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lexosaurus · 3 years

Text

Statistic

My contribution to DP Side Hoes Week 2021 day 1! Character: Mr. Lancer Theme: Reflection

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William Lancer stood in front of the mirror, fastening his tie with practiced fingers. He pulled the fabric down, completing the knot, and straightened it before him.

There. Now he was ready to start his day.

Well, almost.

He picked up the steaming mug of coffee off his dresser and sipped it, cherishing the warmth. It was early, too early. No matter how much his parents told him he would get used to waking up early for work every day as an adult, he never seemed to get the hang of it.

He stifled a yawn, noting the bags under his eyes and creasing forehead as he stared at his reflection in the mirror. Teaching had aged him, there was no doubt. Between preparing the lesson plans, grading assignments, editing papers, meeting with parents, tutoring students—not to mention the dreaded administrative meetings—it was really no surprise that teaching had slowly worn him down over the years.

But he wasn’t sure he could ever walk away. At least, not for a few more decades.

He headed downstairs, swiping his keys off his kitchen counter and starting the familiar drive to school.

Teaching wasn’t all bad, it wasn’t all weary, thankless work. The students, though hormonal and immature they could be, kept him going every day. Watching their eyes light up as they understood a concept, seeing them succeed in their athletic or creative ventures, those were the small moments he cherished. The parts of his days that he yearned for.

He parked and strolled into the school, coffee still in hand. The hallways, though empty now, would soon be teaming with life as the students slowly made their way to school. And though they’d be tired at first, slowly throughout the day the voices in the halls would get louder, more lively, as the day picked up steam.

He said a few obligatory greetings to his coworkers, grabbed a few files from his office, and then headed to the printer room. He had a few worksheets he needed to print out for his students today.

“Will!” Tom Falluca greeted him. A copy machine buzzed next to him, spitting out papers.

“Hey, Tom.” Edward set his mug down on a spare table. It always amazed him how lively Tom seemed to be in the morning. “Happy Friday.”

“And to you! Got any plans for the weekend?”

William shrugged. His weekends tended to all be the same, with him switching off between prepping for school, emails, reading, and video games. Not that he told anyone about the latter hobby. It would have been rather unprofessional of him to admit to such a thing. “I’ll probably get started on my book club book. It’s a rather interesting one I believe. Well, according to Jane from the history department it is. But that woman will read anything, so I take her recommendations with a grain of salt. How about you?”

“My wife’s sister will be in town this weekend, so we’ll be hosting them.”

“Oh, that will be fun. Is she the one with the kids?”

“Yup, although they’ll be spending the weekend with their grandparents, so we won’t have them this time. It’ll just be Alice and her husband. I think we’ll probably go biking around the city on Saturday and then go out to dinner and a bar.”

“I’m sure they’ll appreciate it.” William pressed a button, whirring his copy machine to life. “Kids can be such a handful.”

“Oh, you’re telling me! I still have one at home, although he’s old enough now to be able to take care of himself for a day.”

“That’s the good thing about you working here, isn’t it? He would never be able to get away with a house party.”

Tom chuckled. “Heavens, no. The rumor mill works too well for that.”

William hummed, swapping a paper out of the copy machine with another.

“If any of your students look despondent today, it’s because they got their math test back,” Tom said.

“Not a good one?”

“Well, for the most part it went okay. But there were a few scores that were a bit lower than expected, and the usual suspects didn’t do well either...”

William didn’t miss the implication of that last comment. “You mean Mr. Fenton and Mr. Baxter.”

“Dash didn’t do great, but I spoke with his parents about arranging him with a math tutor last week and they seemed to agree with the idea, especially since I know he’s starting to think about college recruitment. But Danny!” He let out a sharp breath and rubbed his temples with the tips of his fingers. “Good grief, I don’t know what to do with that kid.”

William recalled the essay he graded from Mr. Fenton earlier this weekend. It was a garbled blend of English words that could only have been written by someone who couldn’t even bother to read the Sparknotes of the novel. For a while, William suspected dyslexia. But he had seen Mr. Fenton’s work after being forced to study in the classroom after school, and while he certainly wasn’t on the same level as his sister, he had shown to be able to produce legible, comprehensible papers when he put the time into it.

It was almost too easy to write him off as just another lazy student. And sometimes, William did do that. But he knew that deep down there was a much, much larger issue at play.

He just didn’t know what that issue was.

“Fenton is a rather interesting case,” William finally said. “Truthfully, I haven’t been able to figure out how to handle him either.”

“It would be much easier if his parents would get involved. I’ve sent emails, but they just apologize for his performance and promise that they’ll talk to him. He doesn’t need to be talked to, he needs real intervention, and I can’t do that if his parents won’t agree to it.”

“I’ve had similar issues,” William admitted. Jack and Maddie Fenton were an unfortunate roadblock in his progress with Daniel. At the moment, it seemed detentions were the only way he could actually get Mr. Fenton to be forced into doing schoolwork at all. And even then, half the time Mr. Fenton would either not show up to the detention, or he’d pull one of his infamous disappearing acts halfway.

“I don’t know.” Tom shook his head. “Every so often, you get a student like this. I know, I’ve been at this job for almost thirty years. I know we’re not heroes, we can’t save everyone. But it still is such a damn shame to see a student with so much potential slip through the cracks.”

“I agree.”

At this rate, Mr. Fenton would amount to nothing more than just another failed statistic. He would just slip through the cracks.

William hated to think about it.

“We can’t save them all, Tom, but I’ll see about trying to get Madeline and Jack Fenton into my office again with the guidance counselor.”

“Theresa’s good. Maybe she’ll get through to them.”

William shrugged and collected his papers. It wouldn’t have been the first time that Theresa, Mr. Fenton’s parents, and himself had sat down together to discuss Daniel’s performance. But it was always the same response, just a, “We never had these issues from Jazz!” from the father and a, “I’m so sorry, I’ll talk to him,” from the mother. Any suggestions of a 504 plan was shut down before William could finish his sentence.

“He’s never had these issues before. We’ll talk some sense into him!” Jack Fenton had said.

There had been students in past years who had parents that spoke like this. Opposed to alternative methods, so sure they alone could “talk some sense” into their teen as if that would solve all their academic issues.

It never ended well.

William shuffled off to homeroom, one hand clutching his photocopied papers and the other holding a nearly empty mug of coffee.

He wasn’t sure how to get through to Daniel. He wasn’t sure how to convince his parents that Daniel needed extra help, and that was okay. It wasn’t a sign of intelligence, or lack thereof.

But he needed to figure it out.

He refused to let Mr. Fenton become another statistic.

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Thanks for reading!

#danny phantom #dp side hoes week 2021 #phicc #my writing #unbeta'd

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