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ellydashTitle: Power Switch
Author:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
ellydash
Pairing: Will Schuester/Sue Sylvester
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: Slight dub-con, rough sex, references to pegging
Word count: 9,458 total
Spoilers: None
Note: This story is a follow-up to Sacrilege (but works as a standalone, so it’s fine if you haven’t read the other one first). Posted in two parts due to length.
Summary: Sue and the Cheerios receive second place at Nationals, catalyzing a (literal) explosion that results in Sue teaching a U.S. history class, with a newly promoted Will supervising. Sue’s not happy. Will’s out of his depth.
Part One
5. you with fire running in your veins: sit down in fire
It’s the unsurprising secret folded beneath the larger riddle of their coupling: how rough they get with one another in bed.
He receives the worst of it, by far: teeth marks, scrapes and light bruises he hides under long sleeves and collared shirts. It thrills Will, shames him a little too, when he catches a glimpse of his body in the bathroom mirror before showering and sees how she’s damaged him, how she’s left behind the ghosts of her fingers, her teeth, her nails. It’s their unspoken accord. Sue dictates the terms, and Will submits, letting Sue do to him with her mouth and tongue and toys what she does elsewhere with words: evisceration, annihilation, ruin. He falls apart with her.
He’d asked Sue once, confused, why she enjoyed going down on him if she got off on being dominant, and she’d sighed with irritation. “It never fails to astonish me,” she’d informed him, “how exceptionally, extraordinarily terrible you are at understanding simple power dynamics. There’s nothing submissive about giving a blowjob – and you know what, Will? That phrase is insulting. I’m not giving you anything. You are giving me the most sensitive and vulnerable part of your body to do with what I please.”
Tonight, it’s taken Will nearly fifteen minutes of persuading to get Sue into bed, and he’s got a sneaking suspicion that the bottle of sour Iowan wine they’ve consumed has something to do with her capitulation. She’s curled on her side, facing him, with an expression of boredom that doesn’t falter as he unzips her jacket, slides an impatient hand underneath her tank top. It’s the first time Sue’s let Will near her body since the night she’d attacked him in his bedroom, after Nationals.
“You have great breasts,” he observes. “It’s a shame they’re always hidden away under a tracksuit.”
Even lying down, her head on a pillow, Sue manages a look that’s replete with condensation. “My look is outstanding. If you think I’m gonna change it just to satisfy the greedy, milky eyes of an oversexed vaudevillian, you’re higher than Willie Nelson at a Pfish concert.”
“It’s the world’s loss, then.” He pulls down the tank top, exposing her breast, and takes the nipple between his teeth, biting gently. “Take this stuff off, will you? It’s in my way.”
Sue sighs (in annoyance? pleasure? it’s always hard for him to tell), but she sits up and shrugs off the jacket, pulls the tank top over her head. Will reaches behind her to unfasten her bra.
“Failure,” she observes, as he struggles with the clasp. It’s her standby invective, the word she retreats to when she doesn’t feel like expending the effort to harvest another witticism. The corner of her mouth twitches a little, and she tosses the unhooked bra at him; she knows her insults are like sparks to the wick of his body.
“Hey, I’m not the one who just got humiliated on national television,” Will retorts, not thinking, and immediately cringes after the words leave his mouth. Oh, shit. Too far. Way too far.
She jerks away from him, instantly tensing. “What did you just say to me, Will Schuester?”
Will looks at her, startled. Clearly she’s furious with him, that’s not unexpected – and honestly, Sue’s got a right to be angry that he’s rasping at her still-fresh wound. But there’s something else in her voice, humming below her anger: a low lilt of intrigue.
Sue’s staring at him, propped up on her elbow, still imperious even half-nude. “Well?” she adds, and now he knows what he’s hearing: a challenge. She’s throwing down a gauntlet, to see if he’ll retreat or pick it up. She’s done this with him a few times before, tested him to see if he’s willing to chase her up another escalation. Usually, he backs down. I didn’t mean it. You’re right. Whatever you say.
He’s tired of acting like the Nationals catastrophe didn’t happen, tired of pretending it hasn’t sparked this troubled shift between them. She’s been sharper with him over the past two weeks, methodically annihilating those small shards of humanity he’s managed to excavate, and Will’s coming to realize that even he can’t take her undiluted abuse much longer.
Something’s got to change. Even if the fallout means he goes back by himself to the shrieking silence of his apartment; even then.
