By mid-August, Will's got his lesson plans mapped out and he's starting to think about strategies for competing. He has to wonder if the teams are going to be randomized this year like they were last year, if they'll be up against Vocal Adrenaline for Sectionals or Regionals or if they'll be able to avoid that until the end.
He's certainly not thinking about this whole Dustin thing in the long-term, even when he finds himself wondering just how Dustin would react if New Directions did knock Vocal Adrenaline out of competition before Nationals. He's not sure how seriously Dustin really takes them as rivals, but he knows Dustin just tends to talk about Nationals like it's a foregone conclusion that his team will be there, because for Vocal Adrenaline, it always has been. Will's been thinking about borrowing some of Dustin's more obvious strategies, in terms of rehearsal schedule and more intricate choreography, because surely he can do that without resorting to putting the kids on IV drips and working them until they drop.
The problem is that it just isn't quite as satisfying now to think of crushing Vocal Adrenaline and moving on to Nationals without them to contend with. It's still satisfying, to be sure, but there's not nearly as much pleasure in it when he's aware of the fact that it would put Dustin's job in jeopardy, and when he's come to actually care about that. As Dustin had pointed out himself, he wasn't hired to teach. He doesn't have anything to fall back on if Carmel gets rid of him.
Well. It is what it is. Neither of them is going to back down; they'll both be giving it everything they've got this year, and may the best man win. Dustin's certainly not going to be sacrificing any of his competitive edge for Will's sake.
This isn't the kind of thing to be thinking about right now, though, at five in the morning when it's barely light out and Dustin is curled warmly around him, arm wrapped tight around his waist from behind, breathing slowly and evenly against the back of his neck. Will might have objected to being the little spoon, had they been awake when they'd wound up in this position, but right now, it feels nice to just bask in it. This relationship is built on a lot of unspoken agreements, and one of them is that they don't bring up the subject of Will's sexual orientation. Dustin, who swings enthusiastically both ways, doesn't have a lot of patience for Will's questioning and doublethink and delicate balancing act, but he also seems to be afraid of scaring Will off, and he anticipates the kinds of things Will's comfortable with and doesn't ask any more of him. He's only complained once, and he'd been facetious about it, but sometimes it does make Will think. It's not like anyone else is ever going to know about this. It doesn't make Will like women any less.
He drifts off again, leaning back against Dustin and letting Dustin hold onto him a little tighter in his sleep. When he wakes again, it's late in the morning, sun streaming through the windows, and Dustin's actually beaten him to the shower for once.
"I woke up this morning and the sun was gone, / Turned on some music to start my day, / And lost myself in a familiar song, / I closed my eyes and I slipped away..."
Will stretches luxuriously, making himself comfortable in bed and grinning as he joins in the chorus.
"It's more than a feeling-"
"More than a feeling-"
"When I hear that old song they used to play..."
There's nothing like a classic to sing at the top of his voice in the morning to put him in a good mood, and it's late enough that they're probably not even bothering the neighbors with it. He's missed doing this. He hadn't been sure why Dustin had stopped, but there had been a few days where he'd found excuses to avoid it, or simply not bothered at all, and Will had been a little worried. His own shower is working again, and he really doesn't need to use Dustin's at all anymore, but singing alone isn't the same. He lets Dustin take the last chorus, with the difficult high note, and Dustin doesn't disappoint.
Dustin comes back into the bedroom with a towel around his waist, whistling absently. "Shower's free," he says, but Will thinks it can wait a little while. He pushes the covers aside, propping himself lazily up on one elbow.
"Don't get dressed," he says, glancing at the towel. "Come here."
He wonders if Dustin's ever going to stop looking wary when Will initiates things. Surely he's learned by now that Will's not just doing it to get something from him. Still, Dustin immediately obliges, sitting on the edge of the bed.
"What are you thinking?"
Will moves aside and tugs on Dustin's arm until he's back in bed. Dustin tosses the towel on the floor, smirking lasciviously, his wariness gone.
