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Hummel doesn't tell anyone.
It takes Dave a couple of days to notice. For whatever reason (reasons he refuses to acknowledge) he's more than a little out of it the first few days following what he's carefully decided to label in his mind as the Locker Room Incident. It’s not that he’s depressed or anything. He just feels numb all over, sort of like that time when he broke his arm back when he was thirteen and took three Vicodin all at once to kill the pain. He’d wound up passed out downstairs on the couch, snoozing for a blissful (and pain-free) fifteen straight hours before his mom had started to panic and woke him up. He still remembers the weird feeling he had upon waking, how the world then had seemed all fuzzy yet strangely reassuring.
This time, though, the vague feeling of warmth and reassurance is missing and anyway there are no drugs to blame. Instead, Dave's just tired, on a bone-deep level, and on something of a hair-trigger when it comes to randomly sparking emotional outbursts. He's been sent to see Ms. Pillsbury twice already, though he skipped out and went to chill with Azimio each time. It's embarrassing enough during class—he still maintains that substitute had no right to be demonstrating papier-mâché volcanoes when they were in there to prepare for the Biology AP for freak's sake—but it becomes downright problematic when it carries out on the football field as well.
Azimio picks up the habit of clapping him on the shoulder between plays, tossing off barbs like "I thought your name was the Fury, boy, not the Fairy" after Dave stumbles and botches yet another routine practice drill. Dave resists the urge to punch him in the face. Giving each other crap is what passes for worry in both their books and he knows it. He'd be lying if he said he hadn't ragged on Azimio using the exact same insult not two weeks ago, not to mention with the way he's been playing, Azimio is pretty much his only bud on the team right now. Azimio can't possibly know that the last thing Dave is willing to tolerate at the moment is being called is some variation on a fairy. So Dave bites his lip, takes the hint as intended, and focuses his energy on the game, firmly ignoring anything else that may be going on in his life.
This strategy serves Dave well right up until around day five post the Locker Room Incident. Then his brain, tired of being sent offline for the past week, decides to get his attention by smacking him upside the head with the realization that Hummel now holds one hell of a blackmail card.
Dave's first reaction is, unsurprisingly, panic. How had this possibility not been obvious to him from the start? Why, amidst all the what-had-definitely-not-been-moping-over-the-gay-kid, had it never occurred to him even once that Hummel could open his mouth and tell someone? It wouldn't even matter who he chose. News of two dudes kissing in the locker room would spread faster than weed-laced cupcakes through McKinley, no matter who was quoted as the original source. Even if Hummel told that weird Asian Goth girl with the stutter, it wouldn't be an hour before Jacob Israel had the whole salacious account posted on his blog, complete with a title filled with appropriately awful puns. Comments on the entry would be in the thousands, probably even more than the time when Israel dropped the bomb and revealed Quinn's pregnancy. Dave would spend football practice that day locked in a Port-a-Potty, most likely would never make the field again. None of the other guys would let him in the locker room if they all thought he was sneaking peeks at their junk.
His entire reputation, and social future, is now resting in the delicate, manicured hands of someone who not only has he bullied for over a year, but whose very definition of subtle is "I left my bedazzler in the car."
Dave is so screwed.
Or, at least, he should be. Even looking back at the past week with a critical eye, he can't spot anything he would label as out of the ordinary. He decides to stalk down the hallway a couple times as a test, just in case people were acting oddly and he had missed it. He watches carefully, but no one's suddenly talking behind their hands or giving him strange looks. There aren't any conversations ending abruptly when he draws near. The nerds still cower when he looms over them in his letterman jacket and they hand over their money to him with shaking hands but without protest. Everything seems normal, which can only mean that Hummel hasn't been talking.
Dave doesn't know whether to feel relieved or confused.
After all, it's not like Hummel had any problem telling his lady boyfriend. Dave still hasn't forgotten about ladyboy’s simpering little attempt at an intervention, isn't likely to anytime soon with the way Hummel keeps the guy's picture in his locker. (Dave does not look every day, just to check.) You’re not alone. Please. Like either Fancy or Twinkerbell had ever had a choice about being labeled a homo. They probably met on weekends to exchange tiaras. Dave may be teetering on the edge of social suicide here if what happened in the locker room gets out, but he's not ready to accept offers to a pity party from a pair of prancing fairies.
He's just not sure what to do in the face of Hummel's ongoing silence.
Dave tries to put out feelers over the next couple days, get an idea of what's going on in Hummel's head. Okay, so he stalks the hell out of him. Seriously, Dave's not James Bond. It's not like he can plant bugs on Hummel or something. So instead Dave just kind of hovers just outside the periphery of Hummel's vision, occasionally flattening another kid in order to stay out of his direct line of sight, and watches.
What he observes is frustrating. For the most part, Hummel seems happier than he's been in a long time, which Dave attributes to the soppy look he gets whenever he opens his locker. Between classes, he can mostly be found exchanging what Dave can only assume are fashion tips with the ex-cheerleader, Mercedes. The two of them are always joking and laughing whenever they’re together, and generally Hummel looks like he hasn't got a care in the world right now. Whenever they split, though, the very first thing Hummel does is grab his phone out of his pocket (or purse, depending on the day) and start texting someone furiously. Judging by the dreamy look he gets on his face while he types, that someone is almost certainly Twinkerbell.
In fact, the only times Hummel seems less than ecstatic seem suspiciously to coincide with the unexpected appearance of a letterman jacket in the hallway. The abrupt difference in his demeanor then is startling. Hummel's shoulders hunch in, his mouth turns down, and his grip on his phone tightens to the point where his knuckles are white. He looks like he's preparing himself for an attack, which Dave figures he probably is.
