1.
I can't really believe it's actually been 15 years. It seems like only yesterday I was sitting right there in the choir room, unsure and inexperienced.
But here I am, still at McKinley High School, yet so vastly different. I never really thought I'd be a teacher here, I wasn't really sure I was even bright enough. I guess you could say I was inspired by my own favorite teacher, Mr. Schuester. I just want to help these kids like he helped me.
I stare up at the enormous glass case of trophies, most of them Cheerios. There on one side are the Glee club awards, many that I helped win.
It's right then that I realize I can't let them get rid of the club.
If they have no one to coach it after the incident with that creepy Dave Karofsky, I have to. It's time for me to step up.
If they have no funding for it, I have to make it work anyway. Even if my wife doesn't like it, these kids need this opportunity.
I'll speak to the principle. I have some experience in this job.
Who would have thought I'd end up here? Everything seems so different yet so incredibly similar.
Finn Hudson is ready to coach this Glee Club.
2.
Glee club.
Just the words make me sick.
That budget should be mine; my Cheerios need their new private jet. And I'm going to get that budget, mark my words. Finn Hudson doesn't have a clue what he's in for.
I saw him the other day with his new protégé, Beth Corcoran, an obnoxious little hobbit with a voice like a foghorn. I tried to explain to him that Glee club was a pathetic sinkhole of failure but he didn't take it well.
May have been because I also mentioned the fact that his hair looks like Jimmy Neutron. Some people just can't handle my raging cyclone of truth.
For some reason he brought up the fact that I'd been in Glee club with him. I pointed out that it had never allowed me the opportunity to crush worthless enemies and blind others with my radiant talent like cheerleading has. I learned it all from that Goddess on earth, my mentor, Sue Sylvester.
I will end you, Finn Hudson, you and your hideous cowlick. And when you are rotting in a pit of your own ineptitude don't expect any sympathy from me. You thank that's hard? Try juggling chainsaws in 9-inch platforms, THAT'S HARD!
Glee club will fall just like George Washington after Gandhi betrayed him during his invasion of Russia. Kurt Hummel will not be a loser again.
3.
Running a school isn't easy. I've always liked being in charge but I never realized how complicated it was to find a compromise between everyone.
I'm glad that Finn has taken over Glee club; it really helped me when I was a student, but their utterly inappropriate performance at the assembly has me worried. Kurt keeps demanding that I obliterate them after every little offence and expects my loyalty as a friend.
I've come up with a list of songs for the club to perform with help from my pastor. That should solve the conflict right? And doesn't everyone love 99 Luftballons?
I try to be a strong leader, reasonable and fair, but this job doesn't make it easy. Everyone wants me to play favorites. Kurt even tried to blackmail me with an old video he found of me hallucinating Artie was a cheeseburger. It won't work; I still have his Single Ladies video.
No one can control Mercedes Jones. I'm the principle. What I say goes.
4.
It's official: I hate kids. I swear mine are little demons. After years of flu shots, they've gone stupid. How else could they be related to me?
Finn asked me to talk to his wife about her pregnancy. He's completely unprepared. He still thinks he'll love the savage monster his wife squeezes out. But of course, there's something else he doesn't know.
His beloved childhood sweetheart isn't pregnant.
She's only faking it to keep their marriage together. It's good to see a woman using a healthy amount of lies to stick her life together.
And if there's one thing Santana Lopez knows about it's lies. Lies to husbands, to children, to best friends, to coaches, I'm the master. And I'm ready to help.
It can't be that hard to find a baby. Why would someone want it in the first place?
5.
Looking in the mirror, I almost don't recognize myself. Wrinkles, receding hairline, my gut hanging out further and further over my shorts; what happened to Lima's most massive stud? Too much living the good life, maybe. Too much loving with not enough planning.
What am I now but a failure? Not a rock star. Not even a successful coach. Our football team hasn't won since I let that little kid in the Glee club kick for us. I'm stuck here in Lima, like I always feared, and I'm nothing but a huge loser.
Is it wrong to want a little happiness? Did I really use it all up in my younger days? Did all of those nights with the MILFs of Lima add up to my girlfriend now who won't even let me hold her hand?
The most beautiful guidance councilor in all of Lima and I didn't get to meet her when I was the sort of man someone could actually want.
She's so perfect, so much better than me, so much more than I could hope for. Is it wrong to want her? To bring her down to my level? I'd be so good to her; make her happier than Finn Hudson ever could. It hurts every time I see her staring at him with those big innocent eyes.
I'll ask to marry me and I'll take whatever I get. One small piece of something better than Lima Loser Noah Puckerman.
