As Finn's car came to a skidding halt at the entrance of William McKinley High school, Kurt Hummel's stomach did a flip-flop. And it wasn't just from Finn's horrific driving skills (although it probably didn't help the situation). He nervously picked at his tight jeans, silently berating himself for wearing such uncomfortable clothes on the day he was most likely to be vomiting – from nerves mostly. However, he didn't doubt the possibility of being beaten to the point where his breakfast decided it didn't want to stay in his stomach anymore.

Finn took the keys out of the ignition and put a hand on Kurt's shoulder. "Don't worry, bro," he said, his eyes filled with worry. "Nobody is going to touch you today. I promise."

Kurt looked up at his step-brother, forcing himself to put on a strong face. Blaine's words of "Courage" momentarily flashed in front of his eyes, and he smiled, albeit with a tint of regret. Already he missed his boyfriend, who was only a two hour drive away. But it might as well have been in a separate universe. Blaine, usually poised and dapper, had fallen apart at Kurt's news of his decision to transfer back.

"You're joking, right?" Blaine said, jumping up from his sitting position on the couch. At any other moment, Kurt would've laughed. Blaine was usually jumping on couches, not off of them. But the moment was too difficult, too emotional, that his mind didn't even side-track to that bit of ironic humor.

"Blaine –" Kurt began, but he was immediately cut off by Blaine's mouth forcefully pressing on his own. It was the most heated and passionate kiss Kurt had ever experienced, and his head spun from both arousal and lack of oxygen. But a warning sign flashed in his brain, and he pulled away. He needed to talk to Blaine, not make-out with him.

Something wet had rubbed off of Blaine's cheek on his own. He touched it, confused, and then realized all of a sudden that they were tears. Blaine had been crying!

Blaine flopped back on the couch and let out a sarcastic laugh. "It's karma, I guess." He snorted, looking completely forlorn and hopeless. "What do you mean?" Kurt asked, putting his arm around Blaine. "It took me months to realize I was in love with you, and now, right after I do something about it, you decide to leave. I deserve it…"

"NO!" Kurt said with such ferocity that Blaine actually flinched. "You didn't do anything wrong. Its just…I miss my friends. And I miss New Directions. And seeing them perform at Regionals, with each of them shining in their own way, it made me realize that I don't want to be a Warbler! I don't want to conform and become part of that mindless pack of sheep!" Kurt saw Blaine cringe, and his hand immediately flew to his mouth. "Oh, I didn't mean…"

"No," Blaine said, cutting him off again. "You're right, as usual. And it was silly for me to expect that you should change yourself for us. It was selfish, and I'm sorry."

An awkward silence hung in the air like a thick, wet blanket. Kurt coughed, Blaine shuffled his feet, and suddenly they were both laughing hysterically, tears practically running down their cheeks. It took several minutes for them to calm down, and by the time that happened, they were both on the floor. Kurt was curled up against Blaine's chest, and Blaine had his arms around Kurt's shoulders.

"This doesn't mean we have to break up, right?" Blaine asked, his voice barely a whisper. Kurt laughed and sat up, hitting Blaine playfully. "After all I went through waiting for you? Hell to the no!"

And now, as Kurt sat in the car, trying to muster up the courage to undo his seatbelt and walk inside, he realized something. He was never going to be fully content in one place again. At Dalton, he would forever miss New Directions and his friends. But here at McKinley, he would forever miss Blaine, his mentor, best friend, and love interest.

Oddly enough, this thought gave Kurt the strength to undo his seatbelt and climb out of the car. Finn smiled that sideways smile of his and got out to unlatch the trunk so they could get their bags. As Kurt walked up the steps to the front door and mentally braced himself for the possibility of a slushie attack, or a push into the locker, he felt his uncomfortably tight jeans vibrate from his side pocket. He somehow managed to remove the phone from the constricting article of clothing and opened it, revealing a text from Blaine. It had one word. A word that, ironically, only a few months ago had given him the strength to walk through these very same doors.

Courage.

