From sarcasticfina's prompt on the puckracheldrabblememe: "Puck gets kicked out of class. Teacher: What comes after 69? Puck: Mouth wash. Teacher: Get out."

This story is set just after S1EP09: Mash Up.

Quite frankly, Noah Puckerman didn't understand the point of Algebra. He just didn't understand Algebra in general. In fact, he hadn't attended an Algebra lesson since his freshman year at William McKinley High School.

So, today was Puck's third lesson of Algebra. Ever.

It had been Mr. Schuester's fault. The guy had come running at him after second period, waving sheet music in his tiny, unmanly hands. Puck was a little scared of the dude. He had to agree with Coach Sylvester when she noted that things lived in his hair. Not head-lice, no, but maybe Smurfs. Or elves. Whatever.

"Puck!" Mr. Schue had called, "I've got some more sheet music for you. These songs are all by Jewish American artists. I thought you'd want more after your fantastic rendition of Sweet Caroline. You know, I think you could have a solo in store for you at Regionals."

He handed the papers to Puck, who nodded as if he were actually listening and waited for the curly-headed man to wander off. When he was gone, he threw them in the nearest dumpster.

Puck didn't want to sing songs by Jewish American's anymore. He'd done that only for Rachel, and since Rachel wasn't his girlfriend anymore, he wasn't gonna waste his time singing when he could be banging cougars; poolside.

So, since Mr. Schuester had interrupted his walk to the Nurse's office – Puck was late. He missed out on his morning nap. Grumbling, he made his way to the Algebra classroom. It took him a while to find it because he hadn't laid eyes on it in over a year. Seriously. He still hadn't figured out where the English classroom was (and he wasn't going to either, because, well, fuck proverbs and nouns).

When he opened the classroom door, Mrs. Kowalski and the students inside stared at him in awe. Yes, he had actually come to class. He ducked his head and made his way to the back row, where he slumped in a chair in the far corner of the room. From where he sat, he could observe the class. Even throw stuff at them. Primal seating.

"Noah, nice of you to make an appearance," Mrs. Kowalski snapped. Well, she'd meant to snap. It couldn't really be classed as snapping. She was too shocked to speak correctly and her sentence had come out weak. It sounded as if she were asking him a question.

"Yeah," he muttered, pushing his chair in and resting his head on his right hand. Maybe he would take a nap right there, in the middle of class. It didn't seem so bad. He was a pretty stealthy sleeper. He could sleep with one eye open like a ninja. Well, Mike could. And anything Mike could do, Puck could do ten fucking times better.

Mrs. Kowalski cleared her throat when she saw his eyes drooping. "Noah," she warned, "You aren't going to fall asleep in my class."

Sure, sure, lady. Whatever you say.

"I mean it, young man."

"Whatever," he replied, "Keep teachin'. I'm listening."

The woman glowered at him and continued to blather on about some random shit. It had to do with 'finding x', but Puck didn't know what that meant. Why the fuck would he even bother knowing what it meant? Algebra was for pussies.

He drifted off about two minutes later, much to the disgust of everyone else in the classroom. He drooled down the side of his face, snorted occasionally and even mumbled something about CoD.

Puck was dreaming. He'd gotten a new record on Black Ops. His ma had made him cookies. His little sister Jenny was out of the house until next week – which meant no being forced to play Barbies for him this weekend. Everything in dreamland was going pretty fucking amazing. But then, as per usual, she made an appearance.

"Hi, Noah," she said, smiling her stupid fucking smile. He groaned and pressed 'pause' on his Xbox controller. "Do you mind? Your mother said I could come in and sit here for a while. She's lovely."

Rachel fucking Berry. She'd made several appearances in his dreams over the past few days. Ever since she'd dumped him, really. He hated to admit it out loud, but that had been what she'd done. Dumped him. Him. Noah Puckerman. Dumped. That shit didn't happen.

"I do fuckin' mind, actually," he replied, pressing 'play'. He killed some Nazi zombies to vent. She didn't seem to mind the blood and guts on the television. This was Dream Rachel; after all, she did some weird shit sometimes. Dream Rachel didn't mind blood. She actually liked CoD, by the looks of it. Real Rachel would hate CoD. She would say that it was pointless and a humongous waste of time.