Will has never really let himself appraise Dustin, the way Dustin so often does to him. He knows Dustin finds him attractive, and it's mutual-Dustin hardly needs anyone else to tell him how good-looking he is, because he does quite enough acknowledging of that on his own, but it's still undeniable that he's gorgeous. Will's not blind. His appreciation just isn't as overtly sexual as the way Dustin looks at him and touches him, because it's like he has a brake mechanism in his brain that he engages every time his thoughts turn in that direction. His eyes always skim over Dustin's body, never linger, and maybe-just once-he should try actually looking.
"Seriously," Dustin murmurs, "what are you thinking?"
Will runs a hand slowly down his side, over his hip, acutely aware of Dustin's eyes on him, and of the anticipatory tension in Dustin's body. He's never had a problem touching Dustin, or even looking him in the eye while doing it, but this is different. Even if his instinct weren't to compare and contrast, he can't help but feel a little insecure, because Dustin's built like a Greek god, and his competitive nature certainly isn't because he's compensating for anything. Will's abs are a lot nicer, though, so he holds onto that.
"You were saying I never reciprocate anything," he says, pressing his lips just above Dustin's navel, nuzzling against shower-damp skin. "I thought I should fix that."
He can feel how much that thought turns Dustin on, hear him letting out an uneven breath and swallowing hard, and knowing that makes Will flush with want. "Yeah," Dustin says, his voice husky with arousal, "it's about time." He softens that with a hand on Will's shoulder, steadying him.
Will wraps his fingers around Dustin and strokes him until Dustin's leaning back into the pillow and whispering "Come on," rocking into Will's hand. Will doesn't think he can articulate what it is about this that he finds so hot, because it's not about having Dustin at his mercy, like it might once have been, and it's not about what he's about to do, and maybe it's a little bit about how stunning Dustin is when he's naked and pleading, but that's not all of it. He remembers that encounter in the theater, and just recalling it is enough to make him half hard, but he remembers how Dustin hadn't even hesitated for a second to get on his knees and suck Will's cock. It hadn't meant anything to him, it hadn't been submission or surrender, he'd just enjoyed it, he'd wanted to do it, and he'd made sure Will wanted it even more.
He slides his mouth over Dustin's cock, unsure how much he's supposed to try to take in at once, what he should do with his hands. He anchors them on Dustin's hips and slowly explores with his tongue, letting himself be guided by Dustin's reactions. He's always secretly liked Dustin's tendency to give orders and keep up an obscene running commentary during sex, but now more so than ever, because he can use guidance like "god, yes, keep doing that" and "slower, not quite so-yeah, like that, just like-fuck." It helps to have Dustin's hand in his hair, because he's careful about it, careful not to move too much or thrust into Will's mouth or anything Will couldn't handle, even as his voice grows thicker and more breathless and his free hand grasps a fistful of the sheets. "Fuck, Will, that's perfect."
Will almost stops at that, almost looks up at him, because he doesn't know which part of that stuns him more-being called by his first name, or the fact that the infamously-never-satisfied Dustin Goolsby just called something 'perfect.'
He'll demand an explanation for that as soon as his mouth is free, but he's not cruel enough to stop now, when he knows how close Dustin is. He swallows around Dustin's cock and digs his nails into his hips because he knows Dustin likes it to hurt, and Dustin's hand clenches tight in his hair as he comes hard, gasping something incoherent, only just barely managing not to arch upward.
Will spits into a tissue and throws it away, and even while breathless and recovering, Dustin manages to roll his eyes. It's only for a moment before he pushes Will back onto the mattress and pins him by the shoulder, leaning down to kiss him, already stroking him to full hardness, and as badly as Will wants to let him, he puts a hand on Dustin's chest just to stop him for a minute. "'Perfect?'" he says, raising an eyebrow. "I didn't think you believed in perfect."
"What?" It takes Dustin a minute to remember what he'd said. "It's a figure of speech. I was caught up in the moment."
