Doyens and Daydreams [England]

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1924, Europe. The Locarno Treaties are signed and the new Weimar Republic accepts her western border with France. No. 1925. Or was that the Geneva Protocol? The Washington Conference perhaps? No, that couldn't be right. Oh! The Dawes Plan. But that wasn't signed for another few years, right?

Defeated, the boy sat down his pen. He was sure he'd gotten his head around this previously, but apparantly that wasn't so. Treaties and arrangements waltzed in and out of his memory at their own leisure and Afonso wasn't so sure that that was an arrangement that he would be able to maintain for much longer. Exams weren't all that far away, and with such poor knowledge on the course he would have no foundation to even begin explaining why events took place or whether they were justifiable or not. He'd have no hope of answering a paper, let alone passing it.

So when the bell rung and his classmates filed out, he remained in his seat. He was thankful, partly; he had no desire to trek across the bleak, heimal grounds to get back to his dormitory and grapple with the rush of bodies flooding the hallways. But at the same time, he wasn't so keen on sacrificing his own time to more schoolwork. This wasn't what his father had sent him to the Academy for. Afonso was here first and foremost to gain some control over his clairvoyance; find a use for it in the outside world- not study two centuries' worth of International Relations.

Not that he wasn't fond of history, not at all. It fascinated him to no end; there was little he loved more than just sitting and listening to the professor recount stories and events of years gone by. The rise and fall of empires, the evolution of democracies, he loved it all to pieces. He just couldn't remember any of it to save his life- which was rather disappointing. No; frustrating was probably a more appropriate emotion.

But not an emotion he felt strongly enough to seek out a tutor. His professor had organised that for him.

Afonso wanted to pass History, but it wasn't really the first thing on his mind. It wasn't a priority for him; and while he'd love to improve at the subject, the last thing he wanted was some tetchy, inscrutable pedant to look down their nose at him, trying to help him understand the work of the League of Nations.

Arthur Percival Kirkland. That's who he was told to wait for; and while Afonso hadn't met him yet, his expectations weren't set very high at all. Just the doyen's name seemed to carry an air of pretentiousness that made him want to wrinkle his nose.

But, he was told to wait, and wait he would. Who was he to question the boy's potential? Maybe he could actually help him out. Or maybe he would be just as hoity-toity and pompous as he imagined him to be.

Afonso stretched his arms over the desk and groaned lightly. With the caucophony of the students now gone, the somnolent warmth of the radiatiors seemed to almost overcome him. Anticipating a long wait for his tutor to arrive, the boy splayed his upper body across the table and settled himself amongst the papers. He'd just take a quick nap. Yes. That would be nice.

[ahhh i'm dreadfully sorry to have kept you waiting for so long lovely! please let me know if you'd like me to tweak anything at all~!]

[Deleted]

“Ah, shit, shit, shit,” Arthur seethed as he rushed through the crowded hallway. Leave it to his luck that he’d turn up late to his first session as a tutor.

It was a week ago when his History professor called him over after class and explained to him the situation. Not much was said on it - only that he’d be mentoring an upperclassman on subjects he previously learned. Their allotted time together was exactly one hour and fifteen minutes. How well the student did on their upcoming test determined the amount of extra credit Arthur would receive. That was all - no specifics on their gender, name, or ability.

This sort of activity wasn’t exactly his cup of tea - one-on-one leading, that is - but regardless, he planned to do his best in teaching whomever rested behind the door.
In fact, he was known to be a bit of a martinet in these cases. Leading over people seemed to have a positive effect on him, and he was in unusually high spirits.

Of course, that was before he had hit a detour. His plan was simply to head to his dorm, brew some afternoon tea, and rush right on back, but that was before a meddling Frenchman snaked his way in. Their conversation escalated in the same way it regularly did. Small talk between the two quickly moved to a light amount of disagreement, which from there went into an all-out vicious argument. They bickered and bantered until the whistling of the kettle reminded Arthur of where he should have been. He was already 20 minutes late.

