Folle Sagesse

AnniKay

Sam/Mercedes/Puck

Disclaimer: I own Nothing…Murphy, Falchuk, and Brennen along with Fox and others own this fandom and all the characters there in…Anything you recognize obviously belongs to them

*****PLEASE NOTE: Thanks for this story's title goes to MsLadyThankYouVeryMuch. The Title translates into Foolish Wisdom.*****

****THANKS to everyone who has taken the time to review! Your encouragement helps more than you know!****
Thank all of you for being avid readers & reviewers of my stories:
I appreciate all of you.

Boredom Busting Fic Reread Rec
The Past Returns by Ssann

Isis Aurora Tomoe, you are the most awesome Beta ever. Thank you for being such a help in my time of need!


So You Wanna Be a Rock and Roll Star (The Byrds)
Puck PoV

The Wednesday and Thursday of midterm week were filled with exams and finishing up papers and projects and turning them in. Thankfully there was nothing on our calendar for Thursday night. Well, except the delivery guys bringing the furniture of Nikki's future room, but Hudson was cool with handling that for us to give us time to get dressed. Sam and Sexy Mama had been so damn great about everything with Ms. Shirling and Nikki…even understanding the fact that I never told them about it, that I wanted to something special for them. I was able to get us reservations at Davio's Northern Italian Steakhouse so that we could have a nice romantic date night. We had to be up early the next morning, since we were doing video filming all weekend and it started bright and early that Friday morning, since we'd managed to avoid any Friday exams. Besides, KAMA hadn't been seen going out like that in a while, so it was about time. I texted Sammy Boy and Sexy Mama to let them know that I was taking them out for dinner and we needed to be out the door by eight.

The surprise for them was that I had gotten us tickets to go to a comedy club afterwards. We could laugh our asses off then go home and bone until we dropped from satisfaction. Of course, my plans never work out the way I thought they would. Sam and Cede were both cool with going out. We got home and Sam and I took showers then got dressed. He actually picked out clothes for both of us, I was kind of shocked. "Hey, I want to see if I'm picking up anything when Kurt and Bubbie and Mercy are blathering on about fashion." He defended. For himself he'd selected his navy blue, Tom Ford summer weight suit, complete with pale ivory dress shirt and a blue and ivory bias striped tie. He put me in a slightly heavier charcoal Gucci suit with a similar dress shirt and a tie that looked like someone had grabbed ivory gray and blue thread than then sat at a loom while on an acid trip. Once we were dressed, we headed out to our man cave to chill until Mercedes was ready.

Sam turned on the TV to amuse us and hopefully distract each of us from the fact that we were looking really damn good and Sexy Mama was going to look even better when she got finished getting all dolled up. For some reason, probably because music channels didn't play videos anymore and the stupid things could be amusing but they were never something we just had to sit and finish watching. Anyway, we ended up watching one of those stupid entertainment news shows. So Access Hollywood was doing this thing where they were asking random celebrities who their celebrity crush was. One of the guys they asked was Jared Leto. "I would never interfere in a relationship, like ever. But that new singer…the one from KAMA…Mercedes." He gave a small smile and his eyes kind of got leery. "Her. She is beautiful and talented."

We couldn't disagree with him and it was just cool or whatever. Until Kit Hoover chimed in to say, "That was a lovely sentiment, one which Jared has seemingly put a lot of thought into." Then they showed the dude talking about how sexy Cede was like six other times. I could feel myself starting to get pissed.

Of course that was when Billy Bush had to add his two cents. "Jared has good taste. Have you seen their latest video, or did you see her at the VMAs red carpet? She is a very beautiful young lady. However, I'm not the only one who agrees with Mr. Leto."

They showed Cameron Diaz saying that she loved her body, but probably she might love it a little bit more if Cede had shared the boob wealth. But then she gave them that Charlie's Angel smile, "No seriously. I'm just grateful that she is a beautiful and curvy young woman who goes out of her way to say that all bodies are beautiful. Every woman needs that affirmation in this society."

Colin Ferrell couldn't remember Cede's name or our group's name, but he managed to get his point across anyway. "The black girl from the new rockish group, it's her and her two boyfriends and every one was all pissed off because they love who they love…the one with the shape that would make any straight man anywhere drool in his dreams. Now she's worth fancying."

The last one though…the last one was pretty worrying. It was the guy that played Loki. Hiddleston, he was newly single and his response was more worrying than any of the others. "There is something positively brilliant about the young lady in the music group KAMA. She seems to have a magnificently strong will and character. She conveys a sense of positivity and acceptance that is quite thrilling and quite attractive. Her loyalty and integrity seem unimpeachable. Then there is the fact that she has the most compelling voice I've ever heard. Of course, it doesn't hurt that she is very physically appealing, very. Yes, I believe that she would be the celebrity I would have to fancy."

His statement wasn't troubling, but not because of the usual red flags. He wasn't a danger to her. He wasn't objectifying her. It was worry worthy because he was totally Mercedes' type and because what he had to say was just freaking Brit-speak for all the things we love about her. I looked over at Sam and he was looking over at me. "He's kind of skinny. We should be okay." His reassurance fell a little flat.

I shook my head. "She said he was sexy when he was Loki." I reminded him.

He nodded. "Yeah, but she said that Chris Hemsworth was hotter." He looked hard over his shoulder. "I'd be more worried about Jared Leto. He has really cool hair, he can sing and he is literally every girl's type." I nodded. Dude did have some epic hair and he kept it that way all the time. Hiddleston only had long hair when he was being Loki. Then again neither me nor Sam had long hair. Our hair was just thick as hell. Before I could think of anything to say, Sam got a distracted look on his face. "We need to squash this. I mean, remember how mad she got at us for the whole Idris Elba thing."

I nodded. "Yeah, still. I was cool with Colin Ferrell, but Loki and Leto better watch their asses." I grumbled.

Sam just shook his head at me. "Man, we've gotta be cool about this. We can know that we are Neanderthal asses who get jealous when other guys who see how amazing Mercy is…but the last thing we need is her knowing it. For women this kind of thing is a trust issue. She won't think that we just want to protect our relationship, she will think that we don't trust her to be faithful to us."

