A Balance of Harmonies: Teaching
Feb. 19th, 2012 06:15 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
frogs_of_warI was mentioning names in a comment to Skimbli a few days ago and I decided to see how often I reused a name (I try to make each unique for the most part), which turned out to be a good thing. I named Kit’s husband twice. Once in chapter 50, but the name was so ho-hum and boring that I forgot I’d done it and I named him something new and different in chapter 55.
I’m still reading my old stories to find what names I used. So far Harmonies (and its connected stories, none of which have been typed in yet) has the most reused names (one set on purpose) and the most names total. Hunter, I think (as I’m not done yet), is my most used name, with four. Harmonies’ Hunter, the kid the son in Headache had a sleep over with, the kid the POV’s friend’s little brother wants to have a sleep over with in My Impish Angel, and the younger brother of a POV in After the Wedding, a story still sitting on my computer. But when three of these stories were written, my youngest had two Hunters in his class and was friends with another.
Title: Teaching
Series: A Balance of Harmonies (Three)
Status: Chapter fifty-seven of
Genre: m/m romance, drama, city life, businessmen
Rating: R
Content: paper, math, an invitation, laughter, letters, drawings, a revelation, chocolate
Length: about 3,300 words
Summary: Kurt learns a lot of names.
Master list
Kurt pulled up at youth shelter with a ream of printer paper and a box of number two mechanical pencils. He could do this. He’d never done anything like it before, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t start now.
He tucked his supplies under his arm and headed for Andre’s office to check in. Andre was in conference with boy wearing a pink plaid flannel. Kurt let them be. Kit had the class doing math problems. Kurt set his supplies on a table. “Am I early?”
“Just a bit,” Kit grinned. “Do you need time to prepare?”
Kurt shook his head. He wouldn’t be so nervous once he got started. The boys kept looking up from their papers. Hunter brought his math page up to the front. They were terribly simple problems that he should have conquered in grade school, if he’d gone to grade school. “Can I help?”
Hunter looked at Kit, who nodded. Then he brought his paper over to Kurt and Kurt looked it over. He found the mistake right away. “Do you know what seven plus eight is?”
Hunter shook his head.
Kurt nodded. “I’ve always had problems with sevens and eights and here there are two of them. Seven times eight was hard for me to. I had to remember that fifty-six had a five in it just like seven plus eight does. Isn’t that a funny way to remember?”
Hunter leaned against Kurt and fixed his mistake. Kurt wanted to wrap his arms around the little boy and hold him close. “Can I come with you on Friday?”
Hunter wrote the answer to his next equation.
“I was thinking we’d go to Zan and Autumn’s afterward and Zan could show you how to blow glass.”
Hunter looked up from his paper.
“Zan is likely to eat salad or something, but if you come we’ll have enough votes for pizza.”
Hunter turned away with the smallest of grins. “I like salad.”
“Then you will like eating at Zan’s, so how about it?”
“Do they want me?”
“I said I might be spending the evening with you and asked them where we should eat and they said their house. I have something I want to make Emil, but I haven’t had time to make it yet. Do you want to come?”
Kit walked around the room, picking up papers and answering questions. The boys got out of their seats and came to Kurt’s table. The one with the black mohawk, Nick maybe, leaned on the table. “What are we going to do today?”
Kurt stood up. “We are going to start with the hardest thing of all.”
“And what’s that?”
“I’m going to try to learn your names.”
The boys laughed.
“So take a few pieces of paper and a pencil and draw your name and put pictures around it of things you like and what makes you, you. And at the end of class if I get your name right, you get a prize.”
“What kind of prize?”
This was the hardest part of the class to come up with. “Sweet or sticky or spicy or sour or crunchy.”
“Food then?”
“Bad for you foods. Be sure, if you don’t eat them, I will.”
Nick looked like the kind of boy who would take it even if he wouldn’t eat it.
“I’ll do one too. So will Kit.”
Kit put on a shocked face and dutifully picked up paper. “Now what shall I draw?”
The boys had a lot of suggestions. The best being that he should draw a bowtie. Kurt agreed.
Kurt started out by drawing a dragon. The wings and tail were the straight part of the K the head and neck were the other side of the top and the legs and feet were the bottom. He drew tiny little arms like a T-rex.
“Hey!” said a boy whose paper read Tyler. “You never said to make the letters into things.”
“You don’t have to. But, you see, I already know my name.”
The boys laughed and Tyler smirked at him. “Funny.”
“Thank you. I have more.”