"Oh, Noah," Dream Rachel sighed. Suddenly, she was wearing a bikini. Yeah. Definitely a dream. Puck had never seen Real Rachel wear a bikini. He assumed that Real Rachel wore some sort of creepy kid's bathing suit – with Disney Princess' on it. Like his little sister. "I don't know why I dumped you."

You see, this was another weird thing that Dream Rachel did. She always told him that she felt she did the wrong thing by dumping him. In reality, Real Rachel wasn't sorry at all. She had moved on, and she had assumed that he had, too. He was all hung up on Quinn in her mind – something that he supposed he should actually be, considering the girl was having his baby and all. To Real Rachel, everything was Finn, Finn, Finn and Finn.

Fucking Finn. God, now he was in the dream too.

Dream Finn was actually a pretty cool guy. He wore clothes from Grease – a movie that Puck would never actually admit that he liked – and smoked cigarettes. Sometimes, he said some insightful shit like; "Rachel, you should have gone out with Puck instead of me," and, "Dude, your headshot score is off the roof."

Real Finn didn't know how to play CoD - let alone what a headshot was. Real Finn didn't wear Greaser clothes and smoke cigarettes. And he didn't exactly know that Rachel was hopelessly in love with him. Okay, maybe he did, but he didn't do anything about it. It wasn't like he could, though. Real Finn thought he was having a baby.

Dream Finn didn't think that. He was focused on chewing the cancer sticks.

"Hi, Finn," said Dream Rachel, her face lighting up as she smiled again. Dream Rachel's smile was a lot nicer than Real Rachel's smile. Puck didn't know why, because Real Rachel's smile was really nice anyway. Still, it looked less like an axe-murderer's one in his dreams.

"I am not attracted to you," Dream Finn replied; dead-pan.

Puck was really starting to like Dream Finn.

"I am not attracted to you, either," Dream Rachel smiled, "Only Noah."

Shit. Puck wished it were like that in real life. But Real Rachel and Real Finn were fucking stupid and he hated them.

"What comes after sixty-nine?" Dream Rachel asked, turning to face him. She was still wearing the bikini, which Puck could say that he definitely liked. Wait. What? Had Dream Rachel just implied what he thought she had?

He kind of hated these dreams because they reminded him how shit real life actually was. But sometimes they were fun. Especially when Dream Rachel started to talk dirty. "Mouth wash," he answered her, smirking.

Puck awoke to the sound of Mrs. Kowalski's ruler hitting his desk. "Excuse me?" She bellowed. Her voice was like a thousand knives. They rushed toward him in the form of soundwaves, and he fell out of his chair to avoid them. Scrambling to right himself, Puck looked at the old woman before him in shock.

"The fuck?" He asked, incredulous.

Mrs. Kowalski was visibly shaking with rage. Her flabby arm was raised, pointing toward the whiteboard. He squinted, trying to decipher the numbers. Numbers… Oh. Shit.

"I asked you, Mr. Puckerman, what came after sixty-nine," she snapped, "And you, you smart-aleck, replied with mouth wash."

The rest of the class burst into uproarious laughter. Usually, he would have congratulated himself for his wit – really, he was fucking badass. To think of that when he was asleep? Genius. Einstein had nothing on the Puckzilla. But at that moment, Puck was terrified. The woman before him was formidable. She scared him more than his mother when she watched those stupid-ass rom-coms and cried herself to sleep because his father had left them.

"After that outburst, you swore in my classroom," Mrs. Kowalski was seething. He cowered against the wall, not even scared for his reputation as head badass at WMHS. He looked like a dog with its tail between its legs.

"Get out."

The words were simple enough. Puck wasn't exactly sure what they meant – he'd never bothered to find out where you were actually meant to go when you got told by a teacher to get out of their classroom – but he did as she said. Algebra may be scary but the Algebra teacher was much scarier. Puck couldn't believe he feared a sixty year old woman. Then again, he could. She must have been in the army at some point of her life.