“You heard me,” he tells her, heart picking up pace. One of them needs to confront it. “I said I’m not the loser here, Sue. You are.”
She’s on top of him almost before he realizes it, snarling into his neck and ear and hair, her nails biting at his arms. “No one calls me that,” she hisses, and then she’s yelping in surprise as he manages to top her, hands gripping her shoulders, pressing her back against the bed. Her hands flare helplessly, trying to grab at him, to pull him off. She wasn’t expecting him to fight back; he can tell.
For a moment, they dance like this: he pushes his hands into her, the heels of his palms grinding just above her collarbone, and Sue aims for Will’s chest, his stomach, whatever flesh is closest. Her eyes flash with the apprehension of a cornered animal.
He lifts one leg over hers, and carefully straddles her hips, sliding his hands down to restrain her upper arms. Sue’s mouth drops open, and her hands fall to her sides, thumping against the mattress. She’s pinned. She stares up at him.
“Let me go,” she demands, but the fury’s gone from her voice.
“No,” Will snaps. The thrill of denying her something she wants makes him almost light-headed. He shuts his eyes briefly, feeling the low, lovely tremor of lust shake him, and he doesn’t have to look down to know he’s already half-hard, quickly growing.
“You’re disobeying me?” A telltale pink flush spreads slowly over Sue’s face and neck. Oh, Will thinks, recognizing the familiar marker of her arousal, watching her squirm slightly under him. Isn’t that interesting.
“Yeah, I am,” he says, looking closely at her. “We’re going to do this my way, for once. Whether you like it or not.” He pulls his t-shirt over his head.
“Say it with more conviction, Schuester,” Sue mocks, but she’s taking in his torso with greedy eyes. “You can’t command a glee club made up of sexually ambiguous bottom-feeding teenagers. What makes you think you can make me do what you want?”
In response, he wrenches down her tracksuit pants and underwear past her thighs and licks a deliberate, slow stripe across her lower belly, just above the pubic mound. Sue shudders as his tongue drags over her skin. “More,” she orders, trying to thrust his head between her legs.
He resists, pushing back against her hands, and lifts his head. “No.”
Sue’s face darkens, although it isn’t clear whether it’s anger or lust causing the change. Maybe both. She fists a hand in his hair, pulling hard to show she means business, and he cries out, frustrated; she’s not going to get the advantage here. Not tonight.
“I know what you want from me,” Will pants, trying to pry her hand out of his hair, “even if you can’t admit it. It’s why you haven’t wanted to touch me for the last two weeks. Fucking me isn’t working for you anymore, is it, Sue? Topping me?” He tears the hand free. “You want me to take a turn. Make you beg for a change.”
“You’re weak,” she sneers, and reaches down to fumble at the zipper on his khakis. “You think you can make Sue Sylvester beg? That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve heard since John Boehner’s last press conference. Buddy, you couldn’t make a drowning man beg for a life vest.”
Will realizes, with an accompanying kick of desire low in his stomach, that it’s not a denial.
Sue’s breathing hard.
He lets his hand drop back to her breast, thumbing the erect nipple. She hums in her throat, a sound like irritation, invitation.
“Feel good?” he asks.
“Pathetic,” Sue says, hoarsely, reaching into his khakis.
Will grabs her wrist and pulls her hand up towards him, isolating her index finger. He watches her face while he draws her inside his mouth, circling his tongue around the fingertip like he does to her clit, like he’s done to her strap-on.
At the press and suck of his tongue on her, Sue swears and arches, just a little, against the mattress, her chest rebounding with the quick oscillation of her breath. Her other hand moves down between her legs. He follows it with his eyes, fascinated, as she slips two fingers inside herself, before he remembers that Sue doesn’t get to control what happens here.
Will bites down on the finger in his mouth to remind her, and her hips jerk up against her hand in response to the pain: once, twice.
“No,” he tells her, “you don’t get to do that,” and he yanks her left hand away. It smacks against the mattress, without resistance. She watches as he pulls off his pants and boxers, staring at his twitching cock, full and slick at the tip; she slowly draws her index finger out of his mouth.
“Well, look at you, William.” There’s no confidence in Sue’s voice, no real wit, just the shaky tenor of increasing need. “You’re almost butch enough to wear my strap-on.”
He leans over her, naked now, rubbing deliberately against her thigh. She’s staring at him, flushed and wanting. “You’d like that tonight, I think,” he observes, realizing the truth of it as he speaks. “Getting fucked with your own cock.”