“Please no.” Tyler was one of the boys who had hung from Kurt’s arm yesterday. Maybe.
Kurt got up and looked at the papers and the boys. A few boys drew very well. One of them was Brandon, who looked older than his height claimed he was. He had dark brown hair that hung over his killer green eyes. Kurt paused to watch him draw until Brandon looked up. Kurt nodded at his page. “Don’t waste that.”
“The paper?”
“That talent. Have you looked into a scholarship?”
Brandon shook his head. Saif, who looked to be of south Asian decent, asked Kurt how to draw a skateboard. Kurt followed him to his table and reminded them that he didn’t expect perfection, but he had someone bring one inside and showed Saif and his tablemates the principles of perspective.
Kurt tried to talk to all of the boys including the really shy ones. Only one had a blank piece of paper and that was JJ, who sat with his arms crossed and glared at Kurt when he wasn’t goofing off in some other way.
Kit’s name was in block letters. The K was in plaid. The dot for the i wore a bow tie and glasses just like Kit. And the t was reading a book.
Kurt grinned. “Good job.”
“Thanks.”
Kurt finished circling the room and sat for a moment to make a u out of the food left on a plate. The steak was only the bones and the fries were picked through, but the salad was untouched.
Thon, a small boy with several piercings, pointed at Kurt page. “What’s that?”
“That is what my plate looks like when I’m done. I really don’t like vegetables.”
“Eat your greens,” Thon wiggled his finger at Kurt. “Or you won’t grow up big and strong.”
The boys laughed.
“Well,” Kurt got to his feet, “I did eat my vegetables when I was your age.”
Thon pouted.
Andre walked in with the boy he’d been talking to. “Kit, this is Dakota. He starts here today.”
Dakota pulled his bag strap against his chest.
Kit waved in to an empty chair. “Kurt, here, is our substitute art teacher for today.”
He set paper and a pencil in front of Dakota. “We are drawing our names and something about us.”
Kit showed off his own drawing. Dakota nodded and set to work, glancing from time to time at the other boys’ pictures. Some were already done. Kurt squatted next to Dakota. “This is my first day and I only know a few names. Draw something so I’ll remember that Dakota is you.”
He stood up. “Anyone done?”
A few boys nodded.
“Then come up and show us your paper and explain what you drew.”
One boy stood up and pressed his paper to his chest. “You didn’t say everyone was going to see it.”
Kit cleared his throat. “Exceptions will be made on a case by case basis.”
The boy relaxed into his chair.
Thon started. His name was pierced and the T had his swishy bangs. Kyle was next. His name was talk balloons with many words in them. He talked about himself and his drawing for three straight minutes without a pause long enough for a paragraph break. And then he sat down and was quiet. Amazing.
Daniel spoke with a thick Spanish accent about how he got his name and life in his hometown in Ecuador before his grandparents died. His name was all in caps on a house surrounded by food: dried chilies and onions and bananas and mangos and beans and rice and meat being grilled.
Several more boys showed off their names.
Evan asked if he could just show Kurt. Kit nodded. Around Evan’s name was shredded up dolls and dresses and a torn apart name that might have been Sarah. Kurt touched his shoulder. “Good job expressing who you aren’t. I go to church with some kids like you, but in my personal life, I know one transgirl and a few nonbinary, but they are all nonbinary in different ways.”
Dakota looked up and met Kurt’s eye before staring back at his page.
“But you know, I think you can do better. I think instead of telling me who you aren’t, you can tell me who you are.” He handed Evan a new sheet of paper. Evan sighed.
Kurt stood up. “I think it’s time to show off mine.”
Almost ever kids’ head popped up and the ones that didn’t were drawing. “My name is Kurt and I am a green dragon.”
The boys laughed.
Kurt shook his head. “It’s true. But I didn’t bring any colors, so you’ll just have to imagine me green.”
More titters.
“I love meat like every good dragon should and I hate vegetables unless they are cooked just for me by someone I love. I will eat them then.”
Several of the boys nodded sadly. Kurt hoped he hadn’t stepped on any landmines. “I like to blow glass in my spare time.” He pointed at the r and then at the t. “And I have to exercise at least an hour a day to keep these muscles. Otherwise they will shrink and a dragon can’t have rinkydink muscles.”
“Why,” Nick asked, “do you think you are a dragon?”
“I know I am a dragon.”
“Why?”
“Because I was told by my first boyfriend back in college that I was a dragon.”
“And you believe him?”
“When Peregrine tells you something, you have to believe it.”
Thon stood up. “You were Peregrine’s boyfriend?”