He was wandering the empty hallways of the school when he saw her. She was in those stupid penny-loafers and in one of those ridiculously short skirts. With a stupid sweater. And a fucking headband.

Oh, and her huge-ass fucking nose.

Real Rachel. At her locker. Not looking at him.

But then he realised that she was looking in the small mirror attached to her locker door. Those stupid penny-loafers and that ugly sweater were covered in icy, blue substance. She'd been slushied.

And it wasn't even grape flavour.

That hadn't happened in about a week. In fact, that hadn't happened in about two weeks. Rachel and Puck may have been over – but that didn't mean that the other jocks got to slushie her. Out of respect for the Puckzilla, they should have waited at least a month. Anger surged inside of him. Was he loosing his authority? Had she done this to him? He hated her. More than he hated Finn, even. But not more than he hated his dad.

"Oh, hi, Noah," she said quietly when he walked past her. He hadn't even planned on stopping. He had been on the way to the Nurse's office – planning on begging for his spot on the sickbed back. He may even have fought the kid currently occupying it. Nurse Jackson and he had a special bond. Not sexual, like most of the other kids at school had assumed, – even he wouldn't go anyone over forty-five – but almost familial. He and the nurse had spent a long time together. She must have known that he was never sick by then, but she had never said anything about it to anyone. She was a cool dude - for a woman.

"What are you doing here?' Rachel asked. Reluctantly, he turned back to look at her. She had red eyes and slushie in her hair, but she still looked pretty. Shit. He meant that she looked like shit.

Puck shrugged, trying to maintain his badass attitude. "Got kicked out of Algebra."

"You actually went to class?' She questioned. Her eyes were wide. He hated her. He hated her. He hated her.

"There was no room in the Nurse's office," he explained. Then, unable to control himself any longer, "Who did this to you?"

Rachel looked confused, then realised what he was talking about. As if she was used to it, – which he knew she was – she absentmindedly flicked some ice off of her shoe. "Oh. This? I don't really know. I didn't see them coming."

Rage bubbled up in his stomach. He liked to think it was because she was there – but he knew it wasn't. At least, partially. He hated her. But he didn't. He didn't know anymore. "Was it-?"

"It was probably Karofsky or Azimio," she continued, not letting him get a word in. He didn't like it when she did that – even when they were together she had done it. "They're usually the ones to do it. At least on a Tuesday."

Puck furrowed his brow. "What? Like, you have a chart for it or something?'

She actually nodded. Un-fucking-believable. "Yes. Would you like to see it?"

He was about to say that, no, he actually wouldn't when she pulled it from her locker and shoved it in his face anyway. Grudgingly, he took it from her and examined it. "You've got me on here," he said after a while.

"Oh, yes," she grabbed it back from him, "I should really mark that off."

She did so, using a sparkly pink pen with a unicorn on top. He resisted the urge to roll his eyes. Rachel Berry. She was what his mother would call a 'fruit loop'. In other words, she was slightly insane.

Oh, yeah. And he hated her.

"Why Thursdays?"

She shoved the chart back into her perfectly arranged locker and returned to gently picking the slushie from her partially soaked hair. Whoever had slushied her hadn't done a very good job. Half of it had missed her. Poor form. They were probably a newbie. Or blind.

"You slushied me every Thursday."

Puck raised his eyebrows. He hadn't realised that there was a specific day that he had felt the urge to slushie her. He'd just done it when he'd felt like it.

"In fact, you slushied everyone in Glee club every Thursday. We all realised it at about the same time, you know, a few weeks before you yourself joined New Directions. And then we remembered."

"Remembered what?"

"Well," she began, "Thursday is the day before the Football game every week. We assumed that you did it to release pent up frustrations."

He hadn't thought of it that way before. He'd thought he dealt with pent up frustrations by fucking either Santana or Brittany under the bleaches. He slushied people because it was fun.

"Right," he replied. He didn't know what else to say. Sometimes, Rachel Berry scared him. But then he remembered that he was a badass. And that he hated her.

Rachel was still talking. He wasn't really listening. All he heard when she was talking was the name of the guy he hated the most at that moment. "Finn," Rachel was saying, "Finn. Oh, and Finn, Finn, Finn. Finn? I love you, Finn."