“God, Will,” she whimpers, and purses her lips together to stop the yes he knows is bursting in her throat.
“If you ask me, I’ll do it.” He reaches down between their bodies and fists himself, pulling, the friction incredible. Sue lifts her hips, appealing wordlessly for his attention, and Will finds her swollen clit with his thumb, brushes it lightly. She gasps, bucking against him. The raw sound pulls at Will, makes him want to forget this game he’s started, to spread her legs and fuck into her until he can’t hear or see or speak.
He slides his thumb away, trembling, and Sue mewls at the loss of pressure, her mouth open and red and panting.
“Ask me.” Will doesn’t recognize his own voice; it’s cracked, wrecking against the walls of his throat. “Sue. Ask me. Ask me.”
There’s nothing but their labored breathing, and then, she whispers: “Please.”
It’s quiet, but it’s there: shaking out of her, a broken plea. Will has to bite down hard on his lower lip to keep from coming.
“Please, what?” he manages, and cups her face in his hands, panting. He wants to hear her say it.
“Please,” Sue repeats, her voice thick, and says the word again, like she doesn’t know what else she can tell him. There’s no more script. “Will – please.”
He kisses her then, a fierce careless knocking of teeth. Sue whimpers into his open mouth and he thinks, I’m in, I’m under her armor. And then, an illogical wave of panic: Don’t let me get trapped here.
The strap-on harness Sue keeps in her bedside table drawer fits him surprisingly well, considering it’s adjusted for Sue’s hips, not Will’s. He struggles into it, nestling his pulsing cock into the fabric pouch, fastening the Velcro straps, rolling on the condom she always insists on using when she fucks him. Without a word from him, Sue flips over onto her stomach, rising to her hands and knees, and he realizes she’s assumed the position she likes him in best.
His hands grip her hips, shaking. She reaches back between her legs for the plastic cock, guiding him, and Will can’t wait anymore; he pushes, gasping, into her cunt, a deep desperate thrust that drives a shattered moan from her throat.
“Beautiful,” he breathes, meaning her, meaning the way she’s opening for him. It’s the closest he knows he’ll ever get to an endearment with Sue, and when Will bends down against her back, Sue’s dildo all the way inside her, he whispers it again, into her damp skin: “Beautiful.”
Her arms tremble and she cries out the first notes of her climax, beginning the hot, wet quake that ruins him.
6. you melt my wings and call it fun. I should run
In the aftermath, Will’s mute. He can’t find the right words.
Throughout the weekend, he scrolls continuously through his iTunes, hoping that Nirvana or Soundgarden or maybe Air Supply will give him a solution, provide him with lyrics in the absence of prose, but there’s no help there.
Sue doesn’t call him. He wonders if she’s as embarrassed as he is. Probably more so. He’d mocked her to her face, called her a failure, and worse, he’d made her like it. He’d taken her humiliation and her loss of control out of the workplace and into bed with them. Will’s face turns hot at the memory of it, thinking of the wet drone of her skin against his demanding fingers; the way she’d gotten on her hands and knees for him without being prompted.
It occurs to Will then that an embarrassed Sue Sylvester, with the added variable of time, mutates into a vengeful Sue Sylvester. His stomach twists, unpleasantly, and the familiar sense of trepidation he’s come to associate with Sue steals up his spine, settling like a small, charged nub in the back of his neck.
On Monday afternoon, after a day of successfully avoiding Sue in the hallways (he’s a coward; Will understands and accepts this), he steps into the music room for glee rehearsal and breathes a quiet sigh of relief. It’s a refuge of sorts for him, the only place where he can forget about the mess he’s made of his personal life, and he silently thanks whatever guiding force gave him this sanctuary.
“So,” he begins, rubbing his hands together, taking in his kids’ expectant faces. “You’ve prepared songs for today that have to do with power, right? Tina, what’d you come up with?”
Tina beams. “I did some googling, like you said, Mr. Schue, and I discovered that before she was an actress and a spokesperson for CoverGirl, Queen Latifah actually made music!”
Will attempts to hide his wince. They’re all so young. “That’s right, Tina. Did you choose something by the Queen?”
“U.N.I.T.Y,” Tina announces. “It’s got this amazing feminist message about how men shouldn’t call us bitches and hoes.” She glares at Artie. “It’s girl power before the Spice Girls invented the term.”
“Okay, good.” Will looks around the room. “Anyone else?”