None of this helps Dave any in figuring out whether Hummel is planning to spill the beans on the locker room or not. The way Dave sees it, there are only two real possibilities here: either Hummel is planning to tell and just hasn't yet, or he's choosing to keep silent out of fear or for some other yet unknown reason.
Dave doesn't think it's the fear. Hummel may be many things, but he's not a coward. The way he tore into Dave in the locker room alone proves that. Not to mention it would be pretty difficult for anyone to bully Hummel more than Dave already does, even if Hummel were the one who would come off looking worse in an exposé scenario, which he definitely isn't.
Dave tests anyway, just to be sure, walking up to Hummel in the cafeteria and checking out his response. "'Sup, homo?"
He catches the tail end of some conversation about Rashad the wide-receiver when he does. Dave wrestles briefly with an ugly flare of jealousy before he realizes, feeling stupid, that the table where Hummel’s sitting (predictably) includes Mercedes as well. Hummel, for his part, doesn't look frightened by Dave's presence so much as confused, which is a feeling Dave shares once he realizes that, in turning to leave, he had freaking winked at Kurt Hummel in front of the entire cafeteria.
Sometimes, Dave feels like he couldn't be more of a heterosexual failure if he actually tried.
So, no, it looks like fear is off the cards, which leaves either the possibility that Hummel's got another reason to keep silent hidden up his sleeve or the one thing Dave's starting to dread most—that Hummel's settling in to play the long game with this blackmail thing. Maybe he's just been toying with Dave these past couple weeks, letting him build up a sweat before swanning in to name his terms. It doesn't seem like something Hummel would do, but then Dave can't exactly claim to know everything that goes on in his head either. Despite his obsession, they're not actually friends. Maybe Hummel was more subtle in those areas of his life that didn’t involve fashion, calculating enough to pull off something as deeply complex as an extended blackmail scheme. Dave wishes there was some way he could get a second opinion on all this, but it's not like there's any way he can ask someone for their opinion without giving away what happened, which defeats the purpose of asking.
His mind has been reduced to nothing but an endless loop of "Hummel hasn't told anyone. He hasn't, but he could. He could, and it would ruin everything." It’s distressing enough on first repetition; by the hundredth, it’s flat-out terrifying. So he can hardly be blamed for the less than suave way he swoops in when Hummel's apparent BFF Mercedes (one of McKinley's most notorious gossip hounds, his mind unhelpfully notes) abruptly decides to saunter off Friday afternoon and leaves Hummel all alone at his locker.
Dave doesn't waste a second. "Question for you!" he growls, grabbing Hummel's shoulder and wrenching him around to face him.
Dave takes a quick moment to check if anyone's listening, but everyone seems preoccupied with their own private drama today. When he looks back, he's absurdly pleased to find that Hummel doesn't even seem fazed by Dave's appearance. It reminds him of the various states of happiness he's observed in Hummel this past week. Unfortunately, it also makes him stumble over his next words.
"You tell anyone else what happened?" he demands tightly. "How you—" And here Dave's throat closes over the words until all he manages to push out is, "—kissed me?"
"You kissed me, Karofsky," Hummel corrects firmly, not too loudly but Dave attempts to shush him anyway. "And I understand how hard this is for you to deal with so no, I haven't told anyone."
Dave thinks he should be feeling relief right now. After all, there it is. He's got his answer. Hummel hasn't told anyone and isn't planning to, is willing to keep this whole thing silent out of some hidden sense of solidarity. Dave should be ecstatic, should be about to— well, whatever the super manly version of kissing Hummel for sheer joy in the middle of the hallway would be. That, he should be doing that.
But at the same time, he finds himself unable to just let go of the fear of the past week. Hidden sense of solidarity or not, the fact remains that Hummel could tell someone and what's to say that feeling of solidarity would last into the next week anyway? How long would Hummel continue to feel sorry for the pathetic jock who bullied him? Another week? Two?
His mouth opens before he even has the chance to think. "Good," he hears himself say. "You keep it that way." And then, because his life is currently just one botched moment after another, he adds, "'Cause if you do, I'm gonna kill you."
The silence that follows is deafening. Hummel stares at him with wide eyes, the first pale traces of genuine terror creeping into his face. Dave stares back, only manages it for a few seconds before he flees the scene in a rush, his head reeling as he stalks off because— did he seriously just issue a death threat to Kurt Hummel? Is that actually what happened here? It all seems so unreal, like something out of his mom's trashy soaps instead of Dave’s own freshly screwed up life. He can't take it back now. It's out there and doing that would just make him look stupid, but he can't exactly ever imagine getting the nerve to follow through on the threat either. Hummel is too— he's just— well, he's important to Dave, okay?
Dave spends the whole weekend thinking the incident over, replaying it again and again in his head like if he just does so enough times, the lines will somehow change and he'll end up looking like less of a creepy psychopath. He snaps at his mom when she tries to get him to leave his room and ignores calls from Azimio to hang out in favor of playing his favorite Call of Duty campaign for the hundredth time. Blasting row after row of polygon enemies is perfect for keeping his eyes and hands busy while his mind races in circles, fully occupied with thinking up ways to fix the flaming train wreck that is his life.
Dave still hasn't come up with anything by the time he has to go back to school on Monday. He tries to seek Hummel out anyway, figuring if nothing else he can retract the death threat and work later on regaining some of his dignity. His admittedly vague plan, however, is thwarted by the baffling way that Hummel suddenly doesn’t seem to be anywhere in the school . Dave wastes valuable time checking all of his usual spots like an idiot before he realizes that of course Hummel would have opted to change his routine following their conversation on Friday. He thinks Daveis planning to kill him.
