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chapter five !
( takes place during 1x13 'sectionals' )
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LUNA FELT STRESSED.
Not only had their rehearsals gone to shit, but they were now a member down, only a few days before Sectionals. And that missing member was their main male vocalist.
After Finn had left the room in a rage, it wasn't long before Quinn had also fled the room, whether that was to try and catch up with Finn, or to escape the eyes of everyone in the Glee club, Luna wasn't entirely sure.
After about five minutes, the rest of the New Directions decided that they should probably start heading home as well. Puck had left not long after Quinn, and Rachel had also left, and Luna knew that the reason Rachel had left was definitely down to the scathing and accusatory glares from her fellow glee clubbers.
Luna felt very conflicted about the entire situation, as she wandered slowly down the hallway, letting out an exhale and running a hand through her curled, brown hair.
One the one hand, she obviously felt incredibly bad for Finn, and an overwhelming sense of guilt was sitting uncomfortably in her heart whenever she thought about the fact that she was one of the people to keep this massive secret from him.
But on the other hand, her heart also hurt for Quinn. It was clear to see how much the pregnant ex-cheerleader loved her tall, Quarterback boyfriend. Albeit, cheating on him didn't exactly scream "look how much I love my boyfriend! I slept with his best friend!". But Luna was very observant, and she could tell by the way Quinn and Finn looked at each other, how in love the two of them were with each other.
Keyword being were.
There was no way that Finn would forgive either Puck or Quinn easily after their almighty betrayal.
Especially not before Sectionals.
Luna's phone buzzed in her back pocket and she fished it out of her jeans, seeing Amelia Abrams' contact name light up here screen with a text.
FROM: lia💖
Hey, u still at rehearsal? I heard from Artie that some shizz went down with Quinn and Finn?? What's the tea??? Does Finn know about Puck???
Pls respond within the next five seconds or our friendship is cancelled.
Love u xxx
DELIVERED @ 4:39PM
Luna let out a giggle at her friend's text message, and went to type out a response, but collided into someone else's body as she started to type the first word. She looked up from her phone and saw Quinn, whose eyes were all red and puffy, she'd clearly been crying since everything went down in the choir room.
Immediately Luna felt bad for laughing about Amelia's text regarding the whole situation.
"Oh, shit." Luna swore, reaching out to steady Quinn as she nearly toppled over from the force. "Sorry, Quinn."
Quinn shook her head, reaching her hand up to itch her already red eyes. "It's fine." The blonde's voice was quiet, and she went to walk past Luna, until the Moretti girl stopped her by grabbing the sleeve of her white cardigan.
"Hey, uh," Luna stammered slightly, kind of regretting her decision to stop Quinn, as the other girl shot her a slightly irritated look. "Are you okay? What happened in there was kind of. . .a disaster." Luna couldn't think of a better way to describe the whole ordeal.
Quinn's annoyed look softened as she heard Luna's question, and she started to fiddle with the rings on her fingers as she answered the question. "You're asking if I'm okay?" She seemed genuinely confused at Luna's concern. Almost as if she thought that Luna shouldn't care about how she was feeling.
"Yeah, of course." Luna nodded earnestly. "Look, I know we haven't spoken that much since I joined the Glee club, or before really. . ." Luna tilted her head in thought, and Quinn shifted uncomfortably, prompting Luna to continue talking hastily. "But I just wanted to make sure that you're okay. Everyone is stressing over Finn, but you're the pregnant one. And you seemed pretty upset, so. . ." Luna felt herself grow quieter as she neared the end of her sentence.
"Uh, no. I'm not really okay." Quinn told her honestly, exhaling through her nose shakily. "I don't know what I'm gonna do, I was living with Finn and his mom, but now I know I can't stay there. Puck said I could live with him and his mom but I just. . ." Luna could hear Quinn's voice grow tight, as a lump formed in her throat. "I've screwed everything up."
