A/N: This is set during Mash-up. Mike's trying to think through the process of picking football or glee. It's kind of a look at what he thinks/feels about his glee teammates. I started this forever ago and never had time to finish it. I rushed through it now though, because Glee's back in less than a week (yay!) and I wanted to post it before season 2 started since it's from a season 1 episode. I'm going to try to finish my other glee fics based off the first season, but the chance of that happening before season 2 starts is ridiculously slim. I don't know how this came out so wordy; I'm way too typative for my own good.
Disclaimer: I don't own Glee or anything related to the show.
It's Wednesday night and Mike's in his room splayed out on his small bed and staring at the ceiling. Matt's sitting on the other side of his room in the computer chair looking out the window and neither really has much to say. Mike knows exactly what his friend is thinking about, because how can he possibly be thinking of anything else? They have less than twenty-four hours to decide between their two teams. Mike knows what team he wants to pick, but he isn't sure he can handle picking one side over the other. No matter which choice he makes, one team is going to end up angry with him.
The problem with joining a team, he always knew, is that they come with team mates. Every time his mom signed his younger self up for another sport he'd force a smile and thank her, but as soon as he was in his room, away from her, he'd let out a loud groan before turning on some music in an effort to forget about it, at least for a while. With every new move he'd tried he'd forget a little piece of his aggravation. By the time his mom would call him for dinner he'd be all smiles and she'd be happy. (Looking back now, he thinks it speaks volumes that dancing has always been his happy get away.) Eventually it turned time to go to practice for whatever season they were in and he'd be far less chipper. He had hated having to put up with all the other pre-teen boys. They thought it was cool to be mean, funny to hurt people and plain awesome if you could make someone cry. They were rude and obnoxious.
Well, a few of the guys were alright. Matt had been pretty quiet when they'd first been on the same team and Mike hadn't given him much thought because he was new to town and no one really knew anything about him. Eventually Mike learned Matt wasn't really very quiet at all and that he just didn't talk because he'd thought their team mates were equally obnoxious. They'd been pretty good friends since that discovery. Then there was Finn, who wasn't actually a bad kid. He'd just wanted to fit in so badly that he went along with anything. He was best friends with Noah – who was just starting to tell people to call him Puck those days – and was the cause of most of the trouble Finn got into.
Mike first decided he liked Puck only because the other boy had stood up for Matt when he said he didn't want to pull a prank on the cheerleaders that practiced on the other half of the field. Actually, he'd said "forget him, we don't need him" but once the others had backed off Puck had stuck around long enough to grin and nod his head, so Mike knew that was his way of having Matt's back. The four have been pretty good friends ever since.
The problem is that Mike's always had a lot more team mates to put up with than the three he is able to stand. He just never could bring himself to tell his mom how much he didn't really enjoy it. She was a total soccer mom; she loved being able to cart him and his teammates around to practices and games and doing fundraisers. She genuinely enjoyed it all and Mike loved his mom too much to tell her he hated it. That's how he still found himself on the football team, with the same obnoxious guys, at the age of sixteen.
When he joined glee club his mom was instantly against it. She didn't want glee to interfere with football at all. He'd told her not to worry; coach had worked out a practice schedule with the glee director so him and the other guys could do both. What he didn't tell her was that it only took until the Invitational for him to love glee more than he'd ever loved football. And now he definitely can't bring himself to tell her that his friends and he have to choose between the two teams. Because he is a member of both teams, and one way or the other, he is going to have to let down a set of teammates. And he ultimately knows which team he'll be letting down. It just sucks that he has to let his mom down along the way too.
He thinks making his decision all comes down to his teammates. He loves to play football, but constantly dealing with his team mates' attitudes drastically impacts his opinion of it. It's not like the team is even any good anyway. The only game they've ever won was simultaneously one of the most embarrassing and exhilarating moments of his football career. But glee club? He just knows the glee club is going to win Sectionals because they are good. The fact that they have winning potential isn't what he finds best though; it's the teammates.