Dave wants to punch something until his life stops sucking.
He comes to school on Tuesday resolved to figure out Hummel's new hallway circuit. He's just plotting a possible plan of attack in homeroom for covering all the alternate pathways when a pair of unrepentantly giggling adults, a red-haired woman and a balding man wearing a vest jacket, stumble clumsily into the classroom. Their faces are flushed and grinning, and the man doesn't waste any time before getting down on one knee.
"Carole," he says, looking nowhere but her. "It all started here for you and me. You walked into my life, and you made impossible for me to ever see you walk out. So I'm asking." He pulls out a ring box and cracks it open. "Carole Hudson,” he intones solemnly, “will you marry me?"
Dave barely hears Mrs. Hudson's screams over the roar in his ears. That's—that's Hudson's mom, which means the guy in the vest must be Hummel's dad, and—and they just freaking got engaged, which means Hummel and Hudson are now going to be for-real, no-joke, actual brothers and are probably going to live in the same house again like they did that one time sophomore year. They had lived together and then Hudson had come to school one day dressed all crazy just like Hummel and Hummel had smiled at him for days afterward. It's more than Dave can process all at once.
It also gives him the perfect excuse to talk to Hummel, however. Nothing suspicious about going up to the gay kid and congratulating him on his dad's upcoming nuptials to the mother of his former crush, right? And then Dave can casually work in how he never really meant that death threat a couple days ago and things can all go back to normal. All is has to do is find the kid.
He finally gets his opportunity on Monday the following week. Hudson manages to delay Hummel at his locker by asking him about wedding preparations and Dave hovers just out of sight until Hudson claps him on the shoulder and walks off.
Dave moves in immediately, taking up the vacated space on the other side of Hummel's locker. He's trying for casual and does his best to project nothing but friendliness Hummel's way, but judging by the look of terror on Hummel's face, he's not being very successful at either.
There's silence for a moment before Hummel says, quietly, "I don't want you near me."
Dave flinches, but it's no less than he expected. It's okay, he's here now and Hummel's listening. All he has to do is apologize and he and Hummel can go back to occasionally mocking and quietly not-envying each other from a distance. Dave pokes him in the chest, tries to smile and make a joke about his dad's engagement, but somehow his smile seems frozen on his face. Instead of a teasing poke, the touch becomes something more like a caress as his finger slides, slowly and inexorably, down the line of Hummel's chest. It's quite possibly the creepiest thing Dave's ever done and he's resoundingly grateful when his sliding finger suddenly encounters plastic. He wraps his hand around the offending item with relief and jerks it from Hummel's grasp.
"Can I have this?" he asks politely, the words sounding stupid to his own ears. Hummel looks too shaken to respond, so Dave tags on a bright hasty "thanks" and freaking beats it down the hall. He’s careful to tuck the wedding topper (so that’s what it was) in the pocket of his letterman jacket as he goes.
He sets it on his dresser when he gets home that night and stares at it for a long time trying to figure out how he can maybe stop sucking at this whole not being a jerk to Hummel thing. In the end, he comes up with nothing and he stashes the topper in his former slushie moneybox to keep his mom from asking questions. She has a habit of entering his room unexpectedly.
Well, it looks like talking directly to Hummel is definitely off the cards. Dave immediately discards his second idea, which is writing a note and leaving it somewhere, for obvious reasons of potential identification problems. Unfortunately, Dave is batting zero on coming up with other ideas of how to communicate "Hey, we're cool! Please stop being terrified of me!" somehow to Hummel when a voice calls him out after practice in the locker room.
"Stop picking on Kurt."
It's the wheelchair kid, Abrams, and Dave can't help snorting. Chang is standing next to him and they're trying to look intimidating, but all Dave can think is how easily he could toss either of them into a dumpster.
He ignores them and turns around to grab his jacket from his locker. "Do you mind? I'm changing."
"We're serious," says Chang, slamming Dave's locker shut. "This is a warning."
It would be a better move if Chang had anything to back it up. Dave humors him anyway. "Oh yeah?" he asks.
"From now on, you're going to leave him alone," Abrams informs him coldly.
Like Dave hasn’t been trying to accomplish that for the past week? Like he hasn’t been breaking his brain trying to find a way to make Hummel stop being scared? Screw humoring the nerds. Dave has had enough of this.
"Look," he states clearly, "if he wants to be a homo? That's up to him." Truthfully, Dave has never had a problem with Hummel being queer. He's always figured it was just his choice—a dumb one, yeah, but so was joining Glee club and Dave can't actually imagine Hummel any other way. It's this new thing, the one where he drives Dave to do stupid, crazy stuff like steal wedding toppers and make death threats, that really has to go. "But don't rub it in my face," he concludes.
"We're not asking you," Abrams grits.
"Yeah," says Chang. "We're done talking about this." He gets right up in Dave's face and freaking barks, "So back off, alright?"
"No, you back off!" Dave retorts and shoves Chang at just the right angle to topple Abrams in his wheelchair. He moves to leave the locker room but instead is surprise tackled by none other than Sam Evans.
The fight that goes down is short and dirty. Like a coward, Evans goes straight for his groin before using the momentum of Dave's reflexive response to slam him against the opposite row of lockers. It hurts like hell and Dave knows he’s going to have a serious bruise to show for it. Dave gets in a solid punch to his face next, though, and Evans goes down like a pile of bricks. Dave follows him down, keeps whaling on him even though Evans is mostly flailing at this point and Dave's not even sure why. Maybe because he just said it was okay for Hummel to be gay even if no one in the room seemed to notice. Maybe because Hummel once looked at Evans the same way he used to look at Hudson and the way he's never looked at Dave.
