sat in the chair beside a wide-eyed Kurt as Sue began her tirade, "Ladies, we have a grade-A dilemma. Mercedes, your vocal runs have had more fantastic runs than a Kenyan track team but, that look will simply not do." Sue snapped to Mercedes, her disgust was evident. "At first, I thought it was a subtle homage to yours truly, but now I feel it's some sort of ironic comment." The lady bit.

Mercedes was hesitant as she spoke, staring down at the floor below, refusing to make eye contact, "Miss Sylvester, I'm not comfortable in those Cheerios skirts. They don't fit me right."

"Mercedes!" Kurt gasped, clutching Mercedes's hand, "you should never feel embarrassed about your body."

"Embarrassed? No, no." Mercedes scoffed, "I'm worried about showing too much skin and causing a sex riot." She smirked, as she and the boy beside her fell into quick laughter.

Dorothea looked around the room, trying not to show how left out she truly felt during all of this. "How do you two not have a show on Bravo?" Sue asked rhetorically, deadpanning. The two shut up at that, "Here's the skinny. Splits! Magazine, after much campaigning by one Sue Sylvester, has named me the cheerleading coach over the last 2000 years. In seven days, reporter Tracy Pendergrass will arrive on campus and my new star singer will have lost ten pounds and will be in a gender-appropriate cheerleading uniform, or she is off the team."

Mercedes visibly gulped, as she bit her lip and shied away from the heated glare of the ageing lady, "Ten pounds? Are you serious?!" Kurt gasped, clutching the side of the flimsy plastic chair.

"You couldn't mind losing a few too kiddo." Sue snapped at the boy, who fell slightly back against the back of the chair. "And you," Sue finally addressed the girl on Kurt's left, "One Sue Sylvester hasn't made up her mind about you. Could just avoid food and only drink Sue Sylvester's magic mixture while your shiver under the thought of one Sue Sylvester not having formed an opinion yet."

Dorothea avoided looking at anyone else in the room, preferring to gaze down at the floor instead. "None of us need to lose any weight just for you." Kurt bit to the woman.

"Lady Hummel, to stay on this team, you will do as I say." Sue didn't spare him a glance as she shoved her glasses on with such force that would be assumed to break them, "Now get out of my office. I need to call the Ohio secretary of state, why? To tell them I no longer need an ID, everyone should know who I am. Be here for your first weigh-in tomorrow, or else."

***

Despite her dripping hair, as her fingers de-pruning from the disgusting school pool, Dorothea still tried to keep her mood up as she entered the office all of the sports teachers shared. Which was odd, as teachers like Schuester and Sue got their own separate offices.

She hadn't ever spent too long in the coach's office, but sitting in front of the woman in her Cheerio uniform felt weird. "Dorothea," The older lady began, flickering her brown, hinted greying, hair behind her shoulder. "I think you know why I called you in here." She ominously said.

She frowned, "Coach, I actually don't."

Coach Ashford shook her head, "The Cheerios." She sighed, "You're on a competitive sports team and the Cheerios." Dorothea bit her lip, looking down at the beige tiles, the grey grout standing out from the tiles. The slight mud streak near the edge of the desk, "I've discussed it with Figgins," Feeling compelled to look up, the brunette met the look of the woman, "You can do both. It's not preferred by me," She grumbled, "But as long as it doesn't affect anything for the swim team, you're fine."

Dorothea bit back a smile that was bubbling up, "Thank you," She told her coach enthusiastically.

The woman raised an eyebrow, "I'm not done, but you're welcome." She scored something off on what appeared to be a list on a post-it note. "If anything from the Cheerios overrides this, then you're off the team. Got it?"

The smile and enthusiasm dimmed, "Mhm. Got it."

***

Clicking her pen over and over on her wrist, drawing little circles with the blue colour on the back of her hand, turning herself into somewhat of a smurf, time straining and turning slowly as the door squeaked open. Becky bounced out of the room, high on her heels.

Dorothea collected her scattered thoughts as Sue pierced her with a sharp glare, welcoming her in for the mid-week weigh-in, as Sue referred to it. The brunette entered the room, the temperature spiked to a low, "Stand on the scale and don't be stupid with your responses. The attitude increases the weight. Biologically proven by the university commissioned by one Sue Sylvester."

Dorothea hoped and endlessly prayed to somehow not have to be put into the scenario of having to be judged by her weight by an obsessed middle-aged woman, who claimed to be younger than she looked. She gulped, as she stepped into the metal plate which determined how Sue viewed her, "115lbs." Sue determined, scoffing. "Drop at least five by Thursday or you're off the team and a failure." Sue scribbled it down beside her name on a piece of greenish paper on a clipboard. "I'm disappointed, you've failed me, Broomstick. Next!"

