Hey guys. This chapter isn't as long as usual (I needed a break after the monster that was Valentine. So happy you all liked it btw - thanks for the lovely reviews) but I thought it would be nice to post it today seeing as it's my birthday! I am now 20 years of age and still completely obsessed with Glee :D *regrets nothing*

So, enjoy!

Liz xxx

Chapter 31 - Debate

The library was busy. Very busy in fact. We'd been squished onto a small table right in the centre, surrounded by people frantically cramming for tests and groups meeting to discuss presentations. This was the last place I would have thought to have a tutoring session. Especially considering the person it was with.

"Sorry, it's a bit cramped in here." Gabriel said, digging into his bag for his Trig book and setting it neatly onto his desk. I have to admit I was impressed. I'd been expecting for us to meet somewhere quiet and secluded, or even worse – in his dorm room. But he was obviously through with trying to win me over. Or at least I hoped he was. Gabriel had grown up.

"It's fine." I replied with a smile. "As long as you can concentrate."

"I'm sure I'll be ok." Returning the smile the Wildeian brandished his pen and set it onto a clean page. "So, are we starting from the beginning?"

"I thought that would be a good place." I'd be lying if I said I hadn't enjoyed creating a study programme for my fellow junior, and to my horror the pleasure had mainly been in the charts and pretty note cards, instead of the feeling of helping someone out. I was definitely turning into Miss Pillsbury. "Try these equations for me and we'll see what stage you're at." I pointed to some questions on the first page and Gabriel immediately began scribbling. His enthusiasm was definitely evident.

"So, what did you and Blaine get up to for Valentines?" I stopped dead. Snapping my head over I searched in vain for the sarcastic look, the jealousy in his eyes, anything. Gabriel stared back at me like I had something funny on my shirt.

"Um…" This was weird. Too weird. He was normal. "Are you sure you want to know?"

"Of course. I'm not like that anymore. We're friends remember?" I was still gobsmacked. This was the guy that barely weeks ago had almost started a fight at a party – shot eye daggers that would have killed instantly. I wondered if this was a test, whether proceeding was going to trigger off an alarm and cause immediate evacuation of the library and the area surrounding it. But of course, the urge to talk about Blaine was far too much to pass up. Gabriel was just going to have to deal with it.

"Well…" I dithered, wondering how to phrase it, before giving up. "It was amazing. We went for a picnic in the woods nearby but it started raining so we had to leave early and we got so wet I had to borrow some of Blaine's clothes and then we watched Aladdin and Blaine serenaded me and told me he loved me then we spooned on the bed and it was the most romantic thing I have ever experienced." The words had burbled out before I'd even had time to stop (or edit) them – instinctively I looked back at my pupil expecting to see the mask of okayness gone – the fire raging. But again to my surprise it remained.

"He said he loved you?" This had to be it – he wouldn't be able to stay calm through this. I braced myself for the tirade.

"Yeah."

"And you love him back?"

"Hell yeah."

"Well, that's awesome." I almost fell off my chair. Gabriel had gone back to doing his work and unable to stop myself I twisted my head so I could look up at his expression, my mouth hanging open. This couldn't be happening…

"Er, Kurt – what are you doing?" I suddenly realised how strange I looked and my face flushed red, instantly drawing back.

"Sorry. It's just…I wasn't expecting you to…"

"You were expecting me to be mad?" I blushed again.

"Well, um, yeah." Gabriel sighed.

"I guess I have myself to blame for that." He tapped his pen on his work and leant back in his chair. "I realise now that chasing after you was only going to make things worse. That it would make you hate me more than love me. And I value your friendship more than that." Holy hell. This was a turn up for the books.

"Thanks…I'm glad." I wasn't lying. Before the weirdness he really had been a nice person. Gabriel smiled, the boyish good looks I'd seen on our date showing through, before he went back to his work.

"Did…you do anything?" I was still speaking sheepishly, wondering how far to push it, but was still only faced with calm.

"Oh, no, not really. I've never really been that big on Valentines anyway. But what you and Blaine did was adorable." Pushing his paper over I remembered the real reason I was here and quickly glanced over the answers, nodding in approval.

"Well, you got most of these right, but there are a few issues we need to correct. For example here…" I pointed out the mistakes and Gabriel nodded intently, staring down as my fingers danced across the page. This was going to be much easier than I'd thought.

Later on that day Gabriel and I both headed to the Warblers rehearsal room, which was doubling up as the auditorium for the debate teams house contest. Wes was going out for Wordsworth and I'd promised I'd go support him – Wilde had already lost to them in the previous semi final so it was a fight for the top points with Darwin. (No surprise there – rumours had been circulating everywhere of a fixing between the Ds so Xavier could keep his team well rested.) When we reached the room I was surprised to see it so packed, still not fully adjusting to the tolerance level Dalton housed. The McKinley team were lucky to have enough people to compete, let alone anyone coming to watch them.

"Busy busy." Gabriel muttered to himself. I spotted Artem waving at me and went over – he'd saved me a seat in the front row but Gabriel had to pull one down from another behind to perch on.

"Wow, nice seats." I said, impressed. Artem smiled.

"We were here early. Brought some reading." He held up a newish copy of Vogue and I laughed, taking a glance of the cover.

"Ooh, Gwyneth Paltrow…" My hands had reached out to take it from him, but I was interrupted by a sharp tap on my shoulder. "Hmm?" Looking up I faltered. Phoenix and Oscar were standing centimetres away, the height difference from me sitting making them look rather menacing and scary. They did not look pleased to be attending the event.

"Oh hi-"

"-We know it was you." Phoenix didn't stop for pleasantries, launching straight into his attack. I raised my hands up in defence.

"Woah, guys, steady on. I have no idea what you are talking about." Mocking laughs echoed out.