Quinn wasn't wrong. Everything was extremely screwed up now. And to be fair, it was technically her fault, well, her and Puck's fault. But she wasn't about to voice this opinion, because that's not how you comfort someone in distress.
And Quinn was definitely distressed.
"Look," Luna sighed through her nose, taking a step closer to the pregnant blonde. "Yes, things kinda went to shit in there. But, Finn cares way too much about the New Directions to not show up to Sectionals." Luna tried to sound as reassuring as possible, but in her heart she knew that this might be a betrayal that even Finn couldn't find a way to forgive.
Quinn nodded, probably not believing what Luna said either. "Uh, I better go." She announced. "But thank you for checking on me. "It. . .means a lot." The look in Quinn's eyes was sincere and honest, making Luna give her a genuine smile back.
"No worries." Luna nodded. "I'll see you tomorrow."
As the two parted ways, Luna felt her phone buzz once again. It was Amelia again.
FROM: lia💖
Bitch I said five SECONDS !! Not five minutes :(((( wtf ????
DELIVERED @ 4:46PM
Luna rolled her eyes and huffed through her nose as she opened the double doors that led to the school parking lot.
She was gonna have a long phone call with her friend tonight.
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The only noise at the Moretti's dinner table was the noise of cutlery scraping off of empty plates.
When Luna had returned from school, her father was already at the stove, and she could smell the familiar scent of Spaghetti Bolognese wafting from the pot sat atop of the lit stove.
Her father had greeted her with a wide smile, and Luna had returned it, giving him a quick hug as she set her school bag down on the kitchen counter. She'd always had a closer relationship with her dad, Leo Moretti ( his full name is Leonardo, but he'll literally kill you if you use his full name ), than she had with her mother, Claudia.
When her mom had entered the kitchen, the once happy mood between father and daughter was noticeably diminished, and it stayed that way until now, whilst they were eating dinner.
Once Luna had finished the majority of her Spaghetti, she set down her fork and wiped her red-stained mouth with a napkin. As she shot a quick glance to her mom and dad, Claudia being deep into a stack of paperwork that she unceremoniously dumped beside her plate when they all sat down to the family meal, and Leo reading a newspaper, his reading glasses sat at the tip of his nose, Luna decided that it was time to finally ask them what she'd been wanting to ask since she'd arrived home from school.
"Uh, we're not doing anything on Saturday, right?" Luna broke the long stretch of silence that had befell them. She also already knew the answer to this question and that they did not have plans. Otherwise she wouldn't have asked. "'Cause Amelia asked if I wanted to have a sleepover at her house, and I really wanna go."
Neither of her parents replied at first, making a pit of anxiety start to form in Luna's stomach. Had she crossed some sort of unspoken line? Did her parents know? Had Artie and Lia's mom told her that she was part of the school's Glee club, despite both of her kids swearing her to secrecy about the whole thing?
( Artie and Lia were really the only people who knew how Luna's parents could be when it came to their daughters school studies ).
Claudia was the first to speak. "Are you sure that's such a good idea?" Was her mother's reply, eyeing her daughter skeptically, and finally looking up from her stack of paperwork. "What about your homework?"
"I finished it." Luna told her mom. "All of it. The last piece of it was for History and I handed that in today."
Claudia still didn't seem satisfied. "Well what about studying? Surely you have some tests coming up?"
Luna sighed quietly to herself. Her mother was never satisfied was she?
"Uh, actually, I don't have another test for like. . .another three weeks." Luna crossed her arms, this action making her mom narrow her eyes slightly, taking the action as some sort of sign that her teenage daughter was being disrespectful.
As Claudia went to speak, and probably not allow Luna to attend the plans she was so eager to attend, Leo's voice interrupted the staring contest that his wife and daughter were having.
"Of course you can go." He looked up from the newspaper article he was reading to smile at Luna, and send Claudia a pointed look. "We know you won't let us down and pass that test coming up."
Luna beamed at him, electing to ignore the last part of his comment. "Thanks, dad." She stood up from her seat to place a kiss on top of her father's head before turning back and giving her mother, who was now glaring at her dad, an awkward smile.