"Sure." Will grins at him, just to make Dustin kiss him harder to shut him up. Dustin slides down his body, sucking a faint bruise onto Will's hipbone, licking a long, slow stripe up the underside of his cock, and Will leans his head back with a moan. Dustin is better at this than he'll ever be, and he has this way of holding onto Will and still encouraging him to move, of using his tongue in ways Will would never be able to replicate, and it's fantastic. He hums something around Will's cock, possibly music, possibly just a vibrating moan of pleasure, but it pushes Will over the edge with a fervent groan, and he can't resist pressing up into Dustin's mouth. He holds tight onto Dustin's shoulders through the aftershocks, as Dustin languidly licks around his shaft.
Dustin slides up to lie next to him, moving in for a brief, tender, almost-chaste kiss, tracing his tongue along Will's lower lip. Will flops back onto the mattress, exhausted. "Really, though. Perfect?"
"For christ's sake, Schuester." Dustin looks somewhere between amused and exasperated, and that's another thing Will's got to address.
"We've been doing this for three months, Dustin. I think it's okay to be on a first-name basis now."
Dustin looks over at him, and from the expression on his face, Will wonders if that isn't a more controversial idea than he'd thought. He doesn't know why Dustin seems so resistant to the idea; even when they hated each other, Will still hadn't had any qualms about addressing him by name.
"I've been thinking," Dustin says slowly. "Suppose we keep going with this."
It doesn't entirely surprise Will that Dustin would suggest that. It makes him nervous, because he truly can't tell if Dustin's suggesting this on the spot or if this had been his plan all along. It bothers him because he knows he should have more faith in Dustin by now, and it makes him feel guilty.
"I'm not sure about that, Dustin. I just...I don't think it would work."
"That's exactly what you said when we made out at that bar," Dustin says. "You were wrong then, and you're wrong now. I'm sure you're going to give me some excuse about how I can't be trusted and it's too dangerous and I'm a lying scumbag and all that other shit, but let's face it, Will, if I haven't done anything to sabotage you by now, I'm not going to."
"That's not proof of anything," Will points out, because he can spot at least three gaping holes in that logic. "You haven't sabotaged anything because I don't haveanything for you to sabotage yet. I don't even have a tentative set list for you to steal."
"I'm not-" Dustin breaks off, rubbing his eyes with exasperation. "I'm just curious. Are we taking any of this into account here? This whole...whatever we're doing?"
"What do you mean by 'taking it into account?'" Will narrows his eyes.
Dustin appears to be choosing his words carefully. Will can't help but think of the contrast between this and the breezy, careless bravado of Dustin's 'hey, let's forget about the glee clubs and be summer fuckbuddies' proposal of a few months ago.
"I'm just saying," he says, "that maybe we should reevaluate our original agreement, what with the fact that we actually areenjoying each others' company in ways that don't necessarily involve nudity. Although don't get me wrong, the nudity is awesome."
Will can read between the lines. The part of him that's still wary is being eclipsed by the part of him that feels like a dick. "You're saying you have feelings for me, and that'll keep you from taking advantage of this to win."
Something about the phrasing of that makes Dustin clam up immediately, his expression closing off. "I'm saying that we're both having fun, and if you think about it, there's no reason to give up getting laid on a regular basis. We can give it a test run for one more month. If it's not working, we end it before Sectionals and we're all good, no harm done." There's that breezy tone again, but now that Will knows it's an affectation, it sounds different.
Regardless of what Dustin's motives might be, that's logic Will can get behind, because at the heart of it, he doesn't want to give this up yet. Practically, it sounds like a good idea, but when he thinks about going through an entire school year without speaking to Dustin, except for a few hostile words when they see each other at competitions, it feels lonely.They've spent so much time with each other now that everything about that scenario just makes his chest feel hollow. Dustin's wrong about Will lacking friends his own age; he has plenty of other adults to talk to, but...nothing quite like this. He hasn't had anything like this since Holly, and he hadn't wanted to give that up either.
He's going to give Dustin the benefit of the doubt. Even if it does end badly, maybe some of this will have been worth it anyway.
"Until Sectionals," he says. "My showers do get pretty boring without you, Dustin."