She attempted to not look the woman in the eye, not even threatening to mumble any curses under her breath, leaving the room in a hurry. She nodded as Mercedes who entered the office next.

"Brace yourself," She muttered, not even attempting to think before she spoke to Mercedes.

***

Recollecting her thoughts after her previous encounter with Sue, just a mere few hours before had screwed up Dorothea's head. Finally, she was listening to what Schuester said before, "A roller rink?" Tina questioned beside her.

"Weren't those outlawed in like 1981 for being so, totally lame?" Santana asked.

Schuester sighed, bringing back his gigantic hand expressions that nobody and their mothers asked for, "Come on, guys! Where's your sense of adventure? The space is great, and April is giving it to us to practice for free,"

"Mr Schue, if I may?" Kurt raised his hand, as Schuester just stood silently, Kurt making his way to the front of the room unwarranted. "The New Directions is clearly a club with a dearth of direction. Rachel and Jesse refuse to accept that all of us would rather die than we allow them to become the next Beyonce and Jay-Z—"

"I'd rather die than listen to him go on for one more minute," Tina whispered to Dorothea, as she tried to conceal a laugh with a badly acted-out cough. The brunette felt watched, as she peered to her left, catching Quinn looking at her for a split second.

"—and Finn's mother's romance with my father is sending him into a wholly unnecessary tailspin of despair. What we all need right now is to explore the idea of a sense of place," Kurt walked over to the piano, and shuffled some sheet music that was sitting on the surface, before handing them to a confused Schuester, "And how, if we find that place within, we will get that happy ending."

Kurt dramatically stalked up to the piano & dramatically turned around as his song began, A House is not a Home, and he kept making a quite weird eye contact with Finn. Dorothea shrugged it all off, though, as she leaned into Tina's side.

***

Dorothea ignored the food on the table. Artie threw her odd glances at the girl who was hunched back, scribbling down revision notes for World History.

"You know that's goin' cold, right?" Artie asked her, as Dorothea spared him a darting glance, before looking down at the chicken scratch of handwriting on the low-quality paper. She nodded as he sighed.

Dorothea ignored the boy again, "Thea, are you okay?" Tina asked her, Dorothea nodding intensely.

"I'm fine, just go back to what you were talking about."

Tina took her advice, and in a strained voice went back to talking to Artie about some recent international scandal of some English singer.

Mercedes stalked over to the table, tray in hand, after being in the humongous lunch line. Mercedes sat at the dingy table with them, the tray shot down with a thump, though only containing a worryingly low amount of food. Tina looked over to Artie, from where Dorothea could see, and asked Mercedes, "Do you want half of my Peppermint Patty?"

"No." Mercedes said, glaring at the goth girl. "I don't put junk in my body."

"Why are you doing this? Why are you both doing this?" He asked, his tone drowning in surprise, at Dorothea, concern. "We love you both how you are, and you shouldn't have to starve yourselves just for Sue."

"And those shake diets are unhealthy," Tina added on, gesturing to Artie to finish off her sentence.

Dorothea bit herself back from anything, though that just fell as she put her blue pen down. "As soon as you go off them, the weight comes back. It's why I don't drink them."

"And it's why you're just not eating." Artie bluntly told her, as Dorothea preferred to just twirl her pen like a ballerina between her fingers, instead of the embarrassment of looking at Artie at that moment.

"I've had it! You have no idea how much I'm sacrificing to be a Cheerio and to look fantastic! To finally fit in at this school!" Mercedes's tone never lowered as she slammed her hands down on the table with force.

Mercedes's eyes were practically screaming with hunger, as she dizzily looked around. "Cedes, are you okay?" Dorothea asked, distressed, as Jesse and Rachel waltzed behind her to a different table, hand in hand, dramatic as always.

"Stop tryin' to get me to eat you!" Mercedes yelled again, as the three shared worried glances between them.

"Hold up. Did she just say she wanted to eat us?" Artie asked, creeped out slightly.

"Aw damn." Was the final words Mercedes Jones spoke as she plummeted to the floor with a thud.

***

Dorothea waited outside of the sterile nurse's office for Quinn to get out so she could finally see if Mercedes was at least alright. Nobody could be fine if they'd just fainted.

As the door opened, it didn't shut, as Quinn fucking Fabray held it open for her. "Dorothea," Quinn muttered, as the brunette entered quietly.

"Thank you." That was all she managed to reply, as things got awkward once more. "You're literally everywhere these days, Quinn, it's like you wanna be seen by me."