They were definitely going to argue tonight.
"Uh, I'm gonna head up to my room." Luna told her parents, grabbing her dishes and shoving them in the sink. "Lia's gonna be so excited that I can go."
Leo smiled, and Claudia nodded mutely. Luna took this as her cue to head upstairs, so she did.
As she entered her room and closed the door, already hearing the hushed whisper-arguing of her parents downstairs, Luna picked up her phone before flopping down on her bed with a loud huff.
She saw that a text from Tina had been sent to her phone whilst she was at dinner, so she slid her finger across the screen and tapped on the text message.
FROM: my goth queen🧛🏼♀️
We're literally doomed.
DELIVERED @ 6:43PM
Luna furrowed her eyebrows at the message. What happened now?
FROM: lulu🌜
What's happened now ??? Has someone else quit ???
DELIVERED @ 7:05PM
FROM: my goth queen🧛🏼♀️
No, thank god. But the only person that Miss Pillsbury could find to replace Finn is Jacob Ben Israel.
DELIVERED @ 7:08PM
Jacob Ben Israel? The guy who once asked Luna if she was wearing any underwear, which resulted in Luna dumping her iced coffee on his curly head of hair? That Jacob Ben Israel?
Oh hell no.
FROM: lulu🌜
Hahaha I'm gonna cry, deadass.
HE CAN'T EVEN SING, TINA.
DELIVERED @ 7:10PM
FROM: my goth queen🧛🏼♀️
YES I AM AWARE !!!
We need a 13th member who can actually hold a tune.
But literally everyone in school would rather die than join the Glee club so I guess we're gonna lose sectionals. And then glee club will be over forever.
DELIVERED @ 7:14PM
FROM: lulu🌜
Wow, a bit dramatic, my dude.
DELIVERED @ 7:15PM
FROM: my goth queen🧛🏼♀️
I'm not being dramatic, I'm just upset okay.
What the hell are we gonna do if Finn doesn't show up :(((( ???
DELIVERED @ 7:17PM
An idea suddenly hit Luna as she sat frowning at her phone screen.
FROM: lulu🌜
I might have an idea.
DELIVERED @ 7:21PM
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The school bus that they had been provided to get to and from Sectionals smelt like sweat, and felt like the Glee club was sitting inside a moving tin can.
The mood inside the bus was somber, having just been waved off by the exact teacher who was supposed to be going with them, who was the reason they were even at Sectionals in the first place, no one was in a particularly good mood.
The only thing keeping Luna from being as miserable as the others, was the fact that Amelia, her best friend, was sitting beside her.
After she'd stopped messaging Tina the night before, Luna had taken it upon herself to call Lia, who had answered as cheerfully as she usually does. Luna was worried that asking Lia to join the New Directions would result in her friend laughing in her face and telling her where to go.
But to her surprise, Amelia had excitedly agreed.
"Oh my god," Luna recalled her shrieking. "I was just telling Artie how much I wanted to join! I was just about to call you and tell you."
She had also let Amelia know that her parents thought they would be having a sleepover on the same day as Sectionals, so that her friend knew to play along if Luna's parents ever asked her about it.
So Luna felt as though Lia joining them, instead of Jacob Ben Israel ( who was still unfortunately joining them to Sectionals, in the excitement of Amelia joining them, everyone had forgotten to tell the afro'd boy not to bother turning up ) had somewhat made the other members feel less nervous.
But, without Finn being there, it still felt wrong.
When they finally reached the auditorium where the Sectionals competition was being held, the nerves really started to kick in for Luna.
Was she seriously about to get up on stage and sing in front of a bunch of strangers?
Apparently so.
The waiting area had comfy looking sofas that the New Directions wasted no time in occupying. By the time Luna reached them, all the seats had been filled, but Matt, her friend from Homeroom smiled before scooting over slightly to make room so she could sit down beside him.
"Thanks." She huffed, taking into account how close their faces were to each other.
