Professor G. Hendrix

Everyone's an open book to me

[aliceandersons]

Gemma’s words actually made Alice pause, and her tears dried up almost instantaneously. Had she really just heard that correctly? An insult towards Lisa Vanderpump, the light of her life and personal idol? Just who exactly did Gemma think she was, badmouthing Lisa Vanderpump in front of her?

A sudden anger flared up inside of her, and her brows creased into a frown over her puffy, red eyes. “Her accent is perfectly fine.” Alice’s tone then was ice cold, and her arms folded tightly across her chest, feeling incredibly displeased with her colleague.  She side eyed the woman for a few seconds, gaze sliding over to the book that lay on the end table just next to the sofa; it was about the same height as Gemma’s back…and probably heavy enough…

It only took a second for the book to move itself across the top of the table and laugh forward, hitting Gemma square in the back as Alice attempted to disguise a laugh as a cough.

[professor-g-hendrix]

Gemma somehow managed to keep her feet underneath her as the book's impact rattled through her spine, but only just. She reeled forward, windmilling her arms in a desperate attempt to remain upright. When she regained her balance, she looked up at Alice with nothing short of murderous realization in her eyes.

She knew it! Alice was out for her - that book would not have moved on its own, and there was only one telepath in the room. Now to determine what Alice's endgame was - all good to find out you have an enemy, not not if you don't know what they want from you.

Gemma glared at the book on the floor, then turned her gaze back to the crying blonde.

"That wasn't your doing, now, was it?"

[alistairgrismond]

"For them, perhaps, but I can’t imagine it’s very fun for you. A majority of the students here, I adore teaching. Yet there are some who are so —," he decided at the last minute to discontinue his words, "—-well… they’re creative with what they get up to, I’ll say that. I wonder who their ring leader is.” He smiled then, and folded his arms. “What? This is the auditorium?” He jested, feigning incredulity. 

"I’ll help you get to your intended destination."

[professor-g-hendrix]

"Oh!"

She hadn't been expecting an offer of help - a "friendly" laugh at her expense and a distracted wish of luck, maybe (it was the best she'd received from anyone else she'd stumbled across). Her brain kicked into overdrive, wondering what on Earth Professor Grismond was getting at, offering to walk her to a meeting that was definitely over by now.

"Um..."

There it was again, that horrid, hesitant reservation. Not that she could really help it - "other people" had never been Gemma's strong point, "hot people" less than even that. She looked up; Professor Grismond was looking at her kindly, but the telltale glint of bored (unsure?) expectancy played about his eyes.

"Well...I'm pretty sure my meeting's well and ended now - I've been creeping around secret corridors for a good half-hour. I swear, Hogwarts is real, it's American, and it goes by 'Morgana Academy'!"

There, a funny distraction. That would defuse the tension; everyone knows that Gemma can deliver a joke, it just takes time for her to get there. No harm, no foul.

[aliceandersons]

Alice had been feeling particularly emotional ever since she woke up. First she’d gotten strangely distressed about how her jacket had fallen off a hanger in the night and become a crumpled heap on the floor; then she’d started crying about one of her favourite shirts still being in the wash basket. And now? Now she was sat in the common room, watching The Real Housewives and crying once again about Lisa Vanderpump. Nobody had approached her so far (probably out of fear) but when she spotted somebody out of the corner of her eye she turned to them with a tear stained face and shaky voice. “Lisa Vanderpump is just so amazing. She has the nicest shoes.”

[professor-g-hendrix]

Alice was crying.

Why is Alice crying? Not possible. Definitely some kind of trap. Who would set me up? Morgana? She's always acted like a friend, but who knows with a woman like her? Can't be Georgiana, she's been away...unless she's been off plotting against me all this time!

Gemma blinked - she didn't realize she'd been staring. Her eyes felt dry.

Or maybe this is Alice's own game? She always seemed so distant - maybe that was a ruse designed to make me drop my guard...

Gemma nodded slowly. No good to finally catch on to someone's ruse just to throw away the advantage. Her heart pounded in her ears as another wave of anxiety washed over her. When she finally spoke, however, her words seemed unnecessarily slow.

