]

Nicki didn't understand anything about Damien's life. After all, they were at least twenty years apart when it came to age. Nicki didn't know anything about jobs and getting fired, nothing about managing money, nothing about shifting your personality and appearance to show to those who were important in your adulty little life. Nicki was just a student. The school provided and education and somewhere to sleep at night, and his parents provided some money. That was all that really mattered to him. Well, that and not being eaten, which really was something you had to look out for when you shifted into something related to a rabbit. He watched Damien laugh with a nervous air to his posture, which was currently balanced on the edge of his seat. Though he may have been far from drunk, Nicki wasn't experienced enough around alcohol to realize that, believing him to be “under the influence”, as his parents had so often put it. He leaned away from the man, uncomfortable. He had once lived in the city, and when you lived in the city it was inevitable to see and hear the drunks around midnight. Though Damien didn't seem to be acting like one of them, the laughter made him skittish. The irritated tone of Damien's voice didn't help much either, but the freshman was still glad for a change from the laughter. Talking was okay... but he would still rather just pay and leave. He had his wallet out, so the waitress would probably be coming over here any minute, anyway. It wasn't like he could stay for that much longer.

”Thesaurus?” he asked, curious. It wasn't like he had never heard of one before, but... ”Aren't they, like, really old fashioned?” The question was completely innocent, no second meanings or rude intent. In Nicki's mind, even dictionaries were old fashioned. There was this thing called the internet, even if he didn't use it much. The old books with yellowing pages were just... well, annoying. The constant flipping through pages wasn't necessary when you could just type the word and have the definition pop up on the screen in front of your face.

A sharp intake of breath proved that he noticed the friendly punch. That, and the fact that Nicki's pale paled, his body automatically jerking backwards to hit the back of the chair with a small thump. Damien was punching him. Sophomores punched him when they were angry, and he always hurt afterwords. He always got beat up. Was a teacher trying to hurt him? ”Ah... er...” he stuttered, trying to form a coherent sentence. He couldn't. The pika was just too freaked out to say anything. For some reason, he blushed brightly, grabbing his wallet and pulling out the correct amount of money to pay for the bill that had been placed next to him a few minutes ago. He stood up, biting his lip nervously and staring at the floor. ”I... uh... I should go,” he squeaked, grabbing his schoolbag and quickly walking out the door. He would probably calm down later... probably. Maybe. If Damien didn't sub for his class again for a few days.

notes Guess it's the end XD