First of all, his main group of friends is there. He has Matt, Puck and Finn, at least for the time being. He knows the chances of all three of them choosing glee over the football team are slim to none and he's okay with that. Their choice is their own and he'll accept whatever they decide. He thinks even with out them he'll be okay in glee. They won't stop talking to him if he goes with his gut reaction and chooses glee; they'll understand because it would take an idiot not to see the way he loves to dance. He's half convinced Matt might even want to pick glee. He sees the way his best friend looks when he dances and Mike has to guess the look on his face isn't too far off from his own. And looking over to him now, Mike knows his friend's having just as hard a time sort through his thoughts as he is. And he really hopes Matt will be on the same team as him, because they've been teammates since they were far younger than they are now. It's natural for them to be together and he briefly panics about what it'd be like if he went to glee while Matt went to football. He pushes that panic away pretty quick because he knows he has to choose for himself, not for anyone else. He's positive Puck's going to pick football. Even when they became friends, Puck had always been right there along with the other boys in their pranks, if not leading the pack himself. Even if Puck's dating Rachel, the thought of him picking glee just makes Mike laugh. Puck is a tough guy. He needs his tough guy sport. Finn's the only one that he honestly has no idea what he'll chose. He's grown up a lot since the days they first became friends, and Mike totally knows he loves singing and glee and everything that involves, but Mike also knows that Finn's desire to fit in has not changed. Before he joined glee Finn was at the top of the social ladder with his perfect cheer captain girlfriend. Now, it's a struggle for him to keep that spot and loosing it isn't something Finn is ready for, especially after he had his very first slushie facial ever.
Then there are his secondary friends, the Cheerios. The natural order in their high school, him being a jock, entitles him being friends with the cheerleaders. He isn't overly friendly with very many squad members, but the three in glee he's considered solid friends before hand.
Santana isn't one of his favorite friends (she makes him very wary) but she is sort of one of his favorite team mates. She doesn't really talk too much to the original glee members in meetings (other than the occasional and admittedly well timed quip) and he isn't surprised by it. He knows she isn't there to make friends with a bunch of kids he knows she thinks are mega losers. She doesn't use the time to full on torment them, though, and he appreciates that about her. She isn't nice to them by any means, but he knows her not talking to them at all is better than her offending each and every one of them. The only time she's actively mean to them in meetings is when she criticizes someone else's choreography ideas and he really doesn't mind that about her. She's a good dancer. She knows what's good and what's not and quite frankly he thinks they need someone like her who isn't afraid to hurt someone's feelings by telling them their suggestion is lame (though in much rougher terms). One of his friends or not, she is still a bitch and they need a bitch.
Quinn is a bitch too, he decides, but in a totally unproductive way. She's one of the more vocal members of the club and nothing she ever really says is well received. Mike's pretty sure only the fact that she's pregnant saves her from any real backlash for her comments. And Mike's not stupid. He knows she's not in the club because she really likes it. He starts to suspect it when she doesn't want to let Rachel, who everyone admitted was their best singer, back in and cements it when she starts missing consecutive meetings. At first he figures she just joined to protect her territory, and by territory he totally means Finn. It only took a short amount of time to realize that, though she was totally trying to protect her claim on Finn, she was also working against the club. He knows the other Cheerios are in on it too, but he's convinced they aren't as one hundred percent as Quinn is; with Rachel and Finn making eyes at each other it's much more personal for her. She was a bitch and he didn't trust her where glee was concerned.
Brittany he likes, like, really likes. They were friends long before glee came into the picture. He'll never forget the first time he legit decided to be her friend. It was back when the guys (not his guys, the other guys) still thought it was funny to pick on the cheerleaders – before they started wanting to kiss them instead. He'd technically been her friend already, but it was in an "I can smile and wave at you everyday, but that's pretty much it" kind of way. But that day changed everything. His mom had given him money to buy a candy bar from the concession stand and when he rounded the corner of the building he had to skid to a stop not to hit her where she sat on the ground. Unfortunately, he lost balance and landed on her anyway. When he saw the tears he thought they were his fault and hastily bit out an apology. She'd said she was sorry too. He'd asked her why since he was the one who had fallen on her. She said because she'd purposefully kicked someone and her mom always told her that wasn't acceptable behavior and now she was in a time out. She said it was one of his teammates so she was sorry to do that to his friend. He'd asked very deliberately if it had been Matt, Finn or Puck she'd kicked. When she'd said no he smiled and said well you didn't hit one of my friends then so no worries; anyone else probably deserved it. She'd smiled brightly at him and he decided he'd liked being the one to make her smile. To this day, he still likes being the one to make her smile.
