Disclaimer: So, I don't own Hetalia- so on and so forth- and I know that the teacher AU has been done before. Just trying something new. Is it weird that I came up with this while in Zoology lecture?

The crowd outside the science classroom was huge, Alfred noted as he made his way down the hall. It made sense, of course; the class was taught by one of the most popular teachers in the school. He was friendly, casual, and made even the more complicated parts of his syllabus accessible to his students. His office was almost always open for students to drop in with questions, and he was generous with grades and extra credit while still pushing the class to learn. Yes, Mr. Jones was a great teacher indeed.

"Hey guys!" he called happily, and the crowd turned to look at the young science teacher. Already he could see the hearts in some of the students' eyes. Ah, it was the same every semester, but could he help that he was amazingly sexy? No, no he could not.

"Is it locked? Here, I've got the key..."

Alfred rummaged in his bag and pulled out the key, unlocking the door and opening it. There was a mad rush for seats, as usual, but instead of trying to claim the back row first- where they would be free to slack off or nap- Alfred's students always vied for positions in the front of the class. From what he could tell, about fifty percent of it was kids with crushes and another forty percent were there because they just thought he was a cool teacher. The rest were the serious students.

"All right, so! I'm Professor Jones, your Bio professor for the semester!" Alfred said brightly as he passed out the class syllabus, "But y'all can call me Alfred, or Al, if you'd like. My office hours are printed right up at the top of your syllabuses, and I ain't gonna go over the whole thing with you. You guys can read- your first assignment will be to read the syllabus and come to class with it signed and any questions you might have so I can clarify."

There was a murmur of acknowledgement from around the classroom, and the young professor smiled encouragingly. They weren't sure what to make of him, yet.

"Just a few quick rules before I call roll: No headphones unless I give you the ok, turn off or silence your cell phones during class. A big part of your grade is in participation, so try not to fall asleep, and if you have a question or something to add- speak up! Don't worry if you think you're going to look stupid, you'll come to find out that I do stupid shit all the time."

This got a laugh from the class, most of the students beginning to relax as they realized that their instructor wasn't some stuck-up prick who thought he could command them just because he was a professor. Alfred's bright blue eyes changed subtly behind his square-framed glasses, and suddenly he gave off the air of a very over-protective older-brother, or father. One who was not afraid to break limbs and had the physique to do it.

"And if I hear any reports of any kind of bullying," he said quietly, but he knew that the whole class heard him, "That bully will regret it, I promise you. And don't think that I won't find out."

The class nodded solemnly, and Alfred knew that they had taken this last bit of information to heart. He could be intimidating when he wanted to; six-foot two with plenty of muscle packed on beneath his casual attire from years of playing sports and having the best body out of all his peers. It came in handy, sometimes, but he usually played up his goofier side- he wasn't some muscle-head jock! He liked to think of himself as everyone's friend, everyone's cool big brother. The hero.

"Great! And feel free to drop by my office anytime I'm in if you need to talk about anything. It doesn't need to be school-related; if you're upset or stressed or just need someone to talk to, I'll be there and try to help."

Alfred went over roll, glad to see that everyone was there for the first day, and trying to match faces to names. Back when he was in school, everyone had known his name and face, since he was such an extrovert, but his twin, Matthew, was often confused for him or forgotten entirely. Matt had once likened it to being invisible, which was Not Cool with Alfred. No one deserved to feel like they were invisible! Every person in the world mattered.

By the end of the class period, he'd had the class won over and they'd actually managed to cover the first lecture, which was something few other professors got around to on the first day. It was all that introductory-stuff, droning on and on about the rules, and how tests would be graded. Hell, the kids should all ready know how to act in a classroom, and they were fully capable of reading and understanding a three-page syllabus.

"Ok, see y'all Wednesday! Don't forget to read and sign your syllabuses!" Alfred called as the class slowly filtered out, "We'll be starting cell biology, so read pages sixty to seventy-five if you want to get a leg up!"

He checked the time and looked up at the hand-drawn time table on his desk. He had an hour and a half until his next class- a lab- and there were no English classes in progress for another hour. Grinning, Alfred packed up his bag and headed towards D-Building, where the language, art, and music programs were housed. Maybe he could convince Arthur to give up his homemade lunch in his office (steak and kidney pie. Nasty. Although Alfred had seen him packing "fairy cakes", which were worth sneaking) and come with him to the cafeteria for something tastier, like a hamburger with fries and a Coke! Or, failing that, homemade macaroni and cheese was the special today and it was damn good.

"Hey, Artie, you here?" Alfred said, knocking loudly on the door of one Prof. Arthur Kirkland, "You wanna go get some lunch?"

The door opened, revealing a surly blond man with enormous eyebrows and piercing green eyes. He was a few inches shorter than Alfred, but he radiated authority. It had taken Alfred a few months to not be inwardly intimidated by him.