He hastily poured the hot water into a thermos, tightened the lid, and bid a quick goodbye. And now that he’d reached the right building, he ran until the classroom door was in sight. He took a moment to catch his breath, then opened the door.

“My apologies! I had to stop and-”
His words made a hollow echo as they resounded throughout the quiet room. The only noise it held prior was the light sound of a rhythmic breathing - a student sleeping at his desk. Afternoon light shone through, keeping the place warm.

“...Pick up a few things...hm.”
A little bewildered, he took a few steps back and eyed the numbers above the classroom door. RM 203 - yes, this was the place. So this is who he was to tutor?

With short steps, Arthur cautiously approached the elder student. Brown locks were splayed across his forehead, cheek pressed into the desk as he soundly slept. His papers were in a bit of a disarray, overlapping here and there underneath his outstretched arms.

Arthur thought of scraping a separate desk across the floor to face him, but was aware that the loud sound would lead to an unpleasant awakening. He didn’t know this boy well enough to be rude to him. So instead, he set down his mug and messenger bag on a desk one seat forward and gently tapped the boy’s shoulder a few times.

“Afternoon, er...” He glanced down at one of the askew papers to catch an upside-down glimpse of the other’s name.

“...Afonso. A bright and sunny day awaits.” He stumbled over the words with uncertainty, speaking in a soft tone that he wasn’t used to using. The odd situation made him feel much more awkward than angered.
Well, if worst came to worst, they’d only have less than an hour left together.

--
[It's perfectly alright, don't worry! I'm glad just being able to thread with you in the first place. ^^]

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He'd heard the boy before he saw him; he had certainly made quite the entrance, his loud apology carrying across the room had woken Afonso rather abruptly- but in his state of lethargy, he had no intention of raising himself from his papers just yet; instead just laying there still, feigning sleep. He'd probably have been more than chipper to stay there just as he was, if the other student hadn't started tapping away at his shoulder.

“Afternoon, er... Afonso. A bright and sunny day awaits.”

It was probably the irritation of being woken more than anything else, but that statement bothered him a little. A bright and sunny day awaits? In the midafternoon? What on Earth was this boy on about? While the boy had probably meant it with the best of intentions, simply to cheer him up, it only really fuelled his exasperation. This was going to be the longest hour of his life.

His cheek still plastered firmly to the desk, the boy cocked a brow and lazily directed his gaze forwards to study his new tutor. He wasn't particularly sure why he'd expected Arthur to have been in his year, but that certainly wasn't the case. The individual before him really didn't match any of his original assumptions. He was a touch shorter than he'd imagined- if he had to guess, he'd have said the boy was a Sophomore, though peering upwards from the desk wasn't the greatest vantage point. While his voice struck Afonso as unusually soft and light, Arthur had a sort of adamantine feel to him. The kid seemed like the determined, tenacious sort to Afonso. But maybe that was his eyebrows talking.

Regardless, Afonso was becoming rather conscious that he'd been squinting at the boy for a fair while, and while he was trying to formulate some kind of impression of his mentor, he'd become aware that he probably wasn't forming a particularly brilliant first impression of himself.

"Nngghhh." Afonso arched his back and stretched, the boy's bones feeling somewhat tired from being left sprawled stationary in such an awkward pose, before settling himself once more and languidly raising his body from the desk. The faint afternoon sun against his eyes elicited a soft sigh from him, before redirecting his focus back to the matter in hand.

"Afternoon. Kirkland, right? Afonso. But, hey; you knew that already, huh?" The boy gave a weak smile before offering his palm across the desk to the student adjacent. "Don't worry about being late, it's totally fine. I needed a bit of a catnap anyways."

