Trouble
Trouble
April Fools Day is all about appearance vs. reality. Seeing through the ominous smog of make-believe to what the real truth behind the story is. It got Cass Bandum to thinking about her own fantasy world, and what could occur inside it.
It seriously felt like the last day of school rather than April Fools Day. The sun was shining and the temperatures were reaching a scorching 72 degrees, or at least that felt like scorching after such a long and blustery Ohio winter. The halls were seemingly empty with all the band kids gone on their spring trip to Disney World. It felt like finals week, where everyone was coming and going sporadically, anxiously awaiting to finish their tests and begin their vacation.
Cass was crouched low to the ground, just shoving the last of her awkward, bulky textbooks into her locker when Noah Puckerman slumped lazily on locker 2146, two over from hers.
“Hey,” She greeted him, trying to be friendly even though they had barely spoken since he and Santana started dating last month.
“Sup,” he returned with an edgy sigh. She could relate, at only the middle of a very long week she was ready for spring break as well. “Weird, with everyone gone and all. Quiet.”
“Oh, I know,” She said.
He tried to shut her locker teasingly, and she stood up and caught it just before the lock was able to click. Cass’s reflexes were used to his shenanigans.
“Damn it, Cass. You’re not so easy to prank anymore,”
“It’s April Fools Day,” she replied, “don’t think I’m being too gullible.”
Puck laughed. His musky breath ruffled her brown bangs. she hadn’t even noticed that he had shifted from locker 2146 to halfway between 2145 and 2144, her own locker.
Cass parted her lips subconsciously. It was no secret she wanted him. With the way things were lately, she was lonely and craving the attention. But most of all, and she hated to admit this, Cass was horny. Having Puck this close to her only magnified the feeling.
But he had a girlfriend, and Cass resisted. She didn’t let her fingers crawl around his shoulder. She didn’t stand on her toes to meet him at eye level and smile, a trick she knew he loved. She didn’t do any of that. But she damn well wanted to.
Puck raised his eyebrows and smirked knowingly. It wasn’t the best act, because Cass could tell he wanted her as well.
“Where’s Santana?” Cass asked him. His smug disposition quickly faded.
“She’s, uh, on the band trip.” He explained running a hand through his hair.
“Santana? In the band?”
Puck shrugged, “she took up the triangle so she could go to Florida for free.” he explained. “How’re things with, uh-“
She put up a silencing hand. “If you’re going to say Jesse, don’t. Things ended there a long time ago.”
“Oh,” he said, embarrassed. “Badly, I take it?”
Cass shrugged. “Let’s just say with that, among other things… I’ve seen better days.”
“I’m sorry,” he said earnestly, his big glimmering eyes reflecting the rare strikes of silver from the light. Cass couldn’t help it. She leaned. Closer, and closer. He obliged…
A locker slammed three or four rows down the hall. Puck and Cass jumped and turned. It was just a lone, awkwardly-tall-and-scrawny sophomore whose name Cass didn’t know.
She and Puck both realized the dangerous land mine we were standing on. Anyone who saw us together now would have their suspicions, and word would leak to the ever-jealous-and-crazy Santana in seconds, no matter how many miles south she was.
“Sooo…” Puck slid closer to Cass again once they knew they were clear of any more interruption. “Santana’s gone until Sunday…”
“And?” Cass raised a single and- hopefully- sexy eyebrow.
“And I was wondering if maybe you wanted to hang out, maybe, if you felt like it…”
“Maybe,” She repeated, “I might. I’ll get back to you about it… alright?”
He seemed taken aback by her noncommittal, non-freaking-out-on-the-immorality-of-it-all response.
“Oh- OK- cool.” He blinked. Then he smiled a big smile. “Cool.”
Cass chuckled and looked down sheepishly. “I’ll see you later.”
“Aight.”
He slinked his face near hers and brushed her cheek with his lips.
“Bye,” he whispered huskily. Cass’s body shivered cold.
“Bye.”
As Puck reluctantly made the walk down the hall, Cass allowed herself a shuttery breath. It had been a long time since she fed this addiction… and relapse was beginning to feel really good.