The next thing he's aware of is Coach Beiste hauling him off and pinning him against the lockers.
"What the hell's going on here?" she roars.
He doesn't say anything and neither does Evans, so Beiste hauls both of them into her office.
"You want to explain to me," she tells them in those quiet, measured tones that the entire team has come to associate with imminent danger, "what exactly just went down in there?"
Dave sneaks a look at Evans, but Evans is sitting like he plans to remain just as stubbornly silent in here as he was in the locker room. Dave follows suit and stares at his hands.
"Alright," Coach Beiste says finally after a long moment when neither of them has spoken. "If neither of you yahoos wants to tell me why you decided to start whaling on each other out of nowhere, then I have no choice but to suspend both of you from the team for two days."
Neither he nor Evans protests. It's pretty much what Dave expected.
"We'll chalk it up to testosterone and leave at that,” she continues. “Dave, you're demoted to second-string for the week. Sam, I'm going to seriously revaluate whether you should be considered for quarterback. Both of you will shake hands, and if I catch either of you two fighting again, you're both off the team. Is that clear?" she asks sternly.
Dave nods, sees Evans do the same. They stand up and carefully shake hands under the watchful eyes of Coach Beiste, then head silently back into the locker room.
It's mostly deserted at this point, practice having finished awhile back. Chang, Abrams, and Puckerman are still lurking around, but it's patently obvious by the way their heads jerk up at the sound of the door opening that they've all been waiting specifically for Evans. It's then, counting the triumphant high fives they all exchange, that it strikes Dave there was one pretty important face missing from the whole Glee party showdown. For some reason, the abrupt revelation of Hudson's conspicuous absence rankles him even more than the smirk slowly growing on Evans’ face, and he barrels past the four of them without a word.
He grabs an ice pack out of the freezer when he gets home, ignores his mom's shouted query from the laundry room about his day, and heads up straight to his room. Dave strips off his shirt in the bathroom, tossing it aside to check out his back in the mirror. Sure enough, a bruise is already starting to form, right where Evans managed to slam him into the handle of a locker door. He struggles for awhile trying to figure out how to hold the ice pack on top of the bruise before ultimately deciding to just place a towel on his bed and lie down.
He rests his back gingerly on the ice and then lets out a long, weird breath, his arms falling with heavy thumps by his side. He doesn't know how much longer he can live like this.
Dinner is a stilted affair. Dave doesn't feel like talking and his dad almost always spends dinnertime unwinding from seeing his clients at the practice, leaving his mom alone tonight in chattering blithely to fill the gaps of silence between bites. She talks about the new aerobics program they've started offering at the gym, which she apparently worked very hard to create a poster for, and about the cooking event her friends are planning to host tomorrow for their weekly meeting as part of the community women's club. Dave notes dully that all the women she takes care to mention seem to have daughters in the Celibacy Club.
Eventually, though, she runs out of idle chatter and turns her attention back toward Dave. "So how was school today, David?" she asks, fixing her sharp gaze on him.
His father looks up to hear his answer too, so Dave mutters a dull "fine" and turns his attention back to his plate.
His mother is not deterred by his apathy. "Anything interesting happen?" she prods.
Dave pauses, but honestly he doesn't know how to even begin answering that. He settles instead on, "No." Then he shovels in more casserole.
His mom looks ready to give up, but his dad surprisingly clears his throat. "Your mom said it sounded like you took an ice pack out of the freezer when you got home today," he says softly. "Were you injured during practice?"
Dave chews slowly and then says, "A tackle went bad. It happens sometimes."
"Will you still be playing in this week's game?" his mom asks, concerned.
Dave swallows. "Nah, Coach Beiste thought this might be, uh, a good opportunity to let some of the other guys try starting."
"Because of one bad tackle?" his dad asks skeptically.
Irritation swells up in Dave. "Yeah, coaches do that sometimes. It's called part of developing a team. If you'd played sports, you would know," he adds snidely.
"David!" his mother snaps.
"I gotta do homework," he mutters, pushing away from the table. His father, predictably, says nothing to stop him.
He heads upstairs, but instead of opening his book bag Dave just throws himself on the bed and sinks his face in the soft pillows. He's never known how to explain to Azimio or the other guys whose fathers used their belts how much worse it could be when your parents' favorite punishment was to express just how crushingly disappointed in you they were. Dave has never been intellectual enough for his father, even before he started playing dumb, and his mother has been pushing for him to become more popular ever since she realized only half of the mothers in the women's club even knew his name. It's a mindscrew, trying to keep up with all their expectations, and he doesn't have to ask to know that none of them include space for fascination with the color of Hummel's eyes in different kinds of light.
He falls asleep hours later and has vague dreams of being chased by linebackers in frilly aprons.
School the next day is pretty much as he expects. People are abuzz about the impressive shiner Evans is sporting and who gave it to him, so overall people are giving him a fairly wide berth. Dave doesn't mind. He doesn't feel like dealing with anyone today anyway. Not screwing up his life more than he already has is his new mantra, and he's determined to stick to it for at least one day. Things are going well heading into lunch. He actually listened to his history teacher during class today (sadly, there were no bipolar rants) and he's cautiously optimistic about the possibility for tater tots in the cafeteria. He's just heading toward his locker to drop off his books when he catches sight of something that makes him stop in his tracks.
