A/N: Here comes the next chapter, guys! This chapter focuses on Tina, which is a character I have only written so much of, but despite the fact is still one of my favorite characters. I was thinking about having her storyline taking place during Props, but then I have another storyline planned around that episode (guess which), so I placed this around Wheels instead. Hope I did her justice. I can relate very much to 'my Tina' here, so…

This chapter is very much based on one of my own experiences from my childhood, with my mom.

I don't know much about elementary schools in the states, because I am not from there myself, so I will just make a couple of assumptions here and there if I can't find any answers through the minimal research I'm doing (yes, this is very much a professionally written fic, thank you very much… not).

Did you watch the new episodes, by the way? I loved all of them. I know I probably have some readers who think Glee is headed in the wrong direction right now, but I think this is going the right way. I really enjoy this season so far, and the first three episodes had a lot of heart. Marley and Jake are super adorable! And I am hoping for more Tina this season, though…

Anyway, enjoy!

If there was anything Tina Cohen Chang was good at, it was keeping secrets. Hell, her entire being could to some look like a secret. No one really quite knew what was going through her head, mainly because she never worded any of it. Everything about her was like a big, huge, but not really important secret.

It had always kind of been that way, and she had always liked it that way as well. It meant her life was hers to deal with and people would leave her alone. She didn't really like people all that much. It wasn't that they were necessarily mean to her to go away. But whenever she was in the presence of people, they usually wanted her to change.

They never said so, of course. Most of them were adults. They would never actually say anything like that to a child, but she wasn't stupid. She knew how they were thinking.

Keeping secrets had never caused her any trouble before now, though. She had usually gotten away with keeping secrets pretty safely. It had, as a matter of fact, always served to keep her out of trouble. And she liked that. She liked being out of trouble. She liked not having to rely or depend on anyone but herself. She was fine shutting people out…

Until Artie Abrams came along. She didn't really know what it was about him that made him so special to her. He was just her type, and people could laugh all they wanted. But he was. She had always fallen for the guys normal people didn't notice, let alone fell for.

Because yes, she'd had crushes in her life before. Hell, she was still a girl. But this time it was, no matter how cliché that might have sounded, for whatever reason, different. Maybe it had to do with the fact that she was in high school now, and that she was starting to really, truly figure out who she was, but she, for the first time in a long while, suddenly felt like opening herself up completely to someone. To this boy, to be specific.

He opened up to her about his accident, after all. She bet he hadn't done that easily to many people. The least she could owe him was the truth.

And so she did, that day in November. And it all went straight to hell.

He had basically stated that everything he was so sure they had in common was now completely gone, and that comment hurt her more than it probably should. Tina wasn't one to let her feelings show easily. Sure, she did a lot of crying in public, but she hardly ever really opened up verbally about her emotions.

She had opened herself up to Artie, but he had closed her out again. He had said that he would never push people away, but that was exactly what he had done just now.

They had something really important in common. They still had. She knew that. If anything, they had amazing chemistry, and they had fun together. Was her one stupid lie about her stutter worth losing all that? She was pretty sure it wasn't.

Artie apparently wasn't all that convinced.

So she cried. As she usually did. She sat in her room and cried. It wasn't really a big deal. It wasn't like one of those horribly cliché romantic movies, that she generally could like, but only in minimal doses at a time.

She was just crying. That was that. It was her way of expressing herself. She didn't need a diary or music or anything to put words to her thoughts. At least not at times like these, when she was in serious distress. She just needed to cry. Let it out.

She didn't know if she cried because she was in love with Artie and he had shot her down brutally. Of course, generally speaking, that would seem like a big part of why she was so upset, but it really wasn't just that.

She was upset because for once in her life she had opened up to someone, and they had just shut her down again before she could do it herself.

She could hardly remember the last time she had opened up to anyone about anything.

Or yes. She could.

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She had been very little. Seven years, as far as she could remember. One of the so-called 'mean boys' from her class had been picking on her. As she looked back, she couldn't even remember what about, but she had been fairly upset. And she had been crying. Because that was what she did. She guessed she should be somewhat ashamed or embarrassed about that, but she wasn't. It didn't mean she was weak. It just meant she had a heart.

