"Hi, Mr. Schue. Working late, I see."
"Yes. Grading a Spanish test and going over some music scores. I'm deciding on a new number for glee. I was going to discuss it with you tomorrow. What's up?"
"I've waited until everyone has gone home to speak to you about something of great interest to both of us."
"And what could that be?"
"Well, before I tell you, and I will soon tell you, I want to stress that everything we say to each other today must be the complete and absolute truth, as it always has been. Agreed?"
"Of course. Our relationship has always been based on truth and mutual trust."
"Precisely. I want to begin by telling you what's going to happen today, so that I can't be accused of tricking or even manipulating you."
"I'd never accuse you of that, Rachel. You've always been honest and forthright with me."
"Yes I have. That's why I think it only fair to tell you that before I leave today, without my resorting to any form of coercion, blackmail, drugs, magic, hypnotism, or any of the black arts, without touching you or exposing myself to you, you will, on the basis of pure logic, of your own free will, ask to make love to me."
"I will?"
"Yes."
"Rachel, we've been through this with the crush thing last year. You know I can't do that. I won't do that."
"Last year was last year. Much has changed since then. I had a long sexual relationship with Finn, then a short one with Puck.. I'm a very different person now. You must have noticed."
"I admit I've noticed, even though I didn't know about Puck. Did you dump him again? Poor Puck. I thought he had this reputation as a ladies' man?"
"Yes, he's had a lot of girls and even women. But he knows only so much about women's minds and bodies and he's not that bright. I need a man who can learn what I have to teach. Someone smart enough and experienced enough to teach me some things. Someone attractive, intelligent, caring, and mature. Someone I respect. That's where you come in."
"But I can't come in. It's illegal and unethical."
"I notice you haven't yet said you didn't desire it. As to its being unethical, doesn't that suggest it's well out of the ordinary? Are you aware of the study done by sociologists at Stanford who found that 32% of straight male high school choir directors had slept with their female lead soloists, that the number rose to 49% when the girl was very attractive, to 64% when she was attractive and a great singer, but fell to 0% when she was both attractive and could sing as well as I?"
"Why would it fall to 0% when the girl could sing as well as you?"
"Because there is no other high school choir girl who can sing as well as I, as you yourself have said on many occasions, and I haven't slept with you. Yet. When that happens, my category will jump to 100%. Won't that be a proud day for both of us?"
"Not if the results are published. Even if the names are not revealed, everyone in Lima will know it's us if the girl is said to be a truly great singer. There have already been nasty rumors circulating, as it is."
"I know. I've had to scrub stuff off the stalls in the girls' bathrooms. Now I began by saying I was going to be completely honest with you today as I always am, so let me remind you that I merely asked if you were aware of the Stanford study. I never said there was one, which of course there wasn't. But you believed there might have been because the results I quoted seemed possible, plausible, not at all out of line with what you might have guessed. So how unethical would it really be to sleep with me if so many others in your profession are doing it?"
"You're elevating sophistry to a new level, Rachel."
"Thanks. As to the illegal element, the law is an ass written by prudes and out-of-touch fools to protect the very stupid and impossibly innocent, neither of which I am. In fact, in this matter, I am clearly the aggressor and predator. Do you need protection from me? Hardly. In any case, my dads are well-connected with the power structure in Lima, including the DA. If the school board attempts any action against you in the very unlikely event we get caught, we'll threaten to tie them up in the courts so long it'll cost the district millions in legal fees. We're quite safe. It's all win-win."
"How is it win-win?"
"We'll both realize our desires. We'll both get enormous physical and mental pleasure we can't, at least for the moment, get anywhere else. That's what life's all about, Will – pursuit of happiness without harm. Don't make me quote the Declaration of Independence."
"Sleeping with your teacher is a right demanded in the Declaration of Independence? I know at least Jefferson and Franklin liked a bit of nookie, but as a reason for rebellion?"
"What's most telling about your counter-arguments are the things you don't say, the subjects you avoid. Just now, for example, you chose not to take issue with my claim that you have desired me and would get great pleasure from having sex with me. If that's not true, speak now or forever hold your peace on the subject."
"Having a fantasy is not the same as having a desire. And there are millions of women that I could derive great pleasure from having sex with."
"You've had more than fantasies about me, as I've had about you. You've wanted me in a carnal way, even when I wasn't there. You've wanted to kiss me, to have your hands on my thighs, on my breasts, your mouth on my nipples and much more intimate places, and to be inside me. I think about you doing those things to me all the time. As to millions of women, sorry, but as much as I'm sure they'd please you, Paltrow, JLo, and Kelli O'Hara are simply not available. And what good is someone even here in Lima who is both available and legal if you don't desire them? Or someone in the counselor's office of this very school who could no more have sex with a real naked man than she could eat her lunch off the floor of the boys' locker room?"
"Okay, yes, I've thought about you in ways I'm not proud of. And that's the point, isn't it, that I'm not proud of thinking about you in that way."
"Why not? I'm not ashamed of my sexuality, of wanting you to think of me in that way. If that were the only way you thought of me or the only reason you desired me, then I'd be really concerned. You don't give yourself enough credit, Will. Your thoughts of me haven't been all about sex, or even primarily about sex. The reason you haven't had sex since Terri is not because there aren't physically attractive women around, some on McKinley's faculty, who'd have you, it's because you haven't wanted them. But you have wanted me. Why? Think of the two choices you have tonight. You could go home alone, eat alone, watch some TV, go to bed, have a fantasy about me as I will about you, let's make it at exactly 10:30, then talk to me tomorrow at lunch or after school about song choices for glee. Or, I could come to your apartment, make us dinner, have you take me to the bedroom, undress me, kiss and touch me everywhere, make love to me. Then I could snuggle up against you, you could smell my hair, my perfume and our sex all intermingled, you could feel my softness, my fingers on your chest, on your arms, on your balls, and then we could talk about song choices for glee. You could tease me, give the solo of our glee song choice to fucking Tina (again!), I could punch you with my little fist, kiss you where I punched you, make you hard again, make love to you again, or not, it wouldn't matter by then, we'd love each other, we'd make plans for the next day and the next week and trips to see touring companies in Cleveland and the real thing in New York and I'd tell you why the guy who did Lt. Cable in the South Pacific revival doesn't hold a candle to you and you'd tell me why that ugly bitch Menzel's DROMP doesn't compare to mine and she's 100 years old, for chrissake. You see, it's not the sex, it's what happens between the sex. Just as in music it's what happens between the notes. That's what we both want. That's our real desire. But I want you to know that this isn't an ultimatum. If you ask me tomorrow, or next week, or next month, or next year, my answer will always be the same: yes."
Rachel crossed her legs so that her short skirt rode up revealing more leg, but no more than leg. She put her hands in her lap and looked demurely and patiently away. Five minutes elapsed without a sound. Will Schuester then asked Rachel Berry a question and arrived the next day at William McKinley High School happier than he had been in ages.