Disclaimer: None of Glee belongs to me; I've just got a lot of imagination and ADD.
AN: None of this is Betaed; I'm the only one who's edited it so sorry for any mistakes.
Noah Puckerman May Have Involuntarily Left Lima
…But That Doesn't Mean He Wants to Come Back
One day Puck doesn't show up for school, not too out of the ordinary. But when no one can reach him all week they start to wonder. How does someone like Noah Puckerman just disappear?
Chapter 7: Noah Puckerman Never Had Anyone Care Enough
Glee practice had just ended and the members of New Directions were slowly gathering their things together. Rachel was complaining to anyone who would listen about how now that Lauren was taking Puck's place in the choreography the ratio of boys to girls was too unbalanced, just like she had when Kurt was the one who left. Not to mention the complaints she had about losing Puck's voice; Lauren tried to sing as little as possible and it ticked Rachel off when people just mouthed along. They were feeling the loss more significantly than before; the boys missed Puck because he always had his guitar and was up for an impromptu jam session, (some of) the girls missed the eye candy, everyone noticed that many of the bullies who used to stop at a slushie facial were getting bolder and more violent towards everyone in the club.
"I feel like one of us should call or text Puck," Kurt admitted to Mercedes and Artie as they walked, and rolled, out the door.
"What, why?" Mercedes asked as they headed to her locker.
"Well he's been gone for over a month and a half and I think nobody's bothered contacting him aside from that first phone call and sending him our numbers." He casually leaned against Mercedes's open locker door as she grabbed the books she needed to do her homework. "Seriously, think about it, no one's mentioned him other than in an abstract way for the last three weeks."
"That's true, at football practice Finn was trying to explain a play and he mumbled 'Puck would've got this already' and that's the first time I heard him mention him in weeks," Artie confirmed.
"Exactly, no updates on how Finn's old best friend is doing, no Santana bragging about getting together with her sex buddy on the weekend, and those are the only two people I can think of who would have even bothered talking to him." Kurt looked thoughtful for a moment, "when you think about it Puck's entire existence relied on his reputation and the fear of his fellow students, he didn't really have any friends besides Finn. In a new place where no one knows who he is, his entire identity is gone."
"That's sad, man, the thought that once you leave Lima you're nobody," Artie commiserated. Mercedes slammed her locker closed and turned to stare at Kurt.
"Alright, I get all that but why do you care; I'd think you'd be happy that one of your old tormentors was getting what he deserved or something."
"Well, he was in Glee with us, you didn't leave me out when I switched schools, I feel sorry for him," he explained. "He made a deal with Lauren to get us a replacement and none of us have even called to thank him. Also I'd like to ask him why, now that he's gone, is there suddenly an increase in Gleek bullying."
"Okay, sure I wanted to know-" all their phones beeping and receiving text messages at once cut her off. Checking their screens they all noticed they'd received a text from the same number, a number that none of them recognized. Warily exchanging looks, it could be the Vocal Adrenalin coach again, they opened the messages. Each one read the same.
'I'm txting all the numbers in Noah's phone, except Naomi. I think the rest of u r his old glee club. Please call him or something, he's only made 1 friend, me. He misses u, even if he was mean before give him a chance now. Don't tell him I told u.'
After a moment of stunned silence Kurt grinned at Mercedes.
"Now who's psychic?" She playfully slapped his arm as he smirked at her.
"Don't go getting conceited, just 'cause you called it," she told him. "But fine, let's put your phone on speaker and call our missing bad-boy."
"You're making great progress Noah, it's hard to believe that this time last week you were just following along without knowing what any of this meant," Shelby Corcoran congratulated her student on his improved music reading skills.
"Yeah, it is pretty helpful not to have to listen to someone else sing or play the song before being able to join in," he commented as he practiced sight reading a piece of music. Just then Shelby's cell phone beeped, as she flipped it open and read the message she laughed.
"Noah, who's your one friend?" She gasped out as she handed him the phone.
"Crap, Sunny, I knew I didn't drop my phone! She handed me my phone at lunch saying I dropped it earlier, the little midget must've taken it and stolen all my contacts," he groaned as he finished reading the message. "She's pretty much the only person at school I talk to, besides the people in my drama class, now she's telling people I'm a lonely friendless loser."
"I'm sure she's just worried about you," his teacher continued giggling. Before he could respond his phone started ringing and he received three texts simultaneously.
"Oh God, it's started," he moaned as they stared at his phone.
"I'll just go check on Beth," Shelby gave him an encouraging pat on the shoulder before leaving the room. Noah reluctantly picked up his phone and answered the call that said it was from Kurt Hummel.
