Even if the office was bright and nice, and much more discreet than the one at McKinley's, Sam still didn't feel comfortable in there. He felt this need to busy his hands, start tapping his foot or maybe just run away. He didn't understand why he was called to guidance counselor's office during his first week of new school; especially because he was never called nor went to guidance counselor's office before. He wasn't troublesome boy.
Counselor entered the office with the click of her heels and the smile on her face - her lips were huge, just like his, Sam noticed - and greeted him, "Mr. Evans, I'm glad you came", like he had any choice to be here.
"Just 'Sam' is alright, Ms. McPherson" he assured her as she sat down across the table.
The teacher goes through the papers for a while, mentioning something about her being Sam too, but, not getting any answer besides a forced smile, she quits this kind of chatting and goes straight to the subject.
"At first, I want to assure you you're not in any kind of trouble" she says. "I just want to offer you some help, and it would be perfectly understandable if you rejected that help, because, well, that's what teenagers do, just like they run away from home or start protests. Too much?" she asks seeing his expression. "Fine. Anyway - the school board heard about your family's financial problems and the teachers know about you dyslexia, it seems like you're going through a really hard time right now."
Sam swallows hard, feeling slightly embarrassed by all of it. "I've never tried to make big deal out of any of it. I guess news spread fast here."
"Of course you didn't" she assured him quickly. "I think it's exactly the opposite, that you're being very secretive. You keep a lot to yourself. You seem a little depressed, actually."
"That's a weird information to get after a week in new school" Sam said carefully; but it was probably true. He wasn't feeling very well still at McKinley, with all their problems, but at least he had friends, football team, glee club, Quinn and the whole church community, Kurt… Here he had nothing. No start fresh in football team; the coach had his favorites from last years, no glee club, because artistic program was very cut due to finances, and, well… No Kurt. They promised each other to write; Kurt already send him the first email, email which was read by Sam like million times so far (mentioning school, New Directions, works on Pip Pip Hooray, asking how Sam is doing, ending with a lot of questions and silly love, Kurt which gave Sam lump in his throat) and to which he still had to answer. He had just no idea how.
"I'm just good at my job. Also, dedicated" woman smiled. "Listen, Sam" she continued. "I just want you to know that my doors are always open. You can come and talk, about anything, school problems, team problems, home problems… And something tells me you might really need to let it out. That's it."
Sam sighed softly and stood up. "I'll keep this in mind, Ms. McPherson" he said, grabbing his bag and leaving the office quickly.