True artists knew how to express their emotions. She was pretty sure it would come in handy someday.

Oh yes, she had dreams bigger than Lima, Ohio. Who in their right mind hadn't?

So she had been standing outside the school, in the parking lot, and as if her entire day wasn't bad enough, her mom couldn't pick her up today, meaning she'd had to walk home by herself. One mile and a half. Oh, and did she forget to mention? It was raining.

Usually she liked the rain, but that was only when she was seated in her room and could just stare and listen to it. Or when she was outside with an umbrella, or even clothes suited for less than nice weather.

This was not one of those days. It was raining, but it hadn't that morning. The sun had been shining and it had been warm. Everyone had expected it to stay that way, but of course that had to fool them. So she was in a skirt, a t-shirt and a thin jacket and she had to walk.

She was sure she was gonna get a cold. That was okay. Meant she wouldn't have to go to school tomorrow. But still, the walk would be less than satisfactory.

She found herself wondering if this was even safe. Sending your seven-year-old home all by herself in the rain… Who else walked alone in the rain? No one, that was who. Except for like, one or two of those scary men whose vans she should never get into and candy she should never eat.

Normal kids in her position would just ask a friend if they could get a ride home, but she was too shy for that. It wasn't that she didn't have friends, but she wasn't really close to any of them. She got along with them during the school day but no one ever invited her home with them after or anything like that.

She was okay with it, most of the time. She was the one who had pushed them away in the first place, after all. She didn't really know what it was, she just didn't really get along with a lot of people the way it seemed to come naturally to others.

But other times… Times like these… She just felt kind of alone… And just a little bit lonely.

Especially since she had to walk home in the rain.

Just right then Kurt Hummel came approaching. He all but ran across the parking lot, his umbrella high in the air, careful not to let the rain damage his hair. He stopped midways through the lot and Tina realized he had seen her. What could he want?

Kurt Hummel was one year older than her, and he had the nicest clothes she had ever seen. Tina had been invited to his birthday party because they had been walking home from school together sometimes (in a better weather than this of course), but she hadn't really spoken to him all that much. That being said, Tina hadn't really spoken to anyone that much.

But now he was headed towards her, and for once, she didn't mind. "Hey Tina," he said, and his voice sounded a bit concerned. He was within just a couple of feet's distance now. "Won't your mother be picking you up soon?"

Tina could only shake her head vaguely. "No, I have to walk," she said, and that was when it occurred to her that she had been standing out on the parking lot for quite a while, not doing anything but standing there. She couldn't really comprehend why she had done that.

"In this weather?" Kurt asked, and Tina nodded weakly, - "What about your clothes?"

Tina couldn't suppress a giggle. Of course Kurt would care about his clothes before anything else. Kurt smiled at her. "Oh well…," he said quietly, before the sentence she had secretly been hoping for without really realizing it escaped him: "My mom's picking me up. Would you like a ride?"

Tina knew that a beaming smile she rarely showed appeared on her features at that comment. "Yes, please," she said, and her smile widened even further as Kurt reached out his umbrella to make room for them both under it.

They walked towards a red vehicle that stood at the other end of the parking lot. As they approached it, the door opened and tall, slim woman stepped out. She had to be Kurt's mother.

"Kids, get in the car! It's pouring!" she yelled, but there was a laugh to her voice.

"Mom, don't step out of the car! You're gonna mess up your hair!" Kurt yelled, and his mother laughed.

As they approached the car, Kurt stated casually: "This is Tina. She has no one to drive her home."

Kurt's mom's eyes widened. "Baby, you're soaking wet!" she exclaimed, as she grabbed a hold on her face. Tina wasn't really used to that kind of physical contact from strangers, but for whatever reason, she figured she didn't mind right now.

Kurt's mom gave a heavy sigh and practically shoved Tina into the backseat of the car. "Is anybody home at your place?"

Tina just shook her head and Kurt's mom had to look in the rearview mirror to see her response. "Oh well…," she said, - "You could come home with us, if you like? Until your parents get home from work?"

