So just in case someone actually noticed and is confused, I changed my penname. It was waaaayyyy overdue. So it's still me, I promise! Enjoy!
Mercedes was really bad at keeping her mouth shut.
Sometimes she was worse than Rachel. After all, she was the one who told the entire Glee club the truth about Baby Drizzle. And she always made her opinion heard. And sometimes she had this need to be right that would make her and Rachel knock heads.
But Mercedes cared about her friends and if she was going to be silent for a day to show her support for her best friend, then she would do it.
Her day went a lot better than most people's. She wasn't a Cheerio anymore, but she had actually made real friends while on the squad. They still hung out sometimes, so she was still almost-popular by association. Nobody slushied her anymore and Puck was still nice to her, even though they both knew that nothing would ever happen between them. The rest of the school had started to appreciate her sassy-ness, realizing that a lot of the time she was really funny and when they listened to her, they'd probably get at least a smile out of it.
So it went without saying that not many people bothered her. Karofsky and some of his friends gave her dirty looks a couple times and quite a few people whispered behind their hands, obviously not sure what to think of it, but nobody actually did anything to her. After she heard what had happened to Finn, she felt very lucky. Kurt's day probably hadn't gone any better, so when school let out, she went to find him.
They had glee practice, even though they weren't speaking. She wasn't sure if anyone was actually going to show up, so rather than head to the choir room, she went straight to Kurt's locker, hoping to catch him in case he was going to rush home. She wouldn't have blamed him if he had.
After two minutes of standing around, Mercedes went to the choir room, figuring that Kurt was either there or he had left already. And when she scanned the room and noticed the very obvious lack of Kurt Hummel-ness, she decided that he had just gone home.
She was wrong.
Matt came into the room not long after, telling the room, "Kurt's in the nurse's office. Karofsky and his idiot brother -"
Mercedes didn't wait to hear what had happened to him. She left the room, heading straight for the nurse's office. Nobody hurt her boy and got away with it.
So it was a surprise when she found both Karofsky brothers also in the nurse's office, blood on their faces. The younger one's nose was purple and swollen and Mercedes raised an eyebrow. What had happened to them?
She didn't stick around to find out. She went into the second room in the office to find Kurt and Puck sitting on one of those fold-out beds, the nurse dabbing at a cut on Puck's eyebrow. All three looked up when she came in.
"Miss Jones," the nurse didn't seem surprised. "Do me a favor and help Mr. Puckerman clean himself up? I have to help those two idiots out there." The nurse passed her the cloth she had been using to dab at Puck's eyebrow and with a look that told Mercedes she really didn't want to, headed back out into the front room.
Mercedes walked over to Puck and Kurt, eyes wide and looking from one to the other, wishing one of them would tell her what had happened. Obviously that wasn't going to happen, so Mercedes just pulled over the roll-y stool and began dabbing at Puck's eyebrow. It wasn't that bad of a cut, more like a scrape, but it would probably take a while to heal. A spot around his jawline looked slightly swollen too. What on earth had he been doing? Had he tried to take on Karofsky and his brother all by himself?
The nurse's conversation with the Karofsky brothers floated in through the open door.
"You two certainly got a number done on you," she was commenting, obviously examining the pair of them to figure out just what was wrong with them.
"It's that asshole, Puckerman," Karofsky told her and the nurse drew in her breath sharply and made a tutting noise.
"I will not have that sort of language used in my office," her voice was stern.
"But he is!" Karofsky's brother insisted. "He defended that Hummel kid!"
"Well, then he is a more admirable person than either of you two," the nurse was angry. "Honestly, I will never understand you children and your incessant need to pick on others, especially ones that are smaller than you. Kurt Hummel has come to see me more than once with a bump to the head or a black eye and you know what he does? He just shrugs it away, saying he slipped in the hallway or walked into a door. As far as I'm concerned, Kurt and Noah are the bigger people here. You two should be ashamed."
There was a pause. The clock ticked loudly and Mercedes could feel her heart beating at her ribs. The Karofsky brothers were idiots, but were they stupid enough to argue with the school nurse?
"I want you two out of my office. Now. Get on over to Figgins. He can clean you two up the rest of the way himself if it's that important. I've done my job."
They heard heavy footsteps shuffling, obviously the Karofskys leaving. Then the nurse came back in, her face a little pink and her eyebrows drawn together.
"How's he doing?" she asked Mercedes, who wheeled herself away so the nurse could look at Puck's face. She made a clucking noise with her tongue, saying, "Well, it could have been a lot worse. They barely broke the skin. It shouldn't be bad enough to leave a scar, so don't worry about that."
Puck's face fell slightly and Mercedes almost giggled. Puck would wish for a scar.
"And let me take another look at you, Kurt," the nurse took a step over to examine Kurt's face. Mercedes looked over at her friend, wishing - not for the first time - that he didn't bruise so easily.
"I'll give you something for that black eye you'll no doubt have in a few hours," she said, fingers trailing lightly over Kurt's skin. "You're lucky too; there's no broken skin at all. A little swelling and you'll have quite the mark on your chin for a while, but no permanent physical damage." She turned to look at Mercedes, smiling sadly and saying, "Thank you for checking in on them, Miss Jones."
She made to leave, but paused at the doorway, turning to say, "You boys were very brave today. Now, I can't condone fighting, but Noah, what you did was truly admirable."
The three of them sat in the nurse's office until Mr. Schue came in, guilt written all over his face when he saw the state of Puck and Kurt's faces. He didn't say anything either, just sat with them for a few minutes. Then Matt came in, saying quietly, "Mr. Schue, the rest of the club is finished." Schue looked up, nodded, and made to leave, but not before he laid a hand on Kurt's shoulder, resting his hand there for a few seconds.
Mercedes drove Kurt home. She and Kurt and Puck had all wordlessly left the school together, not bothering to stop back at the choir room. Kurt invited her in, and the two of them waved hello to Mr. Hummel as they walked down to Kurt's bedroom, Kurt trying and failing to hide his face from view. Mr. Hummel ran after them, taking his son's face gently in his hands and examining it with a broken look on his face.
"Can I fix you up?" he finally asked, even though Mercedes was sure the nurse had already taken care of it.
She felt like an intruder, watching Mr. Hummel dab at Kurt's face with a washcloth, watching him gently put some sort of cream on Kurt's bruises, watching him wipe at his son's eyes with a tissue when tears appeared there. But Kurt was holding her hand, so she stayed put.
After Mr. Hummel had finished, he went back upstairs, promising to fix them something to eat. They heard the muffled sound of him shouting through the closed door, heard his voice reach such a volume that they were able to figure out that he was yelling at Figgins for letting this happen.
Kurt finally got up from his spot on the bed, releasing her hand and going over to the old record player he kept in the corner. He put on an album, which crackled slightly, and then Judy Garland's slightly faded voice filled the room. He sat back down, reaching under his bed and pulling out a plastic bin, pulling a blanket and a sewing kit out of it. She watched as Kurt unfolded the blanket, which was covered in embroidery, found an empty spot, and started sewing.
She let him pull the blanket up around them, let him lean against her as he worked on the blanket.
That was how Mr. Hummel found them later, when he had finally gotten off the phone with Figgins. He started down the stairs again, meaning to ask them what they wanted, but stopped with his mouth open when Mercedes put a finger to her lips. She pointed to Kurt, whose head was resting on her shoulder and whose slow breaths made it clear he had fallen asleep.
Mercedes gave Mr. Hummel a sad smile when he came over, brushing Kurt's hair from his face and pressing a light kiss to his son's forehead.