There, in the music room with the chairs pushed aside, are Hudson and Hummel. They're standing together and holding hands like they're practicing to dance, standing with the door wide open so that anyone could walk by and see— like it'd be okay, like no one would dare make fun of them now that they were going to be brothers. They're standing together like Hudson hadn't chickened out the day before, hadn't decided against sticking up for Hummel when all the other Glee boys had. Like Hudson had already been forgiven, could always be given more chances when Hummel wouldn't even give Dave one. In that moment, Dave sees red.
He sends them a limp-wristed gesture when they happen to glance his way and storms off with an angry jerk of his head. Frustration buzzes in him like the thrum of a hot engine. Forget trying to make nice with Hummel. What was the point? No matter what he said or did, in Hummel's eyes Hudson would always be a hero and Dave would just be the moustache-twirling comic book villain. The roles for both those parts had been cast long ago, and well, if they don't seem to fit any more that’s just Dave's own fault. He should have known better than to mess with what is clearly the status quo.
He's preoccupied enough with his internal seething that he misses the abrupt thundering of footsteps behind him and the way he's suddenly slammed up against the bulletin board comes as a complete surprise. Dave barely has time to let out a furious "What the hell, dude?" before a flannel arm is pressed tight against his throat.
The arm belongs to a hefty man not much shorter than Dave. "You like picking on people?" he growls, his face inches away from Dave’s own. He presses his arm in a little tighter. "Why don't you try me?"
He looks familiar is all Dave can think, like Dave's seen him somewhere before, but it's not until Dave sees Hudson and Hummel running up to him that it actually clicks. The man with an arm currently against his throat is none other than Hummel's dad, the same man who not ten days ago got down on one knee in Dave's homeroom to propose to Hudson's mom. This time his face is neither relaxed nor happy, fixed instead in a smooth mask of rage, and Dave is startled to realize just how difficult it is to recognize that other happy man in him now.
Eventually the combined pleas of Hummel and Hudson convince Mr. Hummel to lower his arm. Dave wastes no time in sliding securely out of the man’s grasp and even less time in bolting for the nearest exit, not caring if he looks ridiculous.
He spends lunch in the locker room—doesn't feel like eating anything—and debates whether or not to cut his afternoon classes. It turns out to be a moot point. When he goes to put his books away in his locker, Principal Sylvester is standing there waiting for him.
She gives a quick once over, looking unimpressed. "Dave Karofsky,” she says flatly.
It takes Dave a moment to realize it’s a question. Fortunately, Ms. Sylvester seems to accept his confused blinking as confirmation.
Her voice is deceptively pleasant. “You are hereby suspended pending the results of a disciplinary trial to examine certain charges that have been leveled against you.” She leans in with a unsettlingly sympathetic expression and Dave struggles immediately not to lean back as she explains softly, “That means you’ll be leaving my campus immediately. Do not pass Go, do not collect two hundred dollars, do not slushie one last fattie—now. I've already contacted your father and he has agreed to meet with us in person in order to discuss your future at my school. I will see you both in my office at nine o'clock." She levels him a long look. "Is that clear?"
Dave nods around the thick lump of dread in his throat.
"Good. Now get off my campus."
It's weird coming home in the middle of the day. His mom's off at her women's club thing and his dad works afternoon and evening hours on Wednesdays, so the house is empty when he arrives. If this were a normal day, he'd waste no time in stockpiling junk food in the living room in anticipation of a hours-long TV and gaming marathon. Today, though, he just climbs the stairs to his room, empties his pockets on the floor, and passes out face-first on his bed.
He wakes up a couple hours later to the buzz of an incoming call on his phone. He checks the display. Azimio.
"What's up?" he says.
"Shouldn't I be asking you that?" Azimio replies. "Man, word around school is you got your ass suspended."
"Hummel's dad caught me picking on him. Wrong place, wrong time."
"Seriously?" Azimio laughs. "You got suspended because the fairy's father went and cried to Coach Sylvester?"
"More like he bellowed, dude," Dave says. "Don't ask me how, but Hummel's dad is built like a freaking tree. Pinned me right up against the wall."
"Damn. I would have paid to see that." There's a shuffling noise on the other end, something that sounds like Azimio dropping his backpack, and an additional moment of pure awkward silence before Azimio’s voice says, hesitantly, "So you think you're going to beat the suspension?"
Dave swallows. "Absolutely, man," he says, trying to inject a confidence he doesn't feel. "They'll keep me out two days, tops. It'll be like a two day vacation for me. Only part that will suck is missing the game Friday."
"Yeah, man, we'll miss you," Azimio says loyally, and Dave wants to thank him for pretending that anything that has gone down these past four weeks has been normal.
That would be mushy, though, so instead he says, "I think I hear my mom coming in, bro. Time to face the music."
"Good luck," says Azimio and hangs up. He's never seen the point in saying goodbye.
Dave's mom isn't home yet, but of course when she does arrive she's already heard the story from her friends in the women's club. She asks first if it's true that Mr. Hummel choked him against a wall and after Dave waffles for a bit over whether to qualify an arm against his throat as choking, she falls uncharacteristically silent for the rest of the night.
Dave's father shuffles in around nine o'clock, hanging up his coat and accepting a reheated plate of dinner quietly. Dave watches him carefully, still keyed up thanks to sleeping all afternoon, but his dad doesn't appear especially angry or disappointed in him. To Dave’s eyes, he just looks tired. When he finishes his plate, he tells Dave that he rescheduled his morning appointments for the afternoon and that he expects Dave to be ready to leave at eight-thirty. He nods when Dave does and then without ceremony goes to bed.