Kurt grinned. The kids all looked so shocked. “My first true love.”
“Don’t you only get one of those?” asked Tyler.
“No.” Brandon crossed his arms.
Kurt nodded before the discussion got out of hand. “That’s right. Peregrine is a Phoenix, a bird that rises again from its ashes.”
This comment had to be explained and the story of the Phoenix told. Lucky Kit knew all about it. But just when Kit asked if anyone else was ready, Hunter sat up. “What is Emil?”
“Who is Emil?” asked Tyler.
“Emil is Peregrine current boyfriend,” said Kyle. “They live together. Peregrine couldn’t live without him. Or so he says.”
“That’s right.” Kurt would just have to live with the biting pain of not being able to acknowledge his men as his own. “They are both down visiting Peregrine’s dad who was hurt in a car accident. But, Hunter, I haven’t forgotten your question. Emil says he’s a blue monkey.”
Dakota perked up. “So you can all fly.”
“Monkeys can’t fly.” asked Thon.
“Blue monkeys can. Haven’t you ever seen The Wizard of Oz?”
Kurt laughed. How would Emil take that? He thought he needed the others to fly, but he never had. “Words of wisdom. Thank you, Dakota.”
After that the boys clambered for Kurt to guess their names. Kurt made everyone at least show him their picture. Then he sent Hunter out with his keys to get the box of prizes from his trunk.
He had the kids sit down and he tried to match their names to his pile of papers. Some were easy. JJ’s was blank. Nick’s had a matching mohawk. Daniel with the food was the taller Hispanic boy. Daniel with the airplane was the blond boy in glasses. Kyle’s small body could hardly contain his words. Evan’s second drawing had test tubes and a microscope on it. Thon’s had piercing eyes and thoughts as well as holes in his ears and eyebrows. He looked like a younger, bottle blond Peregrine. Saif drew Afghanistan on page, so Kurt was sure to get him right and the other South Asian boy, Adhi, was a war refugee from Sri Lanka with a scar to prove it. Hunter drew Keith’s family. And Dakota put a hot air balloon on his, so Kurt would remember he was the Wizard of Oz kid. Or maybe ne was the Wizard of Oz kid. Kurt would have to ask.
But the others he had to work at. And the chocolate had melted in the heat. And sometimes the clues the boys gave confused Kurt more than the pictures did, but everyone had a good time and Kurt went back to work with a spring in his step. He could do this. He had done this. And only three more days until he did it again.
I’m still reading my old stories to find what names I used. So far Harmonies (and its connected stories, none of which have been typed in yet) has the most reused names (one set on purpose) and the most names total. Hunter, I think (as I’m not done yet), is my most used name, with four. Harmonies’ Hunter, the kid the son in Headache had a sleep over with, the kid the POV’s friend’s little brother wants to have a sleep over with in My Impish Angel, and the younger brother of a POV in After the Wedding, a story still sitting on my computer. But when three of these stories were written, my youngest had two Hunters in his class and was friends with another.
Title: Teaching
Series: A Balance of Harmonies (Three)
Status: Chapter fifty-seven of
Genre: m/m romance, drama, city life, businessmen
Rating: R
Content: paper, math, an invitation, laughter, letters, drawings, a revelation, chocolate
Length: about 3,300 words
Summary: Kurt learns a lot of names.
Master list
Kurt pulled up at youth shelter with a ream of printer paper and a box of number two mechanical pencils. He could do this. He’d never done anything like it before, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t start now.
He tucked his supplies under his arm and headed for Andre’s office to check in. Andre was in conference with boy wearing a pink plaid flannel. Kurt let them be. Kit had the class doing math problems. Kurt set his supplies on a table. “Am I early?”
“Just a bit,” Kit grinned. “Do you need time to prepare?”
Kurt shook his head. He wouldn’t be so nervous once he got started. The boys kept looking up from their papers. Hunter brought his math page up to the front. They were terribly simple problems that he should have conquered in grade school, if he’d gone to grade school. “Can I help?”
Hunter looked at Kit, who nodded. Then he brought his paper over to Kurt and Kurt looked it over. He found the mistake right away. “Do you know what seven plus eight is?”
Hunter shook his head.
Kurt nodded. “I’ve always had problems with sevens and eights and here there are two of them. Seven times eight was hard for me to. I had to remember that fifty-six had a five in it just like seven plus eight does. Isn’t that a funny way to remember?”
Hunter leaned against Kurt and fixed his mistake. Kurt wanted to wrap his arms around the little boy and hold him close. “Can I come with you on Friday?”
