Chapter Nine - Need You Now
Blaine and I had gone from hanging out and talking to barely saying a word at all. I had been on top of him this time on his bed as we kissed, music being played out of his iPhone 4 speaker, which wasn't really the best. We had only been kissing, though Pam would bang on the door whenever she passed by, her way of saying she could hear us. We chuckled as I rolled next to him, his arm wrapped around me, pulling me closer. It was then I knew what I was getting him for Christmas.
I had gone to the mall with Kurt to pick it up afterwards. It was by far the best quality speaker, though I found a JBL on sale. It was the perfect gift since Blaine liked his music and was always complaining about his headphones tangling.
My last week at Dalton was sad, though somewhat relieving. I had gotten to be good friends with Wes and David, even if they wouldn't let me join the Warblers. Though everyone was in the Christmas spirit, and they let me join in their Christmas sing-alongs in the Common Room. Though as I said goodbye to everyone at Dalton, I was also saying goodbye to Blaine for the holidays, who was going to stay with his family in Michigan.
"It's not much use for a while, but I know you'll like it," I said, handing him my neatly wrapped parcel. We had been sitting in the study room, which was completely empty, though felt somewhat sentimental being my last day here. Blaine smiled at me, opening the box to find the speaker, he gave a soft chuckle.
"Mum's going to love this." He gave me a quick peck on the lips, which still made me blush controllably. "You're adorable, you know?"
Then Blaine got out a small box from his blazer pocket, which he opened for me to reveal a golden necklace. "So it's a poppy, then that little bird on the poppy is a warbler." He explained, and my heart melted as I held up my hair so he could put it on me.
"It's a beautiful Blaine." I awed, as I grabbed his cheeks and pulled him in for a deeper kiss, it lasted longer, his hand grabbing my waist to support me. "I'm going to miss you this Christmas."
Christmas Break went surprisingly quickly, we had a quiet Christmas at home with just Burt, Carole, Finn, Kurt and I, which was nice as a new family. Finn had broken up with Rachel pre-holidays, Kurt and Oliver weren't yet a thing and Blaine was away, so I spent a lot of the timing just hanging out with the boys. Finn had been excited for me to come back and join Glee, though we both noticed silent resentment from Kurt when we both spoke about it. He had wanted to come back, though he had wanted to avoid Karosfky more.
The best news was when the doctor had given me the thumbs up to start dancing on my foot again, as long as I was wearing the sports sock aid. It was almost perfect timing, and I couldn't wait to not be in pain again.
It was the day before school started again, and the last person I had wanted to see walked into the Lima Bean. I was waiting there for Sam, though he was running late as usual so I was alone.
"Poppy Hummel as I live and breath," Freddie Lancaster came and sat down opposite me as I had invited him. "I was upset not to hear from you after our little makeout session."
"I don't tend to like to associate myself with Blaine's exes," I spoke softly, so only he could hear. His eyes widened, then grew angry.
"He said he wouldn't tell anyone, that-"
I interrupted him before he dared to insult Blaine, "He didn't tell me, his mum knew since you were apparently round his house so much."
"You can't tell anyone, my reputation will be ruined." He hissed, and I saw the vulnerability he tried to hide.
"There's nothing wrong with kissing a boy and liking it, the good people in this world know that." I hushed back.
He laughed, "What does it matter anyway? It's not like you two are going to break up anytime soon."
"That doesn't change anything, you lost Blaine because the truth is, Freddie, you're a bit of a dick," I stated bluntly.
"That's only my exterior though!" Freddie defended, "I'm a nice guy underneath everything, I care about people."
I noticed Sam walk in, which was my perfect opportunity to leave, "Then show people that Freddie, and maybe you'll find somebody who likes you for you."
"Who was that?" Sam asked, as I grabbed his hand and led him out the door.
"It's a long story." I sighed, as I told Sam I'd rather go to the mall.
As I walked into my first Glee Club, it seemed like I wasn't the only one who was joining. I was surprised to see the whole football team sitting there. I had walked in on a confrontation between the Glee Jocks and their football team friends, Artie soaked in a slushie. Then in walked Coach Beiste, who told everyone to sit down. I glanced at Mr Schuester, who mouthed a kind of apology. I assumed this wasn't a normal Glee Club session. I noticed Karosfky standing there, my blood boiling as I shot him the dirtiest look I could.
"All right, New Directions, let's give a warm welcome to the newest members of Glee Club!"Said Schuester pointing towards the football team. Everyone started shouting angrily in protest, both the club members and the jocks.
"I hope that's not because of me," I whispered to Sam, who chuckled softly.
"Mr Schue are you serious these are the guys that made Kurt transfer!" Finn protested.
Rachel, somewhat expectedly, chimed in straight after Finn, "And there's no way I'm sharing my choir room with a known homophobe."
"I don't disagree with you guys," Schuester began, "But I talked to Coach Beiste about it and she and I both agreed that the kind of bullying that David does is born out of ignorance. Having him in here, as difficult as it may be for us, is an opportunity to show him and the rest of the guys that being in Glee Club is kind of cool, find some common ground."