“I’m telling you, it’s like ninety degrees and humid here! I can’t do a thing with my hair…” Rachel rambled over the line. Even through the phone, she sounded a thousand miles away to Cass while the latter pulled out of the school parking lot, opening her sunroof for the first time in months. She muttered an incoherent response. “So what’s bothering you?” Rachel asked. “Missing all your other Florida friends?”
“It’s Puck.” She said. “He… well… we talked today.”
“Uh oh. This can’t end well. And…”
“And he wants me to… hang… with him… before Sunday.”
“But… Santana’s here in Florida…”
Cass stayed silent for a moment, clutching the steering wheel bracing for Rachel’s reaction once she realized what was going on.
She heard a long dramatic gasp on her end. “No! Shut up!”
She turned onto Marnelm, “No lie.”
“That- that- DOUCHEBAG!” She rumbled. “Beyond that. Doesn’t he know you at all??? Doesn’t he even care about his skank-ass girlfriend! I mean, I know she’s not exactly you or anything…”
Cass tried to pull that final compliment as a positive note from her rant. She had had a feeling Rachel was going to react this way.
“I cannot even fathom that he has the balls to do that. God. What did you say?? I can’t wait to hear how you told him off…”
A light turned yellow ahead of Cass. She had to slam her brakes awkwardly to avoid running the red.
“Well, that’s the thing, Rachel.” Cass said delicately. “I didn’t.”
Rachel Berry, for once in her life, was silent for a moment. “I don’t get it.”
“I said I’d get back to him.”
“Oh. So you just didn’t want to waste your time with the drama?”
“Not exactly…”
Cass could practically see Rachel’s big brown bugging out of her head.
“Cass Bandum!” She cried. “You cannot possibly be considering this, right?”
Cass tried to time her breathing with the metronomic ticking of her blinker. If she didn’t stay calm, Rachel definitely wouldn’t.
“I don’t know…” she replied as smoothly as possible. “I mean, it’s all innocent. Everything I feel for him is strictly physical. I’ve detached myself from him completely otherwise. It’s just… lust, I guess.”
“Bull spit.” Rachel retorted. “Don’t try to reason yourself into this. I know you and if all you felt was physical than his extreme assholeness would have completely turned you off by now.”
“I’m just bored, Rachel.” Cass said. “I need to just get this out of my system and its back to ignoring him.”
Rachel sputtered, “I- I can’t believe you are actually planning on going through with this! Not even you would never sink that low!”
“Not even me? Not even me? And sink, how low, Rachel?” Cass snapped before she could stop herself. This was it. She had lost my cool, and there was no stopping her now. “Sink so low to let this guy run my life? Sink so low to do anything to be with him? Doesn’t that sound familiar to you?”
“I didn’t mean to attack you, Cass. I didn’t mean that at all.” Rachel said tiredly. Her defeated attitude pissed Cass off even more. It made it seem like Rachel was bored with her. She didn’t understand anything. “I just don’t see how you can possibly put yourself in a position to be hurt even more than you already have been.”
“That’s not what I’m doing at all! I’m just bored. I’m frustrated.”
“And helping a low-life like Noah Puckerman cheat on his less-than-stellar girlfriend isn’t the way to fix that.”
“For me, it is.”
“And how is that, Cass? Is a one-night-stand all you’re going to want? I can guarantee you you’ll be looking for more after…”
Cass hadn’t even bothered to think about what would happen after. Rachel’s point, in retrospect, was legitimate. A note Cass was too stubborn to realize in the moment.
“I need this sort of attention right now… you don’t understand.”
“I’m trying to.”
“Well, you’re failing.” Cass shot back at her best friend. “No one can understand this. I need Puck right now. I need someone to look at me that way. I need someone to hold me without hurting me the way that only Puck does.”
“Only he will hurt you, Cass. He already has!”
“I don’t care!” Cass shouted, causing the older gentleman in the car next to her do glance over alarmed. “I don’t care about the past. I don’t care about Santana. I need to do something that will make me happy for once. I let Jesse walk all over me and dump me hard and fast- just like he did to you. Don’t you remember what that made you feel like? Right now, being with Puck will make me happy.” she finished with a certain definiteness that made Rachel quickly jump to get the last word.
“I don’t want you doing this. I can’t stop you, but I can’t support you either.” She sighed heavily. “When Puck drops you, I’ll be there to pull whatever pieces are left back together. Again. But to whatever you might lose out of this… don’t say I didn’t tell you so.”
