(3 years prior)

Carmel Middle School is bigger than Alex Anderson-Hummel had ever imagined, much more frightening than the small school he went to in the outskirts of New York. His fathers took him out of Havant Middle School because of the way the teachers taught him and moved them to Lima of all places to be closer to Burt and Carole, Kurt's parents, after Burt Hummel had, had another heart attack. He hoped that he would be able to be invisible for the next few years of school and leave Lima as soon as possible and go back to New York.

Alex looks at the students with a blank, yet frightened look and he keeps close to he lockers in attempt to hide.

"Well, look what the unicorns flew in. A barbie."

Alex jumps and turns around to look over to a brown haired boy with a blond haired girl under his arm. He quivers, and moves back against the wall, in hope to get away.

"Could you look more gay?" the boy continues.

"Puck. Stop."

Alex freezes, knowing he had heard that name before. The boy, Puck, glares down at the girl and opens his mouth to report. He turns his glare on Alex, eyes softening gently when he notices Alex's reaction.

"You promised Serenity that you wouldn't," the girl starts.

Puck cuts her off, "She isn't here, Lottie."

"Think of Ben? Would you do this to him? You promised us you wouldn't turn on anyone ever since you saw what happened to Ben," Lottie continues, looking over to Alex, brown eyes warm. "Serenity would never forgive you."

Alex starts to move forwards towards them. Suddenly, he is grabbed by the shoulder and thrown back. He flinches as he makes contact with the lockers and then the floor. A body hovers over him, shaking him from side to side on the floor.

Alex jumps up, Lottie running over and she tries to pull the man off Alex while Puck runs the other way. He makes his way around the school to find the person he is looking for until he finds her standing at her locker. He grabs her arm and drags her over to where Alex is about to get punched.

"Jamie," the girl growls when she sees him. Jamie freezes and looks down at the boy. "Haven't I told you that if I saw you hurting one more person that I would personally pull each and every one of your fingernails out?"

Alex looks around the boy and to Serenity, her red hair around her face in a messy bundle. Puck stands beside her as Jaime starts to get off of Alex.

"And I'll kick your balls up so hard they'll end up in your nose. I'm sure they are small enough to fit," she grins at him when he turns around.

Jamie quivers in fear before being pushed in the lockers by the girl in five inch heels. Serenity's grin turns into a smirk as she approaches him. She seems to want to say something but her eyes turn to Alex in a quick glance only to fall back on him. Her face softens the same way Puck's had and she drops Jamie. She slowly walks over, tilting her head to the side and she lets a small, delicate smile break through.

"I'm Serenity Chords."

"Alex Anderson-Hummel"

She puts out her hand to help him up but he freezes. Serenity frowns at his actions but she leans down to be at his height. Serenity couldn't believe how abused he seemed, as if he had been bullied his entire life.

"Nice to meet you, baby-face," Alex feels like the use of his nickname was more of a showing of affection than it had been an insult all the year before. "Now, get up before you ruin those fancy-ass McQueen trousers of yours and let's get you to the nurse."

Alex grins at her sassy attitude and she grins back. They grab hands and help each other up to be able to stand at full height. She stands at least an inch over him in the heels she's in and her odd choice of clothes make her seem like she belongs in the Carmel Skanks, though her attitude makes Alex think she is completely different.

Alex goes to ask her why she helped him out, but the words don't seems to want to come out. He didn't care why she did, because the fact that all of the other students didn't even approach them made him feel safe. She seemed to have a hold on the school and nobody messed with her or the people that were with her. The way she held herself straight is the way Alex wanted to stand and she knew it. She stood in front of him, showing him unconsciously that he had nothing to be scared of.

Next thing he knew, he was sitting at the nurses office with his fathers running into the room, cutting off whatever insult Serenity was saying about Jamie.

"Alex, are you all right?" one of his father's, Kurt, grabbed his face to inspect it.

"Fine, dad," he mumbled, adverting his eyes from Serenity as embarrassment took over.

"I can't believe this happened, on your first day too," Kurt and Blaine were cut off with Puck marched into the room.

"Jamie admitted that Frank had put him up to it, again," he told Serenity as he walked in."Said he visited Frank at the hospital and was told he wouldn't be caught."

Both Blaine and Kurt finally noticed Serenity sitting on the bed next to Alex. She gave them a small smile, nudging Puck to do the same.

"Sir," she nodded. "I'm Serenity Chords and this is Mark Puckerman. Sorry for intruding on this discussion, we'll be off."

"What are you going to do?" Alex called out, stopping the two from leaving.

"I think I need to have a chat with Frank Seymour about something. Don't mind me."

"Stay, please?"

"Puckerman as in Noah Puckerman's son?" Kurt mumbled to Blaine in confusion. "How do you know them, Alex?"

"Serenity and Puck are the ones who got Jamie off of me," Alex admitted, watching Serenity's face crumble and build a wall. "Come to Friday night dinner this week, so I can make it up to you guys."

Puck froze, eyes snapping down to Serenity as she frowned. She opened her mouth, but started to stutter her way into an answer. Puck grabbed her arm, stopping her.

"Sorry, kid, we're busy Friday. Maybe some other time, yeah?"

Alex nodded, defeated as he turned to his fathers to avoid looking rejected. He could sense Puck and Serenity's eyes on him, but he ignored it. Serenity cleared her throat in a raspy manner.

"I-I'm s-sure, we, uh, c-c-can reschedule our plans," both Puck and Alex looked at her confused, as they looked at the breaking look in her eyes.

Alex grinned, excited of having made potential friends, but the look Puck gave Serenity was weird to the eyes of Blaine and Kurt, as if getting more friends wasn't their plan. They watched the girl go from indifferent to a stuttering mess, but they let her join them nonetheless.

By the time Friday dinner had arrived, Puck and Lottie had gotten used to sticking around Alex, dragging a reluctant Serenity along. Serenity glared at everyone getting close to them, but it helped Alex get used to the feeling of not getting bullied. He had learned that Puck's father had been friends with his own parents when they were younger, but that Mark was his opposite (nice and gentle and protective of those who were weaker, while his father had bullied kids for most of his life.) Both of Alex's parents were shocked by Mark's manners, seemingly understanding when Mark mentioned that Noah Puckerman was married to Quinn Fabray – knowing that's where he learned it all from.

Serenity and Mark had met in grade school, when Mark had answered a question in class for Serenity when she was getting a lecture about speaking louder in class. Mark had told Alex how Serenity was born with vocal cord paralysis, and couldn't speak correctly until her surgery when she was ten, and then she spent years stuttering because of fear to speak too loud and someone make fun of her.

Over the week, Alex had heard more about Frank Seymour – the boy who put Jamie up to hurt him on his first day. Serenity and Frank hated each other, since Frank had bullied Serenity and her brother, Benjamin, since they met, because Serenity couldn't speak. They had been beat up daily after classes, until Serenity did something about it – which landed Frank in the hospital.

Alex jumped from his thoughts when they doorbell rang, announcing the arrival of Puck and Lottie. Serenity had tried to get out of showing up, so her attendance would be surprising for Alex. Just as he invited Puck and Lottie in to met his fathers, the bell rang again, and he wrenched it open to reveal Serenity.

She gave a weak smile, nodding her head in acknowledgement and then entered the house. Alex felt as if the fact that she took up the offer of dinner and actually showed up meant he was getting somewhere with their friendship and that's all he wanted.

**Disclaimer: All of the Glee Characters do not belong to me and I am aware that I am using the songs used in Glee – but in different circumstances. Some ideas are retrieved from the original episodes, but I had to take my muse from somewhere! **