Then he comes to the original glee members. The one's he has no tie to, the ones he owes nothing. He thinks he'd like to owe them something. They're geeks at the bottom of the social ladder, but they're geeks together and he likes that. He likes that because of their equal love of music and performing they found each other. They're all so different, but they just work together somehow. He's pretty sure if he sticks around his tentative friendship with them all will become something more sound.
Rachel annoys the hell out of him half of the time and he isn't really sure what Puck's up to dating her. It caught him so off guard he'd been convinced he'd just imagined seeing them walk by, arm in arm, until Matt asked "Did I really just see that?" and he knew his eyes weren't deceiving him. Because it was no secret Puck was only second to Quinn on the list of Rachel's top tormenters. If Rachel annoyed him half of the time then she annoyed Puck every second of the day. He remembered Puck specifically saying she made him want to light himself on fire, which he thought was way extreme. She's critical and demanding and she thinks she was so much better than everyone else. Puck hated it. Honestly though? Mike admires her more than he'll probably ever admit. She's far from popular, so far the word shouldn't even be associated with her in any positive way, but she walks around with more confidence than any of the Cheerios, who rule the school, and she is a hell of a lot nicer than a good number of them too. He's pretty sure he will never forget her suggesting they sing 'Keep Holding On' for Quinn. The moment it happened he felt like he was really seeing who Rachel was. It said a lot about her as a person that she would be the one to suggest such support for someone who was so cruel to her. It makes his annoyance with her far more tolerable. She will critique the hell out of someone's singing, but she always follows up with an offer to help you improve or, at the least, tips on how to do so on your own. He knows that specific part of her annoys everyone, even him sometimes, but he keeps reminding him self that she knows what she's talking about more than anyone else in that room. If you are looking to improve, her help is the best way to go about it. She wants everyone to be their best, even the people that treat her the worst, and he likes that about her. She gives her best and expects everyone else to as well. She knows what she wants and she refuses to settle for anything less. Even though he kind of can't stand her, he has to respect her.
Tina sort of scares him. It has nothing to do with the whole goth look she sports and everything to do with what the first words she'd spoken to him were. "I don't know what you and your friends are up to joining the club, but if it's bad intentions you'll regret it." It isn't even that he is scared of her lame threat because he totally isn't. It's that any other time after that he ever heard her talk she stutters. He thinks she must be pretty damn serious to make it through the threat without a single stutter. It's pretty cool of her to want to protect her teammates like that he decides. He thinks the team needs someone like her, someone who's willing to protect them. And he's realized she's shy as hell which just makes her attempting to threaten him all the more impressive. Some times when he's looking around the room he sees her looking at him and she locks eyes with him briefly before looking away and he thinks back to those words. He thinks of them now too, as his debate goes on.
Kurt is someone he really doesn't like. It isn't because he's gay; he has no real problem with that at all. The dude can like whoever he wants so long as it isn't him because he can't handle a gay kid crushing on him… he can't even handle when a girl he doesn't like is crushing on him because he doesn't want to have to reject someone, he's sure a boy would make it so much worse. No, it isn't because he's gay; it's because he's catty and Mike is pretty sure he has ulterior motives behind just about all of his actions. He seems like he thinks he's better than everyone else and he really isn't. He'd noticed it when Kurt first joined the football team. He thought he was so much better than them all just because he could kick the damn ball throw the posts. Mike might not have been able to kick the ball through the post every time, but he's sure Kurt can't do his job out on the field. That's the point of a team; a range of talents coming together to make one strong force. Mike isn't sure how everyone accepts Kurt's self-importance so readily and shuns Rachel's. Mike thinks if he ever has to choose between the two, he'd rather be stuck with Rachel than Kurt. At least she's honest and nice, where Kurt is more often than not sneaky and demeaning. It's like every time he says something, he really means something else. He reminds Mike of this dude he saw in a movie a few weeks ago. He'd spent the whole movie debating whether the guy was one of the good guys or the bad guys. Turns out he was a bad guy. Mike just hopes Kurt doesn't turn out the same way. Despite all that Mike can appreciate what an individual does for a team and he can't deny that Kurt adds a certain flare to the group that really helps make them what they are.
