Today was the day. Today was the day that William Shuester finally got his Glee club off the ground. The school day had been rough and many of his students had seemed to notice how distant he was. Not that he could be bothered by that, no, he was so excited that not even Sue herself could bring him down today.
Will practically skipped around the corner, yanking the sign-up sheet off the wall. He frowned a little when he saw how empty it was, but quickly shook that off. Everyone had to start somewhere. Reading through the names, he realized he didn't know most of these people. Rachel Berry he had heard of; her attitude was often complained about in the staff room. But Mercedes Jones and Artie Abrams were unknown, and all he knew about Tina Cohen-Chang was she had a stutter. However, the last name, which was written somewhat sloppily across the bottom, threw him for a loop. Kurt Hummel.
He had never actually met Kurt, but he had heard a lot about him. Mainly about his outbursts, or how he would talk to seemingly no one. It was well known across the staff that Kurt was schizophrenic, but he realized at that moment that he didn't even know what that was. He was pretty sure that was the one where they had multiple personalities. Like they had many people in their heads. Will shuddered a little, he wasn't sure if he was ready to handle that.
Auditions were that afternoon, and so far everything had gone smoothly. Rachel had killed it, Mercedes had a killer voice that would sound great at the end of a song, Artie was good, but could use some improvement, and Tina did much better than expected. The only one left was Kurt. Will had prepared himself incase something happened, though realistically he knew he should be fine. Kurt, from what he had gathered from teachers, had been doing very well lately, and had been, for the most part, stable and a good student. Will noted as Kurt walked in how he was dressed very nicely, and his hair was combed perfectly. The boy seemed tense, but Will calked that up to nerves. As the boy reached the stage and started to readjust his scarf, Will spoke up. "Have you prepared a song to go along with our audition prompt?" If Will was being honest he was very proud of his prompts. That was always a big deal when he was in glee, so when the idea to do a "tell me about yourself" song came into his head, he went with it.
"Um, yes I believe so," Kurt said, in a clear, high voice. "Should I just begin?" Will nodded, and Kurt took in a deep breathe.
"I'm not clear, how it is that I ended up here
Déjà vu, think of you, now so far, once so near
Tangled in my own reflection, on the way down, fade away
With my hands on my mind I hold wounds that won't mend"
Kurt looked so into the music that Will couldn't help but be a tad uncomfortable. He wasn't sure how ready he was for this.
"Don't hate me now; they've torn away the ground from under me
Right after they were reassured that I believed
Normality, is not a word I understand at all
I set myself up for the fall
Withdrawing deep into the hole
This isolated little cell leaves me cold and faded
I'm my one and only friend, I am my worst enemy
I find new methods to pretend that this is not reality
Just stay far away from me when I fade away from me
When I'm not what I used to be
When I fade away from me."
Kurt finished, and for a second stood still looking off over Will's head. Will coughed lightly, and Kurt looked back down, expectant for a critique. Will took in a deep breathe, how did he handle the fact that none of the others were this gloomy?
"Well Kurt that was really good," Kurt broke into a smile, nodding as if he already knew. "But I do have one question, and please, don't take offense to this." Will looked Kurt in the eye, "Are you sure you're ready to do this?" Kurt still looked confused, so Will quickly elaborated. "I mean, this is going to be a lot of extra work, and stress, and I don't know if you feel like you're…mentally prepared for this challenge. I don't want to put the other kids in danger." And with that a wave of sadness washed over Kurt's face, turning quickly into a scowl.
"Mr. Shuester, I need to ask you one question, and please don't take offense to this, but do you even know what schizophrenia is?" Kurt paused, glaring at Will, who flushed with embarrassment. Kurt rolled his eyes dramatically, "That's what I thought. Now I on the other hand was diagnosed at 10 and have been living with it basically my entire life, so I'm sorry if I don't take concern very seriously from a man who knows nothing about what's going on." Will opened his mouth to protest, but Kurt wasn't done. "Furthermore, I'm not some dangerous criminal, and I assure you your other Glee club participants are safe. I have every right to be in this club." Before Will could respond, Kurt had spun on his heel and stormed off the stage. Will watched him go and couldn't help but to smile. He was going to like this kid.
