Cheerio

Wednesday morning, I woke up with a splitting headache and my body felt like it had been run over by one of those street sweepers. Thankfully, I didn’t feel the need to binge the night before, but it was like all the pain had caught up at once.

Taking a deep breath, I went to my closet and picked out some clothes. Normally, I would have asked Mom if I could stay home, but with Sectionals just around the corner, it really wouldn’t be the best idea to miss a day of rehearsals. So I just threw back a couple painkillers before rushing out the door, hoping that it would do something to help my overall crummy feeling.

And for once, when Kurt first saw me in the hallway in the morning, he didn’t point out that I looked like shit. He just fixed the front of his hair so it fell perfectly, an obvious manifestation of his worries that he could look like me, and said, “Did you learn the lyrics to Moments last night?”

“Well, I mostly knew the lyrics already. So with music, I’ll probably be able to fill in all the parts I might not remember a capella.” I yawned so widely that my eyes started to water and covered my mouth.

“I think Mr. Schue might give you a solo, you know,” he voiced.

I struggled not to laugh. “There’s no way he’s going to give me a solo to the ballad over Rachel. Rachel and Finn pretty much get all the ballads by default, don’t they?”

Kurt shrugged. “I think Mr. Schue’s trying to change things up so that it’s not all Rachel, all the time. But hey, what do I know?”

There was a short pause between us when I reviewed his words in my head again and finally registered his tone. I threw my arm in front of him to stop his walking before turning to face him, my eyes narrowed. “Did you hear something?”

He just shrugged again, but there was a familiar twinkle in his blue eyes that told me I was right on the money. I slapped his shoulder (maybe a little too hard, judging from his wince) and squealed. “Oh my God! What did you hear? Tell me!”

Some dam inside of him burst, and his need to spread gossip took over. “So yesterday, after you left my house, Finn realized that he forgot his history notebook or something, and so we had to come back here. And I was roaming around when he went to his locker, and it turned out that Mr. Schue was still in his classroom, trying to figure out who to give solos to for Sectionals. I think Miss Pillsbury was in there with him because he was talking, so it was either that or he was just having a conversation with himself…”

A kid smashed into my back, sending me stumbling forward. I turned back and glared at him. “You’re blocking the hallway,” he snapped at me.

“Oh, I’m sorry. Are you not capable of moving around us?” I fired back. “Have some kind of depth-perception issue?”

“No, but-”

“Exactly. So shut up and keep walking. And if you hit me again, I swear to God that I’ll castrate you.”

A shadow of fear crossed his face, or maybe it was horror, but either way, he regained his composure quickly before continuing down the hallway.

“Now that that douche is taken care of…continue.” I laughed for a second, and after Kurt did, too, he finished his story.

“He was saying that he was trying to mix things up a little so that the judges wouldn’t get exactly what they were expecting. And then he was like, ‘And spotlighting Evie for some of it would be great, because she’s a completely fresh face.’ So I’m thinking that he probably gave you some kind of solo somewhere.”

I grinned and squealed again.

Kurt shook his head, a smile tugging at the sides of his mouth. “God, when you first joined Glee Club, I never would have guessed in a million years that you’d be happy about a possible solo.”

“I’m a different person now,” I answered without much thought. Well, it was true.

“Oh, you don’t have to tell that to me.” We started walking down the hallway again before Kurt started to inch toward his classroom. “I’ll see you at lunch!”

“Yup!” I waved briefly before hurrying into my classroom, leaping through the door just as the late bell rang.

* * *

Glee Club could not have come quickly enough. Of course, the rest of the day dragged on forever as I waited in severe anticipation for finding out my possible solo. Or probable solo. It just made the whole thing so much better that I’d be able to sing a One Direction song, since I was such a huge fan of theirs.

But eventually, Glee Club finally did come, and I ended up being the absolute first person in the choir room. Even before Rachel. Which, frankly, was just kind of sad. Thankfully, I was too freakin’ excited to care.

Slowly, the rest of the club arrived, none of them looking like I felt. Some whined about how we were going to have to learn some kind of crazy dance routine, and they were just too tired to start that today.

That, to me, was something else to look forward to. Just thinking about any dancing at all made my muscles twitch. My knee started to bounce in anticipation, but it wasn’t going for long before Kurt sat down next to me and held it down. “Stop. You’re shaking my chair.”

"Sorry,” I grumbled. “God, where is Mr. Schue?”

“He’s never here by now,” Kurt reminded me soothingly

“Right.”

After an agonizingly long ten minutes, Mr. Schue finally entered. “Alright, guys-!” he started before Rachel stood up and promptly interrupted him.

“Mr. Schue, if I may?” But she didn’t give him time to answer one way or the other before she continued. “There has been quite a buzz throughout the entire club about who’s going to be given the solos during Sectionals, and I’d just like you to clear up the fact that I’ll be getting all of the female parts that you’ve arranged for.”

Mr. Schue just sighed and rubbed his forehead for a second, like he was all too sick of Rachel doing shit like this. “Actually, we’re not going to talk about solos today. We’re not going to talk about the lyrics or singing at all, really. Today’s going to be focused on dancing.”

Everyone was quiet as he started getting so into what he was saying that he was gesturing widely. “Miss Pillsbury and I decided that it would be best for the group if we started displaying talents other than just our best singers. So we sped up the tempo for Tell Me a Lie, and we’re going to have the Cheerios and Mike Chang do a dancing solo during the bridge.” He turned toward me, his eyes suddenly losing their sparkle. “That would mean you, too, Evie, of course. Just because you’re not a Cheerio anymore doesn’t mean that you’re not still a talented dancer.”

“I’d love to,” I agreed, and I meant it. My heart was starting to get that full of happiness feeling that didn’t happen all too often.

“Alright, great! So tomorrow, we’ll have a special rehearsal with just the five of you to focus solely on that routine. But as for the rest of us, we’ll start learning the choreography for What Makes You Beautiful.”

Everyone got out of their seats and spread out throughout the choir room. I was still standing next to Kurt (though, granted, about seven feet away), and I shot him a quick smile before the music started up.

Mr. Schue was showing us what to do, which wasn’t too complicated, but a few people were having trouble keeping up. Like Finn. Not that I’m naming any names.

My muscles were getting excited that they were finally getting to do something that they used to do everyday before stopping completely, but they were also feeling tired, too. Sluggish. Not to mention that my headache from earlier was starting to come back, since it had been over six hours since I’d last taken the aspirin.

Everything just kept getting worse and worse the longer we danced. My knees were turning to jelly, my head was swimming in fog. After a set of about five spins in a row, I stopped and put a hand to my forehead.

“Oh my God,” I mumbled, trying my hardest to breathe deeply through my mouth to make it through the rough patch.

I heard Santana’s shrill laugh from across the room. “Someone’s out of shape!”

“I think she’s going to puke,” Tina spoke up.

I thought she was right, and I turned away from the group so they wouldn’t see me, but instead, my vision went completely black.

I was vaguely aware of myself falling falling falling, and the feeling of the back of my head smashing against the tile floor. And right before I went completely out, I could hear Puck’s worried whisper in my ear.

“Evie.”