6.
Shattered dreams. That's all I have left. No one wanted me on Broadway. No one wants in my home. Finn left me. Finn found out. It's all over.
All that's left are the shattered dreams of a gold star fading to black.
He yelled at me. I'd never seen him so angry, even when we were in high school. All those years we spent, so happy and content. I was allowed to be selfish then, I got what I wanted, and life was kind.
Santana failed me, with all of her talk of secrets and lies. Puck failed me, with all of his promises to marry that guidance councilor and keep her away from Finn. Finn failed me, with his wedding vows so beautifully sung. I failed myself. No more defying gravity. No more defiant show tunes and comebacks. No more sympathy.
What does Rachel Berry have left? The echoes of songs fading into silence.
7.
I had really meant to change. After Finn told me I could be a big star and sing and dance again in Branson, I really meant to go. But I got lost. Somehow I ended up in a bar again.
I get lost a lot. Maybe it's because I never know where I am. But I'm usually happy if I can sing and dance. I met a man who let me do that if I had lots of sex with him. I'm really good at that too. Soon I'll have kissed everyone in Lima.
I met Finn again and he sang with me. It was fun! But that night I got scared because I think my cat was following me again so I went to his house. He was all alone. He said Rachel had gone away.
He said he was divorcing her. I didn't know Finn ate people!
But he didn't eat me. He let me sleep in his house. And when I was lonely, he let me sleep in his bed. He even remembered how to spell Brittany Susan Pierce! I can't even get it right half the time.
Finn's nice to me. I like him.
8.
The most incredible thing has happened. I've met a man.
Again.
Every since Mike died, I've never really allowed myself to feel this way. Partly it was for my son, but now he's old enough to handle the idea of me seeing someone.
Or at least I thought he was. He's been so strange lately, carrying around Mike's ashes and keeping his chair like a shrine in the living room. All I want is something for myself, some love in my life again, something more than just getting by and surviving. It's time my son understood that.
I've always been shy. I've always been a little lonely. It's time I let myself be happy. My son will understand that someday.
I'm still the same Tina Cohen-Chang underneath. I'm not going to give up this relationship. I'll make it work this time.
Mike would understand that.
9.
If my wife were alive, I keep thinking. I thought about getting Tina to talk to him but it would only make things worse. Sometimes I just don't get it though.
It sounds horrible, I know, but I really don't understand my own son. He seems convinced that I'd rather spend time with Tina and her son than with him.
But if my wife were alive she'd know what to say. She'd be able to tell him that no matter who he is or whom he's attracted to, we'll still love him.
All I've managed is some awkward mumbling about how we're family and we've always stuck together. When I watched him sing, so incredible yet so sad, I couldn't even comfort him. A fumbling hug and a few badly chosen words, that's all.
There are no words I can say to make him understand. He's not losing me. I'm losing him. I'm letting him down. All I wanted to do was protect him, my son, and he won't even talk to me.
I was an outcast then, he's an outcast now, we should be able to relate. At least Finn's done good things for him with the Glee club. We can talk about that, at least.
He led me to Tina again. I won't give her up. And I won't let him down again.
Artie Abrams is stronger than that. And the Abrams men stick together.
10.
Everyone always said that I was going to succeed. Everyone told me that I would be great one day.
Everyone lied.
That's what I have to tell people, that dreams don't come true. I told Hudson's whole Glee club. He was always a jealous of me when we were young and yet here he is, still full of dreams and apparently he was married to Rachel Berry, the one who got away.
I can't stand his pity. I'm practical. I have a real job. I tell kids the truth, not the crap people used to say to me. Where did any of that get me?
Hung over in a filthy little crack house in Cleveland.
Well, I'll show Hudson. I have the power here. I control the budget. And I'll show him that I can still out-sing him any day. That Cheerios coach, Hummel, needs his budget cut too, it's absurd. Although he is rather disconcertingly adorable…
Dreams don't come true, but there was one thing no one lied to me about. Jesse St. James was born to sing.
11.
I've always had this thing about control. I need to be in power. I need to be independent. I need to be in charge.
Coaching Vocal Adrenaline is exactly what I wanted. I'm going to send this team to Nationals and we're going to win. I'm going to make them good. I'm going to be the best.
You could say I'm married to my job. It's basically my entire life. I didn't think I needed anything else, that the power was enough.
But then a girl named Beth Corcoran, star of the New Directions Glee club, came waltzing into my auditorium and I realized something. It's not enough.