I sighed. Women just didn't get it. "Of course we trust her. She is Cede…she is the most loyal person I know. I mean, I'd have said fuck you to Hummel years ago if I'd been her. But we do know how other dudes think. There are plenty of real men who would never try and press up on a chick with a man. But other guys see that shit as a challenge. Cede's got tons of backbone so that wouldn't be a problem…except plenty of those assholes who see rejection as a challenge are the type of pathetic dickheads who would force that shit…dudes like that bastard prick Williams. If Cede was jealous of another chick, I know enough to run the fuck back to our woman's side. I've seen enough movies and shit to know chicks know when another chick is shady. I just wish they would believe that dudes know when another dude is a prick."

Sam barely had a chance to cosign, when Mercedes stepped out of our bedroom looking good as hell. She was wearing a pair of 'nude' leather, red bottom pumps with high as hell heels and pointy as fuck toes. Going up her pretty brown legs were bare until her knees. That was where the slim skirt of her cocktail dress started in a pinkish-beige, slightly metallic, silky fabric that made her skin just fucking glow. The dress itself followed her curves in the subtly sexy way that she was becoming known for around the world. It nipped in at her waist with an even shinier, thin belt kind of detail before demurely, well as demurely as possible considering how blessed she was in that particular area, covered the prodigious swells of her gorgeous tits. Then the dress did a sort of fold over thing to give it sleeves and turn it from a strapless deal to an off the shoulder dress. She wasn't wearing a necklace, just a pair of big ass teardrop 'statement' earrings that came down to her shoulders and somehow made her strong little neck look longer. The earrings, her shoes and the fringy stole thing she carried were all the same orangy-red color, but her little clutch purse was a metallic pinkish-goldish-beige that made the metallic of her dress stand out even more. God, I wanted to go over there and kiss that sexy ass lipstick from her full, juicy, sexy lips. It took me a second to realize that the lipstick's color was a warmer version of the color of her accessories. Her eyes were lined in a shade of brown darker than her skin, but still light enough not to look black that kind of looked like she'd been watching Cleopatra recently, but not in a weird or over done way. Above the liner, she had dusted her lids with goldish-ivory eyeshadow. Her soulful brown eyes looked like they could read your every sin that night. Her hair was pulled back and up in one of those curly updos that take half an hour to create but look like they took five minutes to do.

Damn, our woman knew how to put herself forward as the best possible version of her. Not that any version of her wasn't really fucking awesome. There was a reason she was already being wooed by Vogue for an interview. Haja had called her with that news the day before and she truly loved that fact. She and Kurt had kvelled for almost an hour. My chest swelled with pride just knowing that she allowed me to be seen in public as her man. I looked over and Sam was just as proud and happy for the exact same reason. We looked damn good. When we reached the first floor, we were surprised to see Lester Santos and Darcy waiting with Binkie rather than Junior. Lester looked at us and made appropriately complimentary noises. Darcy was never appropriate. "Damn, Boss Lady, I know you're younger than me…but I want to be like you when I grow up."

Cede looked Darcy over. Our usually layered and covered up Social Media manager was decked out in her best date night fashion. She looked really nice in a navy, lace, scoop neck mini dress and nude sling back pumps. Her lips were fire engine red and she was wearing a simple gold chain with a single pearl for the pendant and pearl stud earrings. She didn't bother with a clutch, her bag was a tote the same color as her shoes, I was pretty sure it contained her iPhone, the OnePlus One android phone she used to do our social networking on the go and her iPad Air 2 that acted as a super computer when she couldn't get to her laptop or her desktops. And probably one of her trusty Tasers. "I don't know why…you look good Girl." Mercedes told her honestly.

"Oh I know I'm the hotness." Darcy laughed. "But my rack, as awesome and capable of rendering men speechless as it may be, just can't compare to the Rack of Unusual Size you're sporting. Add that to that ass that is making that dress look right even from behind…and you, Boss Lady are traffic stopping hot tonight. Sam and Puck…you two look good too…the three of you together…just a metric fuckton of Oh My DAMN."

Lester laughed, he looked down at Darcy with a complete and total devotion that I knew he didn't intend to feel let alone show. "I hope it is okay that Darcy and I tag along. When I realized that we had reservations at the same restaurant at roughly the same time, I figured that there was no reason for Junior to have to work tonight when I was capable of providing backup for Binkie if there is any need."

"We're cool with it. Junior was on duty earlier." I told him honestly.

With that settled, we headed outside. Rather than seeing one of the usual black SUVs, either one of Rangeman's or Cede's Tahoe, there was a shiny black Chrysler 300 limo. There was even a fucking chauffeur. Binkie held the door for us before taking the front passenger seat next to the dude in the hat. Lester looked at us. "Since you guys usually utilize your own vehicle, you have plenty in the transportation budget…I figured the splurge wouldn't hurt." He explained to Sam who'd definitely had that 'how much is this costing us' look on his face.

We just nodded. Then Mercedes gave him that thousand yard stare glare and asked, "So, Mr. Santos…do we need to be having a shovel talk?"

Darcy shook her head with a laugh. "No. Darcy doesn't do serious relationships. Lauren might…but this cousin is nowhere mature enough for a monogamous, long term thang. Fortunately neither is 'Mr. Santos'. We're just two very sexy people enjoying giving each other ridiculous amounts of orgasms."

I smiled to myself. Outwardly I just shrugged. "Well, if you guys ever do…prepare yourself Lester. Cede's shovel speech is a thing of beauty. But Lauren's is even scarier." I shivered when I remembered the speech I got from Lauren in defense of both Cede and Sam once we were cool again after our breakup.

Thankfully our reservation was ready and so was theirs. I'd kind of been a little worried that we'd all end up at the same table or something. But we were shown to a nice, a really nice table in a location where we couldn't be seen from the windows, but we weren't near the kitchen or anything. Our waiter was excellent and the food was awesome. We looked over the menu and it was divided into eight sections. We almost made the dumb ass mistake of ordering from each since the titles of each section were in Italian. But Donato, our waiter, explained it to us. The first three sections were the finger foods and then the more substantial appetizers and the salads. The next three were the entrees, either pasta, Italian casseroles and complete chicken or fish meals or kind of a build your own entrée deal where you chose your steak or seafood and then sauce and side. Thing was that if you wanted to you could take the pasta or casseroles and order those as sides to the steaks or seafoods. So we went with that.

