Chapter Text
Noel held onto Constance for comfort. His boyfriend was gone. The man who would call him his poet, his beautiful poet. The man who would speak words of love in Ukrainian even though Noel couldn’t understand Ukrainian. He was so deep in his thoughts he didn’t realize that Karnak had walked up to Constance and him. “Stay back your fortune-telling man! Don’t even hum.” Constance scolded Karnak as he stopped walking toward them. “Do not worry I have no interest in singing. I can’t say the same for these little angels.” He gestured to a small choir of children. Constance gasped in response.
“There's a magic in the air around us. We all have the sudden urge to bake. It feels like a very special birthday, but whose name should be written on the cake?” Constance recoils in response, shielding her eyes. “Constance, you have to get out of here!”
“We asked our public school to give the answer.”
“They're not gonna tell you.”
“But they could only teach us not to pray.”
“That's what they do. That's what they do.”
“The constitution says the state can't tell us. Was anyone important born today?”
“Oh, gotta tell them!” She ran up to the choir standing right in the middle. Noel uselessly tried to get her to stop, but he could only watch in horror as she started to sing.
“Jesus Christ! Jesus Christ is the lord! Happy Birthday, Jesus ! Cut the cake, cut the cake now! Cut the cake, my lord!” Noel ran away thoughts flooding his mind. He found Penny in the hallway! “Penny! Penny! Oh thank god! They got Constance we’re the only two left.” Penny turned around with this look of pure happiness on her face. She started to sing. He screamed as he could feel the glee take over his body.
~~~
Father Markus had them all standing in a circle holding hands for a small pep talk. “Guys, I am swelling with pride! You stepped up, and you saved the Christmas pageant!” He was overflowing with joy.
Penny smiled. “And it's all thanks to you, Father Markus. I just hope we can repay you by making regionals.”
Karnak looked at her in confusion. “Uh, I thought this was regionals. Don't let my confusion undercut their importance.”
One of the stagehands told them that they needed to be in their places. They were all excited. After this they were going to go to regionals!
Father Markus pulled Ricky aside. “I could not have done this without your recruiting skills, Ricky.
“I was happy to do it. For a while there, I thought we were going to end the semester on a really dark note. I'm glad we're singing and dancing together instead. This has been a good time.”
"And it's going to continue to be a good time. If we win regionals, then it's straight on to sectionals. And then a week later is semis. Then semi-regionals. Then regional semis. Then national lower-zone semis!”
“Oh. But I kinda thought this was... You know, just for Christmas.”
“No, no, no. This is forever. This is what we do now. This is who we are, Ricky.” He smiled eerily. The glee was leaving his body as the reality of the situation came to him. They began to sing and Ricky rushed over to Noel. “Hey Noel, I just talked to Father Markus and he says you need to be The Mouse King.” He took off the crown and handed it to Noel. “But I'm supposed to be the mute tree. I haven’t warmed up yet, so I'll sound terrible. Also why me?“
“He said this would help us get to regionals.” Noel put the crown on and smiled. A smile that was too bright for him. This person wasn’t Noel. He was a brainwashed singing zombie. What are the words?" Noel asked. Ricky pointed to his heart, completely sick of talking. “Oh they’re in my heart! Duh-doy!” He ran onto the small stage when his cue came. Noel sang terribly, but that was enough to break the gleeful spell.
“No, stop, stop, stop, stop! What are you doing? Get off the stage!” Father Markus violently tugged on Noel’s arm.
“I'm singing my heart's song,” Noel said tearfully.”
“Get off the stage and never sing again! You are the worst!”
“Hey! You do not get to call my boyfriend the worst.”
The crowd cheered in agreement.
The Dean walked up to Father Markus. “Sir, I think it's fine. Uranium is an all-inclusive school. Why don't we let Noel sing his awkward song?
The crowd cheered again.
“No, no, no, no, no, no! This show is supposed to be gleeful and bright and fun, and you can let me do that, or there can be another bus crash! Well, figuratively. I'm not saying, "I killed the last Glee Club." I'm saying you not listening to me is like metaphorically cutting the brake lines on your own- look, Kings of Leon!” Then Father Markus made his escape running through the school never to be seen again.
“What did he say? Did Father Markus kill the last Glee Club?” Penny asked.
“Maybe Penny is right. Maybe forcing things to be bright just makes the darkness underneath even darker. This was all my fault, insisting we do the pageant. Sorry. Merry Christmas. I guess I’ll just see you guys after the holidays.” He sulked away, silently beating himself for his stupid ideas.
~~~
Ricky began to watch the Inspector Spacetime Holiday special, truly one of the most terrible things ever created. He sighed leaning back in his chair. Christmas was going to be the most miserable day ever.
“The angels did say was to certain poor Shepherds in fields where they lay in fields where they lay keeping their sheep on a cold winter's night that was so deep.”
He walked toward the sound, chills running down his spine. ‘It’s happening again.’ He opened the door and breathed a sigh of relief. It was just the study group. They all acted normally. Noel didn't smile as if someone was holding him at gunpoint and Ocean wasn't acting too sexual. “We wanted to come over to make sure you were alright. Things got really hectic this semester.” Constance walked in holding a tray of cookies. “Yeah I basically killed a guy and attacked you all with an axe.” Penny chuckled and took Ricky’s hand leading him to the living room. The rest of the group followed them. Noel grabbed Mischa’s wrist and held him back. “Can we talk? It’s not anything serious, I promise.” Mischa turned to him with a look of concern on his face. “What is it poet?” “It’s just, it was really scary seeing you sing and dance.” “We do that all the time.” They really did. Mischa should spin Noel around dancing to some slow corny romantic song. “Yeah I know. I think what made it scary was you not acting like yourself.” Mischa looked into Noel’s eyes. They were filled with hurt and pain. “What made it even worse was when you used the word y’all.” Mischa chuckled and pulled his boyfriend near him. “I love you поет.” Noel kissed his boyfriend. It tasted sweet. Like they always were. They both walked into the apartment, holding hands.
“We’ll see you all after regionals!“
“What even are regionals?”
The group collectively shrugged.
Maybe Christmas wasn’t going to be that bad.