"All of you are going to be in this Glee Club for one week, no exceptions," Beiste said sternly.
It sickened me just to hear Karosfky speak, "She's bluffing, next week is the championship game. Without us, she has no team."
"With you, I have no team!" Beiste shouted back. "You guys gotta find a way to come together or we're getting our asses kicked from here until Tuesday finds a saddlebag full of buckwheat."
"If I have to stay, I'm not singing no show tunes." One of the guys called out. "That is the music of my oppressors."
"Do you even have any idea what we do in here?" Finn questioned, defensively.
Schuester answered, "No. None of them do. We have to show them. Rachel, Puck, haven't you guys been working on something? Why don't you give it a whirl?"
"Fine." Rachel sounded, "As offended as I am by their presence here, I won't let anything get in the way of a performance." She stood up, shooting a mean glare to the team before walking to the front. I had imagined Finn was upset with Rachel performing with Puck, especially after he found out she had cheated on him with Puck.
Blaine had snuck into the bleachers to meet me that lunch, since Dalton didn't go back until tomorrow, and he only just got back from Michigan, it was a perfect time. "So the football team has joined the glee club? That's crazy." He laughed.
"A bit kind of stole my thunder though," I commented, not like I cared that much but, it would have been nice to have some more recognition.
"I'm sure you're going to have plenty of moments to shine in there, you've got one of the best voices I know," Blaine said, stroking my arm. "It's going to be so weird you not being at Dalton, even if you were only there for a month."
"We'll always have weekends and after school, and I bet you'll enjoy seeing your friends without having me tag along, even if you feel mean admitting it." I nudged, even though Blaine continued to insist he wouldn't.
"I saw Freddie for the first time since the party yesterday," I mentioned, "as dickish as always."
Blaine chuckled, "That's the one good thing about have you not at Dalton though, he won't be crying because he's not dating the only girl there."
"Will you look after Kurt, while I'm not there?" I asked him. I knew Kurt would be happy and safe at Dalton, though as his sister I needed to know that there would be someone looking out for him.
"Of course." Blaine smiled, before giving me a quick peck before leaving the school grounds.
As I walked into Glee the next day, Mr Schue took me aside for a moment. "I'm sorry this week is a bit different, not really the introduction you deserved."
"It's not what I had expected, though it's fine, it'll be an interesting week." I shrugged, before going to sit down. There was an even bigger plot twist waiting, and it was that we and the football team would be performing the halftime show. There was upheaval at first, though there was always going to be. The next thing we knew we were practising the dance in the auditorium. I thought it would have felt good being up on my feet, though with arms being flung everywhere, this was barely enjoyable.
Rachel had taken me aside afterwards. "Poppy!" she had called, just as I went to walk off. "I wanted to properly introduce myself."
I chuckled, "Funny how you do that now and not all the time you spent at my house in the summer." She seemed put off by this, incredibly insulted and lost for words. "What do you want? As you must want something?"
"Do you have a problem with me?" She spat, it was all she knew to say. She knew all too well how to blame everyone else on having the problem, and not her.
"No, though I've observed that the only time you make a conscious effort with other people is when there's something in it for you, so you might as well just get to whatever you were going to say."
She coughed, she had lost her focus now, everything she said would have less of an effect. "Everyone in this glee club has their thing, Artie does R&B, Mercedes does soul, Mike dances. Yes, I am incredibly versatile, but musicals are my thing."
I smirked, "You liked my Good Morning Baltimore then?"
"It was good for an amateur." she tried to diss me, it didn't work.
"Wow Rachel," I chuckled, "you're exactly how everyone describes you to be."
"I know who I am, and I know where I'm heading," she stated, almost like she was handing me the opportunity on the plate to rip her down.
"I thought I knew the same, I was the best striker on my team and I was on course to go professional at 16 in soccer. Then a guy was out with his friends, he had a few too many but he was too lazy to just risk the four-minute walk home. He drove his car over my foot, crushing every single little one in it and every one of my dreams." I was breath distance away from her, "Now if you think you're going to stop me from performing what I want to perform, you're wrong, you don't scare me." Then I walked out, leaving Rachel teary-eyed.
When she came to me the next day before Glee Club, I was surprised. "I'm sorry Poppy, it was wrong of me to say you couldn't perform musical songs."
"I don't have anything against you, you know, I just can be quite brutally honest when I feel like I'm being attacked." I defended, I was hoping she would come up to me. She struck me as someone who acted a certain way but really wasn't.
"As soon as competition gets in the way I can get so feisty and unreasonable, and it was completely unfair on you." She sighed. I had hugged her, feeling it was the right thing to do. Rachel was going to be a tricky one, but I wasn't here to make any enemies. "Kurt had asked me to tag along for coffee later on with you, Blaine and Mercedes, and I wanted to make sure you were alright with that after yesterday."
"I have no problem at all." I smiled.
Kurt passed me and Blaine our coffees before we went to go and sit down at a table. "Now I don't want to sound cocky or anything, but you guys better be pulling out all the stops for Regionals, because the number we just rehearsed is so off-the-hook, it's dangerous."