Dustin looks at him, not quite comprehending. "Yeah, but I said-"
"Before Sectionals. I know. I'm seeing your month and raising it another month." It's a spontaneous gesture of goodwill, because he's starting to realize now that if Dustin is just faking the obvious feelings he won't admit to, he's one hell of an actor.
That warm smile of Dustin's looks pretty genuine, too. "Deal," he says. "Until Sectionals."
Will doesn't doubt his decision, even when he looks out at his kids' bright, shining faces in the choir room, watching them eagerly read over the sheet music he's handed out and clamor excitedly about how this is their year, this is the year they take everything, this is the year they stomp Vocal Adrenaline into the ground. It's easy to get caught up in that, because as much as he's come to like Dustin's company, it's nothing compared to this. There's nothing like the joy of seeing his kids happy and motivated and believing in themselves, and he knows they can do this. He wants them to have everything he had. He wants nothing more than for them to know what it feels like to be on top of the world at Nationals.
"You know what we need?" says Puck. "We should have, like, a dartboard. For morale. With pictures of all our competition."
"How would we do that?" Rachel wants to know. "I'm not dismissing the idea, I think it might have some potential motivational benefit, but would we have group pictures of all the choirs who made the top ten last year? Where would we get them?"
"I don't know." Puck shrugs. "I just wanted to throw darts at something. We could use headshots of the coaches."
"We don't even know what most of them look like," Kurt points out. "I mean, have you ever seen the coach of the Portland Scale Blazers?"
"That's what Google's for," says Tina. Will's not liking the direction this conversation is taking.
"I'm sure it would be easy to find a picture of Dustin Goolsby," says Rachel, with a hint of steeliness. "Vocal Adrenaline is our main concern. They're the ones who really need to be on our dartboard."
"Guys." Will holds up his hands, slightly troubled by the bloodthirstiness. "We aren't putting any of our competition on a dartboard. There are better ways to motivate ourselves. Come on."
"I'm totally doing it anyway," he hears Puck mumble under his breath, as he turns away, and Mike and Finn nod encouragingly. Will sighs.
This is fine. He can work with this. They're just enthusiastic, that's all, and that's good. They're going to need enthusiasm to beat the competition, and the competition doesinclude Dustin. Besides, he's fairly certain Dustin would find it hilarious that the kids wanted to put him on a dartboard. He won't be mentioning it, though.
He's drawn up a stricter schedule for rehearsal this year, and he's making the choreography tougher, but the kids don't complain. They want to work harder, and it makes pride well up inside him when he sees them trying so hard.
"Do we still have Sunshine Corazon to worry about?" Finn asks, a couple weeks later. Rachel grimaces.
"She's still with Vocal Adrenaline. I don't know what kind of competition shape she's in, given the way they abuse her, but she did end up staying here and not getting herself deported after all. You should hear some of the stories she tells about Goolsby. They're horrible."
"Guys." Will's just going to cut that off right there, because he doesn't want to hear it. The less he knows about that, the better. "Come on. Let's get back to work."
"I heard he threatens to have their pets killed if they slack off," Kurt chimes in. "If you're late to rehearsal once, he just breaks a limb or cuts off a toe. If you're late three times, Fluffy sleeps with the fishes."
"That's not true." Will rubs his eyes. "Really, guys, I mean it."
"Would you really put it past him?" Rachel folds her arms. "I wouldn't. Vocal Adrenaline crushes souls."
"We're not focusing on Vocal Adrenaline right now. We're focusing on us. Now let's go."
The next time he sees Dustin, though, he has to ask. "You've never killed anyone's pet, have you?"
"What?" Dustin makes a face. "Why not just ask me if I tie women to railroad tracks while twirling a mustache? Of course I don't kill pets."
Will lets out a sigh of relief. "Good. I swear, you wouldn't believe some of the crazy-"
"I mean, why would I need to? Just the threat works fine, trust me. Nobody's ever found out what happens when they're late to rehearsal, because they all show up ten minutes early just to be safe."
