Friday came and only Bree had given Brittany the dance solo she had asked for. We couldn't let her win. There were pretty much no prizes to this, nothing but the authority it would give the winner within the glee club. And, being in the Cheerios, I knew that Bree should not be given authority. So I decided to suck it up and remove the uniform. For good this time.
"Whoa," said Ryder as I passed by him that morning. He began walking besides me. "Someone forgot to wear their cheerleading uniform today," he said smugly. We still hadn't talked about the song, so I figured we'd never have to if I just pretended it never happened.
"Yeah," I told him. "I guess I'm just trying to show Bree that she can't dictate what I do. Or don't do. And taking off the uniform on my off time was just part of it."
"I'm proud of you for that, Julie," Ryder told me with a grin. "And you know, I happen to think you look much better like this. You look more you..."
I blushed just as we reached Amity and Dan. They were in some sort of conversation with Phil Lipoff, an asshole junior who liked to pick on other kids. On glee kids.
I rushed towards them, with Ryder right behind me. "Is there a problem here?" I asked him. Dan and Amity looked spooked. There was definitely a problem.
"I don't know," said Phil. He turned to Dan and Amity and asked, "Is there?"
"Is this punk bothering you guys?" Ryder stepped in. "Come on, Lipoff, is this going to be a repeat of last year? Will I need to kick your butt again for you to leave my friends alone?"
Phil laughed. "As if," he said. Then they arrived. I'd only ever seen this happen as a freshman, to Rachel and the rest of them. And then to Blaine, Tina, and Marley. I'd seen it before, from afar. But I'd never really seen it like this, though. Up close.
We were instantly surrounded. The entire wrestling team stood there, holding cups of slushies in their hands. Ryder and I simultaneously dropped our backpacks and slowly kicked them aside, where they wouldn't get ruined. I wish I could've warned the others in time.
Just as Phil's equally douchey best friend, Bobby Surette, handed him a slushie of his own and they raised their cups, a voice halted them.
"Stop!" she demanded firmly. We watched as Bree walked through the huddle of jocks and took a stand right in front of me.
Dan sighed with relief but I knew better than to drop my guard when it came to her. "Bree..." I murmured.
"Hi, bestie," she said sarcastically, smiling widely at us. "You really should've worn your uniform today."
"Why?" I asked.
"It might've helped them distinguish you," she said as she took a step back. Then, taking a cup that one of the guys was handing her, she faked a frown and added, "Could've avoided a misunderstanding. But now... Well, we can't help it if we confused you for just a regular, glee club loser." That was the key word. Loser. Right on cue, they all lifted their cups, including Bree, and tossed the slushies at us.
"What the hell man!" Ryder instantly reacted. He shoved one of those guys-- I think it was Phil but it was hard to tell with the syrup covering my eyes-- against the locker but he was outnumbered. My heart beat fast as another wrestler pulled Ryder away and lifted a fist at him. But then someone else knocked him over.
"What is the problem with you idiots?"
Jake.
"You really think the two of you," Bobby said, "this loser hippie, Miss Jitters, and the moody Cheerio can take all of us?" At that last one, Ryder flung himself at Bobby. I pulled Dan and Amity out of the way before the real punches could start.
"Is there a problem here?" asked Coach Beiste from the end of the hall. Thank god. She definitely forced them to back off, even from twenty feet away.
All I heard was Bree's laughter as they merrily walked away. Nobody in the hallway did or said anything. They were all probably just glad it wasn't them as they walked past us and pretended to have seen nothing.
"Holy crap, that's cold," Ryder murmured, finally taking the impact of the slushie. He turned to me and asked if I was okay. I nodded and turned to the newbies.
"I'm so sorry you guys had to go through that," I said.
"I think it ran all the way down to my pants," Dan said with a chuckle.
"I can't feel my face..." Amity mumbled softly.
"And with that you're all official members of the glee club," Jake said. He placed a palm on my shoulder, sympathetically nodding at Ryder, before walking away.
"The loser club, eh?" said Dan softly. He was cleaning his glasses.
"Don't say that," I told him. "You are not a loser, okay?"