"Jones," Professor Kirkland said in his crisp British accent (which Alfred really loved when it wasn't making him feel like he was two inches tall), "We've spoken about this before-"

"Please?" Alfred interrupted, looking hopeful. Arthur's look softened and he sighed, ushering the taller man into his office and closing the door behind them. Hearing the automatic lock click into place, Alfred leaned down to kiss the Brit.

"I missed you," he said, pulling away. A faint blush tinged Arthur's face, and despite his scowl he looked adorable (perhaps because of his scowl. Alfred didn't know. Arthur always looked adorable to him).

"I know you did," Arthur said, "But Alfred, we're supposed to being laying low."

"Flying beneath the gaydar?" Alfred quipped, happy to see that it brought a small smile to Arthur's face.

"Exactly. It's all ready suspicious enough that we're 'roommates', and the school has been watching you so closely..."

Now it was Alfred's turn to scowl. A few people in the school had balked at his being so casual with his students, claiming that it wasn't appropriate. This led to his every move being watched over by the Dean of Faculty, who was an old-fashioned kind of guy, with strict views of how everyone should behave.

"There's nothing gay about going down to the cafeteria with another professor," he protested, "Even if he is secretly my boyfriend. C'mon, Arthur. We don't need to be all snuggly and lovey, but we don't have to act like complete strangers all the time. We're supposed to be roommates. That usually means friends."

Arthur's arms uncrossed- a good sign- and he raised himself up to give Alfred another kiss.

"All right, all right. Damn you, I can never say no to you..."

"Damn straight. You love my natural charm and good looks," Alfred beamed, giving his boyfriend his best hunky-look, the one that had made all the girls swoon in high school. Arthur laughed and gave the taller man's cheek a pat.

"Yes, yes I do. My love for you has absolutely nothing to do with your brains or your personality," he said sarcastically, "Now, let's get going, you big oaf. We won't have time for lunch if we linger much longer."

Arthur was in his usual dour after-class mood when Alfred got home evening, and the biology professor was prepared to ease him back to a more genial state.

"Honestly, you'd think this was primary school!" Arthur snarled as Alfred set about making tea for his partner, "I thought this semester would be it, the semester when I finally get a class that knows how to behave, but no! No, they spend their time gazing out the window, or giggling with their friends, or doing work for other classes! We barely managed to get through the syllabus today! And most of them don't even have their books. How hard can the simple act of buying a few books be?"

Alfred chuckled, setting a mug of tea with milk in front of the raging English professor. He'd asked Arthur once if he ever tried lowering his expectations just slightly- not everyone was as devoted to literature and the English language as he was, after all- and being less strict with his classes, especially on the first day, but he'd gotten a scalding two-hour lecture and been forced to sleep on the couch that night. It wasn't worth bringing the topic up again; not when he was trying to calm Arthur down.

"Kids are always lazy on the first day," he chuckled, kissing Arthur's cheek before beginning to prepare dinner (hmmm, Chicken Marsala tonight), "You always have at least two good students, don't you?"

"My 'good students', as you call them, should be the average, not the exception," Arthur grumbled, taking a sip of his tea, "Everyone in my classes should be able to perform to that level. Everyone in my classes could perform to that level, if they put the effort into it."

"I'm glad I'm not in any of your classes," teased Alfred, "You know I'd flunk."

"You would not," Arthur said sternly, looking at the taller man and frowning.

"Yeah? Then why did you have to tutor me for three years back in high school?" Alfred quipped, thinking back to when he and Arthur had first begun spending time together.

"Excuse me, let me rephrase: You would not flunk if you put you mind to it to succeed. Nothing can ever stop you once you've decided on a course of action- you just need to have an interest in whatever it is you're doing to want that. And don't even suggest that I don't make my classes interesting enough- I teach them the same way I tutored you."

Alfred turned back towards his partner, his arms crossed over his chest and one eyebrow raised. He was smirking, but there was faint evidence of a blush on his cheeks.

"Do you, now? Because I'm pretty sure that your methods in senior year would get you arrested if you tried them on one of your students, especially an entire class full of them."

The frown on Arthur's face deepened, and he gave Alfred the slightest of confused looks before it all came back to him. He blushed bright red, sputtering as Alfred laughed.

"Th-that was completely different! It was only because I had an attraction to you, and you were too dense and too prudish to make any sign that you reciprocated! And there I was, lavishing attention on you and going out of my way to see you outside of an academic sense and you-"

"Chill, Arthur," Alfred grinned, "I knew you were into me. It was just funny watching you get all flustered."

"Why you little...!"

The next day, Arthur had no classes and Alfred only had a lab in the afternoon. The morning was spent very well (read: not leaving the bed for an hour or so after they woke up, then homemade waffles), and then a movie date before Alfred had to go to his classes.

At home, Arthur busied himself with cleaning up, preparing for tomorrow's lecture and a little embroidery while he tried to combat the stress of hiding his relationship with Alfred. It was a slim chance that they would be seen together by someone from the school and that they would make that connection, but it was not a chance that Arthur was willing to take. He could handle the scrutiny, but to think of his bright and bubbly partner being put through the wringer just because the dean didn't think that men should love other men... it was painful.