As increasingly convinced as Will is that there is something very wrong with any school board that would certify Dustin as a teacher, it doesn't mean he wants to hear his kids badmouthing him, citing urban legends about Vocal Adrenaline as fact, making him sound like some kind of barbaric criminal. He can't deny that Dustin is tyrannical to his students; he's perfectly well aware that the kids of Vocal Adrenaline are terrorized to within an inch of their lives and that their rehearsals are probably in violation of some child labor laws, and yet every time he hears one of his kids talking about this, an instinctive he's not like that rises to his lips. He always has to remind himself not to say it.
It comes to a head about three weeks into September, on a day when nothing is going right. They've never rehearsed this hard this soon, and Will hasn't been doing as many fun exercises. He's not working them too hard, certainly no harder than Shannon works the football team, but it's a departure from the norm, and maybe the kids aren't quite as eager to put in extra effort as they'd seemed. Today, they're grumbling about it, and he keeps having to raise his voice to get their attention. Finn keeps stepping on Sam's feet and Santana's already gotten into a shoving match with Lauren, and after two hours, even Rachel is whining about wanting to go home.
"Just half an hour more, guys," Will pleads. "We haven't gotten it right yet. Your timing is off, and I don't know who it is, but someone's really flat on the second line of the chorus. Can't you hear it?"
"No," Quinn snips. "I think it sounds fine. We have over a month until Sectionals. Why do we have to get it right now?"
This is met with indignant agreement, folded arms, surly glares at Will. "I have to get home and shampoo my cat," says Brittany.
Is there something he's just not seeing? Is he really being unreasonable about this? "What's the matter with you guys?" he demands. "You're being lazy. We need to step up our game if we want to win this year, and you're complaining about having to put in some effort. I really thought better of all of you."
"There's effort and then there's this," Kurt says. "You've had us staying later and later every day this week, Mr. Schue. It's not even October yet."
"Yeah," Finn says, "is it gonna be like this all year? I mean, is it just going to get worse from here? We have football practice to worry about, too. We can't keep doing all this extra stuff."
"We haveto do a little extra," Will insists. "You're the ones who are always worrying about Vocal Adrenaline beating us. This is how we beat them."
"What," Kurt snaps, "by turning into them?"
"I sense IV drips in our future." Santana flops into a chair, folding her arms. "No wonder he never lets us say anything bad about Goolsby anymore."
"Or maybe that's because I think we should be above insulting our competition," Will says, because even if he weren't seriously concerned by Santana's too-accurate implications, it's true. He's trying to set a good example for them, that's all. "Maybe we just disagree on what we need to do if we want to be competitive, guys. Maybe you don't want to make the top ten this year. That's fine. But standing around complaining about having to work hard is not productive."
"I didn't know we were all about productivity," says Kurt.
"I thought you were proud of us even if we didn't make the top ten." Mercedes gives him a baleful, betrayed look. "I thought we were doing this because we love it. Not because we want to beat everybody. I didn't think you cared that we didn't win last time."
"Did something happen over the summer, Mr. Schue?" Mike furrows his brow, earnest and concerned and too insightful for comfort. Will's starting to feel backed into a corner, and he doesn't know what to say to any of this. How do they know? How much do they know?
And how much has Dustin rubbed off on him, anyway? The kids have a point, and it's troubling. He looks away, rubbing his forehead.
"You guys are right," he says finally. "This isn't what we're all about. The last thing I want to do is take the joy out of performing for you. We don't want to be anything like Vocal Adrenaline."
"We do want to win," Rachel reassures him, as the kids gather their things to leave. "And we will. We'll just do it on our own terms, that's all."
That weekend, curled up under the covers at night with his arm around Dustin's waist, his mind is miles away. The room is utterly silent, but it still takes him a moment to notice that Dustin's said something. "What?"
"I was just asking what's wrong with you." Dustin eyes him searchingly. "You've hardly said anything all night. It's boring and kind of creepy."
Will shakes his head, because this isn't the kind of thing they can really talk about. He doesn't want Dustin's advice on it, for one, because that's part of the whole problem to begin with, and anyway, they've decided they're not going to talk about work, for safety's sake.