Tina liked that idea. It wasn't often she got invited by friends to their places. They usually just invited each other, and Tina figured it was because they found her boring.

"Can't she, Kurt?" Kurt's mom asked her son, and to Tina's delight, Kurt nodded enthusiastically.

"Yes!" he squealed, grabbing Tina's hands all of a sudden,- "We can play dress-up! I have so many different costumes we won't even have time to try them all on!"

Tina gave a short laugh. She didn't really know Kurt all that well, but she figured she liked him more and more. He was actually one of the only people her age she'd met in her life, that weren't in her family, who actually seemed to really enjoy her company.

"I'd like that," said Tina, and she tried to sound polite. To be honest, Tina didn't really think all that often about how she came off to the adults she met. She didn't usually care if they thought she was being impolite. She didn't need anyone's approval, and she had been scolded more than once by her parents because she hadn't been "accommodating" (whatever that meant) enough towards the adults they'd wanted her to meet.

But with Kurt's mom it was different. For once in her lifetime, she wanted this woman to like her. She was sweet and she seemed very loving. And she didn't treat her as if she couldn't think for herself.

She wanted this woman to like her in return.

"Great!" she said, and gave them both a beaming smile in the rearview mirror. She looked a little bit like Kurt, actually. It was probably apparent to the entire town whose son he was. "Then that's settled. When are your parents coming home?"

Tina shrugged nervously. "Usually around five," she said. She smiled a bit at the thought. It was twelve-fifteen now, which meant she would have at least five hours until her parents came and picked her up.

"Oh good," Kurt's mom said, - "Then you'll get to have lots of fun together. Do you know their phone numbers?"

"Yes," Tina answered immediately, she wondered if she should give away more information. She wasn't really one for big talks, but she went for it: "I keep a note with their numbers in my notebook in case of emergencies."

Kurt's mom nodded in recognition. "That's good, you'll get to call them when you get home so they know where you are. And if they can't pick you up, either Kurt's dad or I can drive you home. Sounds good?"

Tina smiled. "Yes," she answered. She liked how this woman seemed to have so many thoughts in her head. She didn't really know where she got that from, but she figured Kurt's mom was a lot more reflected than most people she'd met. She seemed to think of everything.

"How long is dad working today?" Kurt asked.

"He'll be home around four, honey," the boy's mom said with a smile.

"Good," Kurt said, and he hesitated before asking: "Mom?"

"Yes?"

Kurt looked a bit uncomfortable now. "Why haven't you been at work lately?"

Something seemed to change in his mother's behavior right then and there. She shifted a bit in her seat, and Tina just knew something wasn't quite right. That was one of Tina's definite privileges. She saw people. Noticed them. That was what she did now. She noticed something within Kurt's mom, and she didn't know what it was, but she knew that she didn't like what she noticed.

She also knew Kurt's mom was contemplating what to say to cover for whatever it was that made her act this way.

"I haven't been feeling that well lately," she said, and while she obviously tried her best to sound casual, Tina knew better. She wasn't stupid. She knew what fine sounded like, and Kurt's mom was anything but fine.

Subtly, Tina looked over to Kurt, and she couldn't be sure, but she thought he was feeling the same way. "Mom?" he asked again, and there was a slight waver to his voice that Tina couldn't remember having heard before.

"Yes, honey?" his mom asked, and her voice didn't sound completely normal either.

"Are you sick again?" asked Kurt, and Tina figured right then and there that there was a lot about this family she didn't know. That made sense too. But one thing she knew, and that was that by 'sick', Kurt wasn't talking about the flu.

His mother gave a light cough, and she obviously still considered how to put her words. "Don't worry about that now, honey," she said firmly, but there was a light waver to her voice, -"I will be fine."

She sounded almost convincing. Almost.

Tina looked over to Kurt to see his reactions to all this, but he now had a somewhat content smile on his features. There was a somewhat lost look in his eyes though, but Tina figured at least she'd be better off not getting too involved in other people's family drama.

They took the rest of the ride back to Kurt's place in a content silence. The atmosphere was a bit lighter now though, for whatever reason.