So their dates were kept to places where it would be difficult to spot and recognize them, like cinemas or theatres (mostly cinemas, since Alfred usually needed explosions and special effects to keep him entertained for something that lasted more than an hour or so). Sometimes they went to museums, or equivalently public venues, but they were careful to come across as nothing more than friends- sometimes sneaking away to steal a few kisses.

The fact that, if it wasn't for their jobs (and mainly Alfred's at that), they would both be openly gay made things all the more difficult to bear. Their source of income depended on keeping up the charade of 'just friends', because Alfred wanted to save Arthur's inheritance for the future, even if Arthur insisted that they could live comfortably for years with the way he'd invested it. Alfred was one of those blue-collar boys who needed to work for a living to feel satisfied.

The next couple of weeks passed as such, with both professors scouting out the individuals in their classrooms who would be the hard workers, and who would slack off. They made notes of who seemed to need extra help, and who had a good grasp of the material. Upon comparing attendance rosters, they found that they shared several students. Alfred teased Arthur that he should give those students less work to compensate for the workload given by the English professor. He got a loving smack upside the head with a copy of Macbeth for that.

"This is university," sniffed Arthur with a haughty look on his face, "I'm not going to babysit them, nor will I spoon-feed them. They need to learn what real life is. No one will give them handouts in the real world."

"Says the one with an inheritance large enough to buy a small island," chuckled Alfred.

"Not that you'll let us use it," Arthur replied, his tone becoming chilly. Alfred frowned and cupped his lover's face.

"Hey, hey..." he said softly, "Look, you can use it anyway you want for yourself. But I... I don't want to have money that you should be using to make your life easier being spent on something for me."

"Spending it on you would make my life easier," Arthur insisted, "We could buy a real home, a house somewhere quiet. You could have horses, like when we were in school. We wouldn't need to be forced into a closet because of your job. You wouldn't need to work- not like this. You could follow any one of your dreams, Alfred. Don't you think that would make my life easier?"

Alfred sighed, dropping his hands to run his fingers through his hair. Arthur made a good point, and he couldn't really argue against it. He hated forcing Arthur, who had never made his sexuality a secret before they were employed at the school, to endure the same type of secrecy that Alfred had lived with until Arthur had made his affections known all those years ago. It felt selfish either way; to live on money that he didn't earn, or to make his partner suffer like this.

"Let's just finish out the year, and then we'll talk," he said softly, and Arthur wrapped his arms around him in a comforting, understanding gesture.

"My Superman," the shorter man chuckled, "You're such a martyr sometimes, love. When will you do something that makes you truly happy?"

"I have you, don't I?"

Arthur blushed and gave his partner a kiss on the cheek, although it didn't stop his mind from whirring with thoughts of a state where they could legally have each other until death did they part. Iowa, perhaps. There was plenty of room there for Alfred to have his horses. Or maybe somewhere in Vermont (but there was that irrevocable French-ness about it- maybe not). Massachusetts was a third possibility, as long as they stayed out of Boston; the damn state was so proud to be a major part of the American Revolution that Arthur wasn't sure how well he'd be accepted. Perhaps they could take a trip over the summer to visit the few states that would take them in.

"You do have me," he said quietly, bringing Alfred's hand to rest over his heart, "This no longer belongs to me- it is entirely yours, love. It doesn't so much as beat without your care. I will admit that it is a fragile thing, and not particularly pretty, but I trust you to protect it."

Now it was Alfred's turn to blush, but a small smile came over him and he leaned down to give his partner a chaste- but no less loving- kiss.

"You have an unfair advantage with words," he said as he pulled back, "I could never say anything so nicely."

"Pretty words mean very little without sincerity behind them," Arthur said with a smile of his own, "And I have never doubted your sincerity in anything, Alfred, as I hope that you do not doubt my sincerity when I say such tender things to you."

Alfred nodded. It had been a long time since he had not taken Arthur's words to heart. The British man had a sharp tongue and a short temper, and sometimes the words he threw out (especially when he was drunk) stung, but Alfred knew that underneath that draconian exterior and the stubborn, yet easily bruised, pride, Arthur loved him just as much as Alfred loved him. Possibly even more.

"Why don't we go to bed, and you can show me your sincerity," he said, nuzzling Arthur's clavicle and grinning. Arthur gasped softly, but pulled Alfred up into a deep kiss and nodded.

AN: So there you have it, the very first chapter of my very first fanfiction. I can't promise that updates will be regular, but I will try to get them done in a timely fashion. The next chapter may be smexings, but won't have a whole lot to do with the plot, so those who don't want to read it will be able to skip over it without missing anything (except smexings). As it is, I probably won't update until next week, since my girlfriend is coming up to stay for a few days. To those in the US: Have a happy Turkey-Day! To anyone else who may be reading this in a different country (or who doesn't celebrate Thanksgiving) have a good week.