Teacher Orientation? [Jake]

Andrei missed Marie and his kids already. It had only been earlier that morning that they had said their tearful goodbyes before his train rolled off from the station, but it felt like a lifetime away to the man as he stepped off the train onto the eerily familiar Hogsmeade platform. The trip itself had been uneventful; he caught up on the news he had neglected to read the day before because Helen needed new school clothes and he slept or rather he tried to sleep—every time he felt his head begin to grow heavy the train would jolt or the noisy kids in the next compartment would screech about something or another. Suffice to say he was not in the best of moods.

Yet, upon reaching the crossroads that led to Hogwarts, as so often happens to a man about open a new chapter in his life, he temporarily forgot about his old woes. Each step brought back memories of his time at the famed school for witches and wizards. His first kiss by the lake, the time he got hit by a muting spell, and, of course, the small group of friends he used to play chess with on the weekends. All these memories and more began to blur together to such an extent that the man was surprised when he looked up and found himself at his destination, Hogwarts.

The school looked as timeless as ever. As a student, he hadn't really appreciated the beauty of the place with its sloping arches, tall spires, and looming gargoyles. However, now, walking through the grounds he found himself in awe of the school's unique architecture and picturesque landscape. There really was no place on earth like Hogwarts and, in realizing this, he felt the cool tingle of excitement run down his spine.

The childlike excitement only swelled and swelled as he made his way to what he knew to be the staff room and in spite of himself butterflies fluttered around madly in his stomach. He had always wondered what the staff room looked like, but he had never expected something so, for lack of a better word, boring. The door closed soundlessly behind him and he found himself alone in a deafening silence unique to schools nearing the summer time.

All at once any excitement he had evaporated only to be replaced with his old woes once more. Somethings are never quite as magical once you have seen their inner workings; looking at the exceptionally normal staff room Andrei had a sinking feeling this would be the case at Hogwarts. So far it seemed like this job was going to be like any other, work. Not that he minded work, but he had expected something...different?

Shurgging to himself he fell into one of the larger armchairs allowing his earthtone robes to billow around him. Pulling the worn leather breifcase he had with him onto his lap he rifled through it for bit before finding and removing a map he had been given upon being hired. In his years as a student he hadn't taken much time to know every nook and crany of the castle, but now, as a teacher, he felt it his duty to do so.

Step one, he furrowed his brow every so slightly and looked down at the map, find my classroom.

Tracing a route with his index finger, Andrei did not hear anyone enter the staff room or if he did he showed no sign of it. In fact, it was only the mention of a familiar name, Jake Newbury, that he even bothered to look up from the map with an apologetic smile. Folding up the map and putting it to the side to give the man across from his full attention, Andrei looked upon a person he had only read about in the papers.

“Yes, yes I am,” he replied, matching Jake’s friendly tone. “Andrei Kessler, I’ll be taking over for Cynthia Blackwater as the new Ancient Runes professor next term.”

He paused slightly as he so often did when deciding the appropriate way to proceed.

“Though,” his tone shifted sharply to mild disbelief. “Surely I misheard you. You’d be far better suited to being a flying instructor, no?”

Andrei didn’t much like American Quidditch teams. They had, as of late, a bad habit of showing up the English teams he rooted for in any international tournament or expedition. However, his dislike did not preclude him from reading anything and everything he could get his hands on about the teams across the pond. And, while a bit dated, the name Jake Newbury stood out in his memory for the splash he made in the media.

“As for help,” he continued along fluidly. “I remember most of the castle from my time here as a student. That said perhaps you could refresh my memory just a bit. I seem to recall there being a secret passageway from the second floor to the fifth, but I can’t, for the life of me, remember where it was…Anything to avoid those godforsaken stairs.”

He offered a weak smile with his last remark. Andrei could not count the number of times he had been late to class as a student because the stairs decided it would be a good idea to go to the seventh floor instead of the third.

"Ah. Oh well," he shrugged at the lack of information on the secret passageway. "I guess I'll have to do some exploring then."

Secrets, in Andrei's opinion, were there to discovered and uncovered. Perhaps it had to do with his line of work. For him there was a certain thrill to the investigation followed by the final reveal; it was one of the few things in life that really got his blood pumping and mind working.

"That's respectable though," he admitted referencing Jake's preference for defense against the dark arts. "It's rare nowadays to meet someone who is pursuing their true calling in life. "

He wanted to press Jake for more information about his Quidditch days but thought better of it. This wasn't the time for such things. Were he younger and his curiosity not so tempered by his cautious nature, he certainly would have unleashed a torrent of questions, but this was not the case. So, he reigned in his curiosity and contented himself with fact that he would have the entirety of the coming school year to tease out the information he so wanted.