"Yeah...I mean, they're pretty nice. She talks, like, waaaayyy weird though. I mean, I've heard my share of accents, man, but....that one ain't right."

[holly-chameleon]

"Hey I have a question, it’s been bugging me all day. Do you think if we poured like a million tonnes of food dye into the ocean the clouds would change color?"

[professor-g-hendrix]

Gemma wasn't quite sure what had caused Miss Redford's question, nor why she thought it acceptable to simply blurt it out in an otherwise-quiet staff room to an otherwise-engaged person. She had grown accustomed to Miss Redford's adolescent stream-of-consciousness thought process, but it would be untrue to say it didn't grate, given their shared professions as educators - supposedly professional ones, at that.

"Long version? It would depend on how evaporable said food dye actually is. Of course, there would be other ramifications: colored clouds due to a foreign substance would alter the light that reached the surface, all sea life would undoubtedly change color and have to adapt to a newly-tinted environment, all life on land would have to do the same. Plants would have to learn how to photosynthesize in differently-diffracted sunlight. That, and all water on Earth would be colored permanently unless otherwise acted upon."

Gemma looked up from her book.

"Short version? Maybe."

[alistairgrismond]

Alistair found it pleasantly amusing that his colleague continued to call him anything other than his first name, as if Alistair was tabooed. It’d been a long time since he’d seen her, and he’d considered the possibility that she was avoiding him ever since the classroom incident; if he’d made her feel in any way uncomfortable, then he was sorry for it.  Once he was certain his colleague was steady again, he removed his hand and took a polite step back. “A short cut?” He said, “through the auditorium? It’d be the first time I’ve heard of a short cut through here. Did you, by any chance, get this information from a student?” He asked, attempting to hide the smirk that was daring to curl the corners of his mouth. It was a start of a new term at the academy but already the students were pulling pranks on the kindest of all the teachers.

[professor-g-hendrix]

Gemma's gaze dropped to her shoes at his guess, an embarrassed half-smile working its way across her face. Of course she'd been mislead by a student - wasn't the first time it'd happen, certainly wouldn't be the last.

Note to self: memorize the grounds map.

She let out a breathy laugh - there it is again - and attempted to explain.

"Yes, well, I don't spend much time around these parts and I'm sure sending oh-so-professional me on a wild goose chase is always good for a laugh."

"Yet as odd as my presences here is, I can't say an auditorium is where I'd begin looking for an English teacher, either."

[alistairgrismond]

Alistair entered the school’s auditorium in hopes of finding one of his English students; their coursework was overdue and if they didn’t get it in soon, that’d be forty percent of their grade going straight down the drain. Someone rushed up the steep steps right by him, seemingly losing their footing, so he quickly grabbed them just above the elbow to stop them from falling flat on their face. “Whoa there, slow down or you’ll hurt yourself. What are you hurrying for?”

[professor-g-hendrix]

Gemma's heart sank in absolute mortification. It seemed that Fate had decreed that all her interactions with Professor Grismond - Alistair? Could she call him that yet? She had run into him half-naked in a classroom ages ago....no, too unprofessional. Professor Grismond he would stay - revolved around her almost falling or dropping armloads of inconvenient items.

How long had she been standing there like an idiot? Easily over a minute. Gemma sighed internally. Intelligent, respected in her field, and known as the socially-incapable one by everyone she worked with. Fantastic.

"Oh, well, Professor, I find myself running slightly late for a meeting after I decided to try a new shortcut...seem to have gotten rather misdirected, haven't I?"

[skyedumont-x-deactivated2015020]

Does anyone else feel like they’re just waiting for something to happen?

[professor-g-hendrix]

"Perhaps, Miss Dumont, rather than simply waiting for something to happen, you find a more self-directed form of entertainment?"

[aliceandersons]

As soon as she came out of her crossword-related reverie the smile of triumph that had been on her face vanished. A rather more embarrassed look appeared and Alice could almost feel her cheeks heating up, and so she coughed and blinked, shifting to fold one leg over the other in an attempt to hide it. “Are you sure you’re not a mind reader? It was a crossword puzzle.”

