just had to write this. My girl knocked it out of the park last night.

"Are you okay?"

Of course I'm not okay. Anybody who knows me know I'm not okay. I'm not like this, I'm not a whining crybaby. If I'm clutching my stomach and throwing up maybe, just maybe, I really am sick. But nobody here knows me, they only know the temperamental diva.

"Are you okay?"

Of course I'm not okay. Anybody who looks at me can see I'm not okay. They'd see the sudden weight gain and wonder why. And it was a sudden weight gain, 15 pounds in two weeks. Of course they haven't seen me since the last day of school. It's not like we're friends, like they'd call me up to go to the mall or watch videos. Don't worry, I had a good time this summer. But if anybody saw me, they'd wonder about that, why I'm so tired and can barely move by the end of the day. But nobody here can see me, they only see the fat black girl, who's getting fatter every day.

"Are you okay?"

Of course I'm not okay. Anybody who listens to me can hear I'm not the same. I sound better, richer and more mature. Why? What happened to cause that? They don't know that I have been regenerated. I've spent the summer with someone who knows a swan when he see one, so you ducks can just quack off. But nobody here listens to me anyway, they can only hear Aretha.

"Are you okay?"

Of course I'm not okay. Anybody who cares about me would have asked that question last week, last spring, last year. I haven't been okay since Quinn moved out and stopped talking to me. I haven't been okay since Kurt announced that he was leaving and walked out without saying goodbye. I haven't been okay since Schuester sat there and said nothing when Jesse called me lazy I was okay, for a while, but that's over now. Anyway, nobody here gives a shit about me.

I rubbed my stomach and smiled. Not that I expected anybody to quit to show their support, not that I expected anybody to follow me to make sure I'm alright, but club has been over for hours now and nobody's even texted me. "R U OK". Not even that. Shane was right, I don't have any real friends in Glee Club, not anymore.

Shane. What am I going to do about Shane, the only person at this school who believes in me? No way I'm going to try to pull a Quinn on Shane. He can count and he's not blind. I'll figure that out, I have a little time.

Shelby Corcoran studied the young black girl sitting opposite her. Something was wrong, that was obvious, but what? "Are you okay?" The girl closed her eyes and clenched her jaw as if fighting back a wave of nausea. Shelby reached for the water bottle sticking out of the girl's half-open purse, tipping the purse over in the process.

A medicine bottle fell out of the purse and rolled to the center of the table. The girl lunged for it, but only succeeding in starting it rolling again, away from her, to the edge of the table, to drop into Shelby's lap. Shelby looked at the bottle. She'd taken these too, 18 years ago. "Do your parents know?"

Mercedes shook her head.

"Your boyfriend, Shane, does he know?"

The girl looked up, panicked. "He's not..." She started crying.

Damn, Shelby thought, this is getting complicated. Okay. If this were Beth, and she was alone, scared and desperate, what would you want someone to do for her? Shelby moved to a chair next to Mercedes and put her arm around her.

"Does the baby's father know?"

"He's gone." she said flatly. "And he's never coming back."

"Gone as in dead, graduated, married?" Please god, don't let the father be a 40 year old man who's taken advantage of this girl.

"Gone as in moved. He went to school here last year and his family moved back to Memphis. He can't come back. I don't want him to come back just because he feels obligated."

"Well, honey, he does have some obligations. That can wait a while though. Do you want me to come with you, when you tell your parents?"

Mercedes looked at her, eyes wide in wonder. "You don't even know me and you'd do that for me?"

"I'm a mother and you're about to join the club." Shelby said smiling. "Here's my number. Call me anytime."

"Your club!" Mercedes suddenly remembered why she had walked in here. "Maybe I won't be able to keep up the with dancing and everything."

"You've got enough to worry about." Shelby said patting her hand. "Let me worry about that. You can sit in a chair and we'll dance around you if we have to."

McKinley wasn't harder than Dalton, just different. For instance, they teach history differently here. At Dalton they teach world history. It's Europe, Asia, Africa, North and South America on the same timeline. Here Africa and Asia are pretty much ignored. Europe and South American are skimmed over. It's mostly American History. So here it's the Vietnam War whereas Dalton was discussing the French Revolution. That's why he was here late, catching up with the teacher.

He had seen Mercedes talking to Ms. Corcoran when he walked past her classroom so he wasn't surprised to see her walking down the hallway later. She walked briskly until she turned the corner, out of sight of Ms. Corcoran's classroom. Then her pace slowed noticeably. That's what he noticed, how slowly she was walking.

She walked past him without speaking.

"Hi, Mercedes." he called out.

"Hi." she kept walking, a little faster now.

It was easy for him to catch up with her at that pace. "Are you feeling alright?"

She stopped and leaned against the nearest locker.

"Why?" she asked turning to face him.

"Why?" What a strange thing to ask.

"Yes, why are you asking me that? Why would you care?" She didn't sound angry, just interested.

"Because" he thought about it. "I don't know you, but I've never heard you described as a hypochondriac. So I thought maybe you're sick."

"I said I was sick, didn't I?" her deep brown eyes filled with tears, but none of them fell. "I guess they all think I'm a lazy diva, and this was just an act to get out of doing any work."

Blaine broke eye contact. That theory had been discussed.

"Even Kurt?" she asked, her voice quavering a little.

"No, Kurt didn't say that."

"But he didn't contest it either, did he?"

Blaine looked down again. Mercedes blinked and sniffed but she didn't cry. "That's okay." she said with a deep sigh. " I gotta go. I have to meet Shane at 6."

"It's 6:30 now." Blaine observed.

"Shit!" she pulled out her cell phone and called. "He's home already."

"Do you need a ride?"

"Thank you." She was tired and didn't want to have to walk home.

"Let me carry your books." he said taking her bag. She hesitated for a minute and he smiled, trying to make her feel comfortable. "That's what they teach us at Dalton."

"Thank you."

They walked slowly out to Blaine's car. He opened the car door for her, another Dalton thing? They rode to her house in silence. He parked in front of the apparently empty house and jumped out of the car to open her door. She had beaten him to that. She was already leaning out, throwing up on the curb.

for more on Mercedes' summer see: Sam who? by mariposafria

the swan/duck reference is from The Ugly Duckling - Hans Christian Anderson (ie it was a swan the whole time and he needed to stop hanging around with ducks who kept bringing him down.

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