And with that, the line went dead.
Fuming, Cass pulled a quick right into the Shell Gas parking lot. She went to the contacts on her phone, still hot from my argument with Rachel, and dialed “Noah.”
He answered after one ring. “Sup?” He asked, curiously,
“I’m coming over. Now, if you don’t mind.” She said shortly.
“Sure. Not a problem.” He sighed deeply, obviously content.
“See you soon.” She said as she whipped the car back onto Route 48, on a path of destruction to Puck’s. Rachel’s words rumbled between her eardrums. This couldn’t be setting herself up to fail because she knew exactly what it was. She wasn’t expecting anything from Puck after this. Puck was beyond any point of expectations, he had just let her down too many times. Cass knew she wasn’t going to get anything more… no matter how much she wanted it.
Before she knew it, she was in Puck’s driveway, heart pounding. He leaned casually on the broken frame of the front door, much like he had against her locker. Nothing about Puck was inconsistent. Once a casual leaner, always a casual leaner. Once a let down, always a let down.
When she reached him, he placed his hand on the small of her back and led her inside, straight upstairs, to the right, into his room.
It was odd to be here again. Smell this smell again. Feel this touch again. It was like everything was coming full circle. Cass could convince herself of that, right?
She faced Jonah, forcing the heat of her thoughts to melt the ice between them. Slowly and carefully, he leaned her onto the bed, inching ever so close to her face.
And then their lips connected. As many times as Puck and Cass’s emotional connection sparked, then failed, then sparked, then failed… the physical connection was always a lightning charge to Cass’s soul.
She knew this was wrong, not only because it wasn’t fair to Santana, but it wasn’t fair to her. Then again, since when did she deserve anything fair? By choosing losers time and time again, she showed her lack of judgment, her lack of control. Puck held those three strings on her: the one that controlled her hands as they scoured his body, the one that controlled her lips as they moved in rhythm with his. And finally, the one that controlled her heart.
Yes, this was wrong. And it even felt wrong.
“But for someone who doesn’t deserve the right”, Cass thought, “the wrong is the best they have. Puck may be trouble... but he’s always been my kind of trouble.”
It seriously felt like the last day of school rather than April Fools Day. The sun was shining and the temperatures were reaching a scorching 72 degrees, or at least that felt like scorching after such a long and blustery Ohio winter. The halls were seemingly empty with all the band kids gone on their spring trip to Disney World. It felt like finals week, where everyone was coming and going sporadically, anxiously awaiting to finish their tests and begin their vacation.
Cass was crouched low to the ground, just shoving the last of her awkward, bulky textbooks into her locker when Noah Puckerman slumped lazily on locker 2146, two over from hers.
“Hey,” She greeted him, trying to be friendly even though they had barely spoken since he and Santana started dating last month.
“Sup,” he returned with an edgy sigh. She could relate, at only the middle of a very long week she was ready for spring break as well. “Weird, with everyone gone and all. Quiet.”
“Oh, I know,” She said.
He tried to shut her locker teasingly, and she stood up and caught it just before the lock was able to click. Cass’s reflexes were used to his shenanigans.
“Damn it, Cass. You’re not so easy to prank anymore,”
“It’s April Fools Day,” she replied, “don’t think I’m being too gullible.”
Puck laughed. His musky breath ruffled her brown bangs. she hadn’t even noticed that he had shifted from locker 2146 to halfway between 2145 and 2144, her own locker.
Cass parted her lips subconsciously. It was no secret she wanted him. With the way things were lately, she was lonely and craving the attention. But most of all, and she hated to admit this, Cass was horny. Having Puck this close to her only magnified the feeling.
But he had a girlfriend, and Cass resisted. She didn’t let her fingers crawl around his shoulder. She didn’t stand on her toes to meet him at eye level and smile, a trick she knew he loved. She didn’t do any of that. But she damn well wanted to.
Puck raised his eyebrows and smirked knowingly. It wasn’t the best act, because Cass could tell he wanted her as well.
“Where’s Santana?” Cass asked him. His smug disposition quickly faded.
“She’s, uh, on the band trip.” He explained running a hand through his hair.