The woman shook her head, watching her colleague. “I’ve had a very strict morning routine for a while now but since I moved to campus I haven’t needed to wake up so early. I still do though. Force of habit now, I suppose my body is on a schedule.”

She paused then, folding the paper in her hands closed. “Are you always around this early or is this a one off sort of thing?”

[professor-g-hendrix]

"Well, technically, yes, I'm a mind reader. Only past thoughts though - the one hitch to memory manipulation. That, and I'm a teacher. Good intuition is sort of a side effect."

Gemma turned, tea in hand, and seated herself across from Alice. Where some people were diamonds in the rough, Alice was 57 precision-cut planes, edges included. Her adherence to a self-inflicted regimen was highly unsurprising.

"Oh, I'm always here in the mornings. I got Lady Morgana hooked on my favorite brand of tea so it's always stocked now. Trivial personal savings, but the view," she gestured at the large Victorian windows looking out into the central courtyard, "is what really makes it."

[aliceandersons]

Since Alice had moved onto the school campus she hadn’t needed to get up so early to get ready for the day, and yet she still did. Which left her with an a good chunk of free time in the morning, which she’d been filling most recently by doing the newspaper crossword. She’d gotten stuck on a clue and left it a few minutes earlier, sat at a table in one of the common rooms, a coffee cup at her side. Her attention was on one of the latest stories in the paper when her mind moved back to the crossword puzzle, and she paused, eyes wandering absent-mindedly as she pondered the answer. It came to her out of nowhere, and because she’d been so engrossed in her own thoughts she’d accidentally been staring at someone — something she only realised after exclaiming the word “hag” about the same time she made direct eye contact with them. 

[professor-g-hendrix]

"Accidental exclamation or honest evaluation?" Gemma asked with a little laugh.

Gemma turned back to the counter behind her to drop the bag into the waiting mug of hot water

"Or maybe a simple crossword answer? I must say, Alice, I've never seen you here quite so early. Any particular rush or you simply had to spend all your free time on campus?"

[alistairgrismond]

Alistair was still smiling like some charming idiot. An odd moment to realise it, but he found that he’d never really spoken to this particular colleague before — even Alice was more up for socialising than Gemma seemed.

"Well, I am relieved." He said. "I think it would have been inconsiderate of me… to blast out Fleetwood Mac for all the school to hear. No matter how brilliant the band is.”  

His hand itched, and had they been free then he would have weaved one through his hair out of habit. “You, uhh,” his eyes went to the bulk of papers she was holding. “Would you like any help with those? Or anything.” Jesus H. Christ, two drinks and he lost all tact. 

[professor-g-hendrix]

"Oh, well, if we're talking Fleetwood Mac here, I think everyone would benefit from a little impromptu concert!"

Gemma actually did like Fleetwood Mac. She did! Even nerdy people can like good music, jeez. Yeah, most of her iPod was classical music and ambient trance music, but that didn't mean she couldn't loosen up a little if no one was watching!

It wasn't until he spoke again that she even remembered she was holding anything, nor that said something was threatening to spill everywhere. For some reason, she didn't mind...in fact...

"What?"

There was nothing she could have done, obviously. All those papers shifting around like that, of course they were going to fall everywhere. No stopping it, really, not a chance.

"Oh, shit!"

Gemma dropped to her knees, reaching to recollect the papers into a neat-ish pile on the floor.

[alistairgrismond]

Alistair inclined his head to the side somewhat— a result of her laugh. It’d been an unexpected reaction, but not an unwelcome one. “Perhaps you were thinking, my, whoever has such a good taste in music?" He jokingly offered, that same, eye-crinkling smile across his features, (of which grew more and more relaxed by the second). 

Blasted… someone ban him from drinking ever again.

He noticed her slight fidgeting, and quite wished that he could help ease her discomfort for the situation. It did not help that he was only just about managing to keep his abdomen covered by the shirt he was holding (attempting to hold) shut. As for his chest, that was still trying to poke out around the white cotton. “I hope… that the music didn’t disturb you.”