Matt smiled kindly at her. "It's cool." He told her, "so, you nervous?" He asked her.
Luna nodded minutely at him. "Yeah, kinda," she answered truthfully. "But I'm just glad I'm not doing a solo. Leave that to Mercedes." She laughed lightly at the end of her sentence.
Matt shook his head and shrugged. "I don't know, I've heard you and your background vocals, Luna. Your voice is killer."
Was that a compliment? From a boy? On the football team?
What the hell was happening right now?
"Oh," Luna was taken aback at first, which was not helped by the knowing look that Kurt sent her from the other side of Matt's shoulder. "Thanks, Matt."
Matt looked as though he wanted to say something else, but was cut off by Miss Pillsbury.
"Okay," the redheaded guidance counsellor said, anxiety clear in her voice. "Smooth sailing so far, we're all signed in and, um, according to the program, you have drawn performance slot number three." Emma told the group of teens.
Okay so they were going last. Was that good or bad?
"We're going last? Isn't that bad?" Tina spoke up, answering Luna's question without her even asking it.
Rachel took this opportunity to bring the attention onto her. "Hardly." She informed them. "This is good news. My extensive auditioning for community theater has taught me that we either want to go first or last." Luna felt her eyebrows raise as she gave Rachel a skeptical look. One that people often likened to a face her mother would make. This was enough to make Luna stop. "If we're first, then everyone has to measure up to us, and if we're last, then we're freshest in the judges' minds."
The only people that Rachel seemed to reassure was Miss Pillsbury and Amelia, who both smiled at the small brunette's words.
"And did you ever get any of those parts?" Kurt's question made Rachel deflate slightly.
"I'm with Rachel on this. The glass is definitely half full of some very good things right now." Emma nodded, and Mercedes also nodded, standing up.
"Yeah, Miss Pillsbury's right." The dark skinned girl agreed. "I mean, we're here now, right? No reason not to go in with some positive mojo."
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Apparently no amount of "positive mojo" would stop the other show choirs from stealing the New Directions' setlist.
As the girls from Jane Addams belted out the lyrics to And I'm Telling You and Proud Mary, Luna felt Amelia's panicked eyes on the side of her face, but Luna couldn't bring herself to look at her friend.
This could not be happening.
She heard Rachel trying to comfort Mercedes during the ballad, but Mercedes' look of shock did not waver.
As they sat back in the waiting room after the first performance, Amelia was trying to stop her twin from ramming himself into one of the pillars, and Luna was sitting on the floor, her head in her hands.
If they lost Sectionals because of a stolen setlist, Luna genuinely thought she might scream.
The past few weeks of school had been the most enjoyable ones she'd had since she started high school. Sure, the Glee club didn't come without its dramas ( babygate said hello ) and sometimes she felt like punching either Rachel or Puck in the face ( it really depended on the day ) but Luna would be lying if she told anybody that the feeling of an unconventional family didn't make her a lot more happy than she had been before.
Miss Pillsbury was on the phone to Mr Schue, standing a little bit away from the miserable looking kids.
"We've got a problem. They're doing all of our numbers." Emma told Will over the phone, shooting a worried look over her shoulder, as she was met with the sight of Amelia still trying to stop her brother from knocking down the pillar with his wheelchair. "The kids are completely freaking out. Artie keeps ramming himself into the wall, and I'm pretty sure Jacob Ben Israel wet himself."
Luna pulled a face of disgust as she edged further away from the nervous-looking boy.
Amelia, who had decided that her brother was a lost cause, and abandoned her quest to stop him from ramming himself into the wall, sat down noisily beside her Italian best friend, placing her head on Luna's shoulder.
"Well, maybe that deaf kids' school will be different?" It was more of a question. "I mean, we've still got Don't Stop Believing for us to sing, right?"
Luna found herself nodding slightly. "Yeah," she comforted her younger friend. "We've still got that one."
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Newsflash: They absolutely did not have Don't Stop Believing.
