Little Red and the Big Bad Wolf

“Ready to watch your video in Glee?” I asked Puck excitedly, skidding to a stop next to his locker.

He turned and looked at me, rolling his eyes before shutting the door that was separating the two of us. “It’s not that good, you know. It’s not nearly as…realistic as yours and Finn’s is.”

I paused for a second before snickering. “I would say that I’m sure it’s great because you’re in it, but so is Santana, so it’ll probably suck.”

“Thanks for your support.” Puck rolled his eyes and put his arm around my shoulders as we walked into Glee Club.

Finn and Rachel were already there, talking in whispers so quickly that I couldn’t tell if they were angry or not. Of course, my brain decided that they were, and that their argument was about Finn and me kissing, so my face immediately blushed fiercely.

“Hey, Ellie!” Mercedes called from behind me. “Is it true?”

“Uhh…” I shot a look at Puck before turning back to her. “Depends…what did you hear?”

“That you got your ears pierced! Girl, let me see.” She came forward and pushed my hair behind my shoulder, murmuring, “God, I can’t believe that Kurt went with you to get these done and didn’t even think to invite me.” Back at a normal volume, she told me with a grin, “They look great! Bet that Kurt gave you crap about the earring choice, though, huh?”

“Not as much as I thought,” I responded with a smile. “But thanks.”

Mercedes nodded before walking around Puck and me to go find her seat. “God,” I whispered so only he could hear me, “I just about had a heart attack.”

“Why?”

“Because I don’t want the total jaw-dropping part of Finn’s and my music video to be ruined, do I?” I linked my arm with Puck’s and went to sit down.

“Alright, Puck and Santana! You guys are up first,” Mr. Schue announced as he walked into the room, putting his briefcase down on the counter. Behind him, Ms. Pillsbury, the guidance counselor, wheeled in an outdated TV on a huge chipped blue stand.

Puck and Santana exchanged looks before Santana stood up, searching through her bag for the video. She handed it over, looking bored, and sauntered back over to her seat.

Mr. Schue put in the video, and it showed Santana singing at the camera, trying to look as sexy as possible.

Where is the moment we needed the most?
You kick up the leaves and the magic is lost.
They tell me your blue skies fade to gray
They tell me your passion’s gone away
And I don’t need no carryin’ on.

You stand in line just to hit a new low
You’re faking a smile with the coffee to go.
They tell me your life’s been way off line.
You’re falling to pieces every time.
And I don’t need no carryin’ on.

Puck showed up on the screen, playing his guitar, kind of dancing in place. It was obvious that the two of them were in her living room. He sung the chorus well, and then Santana started to sing the next verse.

No offense to them or anything (well, offense to Santana), but it was kind of exactly the music video that I didn’t want Finn and me to produce.

“Great job, guys,” Mr. Schue lied when it finally finished.

Puck snickered next to me before leaning over and whispering, “See how we did it in one day?”

“Clearly,” I responded. “What made you choose Bad Day?”

“It was the first song that came up when I Googled ‘songs about betrayal.’” He grinned at me, and I couldn’t help but laugh.

“Okay, Quinn and Rachel? You guys ready?”

Rachel put a smug look on her face before bouncing up to the front. Then, she turned to face the group of us and started to talk. “I just want to let you all know that it’s too bad that you weren’t chosen to be some of the first ones. None of your music videos will turn out as well as ours did.” When no one clapped or anything, she stood there awkwardly for a second.

“Thank you, Rachel.” Mr. Schue cleared his throat uncomfortably. “You can return to your seat now.”

She kind of curtsied before taking the directions.

The video started, and it showed Rachel and Quinn on a stage (knowing Rachel, it was probably already in her garage or something), and they started to sing “Tango Maureen” from Rent. The beginning was the same as in the movie, them being up on the stage with the microphone, but when it came time for the two of them to tango, they instead took to the streets, pretending that they were undercover, spying on Maureen. Overall, it was pretty cute, and it worked. Of course, when Mark (Quinn) was supposed to say 'fucking', they edited it to 'freaking', and it was more stylized so that it more showed off their voices.