"...No," Quinn muttered. The blonde looked at her, "Are you okay? You're paler than usual." She questioned.

"I'm good, Quinn. I need to go see if Mercedes is okay."

Quinn raised an eyebrow, "Her mom's there, so you'll only have a few minutes to speak to her."

"Thank you, Quinn. I'll see you at some point."

Dorothea turned away from Quinn, making her way over to Mercedes, who was staring at the ground, still sniffling.

"Artie and Tina didn't wanna crowd you, so they told me to go." Dorothea started, as she took a seat in front of Mercedes. "You fainting isn't your fault, Mercedes."

Mercedes looked at her, "Yes it is. I don't wanna be a Cheerio anymore."

Dorothea took Mercedes's hand, squeezing it tight. "No wonder. Mercedes, Sue is encouraging this. If you quit, I'll quit. You're an amazing girl, Cedes, you don't deserve any of this ever happening to you." Mercedes didn't meet her eye. "You are such an inspiration, not only to me, but you are the most talented person ever, and if people only like you for being a Cheerio they're missing out."

The girl opposite her took a deep inhale, "Thank you, Thea, you're too nice to me."

"Lies, it's the truth. You're so, so, so amazing."

As Mercedes opened her mouth to talk, her mom's soft footsteps came around the corner, "Lets go, sweetie." Mercedes's mother softly smiled at her child.

Mercedes practically shot out of the bed, making her way over to her mom. Dorothea bit her lip as watching a mother & daughter together.

"I'll text you later, Thea, okay? Tell Tina and Artie I'm good," Mercedes told her, Dorothea nodding, twisting a piece of hair around her fingers.

***

Leaning on the marble countertop, the soup she held in the miniature bowl just kept beginning to look less and less appealing each time she looked.

Taking a small sip of it, Dorothea sighed, shoving the thoughts of what happened to Mercedes earlier from her head.

She was in control of this, she wasn't going to end up fainting in the middle of the cafeteria.

Dorothea sipped slightly more of the unappealing soup, the texture just getting icky. She grumbled, pouring it out, wasting the soup down the drain.

She heard the jingle of keys, and chattering on the phone, as her dad entered the kitchen, phone to his ear, lowering it slightly, "Did you have dinner?" He questioned, as Dorothea nodded dishonestly., pretending as if she were washing the dishes quickly.

"Right, okay." Her dad replied, going back to the phone.

Her footsteps echoed in the empty hallways as she made her way back to her room in a hurry.

Her dad wasn't that observant. He wouldn't recognise anything wrong with her.

***

Dorothea stepped out onto the gymnasium floor, in a synchronised manner with the rest of the girls & Kurt.

Mercedes though, strayed behind, making her way to the front, still in her track uniform, her footsteps squeaking the only noise in the deathly silence.

The microphone feedback fell away as Mercedes spoke into it, "Hey guys, I'm Mercedes Jones." She let out a shaky exhale, "So most of you guys know that Cheerios is about perfection and winning, lookin' hot and being popular. Well, I think that it should be about something different. How many of you at this school feel fat? How many of you feel like you're not worth very much? Or you're ugly, have too many pimples and don't have enough friends?" Mercedes looked out upon the rows of raised hands on the bleachers, the thick light hazing over most of their features, "Well, I've felt those things about myself at one time or another. Hell, I felt most of those things about myself today. And that just ain't right, and so I just don't think that's right. And we've got something to say, and if you agree with us, come down here and say it with us."

Mercedes started a stunning rendition of Beautiful, which rallied most of the school to stand up, and despite being heavily confused about whatever was going on, she found herself behind Mercedes, with Quinn smiling softly at her on her left.

She didn't even scurry away despite being beside the blonde.

***

The glee club gathered around the piano, as Rachel asked excitedly, "Did you tell him yet?"

"That I bought y'all the auditorium!" April beamed, as Schuester looked from April to the Glee club, his mouth dropped open & his eyebrows so raised that you couldn't even count the amount of more wrinkles it added to his forehead.

"I gave ol' Figgins the cheque this morning, it's now called the April Rhodes Civic Pavilion," She told him, guiding her finger along the air of where the words would be.

Schuester put a firm hand on April's shoulder, "I... I don't know what to say!"

"We've got that covered." Rachel confidently exclaimed, as the Glee club hushedly made their way into the auditorium, Puck and Finn ushering Schuester to a seat as April did a costume change, dressing herself like an angel, as she put on an angelic performance of Home, her white costumes contrasting with the Glee club's black as mourning ones.

The glistening lights found themselves beaming onto Schuester's face, which shone as if he was crying. Good.

***