Chapter Text
November 23, 2010
"Just back it up," Sue Sylvester ordered the FedEx driver as he struggled with his delivery. "I had a loading dock installed." Soon she was signing off on the packing slip for an explosion of Sue-centered items: copies of her inspirational and generously instructive book, tracksuits freshly returned from their dry cleaning in Bulgaria, and several prototype models for an action figure she would soon propose to Mattel.
"What?" she asked the driver as he still stood on the dock.
"Sorry, lady," he grimaced as he rubbed the small of his back. "That was a lot of boxes, I think I—"
"You have thirty seconds to be nothing more than a pair of taillights in my extremely distant vision before I call your supervisor." She smirked when he began stammering. "Of course I know your supervisor. I know everyone's supervisor. This is my town, and until I trade it in for a better one like turning a Yugo in for an Eagle, I'm in control."
She had no idea who his supervisor was, but that mattered little. It was worth it to see the flash of fear move across his face. Sue was pleased with herself when he fled and left her free to slit open boxes. That pleasure died abruptly when she began rummaging through the action figures and found it missing a key component. There was no contract. Without that contract in hand, that no-account sculptor was free to use her appearance in other venues. She was almost certain those venues would be pornographic.
When the doorbell rang insistently and Sue dragged herself to it, she snatched the special delivery away from the mailman. "Idiot," she muttered when she saw an envelope from the artist. Presumably it held the contract, and he'd realized he'd forgotten to put it in the FedEx box. "Not you," she clarified when he looked offended. "Well, probably you, too."
Eying her, he shoved the rest of her mail at her and walked back to his truck. Sue set it aside and returned to the boxes filled with celebrations of herself.
It was well into evening when she finally felt content with her assessment of the day's delivery. She let her attention turn to more mundane things. On the top of the stack of mail sat bills. She could see restaurant delivery menus under that. Grumbling at the outrageous waste of her time, Sue began flinging each piece of new mail across her foyer. Her maid would analyze each one, return the ones that contained something worth notice, and dispose of the rest.
A piece of obvious fan mail had sloppy penmanship on the front and she tossed that as well. A familiar return address made her smirk, but Sue didn't bother reading the likely death threat from one of her biggest rivals. Her mouth twisted into a scowl when another piece of fan mail was sent on a postcard. She deserved a full-price stamp. And Iowa was her forty-eighth least favorite state; there was no chance she would ever 'Visit Beautiful Des Moines.'
It was pure chance that, as she moved to flip it like a throwing card across the room, the postcard's back came into view. There were few words on it and so they were large and easily seen.
Thank you for calling me someone. –Kurt
Instead of flying across the room, the card fell to the floor from numb fingers. Sue stared at it as she felt her head begin to pound. She had armor like few people ever managed, she had carefully killed nearly every warm fuzzy feeling within her, and she should illustrate the antonym section under 'sentimental.'
And normally, that would all hold true. She simply hadn't expected to see those words. Few things took her by surprise.
Very slowly, she reached down and plucked the card off the floor.
Everything was slow and strange as she reread the words. The world suddenly failed to make sense, which was impossible. The world bent around Sue Sylvester's whims; it didn't dare operate in any manner that might confuse her. Her mind flashed back to a special report on the news. Violence on a snowy highway filled her vision when she picked up the phone and dialed one of the few numbers she knew by heart. Normally, it was for prank calls. Not that night.
"William," Sue said as he answered.
"Sue?" Will replied, sounding annoyed. "Whatever you're planning, it can wait until after Sectionals."
"Get over here."
"Seriously? No." But she repeated her command and her voice cracked in the middle of it. He hesitated before asking, "Why?"
"Just get over here," she ordered and hung up.
It took ten minutes to drive between their homes. He took more than twenty to arrive, having likely spent time pacing before setting off. Will Schuester didn't want to appear to be at Sue Sylvester's beck and call, that much was clear. At the same time, his curiosity was obviously piqued. He was leaning against the doorframe and looked unimpressed when she answered the bell. "Well?"
"Come in," Sue said and walked into her home. He took a few seconds to follow. Dramatically annoyed sighs marked his progress.
"I told a neighbor where I was going," Will informed her as she led him to the living room. "If you're trying to kidnap me before Sectionals, it's not going to work. Believe me, with all the... turbulence that's happened recently, I'm taking extra steps to make sure nothing else goes wrong."