Kurt smiled, every last bit of fear completely drained out of him. After all, he was Kurt Hummel. He could handle anything.

"Can you believe we won Regionals?" Tina squealed as she snuck up on Mercedes, who was walking down the hallway at school. "I know," Mercedes laughed. "I'm still reeling from it." "And now," Rachel piped in, walking over to join the conversation. "We can claim our rightful places at the top of this school! Nothing can bring us down now! Not even…"

As if right on cue, there was a splash of purple in each of their faces. Azimio and Karofsky high-fived in front of them, then walked away yelling, "LOSERS!"

Purple slushie dripped down from the three of their faces, staining the necks of their shirts. It seeped into their clothes in an uncomfortably cold and squishy way. Rachel let out a frustrated yell and stepped forward, turning to face Mercedes and Tina.

"That's it!" she screamed. Mercedes, who had been trying to get the slush out of her eyes, jumped back, startled. "I am not standing for this!" Rachel yelled. "We just won REGIONALS! We won, and they don't have any right slushying us. NONE!"

Her eyes flamed behind the mask of purple food coloring. Tina, her voice trembling, whispered, "Rachel, they're never going to stop. We know that. That's why we wrote "Loser Like Me" for Regionals."

"Ya, well its going to end." Rachel said, her voice low and menacing. "They are not allowed to rain on my parade."

Mercedes snorted. "Oh shut up!" Rachel said, but she couldn't help but smile. But even though the tension had dissipated, the anger didn't. And as all of them walked to the bathroom to attempt and get the purple dye out of their skin, the anger persisted. Each of them felt it, but no one mentioned it. It just sat inside each of them, festering like a sore wound, waiting to be released.

"Alright guys, we may have won Regionals, but we still have a long way to go – woah." Mr. Shuester dropped his sheet music at the site in front of him. Every member of his glee club was drenched in at least one color of the offensive slushie material.

"What happened?" He asked, shaking his head.

Finn spoke up first. "Puck and I were ambushed in the locker room."

"But don't worry," Puck smirked. "I got them back. Let's just say a few of them will be drinking their slushies through an IV for a while."

Mr. Shuester shook his head again, hoping that Puck wasn't being serious. "But what about the rest of you?" He asked, turning to the rest of the group. "They didn't get you ALL in the locker room, did they?"

"Nah," Artie said. "Mike and I got it before we even got in the building."

"Rachel, Tina and I got slushed in the hallway," Mercedes piped in, flipping her long, dark, and sticky hair behind her shoulder.

"And I got another one on my way over here…" Tina muttered.

"3 guys slushed Kurt at once, so I jumped one of them" Sam said. Mr. Shuester suddenly realized Sam had a black eye, reminiscent of what had happened earlier in the year. "Let's just say I got more than just a slushie to the face…" he added, grinning from behind his wet mop of blonde hair.

"Sue slushed us," Santana said, her arms folded beneath her fake boobs. Quinn, her bitch smirk practically glued on her face, said, "She told us we better get used to it."

"I slushed myself," Brittany said. Everyone stared at her. "Well you guys are all doing it."

Mr. Shuester shook his head one more time. "This is getting ridiculous! And how is Sue back anyways, after what happened at Regionals?" He was, of course, referring to Sue sucker-punching the judge after her team, Aural Intensity, had failed to place first.

The glee kids shrugged. They were used to Sue getting away with things she shouldn't have been able to. It was just a fact of life at McKinley, almost like getting slushied. But Mr. Shuester wasn't going to just let this slide like every other time.

"Ok guys, I'm going to do something about this." He said. "But until then, we have to get on with getting ready for Nationals. We're going to have to top our original songs. And I think I've just found out a way to do it." He went over to the white board, whipped out his black marker, and scrawled the word "ANGER" in big, bold letters.

"This weeks assignment is to find a song that expresses your anger about something. And from the looks of it, there's a lot to work from."

His sticky students looked back at him. Some of them, like Sam, smirked. Others, like Rachel, only glowered.