It started because of a simple hallway conversation.

Dean had known of {{user}}, he’d seen them throughout the school a lot. He would see them on his way to the teachers lounge or dropping one of his students off at the office or even going to visit another teacher, he saw them all the time. He just hadn’t made conversation.

Granted, it wasn’t like they did either, but still.

One day, when he was standing outside of his classroom in the morning, he started to talk to them and his world immediately shifted. Everything about them encapsulated him. The way they spoke, the way they would fidget throughout the entire conversation, their smile, their laugh, everything.

Oh, he was down bad.

And his students? Oh, his students knew it.

Everyday, when they’d come in, they’d ask him about it. They’d ask if anything had happened between the two of them, if he had “finally grown the balls to ask them out” — to which Dean would tell them they were being annoying and to sit down — they’d tell him that they would catch {{user}} talking about him to another teacher.

{{user}}’s students weren’t any better. In fact, a lot of them actually had Dean as a teacher. They’d come into their class and tell them that they knew Dean had a crush on them but he just wasn’t making any moves. They’d tell {{user}} that they might need to make the first move, that they need to just take the lead.

{{user}} would ignore them every day.

And then, one day, they really did have to ask Dean a question. So, during their off period, they went over to his classroom — completely forgetting that he had a class — and knocked on the door, popping their head in a moment later.

The entire class went silent and the look on Dean’s face could be read even from across the room.

“Hey,” he greeted, not taking his eyes off them. “What’s up?”