"You know exactly what we're talking about." Oscar stepped forward so our feet were almost touching. "The water balloons. We know you helped Macleod." Now I understood. The idea of them having some undercover mole to scout out their competition didn't surprise me, although I was quite impressed. Aside from analysing DNA from the discarded water balloons there was no obvious way of connecting me.

"Now, we know you're a newbie, and he probably made you do it – so we're gonna cut you a bit of slack." They were now closed around me, their voices taking on a hushed tone that made me nervous. I could see Gabriel looking anxious but he didn't interfere.

"But if you do any more, if we catch you,"

"And we will catch you."

"You're in this. And you suffer the consequences." For a second I wondered if I was supposed to be scared. I mean, it was just pranking – I was hardly going to get maimed. But they seemed to be taking it very seriously.

"Ok, I get it. Pranking's not my thing anyway." The two boys surveyed me carefully, their striking green and blue eyes scrutinising my placid expression.

"We knew you were sensible." Phoenix smiled, a strange smile, and then, just like that – they were gone.

"What was that all about?" I turned my attention back to Gabriel, who looked confused and slightly concerned.

"You don't wanna know. Seriously." I could see he was going to press me, but was halted by a voice booming out of the small PA system that had been erected.

"If we could have some silence please. The debaters are about to take to the stage." Instantly the room hushed and five boys from Darwin and Wordsworth houses walked silently up the steps, taking a seat behind the wooden tables we normally used for meetings. I saw Wes looking rather nervous and gave him a small wave – he smiled and nodded back in return. Blaine wasn't far behind and he grinned in a way that made me glad I was sitting. Just seeing his face reminded me of waking up next to him – how amazing it had felt. That and the huge morning make out session we'd had afterwards. I wanted to make that compulsory every time one of us stayed over. The Darwin competitors looked rather scary, in the sense that half of them had glasses and had all decided to style their hair in the same side-parting fashion. Xavier proudly marched up beside them also sporting the look and I was annoyed to find that it made him decidedly more attractive. The smug look of confidence on his face however, cancelled that out.

"Welcome to the house cup debating final." A boy with a Dahl pin on his lapel spoke into the mic connected to the PA system and I turned to look at Gabriel, giving him a 'this is it' look.

Each team was allowed to pick a category from the several on offer – Wordsworth went first and picked Democracy. Despite the hard task the Darwin team came up with a very strong argument – I found myself somehow leaning towards the idea of dictatorship even though it was completely immoral. The chief debater of their team, a tall gangly boy called Corey, had the strangest accent I'd ever heard – it was like a combination of Queens English and Southern drawl. He was mesmerising though. When the first debate finished Xavier went over to congratulate his comrades, a grin on his face the size of Texas.

"S'not looking good." Gabriel said, a despondent look on his face. I saw Blaine giving the Wordsworthians a team talk and nodded.

"Hmm. But I'm sure Blaine's riling them up." Suddenly from the other side of the room I noticed Scott dashing through the seats, knocking into people and hurriedly shouting apologies. He went to run the opposite direction but I was having none of it – beckoning him over.

"What the hell are you doing?" Despite the fact that I hadn't expected him to be attending, he looked very flushed and excited – and that worried me.

"Just attending to some business." There was a wicked smile on his face, and my keen eyes spotted something in his hand that looked like a memory stick. What was he playing at? "Gotta go sorry!" I let out a cry of annoyance but it was no use. My best friend sped off and I raised my hands in the air, before letting them drop down loudly to my sides.

"What was all that about?" Gabriel asked, for the second time that afternoon. I laughed.

"I have no idea. But whatever it is, I don't think it's good."

The next debate started and Scott was long forgotten – Darwin picked animal testing and completely rocked it – despite Wes making a valiant effort to counter attack. It looked like it was going to be a walk-over for the opposing house, so I began to switch off, thinking about my next date with Blaine, which we'd planned for a couple of days from now. We were starting to get really busy with Warbler rehearsals and of course mid term revision, so things like that were going to become more infrequent. It almost seemed cruel to take it away just when thing had begun to get serious. And very juicy. I was just getting into a particularly nice replay of the 'pyjama debacle' when a loud gasp rushed around the room like a Mexican wave. Immediately I sprung to attention, wondering if somebody had passed out or there was a masked murderer waving an axe – but then the gasps turned to laughs. The screen that had been showing the discussion options now no longer had words dotted across it. Instead it was now displaying two photos – one of a dark skinned boy dressed completely in drag and another of a blonde haired individual singing into a mirror with a hairbrush. I groaned.

"OH NO." The photos were horrendous. If I were Oscar or Phoenix I would be hiding under my seat, and from the looks of the two of them you could probably fry an egg on their faces. By now everyone was looking at them, and despite various pleas from the PA system to stop the laughing and calm down, the noise continued to bubble. Great.

I looked around for Scott, the obvious perpetrator for the crime, but he was nowhere to be seen, probably watching from a window somewhere laughing his head off. It was a good prank – a brilliant one even. Oscar and Phoenix were mortified and there was another tally added to the Macleod set - a tally that was beginning to look pretty impressive. But then it hit me. Neither of them had seen Scott. Neither of them knew it was him. I was the only person in the room they knew was involved with the pranks that wasn't them.

"Stop grinning." I suddenly said to myself hurriedly, my tone panicked. Stop grinning. If you're not grinning they'll know it wasn't you. But I couldn't stop. The photos were funny. Scott was a genius. But right now I hated him for not being there. Because the two boys that obviously liked to play dress up and Singstar in their spare time were now looking at me. And it wasn't a look that said 'well played, nice one' or 'you got us'. It was a look of death. A look that said, no, screamed 'you are dead. We gave you a chance, and now you are in this prank war.'

It looked like I was gonna have to watch my back from now on.