The College Professor || Rdj fanfic || studentxteacher

A Fresh New Start

And so it begins, a new day, a new school, fresh new faces of people i've never seen before and most importantly a fresh new start.

I walk out of my dorm and made my way towards my first and only class of today. College seemed so much easier already. I had three classes in total, two of which were only on certain days and not all week. Whereas for the class I had today, math, I had everyday at 12pm.

I walk inside the empty room, well the professor was there but no other students were on site. Only me. I was quite early. I wanted this to be the beginning of me redeeming myself for my high school behavior. If it wasn't for my actual intelligence I have then, I wouldn't have graduated. However, I was lucky enough to graduate with high grades and get into my dream college, UCSD.

I was so busy looking around the huge classroom that I hadn't acknowledged the professor, not once.

"Afternoon." I say taking a seat three rows up

The professor not once looked towards my direction nor did he say anything back. He kept his back towards me as he continued to write something on the chalkboard.

'Well he seems rude' I thought to myself 'No shut up Lily! Maybe he didn't hear you' I continued to argue with myself in my head...

Soon I was pulled out of my thoughts as I saw more students walk in and take a seat. After a couple of minutes the professor had finally turned towards his class and began to acknowledge our presence.

"Good Afternoon class, My name is Professor Downey. First off I'd like to start by telling you all that you will not and can not call me Mr. Downey, Sir, Mr.D, and I will most certainly not tolerate just Downey. If you want my attention you will use 'Professor Downey' otherwise I will not acknowledge you. Secondly, I do not permit the use of phones in my class. If I see a phone out I will take it and give you detention. If you chose this class then I expect you all to be all ears otherwise you may leave and do whatever the hell you want. While you're here you must obey my rules. In my classroom I do not tolerate any type of disruptive behavior, in other words no clowning around. Leave that stuff in high school. You're in college now. Understood?"

The room filled with scattered "yes's"

"Good. Now today I will be handing out this syllabus. We will go over it today and I expect you all to come to class prepared to learn tomorrow."

He passes out the paper to the class and we begin to look it over

"Can someone tell me what are Integrals?" he asks

"You." he points to a girl in the front row who now probably regrets sitting there
"What's your name?"

"Uh- Emily Professor Downey."

"Good. Emily what are integrals?"

"Integrals calculate area, and they are the opposite of derivatives."

"Mmm. That's part of it. I didn't ask about derivatives so let's not get ahead just yet. What else is an Integral?"

"You. kid. what's your name?" He points to the boy two seats far right to me

"Julio."

"Ok what's an integral? Julio."

"An integral is- um, it's a numerical value equal to the area."

"I need more information people don't just restate what others have said"

"I'll ask one more person. You." he says pointing to me

"Me?" I ask stupidly

"Yes. You."

"Well, the easiest way to define an integral is" I proceed to answer when suddenly I'm rudely interrupted by the teacher

"you forgot to tell us your name." he says disruptively

I ignore him and continue to answer his question "is to say that it is equal to the area underneath a function when it is graphed. For example, integrating the function y = 3, which is a horizontal line, over the interval x = [0, 2] is the same as finding the area of the rectangle with a length of 2 and a width or height of 3 and whose southwestern point is at the origin. That is an easy example, of course, and the areas calculus is interested in calculating can't be determined by resorting to the equation A = l x w. Instead, calculus breaks up bathe oddly shaped space under a curve into an infinite number of miniature rectangular-shaped columns. I'm not going to go into depth but, in other words, integrating, or finding the area under a curve, can be more formally defined as calculating the limit of an infinite series."

"Finally someone with a correct in depth answer. However I didn't get your name."

"My name is Lilliana Sullivan"

"Well Ms. Sullivan you gave a great response and I hope you keep that up all semester long."

This class doesn't end for another hour so we all continue to read over the syllabus as he frightens more students with his questions.

"Alright class you are dismissed, I'll see you tomorrow. Make sure you come prepared and well rested. I don't want you falling asleep in my room while I teach."

Everyone packs up and rushes out of the room. I stay seated for a bit while I slowly pack up my things. I was in no hurry unlike my fellow classmates. I was done with classes for the day since I only had his class today.

As I get up from my seat and head for the exit I hear him call my name.

"Ms.Sullivan, right?"

"Lily, sir. Please call me Lily." I reply turning around to see him

he coughs slightly "Please don't call me sir, and nice to meet you, Lily." he smiles oh so slightly

"Would you maybe like to go out for coffee right now? or if you're busy maybe some other time?"

"I'm not sure that would be appropriate, don't get me wrong I would love to have coffee with you. But if the school sees a student and a teacher walk out of the campus together in the same car I'm sure they'd be suspicious of us, if not you. It could in the end get you fired."

"Well I don't think they'd have to think of anything wrong. It's a harmless coffee date."

"Date-?" I ask raising an eyebrow

"Pardon. I meant coffee... outing? I don't know. It's not a date of course not but we're just getting coffee that's all. But if you don't feel comfortable then maybe some other day." he looks back down continuing to put his papers in his briefcase

I'm not sure why I didn't just say yes in the first place. It's not that i'm uncomfortable, I've just never been on some sort of "date" with a guy. No guy in my previous schools has ever asked me to go anywhere with them. They all disliked me because of the way I had dressed, very "emo-ish" to them, even though i wasn't emo. I was just more of an outcast. I talked back to all my teachers. I often skipped class and got into fights with girls many times. Everyone thought I was some sort of idiot junkie when in fact I wasn't. I'm smart. Obviously I'm not Einstein but I understood everything I was taught. There was a time in my life where I just simply didn't care but I got my shit together and that's how I got here in the first place.

I realized I had been standing at the door long enough for Mr.Downey to finish packing his things up. I was blocking his way so he walked up and cleared his throat signaling that he was trying to exit.

"While it may not be appropriate for us to leave campus together in one car. If your offer to have coffee today still stands, I normally go to the Starbucks 10 minutes away from here. I'm usually there at around 3:30pm to 4pm. If you just so happen to be there at that time I wouldn't be bother to be accompanied by you and I don't see anything remotely wrong with a student and teacher engaging in a conversation outside of school in a place they both just so happened to be in at the same time coincidentally."

"Well Lily, I just so happen to go to the same Starbucks at around the same time so maybe we'll run into each other today" he winks at me as he walks out his classroom

I stand there like an idiot before rushing off to my dorm room to get ready for our coffee "date/outing"