We each ordered a different small antipasti plate. Each one was just enough for the three of us to share and each get to taste. Sam went with the American Kobe beef meatballs and caciocavallo, an Italian sheep's milk cheese. Cede ordered the Maryland crab cakes with tarragon mustard aioli and toasted cashew vinaigrette. So I went with the grilled sausage, marinated peppers, spicy tomatoes on Tuscan toast. All three were pretty good, but they were finger foods, by the time we all sampled them, they hadn't even taken the edge off the fact that our last meal had been like nine hours before. We didn't actually order any wine, but Donato served us each half a glass based on what we'd ordered. Mercedes had a 2011 Abbazia Di Novacella Valle Isarco Kerner Praepositus from Alto Adige. Granted we only knew that because he told us. He gave Sam a 2008 Castello Di Fonterutoli Siepi made in Tuscany and I ended up with a 2006 Bellavista Franciacorta Vittorio Moretti from the Lombardy region. With three distinct colors of wine in front of us, we knew better than to take more than a sip of the others glasses, just to taste. They were very different from each other though they were all very, very good.

For our entrees, Donato again brought us just half a glass of wine. He kept our water glasses filled like a boss all night though so it wasn't as if we minded. Sam had the pappardelle, braised veal oxtail ragu alongside the center cut veal rib chop and finished with the roasted Brussels sprouts in carrot purée topped with slivered almonds. Donato brought him a half glass of 2007 Bruno Giacosa Barolo Le Rocche del Falletto Riserva DOCG, from the Piedmont. I was determined to remember the names of the wines so I could google them later. Something told me that Donato was trying to teach us about fine dining…if he was going to teach it, I didn't mind learning it. Cede loved that shit. With her braised veal agnolotti, black truffles, parmigiano, center cut filet mignon and spicy broccoli rabe, he brought a 2011 Cantina Terlano Quarz Alto Adige Terlano Sauvignon Blanc. And then with my prime natural aged New York sirloin, salt roasted fingerling potatoes and crab ravioli, served in ricotta and orange infused butter sauce he gave me a 2008 Tasca D'almerita Rosso del Conte made in Sicily.

Everything was delicious…I mean really, amazingly good. I got the check since I'd made the reservations and the date was my idea. Plus I had no desire for Sam to see it. The thought of three people having a dinner that ran almost five hundred bucks would have bothered him at least a little; probably a hell of a lot more than a little. I wasn't having any bullshit spoil our night. I was pretty sure that the by the glass wine thing was a rip, but I didn't care. It was worth it for the lesson in how to eat in places like that. I paid the bill and left Donato a twenty-five percent tip for helping us look more like we belonged rather than letting us look like stupid college kids with big bank.

Davio's didn't really do traditional desserts. I could have preordered a cake, but we were going to the comedy club and we'd be expected to order something there, so it wasn't a big deal at all. The Limo delivered us to the front of the world famous Caroline's On Broadway. We lucked out and that evening's show was Katt Williams. He was hilarious. For where our seats were, I didn't think he could see us, but turned out he had a small part of his set about us. "Man, I'm telling you…this music group KAMA. I've got some real mixed feelings about them. I mean, I like the fact that their asses sing and play their own music, and it's got that smooth, R&B undertone to even their rock songs…so I like that and Lil Girl's voice…that shit will make a nigga's dick hard without even trying. You know that's at least part of why those two white boys won't let her go. Hell, they fuck each other just to get her ass and keep it." The people who could see us checked to see if we were laughing before they finally giggled themselves. "But see the emotional conflict comes in on the whole 'they done brought back real baby makin' music' thing. I'm probably looking at three or four new muthafuckin' kids in the next year or so. And then they put out that newest video…done made me sweat out my fuckin' perm three times in the last couple of weeks. Then I remember that that Lil Girl is 'bout the same age as my son. There is a special kind of fuckin' shame in having masturbatory thoughts about someone then realizing that you could be their muthafuckin' daddy." We were all dying laughing, including Katt Williams.

"But you know what, those white boys they know how to date a black woman. They talking about Black Lives Matter and how the police need to do their jobs without killing muthafuckas every time we turn around. See they do what they gotta do to keep that sista happy with them. Still apparently jungle fever is actually hereditary. The brown haired one, Puck…he got a black brother…hell he's black his damn self. Think about it for a second…he was already taking care of his baby he had before he even got out of high school. Then boom he got famous, now there is a baby momma coming out to tell the world she done had a baby by him before he even got out of JUNIOR HIGH. He must have some black in him too. The blond one…those lips and he's southern too. You know that the Master had to have had a child or two with one of them light skinned house slaves and passed that baby off as his wife, now all these years later, those lips popping up on that blond haired, green eyed white boy." I almost peed my pants. The laughter was loud and exhaustive. Even Sam looked like he was dying laughing.

He had one more line of KAMA jokes. "Still though, I cannot be the only one about tired of hearing muthafuckas like Reggie Bush and Tim Duncan talking shit about that little girl for dating her white men, when their asses don't date nothing but white women. The muthafucking hypocrisy is muthafuckin' real. Still I hear brothers talking about how the two KAMA white boys can't be really satisfying that sista, because of the bullshit stereotype that white boys don't have big dicks. Now I'm not saying I know for sure…but I will say that I've been in jail with some white muthafuckas had dicks bigger than me. No, not bigger than my dick, bigger than all of me. So don't believe the hype, there is less difference between us and white folks than you think." From there he moved onto championing the fact that there were white people in the audience and asking for more togetherness, even though he did admit that he hated Darren Wilson from the very bottom of his heart. I agreed whole heartedly with that.

After the show, we went backstage to meet with him and let him know that we loved his set and no we weren't offended by anything he said. Then we took selfies with him and sent them to Darcy to post appropriately. We probably could have done it ourselves, but I wanted to know what hashtag she would create for them. Binkie showed us out a back door to the limo waiting on us there. Apparently people had tweeted about us being there, so the front entrance was Pap Central Station. Late on, we found out that at least a couple of them caught us anyway. At some point they are gonna get sick of taking pictures of us getting our macks on or of me and Sam checking out our woman's ass. We usually wouldn't have cared, but all we wanted to do at that point was go home and bone until we were too exhausted to even shower again afterwards. And that was just what we did. In fact, at one point Sam was fucking Cede, I was fucking him and when we came, that shit was so good we screamed ourselves hoarse.