"Yo, Noah here. If you're calling about Sunny's text it was all a lie, she didn't know what she was talking about," he quickly said.
"Who's Sunny?" Kurt could be heard distantly, like he was asking someone standing next to him.
"The midget who stole my phone and, you know what, never mind. So, to what do I owe the honor of your phone call?"
"Oh-kay," Kurt said slowly as if worried about how he should be responding. "We've got a few things we wanted to talk to you about. First I wanted to say thank you for getting Lauren to re-join Glee."
"Yeah, nobody had to get shoved in a port-a-potty or sent to a crack house this time thanks to you," Artie added in.
"Hold-up, do you have the whole club there with you?" That would be even more humiliating; he'd never be able to show his face again in Lima if all of New Directions had gotten on a conference call to cheer him up.
"No, just Artie and my girl Mercedes."
"Oh, okay, cool. So what did you want to talk to me about?"
"I was wondering why there's been a lot more bullying now. Not only have we been getting more slushie facials but people have been pulling a lot more rude pranks and the dumpster dives have started up again. Since this started happening once you left I thought you might know why," Kurt's tone had a hint of accusation in it, like Puck might have been telling the bullies what to do from wherever he was.
"Damn, I forgot about that. Okay, I'll send someone the blackmail stuff, ask Lauren to get one of the guys from our, uh, group to hold up the other half of the deal, Jeff and Dan are big on the whole suffering makes you stronger thing, one of them'll be good for it." How had he forgotten that he'd been keeping the biggest bullies in check? Part blackmail and part giving/getting a beat-down once or twice a week after school to keep them from bothering the rest of the club. As long as they could take out their extra aggression on him and know that their mothers and them would be screwed if they crossed him too far (the whole MILF thing was for so much more than sex with older women, it was blackmail on all the women over twenty in Lima because he'd still been a minor and all). They'd left the Gleeks alone without anything further than a few slushies to the face.
"What are you talking about? What deal?" Mercedes demanded.
"I was doing what I did best and keeping them off the club," he tried to explain without going into details.
"You had sex with them?" Kurt asked dryly in a voice that said he didn't believe it but he couldn't let it go without comment.
"NO, I got together some blackmail to keep them in check and we had a brawl once a week or so to remind them that I could easily catch them in a dark alley or something and send them to a hospital."
There was an awkward silence as the three Gleeks thought about what that meant about Puck. Sure he'd sat slouched in the back row, and made some sarcastic comments, but he'd been willing to get beat-up at least once a week to save them from a little extra humiliation. In his own juvenile delinquent way he'd been showing how much he cared about them.
"I think it'll be better if I just send the stuff to Lauren, she already knows about it because she helped me dig up some dirt, just tell her to find a replacement for me, she knows what for. And, it'd be cool if you could just forget about it after that," he offered hesitantly, like he knew they wouldn't let it go so he wasn't even going to let himself hope.
"How long has this been going on?" Kurt demanded.
"Since before you left McKinley, and came back, Karofsky was pretty impossible to control without some more blackmail. I got it eventually, y'know, to make sure it was safe enough for you to come back, he was good at hiding his secrets," shrugging he held the phone between his ear and his shoulder and started picking out the song he'd been sight reading again. "More importantly, how's Glee and everybody, Rachel still bitching about everything?"
It was a clear cop-out and he was obviously avoiding the situation but since they were still absorbing everything he'd let slip they allowed him to change the conversation and proceeded to tell him tales of all the Rachel Berry bitch fits that had happened since he'd left. When Artie got into the story of when Rachel yelled at Lauren because she found out she wasn't learning the whole song, just her parts, and Rachel had gone off about integrity and learning the whole piece, every part, Noah snorted.
"Wow, I'm glad I wasn't there, she would've killed me if she learned I can't even read music," he laughed out.
"Wait, really? Since when?" Artie asked him.
"Uh, since forever. Shelby started teaching me how last week," he admitted.
"So how did you learn any of the songs in Glee, or all those songs you played for us on the guitar for that matter," Kurt demanded.
"I just listened to them on the radio or whatever and figured out how to play them, or sing them. Same with the guitar really, before my dad left he showed me a little but mostly I just messed around until I was making the right sounds. Shelby corrected some of my finger positions when she first started teaching me," he explained. He was slightly embarrassed to admit that he hadn't been able to do something even Finn could (although perhaps not Brittany). What he didn't know was that both Rachel and Mr. Schuester had taken time to teach the tall boy how to accurately read sheet music. Everyone had to learn at some point, Puck just never had anyone care enough to teach him or make sure he wasn't behind.