She didn't say anything and his interest seemed to grow. "And I'm not eating anything," he added. "In case you're trying to mess with me right before Thanksgiving. So much for any plans to give me food poisoning. And I don't have any allergies." He frowned when she sat down and stared at the coffee table, and finally ventured asking, "So... why did you call me, Sue?"
For an answer she plucked the postcard off the table and held it out to him. Will took it, blinked uncomprehendingly at the front picture, and then turned it over. He was absolutely still and silent as he read the words what must have been a half-dozen times.
When Will sat next to Sue on the couch, neither of them said anything for a very long time.
"It was Jacob's blog," Will finally said to break the silence. "I heard from the kids that he was following what was posted there. I guess you must have said that on one of the videos. I mean, I'm assuming you didn't go over to visit."
No. She hadn't. Sue visited her sister and no one else. She certainly didn't visit students, no matter what happened to them. Besides, stepping onto that family's property could earn jail time, as could making a call. She wasn't about to risk it.
At her lack of response, Will seemed compelled to continue the conversation on his own. "They made me good-bye videos, both of them. Since the whole family was leaving. Both Finn and K-Kurt, I mean. Did they make anything for you?" He looked at her, determined her stony silence to mean 'no,' and continued, "Well, their friends went over to say goodbye before they left. And they were all from Glee, so I think it was just kind of natural to think of me. I don't think he meant anything by not making one for you. It's not that you were friendly with him, but...."
Sue plucked the postcard from Will's hands and traced the thick, heavy ballpoint lines with her fingertips.
"I couldn't believe it when I heard," Will finally said when they'd both sat in another stretch of uncomfortable silence. "Rachel called me. Finn told all the kids, and it was like they didn't know what to do. And there's nothing you can do. But I guess they figured if some adults couldn't do anything to help, they'd try the others they knew." He rubbed a hand over his face. "I would've called you, but it hit the news after that. I guess I figured you saw."
She had, and firsthand. She'd just finished up a Sue's Corner segment and was relaxing at her desk as the anchors took over. A yearbook picture with a familiar face was suddenly on the monitors. After a stab of concern that he was dead, Sue learned something far worse had happened. It was always mildly interesting to local journalists when someone was collared, as it was so rare, but the reason Kurt was on the news was his age. That idiot Rod Remington confirmed that being found that late was highly remarkable. As Sue sat there, pulse pounding in her ears as they described the capture and shipment to a training facility, only one thought managed to coalesce: please don't remember that I took him to Nationals.
If they had, they would have turned the camera back to her and expected a statement. She only would have stared back into it.
It was several days before Sue managed to say anything to the people around her, or particularly wanted to. No one noticed. There was some attention later that summer from the cheerleading community, as the people there put together the pieces of how soon after Nationals the collaring had occurred. They wanted McKinley's win investigated and competition footage analyzed; some were convinced that she'd somehow hid his condition.
No: its condition.
Sue had never given much thought to the Angel trade, as she hadn't wanted one for herself. They were like pets, she'd always assumed, and she didn't have time for animals. With her awareness suddenly raised, she began to process what really went on and was quietly sick. She didn't mind hurting people. She liked hurting people. But with the memory of a childhood spent looking after her sister, she was left hating every word that said a student she'd mentored wasn't a person.
It had been a bad summer. She assumed Will had talked to his little tomato-headed Freud in a cardigan and sensible heels, but Sue only had Jean. As much as she loved her, Sue wanted someone from school to ask how she was doing. Jean had never seen those ridiculous outfits walking down the hall and so wouldn't understand what it meant to know they would never return. So she didn't really talk to her sister about it, she didn't talk to any of the other faculty, and of course she didn't talk to any of Kurt's friends. Occasionally she would see news footage where some celebrity was accompanied by a quiet, broken figure in a gold collar, but all Sue could do was change the channel.
Then he came back and she didn't have to think and feel any more. She just had to fix things so they were exactly the same as before.
Except that she couldn't.
He still wasn't a person. Figgins called him 'it.' Boys who had once slammed him unthinkingly into lockers like pushing open a door... they doled out the worst violence that town had ever seen. No one cared that they'd hurt him; the town only cared that those boys' lives weren't ruined.