Hunter wrote the answer to his next equation.
“I was thinking we’d go to Zan and Autumn’s afterward and Zan could show you how to blow glass.”
Hunter looked up from his paper.
“Zan is likely to eat salad or something, but if you come we’ll have enough votes for pizza.”
Hunter turned away with the smallest of grins. “I like salad.”
“Then you will like eating at Zan’s, so how about it?”
“Do they want me?”
“I said I might be spending the evening with you and asked them where we should eat and they said their house. I have something I want to make Emil, but I haven’t had time to make it yet. Do you want to come?”
Kit walked around the room, picking up papers and answering questions. The boys got out of their seats and came to Kurt’s table. The one with the black mohawk, Nick maybe, leaned on the table. “What are we going to do today?”
Kurt stood up. “We are going to start with the hardest thing of all.”
“And what’s that?”
“I’m going to try to learn your names.”
The boys laughed.
“So take a few pieces of paper and a pencil and draw your name and put pictures around it of things you like and what makes you, you. And at the end of class if I get your name right, you get a prize.”
“What kind of prize?”
This was the hardest part of the class to come up with. “Sweet or sticky or spicy or sour or crunchy.”
“Food then?”
“Bad for you foods. Be sure, if you don’t eat them, I will.”
Nick looked like the kind of boy who would take it even if he wouldn’t eat it.
“I’ll do one too. So will Kit.”
Kit put on a shocked face and dutifully picked up paper. “Now what shall I draw?”
The boys had a lot of suggestions. The best being that he should draw a bowtie. Kurt agreed.
Kurt started out by drawing a dragon. The wings and tail were the straight part of the K the head and neck were the other side of the top and the legs and feet were the bottom. He drew tiny little arms like a T-rex.
“Hey!” said a boy whose paper read Tyler. “You never said to make the letters into things.”
“You don’t have to. But, you see, I already know my name.”
The boys laughed and Tyler smirked at him. “Funny.”
“Thank you. I have more.”
“Please no.” Tyler was one of the boys who had hung from Kurt’s arm yesterday. Maybe.
Kurt got up and looked at the papers and the boys. A few boys drew very well. One of them was Brandon, who looked older than his height claimed he was. He had dark brown hair that hung over his killer green eyes. Kurt paused to watch him draw until Brandon looked up. Kurt nodded at his page. “Don’t waste that.”
“The paper?”
“That talent. Have you looked into a scholarship?”
Brandon shook his head. Saif, who looked to be of south Asian decent, asked Kurt how to draw a skateboard. Kurt followed him to his table and reminded them that he didn’t expect perfection, but he had someone bring one inside and showed Saif and his tablemates the principles of perspective.
Kurt tried to talk to all of the boys including the really shy ones. Only one had a blank piece of paper and that was JJ, who sat with his arms crossed and glared at Kurt when he wasn’t goofing off in some other way.
Kit’s name was in block letters. The K was in plaid. The dot for the i wore a bow tie and glasses just like Kit. And the t was reading a book.
Kurt grinned. “Good job.”
“Thanks.”
Kurt finished circling the room and sat for a moment to make a u out of the food left on a plate. The steak was only the bones and the fries were picked through, but the salad was untouched.
Thon, a small boy with several piercings, pointed at Kurt page. “What’s that?”
“That is what my plate looks like when I’m done. I really don’t like vegetables.”
“Eat your greens,” Thon wiggled his finger at Kurt. “Or you won’t grow up big and strong.”
The boys laughed.
“Well,” Kurt got to his feet, “I did eat my vegetables when I was your age.”
Thon pouted.
Andre walked in with the boy he’d been talking to. “Kit, this is Dakota. He starts here today.”
Dakota pulled his bag strap against his chest.
Kit waved in to an empty chair. “Kurt, here, is our substitute art teacher for today.”
He set paper and a pencil in front of Dakota. “We are drawing our names and something about us.”
Kit showed off his own drawing. Dakota nodded and set to work, glancing from time to time at the other boys’ pictures. Some were already done. Kurt squatted next to Dakota. “This is my first day and I only know a few names. Draw something so I’ll remember that Dakota is you.”
He stood up. “Anyone done?”
A few boys nodded.
“Then come up and show us your paper and explain what you drew.”
One boy stood up and pressed his paper to his chest. “You didn’t say everyone was going to see it.”
Kit cleared his throat. “Exceptions will be made on a case by case basis.”
The boy relaxed into his chair.