“Santana? In the band?”
Puck shrugged, “she took up the triangle so she could go to Florida for free.” he explained. “How’re things with, uh-“
She put up a silencing hand. “If you’re going to say Jesse, don’t. Things ended there a long time ago.”
“Oh,” he said, embarrassed. “Badly, I take it?”
Cass shrugged. “Let’s just say with that, among other things… I’ve seen better days.”
“I’m sorry,” he said earnestly, his big glimmering eyes reflecting the rare strikes of silver from the light. Cass couldn’t help it. She leaned. Closer, and closer. He obliged…
A locker slammed three or four rows down the hall. Puck and Cass jumped and turned. It was just a lone, awkwardly-tall-and-scrawny sophomore whose name Cass didn’t know.
She and Puck both realized the dangerous land mine we were standing on. Anyone who saw us together now would have their suspicions, and word would leak to the ever-jealous-and-crazy Santana in seconds, no matter how many miles south she was.
“Sooo…” Puck slid closer to Cass again once they knew they were clear of any more interruption. “Santana’s gone until Sunday…”
“And?” Cass raised a single and- hopefully- sexy eyebrow.
“And I was wondering if maybe you wanted to hang out, maybe, if you felt like it…”
“Maybe,” She repeated, “I might. I’ll get back to you about it… alright?”
He seemed taken aback by her noncommittal, non-freaking-out-on-the-immorality-of-it-all response.
“Oh- OK- cool.” He blinked. Then he smiled a big smile. “Cool.”
Cass chuckled and looked down sheepishly. “I’ll see you later.”
“Aight.”
He slinked his face near hers and brushed her cheek with his lips.
“Bye,” he whispered huskily. Cass’s body shivered cold.
“Bye.”
As Puck reluctantly made the walk down the hall, Cass allowed herself a shuttery breath. It had been a long time since she fed this addiction… and relapse was beginning to feel really good.
“I’m telling you, it’s like ninety degrees and humid here! I can’t do a thing with my hair…” Rachel rambled over the line. Even through the phone, she sounded a thousand miles away to Cass while the latter pulled out of the school parking lot, opening her sunroof for the first time in months. She muttered an incoherent response. “So what’s bothering you?” Rachel asked. “Missing all your other Florida friends?”
“It’s Puck.” She said. “He… well… we talked today.”
“Uh oh. This can’t end well. And…”
“And he wants me to… hang… with him… before Sunday.”
“But… Santana’s here in Florida…”
Cass stayed silent for a moment, clutching the steering wheel bracing for Rachel’s reaction once she realized what was going on.
She heard a long dramatic gasp on her end. “No! Shut up!”
She turned onto Marnelm, “No lie.”
“That- that- DOUCHEBAG!” She rumbled. “Beyond that. Doesn’t he know you at all??? Doesn’t he even care about his skank-ass girlfriend! I mean, I know she’s not exactly you or anything…”
Cass tried to pull that final compliment as a positive note from her rant. She had had a feeling Rachel was going to react this way.
“I cannot even fathom that he has the balls to do that. God. What did you say?? I can’t wait to hear how you told him off…”
A light turned yellow ahead of Cass. She had to slam her brakes awkwardly to avoid running the red.
“Well, that’s the thing, Rachel.” Cass said delicately. “I didn’t.”
Rachel Berry, for once in her life, was silent for a moment. “I don’t get it.”
“I said I’d get back to him.”
“Oh. So you just didn’t want to waste your time with the drama?”
“Not exactly…”
Cass could practically see Rachel’s big brown bugging out of her head.
“Cass Bandum!” She cried. “You cannot possibly be considering this, right?”
Cass tried to time her breathing with the metronomic ticking of her blinker. If she didn’t stay calm, Rachel definitely wouldn’t.
“I don’t know…” she replied as smoothly as possible. “I mean, it’s all innocent. Everything I feel for him is strictly physical. I’ve detached myself from him completely otherwise. It’s just… lust, I guess.”
“Bull spit.” Rachel retorted. “Don’t try to reason yourself into this. I know you and if all you felt was physical than his extreme assholeness would have completely turned you off by now.”
“I’m just bored, Rachel.” Cass said. “I need to just get this out of my system and its back to ignoring him.”