"So..." Still somewhat dazed from his impromptu nap, he tilted his head and squinted hard at the clock on the wall. 3:32pm Good. That gave them, what, about fourty-five minutes of studying time? That sounded pretty reasonable; his regular classes ran longer than that, so this shouldn't be a wholly terrible experience. On top of that, other than the boy's odd sing-song voice, this Kirkland kid didn't seem that terrible either- for now anyways.

This was starting to seem less like pulling teeth and more tolerable and possibly useful the more he thought about it. Maybe this wouldn't be completely pointless after all. His face still trained on that of the clock's, he flicked his eyes back towards his tutor.

"...how do you want to do this?"

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It felt like waking a sleeping dragon.

When teleported into fictional worlds via literature, Arthur experienced many treacherous and terrifying situations firsthand. Why, then, did his breath hitch in apprehension as a sleepy senior opened his eyes?
Perhaps it was because this was real. His actions caused consequence. He did not stand back as the main character courageously slayed the monster. This wasn’t a scene that Arthur could escape from with the close of a book.

And that, quite honestly, frightened him.

As he woke, he young man before him said nothing in response. He simply stared, giving his tutor a somewhat disapproving once-over.

Ah.
He was sizing up the prey, wasn’t he?

One of the many benefits of reading various literature included knowing what to do, no matter your bearings. For example, the junior was aware that rapid movement caused predators to strike at weaker animals. In this case, getting eaten was the equivalent of making a bad first impression. Arthur pressed his lips into a fine line, trying to restrain himself from showing any significant emotion. People often found him strange, but it would be awful to make any bad first impressions without having even done anything yet.

After a few moments, the student stretched in his seat, then sat up languidly. His movements reminded Arthur of a cat - sleek, but slow-paced. He raised his arm to break the air between them, hand outstretched.

The predator had become the peer.
After a moment, the junior returned the movement and shook hands with him.

"Don't worry about being late, it's totally fine. I needed a bit of a catnap anyways."

Arthur nearly cracked a smile. His earlier ascertainment was right, then; this boy’s actions very closely resembled those of a cat’s.

Something about Afonso seemed very gentle - no, contained was a better way to describe it. As though he had to deal with strenuous tasks on a daily basis. The underclassman knew from experience how stress could turn a person tired and informal. He’d do his best not to be especially harsh.

"So...how do you want to do this?"

“Well...”

Cumbersome, Arthur debated between actions before deciding to sit sideways on the desk chair in front of Afonso. He cleared his throat, and began to focus his mind.

“It’s all a matter of knowing in what way your brain best retains knowledge. Guessing by the fact that you’ve been assigned a tutor, we can most likely rule the auditory technique out. That’s mainly the type that the professor of this class uses. His style of teaching, depending on the student, could be more bothersome than helpful - he tends to ramble and digress, on and on.”

A curled hand covering his mouth, Arthur stared up at the ceiling, mind lost in contemplative thought. He was thinking aloud, not realizing that his tone emulated that of the droning the had only just mentioned.

“That leaves the visual approach...but there’s a mix of that here as well, so perhaps kinetic? That’s fairly difficult to perform in a history class, though. Perhaps memorization is the true problem? Hm.” He sighed promptly and crossed his arms, eyebrows knit.

A glance to his side reminded him that he was indeed in the room with another person, and that talking to oneself was regularly frowned upon in society. It wasn’t as if he was bad at reading the mood of a situation - just that he was too used to thinking only for himself.

Breaking from the isolation, Arthur turned his gaze towards the boy and reminded himself sternly to be more inclusive. He was acting as a mentor, after all, and mentors were meant to interact with and help their student.

“In your free time, would you rather read a book, listen to music, or play sports outside?” He inquired, trying not to look too stern. Why did there have to be so many things to focus on in a social situation?

