Common Room

Caroline sighed heavily, frowning as she looked over her notes yet again. She was desperately trying to pull together her lesson plans for the next couple of days and, frankly, failing miserably. She chewed on her pen and flicked through the folder balanced on her crossed legs.
"...oh, Lord. They'll have died of boredom by the end of it," she groaned to herself, running her hand through her hair and scowling. She leant back on the armchair she was sat on, shutting her eyes and sighing once more. All around her there were scattered bits of paper covered in crossed out diagrams, tables and huge chunks of Caroline's own sprawling handwriting.
"Serves me right, I suppose," she grumbled quietly. "Should have done this weeks ago..." She cursed herself again for that tedious aspect of her personality that pushed her to ignore any kind of deadline she might have until the very last moment - despite years spent writing essays at god-awful o'clock in the morning or begging teachers for extensions on her homework deadlines, she simply hadn't learnt her lesson.
She sat there for another moment or so, praying quietly that somehow, when she finally did open her eyes, the work will have magically done itself for her.

Caroline turned to look at the newcomer, pen still dangling from her mouth. She broke into an apologetic smile, taking the pen with her hand and twisting in her seat to face Herl properly. "Sorry," she said in a quiet voice. "It's just..." She waved her hand vaguely at the piles of paper and shrugged.

She pushed her ring-binder off her lap and onto the floor, and turned fully round in her seat to kneel up and look at Herl properly. She wondered to herself if he realised quite how much he resembled a snowman in his all-white outfit, albeit a very tall and skinny one. She had to stop herself from laughing when the thought popped into her head

"Trying to figure out a lesson plan that won't bore the kids to death," she said quickly, suppressing the thought as much as possibly. It probably wouldn't be a great idea for her to start laughing at her colleagues before she'd even gotten to know them properly. "My name's Caroline, by the way," she said, holding out a hand. "It's my first year here."

Caroline looked down at her notes, thinking about what Herl had just said. After a moment, she smiled. "You know, you're right! Anyway, I reckon I've got enough here to be going on with. Excellent attitude!" she laughed, shutting the folder and collected her sheets of paper into more or less organised piles.

"So, seriously, this is your first teaching job?" she asked as she tidied up. "It's my third. Seems nice - I've never worked at a boarding school though." She shoved her work onto the floor and sat back in her chair. "It'll be a bit weird, I think, living here - do you reckon there's much to do around here? I didn't see a lot of the town when I was driving through."

It was true - Growler had been especially badly behaved when she was driving up to the school, and the last leg of the long trip from New York to the school had almost been the end of the poor little car. Caroline's attention had been almost completely taken up making sure Growler kept running, she'd been far too focussed to look at the place she was driving through.

"Great - I love amusement parks," she said with a wink. She picked a little imaginary lint off her jacket and yawned. She was knackered, but then, she was usually knackered - a lifetime spent reading until 2 in the morning had left with a body-clock that simply refused to understand that most people needed rather more than 5 hours sleep to be a fully functioning human being. As a result, even when she tried to get a decent night's sleep she found herself lying awake until the early hours.

"What's that thingy you keep taking out?" she said at last, nodding at Herl's iPhone. She'd never been especially technologically minded, and most of the last few years advancements in phones and MP3 players and the like had totally passed her by. "Is it like a cell phone or something?" Caroline's own cell was as old as her car - it texted, phoned and played Snake Two. What more could a girl need?

"You can get internet on your cellphone?" said Caroline, amazed. The rest of what Herl had said - iPhone, Facebook, applications - had meant nothing to her, but the off-hand manner which he spoke about them with made her feel that asking what they meant would make her look like she was some kind of idiot.

She shrugged where she sat, stifling another yawn. "Never had much time for the internet, to be honest. I mean, it's useful and all, but it's so..." She shrugged again. "So not-a-person, you know? I like people, I like dealing with them, and the internet takes that element away. It's all about speed and results and getting it done." She punched her left fist into her right hand to emphasise each of the words before pulling herself back and calming down. "Ah, I dunno. Just never took to it, I guess," she finished lamely.

"Sounds like a great idea!" she said enthusiastically. "Sorry, I got a little carried away with myself there," she added, feeling a little embarrassed. "I don't know what the other guys here are like though - I mean they seem nice and all, but I've not really spoken to them properly." She dropped her voice conspiratorally. "Say, do you know that Zack guy at all? He seems a bit... I dunno. A little over interested in the students, if you get my drift?" She paused for a moment, leaving the suggestion to hang in the air. Then she broke the tension by shrugging suddenly and sitting back in her chair. "The vice principle seems nice though - Mr Gant is it? Cute too," she added with a wink.