The morning dawns weird and tense. Dave carefully selects a shirt that his mom says brings out his eyes and combs his hair even though he doesn't really think Ms. Sylvester will come down less hard on him just because he looks neat. He heads downstairs, finds his dad sitting at the breakfast table with the newspaper already spread out before him. His mom hovers over his left shoulder, reading the same article. She's made them both bacon, eggs, and toast, but Dave finds he can only swallow a couple bites of each before he loses his appetite. His mother seems to understand and clears the dishes away early.
She gives him a hug before they leave, whispering in his ear, "I've already taken the day off with the gym. Don't worry, okay? We'll get this straightened out." She pulls back and fixes his collar. "Call me as soon as you get the news."
Dave's stomach churns the whole drive over. Being hauled in front of the principal is different than being hauled in front of your coach. This could have consequences—beyond suspension from the team kind of consequences—and Ms. Sylvester's not exactly known for her fair and balanced judgment. Dave’s heard the horror stories from the Cheerios. This could very well be a show trial, just Ms. Sylvester's decision to enjoy watching Dave squirm before handing out whatever punishment she sees fit.
He glances over at his father, but he hasn't said a word to Dave since last night. Dave has no idea what Ms. Sylvester told him about this meeting. He'd kind of like to know, craves a glimpse of what's going through his dad's head, but Dave doesn't really feel like breaking the silence to find out. He’s already struggling with keeping down breakfast. So instead of finding out which details his dad has in his possession, Dave just focuses on summoning the calm, collected persona he assumes he’ll need for the meeting ahead.
He realizes his mistake the moment he walks in the room and Hummel and his dad are there already sitting on the couch. Dave has to take a quick step to keep from shuddering to a full stop in the doorway. He glances back at his dad, but his father doesn't look remotely surprised to see the two of them there, like he expected them.
Mr. Hummel looks at Dave as though he'd like nothing more than to toss Dave in a dumpster and then stand guard to make sure he stayed there. He's dressed in a uniform shirt—his name is Burt, apparently—like he's just come from work and sitting like he only intends to take his twenty minutes here to kick Dave's ass.
"Mr. Karofsky, thank you for coming," Ms. Sylvester calls graciously from her desk. She motions for both of them to sit down, and the sharp look with which she pins Dave has him sitting in the chair across from Hummel's dad rather than Hummel. Dave folds his suddenly sweaty hands on top of his letterman's jacket and tries to look anywhere but at the man sitting across from him.
Ms. Sylvester takes off her glasses, folds them, then strides around to the front of her desk and sits on the edge. There's a brief pause before her voice cuts through the thick silence. "So it seems this situation has reached a boiling point."
"You're damn right it has," Mr. Hummel bursts out. His eyes haven't left Dave once since he entered the room, and Dave shrinks a little under the intensity of that glare.
"Nothing happened," Dave points out weakly, like it matters, like it should count for something.
Not in Burt Hummel's book, it doesn't. "I'll tell you what really happened. Mr. Karofsky—"
"My name's Paul," his dad interrupts smoothly, years of practice in psychology showing through.
"Paul," Mr. Hummel allows. "Your kid? Threatened the life of my son."
Dave's dad looks at him for the first time since they entered the room at that. Dave stares back, unsure what to say. He'd figured Hummel had told his dad about the death threat the moment he realized they were part of this meeting too, but he hasn't exactly had time to come up with anything to counter it. The only defense he has is that nothing ever happened and that he never intended for anything to.
"Porcelain," Ms. Sylvester asks gently, "is that true?"
Hummel nods shortly without looking at anyone.
"It's not true," Dave protests, because denial is all he has at this point. "I didn't say anything."
"That's what he said," Hummel cuts in sharply, meeting Dave's eyes baldly for a moment before turning to Ms. Sylvester. "He said he'd kill me if I told anyone."
"If you told anyone what?" she asks.
Hummel's eyes flicker to Dave and Dave's heart stops. Hummel can't tell, not here, not in front of Dave's dad. That would be the worst possible thing, worse even than if Hummel had chosen to do a tell-all interview for Israel's blog that very first day. In here Dave's entirely without protection, unable to write the whole thing off as wistful thinking on Hummel's part, and he's pretty sure Mr. Hummel will deck Dave if the words he finds threatening to burst from him (I kissed your son) actually cross his lips.
"Just—" Hummel hesitates, licks his lips. His eyes don't leave Dave's. "That he was picking on me," he says.
Dave lets out a huge sigh of relief, makes a mental note to thank Hummel later, and goes back to his denial defense. "He's making all this stuff up," he claims.
"Oh, is that right?" Mr. Hummel demands, sounding like he's ready to tear Dave a new one.
"Hold on a second." His father's quiet, measured voice silences the room as effectively as a shout. "You have been acting differently lately, David."
He's using his psychologist voice again, and to Dave's horror he starts listing off examples of Dave's changed behavior, like Dave's a patient in some textbook case instead of his son. "And now we're sitting here," his father concludes bleakly. "So let me ask you." He points to Hummel. "Why would Kurt make that up?"
"Maybe he likes me," Dave says helplessly, and his father gives him a sudden, piercing look.
"I think that we are wasting our time here," Mr. Hummel bites off in short, angry bursts. "It's your job to protect people," he accuses, facing Ms. Sylvester.
"I couldn't agree more," Ms. Sylvester replies. She fixes narrowed eyes on Dave. "After hearing both sides of the story, you are hereby expelled. I will not have one student threatening the life of another."
