METANOIA. glee.

6. "vitamin d"

"five, six, seven, eight. step, turn, out, in, ball-change, step ball-change step. you, you, you, you. and ba-ba-ba. turn..." mr. schue is trying to teach us choreography, but it's not going very well. "come on, guys, you're sleepwalking on me here. give me some energy. we've got sectionals in two-" mercedes cuts him off. "please, sectionals is going to be a breeze." we all nod. "maybe so. but if we coast through sectionals, we're gonna get killed at regionals. we have got to be on our game." "well mr. schue, we know we're going to win. both at sectionals and regionals. we'll give it our all onstage." i say, and he sighs. "i want to see you give it your all in rehearsal too." "we do! sometimes..." i shyly mumble, and he smiles.

i remember him announcing our competition last week.

"great news, guys. Just got the competition bracket for sectionals, and we are in really good shape. There's only two other teams. We beat them, we make it to regionals." only having to go against two teams is amazing! "uh, who are the other teams?" rachel asks. "drumroll please, finn." "school for the deaf in Dayton, and someplace called Jane Addams academy." ok, not bad. mercedes scoffs. "Jane Addams? that's a halfway house for girls just getting out of juvie." ok, we really lucked out! "th-th-this is great!" tina says. "people who can't hear what they're singing and criminals who don't care. it's gonna be a cakewalk. high five!" i give artie a high five."

its the next day, and we notice mr. schue has a board with a bunch of pictures on it. "mr. schue, what's the board for?" finn asks. "competition." he says, as he points to the different pictures. "every one of these people or elements was a champion in their own right. but they used competing with each other to make themselves even better." " i don't understand how lightning is in competition with an above-ground swimming pool." kurt mumbles. "just go with it. you guys have become complacent. you were great at the invitational, but you got to up your game if you want to get through sectionals. okay, split up. guys on the left side, girls on the right side. let's go, come on. all right." i happily move over to the girls side and kurt follows. i honestly have no problem with him in our group, but mr. schue then tells him to go the guys side. "here's the deal. two teams. boys versus girls. one week from today, you will each perform a mash-up of your choice." we all look at each other excitedly. "what's a mash-up?" puck asks.

"a mash-up is when you take two songs and mash them together to make an even richer explosion of musical expression. boys will perform on tuesday, girls the next day. i want you guys to go all out, okay? costumes, choreography. whoever wins the competition gets to choose the number that we do for sectionals." oh we're totally going to win. "wait, who's going to be the judge? your gender makes you biased." rachel says, and the rest of us girls nod in agreement. "ah...there is going to be a celebrity judge." "wh-who?" tina asks. "oh, you're going to have to show up to find out." mr. schue say. i smirk. "we got this in the bag." mecredes says. "totally. i'm going to start storyboarding our choreography tonight." rachel can be a blessing or a curse. but i'm glad she's on my team. we leave the classroom bubbling with ideas.