Rachel sputtered, “I- I can’t believe you are actually planning on going through with this! Not even you would never sink that low!”
“Not even me? Not even me? And sink, how low, Rachel?” Cass snapped before she could stop herself. This was it. She had lost my cool, and there was no stopping her now. “Sink so low to let this guy run my life? Sink so low to do anything to be with him? Doesn’t that sound familiar to you?”
“I didn’t mean to attack you, Cass. I didn’t mean that at all.” Rachel said tiredly. Her defeated attitude pissed Cass off even more. It made it seem like Rachel was bored with her. She didn’t understand anything. “I just don’t see how you can possibly put yourself in a position to be hurt even more than you already have been.”
“That’s not what I’m doing at all! I’m just bored. I’m frustrated.”
“And helping a low-life like Noah Puckerman cheat on his less-than-stellar girlfriend isn’t the way to fix that.”
“For me, it is.”
“And how is that, Cass? Is a one-night-stand all you’re going to want? I can guarantee you you’ll be looking for more after…”
Cass hadn’t even bothered to think about what would happen after. Rachel’s point, in retrospect, was legitimate. A note Cass was too stubborn to realize in the moment.
“I need this sort of attention right now… you don’t understand.”
“I’m trying to.”
“Well, you’re failing.” Cass shot back at her best friend. “No one can understand this. I need Puck right now. I need someone to look at me that way. I need someone to hold me without hurting me the way that only Puck does.”
“Only he will hurt you, Cass. He already has!”
“I don’t care!” Cass shouted, causing the older gentleman in the car next to her do glance over alarmed. “I don’t care about the past. I don’t care about Santana. I need to do something that will make me happy for once. I let Jesse walk all over me and dump me hard and fast- just like he did to you. Don’t you remember what that made you feel like? Right now, being with Puck will make me happy.” she finished with a certain definiteness that made Rachel quickly jump to get the last word.
“I don’t want you doing this. I can’t stop you, but I can’t support you either.” She sighed heavily. “When Puck drops you, I’ll be there to pull whatever pieces are left back together. Again. But to whatever you might lose out of this… don’t say I didn’t tell you so.”
And with that, the line went dead.
Fuming, Cass pulled a quick right into the Shell Gas parking lot. She went to the contacts on her phone, still hot from my argument with Rachel, and dialed “Noah.”
He answered after one ring. “Sup?” He asked, curiously,
“I’m coming over. Now, if you don’t mind.” She said shortly.
“Sure. Not a problem.” He sighed deeply, obviously content.
“See you soon.” She said as she whipped the car back onto Route 48, on a path of destruction to Puck’s. Rachel’s words rumbled between her eardrums. This couldn’t be setting herself up to fail because she knew exactly what it was. She wasn’t expecting anything from Puck after this. Puck was beyond any point of expectations, he had just let her down too many times. Cass knew she wasn’t going to get anything more… no matter how much she wanted it.
Before she knew it, she was in Puck’s driveway, heart pounding. He leaned casually on the broken frame of the front door, much like he had against her locker. Nothing about Puck was inconsistent. Once a casual leaner, always a casual leaner. Once a let down, always a let down.
When she reached him, he placed his hand on the small of her back and led her inside, straight upstairs, to the right, into his room.
It was odd to be here again. Smell this smell again. Feel this touch again. It was like everything was coming full circle. Cass could convince herself of that, right?
She faced Jonah, forcing the heat of her thoughts to melt the ice between them. Slowly and carefully, he leaned her onto the bed, inching ever so close to her face.
And then their lips connected. As many times as Puck and Cass’s emotional connection sparked, then failed, then sparked, then failed… the physical connection was always a lightning charge to Cass’s soul.
She knew this was wrong, not only because it wasn’t fair to Santana, but it wasn’t fair to her. Then again, since when did she deserve anything fair? By choosing losers time and time again, she showed her lack of judgment, her lack of control. Puck held those three strings on her: the one that controlled her hands as they scoured his body, the one that controlled her lips as they moved in rhythm with his. And finally, the one that controlled her heart.
Yes, this was wrong. And it even felt wrong.
“But for someone who doesn’t deserve the right”, Cass thought, “the wrong is the best they have. Puck may be trouble... but he’s always been my kind of trouble.”