Thankfully we didn't actually have to sing for the videos. The next morning, we were up at six, at the studios where Cede and Jill Scott had filmed the 'Who You Are' video in hair and makeup by seven thirty. Then we were back into the formal wear from the CD cover shoot walking through fake snow drifts. That was turned out to be part of the video for 'This Christmas'. Then we were changed into a different set of formal wear, that time Mercedes was in emerald green, Sam was in blue and I was in silvery gray. By the time we finished the change, the entire band was there and they were all decked out in Christmas looking finery too. The next scene had us all seated at a Christmas table that was laden with food that looked delicious but we couldn't actually eat any of it. By the end of the filming of that part of the video, we'd lip synced the song a hundred times.

The next video we did was for 'Mi Yimalel', so I was actually alone sort of. It was me in a silver sweater and some jeans on a stool with my guitar, they wheeled in a drum kit and a keyboard Dave and Justin sat down at their instruments. Then Sam and Erika got stools in the back, him with his guitar and her with her bass. I looked back and Artie had a fucking lyre. I didn't even know he could play a damn lyre. Maybe he couldn't but he sure as hell looked like he could. It was smooth as shit. The next one we filmed was for 'Little Drummer Boy/Peace on Earth'. That one looked like me and Sam were in a studio with just Dave playing the drums. That was pretty awesome, and we got to wear some ridiculously soft sweaters for it. The last one we filmed that day was Mercedes' 'Angels We Have Heard on High' solo video. She looked incredible standing on a stage wearing a pale ivory, wide leg jumpsuit that had the same kind of off the shoulder top as the dress she'd worn the night before. Except where the sleeves on the dress were about three maybe four inches wide, the sleeves of the jumpsuit went all the way down to the floor like a cape. She was wearing high ass brown boots and she looked incredible. I knew she probably had some reservations with the look because the jewelry was all yellow gold, but they looked great with the outfit. The album version of the song was acapella, just her voice…pure and unadulterated. As she stood on that stage all alone looking out over all of us, her most adoring fans and all I could think was that she was in her element…that was exactly where she belonged.

We grabbed something to eat on the way home and we were so tired that I don't even know what the hell it was. Cede showed us how to clean our faces of all the gunk and we showered and that was all she wrote. We were back at it the next day. We started with Sam's solo 'Please Come Home for Christmas', then we changed and were joined by the band for 'We Three Kings'. I did my last solo 'Eight Nights of Joy' and Artie gave them a great amount of pictures and videos of Tina and some old pics of Matt that they looped into shots of me, Cede and Sam. That was the only one of the songs that we had other people's vocals on that we did a video for. Of the twenty songs on the CD we only did videos for ten. We did four the first day, four the second and the last two Sunday afternoon after church.

After a week of midterms, videos and babies…the Berry triplets were all biracial and they were all freaking adorable…but Cede's was trying to drive Sam and me crazy picking out the best baby gifts for them. She was seriously determined. Ultimately, she found each of them the perfect gifts from all of us, an assortment of baby clothes with sayings designed for multiples and a double baby carrier plus a matching single one. We tried to put in our opinions, but they got shot down. She did promise that we could pick out their first birthday gift. The week was exhausting, the weekend wasn't any better and after all that we had a nice normal week where, yes we didn't get home until after eight or nine practicing for the Halloween show…but at least there wasn't the high stress of exams and projects and hell all of it. Plus, since Vi and Patrick had started that Monday, we came home to a clean house and clean clothes and food that was so good that I almost didn't miss the days when Mercedes and Kurt had time to cook. And fuck, slipping into fresh sheets a couple of nights a week…there were just no words for how fucking awesome that was. Friday night after our last class at Juilliard, Sam and I drove ourselves in Cede's Tahoe up to Billerica. We stayed in a Hampton that time, hoping to remain under the radar. Cede let herself and all the girls in the crew, plus Kurt, get caught by the paparazzi going to Faina. That really helped, because when we read anything about Sam and I it was just supposition about what the KAMA guys did when we were hanging with our friends.

What we did that particular weekend was spend the night talking and all Saturday doing whatever Nikki wanted to do. We also went grocery shopping because as Ms. Shirling got weaker and weaker, there was less she could do even with help. Nikki was an amazing little girl. She was only eight, but she was doing Sudoku puzzles that had Sam shaking his head. She read books that I wouldn't have been able to manage when she was conceived. She could draw, a talent only Bubbie possessed among my entire family and Ms. Shirling swore no one in her family had. I just loved finding pits and pieces of her personality that came from me or my family. After we got back from the grocery excursion, we went to the park. Nikki was one of those crazy park kids who did the stunts that no one else could or would dare. Yet another thing she got from her old man.

When we got back to the house, she and Sam spent hours drawing pictures. I used a grill on the back porch to make hamburgers and hot dogs for dinner and Sam had made some special soup his MeMaw made when they were feeling bad. Ms. Roloft was way too relieved for my sense of well-being by the fact that Ms. Shirling ate almost half a cup of the soup. We stayed as late as we could Sunday, taking Nikki back to the park and helping her with a science fair project that wasn't due for a while, but that she was really excited about. She was examining the effects of hand soap and hand sanitizer on bread mold. Damn, my little girl was so smart. Leaving her there, Sunday evening sucked. As we were heading out, Ms. Roloft pulled us to the side. "I know that you said you had an event you were performing at this Friday night for Halloween, but I think that you need to come Saturday if at all possible." She said cryptically. Her face was sad enough to say what she didn't.

"We might not get here until that afternoon, but we'll be here." I answered.

Sam nodded and sent off a quick text to Sexy Mama and Hudson. "We have to be back in Manhattan by two Monday afternoon, but we'll stay until Monday morning." He agreed.

"Good, good. I'll try and get Nikki prepared and enthusiastic about packing her things. We can do some here and there so there won't be everything to do all at once."