He nodded. "Fifteen minutes," said Ryder as he looked at the time.
"Ok, let's get you guys cleaned up before first period starts," I told them. I nodded at Ryder, signaling for him to help Dan out as I led Amity into the girl's restroom.
"Thank you," Amity said as I helped her clean the sticky syrup that was drying on her skin. We couldn't do much about the clothes, so I texted Sugar, who I was pretty sure had plenty of clothes in her car, locker, and probably stored in some of the janitors' closets.
"It's really not a big deal," I said. She took over as I started cleaning myself off. "I've never gotten a slushie facial," I added.
"Me either," she whispered.
"You don't talk much, do you?" I said as I remembered about my meds and began digging through my backpack. It had survived the attack, but Amity's bag wasn't so lucky. The outside was soaked and, unfortunately, stained. If only it weren't white, it wouldn't be so noticeable.
I finally found my medication, so I took what I needed to and then put it away.
"Are you sick?" Amity asked me. I looked up, surprised she was talking to me.
"Um, yeah," I said. "Something like that." She nodded and then turned back to the sink. "So why were you late?" I asked her. "The day of auditions. Joe said you had a good reason."
"Oh, that," she said. "Um, it's really a long story. But basically, my family's going through a bit of a rough time lately. And I needed to go home to babysit my sister right after school until my mom got home. Then I had to rush back here for auditions."
"Oh," I said. "Well, that makes sense."
"I'm really sorry we got you into that mess out there," she apologized, wanting to change the subject.
"It's not your fault, sweetie," I told her. "So why were those guys messing with you, anyway?"
"I have the one with the braids for Algebra II," she told me.
"Ahh, our dear pal Phil," I said. "Continue."
"Well," she said nervously. "I have a little bit of a fidgeting issue. And, uh, he sits next to me in class so I guess I was bothering him the other day, just tapping away. And he came over to, well, make fun of me for it..."
"Sounds like a classic dick move," I said. "Oops, I meant jock move. Sorry." She smiled. "Ahh, and she does have teeth!" I joked. "Listen, those guys are idiots. You have no reason to listen to them and you've done nothing wrong, got it?"
She nodded. Then she cringed her eyebrows. "Wait, so what about Bree?" she asked.
I stiffened. "What about her?"
"Isn't she also a part of the glee club?" she asked. "Doesn't that mean she just--"
"Hello!" exclaimed Sugar as she and Kitty interrupted. They were carrying clothes.
"We just heard what happened," Kitty said as they started handing us what they had brought us. "And Oh-Em-Gee. What has gotten into Bree? I swear, we will get her back for this, Jules. One of us has to show her who's boss by winning the new Brittany contest."
"No, not one of us," I told her. Amity was scrunching her nose at the clothes Sugar had given her. She went into one of the stalls to change but I just changed out there so that I could keep chatting with Kitty.
"But we're the only ones who can beat her at dancing," Kitty insisted.
"But we aren't the ones she's angry at," I said. Kitty squinted at me as I put her jeans, which were a little loose on me, on and slipped into a girly, yellow blouse. The first bell rang so we rushed to class as soon as we could, trusting that Sugar would help Amity out.
Once in physics, Ryder smiled at me. He was covered in slushie stains, so I figured he had spent his time on helping Dan out.
"You look like a--" he started, a mocking look on his face. I glared at him. "Like a flower," he said, intimidated by my scowl. "Like a beautiful, perfect flower." I stuck my tongue out at him just as Marley was coming in, with Bree right behind her.
"I heard," Marley whispered to me. "I can sit next to you, if you'd like."
I shook my head. "Sit with Ryder," I told her. "I can handle this." She nodded and took her usual seat as Bree grinned and took hers next to me.
"Sorry about earlier," she said. "Those boys just can't tell a cheerleader apart without their uniforms, you know?"
"You're going to lose this contest," I told her. "And you're going to fail this test."
"What test?" she asked as our teacher handed us the exam booklets. I grinned at her as she began to panic. She tried to get an angle at my booklet, so I asked to take the test outside in the hallway.
"See you at glee club," I whispered to her with a smile as I left the room.