"Have you ever felt like you're just being pulled apart in different directions by two things you care about?" Maybe if he frames it in more abstract terms, though it's still obvious what he means. Dustin snorts.
"You mean like you and my job? That's a pretty accurate description, yeah." He nestles closer, brushing a kiss against Will's shoulder. "Sometimes I kind of hate you for taking all the fun out of mercilessly slaughtering you."
"All the fun?" Will raises an eyebrow at him. Dustin rolls his eyes, conceding.
"Okay, fine. Most of the fun." He pulls the blankets closer around himself. "...Some of the fun."
"You're so romantic it hurts." Will sifts his fingers through Dustin's hair, and Dustin laughs, deep and quiet and affectionate.
"Seriously, though," he says, making himself more comfortable on Will's pillow. "I'm afraid my kids will think I'm going soft. I need to step up my game, maybe dangle someone's hamster over a blender or something."
"For god's sake, Dustin." There was a time when that wouldn't have made Will laugh, and he tells himself it's because he's not taking it literally now, but...well, there's quite a real possibility that Dustin means it literally. "You wouldn't really, would you?"
"I wouldn't actually drop it in, if that's what you're asking." Dustin seems to sense that this is not a satisfactory answer, though. He sighs. "No, I wouldn't do it. It wouldn't really help maintain the kind of discipline I need. Intimidation is great, and it's useful, but it has to be the right kind of intimidation. Threatening to puree a hamster would just be useless showboating. It's a subtle distinction."
"You're completely missing the point." Will looks down at him. "You get that it's not about whether it would be useful or not, right? The point is that it's morally unconscionable." The way Dustin brushes this off with a dismissive little huff is troubling. "Come on, Dustin. You have to have at least some sense of right and wrong."
"No, I don't. Are you kidding? You know me." Dustin raises his head from Will's shoulder, enough to look him in the eye. "You know I think consciences are overrated."
"I was hoping that was just posturing." He's never been under the impression that Dustin has a heart of gold just under the surface, but he has to admit, he can't bring himself to accept that Dustin is completely amoral. "I don't think you're as bad as you pretend to be."
"And you can keep on thinking that. It's endearing." Dustin kisses his cheek. "Really, I mean it. You're adorable."
"This isn't funny, Dustin." Will pulls away from him, wanting to make him listen. "Why would it even occur to you to traumatize your students that way? Why do you like it when people think you're a monster? Did your parents not hug you enough when you were little?"
"Au contraire. They hugged me way too much." At the look on Will's face, Dustin immediately backtracks. "Jesus, no, not like that. I just meant that they're granola-crunching pacifists who think competition is immoral."
"So you're pretty much saying that your scary sadistic streak is because your parents wouldn't let you be a ruthless little winning machine as a child, and now you overindulge."
"Exactly," says Dustin. "I swear to god, if you spent ten minutes at the school I went to, you'd come out wanting to torture people too. You know how you play tug-of-war on the playground in elementary school?"
"Yeah?"
"We weren't allowed to do that. We had to call it a 'Tug of Conflict Resolution.' Stop laughing, I'm serious."
"I'm sorry." It is funny, though, and a bit of levity is nice to have right now. "But okay, fine, so your school didn't have a glee club and you couldn't compete in things. That's tough, but it's no excuse for treating your kids badly."
"Oh, I'm not using it as an excuse. I'm just complaining about it. I don't have an excuse." He rolls onto his back, staring at the ceiling. "Look, just because I don't like my kids doesn't mean I would actually hurt them, okay? Not on purpose. It's just that I don't have the patience to deal with whiny, incompetent teenagers, and I really like winning things, and scaring the shit out of them makes them listen to me. It's not some big Freudian mystery. You always like to complicate things."
"I'm just trying to figure out what possesses you to do half the things you do." Maybe what really scares Will is the fact that he can understand, at least a little. Having that drive to win is a slippery slope; he's started to see that all too well. Getting frustrated and feeling like anger is justified when his kids don't want to work as hard as he thinks they need to-isn't Dustin's coaching philosophy just that, taken to an extreme? "Why did you even become a teacher in the first place?" he asks. "If you hate it so much, why did you put in the effort to get an education degree at all?"