"Oh God." I muttered realizing that for Ms. Shirling, death was coming on swift feet. "Nikki's rooms are pretty much ready and waiting on her. Cede is putting some finishing touches on the one at our house, but Bubbie Ruth's is perfect." Then again, Bubbie Ruth had allowed other people to help. Even the things Mercedes allowed other people to do, she payed such close attention that she was basically micromanaging. Blaine had finally turned off his phone the Friday we were filming the videos and he was there with the painters. She was checking in obsessively. Then she got a little pissed when she got home and, while the accent wall was done exactly as she wanted it, the fluffy ivory butterflies on the three purple walls weren't done the way she's found online. Instead they flew around the room only at and above the border level.

"Look Diva, the one you found online would have played havoc with the furniture placement you mapped out. I had to make an executive decision…so I made it." Blaine finally said exasperatedly. "It's better this way." She pouted for just a second that she couldn't argue with him then she gave him a big hug and all was forgiven. Blaine was so used to dealing with diva type behavior, Cede probably didn't even faze him.

When we'd left, the big ass area rug and the furniture was all in place. They were waiting on the decorative pieces and lamps and stuff that should have arrived while we were in Billerica. Cede had even special ordered her a bunch of her own towels and plenty of extra sheets and school supplies for her desk. After our chat with Ms. Roloft as we were leaving, Sam and I spent the whole ride back to the brownstone hoping and praying that everything had arrived on time. If we had to tell Cedes that we could need that room sooner than we'd really thought and things weren't there and in place, that would be…no it didn't even bear thinking about. She would totally loose her shit if she thought that she had messed up the first thing she felt she was able to do for our oldest daughter.

This is Halloween (Danny Elfman)
Kurt Pov

The more I worked with Mercedes and Haja and Bubbie Ruth, the more I fell back in love with fashion. It was like I was returning to a love that was meant to be after having an affair and almost losing everything. While Lauren's dad was in New York, my position was formalized. I had a salary and a corporate credit card and it was really, wonderfully amazing. The trust that Mercedes granted to me, I still wasn't sure that I was really deserving of it. I knew that I had hurt her quite a lot by allowing Rachel to come between the two of us. That was a mistake that I was so happy I'd had the strength and opportunity to correct. So much good had come into my life and Blaine's and Burt's and Carole's and Finn's since I'd corrected my course, as Blaine called it, that I was forever grateful for the chance to make things right. Sometimes I thought that I would spend the rest of my life making things up to Cedes, but Blaine pointed out that all Mercedes wants for me is that I stay her friend and that I am happy.

I, myself, was amazingly happy. I had my love. I had my family and friends. Even more, I had an opportunity that all of my FIT classmates would have killed for, so despite a really full schedule, I still found the time to find three hair and makeup artists to handle everything that evening. I'd hired four senior fashion design majors who were well known for their tailoring abilities to help me getting all the costume adjustments made. We had needed to borrow the small fabrication lab, to get all the sewing done, but we were a week out from Halloween and everything was finished. Cedes, Puck, and the band had the time they needed to practice in their costumes and to adjust the choreography where the costumes couldn't be adjusted instead. That had allowed me and my assistants to spend the last week altering the costumes for Hudson, Darcy, Blaine and myself. Quinn and James weren't able to come, they were already committed to doing something on their campus. Ryan was going to be Jamie's plus one at the NYADA Halloween party. She had had a bad experience her first year there so Ryan was going to be her backup. I wasn't sure if those two were dating or not. They kind of kept their relationship status to themselves. The last two tickets were going instead to Seth and Summer. But both of them were handling their own costumes. Cedes had been worried about how we'd get Binkie or Junior in, but they were considered to be part of the band. Tina had asked Jamal for us since we knew that Brantley wasn't a huge fan of most of Lucious Lyon's people.

Haja had okayed the use of the office conference rooms for hair and makeup which was perfect because the instruments were all there anyway. Brantley arranged their sound check early enough that the band could be back at the offices in plenty of time to get ready. The original plan had Bubbie Ruth helping me the night of with any last minute sewing needs, but Puck had asked her to go and spend the weekend with Nikki, all of us would be joining her the next day. Puck and Cedes had asked that we help them with getting things ready to move Nikki down to the city after…well after. So Bubbie had taken the paperwork from Cedes' Uncle Ethan and from The Studio School and she had gone up that afternoon to get things set up so that the transition would be as painless as humanly possible.

With Bubbie Ruth unable to be there, I'd enlisted two of my FIT cohorts to make sure that everything was perfect. Every member of KAMA's band arrived before six. The guys were ready first. Mainly because there was little that they needed other than the costumes. Well Artie had to have a few prosthetics to make him look bald and as if he had Hugo Strange's distinctive facial hair, and Simeon and Jackson had to be painted white and have their mouths fitted with interesting prosthetics and makeup to turn them into two different versions of the clown prince of Gotham. Then Blaine had to get in the chair to get painted a reddish purple color and have a sinister, thin, villainous goatee affixed to his face. Once that was done Erika was up. It took all three of the makeup artist working with three airbrush machines like thirty minutes just to do the base of fern green. There was another layer of more yellowy, leaf green over that, then they left it to the makeup artist Cedes had put me in contact with, Trina Vega, to do the detail work. The entire time, Erika was wearing just a tiny green thong and a pair of green pasties. Even though they were doing the air brushing in a temporary booth made of shower curtains, not out where all could see, I had to admire her self-confidence. I was not that comfortable in my skin.