It's like a cosmic joke. I have a beautiful little girl right when I don't want one, and then when I desperately do the doctors tell me it's impossible. But here she is. My daughter. She looks so much like me and she sings like an angel.
She looked so scared just coming to talk to me. I tried to make her feel comfortable. I tried to connect with her.
But in the end Quinn Fabray could never be her mom. I'm just her biological mother. I don't even know her.
She was never really mine.
12.
No one thought I was going to be the one to succeed.
I sat in the back of the room. I never sang a solo. William Schuester, savior of the underdog, barely knew my name. When I left, no one cried. No one cared.
Well look at me now, world! I'm a legend! Everyone knows my name! I'm a celebrity judge at the Regional show choir competition!
That little snot Kurt Hummel is a judge as well. He's always hated me after that weird thing that happened between us a while back. I know he'll vote for New Directions just to spite me.
Let him try. New Directions never gave me anything. I didn't need them anyways.
I'm Matt Rutherford: Ohio Legend.
13.
It's the middle of the night and I'm still at the high school, grading Spanish quizzes. It's been such a crazy week.
First we came in third at Regionals but Kurt of all people convinced Mercedes to give the Glee club another year. I knew he couldn't be all bad, not with all of those visits to his father at the nursing home he tries to hush up.
Then one of my students had a baby that Quinn of all people adopted. I'm happy for her but it's such an incredible coincidence.
Finally the love of my life announced today that she's dating a dentist. I don't even know what to think.
I stand up and stretch my legs. A sound down the hallway penetrates my room's door. I frown and look out into the hall. There's a light on in the choir room.
Hesitantly I walk down the hall and open the door, squinting in to see who could still be here so late. To my surprise, the room is full of people.
"Wha- What are you all doing here?"
"It's strange right?" Quinn Fabray says, smiling gently. "I just came here to thank you and congratulate you on your incredible performance. You really did deserve to win."
"I don't know about that." Says Matt Rutherford, picking lint off of his suit cuff. "I was just here to check the dates on your trophy case for the story I'm doing tomorrow."
"I got lost." Says Brittany with a shrug. "Again."
"We were just coming to visit the old room again." Tina Cohen-Chang says, grinning and holding tightly to Artie Abram's hand.
"Great performance Finn, the kids did awesome." Artie says with an identical grin.
"I just felt like seeing it again." Mumbles Santana Lopez, looking like she'd like to sink into the floor. "I don't know why I'm here."
"Sometimes I just sit in here and pretend I'm in high school again." Noah Puckerman says, his face blank and sad.
"I can go wherever I want, Hudson." Jesse St. James says with a haughty hair toss.
"And what about you?" I ask harshly. A painfully familiar face looks sadly up at me. She's sitting in the corner alone.
"I wanted to talk, Finn." Says Rachel Berry. "I just wanted to see you."
I can't even look at her. She lied to me. She betrayed me in the worst possible way. All I want is to never see her again.
"Well, well, well. What a reunion, Finn. Your pathetic loneliness has reached new heights. As your hair has." Says the sneering voice of Kurt Hummel from behind me.
"What's all the commotion in here?" Mercedes Jones appears behind him, looking more put upon than usual.
"It's amazing, right?" Says Quinn. "Somehow we all ended up here again. All of us, together again."
"Not Mike." Tina interjects. There is an awkward silence. I break it.
"None of us ended up where we wanted. What happened guys? How did we forget everything we learned in this room? Mr. Schuester taught us so much. Glee club taught us so much. And here we are again, back where we started, but so different." I whisper. No one responds. Then someone steps forward.
"Then I guess we'll have to learn it again. Once more everyone, from the top." Says Rachel, a touch of her old self-importance creeping into her voice. Tears sting unpleasantly in my eyes.
She crosses to front of the room, looks nervously at me for a second then begins to see. The rest of the room backs her up, smiling slightly at the memory. I clear my throat and begin.
"Just a small town girl, livin' in a lonely world. She took the midnight train goin' anywhere."
"Just a city boy," Rachel responds, "born and raised in south Detroit. He took the midnight train goin' anywhere."
We keep singing, remembering it all again. Everything we went through comes back with those words. The whole journey. And Mr. Shuester was right; it is what mattered in the end.
Rachel cries while she's singing. Artie remembers his whole guitar solo. Tina performs an impromptu tap routine. Santana holds Brittany's hand. Puck looks almost like himself again. Matt actually smiles and Jesse even hums along. Mercedes takes her hair down and gets into it. Quinn can't stop smiling. Kurt smacks himself in the forehead, throws up his hands, then flings himself into the middle at top volume.
Here we go again.
"Don't stop believin'…"