Schuester counted ahead of himself, Dorothea looked back to Santana who nodded at her with a smirk on her mouth.

"Mr Schue?" Dorothea interrupted, as he stopped counting and turned around to her. "Can we stop please?"

"Yes, Dorothea?" Schue questioned, seeming pissed off though masking it.

"You're choreography is basic and needs improvement."

"Way to put it bluntly, girl," Mercedes whispered in her ear, raising an eyebrow.

"What?" Schue asked, turning his head to the side slightly, so his ear is more in her direction.

"It sucks. Your choreography."

Dorothea sucked in a breath as the room went quiet, though originally she thought Santana would be shunned for talking to her, she was down to help her.

"We can't compete with teams like Vocal Adrenaline and even though they're acapella the Warblers. You're a good enough vocal coach, but, we need something original. You're not trained in dance, I probably have more experience than you do. We need Dakota Stanley."

Schue represented offended at the minimum. "Who?"

"Dakota Stanley. He was an understudy on Broadway." Rachel parroted, as the diva saw Quinn and Santana smirk at each other.

"Just because he understudied didn't mean he ever performed," Schuester scoffed, leaning his body weight on the piano.

"Do you think Rachel would know about him if he didn't perform?" Dorothea questioned, as she caught Schuester looking at her with a mix of negative emotions.

"Did you ever perform, Mr Schuester? After high school. Did you even try?" Quinn piped up, making her way to stand closer beside Dorothea. Dorothea gave a small smile to Quinn, who simply returned the look.

***

Dorothea wiped the apologetic look off of her face as she left Schuesters Spanish classroom, which reeked of moisture and had bright red sharpie drawings all over the desk scribbling profanities.

Dorothea said what had to be said; even if it was influenced by Santana Lopez and Quinn Fabray.

The blunt truth was always her favourite if she was able to play her cards correctly. Her gingerbread heart cookies which said sorry! in pink frosting could be shared around the glee club, who would enjoy them more than Schuester could eat away his feelings.

He technically did allow her to go ahead and hire Dakota. Approaching Quinn Fabray's locker after giving the cookies to Finn on the way over.

The nerves talking to Quinn alone were more astronomical than her father last night.

"Schue said to go ahead and hire Dakota Stanley."

"That was the plan, I like how you've done it though," Quinn spoke, though not even looking in her direct direction, though the hallway was crowded at that time she could at least have the decency.

"Oh Woah, honoured, Quinn."

"You were supposed to be," she rolled her eyes jokingly. "Thank you, though."

"Of course..."

"It's nice to know someone in that club has some sense." Quinn slammed her locker.

Quinn Fabray was quite intimidating to anyone to meet the eye; a stereotypical mean cheerleader, blonde and such a bitch, if you meet her eye with just a flicker, a glance even, she would have you dead. Though, even just walking beside her without any hostility it made Dorothea feel saner than she could have ever dreamt of reaching.

The blonde swept the pathway clear as she strutted down the hallway, ponytail swishing for dear life, as most people—especially that ginger, freshman, cheerio who looked like if she were to step into the sunlight for a few seconds her freckles would cover up every facial feature she'd have. As if she'd imagined it; she was sure she saw Quinn give the bitch the nastiest look to current mankind.

"You're pretty, Dorothea. Would mean a lot to me if you didn't let the geeks and the goths corrupt you." Quinn smiled, the words seeping out more friendly than what their undertone could mean.

Dorothea could almost feel herself blush, as she walked into glee club with Quinn fucking Fabray.

***

She was definitely attracted to girls. That's all she knew.

Her research about her sexuality had to be turned into research about whatever floodplains and levees were unless she wanted to fail geography.

She was attracted to perfect blondes. The type of girl to stay determined and strive for what she wanted and wouldn't let that go. The beautiful girl with hair always tied back and never missing a strand. The green of her eyes reflected when her stupid boyfriend would make her laugh, the green shining in the fluorescent sun, the pinch of her bow-shaped lips, the swoop of her nose. She was gorgeous.

Though, as well as Finn Hudson was there, she couldn't do shit.

***

The information had already been told to the club and spread like a wildfire as Dorothea got an attempt to be angry pair of looks from Finn and Rachel.

