French was Hercules's favorite class. Not because of the subject, the other students in the class, or even the reading material.
No, it was because of his incredibly good looking teacher, Mr. Lafayette. He was a new teacher at this school, in charge of teaching Hercules's year 11 French class. Mr. Lafayette, or Laf, was tall with dark brown curly hair, a nice smile, and beautiful eyes.
Hercules often found himself staring the entire class, which was easy to get away with since he was all the way in the back.
But Mr. Lafayette was his teacher. Hercules was too shy to try talking to him during class. He was always awkward around people. He didn't even have many friends to begin with. For the first month of class or so, Hercules tried his best, earning flawless grades. Mr. Lafayette would smile and say "Well done Hercules" when he passed back his essays, but that was about it.
But Hercules noticed something.
Once when one of the other students did bad, Mr. Lafayette kneeled down by the desk with concern in those deep golden eyes, offering to help the student and saying that they could redo it, because perhaps they hadn't been feeling well or were going through something at home.
So Hercules got an idea.
Perhaps he would receive more attention from Mr. Lafayette if he were to start getting bad grades. It would have to stand out, since he was usually great at writing. He began his plan right away, starting with the essay that was just assigned.
He also purposely 'forgot' to do any of the homework, such as the reading questions, which were given to them every few days. It only took about two weeks for him to get noticed, just as he'd planned.
"Hercules, could you please stay after class?" The teenager felt his heart start pounding, but nodded as he made eye contact with his teacher and blushed, looking back down at his desk. All of the students filed from the room quickly.
French was the last class of the day, so they were all eager to get home. Once the room was empty, Laf shut the door and walked over to where Hercules was sitting, taking a seat at the desk beside him.
"Is everything alright at home Hercules?" He asked, with that heart-melting look of concern that Hercules loved. The boy stuttered for an answer.
"Y-yes sir."
"What about here at school? Is there somebody bothering you?"
'You sure get me bothered,' Hercules thought to himself, but answered aloud, "No sir, everything is fine at school."
Mr. Lafayette didn't look convinced.
"I'm worried about you Hercules. Your grades have dropped. Your last two essays were nothing like what you usually give me, and you haven't done any homework for almost two weeks now. That isn't like you at all."
Hercules felt a little ashamed, twisting his hands together nervously and feeling his face heat up again.
"Hey," The older man reached out to tilt his chin upwards, and Hercules almost died. "You can talk to me Hercules. Whatever's the matter, I want to help. You understand that, don't you?"
Hercules squirmed in his seat from the feeling of his teacher's soft fingers that still held his face.
"Y-yes sir. I understand."
"Good boy," The teacher said, pulling his hand back. "How about you stay after school tomorrow and I can help you get caught up with your work, alright?"
'Perfect', Hercules thought. This was just the kind of thing that he had been hoping for.
"Okay."
