Festival of Hearts

"Ok class! Today we are going to do a little something different. Please pull your chairs around into a circle then we will get started!" Miss Penn claps her hands excitedly as her class audibly groans the sound only covered by numerous scraping of chair legs against the hard floor. "Now, now, class this is an exciting thing! The only grade for today will be participation so I expect to hear a little bit from each of you but that will be easy with this topic for sure~" 

Most of the class give her looks of apprehension. Miss Penn was always trying to do things 'out of the box' but… well they never usually had anything to do with actual class themes, and were always exhausting. After all, you generally come to a magic school to learn magic, not listen to your teacher babble about random topics. 

With the class fully assembled Miss Penn beams at them, her head wings flicking with excitement as she sits down in her own chair between two students. "So class, I thought today we could do a sort of cultural exchange! It's spring and I know a lot of cultures have special celebrations around this time centering around love and relationships and I think it would be a lovely idea for us to maybe share some of these different customs and practices. It is important when uh, summoning and finding familiars especially in such mixed company where so many species come together and cross integrate to, um, understand how others work! And that makes it so if you summon something from another culture you will be able to control it and connect with it better." She nods proudly at making her reach of connecting the topic she wants to discuss with the one she is supposed to. 

A few students stand up and she shoots them a look. "Please sit back down, this is important." 

Most sit back down dutifully but one young man just stands at the door for a second considering his options. "Sorry Miss Penn but my culture thinks love is stupid, my culture being me, specifically. So-" he makes a peace sign at her and shuts the door on his way out leaving students snickering and her staring mouth agape at the closed door. 

She glares then marks him absent on her paper. "Well then, that was uncalled for and extremely rude." She pouts a few seconds going over her paperwork when another student raises his hand. She looks up, "oh yes, Fonsi did you have a question?" 

The Nunuke nods excitedly, "yes ma'am, Would you please start with your culture? I am very interested in it." 

Her smile brightens once more "oh yes of course! Well as you all know I am an Auratail and in our Culture we celebrate the Festival of Hearts! It's a very wonder time where we show our love to family, friends and loved ones~" She goes into more depth about how it is celebrated, the festivities and history of the celebration. With most students half listening or passing each other notes, Fonsi though seemingly hanging onto her every word and writing furiously in his book. 

At the end of her spiel, having taking many tangents already and half the class time and opens the discussion for any questions. 

Fonsi once again raises his hand and when acknowledged tilts his head curiously. "Well Miss, do you have anyone special for you during this Festival of Hearts?" 

She draws in a little breath, surprised to be asked such a personal question. "Oh well, I, uh, yes actually, I do have someone in mind that I would like to spend this Festival with." 

Fonsi nods watching her intently and expectantly. "Please go on, how are you going to spend your time? What are your plans. What kind of gifts are you going to give them? What are you expecting from them? In the name of cultural exchange of course." 

Some students shift uncomfortably in their chairs wondering if this was even an appropriate series of questions for a student to ask their teacher but not really wanting to draw attention from Miss Penn taking all the class time talking herself and not making them actively participate. 

Miss Penn considers the questions and decides that she could answer vaguely, but when she opens her mouth they words start pouring out without a second for her to think. "Oh yes I plan to leave him little gifts on a little hunt for to lead him to me waiting at a spot by a pond in the woods that is so lovely in the evening this time of year. I am working on a little dinner picnic with a bunch of his favorite foods that we can hopefully feed each other as the iceflies dance over the water sparkling as the sunsets. 

"I plan to ask him officially into a relationship with me, I know it will work out we have such fantastic chemistry. He is such a wonderful man, so tall and handsome. And smart too. I've loved him from the moment I've met him and I think he loves me back." She claps her hand over her mouth after it finally stops prattling on, her cheeks bright red at sharing so much. "Oh dear, ah, class is over everyone will get passing marks for today. Please gather your things and have a nice afternoon." She stands up quickly herself and leaves the room not waiting for her students to leave. 

The students look at each other, the second hand embarrassment from the teacher palatable to everyone aside from Fonsi who is still taking notes, oblivious to the rest of the class awkwardly filing out of the room. 

One other student hangs back waiting for him. He grins up at them, "hey, Sy! You waited!"