Damaged Goods

Chapter 5

"I've gotta say guys... I'm disappointed."

The Glee club sat in the choir room at the end of the week, this time in their standard formation against the back wall, but there was still one empty seat amongst them. Mr. Schue's eyes flickered from the empty chair to the rest of the group again and again as he addressed the group, a sad look on his face.

"Mr. Schue, we tried. We really did. But have you met the students at this school? They'd all rather die than join Glee!" Mercedes exclaimed. Mr. Schue sighed.

"Look, guys, I realise that it's not easy. That it's not going to be as simple as walking up to someone and asking if they would join the New Directions." Mr. Schue said. "But if you care about this club and care about winning Nationals as much as I do, which I know you all do, you'll go above and beyond, do whatever's necessary, to recruit people. If nobody agrees on the first ask, you keep asking. Keep persuading them. Try and convince them to come to just one rehearsal as a trial run to see if they enjoy it. Do whatever it takes!"

"Mr. Schue, do you really think we didn't do all that?" Rachel remarked. "Nobody wants to win Nationals more than we do. Of course we want to do whatever it takes. But it's just simply impossible. I think the best move would be to just work with 11 people and for competitions, we can get Jacob Ben Israel or some other person to fill in and just stand there in the background."

Mr. Schue shook his head vehemently.

"No, no, no. We're not doing that!" He declared. "You guys were there in New York last year! You saw how incredible the other choirs were! If we want any shot at all at winning Nationals, we're going to need AT LEAST 12 good, passionate singers. Any less than that and we might as well kiss any chance of winning goodbye. If anything, we need more than just one more person."

A collective silence ran through every student in the room as Mr. Schue spoke. Just hearing his passion was enough to reboot their systems. He was absolutely right. For many of them, this was the last chance they would ever get to win Nationals, so none of them would be able to live with themselves knowing that there's more they could've done but didn't. They needed to put everything they had in every part of the process, and that included the stage of recruiting new members.

After a few more moments of silence, with Mr. Schue's voice trailing off after his passionate speech, it was Kurt's turn to speak up.

"Well, update for everyone... I've been trying to convince Blaine to transfer to McKinley. I don't know whether or not he's certain yet, but I think he's definitely considering it."

"Good. Kurt, that's great." Mr. Schue smiled at him and nodded. "Having an experienced singer like Blaine would be an incredible addition to the New Directions."

"Because there are so many of those just lingering around the halls of McKinley High." Sam snapped sarcastically and annoyed.

"I know, guys. Trust me, I know." Mr. Schue replied, sighing. "It was hard enough to find you guys in the first place, and you guys actually wanted to join Glee club."

"I didn't." Finn pointed out. "You found me, saw I had talent and then... convinced me to join."

"Yeah, and Finn, you did the same with me." Sam added. Mr. Schue nodded.

"That's exactly what I was going to say." Mr. Schue smiled. "Some people in this room didn't join because they knew they could sing. They weren't experienced singers or performers, but they had talent and they had heart. I guarantee that Finn and Sam aren't the only people in this school like this. That's who we're looking for. That's who we stand a chance in convincing to join Glee."

"So how do we find them?" Finn asked. At that moment, all of a sudden, there was a knock on the choir room door and somebody walked in. As they did, every eye in the room widened in shock. It was Quinn Fabray, but not the Quinn they had come to expect over the past week. No, this Quinn was almost... normal? At least she looked back to normal. She had clearly dropped the black and leather and replaced it with her customary Cheerios uniform, clearly having been reinstated back on the team by Coach Sylvester. Her hair was no longer pink, but back to her original blonde. The chains of jewellery were replaced with her old gold cross necklace. Her black nails had become white. Her nose ring disappeared. And her horrific temporary tattoo had thankfully begun to fade away. It was like the Quinn of old had returned at long last, and it was a welcome sight to all of them.