If Erika had the most elaborate makeup, Hudson had the simplest. It was a simple beauty makeup since Hudson really did kind of look like Merida without any help at all. Her dark teal and cream medieval dress, bow and quiver just made the connection even more readily apparent. The two remaining makeup artists each took two of the Harleys and using pictures provided for me by Blaine and Artie, they were able to make each of them look as chillingly, innocently, sweetly crazy as Harley giving all the necessary differences for each incarnation. The hair artists were just as gifted. Mercedes had sent Bae Bae to Rickie and the dancer had gotten a 'quick weave' that gave her miles of golden blond hair that he styled into to two high pigtails with big bouncing curls and a fabulous fringe of bob length bangs. All that had to be done in preparation for the event was to reinvigorate the curls. Her incarnation of the character wore a purple mask, so her eye makeup was done in shades of purple and her lips were colored in a shiny, Koolaid red lipstick. Brittany's hair was given a rough and ready set of extensions. The right high pony received black hair added to give it length and the characterization's iconic look, while the left side received blood red hair. The skin of her face was covered in a thin layer of white pancake makeup while her eyes were heavily shadowed in shades of black and her lips given the full blood red treatment. Elena went with a well done blonde wig that was pretty much glued to a wig cap that was clipped to her hair with more hair pins than I had ever seen in one head in my life. Like Brittany she got the pancake treatment, but her eyeshadow was even heavier…giving her a more gothic kind of look and her lips were cherry red. Rainbow's length of silky black hair was easily divided into two slick black high pigtails. She let them use a temporary, blood red, hair spray to color the bottom half of one. Her foundation just turned her ivory skin even lighter without going the extreme pancake look of Britts and JaJa. The rest of her makeup was done in reds and black as well, but it was totally gothed out; red eyeliner and black shadow, repeated on her lips with red lip liner and black lipstick.

After the four of them were done and headed to the conference room I'd commandeered for the costuming, Jackson and Simeon were given the rest of their Joker treatment and sent to me. Artie was already done and back in his chair by the time Brittany came in, so he 'helped' her into her not at all complicated outfit. We'd lucked out and were able to use the same two pairs of boots for Brittany and JaJa since Britts tights were a mirror images of Elena's leather Harlequin pants and they wore the same shoe size, they each got one red boot to go over the black side of their bottoms and one black boot for the red side. For Bae Bae's costume, I just gotten a pair of white, wedge-heeled, over the knee boots with weird, cheap, stretch fabric uppers and painted them with red and dark purple fabric paint. Her 'Harlequined up' nurse's uniform had details in each color too. Rainbow's boots were red and black leather that I'd happened to luck upon when searching cosplay sites. They only had them in two tiny sizes, but luckily enough for me…one of them just happened to be Bow's size.

For Simeon, we'd gone with the Heath Ledger Joker look, so his suit was supposed to be a bit oversized. His hair and makeup were both perfectly done and when we got him into the purple and green suit, I found myself totally creeped out. Jackson was even worse. He was in the pinstriped purple suit with the yellow waistcoat and handkerchief from Arkham Asylum…Artie had allowed me to watch the game so I would understand the reference. His face was just wrong and unlike Simeon's green tint, the hair stylist had made Jackson's hair look full on green and wild. Blaine came in with them and his Yellow Lantern costume went on smoothly. He gave me a smile that was both supercilious and unctuous. He did make a really good Sinestro. Erika was finally ready for her costume. She was wearing green slippers with toes to give the illusion that she was bare foot. A pair of ridiculously brief green tap pants embroidered to look like leaves, were carefully pulled up over the ivy vines that seemed to be crawling up her legs. A custom tailored red and blue hoodie that closed over her breasts rather than zipping all the way up finished her off. I carefully moved the long red hair she was sporting, another of Rickie's 'quick weaves' back into place and she was ready to go. Cassidy had had a quick beauty makeup application, her eyes made to look more exotic, and she'd been sent to me. Her tight, black leather cat suit, black boots, gray gloves and utility belt were donned and she was Talia al Ghul.

Santana and Xena were both ones whose looks were more dependent on costume than makeup. Both were in black cat suits. Santana's shiny black patent leather. Xena's a poly lycra blend. They were fairly easy with completely iconic looks. The hardest part was finding them two black bull whips that looked at least somewhat different. Though getting Santana to understand my decision to go with tech boots rather than stilettos took even longer. The Dam brothers were easy also. The Chris O'Donnell-esque costume for Adam was significantly easier to find than the hooded caped Robin of the video game that served as Damien's costume. But I'd found both and the brothers looked perfect. Darcy had brought me her idea. It hadn't taken much work at all on my part. The costume was pretty straight forward. A short, white dress that invoked the idea of a bride. I'd actually gotten it off David's bridal's site for ninety-nine bucks, it had a lower sweetheart neckline and a bubble hem that stopped at mid-thigh. The white heeled pumps and white stockings were also easy. I'd had to pay full price for the retro look, black leather motorcycle jacket though. Still it fit almost perfectly. It couldn't actually zip over her chest, but if I'd ordered the size she needed for those, it would have been too long and too big on her shoulders and arms. Being Mercedes' friend meant that I knew how that worked better than most stylists. A blonde wig that showed dark roots had been cut into the right ninety's bob style by one of the hairstylists while the band was at the sound check. She wore her own jewelry and carried one of those fake bloody butcher knives. With the black makeup and sharpened black finger nails, Darcy made the perfect 'Bride of Chucky.

Dave became Bane, Anne Hathaway movie version not Uma Thurman movie version. Justin became The Riddler and I became Patrick Bateman…the American Psycho, all through the proper costuming. I did let Trina add blood and had Rickie make my hair look as Christian Bale's had in the movie. Ultimately, I was quite proud of the look. Seth and Summer came in decked out as 'The Ironist' and 'Little Miss Vixen' from his comic book Atomic City which is much more popular than I'd ever realized. Summer had a black whip also, though hers was shorter than the ones I'd found for Tana and Xena. Finally, Mercedes, Sam and Puck showed up. Hair and makeup had been done. Mercedes' long dark brown weave had been augmented with temporarily affixed tracts of red hair and it was all trailing down her back in curls. Her makeup was beautiful. The makeup artist had used spirit gum to hold the black mask, a smaller version of the one Puck wore to her face. She wouldn't be able to smile until it was removed, which worked fine with the character so no problem there. I helped her into the ingeniously designed black leather and 'kevlar' suit. Hers was actually completely open in the back until you zipped the three zippers. Two of which started at each of her ankles and zipped up her legs and over the swells of her bottom to meet at the bottom of her spine. The third started about an inch under the bottom of her hairline at the back of her neck. It zipped down to the base of her spine and then a cute little black lock was used to make sure that none of her movements during the night would start them to unzipping. Her bat ears cowl covered her hair and came to a point in the middle of her forehead. It didn't extend into a mask as in the comic books. In the back it actually had a gap for us to pull Cedes' hair through, but the black cape was calf length and ended in the comic book's traditional points. The black leather over the knee boots had block heels to allow for dancing and, as I told Santana about her own boots, to provide realism. I had to admit the costume was perfect and fit like a second skin, but the combination of the costume and the utility belt that nipped in her waist made her bosom and bottom look cartoonishly large. When she was completely kitted out she did the superhero hands on the hips pose and I was glad to see that the slick edging I'd added the gauntlets on her gloves helped the cape to slid off of them rather than get caught.