"That's actually really intense yo," Artie commented lightheartedly. "You're secretly a musical whiz. But I didn't really notice anything wrong with the way you play."
"Well it was mostly just little adjustments, but she's been teaching me all kinds of things. I'm actually a way better singer now; I'm really learning about how to sing not just the history behind certain songs." He was starting to get excited, sharing these kinds of things with Naomi wasn't as fun; she didn't sing or play an instrument and the only dancing she did was in a club so she didn't really understand. "All the dancing is tough but it's really fun. If I ever join another glee club I won't have much trouble learning the choreography. Rachel's mom is more of a slave driver than she is."
"That sounds really, impressive," Mercedes offered.
"It's seriously fun; three days a week I get out of school, go see Beth and spend hours singing, dancing, and playing the guitar. With all the one-on-one training with the great Shelby Corcoran I'll be better than Jessie St. James ever was in a matter of weeks, or so she tells me," he joked. "I stop by most weekends and spend time playing with Beth while Shelby goes grocery shopping or takes a break, or whatever she does off by herself. I think she's part of a single mothers' support group."
"Is, um, Shelby, okay with you being a permanent part of Beth's life?" Kurt voiced the obvious worry.
"Yeah, she's always taking pictures and videos of me with Beth for when she's older. We talked about it and I'm not always going to be around, I've got to go to college and stuff, so Shelby's still always going to be her Mom. Beth will know who I am and I'm going to visit as much as I can but Shelby's the one she'll go to when she has a nightmare or scrapes her knee. I probably won't be there for all her major events but she's gonna know who I am, she'll know I love her, I won't be some sort of mysterious void like Shelby was for Rachel. We signed some sort of joint custody contingency plan so that if anything ever happens to Shelby I'll get Beth and she won't go back into the system or anything, but other than that she's got final say and she's just letting me be a part of Beth's life."
"That's a really mature way of thinking about it," replied Kurt.
"Well I've had to grow up a lot since getting kicked out," admitted Noah.
"I guess a lot of things have changed, after all, now you're talking college," Artie, his onetime tutor, remarked.
"It's amazing; like I was on a car trip, down this long straight road to the same lame destination as everyone else, when I got pushed out the door because M-, someone, didn't want share a car with me anymore. I wasn't expecting it, and I thought I was lost for a moment, but once I got up I could see hundreds of other roads. And I could go wherever, be whoever, and do whatever I wanted. It's a real second chance, so I'm not gonna waste it." As he finished his passionate mini-lecture Shelby walked back in the room and motioned to her watch. Nodding to her he turned back to his phone. "Um, it was really nice hearing from you guys again but I'm at Shelby's now so it'd be really rude if I kept talking. Can I call you back later when our lesson's over or something?"
"Only if you promise to call back, I don't know about Artie but I'm pretty sure Mercedes and I are interested in hearing more about this new you, and I'd really like to know the vocal exercises Miss. Corcoran has you doing," Kurt told him.
"Sure, thanks for the call, bye." The three on the other end called out their goodbyes and he hung-up. Checking his messages he rolled his eyes.
"Thanks to Sunshine I've got Finn texting to ask if I'm okay, Santana texting to laugh at me for being pathetic enough to miss them and ask if I wanna have sex sometime, Brittany texting me about, as far as I can tell, a missing dolphin that sometimes thinks it's a shark but she's been sending me those kinds of notes for weeks, and Mike texting to ask if I want to play a pick-up game of basketball this weekend with him, Sam, and Finn. Like I'm pitiful and need cheering-up," he complained.
"Well you are spending an abnormal amount of time studying and practicing music by yourself," the ex-Vocal Adrenalin coach observed.
"Have you been talking to my aunt?" He demanded suspiciously.
"Of course," smirking mischievously at him she handed him another sheet of music. "Let's get started, we've already wasted too much of the afternoon on your feelings."
He spluttered and pouted as they started back where they'd left off. "Being friends with old ladies is so aggravating," he whined as he dodged her slap upside his head.
Friday morning a short girl with a Hello Kitty backpack half-danced down the hallway listening to her iPod. She didn't notice the incoming storm cloud in the form of Noah Puckerman stomping down the hall. As people smaller than him, or just those who'd gotten their heads verbally bitten off for saying hello when he'd first moved to Carmel, dodged out of his way he smirked bitterly; sure he hadn't beaten anyone up since moving here but he still had it, and he didn't have the 'he's in Glee he can't be that bad' thing working against him this time.
"Sunny, we need to talk about taking other people's personal property," he said flatly as he pulled her ear bud out.