"Alright kids, we have a new member trying out today!" Blaine smiled a little as she shifted anxiously outside the door, waiting for his cue to come in. Mr. Shu seemed to enjoy being dramatic. "Please give a warm welcome to…Blaine Anderson!" And with that Blaine walked through the door, grinning as he was loudly cheered for. Looking around the room he realized he recognized quite a few of these kids from class. He was a tad taken aback by Kurt, who was sitting on the ground instead of a chair like the rest of the students, and seemed like he had changed. A man who looked about mid-thirties stood about two meters behind him, and seemed to almost be watching Kurt. "So Blaine, how about you go through a quick introduction before you sing your audition."
Oh good, he was auditioning in front of everyone. "Well, as said, I'm Blaine Anderson-""Hey Blaine!" Shouted the shaggy blonde with the large mouth. Blaine recognized him from his math class, so he gave a smile of acknowledgement. "Um, I've lived in this area most of my life, but I'm just transferring from Dalton Academy and-"He was abruptly cut off by a short brunette in the front row. "Um, yes, hi, Mr. Shu are you not worried that he's a spy? I don't think we should trust a past warbler." The whole room groaned, and Blaine saw Mr. Shu run a hand across his face. Blaine waited for someone to start laughing, but when it became clear it wasn't a joke, he pushed on.
"Well I can assure you that I'm not here to spy, I want to beat them as much as you do." He punctuated this with a light laugh, but it was clear the girl was not satisfied. "So why did you transfer huh? Did you not like it there? Not enough solos?"
"No, I loved Dalton," Blaine confessed, "but it…it wasn't working. Like budget wise. My parents couldn't afford it any longer…" he trailed off, hoping she would take this. The blonde guy from math gave him a look of understanding, which was a relief from the sympathy he expected. Unfortunately, the girl was not done; she had instead pulled out a giant portfolio and was sifting through it page by page.
"Couldn't afford it huh…look guys," she paused, glaring at him directly, "I don't buy this. As you all know I keep tabs on all the local and nationally ranked show choirs and according to my records 'Blaine Anderson,' if that is your real name, couldn't have been on the Dalton show choir because he has NOT performed the past competition season, and Dalton Academy Warblers are known for their mandatory-"
"My God, cancer, I had brain cancer!" All the eyes in the room locked on Blaine, and he instantly regretted his outburst. He was never one who was known for being in full control of his emotions, and then the whole brain tumor thing didn't help much. He sucked in a deep breath; he was in too deep now. "I missed competition season because I was in the hospital going through treatment and they didn't want me exerting myself that much, and my parents couldn't afford it any longer because chemo and radiation aren't cheap so I had to switch back to public, and today has been my first full day back at school since forever and all I want is to join the goddamn glee club, is that too much to ask for you?" Blaine yanked off his beanie, it was getting hot and there was no point in hiding it now. He tried to ignore the slight gasp the crossed the room, instead focusing on calming his shaking hands. He looked up and saw the looks of sympathy on the face of every glee member…every glee member other than Kurt who seemed suddenly intrigued.
"I…I'm so….I didn't know it just" Rachel fumbled over words, looking like she was on the verge of tears.
"God Rachel I swear sometimes you're more paranoid than I am," Blaine's head darted up. He looked over to see Kurt sitting with an amused smile. Strangely, everyone else in the club seemed just as surprised as him. Kurt laughed softly at his own joke, and Blaine struggled not to think about how angelic Kurt was when he didn't look like he was on the verge of mental collapse. The group seemed to be stuck in an uncomfortable silence when Mr. Shu clapped his hands loudly, breaking everyone out of their fog.
"Well, on that note, Blaine, would you like to sing?"
"Of course," Blaine nodded at the pianist, and drew in a deep breath,
"Another turning point, a fork stuck in the road,
Time grabs you by the wrist, directs you where to go
So make the best of this test and don't ask why
It's not a question, but a lesson learned in time
It's something unpredictable, but in the end it's right,
I hope you had the time of your life.
Blaine paused, giving the instrumentals time to draw out their part. He let the music wash over him and ground him into the present.