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It was really only good and proper to greet new people with a handshake; and although it was simply common courtesy to accept another's palm when it was offered, Afonso was pleased the other boy'd taken it. After all; their respective tardinesses aside- they were both here on business, and though it wasn't particularly thrilling, good etiquette was always called upon.With any luck it'd help push the process along as painlessly and effortlessly as possible. Afonso still wasn't totally sure what to make of the other boy as of yet, but his manners were in good line, [though his handshake not terribly robust,] and that won him some brownie points for the time being.

Not enough to shake the slight itch of agitation he had for Arthur just yet though. Really, the boy probably didn't want to be here any more than he did- actually, he was pretty sure that was the case. No amount of "extra credit" could possibly compel any young person in their right mind to sacrifice their spare time for this malarky. Arthur was certainly apologetic for his being late, but- did he really care? Probably not. In all honesty, Afonso wouldn't have been sincerely sorry if the shoe had been on his foot. So that was fine. He wasn't exactly the poster-child for punctuality in any case; to build his own first impression of the boy over nothing much wouldn't be that fair at all.

Thinking on it, he really was being far too critical of his tutor- right? Afonso let out a feeble sigh; the kid had barely said "good afternoon" to him, he hadn't any reason to be being so tetchy at all. Yawning a little, he told himself it was just the drowsiness. He had been out for a fair while after all, right? He was probably just still half asleep. Yeah. He hadn't any reason to dislike this boy.

“It’s all a matter of knowing in what way your brain best retains knowledge. Guessing by the fact that you've been assigned a tutor, we can most likely rule the auditory technique out. That’s mainly the type that the professor of this class uses. His style of teaching, depending on the student, could be more bothersome than helpful - he tends to ramble and digress, on and on... that leaves the visual approach...but there’s a mix of that here as well, so perhaps kinetic? That’s fairly difficult to perform in a history class, though. Perhaps memorization is the true problem? Hm.”

Oh.
No, yeah, he did.

Arthur sounded like he'd swallowed a lifetime's worth of thesauri; casually regurgitating the odd word, embellishing his sentences as one would decorate a cake. It didn't sound eloquent to Afonso at all- just empty, superfluous drabble. It vaguely reminded him of his own professor, and he was sure Arthur could probably do a fine job of it, the more he mused on it. That was probably a much finer career path for him than the superhero business; though that seemed far too abrasive a quip to make, Afonso stashed the idea to one side, perhaps to mention later.

He wasn't disenchanted by Arthur's little lecture by any means; he found it to be well and truly otiose but he was captivated- if only out of sheer confusion. What is this kid doing anymore? Words tumbled forth from the boy's mouth, but Afonso was more intrigued by his posture than anything. His brow furrowed, gaze oriented high towards the ceiling tile and his hand wrapped over his mouth- Afonso was well and truly befuddled, and couldn't really refrain from letting his lower jaw drop slightly and cock a brow at his tutor. He'd made up his mind; the boy was a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma.

“In your free time, would you rather read a book, listen to music, or play sports outside?”

"Ahh?"

He corrected his expression quickly, before actually considering the question carefully- running a lock of hair through his finger as an aide. Thinking on it; he was really likely to pick any three of them- he loved them all greatly- literature, music and sport alike, Afonso found them all to be rather fantastic. If anything, he was more likely to sleep in his spare time, but something told him that probably wasn't the kind of answer the boy was looking for here at all. Really, books were probably his best bet. Sport was all well and good, but it certainly wasn't his go to, that decision rested heavily on the weather- and what with it being so fickle, he probably wouldn't choose to do sport in bad weather. Music wasn't his first choice either. Books always managed to provide some kind of solace and entertainment of some sort. Regardless of what he was looking for, it was guaranteed he'd find it in one book or another. They offered variety that sport and music couldn't.

"I'd probably read a book, before the others. Why?"

Afonso felt somewhat cautious, was this some sort of test? He wasn't frightened or intimidated by his companion, but more tentative than anything. Yes. He wasn't stepping on eggshells just yet, but he wasn't terribly sure just what he was dealing with here.

[ooc; this is so late i'm so sorry oh my god]