"I mean you do all look utterly terrifying with your preppy haircuts and blazers," I noted, playfully nudging Blaine as we sat down next to each other.
Kurt had looked over at me, rolling his eyes, sitting down next to me. "Seriously, people should wear protective headgear when they're watching it." Although I was chuckling at Blaine and Kurt's jokes, Mercedes and Rachel seemed less amused. "Guys we're kidding."
"Yeah, well, it's just hard to laugh right now with everything going on at McKinley." Rachel moaned. I thought it was a bit dramatic, though this was Rachel Berry.
"I mean, look at us, the stars of two rival show choirs sitting down to coffee, especially with Romeo and Juliet over there," Mercedes indicated to me and Blaine, "our school is so messed up we can't even keep our own football team together."
"It's so sad, you guys. Coach Beiste and Mr Schue were so close to getting everyone at the school together." Rachel said, and I was so sick of how pessimistic and dramatic they were being.
"I personally think it's not that bad if that team can't stay together because of glee club they were never going to be successful. Besides even if we did all have our high school musical moment and get together, it was never going to last."
Kurt sighed and turned to me, "Why haven't you or Finn mentioned any of this yet to me? Not even when I bring you a glass of warm milk before bed?"
"Warm milk, really?" Blaine giggled, he had been listening while stirring his coffee with one hand and fiddling with my fingers with the other.
"It is nice." I defended, "And I'm not too fussed about it, from what I've heard things always seem to work out here."
My comment was ignored so Rachel could excusably talk about Finn. "Finn's too proud to complain. He feels like he has to be strong for everyone, but I know it's just killing him inside. I hope he realizes that you know, if he and I were still together, I could make him feel a lot better, you know."
Kurt said what we were all thinking. "Let it go, Rachel."
"I just wish that there was a way that we could help. That's all." Rachel moaned.
Mercedes joined in, "Yeah, and the worse part is how bummed the guys are. I mean, they already suffer enough abuse just being in Glee. I really think winning the game could have eased some of the pressure, at least for a little while."
"Wait, so the whole team quit?" Blaine asked as he stole the other half of my sandwich and took a bite. "This is a good sandwich Pops." He muttered to me quickly.
Mercedes answered "Everybody not on Glee. I mean, you can't play football with five guys. And one of them is in a wheelchair."
"Yeah, Coach Beiste put up a sign-up sheet for people to join. I think they'll take anyone at this point." Rachel sighed.
"Well, the good news is that you only need four more guys. High school regulations actually let you play a couple of guys short if you want to. But if they figure out a way to make it work, you can bet that we'll definitely be there to cheer them on." Blaine smiled since we both liked football, and Dalton didn't have the best team, we had both promised we'd go to all the games together.
"I wouldn't let him not come," I smirked.
Kurt chimed in, "And you know I'll third wheel, they love football, I love football scarves."
Blaine had been playing Scouting for Girls during our makeout session that night, which made ms smile as it was one of the British bands I had introduced him to. He had been on top that night, which I had always preferred so I was upset that I had to interrupt his neck kisses when the idea came through. "That's it."
"What baby?" he mumbled into my neck, causing butterflies to flock to my stomach with the pet name. I couldn't let him distract me from my moment of genius.
"Why don't the girls just play, I mean we don't have to actually do anything, we can just stand there." Blaine had leant up and rolled back over next to me.
"That's a really good idea Pops, I can't believe I didn't think that myself." he chuckled, both of us stared at the ceiling above, thinking through the idea.
I sat up, reaching for my phone on Blaine's bedside table. "I've got to text the girls about it."
The next day in Glee, Rachel had stood to the front to announce the plan. "We want to join the team."
"We who?" Artie asked, sounding incredibly nervous. I went up to join Rachel with the other girls.
"All of us glee girls." Mercedes said as we all stood at the front, united. "We want to join the football team, and we want to play in the championship."
"Come on guys, stop screwing around. It's not cool." Mike said, and I shot him a harsh glare so he would know we weren't kidding.
Lauren then lashed back, "What's not cool is you guys not respecting woman enough to realise we're perfectly capable of playing football. And don't forget who the state champ in Greco-Roman wrestling is. I've got offers from three different professional wrestling organizations for after I graduate, so."
I joined in, "I also could have beat half your asses if this was a game of soccer, with or without injury."
"Rachel, have you actually seen a tackle football game? When they tackle you, it hurts." Mr Schuester chimed in, and his mansplaining irritated the hell out of me.
"Yeah, and not in the good, Mellencamp way." Puck stated.
"We thought about that. But the truth is that you guys don't really need us to play. You just need enough players out there to field a regulation team. So when they snap the ball, we're just going to lie down on the ground. We're just going to lie there." Rachel explained.
"Well, I'm not. I'm going to bring the pain." Lauren informed us.
"I guess they won't get hurt if you stay down." Beiste contemplated.
After Mr Schue got all the permission slips from our parents, we were let onto the team. Even though it wasn't legit, knowing I was on a sports team was quite a good feeling, and I would be doing all the training I could to make sure I could at least attempt to play.