Sue made her squad cry that week. She worked them so hard that four Cheerios threw up from exhaustion before they could make it to a trashcan or toilet. When she saw students signing notes of affection to the boys in the hospital, she tore apart their appearance, dress, parentage... whatever came to mind. Possessions were destroyed. Egos were bruised. Figgins told her to stop making a bad situation worse. So did Emma; she added on a bit of editorializing about how she knew Sue was a terrible person, but to please try to control herself until the student body had worked through the worst of their grief.
"Sue?" Will gently asked. "You've just kind of been... zoning out while I've been talking."
She reached out and picked up the postcard. It wasn't just the picture on the front; the postmark was really from Iowa. "He left."
"Yeah. You didn't know?" Will hesitantly asked.
"There were conflicting reports after the kidnapping," Sue said shortly. "I didn't know if he was alive." No one had told her. Will knew, apparently.
"He made it," Will said. "And his whole family moved away."
"Where?"
"I don't know," Will admitted. "I think some of the kids do, but they're not saying anything. Only that it's somewhere with hardly any people." He looked at the picture of Iowa. "And I guess they were driving west." He watched her for a while, and then asked, "So, what are you going to do?"
"About what?"
"About... about everything, Sue. This is the sort of time when people look inside themselves and change for the better." He faltered. "I know I needed to," Will quietly added. "When I look back on what I was encouraging my students to do... I had no idea. I just never thought about it."
"You want to see a big change?" Sue asked thinly. "Then talk to someone who didn't hear about all of this on the news. Talk to someone who got a goodbye," she added with more bitterness than she intended. Will Schuester had done nothing but yell at students in the hallways; Sue had actively fought to get restrictions overturned. She went for results, not warm and fuzzy feelings. She at least deserved to have some appreciation shown.
"What do you call this?" Will asked as he flicked his finger against the side of the postcard. Sue instinctively grabbed it back, lest it bend, and he smiled. "I'm sorry," he continued. "I should have talked to you over the summer. I was just so torn up about everything that I didn't process you'd be the same way."
"I don't need your help, William. Not unless—"
"I know, I know. You're about to insult my hair." He pointed at the hall. "I have to run by Walmart later, anyway. I could pick up a photo frame if you want."
"And why would I want that?" Sue asked.
"So you don't have to worry about that postcard getting bent."
She looked down and didn't respond.
"I'll be back later with it," Will said. "And I'll email you the video Tina made. It's short, but you know... it's something." He hesitated as he turned to leave. "It's a much better image to have in your head than what was on the news that night."
Sue didn't offer a reply and he didn't wait for one. When she heard the door close she allowed her fingers to once again trace the words on the card. 'West' had a lot of possibilities. She doubted she'd ever learn that family's destination.
Her maid hesitantly cleared her throat and Sue realized she'd been trying to get her attention for some time. "Do not throw this away," Sue said as she held up the postcard. "Ever."
"All right," she said uncertainly. "Ah, a fax came for you while I was cleaning up the mail? Here you go," she said as she shakily handed it over.
Sue grabbed it from her and studied the words there. With the tumult at McKinley, she was being asked to return to her intermittent Sue's Corner role. They felt as if she would have an insider's perspective on the students' behavior at that school and asked that she resume her commentary for the next three weeks. Particularly with their... regrettable decision to run unauthorized images of the Angel, they were very interested in being able to discuss the situation without the need for pictures. Her personal knowledge would help with that.
A slow smile grew. "I might be able to do that," Sue said to herself as she wondered if those idiots at the television station had any idea what they'd just asked her to do. She carefully set aside the postcard. As much as she hated to admit it, Will's idea was a good one; it would be reassuring to have the card protected under glass. With a dramatic flourish she reached for a notepad, a pen, and uncapped the pen with her teeth.
"I've been asked to talk about what happened at William McKinley," Sue jotted down. "With the understanding that I possess a far more insightful view into the situation than any halfwit built out of hairspray and tiger tattoos can muster." Her gaze flicked to the postcard and lingered for a few seconds. When she looked back, Sue was smiling. "And so that's what I'm going to do. I'm going to tell you all what happened before they hurt someone."
She could hear the concerned comments now, and they'd try to get her to change things. Something.
Forget that. She was Sue Sylvester. She didn't listen to copyedits.
"Let me tell you some stories," Sue continued. Her pencil danced over the page. "About a person."