"So take the photographs, and still frames in your mind
it on a shelf in good health and good time
Tattoos and memories and dead skin on trial
For what it's worth it was worth all the while
It's something unpredictable, but in the end is right,
I hope you had the time of your life.
It's something unpredictable, but in the end is right,
I hope you had the time of your life.
It's something unpredictable, but in the end is right,
I hope you had the time of your life."
There was a moment of silence before everyone broke into applause, even Kurt. Rachel nodded, smiling softly at him. He had made it.
"Well, well I think it's safe to say you're in Blaine." Will clapped Blaine on the back, and ow he really needed to talk to him about that area. Blaine grinned widely, trotting over to take a seat next to the shaggy blonde.
"Hey, that was good," the boy said, sticking out his hand, "I'm Sam by the way. We're in math together remember?" Blaine nodded and happily returned the handshake.
The rest of glee club was fairly uneventful, and the majority of it seemed to switch between random outbursts of song, Mr. Shu arguing with Rachel, and the Hispanic cheerleader making snide comments about everything from Mr. Shu's love life to Finn's "Pillsbury doughboy" body. She even had the guts to make fun of Blaine's hair, or as she said "head fuzz," which was both shocking and impressive. Blaine decided that they would get along well.
There was about ten minutes left of practice, and Blaine had hit a bit of a wall. He felt the fatigue seeping in, but was trying desperately to fight it. The loud music was giving him a bit of a headache, but nothing he wasn't used to. They were finishing up their dance practice, well, everyone except Kurt who had frantically walked out of the room about halfway through club, followed closely by the man watching him. They were on the last few moves when out of nowhere a lady in a tracksuit barreled into the room.
"William! What kinda of messed up, unorganized club are you running here?" The lady yanked the plug on the stereo, and Blaine was suddenly incredibly intimated. Something about this woman freaked him out. "Schizo is walking through the halls telling me he can't leave the building because he'll be killed, his crazy babysitter is not helping, and I've received three calls from some kid's mom asking when practice will be over!" Mr. Shu sighed, opening his mouth to protest, but the woman cut him off. "Clearly you have no control over this club, so Blaine. Raise a hand." Everyone in the club turned to him as he slowly put his hand up. Kurt wasn't the only one scared of being killed at this point. "Oh good, Baldie, call your mom and tell her when you're going to be home. She's having a panic attack or something I don't know, just don't make me deal with this." And with that she slammed the door and was gone, leaving Blaine incredibly confused.
"Okay, well, practice over guys, I don't think we're recovering from that," Mr. Shu conceded. Everyone nodded, and the room broke into a light chatter. Blaine jogged over to his bag, only to find 13 missed texts and 7 missed calls from his mom. Groaning, he quickly texted her back, assuring her he was alive and well, and he was on his way home. As he was putting all his stuff back away, he couldn't help but overhear the conversation between Finn and Puck.
"Dude," Puck said, "Kurt's not doing so well. What's going on?" Now Blaine's interest was piqued, and he purposely spent extra time reading through all the texts his mom and sister, and even Coop had sent him.
"I dunno man, he's slipping hard. He doesn't sleep, sometimes he can't talk, we have to remind him to shower or eat, and sometimes it's a struggle even to get him to leave the house. Plus he's covered up all his room's windows with newspaper, and he keeps saying that the weather man is giving him messages. None of which actually make sense." Finn sighed, clearly very stressed out. Blaine concluded that he and Kurt must be brothers, but would that make them twins? He shook his head; nothing about this made sense.
"Dude if he's that bad is he going back to St. Mary's soon?" Now Blaine was definitely interested. That was the exact hospital he had been at. But Finn shook his head, "No, probably not soon soon. Burt wants to keep him close, it's some family thing. Plus his therapist said it might help if we keep him in the real world for a while and let him interact with healthy people and live with his family." Finn stopped-biting his lip, before continuing. "Don't tell anyone I said this, but I almost wish we would put him back into the unit. He does better there, and honestly I think if Burt was willing to put him in for an extended time it would help. I love Kurt to death, but it's hard having him at home, ya know?" Puck nodded, giving Finn an awkward side hug. Finn muttered something about how "we better go find him," and with that they left, leaving Blaine with more questions than ever.