Sam was decked out in full Dark Knight Batman outfit. If I didn't know the truth, I'd have assumed that he'd borrowed a costume from the studio's costume department. He looked almost perfect. But nothing could be done for those lips or his tendency to smile a lot. His costume fastened in the same way that Mercedes' did, with his floor length cape, boots and gauntlet gloves covering all the zippers. Puck's costume was nowhere near as complex. More like military surplus that was black with the bright blue 'Nightwing' over his chest. It had ridges where the 'kevlar' in the shirt created abs, that mimicked those under the top. His shoulders, elbows and back were similarly protected with the thick pads of not really Kevlar…I was pretty sure none of it was really bulletproof. His black cargo pants were specially made and reinforced with padding in the crotch, shins, knees and backside. His utility belt almost looked completely really and like it actually did contain a mini generator to recharge the electrified batons in sheathes on his back.

Once we were all ready to go, we did a quick job helping to clean everything up. Thankfully a lot had been done as we'd gone along. I grabbed the garment bags that contained Cedes', Sam's and Puck's change of costumes and we headed out to Leviticus. The club was...well it was almost like going to a club or a movie, it didn't seem real. The back area had places for us to tweak the costumes and we'd be able to help Commune get changed when they came down. Jamal pretty much assigned himself as our guide which was kind of him. "The front is packed. It's good you got here when you did. Lucious was closing the admission doors soon." We'd arrived a little after nine, so that Commune would only have to stay until one, one-thirty to make their bonus. "Here is a rough map of the club, VIP is upstairs. The stage is on the first floor. There are bars in both the regular area and in the VIP. Your whole crew has VIP access, but it can get boring and dramatic up there. Kurt, Blaine, Tina has told me tons about you…avoid Royale T and my father. Most everyone else is cool though. Ummm…if Becky asks you if she can watch you get down, I guess it's up to you, but it would make my life a lot easier if you just tell her that being gay doesn't automatically make you kinky."

"Ain't that the truth…those two are the most vanilla of the whole gaggle of us Glee geeks." Puck laughed. "The kinkiest of us are probably the heterosexual, traditional, white couple." I wondered for a second who he meant. I decided that he must have meant Finn and Lauren. We'd all gone out of our way to make sure that he and Sam never learned just how kinky Tessa and Aidan really were. Sometimes I did wish I hung out with the guys a little more often, there were just some things I couldn't unhear.

By the time Jamal finished giving us the rundown and introduced us to his brothers, one of whom was way too young to be there legally, it was almost time for KAMA's performance. Binkie and I headed out find Blaine, Darcy, Hudson, Seth and Summer while they got their instruments ready again and warmed up. We got there in time to hear the final song of the first card performer, Empire artist Tiana. I'd heard Mercedes sing too often to be impressed. Tiana seemed to be more about the sex than the talent. That was fine, I supposed, if you liked that kind of thing. The stage setup was interesting. It was actually two large stages connected by a plexiglass and LED enclosed lite walkway that bisected the general admission floor of the club. Speaking to the bartender I learned that when there wasn't a performance the 'catwalk' was open for dancing. When KAMA was introduced, the crowd went crazy.

The lights were down everywhere in the club, then one spot came up on Dave as he started with the distinctive drum solo intro. Erika was lit next as she joined him. Then Artie and Justin as more instruments came in. It was one of two covers they were doing that night and it was the perfect song for Halloween. Mercedes voice came out and she was finally lit. The crowd really lost their minds then. I heard a guy next to our little circle of seven groan out, "Holy fucking shit her body is even better in person."

The first chorus of 'Superstition' saw the whole group singing together, then Sam took over for the second verse. The crowd was dancing, some of the older people singing along. Mercedes runs were fucking beautiful. I never used profane language, but there were just no other words that did her justice. She took the last verse, which was the same as the first verse. But the last chorus was just amazing. By the end KAMA had made fans of the entire crowd. They did 'Rub You The Right Way' next, then 'Rescue Me' then they broke out an old Britney Spears song that they had totally restructured and revamped and made it their own. By the end of '3' I was pretty sure that the club's bathrooms were full of people sating the desire that Cedes, Puck and Sam had invoked in them. The next song had those who didn't get to go the first time in the stalls, 'Pillow Talk' was never as dirty on the CD as it was live, and that night may well have been the raunchiest version ever.

Then I was shocked when Jamal joined them and he and Mercedes made beautiful music together. I knew that if he hadn't 'played for the other team' as the saying went, Noah and Sam wouldn't have been calm and smiling hearing the two of them doing 'If You Asked Me To' together. The guys thanked Jamal for helping them out. Then Mercedes was front and center by herself for 'Hard Out Here'. The crowd loved the song. I hated how much she said the B word, but it was a good, fun song to dance to. It even had some good points of social commentary. The seven of us stood dancing and having fun for the entire set, even when Cassidy played a mash up of 'Someone Like You' and 'Rumor Has It' while the band guzzled water and dried off sweat. They came back and Puck was the feature voice for 'Almost Lover' then they killed 'Colorblind'. That song was the best slow dance song of the night. Mercedes and Xena collaborated for 'Who You Are' and they closed their set with 'The Fighter'.

As hyped as they had the crowd, it was no surprise that the audience demanded an encore. "Alright, we're going to give you your encore…but I'm gonna be honest with you, I've never done this one in public before without my whole glee club with me…so if I get nervous, don't laugh at my ass." Mercedes said endearingly. They did 'Thriller'. I laughed until tears rolled down my cheeks. If I thought that the club had been loud and racous before…it was nothing compared to the five and a half minutes KAMA performed 'Thriller'. Especially when Commune, their dancers and background singers all broke into the familiar dance routine during the instrumental break. I watched every second, then I had to let Binkie push our way through the ocean of bodies so I could go help with the costume changes. I shouldn't have rushed. When I got to the dressing room everyone but Commune was standing in the hall. Lucious Lyon came up looking for KAMA to congratulate on their performance. "They will be out momentarily." I lied. Of course, Mercedes picked that moment to let out a very loud, very passionate yelp of Sam's name.