Slowly, he shook his head. "What?"

"I said," she sighed, shaking her sweater to get rid of some more ice, "That now you don't slushie anyone at all."

That couldn't be right. Could it? He had surely slushied someone recently. He had to have done. "Are you sure about that?" He wondered aloud, "I swear I fucked up Kurt's Prada the other day."

She looked at him as if he were crazy. "No. That was last semester."

Fucking hell. Really? He'd spent so long focusing on hating Rachel that he'd forgotten to hate everyone else. "I'm sure I-"

"You haven't slushied anyone in a month, Noah."

A month? A month?

"And the last person you slushied was Jacob Ben-Israel. I'm pretty sure he deserved it, too. He was looking up my skirt." She shuddered, disgusted. He felt the urge to punch the creepy Jewfro kid.

"You accidentally shoved someone in the hallways yesterday," she said quietly, "And then you apologised."

Apologised?

He shook his head. No. No. This couldn't be happening. He was- he was…

He was no longer the ambadassador of badassery.

"What's wrong, Noah? This is great. I can really see that you're changing. You're becoming a better person."

No he wasn't. He was becoming a pussy.

This was all because of Rachel fucking Berry. Annoyed, he looked her up and down.

She was staring at him as if he were some sort of dumb-ass caveman. Shit. He knew what he had to do. But could he? Wouldn't she slap him or something? He didn't really care. His badass-ness was on the line. This was serious. Serious shit.

Before she could say anything else, Puck had wrapped his arms around her waist and pushed her against the lockers. She stared up at him, confused, as he stared down at her with a mixture of anger and confusion.

"This is my badass-ness, Rach," he whispered. His breathe tickled her face, and she shivered. What he was saying was completely ridiculous, but the way he held her made her feel as if it were very important. It was life-threatening. He was going to die if he didn't reverse it. "So, you've gotta take one for the team. Okay?"

Slowly, she nodded. She wasn't exactly sure what he was asking of her, but her mind was foggy in his presence. Had she not dumped him last week? Oh, well. She didn't care. He was there and he was looking at her as if she were the only solution to his problems.

He crushed his lips to hers, pushing her gently against the cool metal of the lockers. She didn't care that it hurt; she was breathless. His lips massaged hers and he felt her moan slightly beneath him. He reassured himself that he wouldn't get carried away. But her tongue was suddenly finding his and he had lost all self-control. No. No.

He hated her.

No. He actually didn't.

Shit. But she was hot. He didn't care.

His hand twisted up to clutch at her hair. It was drenched and sticky with slushie but he didn't mind. Nothing mattered. Except... there was something. He hadn't done this for nothing.

"This is stimulating."

They broke apart, suddenly, at the sound of another voice. Jacob Ben-Israel was standing before them, his mouth slightly agape and his hand inching toward his crotch. Rachel shuddered and suppressed a disgusted groan. She pulled away from Puck and buried her head against her locker.

Puck had remembered. Looking at the creepy Jewfro kid whose name he couldn't remember, he felt the urge to slushie him. But, because he didn't have a spare buck on him, a good wedgie would have to do. He walked forwards, tugging his sleeves upwards as he did so.

He had kissed Rachel Berry to get her out of his system. He had thought that if he did so, he'd stop hating her, and somehow start to hate everyone else again. And he would get his badassery back. Somewhere, in the back of his mind, a little niggling thought resided. She was still there. The kiss hadn't pushed her out of his mind; in fact, it had made her more prominent.

But that didn't really seem to matter to him. Most importantly, Puck had found his anger again. All it took was for Jewfro to creepily stare at his girl, and he was off and running. The little pipsqueak pulled his hand from his pants and tried to get away, but the Puckzilla was too fast for him.

He gave the kid the wedge of a lifetime.

Afterwards, as Puck watched Jacob walk away – okay, waddle – he thought of Rachel. Not Dream Rachel, but of Real Rachel. Maybe he could convince her that she didn't need Finn. He'd wait for her, and she'd come back to him. In the mean time, he'd stick to cougars and Cheerios.

Because he didn't hate her.

He liked her.

Badass-ness achieved.