Hummel lets out a sigh of relief and Dave barely hears Ms. Sylvester as she talks about the possibility of appealing her decision to the school board. "And you'll leave campus immediately," she finishes.
Dave's father doesn't miss a beat. "I appreciate your time," he murmurs and stands to leave. Dave follows him, giving Hummel a look as goes that he hopes conveys just how sorry Dave is about the past two weeks—and how grateful he is for Hummel's silence. Hummel's porcelain blank face gives away nothing.
His dad doesn't speak until they get in the car. "What's going on with you, David?" he asks bluntly, not even bothering to put the keys in the ignition.
Dave shrinks back in his seat. "What do you mean?"
"I mean everyone in that room was scared," he says. "Kurt was scared, his father was scared though he was doing a heck of a job covering it, and you were practically ready to pass out in your chair. So what's going on?"
Dave thinks of a thousand different things he could tell his father. He's under a lot of pressure for football. His classes are harder this quarter. He's anxious about looking at college in the spring. But none of these things touch on the heart of the matter, which is that right now Dave feels like who he is doesn't fit at McKinley. A little addiction to a certain fashionista's put paid to that. He doesn't fit, and what's worse—he doesn't think he can fit back into the person he used to be, the guy who could joke about the Cheerios' skirts and push around Hummel without it meaning anything. The guy who could make his parents, any set of parents, proud if he just put forth the effort and tried a little harder. That guy? He’s now irrevocably beyond Dave’s reach.
Dave doesn't know how to say all that to his father, though, how he could make him understand. So instead he says nothing and shifts in his seat.
After a few moments, his father sighs and turns the key in the ignition. "Did you know," he asks lightly, "that before every answer he gave, Kurt's eyes flickered to you?" He looks at Dave. "That's the mark of a bully, David. Whatever's been bothering you, I want you to promise me that you won't take it out on Kurt when you get back."
"I've been expelled," Dave replies slowly.
"The school board meets the first and third Thursday of every month. Your mom's already making the calls to get your expulsion appeal on the agenda tonight. It's better if we make the challenge early so it doesn't look as though we needed time beforehand to get your story straight." He pauses. "I know you're a good kid, Dave, and back at the beginning of the school year it really looked like you were starting to get your act together. I hope you can push past whatever's bothering you and get back to that."
He drops Dave off at the house, doesn't follow him inside in order to make some late morning appointments that couldn't be moved. His mom is on the phone when he gets in. Whatever she's hearing has her frowning at the person on the other end and she waves distractedly for Dave to sit down at the kitchen table and wait.
It's another two minutes before she hangs up with a chirped, "Thanks, Sheila!" She closes the phone with a sigh and sits down across from him. "Well, I managed to get your appeal on tonight's agenda," she informs him. "So that's at seven tonight. Mrs. Adams says a button-down will give the best impression to the members of the board, so I want you to wear the green one your aunt got you for your birthday. Is there anything you want for lunch?"
"Mom, it's ten-thirty," Dave tries carefully. She just looks at him and Dave gives up. "A sandwich would be great," he says.
His mom gets up and starts pulling cold-cuts out of the fridge. As she rummages around for the special French mustard that Dave likes, an odd thought occurs to him.
"Mom," he asks slowly, "When did you call to schedule my appeal? I didn't think Dad called you."
She turns around to face him. "I called as soon as you left, sweetie. The Hummels have a history of going to the school board with their complaints. At this point, I think the school rules in their favor just to get rid of them."
"You never thought I had a chance," says Dave, stunned.
"It's not your fault, honey," she hastens to assure him, sitting down again. "Mr. Hummel can be rabid when it comes to getting what he wants and clearly he doesn't care who gets in the way." The twist of her mouth is patently disdainful.
Dave is suddenly, irrationally indignant on Mr. Hummel's behalf. "You ever think he might be justified in that?" he retorts. It's not like Dave's about to volunteer to go singing the guy's praises, but the man Dave saw in that office was firmly in his kid's corner, which is more than Dave can say for his own dad.
His mom just looks bemused. "Dave," she asks, "does he have physical evidence on you?"
"What? No." Dave's threats have always been of the verbal or physical kind. He isn't the type of idiot who writes that stuff down.
"Then his case rests on the other kid's word against yours," she explains patiently. "In legal circles, that's known as hearsay. Unless he produces some witnesses, no school board in the state will reject your appeal."
Dave's head buzzes. "So my expulsion's going to be reversed?"
"Almost certainly." She smiles. "Now about that sandwich?"
A sandwich is the last thing Dave wants. "Not hungry," he grunts, scraping the legs of his chair on the floor as he pushes away from the table. "Think I'm going to take a nap."
Dave struggles to place how he feels as he climbs the stairs. It's not that he wants to stay expelled from McKinley. He knows what happens to high school dropouts in this town. Yet at the same time, he can't deny that the very first thing he felt following the announcement of his expulsion—after he got over the initial shock, of course—was anything other than an immense sense of relief. Finally, the endless nightmare of trying to square things with Hummel while also being careful to keep everything involved in the mess under wraps was over. Dave could lead a normal freaking life again. Returning to that, being thrown back in that situation again, just isn't all that appealing, even if it does appear inevitable.
Dave sleeps until mid-afternoon. He wakes feeling vaguely disgruntled, but gets up anyway to eat some sandwiches with his mom. He's sweaty after his nap, so he opts to take a second shower, letting the hot water erase any lingering traces of doubt or apprehension. He combs his hair afterward to look presentable, and dutifully puts on the shirt his mother has laid out. When she calls for them to leave, he even manages to give her a smile as he comes down the stairs.