"The goal is to win. And now that Mr Schuester has agreed to let us hire Dakota Stanley, we can." Santana unenthusiastically yawned, filing her nails as Finn threw his best angry glare at her, which just made him look like a mad baby penguin. Quinn made her way over to Santana, who was closer to Brittany than usual.

"But he doesn't want us to. He just doesn't have The confidence to coach us anymore. Guys are really sensitive when it comes to this kind of stuff." Finn half mumbled, trying his best to stick up for himself.

"And that's my fault? I was stating the obvious truth." Dorothea religiously shook her head.

"Do you see anyone else in here that had to go and apologize to Mr Schuester? I don't. Just you." Finn said, using his full voice for once.

"I'm bored. All those in favour of hiring Dakota Stanley?" Quinn exaggeratedly yawned, as hands went up one by one in the club, excluding Finn.

**

Since Schuester didn't show up; they had nothing else to do other than a plan to ambush Dakota Stanley and ask him to help choreograph them for sectionals.

"Hey, wait up. You can't do this to Mr Schuester!" Finn called after Dorothea, as there were only a few people in the glee club who hadn't left yet.

"Oh please Finn, we have to win. After we win nationals this year we can sure share some of the techniques we're sure to pick up with Schuester." Dorothea rolled her eyes as she shoved the notepad she used for glee club into her bag.

"Since when was your main idea winning?"

"Since I realised what it would mean for us all. Finn, I have ambitions. It's for the club but it's also for me. You may be looking for a football scholarship, but genuinely I need to be something before I escape Ohio. This needs to work out."

"Ambitions? Is that a good thing? Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait... you think I could get a football scholarship!" Finn gasped, practically ignoring anything they had said previously. Dorothea sighed in frustration, boys.

A flash of blonde came over to the two, "Finn, stop terrorizing the poor girl," Quinn Fabray scoffed, throwing Dorothea a quick Cheshire cat esc smile and pulling Finn away by the hand.

***

As Dorothea occupied her time talking to Mercedes, Tina practically shoved her phone into both faces. "I j-just saw this on the school's h-h-hate-Twitter, I had to!" She laughed.

Dorothea bit her lip to contain herself as she and Mercedes watched as Schue danced with three other balding and middle-aged men to a song on a shitty bar stage and another thread with ridiculous praise in a newspaper.

As the New Directions met up, obviously excluding Finn, outside the Carmel Highschool building which looked like an extremely sanitised hospital.

"Are we even sure they're rehearsing today?" Quinn asked, crossing her arms as she stood glaring around her, Brittany and Santana behind her.

"Vocal Adrenaline rehearses every day from 2:30 till midnight." Rachel corrected, as she lead the group down the pavement.

As she wheeled Artie, Dorothea looked behind her as she felt Quinn staring at her. As Quinn caught her eye, she could tell Quinn was turning a similar colour to her cheerios uniform.

"I'm just... so nervous that these Vocal Adrenaline kids are gonna laugh at us. They're so cool and popular, and we look like we just stepped off the short bus," Mercedes groaned, pulling her shimmering golden jacket near to her boy as Kurt put a gentle and kind hand on her shoulder. Mercedes flushed expression was quickly stored underneath a mask of expression. Interesting.

"Those sweaty Nazis have just had more time to practice. We have more heart. And you don't look touched in the head, that outfit is amazing."

Dorothea rolled he eyes as she leaned down to whisper to Artie, "just because we have hearts doesn't mean we have the talent to beat them."

The boy looked at her and nodded. "Delusions girl, delusions."

"So, would you, you know, ever want to hang out?" Mercedes asked as she looked over at his expression, the softness in his eyes and the way he smiled so kindly at her. It was the expression he showed to many. The adoration to everyone. The kindness was immense, if only Dorothea were like him.

"Come over. It's Liza Minnelli's week on AMC!" He cheered as Mercedes's eyes fluttered, shoving her hands deep into her pockets.

The path was clear for the New Directions to, though most reluctantly, go into Carmel high, the intimidating building with the more intimidating people inside and what they could see from the bright blue tutu esc unflattering outfit in front of them, outside too. "Guys! That's Andrea Cohen. She won Outstanding Soloist last year at Absolutely Tampastic."