Mercedes is this crazy mix of awesome and obnoxious. She's opinionated but often outspoken when no one wants to hear it. She's always willing to listen when someone has a problem but she's a terrible gossip and Mike wonders how much of what she hears stays private. She knows she's a great singer, but sometimes she openly doubts that and Mike's convinced she's fishing for compliments. She's a proud black girl, but sometimes she uses that to turn something to her advantage and he thinks that just plain unfair. There are so many things about her that just contradict themselves and he has to just give up trying to figure her out. He just has to leave it at what it is and accept that with all her good traits, come the bad ones to match. He thinks it might be easier to do with her than any of his other teammates.
Artie surprised the crap out of him with how cool he actually was. When they worked on their mash ups for their competition against the girls he'd laughed and joked and fit right in with him and his buddies. Mike thinks it was weird how he just fell into conversation with them like he belonged there. Without the girls around Artie unleashed this crazy side that was completely and totally teenage boy. Not that Mike didn't think he was a teenaged boy when the girls were around, but their absence certainly helped them bond over dirty jokes far easier. It kind of became a ritual that when they had to carry him in or out of the auditorium someone would have something on standby to make the guys all laugh.
His football teammates are so different from his glee ones. The glee ones are a variety. They are all different and they use that to strengthen the team. The football ones are generally one in the same. Sometimes Mike thinks their brains are all on the same wavelength. He's just glad that he never really conformed to their way of being, of bullying and mocking. And looking over at his friend, his best friend, he's really glad he didn't either. And it's with that thought, the thought that he likes being different, that finalizes his decision.
"Hey man," he says, propping himself up on his elbows and looking over to Matt, who turns from the window curiously.
"Sup?"
"I know where I'll be at three-thirty tomorrow." Matt raises a questioning eyebrow, clearly wanting to know where, and Mike hesitates in telling him. Not because he's reconsidering by any means, but because he doesn't want to pressure his friend's choice in anyway. "Look, we're friends right? Best friends?"
"Right," Matt nods warily.
"I'm not going to tell you where I'll be," Mike says. He quickly continues when he see Matt frown and open his mouth to question him. "I want you to pick where you go because it's where you want to be. If we pick the same thing, I want it to be because you want to be there, not because my decision somehow influenced you."
Matt's silent for a minute and then he nods. "Whatever," he says, "I'm pretty sure I know where I'm going too."
Mike gives him a half smile, "here's to hoping we know what we're doing."
Matt laughs and gives his friend a smirk. "When the hell have we ever known what we were doing?"
Mike waits around the corner from Matt's locker at three-fifteen to see if his friend takes off for football practice. As the seconds pass and all that happens is Matt pulls out his backpack and starts putting the books he'll need to bring home in it Mike gets hopeful. Did they pick the same thing? Were they really both doing this? He waits longer, just to make sure Matt isn't just stalling before going to the locker room. He imagines it's a pretty tense place to be right now, the team waiting to see which of them will show and which won't. He wonders if Puck is there now, laughing and joking with the guys like nothing ever changed. When the clock hits three-twenty-eight he decides it's safe to go approach his friend – who he's giddy to see is still at his locker and not in the locker room.
"Hey," he says as casually as he can as he stops a few feet away, hands in his pockets.
"Hey," Matt smirks, "so this is it huh?"
"This is it," Mike agrees.
"You're not going to take off to the locker room at the last minute are you?" Matt asks.
"Are you?" he counters.
Matt doesn't bother to answer him and zips his backpack up before putting it in his locker instead. "You ready?"
"I'm ready," Mike agrees.
"Let's go," Matt says, shutting his locker and taking the first few steps in their direction, "today's probably the worst possible day for us to be late."
Mike falls into step beside his friend. They walk in silence and it's not until they're nearly there that he stops. "Wait," he says suddenly. Matt stops and just raises an eyebrow at him, daring him to say he changed his mind or something like that. That's not what Mike has to say though and instead he says one of the most honest things he's ever told his friend. "I'm really fucking happy you're here."
"Me too man," Matt answers sincerely. "Good to know our loyalties are with the same side."
"Yeah," Mike nods and takes a deep breath. "Alright, let's go." Mike leads the rest of the way to the room and they walk in just minutes late. The sincerely warm response is enough to make him question why he would ever even consider the football team.
A/N: Mikes views on the other glee members aren't neccessarily my views on them. Some of them are, but some of them are things my friends have said about the characters and dreamt up themselves as traits. So if I maybe dissed your favorite character somewhere in there, I apologize. I pretty much like them all, myself.