The appeal goes pretty much as his mom predicted. She lays into the school board about the lack of physical evidence involved in his expulsion, citing additionally the ineligibility of the actual evidence used. Dave doesn't say a word, just sits there and tries not to look too suspicious or guilty while his mom proceeds to systematically outline each of the problems in his case. Initially some of the board members look dubious, but one by one they fold under the sheer force of his mother's argument. Dave's expulsion is summarily reversed and he's let off with a verbal warning combined with a two-day suspension.
The whole process takes fifteen minutes.
His mom's expression as they leave the board meeting is bright and proud. Dave knows there was a time a long time ago that she dreamed of being a lawyer, and arguing his expulsion is probably the closest taste of the real thing she's ever had. He feels sort of bad for her that he can't actually share in her happy mood right now.
"The expulsion was reversed," she tells his dad as soon as they walk in the door. "Two-day suspension, but that's to be expected. They're informing Principal Sylvester officially tomorrow, and—" she notes with satisfaction, "they'll be conducting an inquiry into just how that woman runs her office." His mom grins, teeth like a shark. "That should teach her a lesson."
His dad nods mildly, turns his attention to Dave. "You'll still be held accountable for the three days of class you'll miss, including today,” he says. “I'll pick up the class work from your teachers quietly tomorrow."
He pauses. "It's probably best if you don't go talking about the expulsion to all your friends, David. With any luck, we can convince everyone it was just a three-day suspension. Scholarship committees don't look too kindly on expulsions."
Because of course the first thing going through Dave's mind during this whole mess was how a reversed expulsion might look on his college scholarship application. "Yeah. Sure, Dad," he mutters and shuts himself in his room. He's not at all tired, but he lies down anyway and stares at the ceiling until his eyes fall shut.
Friday at home is boring without the numb terror of the previous day to fill it. His mom goes to work her job at the gym so Dave has the house to himself. He plays some Halo half-heartedly, trying to distract himself from the slow creeping of the clock, but shortly gives up and throws the controller away in frustration. As far as he knows there's nothing that says he can't leave the house, so Dave changes into a hoodie and a pair of shorts and goes running through the neighborhood. The pounding of his feet on the pavement and bite of the chill November air center him somewhat, and when he gets back to the house he doesn't feel like punching a hole in the wall anymore. He makes himself a plate of pizza rolls for lunch and settles in with the television remote to wait for the end of the school day.
His dad comes home around four, carrying a pile of books with a neatly typed list of assignments on top. It's the first time Dave's ever been grateful to have homework to do on a Friday night. The work keeps his mind off the game he's currently missing and he manages to burn through all his homework problems in pre-calc before he realizes it's kind of late and goes to bed.
The whole weekend passes like that. Dave applies himself fiercely to his make-up work and ignores his phone whenever it buzzes with an incoming text. It's only on Sunday night when he finds himself reading ahead in his history textbook because he's run out of real homework to do that Dave stops and admits he has a problem.
Monday he spends worrying about returning to McKinley the next day. He's back to square one on the whole Hummel situation and he's not having any better luck coming up with solutions now than he was before the whole expulsion thing. It doesn't help that his phone keeps distracting him, buzzing furiously starting around one o'clock and only stopping when Dave eventually shuts it off just to be able to concentrate.
It's around one in the morning, sleep-deprived and delirious, when Dave finally hits upon an absurdly simple idea. He scrambles out of bed and yanks his dresser drawer open in a flash. The wedding topper stares back at him, still resting on top of the ones in his slushie moneybox, and he seizes it eagerly. Dave sits down at his desk, pulls out a scrap of paper, and writes "I'M SORRY" on it in clear block letters that give nothing away about the identity of the writer. He tapes the paper to the bride's dress and then leaves the topper on his dresser while he sleeps.
He carries the topper in the pocket of his letterman jacket when he returns to McKinley the next day. He makes sure to get there early, before any of the other kids get there, and heads directly to Hummel's locker. Dave breaks in quickly, intent on leaving the wedding topper there for Hummel to find when he arrives. Surely, this message was unambiguous enough that not even Hummel could misinterpret it, while at the same time not conveying anything to anyone not in the know.
He's pulling the thing out of his pocket when the locker door swings open and Dave’s hand freezes at the sight of the conspicuously empty space which gapes back at him. Nothing. There's literally nothing inside. Even the stupid picture of Twinkerbell is gone. Dave stares, uncomprehending.
"There you are, man!" Azimio calls from the far end of the hallway. He ambles over to where Dave's still standing, feet rooted to the floor, and punches him on the arm. "Where you been all weekend? I've been trying to text you since Sunday."
"My parents confiscated my phone," Dave lies.
"Well, you missed the finest entertainment this school has ever seen," says Azimio. "The minute the fairy's father found out that you were coming back to school? He pulled Hummel out so fast the kid left a pile of glitter where he was standing." He claps Dave on the shoulder. "You finally accomplished what we've working for since the year we started at McKinley—the complete degayification of the building. Give it up, bro!"
Dave meets his high five dazedly, still staring at the bare space that used to strain with the effort of containing Hummel. Azimio takes notice.
"Sorry whatever prank you had planned got ruined, man," he says in commiseration. "Save it for lunch. I hear Jewfro has another exclusive he plans to shoot. Whataya say that you and I spice it up with a little slushie action?"
"Yeah," Dave mumbles. "Sounds great."
He drops his hand out of his pocket and walks off with Azimio, already laughing and joking like they haven't just spent five days apart.
He feels the weight of the empty locker's gaze like an accusation on his back.