Glazing at Tina beside her, Dorothea was solemnly confused on why Rachel knew this honestly random girl especially from quite far away.

As some other girl was gently holding Andrea Cohen's hair up as she vomited into a general trash can that reeked more than Kurt after being dumped into one of the greasy dumpsters by the mohawked jock. Rachel stomped over, though, not aggressively (surprisingly). "You can't leave rehearsals for any reason! That includes heat exhaustion or Crohn's disease." The girl sighed, exasperatedly, as if the girl she was helping was the only thing helping her from fainting and falling over.

"Are you guys Vocal Adrenaline? We'd like to talk to Dakota Stanley about choreography for our glee club."

"Don't!" The girl being sick shot up, "He's a monster!" She sobbed.

Dorothea bit her lips and she stared aimlessly at the ground as Artie wheeled ahead with Tina, a soft touch and a whisper in the ear brought her from her head in space through back to cloud 9. "Let's go in," Quinn whispered.

***

Vocal Adrenaline's performance of Mercy by Duffy was flawless in many aspects, except the way it sounded cold. Their energy was impeccable and timing that no matter how long they spent teaching Finn, could never reach. The blue light bounced from person to person, as each glare hit them it was like they improved even more.

They were almost as perfect as Quinn Fabray.

"Get off my stage!" A short man, who was perfect for the role of a munchkin for the Wizard of Oz shouted, or squealed like an endangered warthog.

Rachel looked over at the club and nodded, as they headed to go and track down the munchkin before he left.

***

"Dakota Stanley!" Dorothea yelled as Rachel squealed over her.

"We're the McKinley High glee club!"

"No interviews." He waved them off ignorantly as he got into a convertible that was comedically practically the same height as him.

"We'd like you to choreograph for us," Tina said, as Dorothea squeezed her hand.

"Look, my fee is $8000 per number, plus a $10000 bonus if you place in the top three. And with Dakota Stanley at the wheel," he said in the passenger seat, "you will place at the top three. Move it."

As the engine revved and the tired squealed, the glee club was left in confusion.

"How are we meant to get $8000?" Rachel groaned.

"Don't look to me this time, Rach." Dorothea tried to make light of a situation for once in her life.

***

"We need to have a gay-vention. That's a gay intervention." Rachel demanded as she shut Mercedes's locker forcefully. Mercedes sneered at them.

"It's K-K-Kurt. He's lady fabulous."

Dorothea bit the inside of her cheek, "I like you, Mercedes. And no man is worth heartbreak, did you see how despaired Elle was in Legally Blonde? No."

"It's obvious you like him. We just don't want you to get hurt by what feelings he cannot clearly reciprocate." Rachel informed her, a dramatic sigh following.

"Look, just because he wears nice clothes doesn't mean hes on the down-low."

"My brother thought he was on the down-low during the summer when he was sneaking boys out of his window in the middle of the night. I like to spot constellations and star gaze." Tina eyed her for that and nudged her.

"He wore a corset to second period today." Rachel scoffed.

"You can do better, 'Cedes," Dorothea told her sternly.

"Really? Well, what if I can't? There are not a lot of guys around here Knocking down my door for a date. Or yours, for that matter. Nobody notices us. Hello? We're in the glee club. And I'm tired of being lonely. Aren't you? But Kurt... Kurt is sweet to me, and he likes who I am, And I like how I feel when I'm with him. And he's in our group, he understands what I'm going through. Now, maybe that's not enough for you guys, but it's enough for me."

***

Quinn Fabray was talking to her again.

"I know you're not a cheerio and all, but, take this and wear it for the car wash. You're gorgeous, show it."

Quinn smiled, handing her what looked like a skirt the cheerios wore on a daily basis, and a bra.

As she watched as Quinn walked away, shoes clicking in the empty hallway. I mean, why wouldnt she do what Quinn told her to?

Dorothea out on the outfit and made her way to whatever car Tina was cleaning in old and baggy clothes. "Quinn told me to." Dorothea spat out softly as Tina raised and eyebrow.

"Okay... and y-you did it? You look great though," Tina smiled, as she scrubbed ferociously with a sponge as Mercedes, from the corner of her eye, looked utterly furious, as she took a rock and smashed Kurt's windscreen.