Sorry, did I say their voices? I meant Rachel’s.

When it was finished, everyone clapped, unlike Puck and Santana’s video. “That was really good, guys. Definitely clear that it’s about betrayal.”

Rachel stood up and curtsied again, and Quinn shook her head before resting her head on her hand, trying to block her face. Sam chuckled at her and put his arm around her shoulders, kissing her on the top of the head.

“Awww,” I cooed, turning to look at Puck. “Sam and Quinn are so cute.”

“Yeah…” he trailed off, looking at them over my shoulder. “Whatever you say.”

I nudged him in the ribs when I heard my name called. “What?” I asked, my face mimicking that of a deer stuck in the headlights, and there was a group laugh on my behalf.

“Will you and Finn be ready to present your video tomorrow?” Mr. Schue repeated, not sounding impatient at all.

“Uhhhh…that’s a Finn question.” I turned around so I was facing him. “Finn, will our video be ready by tomorrow?”

“Yeah, sure,” he nodded. “No problem.”

“Okay, great. So Ellie and Finn will go tomorrow, and so will Mercedes and Artie. That’s all for today, guys.”

I grabbed my bag off the floor and slung it over my shoulder. Right as I took a step, my phone started going off. Feeling my face burn, I pulled out my cell phone and answered it, ignoring Puck asking who it was. “Hello?” I questioned, plugging one of my ears so I could hear Aileen better.

“Hi, Ellie? I hope I’m not interrupting Glee Club or anything.”

“No, don’t worry about it. We just finished. What’s up?”

“I just wanted to tell you that I’m so sorry, but I won’t be able to be home until really late tonight. One of the vendors at our work changed something in the system, and the entire computer room has to work on it. And, of course, they can’t do one freakin’ thing by themselves, so I have to direct them on everything to do.”

“Oh, I’m sorry. That sucks.”

“Tell me about it.” There was a muffled noise, which made me think that Aileen put her hand over the receiver to yell at someone. “Anyway, I just wanted to say that there’s some money in the cupboard in the hutch. You can order some pizza for yourself, okay?”

“That sounds fine. I hope that the…whatever it is, gets fixed.”

“Thanks. Now behave.” I could almost see her narrowing her eyes at me before she laughed.

“No worries about that,” I teased back. “I’ll talk to you later. Call me for updates when there are some.”

“No problem. Talk to you then.”

The line went dead, so I threw my phone back where it belonged. “What’s going on?” Puck questioned, nodding his head toward my bag.

“Aileen’s having a major issue at the office, so she’s not going to be home tonight. How do you feel about pizza?”

His stomach responded by rumbling. I couldn’t help but burst out laughing. “Okay, so we’ll be getting that after football practice, huh?”

“Smart idea. Wait…nah. I’m not gonna go to practice.”

“Are you sure you want to do that? Don’t you have your first game on Friday?”

“No.” He thought about that for a second. “Wait, I mean, yes, we do. But I don’t care. As long as I go to the one on Thursday, Coach Beiste isn’t going to care.”

“Okay…” I trailed off, trying to show as much disbelief as possible. “If you’re sure.”

“I am,” he insisted, and we headed out into the parking lot to go back to his car.

“You prepping yourself for the video tomorrow?” I asked, putting my feet up on the dashboard and shimmying a little further down the passenger’s seat.

Puck turned and raised an eyebrow at me. “Should I?”

“I dunno. You didn’t want to see Finn and me kiss, so I was just figuring that…” I let that thought settle in Puck’s mind whatever way it wanted to. After all, I wasn’t exactly sure what the right words were.

He surprised me by shrugging. “I know it doesn’t mean anything. It’s probably just going to look super awkward anyway. That’s how you looked.”