"As to the the students," his face reddened ever so slightly and he leaned forward as if to confide a well-kept secret. "I'll be honest with you I don't have an overwhelming amount of teaching experience, do you have any pointers?"

Among many things, age taught Andrei to not be afraid to ask for help even if it is from the younger generation. He had made the mistake of not asking for help in his undergraduate studies and, much to his mortification, failed a class. The next semester he attended every office hours available and continued to do so throughout his academic career. He reasoned that sacrificing a bit of evanescent pride for ultimate success was a more than worthwhile trade.

Nodding along with Jake, Andrei took careful mental notes. He hadn’t necessarily told the whole truth; he had taught before. Of course, he had no malicious intent in hiding this fact from the man across from him, but every time he talked about his time teaching at a muggle university people looked at him strangely as if he were some strange animal that they couldn’t quite understand. Suffice to say he did not much like that look, so it was much easier to breeze over the fact by, if he mentioned anything at all, saying he taught in ‘university’.

Plus, he knew, vaguely, that teaching in the university was different. As a teacher in university it was his job to present materials, but here at Hogwarts he understood he would have to teach the materials. There was, in his mind, a difference between presenting and teaching. He planned to take Jake’s advice and undertake a shock and awe approach to teaching—he had just the demonstration in mind.

“A bit of both,” he responded with a wave of his hand. “I started my career as a translator and nothing more, but you know how it goes.”

He smiled bashfully—Andrei knew he had, thus far, lived a blessed professional life.

“One moment you’re sitting in your office deciphering a Slavic text and the next you get an owl that you’re needed on-site. It all happened rather quickly, but I can’t rightly say I regret a minute of it as it allowed me to travel the world and see sights I’d only read about in books. I spent a few years in Egypt, a few in Hong Kong, and more than a few in Russia.”

People always seemed to think that ancient runes were confined to the Egyptian culture. Personally, Andrei found such an assumption strange as while Egyptian runes were a large portion of the field they were still only a portion. Magical cultures the world over used runes in their own unique ways. And it was such uniqueness that kept the older man coming back for more each and every time he thought he’d seen it all.

“Thankfully, I never found myself under the yoke of Gringotts,” Andrei hated the Curse Breakers employed by the bank, they were only after profit and plunder not true discovery. “I like to think of myself as more of a scholar than a treasure hunter. But that’s enough about me, what about yourself? Surely, balancing the life of an Auror and a teacher is a hard one, no?”

"Yes, Russia," Andrei affirmed with an energetic nod. "It's a common misconception that people like myself spend all our time in Eygpt."

He really wanted to go on and explain the differences between the two texts but thought better of it. Early in his marriage, Marie often had to stop him from rambling on when at parties about various technicalities few people understood or cared about. In time he came to temper his enthusiasm with a bit of self-awareness and mastered the art of commenting on the subject without losing himself in it. That said, sometimes he couldn't help himself.

"If you're even mildly interested in the subject I can lend you a few books. One of my good friends, Karl Hinter, wrote up a rather comprehensive history on the different varieties of ancient runes with an emphasis on those coming from the East. It's a book and a half, but it is well worth the read in my opinion..."

He trailed off once more flashing a bashful smile upon realizing he had started to ramble and ceded the conversation to Jake. Thankfully, the other man steered the conversation towards another one of Andrei's passions, his family. Hell, he was sitting in this exact room, because of his family. After all, bills had to be paid. It was just a plus that he could indulge his love of ancient runes while he was at it.

"Both," Andrei stated simply. "My wife, Marie, and I have been married for..."

He paused here. Normally, Andrei was good at remembering things, but when it came to how long he'd been married for he always forgot much to Marie's dismay. All he knew was that it felt like forever and that he didn't regret a moment of it.

"...Oh, it must be going on twenty years or so. My youngest, Nikolai, will be going to Hogwarts next year and his older sister Helen will be going into her fourth year at Hogwarts next term," a small fire burst to life in his eyes as he talked about his family. "I'm not entirely certain Helen is all that pleased with the idea of me being her teacher, but that's teenagers for you, right?"

He smiled wryily—he doubted any kid would enjoy having a parent as their teacher.

"I don't know how I'd manage without Marie though," he mused idly. "Color me impressed, I don't think I could handle being a single father."

He wanted to say something more: words of encouragement, advice, anything really. However, he felt it would be overstepping his bounds and more than a bit preachy. Andrei was many things, but preachy was not one of them.

[Sorry about the wait; I've had one hell of a week.]