Dorothea snickered as Tina saw the whole situation pan out.

***

"Okay, please examine your personalized menus. This is what you'll be eating for the next six months."

"Uhm... mine just says coffee..?" Mercedes asked, as she looked at the man.

"Mm-hmm." The munchkin hummed.

"What's smelt?" Rachel scoffed, as she let Finn tower over her to read the sheet.

"A pungent, low-card, freshwater fish."

"Okay why does mine just say oranges." Dorothea questioned, as she let the goth beside her read the sheet.

"Because I said so. Lets start, Artie, you're cut. You're not trying hard enough."

"At... what?"

"At walking. We cant be wheeling you around during every number. It throws off the whole dynamic and it's depressing."

"So, you're kicking him out? That's ableist," Mercedes shook her head.

"You throw off height studies by atleast 2 feet and who are saying all of that to you unwarranted." Dorothea scoffed as Stanley eyed her as best as he could.

"Mhm. Also you two. Youse got to go, Effie and Bitchy. No, no, no. Yeah."

"You can't kick people out of glee club because you don't like how they look!" Kurt raised his voice and stepped back, crossing his arms tightly and looking down at the munchkin man.

"Uh, why don't you shut your face-gash And stay away from aerosol cans because You could burst into flames at any second?" He casually strolled past Kurt, "You three– you're great. You're perfect. Seriously. Don't change a thing. Uh, you– ew, nose job." He commented as he reached Rachel.

"Now just hold on a second-"

"What? What was that, Frankenteen? Why don't you, uh, wipe that dopey look off your face and get some lotion for those knuckles you've been dragging on the ground?"

"What's wrong with you? Why have you chosen out all of the professions globally to pick on teenagers? I'd say pick on someone your own size but honestly, that means youre limited to Rachel." Dorothea said, stepping back as Artie nodded to her to wheel away.

"What's wrong with me? What's wrong with me is that he's freakishly tall. I feel like a woodland Creature! Um, am I hurting your feelings? Did I say something wrong? Because I thought you wanted somebody who respected you enough to tell you the truth. But maybe you don't have the confidence to hear it, hmm? Maybe you need somebody who's going to lie to you and tell you things like, you got what it takes. But you know what? As far as I can see, you don't. So, why don't you just take a little second, take a breather, and ask yourself, do I want to be a winner or not?"

"Screw this. I quit." Finn sighed, heading for the doorway.

"Me t-t-t-too. Let's roll, you guys."

"No. Great, great. You know, Separate the wheat from the chaff; that's perfect."

"Wait! Barbra Streisand. When Barbra was a young ingénue, everyone told her in order to be a star, she'd have to get a nose job. Thankfully, she refused."

"Where's this going, Yentl?" Dakota sighed, firmly as he glared intensely at the leaving members.

"Where it's going is that We don't need you. Let's face it, we're never going to be as good of dancers as Vocal Adrenaline. We're gonna win because we're different. And that's what makes us special."

"They told J. Lo her booty was too big."

"Curtis Mayfield was more successful after he became paralyzed."

"Taylor Swift. The media is against her for some reason," She got Kurt and surprisingly, Quinn's nod in approval.

"Jim Abbott."

"I have no idea who that is." Kurt whispered under his breath.

"He was a one-armed pitcher for the yankees. Pitched a no-hitter." Finn informed him, as he had a passion quickly cover his eyes.

"Okay, so, yeah. Misfits and cripples can make it, too. That's great. What's your point?"

"Our point is that you're fired. And i'm taller than you." Rachel declared, proudly.

***

Will Schuester was back in charge of the club. Though having a break from him was a thrilling experience, Schue guided them through the choreography. "Uh, uh, step, ball change and head. Step, ball change and head. Low and up. Low and high! Oh, what do you guys think?"

"Schue."

"Yes, Dorothea?" He answered the brunette in a hopeful tone for once.

"It was good for once," She smiled brightly.

"Thank you. Thank you. Okay. From the top!" Schue laughed as Dorothea turned around to Tina, and high-fived the goth.

This might be something more than just something for her CV.

WC: 3076