"The same reason anyone becomes a teacher," says Dustin. "Because I was too dumb to major in something practical, and there's not a whole lot else you can do with a BA in theater."
"That's not why people become teachers, Dustin." Will's voice is chilly, because he knows Dustin's insulting him on purpose. "People pursue teaching because they love it, because they have a passion for something and they want to share it with kids and help a new generation to love it as much as they do."
Dustin appears to be considering this. "You're right," he says contritely, thoughtfully. "You're absolutely right. Say something in Spanish."
"What?"
"I mean, that's why you became a teacher, right? You didn't start out coaching New Directions. You teach Spanish. You must have such a passion for the language. I'm sure you speak it beautifully. Maybe you could recite a poem for me."
Will rubs his eyes. "You know what, Dustin? Your argument isn't going to work. I see what you're doing. You're trying to get me to admit I only became a teacher to pay the bills, just like you did, and that I'm no better than you, but you know that's not true. Because the difference between you and me is that I came to love what I do, and you never will. But even if I didn't love teaching, I still wouldn't terrorize the kids in my Spanish class to the point where they would try to make a run for the Philippine embassy just to get away from me. That's not acceptable. There is no universe in which that is okay."
Even if he regrets turning a perfectly nice afterglow into an argument, he knows he's gotten through to Dustin this time. Even if Dustin's still focused intently on the ceiling, frozen-faced, hands folded atop his stomach, not touching Will at all anymore, he's actually letting this sink in for once.
"Yeah, well," he says, his tone distant and uncharacteristically subdued. "Vive la difference."
Will sighs, reaching over to touch Dustin's arm and make amends, but Dustin jerks away. "Come on," Will says, reluctantly keeping his hands to himself. "I'm sorry, all right? We shouldn't have gotten into this right now."
"Yeah, but we did." At least Dustin isn't pulling away anymore, and that's a step in the right direction. Cautiously, Will eases over until they're touching again, resting lightly against each other.
"I just don't understand," he says. "You act so proud of being cruel and dishonest and not having a conscience, and you go on about how you own it and you don't care, but every time I point out something morally wrong that you're doing, it upsets you. You can't stand it if anyone actually agrees that you're a terrible person."
"No, Will, I can't stand it when you say I'm a terrible person." Dustin shuts his eyes, looking pained. "It's different when you do it, all right? I don't know how, but it is. My own mother thinks I'm an asshole and it doesn't bother me, but I guess you're just fucking special in some way."
It hurts Will to see Dustin so openly distraught, because he's never seemed vulnerable like this before. It hurts to see him in pain, to say nothing of the fist that squeezes Will's heart when he realizes just how much Dustin is admitting to. "I don't think you're a terrible person," he says quietly, though the damage is already done.
"Maybe you should. I don't know." Dustin's voice is resigned and weary. "Can we just...not talk about this anymore?"
They can't just let it go forever. It's going to loom up again someday and they'll have to address it again. But not right now.
He slips his arm around Dustin's waist, spooning almost protectively against him, resting his forehead against Dustin's shoulder from behind. Dustin holds himself stiffly, not reciprocating or cooperating, but gradually, he melts. Will holds him tighter.
"The hell have you done to me, Schuester?" Dustin murmurs, covering Will's hand on his stomach with his own and twining their fingers together. Will shakes his head, not knowing, and closes his eyes.
There are no words for quite how relieved Will is when the list of who's competing where for Sectionals is finally posted. Vocal Adrenaline is in another bracket entirely, competing with a bunch of teams Will's never heard of. New Directions' competition is a little more formidable than usual; they're up against Aural Intensity again, under new management, and there are no schools for the deaf or the elderly on the list this time around, but that's all right. They can handle anything but Vocal Adrenaline. He knows they've gotten lucky.
He can't count on them being this lucky for Regionals, but just for now, the schedule has bought him and Dustin a little more time.