“Oh, it was,” I assured him. “Though I hope that it doesn’t look like that. It would ruin everything…”

“It would be totally fine.” I hit Puck on the shoulder, and we both laughed.

When we finally got to the house, I saw that it was four thirty from the clock on the oven. “Want me to order the pizza now?” I yelled to Puck, who was making a beeline straight to the living room couch.

“Sure.” He already sounded distracted, and I let out a sigh.

I called in an order of a large pepperoni pizza before joining Puck in the living room, sitting down next to him and putting my head on his shoulder. He had the baseball game on and was watching very intently.

“YES!” he exclaimed, fist-pumping the air when one of the players hit a home run. On the other hand, I started pouting. After all, the Indians were playing the Red Sox, and I loved the Red Sox.

“That sucks,” I mumbled, biting my lip.

“What? Our team is winning now. This is a good thing.” The sad thing, Puck actually did not understand what I was talking about.

“No, it’s not. You didn’t know that I was a Sox fan?”

He stared at me for a second, letting that knowledge digest. “What? You’ve lived here your whole life.”

“Thank you, Einstein. But my dad was from Lowell, Massachusetts.” I rolled my eyes and ignored the slightest pang in my stomach as I remembered all the times when I was younger, how Dad used to let me sit on the arm of his big, comfy chair and taught me everything I needed to know about baseball. Since then, my love of baseball had faded, mostly to spite him, but that didn’t mean that the memories had disappeared or lost their full impact.

“I didn’t know that.”

“Well, now you do.”

The next inning, the Red Sox pulled ahead and started winning by five, where the score remained. “That’s enough baseball,” Puck coughed, turning off the TV.

“Someone’s embarrassed because their team lost,” I teased, poking him in the stomach.

The doorbell rang, cutting off Puck’s comeback, so I got up to get the money out of the drawer Aileen had referred to. After paying the guy, I threw the pizza down on the table and Puck grabbed us some drinks from the fridge.

After we were done eating, it was only six o’clock, and it was definitely time for me to hit the books. “Don’t you have homework?” I asked Puck, smiling, since I already knew the answer he was going to give.

“Uh, yeah. Doesn’t mean that I’m going to do it.” He settled on the floor next to me, where my books were strewed around me in an extremely messy fashion.

Shaking my head, I went back to trying to solve some ridiculously hard pre-calc problem that made my brain hurt. It didn’t take me too long to sigh and close the book, declaring out loud, “Whatever. I’ll just tell my teacher that I’m an idiot and don’t get it.”

“Hey,” Puck interrupted, “at least you’re not in a sophomore math class.” What was sad about that statement was that he actually sounded proud that he had made it to that level. Poor Puck. That was what he got for sleeping in the nurse’s office instead of listening.

“So what should we do now?” I asked, pulling myself up onto the couch.

“Gee, I don’t know…” Puck trailed off, smiling, before leaning in to kiss me.

We made out for a while, which felt really good, when I thought back to the promise I’d given him after the Invitational last year. For a second, I pulled away, thinking about it.

I really did want to sleep with him when I made the promise, but I didn’t have the time. Then he cheated on me with Santana, and that kind of ruined everything.

But now we were back together, probation over, and he had already proven to me that he did love me, that he was faithful.

“Puck, do you love me?” I questioned. It was totally blunt and cheesy, but there was no other way I could think to ask it.

“Uh, yeah. Why?” He just looked kind of annoyed that I was kissing him anymore.

Feeling my heart flutter, I leaned close to his ear and whispered, “Do you…you know, have something?”

He pulled his eyebrows together for a second before it registered what I was asking. His eyes widened as he went through his backpack. “Yeah. I always have one on me, just in case.”

I couldn’t help but laugh. “Are you serious?”

He looked around, trying to look innocent. “No…?”

Still smiling, I got off the couch and reached out to take his hand.