Madame Kitzes and the Language Barrier

I'm sitting in Beginning Spanish but the voice in my head is Madame Kitzes, my high school French teacher.

Thanks to Madame, much of what Señora Joseph teaches about verb conjugation, gender agreement and numbers feels familiar.

Learning Spanish isn’t going be difficult, right?
Then it's my turn to answer a homework problem.

I open my mouth and "los libros interesantes" comes out like I'm a bumbling tourist in Paris. Rusty high school French pronunciation.

Señora Joseph's eyes widen. Her head shakes. So does mine.

Oh. No.

Madame: Que faire maintenant?