"You mean they will be out when they finish fucking." He said crassly.

Santana moved in to take over being the voice box…she lied and handled crass language better than me anyway. "Yes. Fortunately, since they just finished performing for a very appreciative audience, it shouldn't take more than thirty minutes. Most other venues they have a separate dressing room so it doesn't hold the rest of us up…"

"Ooooh…remember at Bonnaroo, they got so hot doing their set that they disappeared for two hours afterwards." Adam laughed.

His laughter was punctuated by a long, loud, groaned "Fuck Baby, so damn TIGHT." That was definitely said in a familiar southern twang.

I shook my head. Thankfully Jamal showed up. He looked at us all standing there and laughed. "I thought Tina was making that up. They do this after every performance?" We all nodded resignedly. "Well, I guess that's good for them. They say that the best performers make love to their audiences."

"Yeah, your bed room isn't right under theirs. Soundproof insulation is a blessing, but when they are really enjoying themselves…" I wish I could say I said that ironically with not even a hint of a whine…but I couldn't.

"These dressing rooms are supposed to be soundproof too." Lucious made a face.

"They are, or we'd be hearing every grunt, groan, yelp and shout." Erika admitted. "I'm pretty sure that Little Rock is going to experience a minor baby boom come February, and they will have all attended the music festival last May."

I was leaning against the door, secure in the assumption that we had at least another fifteen minutes before it would open when suddenly I was proven wrong. Sam caught me as he opened the door looking sheepish. "Sorry guys, we tried to be quick since we only have the one dressing room." He said letting us in.

Everyone in the band appreciated their consideration. Lucious introduced himself and even refrained from leering at Mercedes where she waved from behind the changing screen. I joined her and helped her change while Sam and Noah took care of themselves. As we listened, Lucious, Noah and Sam started to chat. It was really like a verbal fencing match. Lucious Lyon would throw out a subtle, cloaked thrust, and Noah or Sam would rebut with a nice parry or riposte. Jamal stayed, though I could see that he stayed because he was just hoping to keep his father from saying anything to jeopardize his new friendships. I assumed that the elder Lyon in the room was hoping to convince KAMA to jump to Empire's roster. It took me a minute to realize, he didn't want KAMA…he just wanted Cedes. Any one could have told him that that was never going to happen. But Sam and Puck were, apparently, not going to be the ones to inform him of that very salient fact. Finally, Lucious seemed to realize that he was probably needed elsewhere. "Next time you play the club; we'll make sure that there is a separate space for the band." He said when he finally finished schmoozing. "Mal, you and Mercedes sounded amazing together. Mercedes, if you can, I'd love to have you and Jamal do a duet on his debut album."

Fortunately, he was gone soon after that. Mercedes had put on her wide strap, black lace pushup bra, matching panties, wide diamond fishnets and was working her way into her shaper slip when I joined her behind the screen. It took very little time to get her into the olive green and red striped sweater dress, black, stiletto, Louboutin knee boots. With a deft hand, she played with her makeup in the room's mirror turning dark eye makeup full on sinister and staining her lips with ox-blood red lipstain. Once she donned the far too realistic looking five fingers of razory death glove, we rearranged her curls and added the hat and she was the epitome of a sexy, Freddie Krueger. Puck's second costume was easy bloody and dirty jeans, Frankenstein boots, a bloody and dirty white tee shirt, bloody and dirty blue over shirt, hockey goalie mask, 'bloody' machete. He wore the mask on his head not down over his face for safety's sake, but still. The Mercedes did something with her compact to make his face look dirty, and boom, he was Jason Voorhees. Sam's was even simplier…blue, industrial looking coveralls, big ass Frankenstein, brown hair wig, white face mask, boots and another 'bloody' machete…and he was Michael Myers.

We packed the expensive as hell Batman themed costumes into their garment bags, put away all their instruments and got those loaded into the black van Rangeman had kindly provided for us and we headed to the VIP to enjoy the rest of the evening. The next three hours were a blur of dancing and maybe a few drinks. I knew I wasn't old enough, but I wasn't carded and I totally needed them to get through Kid Fo-Fo's set. My Gaga he was just wretched. Thankfully the DJ that spun after him was awesome and she had really cool hair. We didn't make our one-thirty schedule…probably because we were all making out with our significant others at one-thirty and it took Binkie, Junior, Hudson and Darcy like forty-five minutes to get us coherent and out of our passion haze. Of course, Darcy posted pictures of everyone in their costumes on the KAMA site and yes, they were accompanied by pictures of us dancing and 'getting our macks on' that were posted to Instagram.

We were all feeling far too amorous to do anything but go home. I ended the night with a round of very energetic shower lovemaking with Blaine. When I awoke a few hours later, surprisingly well rested, I decided to check my social media accounts. The Twittersphere was alive with people haling KAMA as the best thing to happen to the music industry in decades. They talked about how awesome they sounded and how great they looked. Darcy had chimed in as Cedes to give me a huge 'big up' for all my hard work getting all the costumes for the entire crew. The fashion blogosphere went all in celebrating Mercedes' style choices and my attention to detail in all of the costumes. I had gained seven hundred new followers on each of my social media accounts and there were tons of posts asking me to start a fashion blog of my own. I basked in the glow for a few minutes before I headed to the shower. The night had been epically awesome…but something told me that it would be the last moments of pure pleasure we would have for a while.


My Brother from another Mother (AKA Mr. Illy) has gotten me hooked on Mr. Robot...so if my posting schedule is negatively impacted...blame him.

Good news is that I'm three chapters ahead on this story, so we should be golden.

To those of you who are requesting the reactions of our favorite Crazy person and Bad Teacher...they are coming up in Chapter 12 and you will get to see how they react to all that has transpired during the first semester of this school year.

I promise you will not be disappointed by the wait. My Beta was quite shocked and probably a little appalled.

Please hit me with a review and let me know what you think.

TTFN,

Anni