The Glee club was now sitting in the Green Room backstage, throwing the blame at each other. Something that Luna knew wasn't going to help their situation, but also couldn't bring herself to say anything about it.
"You leaked the set list, you don't want to be here. You were just Sue Sylvester's little moles." Kurt was blaming Santana and Brittany, who looked slightly sheepish, but also offended.
Quinn pushed past them, agreeing with Kurt by saying "I know for a fact that's true. Sue asked us to spy for her."
Santana sent Quinn a dirty look as the blonde exposed her ex-Cheerio teammates.
"Look, we may still be Cheerios," Santana began to defend Brittany and herself. "But neither of us ever gave Sue the set list."
A look of shame overtook Brittany's face. "Well. . .I-I did, but I didn't know what she was going to do with it." She admitted to the group, making everyone either roll their eyes or groan in annoyance.
"Okay, look, believe what you want, but no one's forcing me to be here." Santana shot down their accusatory glares. "And if you ever tell anyone this I'll deny it, but I like being in glee club. It's the best part of my day, okay? I wasn't going to go and mess it up."
Despite their current predicament, Luna found herself smiling at the Latina cheerleader, who smiled back at her.
"I believe you." Rachel told Santana sincerely. "Okay, look, guys, there's no point in us arguing anymore. We-we have go on in an hour."
"Yeah, and we have no songs." Luna felt the irritation seep through into her words, the stress of the situation finally starting to take its toll on her.
Artie sensed her distress and tried to help. "Perhaps I could improvise some of my def poetry jams." He offered.
"Oh my god." Amelia groaned at her brother's offer, clearly having very specific feelings about said def poetry jams. "Please don't." She practically begged her brother, causing him to nod his head and quieten.
"No. Look, we're going to do this the right way. Let's start with the ballad. Mercedes, do you have anything else in your repertoire?" Rachel asked Mercedes, who was sitting on one of the chairs.
"Yeah, but it's not as good as anything you're going to sing." Mercedes admitted to Rachel.
Luna frowned, did Mercedes really think that? In Luna's opinion, Mercedes could sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and it would sound like the angels in heaven were serenading her.
Rachel stuttered out a disagreeing response.
Eventually Rachel agreed to perform, saying: "Well, I do have something that I've been working on since I was four." Making the rest of the room chuckle.
They soon agreed that they would close with Somebody To Love by Queen, one of Luna's favourite songs.
"Yeah, that and a can of soup will guarantee us third place." Puck's pessimistic comment made Luna roll her eyes in anger. "We still need another song we can all sing together."
"You know, pessimistic comments aren't actually helpful." Luna snapped at the Puckerman boy that was standing behind her.
"I have one." Finn's sudden appearance took everyone by surprise. Luna felt her heart skip a beat as the six foot tall boy entered the room, a pile of sheet music in his hands. He gestured to the stack of papers and said "I found the sheet music online. I used the Cheerios' copier to make copies and then I trashed the thing." He told them all bashfully.
Finn quickly snapped into the leadership role. "Mike, Matt, Brittany, Santana, you're our best dancers. Figure something out and we'll all follow your lead." The four of them nodded at him, Matt shooting Luna a quick smile before they left the Green Room, a smile that she returned, giving him a reassuring thumbs up.
As everyone else fell into excited chatter, Amelia and Tina began speaking to each other, and Luna was joining in, but at the side of her eye she saw Puck approach Finn, holding out his hand for Finn to shake.
When Finn walked away without shaking it, Luna couldn't help but feel slightly smug on Finn's behalf, glad that Puck wasn't getting away with what he did to his best friend.
Luna smiled in thanks when Finn handed her the sheet music for their group number, the smile growing wider when she saw which song it was.
You Can't Always Get What You Want by The Rolling Stones.
Maybe they actually had a shot at Sectionals now.
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They did it.
They had won Sectionals.