[professor-g-hendrix]

Gemma Louise Hendrix, you brazen little fool!

"Ha..." there's that stupid laugh again, Gemma. Get a hold of yourself! "I will be honest, I couldn't hear much..."

He must think her the most skittish person he'd ever met. That was her problem, though - far too professional for her own good. She'd built that shell so she had something to fall back on when she got nervous, but it did her no favors on the personal side.

Didn't help that he had the best smile she'd seen on staff yet.

"Oh, of course not! I was just cutting through on my way back to my room..."

[alistairgrismond]

Normally, Alistair would have been deeply embarrassed, but the drink had warmed him, and all he took from the scenario was amusement. Although he still felt a pang of guilt at the embarrassment she seemed to be feeling (and displaying).

So he gave her a kind smile, as if to say there was no harm done by it, and found that her rambling was actually quite endearing. It did falter, however, when she started to flee the scene. Alistair dithered on whether or not to say something before she was gone completely.

"—I, ah, Gemma." Alistair exclaimed, stretching his upper body from the doorway a little further. "Please stay a moment. I’d… prefer not to leave it like this." He said, softer this time.

He still held the piece of paper as he spoke. “There’s been no harm done, I can assure you.” He said, adding with a tiny laugh, “well, only to your eyes.”

[professor-g-hendrix]

Gemma stopped dead, slowly turning her head to look at Alistair over her shoulder. She was a little surprised he hadn't let her go - most people did, almost like the awkwardness radiated off her or something - though at the same time, the scotch on his breath might have something to do with it...it and the bemused smile that his face had settled into earlier.

She smiled slightly, turning back to face him, papers clutched to her chest.

"Ha...Professor," she began with a breathy laugh since when do you do 'breathy laughs', Gemma? "it's...it's quite alright. Really, snooping around like a teenager, what was I thinking?"

She glanced down at her feet, shuffling her toes against the tiled floor. She glanced up a little as he spoke, just enough to notice the paper in his hand that looked suspiciously like the ones in her stack...and the sturdy torso behind it...right as the words slipped out of her mouth.

"Well, then no harm at all, I think."

[alistairgrismond]

Alistair had caught sight of the mysterious piece of paper just as he’d lifted his glass to his lips again. It didn’t actually occur to him that the sheet had come from outside, but rather that it had always been there and he’d simply failed to recognise its existence until then.

"…They make such a mess of my classroom…" He muttered, setting down his glass of scotch to wander towards the notepaper. His brows were pulled together, and he did not spot the peeping tom until after he’d picked up the litter and risen again, meeting the eyes of an on-looker.

"—Ah." Alistair got out. It was such a surprise to him that he even did a slight jump backwards, before hurrying to pull together his opened shirt and then open the door. "I, uh, Gemma?"

[professor-g-hendrix]

She didn't even realize Alistair had gotten up - or even that it was him in the classroom - until he looked her square in the eye. Gemma sprang upright, waffling on the spot as the door opened and Alistair leaned out.

Why is his shirt open? Was he.....busy? Gemma, you blundering idiot!"

"Oh...uhm...Professor Grismond...please excuse me...I just...I heard music, and all, and I got a little curious...I'm so sorry to intrude...Please don't let me interrupt you..."

Cut your losses and GET OUT!

"I'll just...be on my way then!"

She spun on her heel, thankful for how well her skin hid blushes. Maybe if she moved fast enough, they would both chalk this up to a simple accident and forget about it by tomorrow.

Well, maybe he will.

[alistairgrismond]

It was late in the evening, and with everything that’d gone on this week, Alistair had given in to the temptation of a drink, and had taken out a bottle of scotch about a half hour ago. He’d made certain to lock his classroom door beforehand, or so he’d believed himself to have done, and turned on some music at a low level before settling onto the edge of his desk. He sighed as he picked up his glass to take a swig, a frown marring his brows.

[professor-g-hendrix]

Is that.....music?