Kurt and Tina spent the day at Kurt the exact way Kurt had planned; playing dress-up. When Kurt was dressed as The Mad Hatter from Alice in Wonderland, and Tina was dressed like Snow White and looked anything but amused by that, Kurt's mom called them upstairs for dinner.

Tina had had a talk with her parents, and to her relief they allowed her to stay at Kurt's until six if it was okay with his parents.

Therefore, Tina was now to be seated at the Hummels dinner table.

Tina was a family's girl, really. She loved her parents dearly, and she knew they loved her. She couldn't have asked for a better family. Nothing compared to her parents. But she had to say the Hummels were definitely second best.

Even though she hadn't really spent a lot of time with Kurt in her life, she was treated by both him and his parents, as a near friend. It felt good. She felt like she could be herself, and dared she even think it? Even open up a little to them, maybe? At least more than she did to normal people. And by open up, she pretty much only meant talk to them.

"So, are you in class with Kurt, or…?" Kurt's father asked. That was pretty weird. Fathers never really talked to her; they usually tended to be shut down and not really friendly. Kurt's dad wasn't really all that different, but he at least talked to her as he would talk to everybody else.

Tina just shook her head as Kurt explained that she was a year younger than him. The rest of the family conversation continued just like that; them speaking in a comfortable kind of company that Tina hadn't really met before outside her own family.

And, go figure, she found herself opening up bit for bit as they ate their dinner. She didn't really know what caused it, but in some ways she felt safe here with the Hummel family. She could just… be, when she was with them. She didn't have to stay quiet or composed like she did when she was at her relatives' places. She didn't have to be on her best behavior.

She could let loose a little; keep her elbows on the table, wipe her face with her hands, and even though she didn't go to that level of insolence herself, she even spotted Kurt speaking with food in his mouth, only receiving a small scolding look from his mother, and not that picky, stern tone she would have gotten had she done that with guests by the table.

Still, she felt like showing them some gratitude through good manners just simply because they were so cool, if that made any sense. So she tried to be on her best behavior.

While Kurt's dad seemed friendlier than most dads she had met, she felt a deeper connection to Kurt's mother. She looked younger than her own mother, but it could just be the fact that she was extremely pretty that made her look that way. She had an open and accommodating nature about her that Tina knew she loved the moment she met her.

Tina still didn't know what she had been so afflicted about when Kurt asked her if she was sick again, or even what "sick" truly meant in this case, but a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach told her she wasn't in for good news. She shook that thought as soon as it entered her mind.

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After dinner, Kurt's mom took it upon herself to drive Tina home, and Burt gave her a concerned look Tina knew adults gave each other sometimes when they didn't want to get verbal in front of their children. She also knew that look meant something was wrong, so she just turned around and slipped on her coat, pretending not to listen to the friendly but slightly supplied tone of Kurt's mother's voice as she said: "I am not that hopeless yet, Burt, I can still drive a car by myself."

She also absolutely didn't notice Burt's sad and all too concerned eyes as he watched them leave. Kurt and Tina were again seated in the backseat of the car, but this time they were much more silent than they had been on their way home from school.

As they reached Tina's house, Kurt's mom gave her the warmest smile Tina had seen in a long while, before calling after her: "Don't be a stranger, Tina."

"I won't!"

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Tina entered her home that day with an empty feeling in her stomach, telling her everything was as it should be. An adult had treated her like a regular human being. An adult had noticed her in general. Both those things were too good to be true. So she should be happy, right…?

The empty feeling in her stomach told her she had been lying when she'd said she wouldn't be a stranger.

She shook that thought as her own mother ran towards her with open arms and asked how her day had been. She wouldn't dwell on it any longer.

But she made sure to hug her mom extra tightly before she went to sleep that night.

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Tina looked around her room as the memory flushed through her.

No. No way.

She was not giving up on this. She was not letting Artie go. She had her flaws and her mistakes, but for once in her life, she had decided not to hide in the shadows anymore. Artie had his flaws as well; he needed to learn how to see that.

But Tina was not giving up on him.

Life was too short for that kind of attitude.