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The HTEPA (Human-Teacher-Eridian-Parent-Association) were furious with him. So enraged were the respectable parents of his pebbles, that Rocky had to sit at the back of the “Grace-intervention” to ensure a violent riot did not occur.
In Grace’s defence, he truly was trying to be child-friendly.
It was the unbridled curiosity of children that began this clusterfluff.
You see, Grace has long been substituting his, unsavoury, language with alternatives. So naturally, a group of pebbles began to document the unknown words Teacher-Grace yelps when he trips, drops items, or walks directly into the few walls within his biodome, which unfortunately, occurs frequently.
The curious pebbles take their list, titled “Teacher-Grace’s Favourite Words”, to the human-linguistics-thrum.
To the pebbles’ glee, and their parents’ abject horror, they discover that the majority of the unknown words are themed around food. Teacher-Grace is vulgar!
Grace began his swearing substitutions, as most would guess, once he became a middle school teacher. Unfortunately, the practice began after a public, mortifying slip-up.
Grace had stood at the school’s vending machine, that had cruelly taken the iced-coffee he was trying to purchase captive.
Those things weren’t cheap! And since becoming a teacher, he was definitely, indisputably, cheap.
He attempted one more time to pay the machine’s ransom, placing a coin inside.
He waited.
The vending machine jolted.
His iced coffee remained suspended, jammed between the glass and the shelf.
Grace tapped at the machine, kicked it once, still stuck.
He tried again, smacking the coin slot.
Unfortunately, these machines had been built with the intention of withstanding the wrath of hungry teenagers.
He prepared his K.O, bracing his shoulder to slam into the machine.
“Ah fuck!” he yelled.
That was definitely bruising.
The iced coffee stared smugly at him from its haven behind glass.
He became possessed with the same impulsive anger that got him kicked out of Denmark around 6-odd months ago.
He kicked the machine with malice
“Fucking asshole!”
He slammed it again
"Piece of shit machine.”
He took it with both hands and attempted to shake the entire unit.
“Fine, keep my money, stupid fucking machine.”
At that moment, Dr Ryland Grace paused in his assault. To his rapidly growing horror, three students from his 5th period science class stood frozen in the hallway.
“Are you okay, Mr Grace?”
Shit.
“Marissa, please pick up the phone, it’s urgent. Please Marissa, I’m going to lose my job– again! Come on–”
“Calm your tits Ryland! Jesus, what did you do?”
And that's how Ryland and Marissa ended up at the bar on a Wednesday afternoon.
“Oh this is golden, go again, show me the machine shake motion again”
“Marissa, this isn’t funny, they're going to dob me in, and I’m going to lose my job.”
“As if! You teach them daily, their potty-mouthes are far worse than yours, relax.”
A week passed, and thankfully Marissa’s determination was correct. Yet the damage upon Grace’s vocabulary had already been felt, he officially had the lexicon of somebody’s Christian mother.
This phenomenon was not restricted to the classroom, as the poor souls aboard Stratt’s vat quickly discovered.
“Sour Skittles Redell! You scared me there”
Dr Robert Redell was, whether you liked it or not, a man or fortitude, survival, and pure grit. However, at that moment, Redell wished to lock himself in an Astrophage testing chamber.
“Christ, Grace, just say fuck”
Dr Grace scrunched his face in completely open judgement.
Rocky, completely unsurprisingly to Grace, was extremely happy to assist Grace in rediscovering his ability to swear.
“Grace is ready? I roll over Grace’s foot and Grace will yell ‘fuck’, 3…2…1…”
“Fluffnutter!”
“Bad, bad, bad. Grace said vulgar food word, parents sad, pebbles corrupted by Grace's dirty mouth, go again, 3… 2…. 1…”
“Fudging fudge!”
“Rocky, I can’t stop myself”
“New approach, say curse without stimulus, go.”
“fuck” Grace said meekly
“Now add stimulus" Rocky rammed into Grace’s side.
“Fiddlesticks!”
“Very sad. Rocky go get ready for another parent-intervention now. HTEPA won’t be happy”
Grace was trying his hardest to curse in front of the young, impressionable, children.
Each time he kicked his toe into the bottom of the whiteboard the pebbles would await his expletive with excitement. Teacher-Grace was going to say a very bad word, and that is high comedy to a pebble.
Grace dropped a marker he had been using to write notes upon the board, for himself, no need for notes when you have photographic memory.
“Ah suga– I mean, shit.”
The class deflated, Teacher-Grace was not being fun.
Oh god, he can’t do this. He’s spent adult life correcting this behaviour and now he has to bring it back.
Later, as he sits at the shoreline with Rocky, his best friend turns towards him:
“I heard Grace used a real curse word today, very good!”
Grace looks at his friend, and bursts into tears.
“Oh no, Grace leaky. Grace leaky disgust. Why is Grace leaky, question?”
Grace had come to the realisation that he was never to stand in front of a human classroom again. He’s not sure why this particular realisation is so Earth-shattering, or Erid-shattering he supposes. He thinks of their faces, frozen over by the cold, he still has no way of knowing that the Beetles reached their destination.
Somehow, it's the cursing, the part of himself he changed for his students, that catalyses this realisation. He has always been one to change for his students, strict when needed, soft-spoken when suited, and now here he was again, changing his language for his Eridian class.
“I’ll never see my kids again”
Rocky leans against him
“And now, I’m changing myself, they won't know this version of me, I will never know who they became”
Rocky stays next to him, a steady presence as sobs wrack his body.
“I’m okay, it’s okay now Rock, no more leaky-space-blob, I’m feeling a bit better, thank you.”
“Grace not have to use human swear word, Grace can use Eridian swear-word substitution”
“Excuse me?”
“Eridian language has same substitutions for use in front of young, impressionable pebbles
Like this, ♪♬, used instead of ♪♬♪♪" (loosely translated in English as: choke on cadmium)
“So you’re telling me, all this time there were perfectly good Eridian substitutions I could have used.”
“I think I can hear Adrian calling me, have to leave quick. Grace cannot hear because of bad human hearing. Rocky go now.”
“You fudging motherfluffer!”