Thon started. His name was pierced and the T had his swishy bangs. Kyle was next. His name was talk balloons with many words in them. He talked about himself and his drawing for three straight minutes without a pause long enough for a paragraph break. And then he sat down and was quiet. Amazing.
Daniel spoke with a thick Spanish accent about how he got his name and life in his hometown in Ecuador before his grandparents died. His name was all in caps on a house surrounded by food: dried chilies and onions and bananas and mangos and beans and rice and meat being grilled.
Several more boys showed off their names.
Evan asked if he could just show Kurt. Kit nodded. Around Evan’s name was shredded up dolls and dresses and a torn apart name that might have been Sarah. Kurt touched his shoulder. “Good job expressing who you aren’t. I go to church with some kids like you, but in my personal life, I know one transgirl and a few nonbinary, but they are all nonbinary in different ways.”
Dakota looked up and met Kurt’s eye before staring back at his page.
“But you know, I think you can do better. I think instead of telling me who you aren’t, you can tell me who you are.” He handed Evan a new sheet of paper. Evan sighed.
Kurt stood up. “I think it’s time to show off mine.”
Almost ever kids’ head popped up and the ones that didn’t were drawing. “My name is Kurt and I am a green dragon.”
The boys laughed.
Kurt shook his head. “It’s true. But I didn’t bring any colors, so you’ll just have to imagine me green.”
More titters.
“I love meat like every good dragon should and I hate vegetables unless they are cooked just for me by someone I love. I will eat them then.”
Several of the boys nodded sadly. Kurt hoped he hadn’t stepped on any landmines. “I like to blow glass in my spare time.” He pointed at the r and then at the t. “And I have to exercise at least an hour a day to keep these muscles. Otherwise they will shrink and a dragon can’t have rinkydink muscles.”
“Why,” Nick asked, “do you think you are a dragon?”
“I know I am a dragon.”
“Why?”
“Because I was told by my first boyfriend back in college that I was a dragon.”
“And you believe him?”
“When Peregrine tells you something, you have to believe it.”
Thon stood up. “You were Peregrine’s boyfriend?”
Kurt grinned. The kids all looked so shocked. “My first true love.”
“Don’t you only get one of those?” asked Tyler.
“No.” Brandon crossed his arms.
Kurt nodded before the discussion got out of hand. “That’s right. Peregrine is a Phoenix, a bird that rises again from its ashes.”
This comment had to be explained and the story of the Phoenix told. Lucky Kit knew all about it. But just when Kit asked if anyone else was ready, Hunter sat up. “What is Emil?”
“Who is Emil?” asked Tyler.
“Emil is Peregrine current boyfriend,” said Kyle. “They live together. Peregrine couldn’t live without him. Or so he says.”
“That’s right.” Kurt would just have to live with the biting pain of not being able to acknowledge his men as his own. “They are both down visiting Peregrine’s dad who was hurt in a car accident. But, Hunter, I haven’t forgotten your question. Emil says he’s a blue monkey.”
Dakota perked up. “So you can all fly.”
“Monkeys can’t fly.” asked Thon.
“Blue monkeys can. Haven’t you ever seen The Wizard of Oz?”
Kurt laughed. How would Emil take that? He thought he needed the others to fly, but he never had. “Words of wisdom. Thank you, Dakota.”
After that the boys clambered for Kurt to guess their names. Kurt made everyone at least show him their picture. Then he sent Hunter out with his keys to get the box of prizes from his trunk.
He had the kids sit down and he tried to match their names to his pile of papers. Some were easy. JJ’s was blank. Nick’s had a matching mohawk. Daniel with the food was the taller Hispanic boy. Daniel with the airplane was the blond boy in glasses. Kyle’s small body could hardly contain his words. Evan’s second drawing had test tubes and a microscope on it. Thon’s had piercing eyes and thoughts as well as holes in his ears and eyebrows. He looked like a younger, bottle blond Peregrine. Saif drew Afghanistan on page, so Kurt was sure to get him right and the other South Asian boy, Adhi, was a war refugee from Sri Lanka with a scar to prove it. Hunter drew Keith’s family. And Dakota put a hot air balloon on his, so Kurt would remember he was the Wizard of Oz kid. Or maybe ne was the Wizard of Oz kid. Kurt would have to ask.
But the others he had to work at. And the chocolate had melted in the heat. And sometimes the clues the boys gave confused Kurt more than the pictures did, but everyone had a good time and Kurt went back to work with a spring in his step. He could do this. He had done this. And only three more days until he did it again.