Luna couldn't really remember much about actually performing on the stage, nerves and adrenaline probably took over. The only thing that stood out to her was the feeling of smugness as she pointed to the Jane Addams glee club director when the New Directions sang the lyric "you can't always get what you want", and relishing the look of annoyance on the woman's face as she did so.
And the next thing she recalled was the feeling of absolute joy when that one guy from the nightly news announced that they were the winners. Amelia had wrapped her in a massive hug, whilst screaming in joy. She had also shared a brief hug with Quinn and Artie before Rachel leapt forward and grabbed their golden, first place trophy.
And as she stood in front of Mr Schuester with the rest of the Glee club, she had the familiar feeling of excitement bubbling in her stomach as they all stood, blocking the trophy so that they could surprise their director with it.
"Well, we have a few things we'd like to show you, Mr Schue. The first. . ." Finn trailed off, as Artie was wheeled forward by Lia, holding the trophy in his lap.
Mr Schue made a noise of victory, and the rest of the students laughed in happiness at the look on their teacher's face.
Mr Schue stared at the trophy for a minute before looking back up at his students. "I am so proud of you guys." He told them earnestly. "You won fair and square. The result was unanimous, and the judges didn't even know about all the shenanigans that were going on behind the scenes. So. . .Congratulations." Luna wanted to giggle at the use of the word "shenanigans" but didn't want to interrupt her teacher's heartwarming speech. "You earned this. Give it up! Come on! All right! But, now we have Regionals to worry about. And you can bet that Vocal Adrenaline is hard at work, so we should be, too. So, let's get started."
Before Mr Schue could speak anymore, Puck interrupted him. "Uh, wait, Mr Schue. There's one more thing."
"Since you weren't able to be there to see us perform." Rachel started to say as Mr Schue looked at them all in confusion. "We put together a special number just for you. Take a seat!" She sang the last part before letting out a loud laugh.
Luna shared an excited look with Lia and Mercedes as they took their places on the podium at the back of the choir room.
"Guess this means you're sorry,
you're standing at my door.
Guess this means you take back,
all you said before."
As Luna sung the back-up vocals, her eyes met with Kurt's as they passed each other due to the choreography. They shared a discreet high-five as they passed each other.
"Like how much you wanted,
anyone but me.
Said you'd never come back,
but here you are again."
"'Cause we belong together now, yeah.
Forever united here somehow, yeah.
You got a piece of me,
and honestly,
My life, ( my life ) would suck ( would suck ) without you!"
Luna felt the words to the song resonate within her.
If you had asked her a few months ago, at the beginning of the school year, if she thought that she'd have more friends than just the Abrams' twins, Luna would have laughed in your face.
As they continued their performance of Kelly Clarkson's best song, Luna soon fell into the same choreography as Quinn, Brittany and Santana were doing, the four of them falling into giggles as they clicked their fingers in unison to the beat of the music.
As the song came to a close and they sung the final chorus, Luna's mind floated back to what Mr Schue had said about Vocal Adrenaline not pulling any punches. Usually this would give Luna some pause, or maybe even make her a bit nervous about what was to come.
But as Luna fell into laughter with her peers, once their performance ended and Mr Schue was applauding them, she felt a strange surge of confidence about the future of the New Directions.
How much trouble could Vocal Adrenaline really be?
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I do not own glee, all rights go to Ryan Murphy, FOX and whomever else made that acid trip of a show that I love so much.
I neither own the gifs in any of my chapters unless stated otherwise, all credits go to the creators of the gifs.
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Luna: "how much trouble could vocal adrenaline be???"
All of Us:
Wow two updates within 24 hours,,bet ur all shook.
But guess what guys 👀 a certain someone is in the next episode 👀 👀
hehe.
I hope you guys enjoyed this chapter!! Bby Luna's first ever sectionals,,
what an emotional time.
Also,, something between Luna and Matt mayhaps?? How would people feel about that??
Also,, did we enjoy the text convos In this chapter?? they were v fun to write lmao.
n e ways,, tysm for reading !!
ily all so much🥰🥰
— Jade <3