"What, like you just grabbed mine?" She asked looking as innocent as a puppy, an adorable one that ripped up your apartment when your back was turned.
"No. Like how you 'borrowed' my phone yesterday and stole my contact numbers and sent them all a message." She looked sheepish but kept a stubborn stance.
"One of you needed a push, either them or you. You were all very close when I tried out and I knew they cared more than you thought they did. I'm sure they were just wrapped up in school work and practice," Sunshine assured him, patting his arm she took back her ear bud.
"More likely drama than school work," he admitted. "Some days at McKinley I felt like we went there for social reasons and school was a second thought, if that. Sometimes it seemed like we only spent a few minutes in any class other than Glee."
"It's like that here but for real when you're in Vocal Adrenalin," she told him.
"What?" They stopped at his locker so he could get his books for English, the only class besides lunch that they shared and also their first class of the day.
"If you're in Vocal Adrenalin and you're not that smart or you're lazy they get a smart Asian kid from the Academic Decathlon team to take your classes for you. You're supposed to spend the extra time practicing your routines," she explained.
"So why are you still in English with me?" He arched a brow at her questioning glance, "I know you're the current star, your practices aren't that hard to spy on."
"I am one of those smart Asian kids on the Decathlon team, even though I never have time for most of the competitions, but since I'm in Vocal Adrenalin I just go to my own classes," she stated.
"How's your team doing, do you need any more members?" He looked thoughtful.
"Vocal Adrenalin?" She stared at him like he'd lost his mind, hadn't he just told her he'd recently watched one of their rehearsals. "There are almost thirty of us."
"No, the Decathlon thing." He gave her a look that said 'I couldn't care less about Vocal Adrenalin.' "Mike, one of the other football players in Glee back at McKinley, was also on Decathlon. I remember him talking about it sometimes, they never had any funding and one of their substitute members was Brainless Brittany who thinks the square root of four is rainbows and didn't even know the whole alphabet until this year."
"That's pretty bad. We get enough funding as a way to pay off the kids doing the Vocal Adrenalin kids' work. But we can use more members, especially if they know the topics we're weak on," Sunshine said as they arrived at their class.
"So, what topics are you guys weak on?" He asked as he held the door open.
"Well, we're a little iffy on the History, especially anything that isn't American history, and nobody but me knows anything about music, not that there's a lot of questions about music, just a few. History's the main thing. All the nerds here know their science and math stuff like that," she snapped her fingers to emphasize her point, "and have no clue about anything that's ever happened outside of the United States."
"Huh, maybe I'll join, just to shake things up. I'm like the authority on everything that relates to the Holocaust thanks to my Ma. Which includes the war, what lead up to it, and the aftermath. I can tell you how many people were killed, how many soldiers died on each side, how many went MIA, what kinds of people besides Jews were killed and how many of them there were. But I also know all this crap about Germany, the country's economics and situations leading up to Hitler's rise to power, and the same about all their allies and the countries that fought against them. So basically European History,and parts of Asia because of Russia and Japan, and the Middle East too, because of Israel and all. Ma was kind of a super Jew, I disappointed her in so many ways," he trailed off and fell silent. Their teacher started the lesson so she didn't get a chance to respond, but the next meeting of the Decathlon team she made it to he was there, and he helped them win their next match answering the History questions.
AN: I had to buy groceries this weekend instead of topping-up my Internet, sorry.
Also, of course Puck's going to be a bit out of character, he's had his entire support system (not that he really had one of those in the first place) ripped out from under him and he's been abandoned with an aunt he barely knows in a new city with no real identity or friends to define who he is anymore. That, and season three never happens for me, we're in season 2 right now. He's finding out who he is without any preconceived limitations. Yeah, he might not be a genius at maths or anything but he doesn't have to play the dumb jock anymore either (I think being Finn's best friend could not have helped him do well in school, they probably spent all their time playing video games because school was super hard for Finn). He's not in Glee so he can take a new elective, drama, and he's not concerned about being popular or fitting in because he's confused, angry, a bit depressed, and more mature than he was before. Right now he could care less, he just lost everything, who has time for popularity contests. He's lost because of all the sudden change and the reasons for it but he's also excited and taking advantage of the move to try new things and a new approach. Trust me, if you've ever been a mid-whatever (year, semester, session) new kid you've reinvented yourself at least a little.
Read and Review because I've got all my stories on my computer already, I don't need to post them if I'm not getting any feedback. Which is to say I really, really, really want more reviews; like actually telling me your opinion on this story and my writing and how I might be able to improve would be really appreciated (and taken into account). Thanks.