Gemma had been on her way back to the teachers' apartments, cutting through the Liberal Arts building so she could stop in her German Language classroom to pick up some papers she'd yet to grade. She was descending the stairs to take the far exit through the Literature Studies wing when she'd heard it.

Maybe it's just a teacher prepping for another Shakespeare lesson. Sonnets do always sound better set to music....

For some reason, a wave of curiosity washed over her. She slowed as she walked down the hall, trying to find the source of the sound. Trying to be sneaky - didn't want to get caught snooping, after all - she peered through the small window set into the door.

As she moved, one of the papers slipped from the top of the pile and gently - ever so gently - slid directly under the door.

[zeldaniles-blog]

Realisation, denial, and now shock. A shock of which hit her bones and made her entire body begin to shake. Not violent shaking, but instead just enough to make it look as if she was freezing. A tiny fit, as it were. Her arms slowly lowered, and folded, as if hugging her front. Zelda didn’t understand any of it, and what was Zelda Niles most famous for doing when she couldn’t figure something out? Ignoring the problem. 

"A needle was stuck in my eye and for what? To upgrade me?” Her brows marred, and at the woman’s last statement, she took to glaring. “I don’t have to live with anything I don’t want to live with.” A childish response; Zelda always grew immature when emotions were tossed into the air, or she heard something she didn’t like hearing. “I’ll make it go away — somehow. I’ve got… things. I think…”

Zelda’s mind went to the secret bag at the back of her wardrobe. “Solutions.”

[professor-g-hendrix]

Eighteen and still such a child - worse, a child who didn't realize it. A child who thought they were so adult because they did grown up things despite not being able to see their own stunted emotional growth.

"I don't know why they did it, Zelda. I don't have an answer for you. You could ask that same question about why Miss Carrington is now twice as deadly and your own cousin is now without her ability and pull the same blank."

"You're going to find that your usual avoidance 'solutions' are not going to cut it, Zelda. You've got hundreds of people in your head now - the best way to make them go away forever is to learn to block them out."

[zeldaniles-blog]

To say it “sunk in” was an understatement. When Zelda caught on to what was happening, the realisation pretty much slapped her, full-force, in the face. She grew a sickly pale, “no."

The awareness rapidly changed to denial, and she mustered up enough energy to flinch out of the teacher’s touch. She raised her arms as some barrier between them, and stared at Gemma as she backed away.

Her connection with the woman’s thoughts was lost, and suddenly a million other voices came flooding back in. It made Zelda’s hands go to her ears, as if that’d help.

"No. I don’t want your help. I don’t need anybody’s help. I just need to forget about all of this."

[professor-g-hendrix]

When Zelda flinched out of her grasp, Gemma instinctively pulled her hands back to her chest. Zelda'd just had a life-changing realization shoved square in her face - there was no telling what she'd do.

"I'm not going to force you into any decision, Zelda. It's just an offer."

She took a few steps backwards, giving the girl more room, making sure she didn't feel cornered.

"Zelda, we don't know what caused this and or if it's reversible. This is your reality now - you are going to have to learn to live with it."

[zeldaniles-blog]

Zelda should have been freaking out, and yet she wasn’t. She could feel her heart race, her wounded eye throb, and it all kind of made her light headed, but she did nothing other than stare.

Confusion twisted her brows into a frown, and she looked from Gemma’s eyes to Gemma’s mouth repeatedly — she’d said something, hadn’t she? But her mouth hadn’t moved. But she definitely said something! Zelda had heard her. I must have missed her lips move, she thought.

The girl gave a few rapid nods. “Yes — yeah, of course I can hear you. I’m not… not deaf. Miss you’re, you’re starting to freak me out a little…”

[professor-g-hendrix]

You can hear me, but I'm not talking, am I?

Zelda needed to come to terms with this very quickly - suddenly being unable to concentrate because other people were constantly yelling inside your head was extremely stressful and Gemma had seen it drive stronger and more seasoned mutants off the deep end.

Zelda, you're going to be fine. This is just a new aspect of yourself, nothing more.

If you want, I can help you.