“Mr. Schue?” Santana’s raising her hand. “Wanna tell us why you picked this theme? Because usually you make up theme weeks when your personal life is exploding. Everyone knows Ms. P-H ditched you for Hot Carl, so it can’t be her. We’re all dying to know what drama bomb went off.”
“That’s inappropriate, Santana,” Will replies, automatically. “And honestly, just because I selected a theme for you guys to explore doesn’t mean it has anything to do with my personal life. Give me a little more credit than that, okay?”
“Hmm,” she says. He really doesn’t like the knowing tone in her voice. “So it’s not Ms. P-H. Who else at this school do you have a bizarrely intense relationship with? On the faculty, I mean.”
“Santana –”
“You and Coach Sylvester seem to know a lot about one another’s personal lives,” she continues. “I mean, like a weird amount. Okay, so this morning, during our meeting, she made this joke about the creepy way you shave your face in the morning before school, making shapes with the foam and stuff. It wasn’t really funny, but it got me thinking: how does she know how you shave your face, Mr. Schue? Why would she be in your bathroom in the morning before school?”
Meeting? What meeting? “This is not an acceptable conversation,” Will interrupts, flustered, “and unless you want me to take you to see Principal Figgins, I’d recommend you stop talking about this, right now.”
His glee kids are wide-eyed, watching him. All of them.
“Suit yourself.” Santana procures her nail file out of an invisible pocket in her skirt, drags it across her index finger. “I’m just saying that this little power-induced crisis you’re having might be linked to your new coziness with Sue.”
“I don’t get it,” Puck says, turning to Santana. “What does Sylvester have to do with anything?”
“He’s doing her, Puckerman,” Santana snaps, and Will’s jaw drops in astonishment.
Finn lets out a disbelieving laugh. “That’s not true, right?” he asks. “Right, Mr. Schue? I mean, she’s evil. She’s our enemy. She wrecked the music room right before Christmas, she leaked our set list last year, she’s done everything she can to destroy us. And she’s really mean to Coach Beiste, who’s pretty much the nicest person ever.”
“I heard that,” Artie chimes in.
Rachel’s staring at Will, and Will, with horror, sees the beginnings of comprehension blooming on her face.
“You asked me to report to you,” she whispers. “I thought you were worried about me, about us, the students – but it was her all along, wasn’t it?”
“Rachel,” he tries. “Rachel, please.”
“I don’t know how I could’ve been so blind. It’s the classic hate turns to love story. Doris Day and Tony Randall in Pillow Talk. Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton in Taming of the Shrew.”
Who gets to be Elizabeth Taylor in this scenario? Will thinks, irrationally. Sue or me?
“Except,” Rachel continues, “that this isn’t a timeless film masterpiece. This is real life. This –” Her voice wavers. “This is a betrayal.”
“Deny it, Mr. Schue,” Finn cuts in, loudly. “You’d never do that to us. Just deny it, okay? Please.”
Santana’s smirking. “He can’t deny it, Finn ‘n Out, because it’s true.” She flips her hair behind her shoulders. “Coach Sylvester told me herself.”
In the sickening silence that follows, Will reaches out with his right hand, finding the edge of the piano, grabbing it for stability. He can’t believe what he’s hearing. He believes every word of what he’s hearing. “Santana, what, exactly, did she tell you?”
“That you guys have been fucking since January,” Santana says nonchalantly, and there’s a collective gasp from the group. “She gave me other information, too, but I forgot it on purpose because, seriously, gross. Although there was one very interesting detail Sue mentioned that I wouldn’t mind sharing. You know, in the name of glee club solidarity, or whatever.” She gazes, pointedly, at Will’s crotch, and Will has never, ever in his life, wanted anything more than the ground to open up and claim him.
“My personal life,” he says, finally, “is none of your business. Any of you. Got that?”
The look on Finn’s face is the worst of all, Will thinks. It’s bigger than disappointment: it’s disillusionment. Finn’s forehead is wrinkling like someone’s told him the moon is purple, or that rain is dry.
“Guys.” Will hears the pleading note in his voice and hates himself for it. “Let’s just change the subject. We’ve got a lot of work to do.”
“Not today, Mr. Schue,” Mercedes informs him, standing up, and she walks out of the music room, her back straight and her head high. After a brief hesitation, Finn follows her. Rachel flounces out behind him, but she’s lacking her usual flair.
The last one to walk out is Santana, and she dawdles, smiling at him. “It’s not that big of a deal,” she tells Will. “Everyone will get over it. Eventually.”
He resists the sudden, wild impulse to shake her. “Why, Santana? Why’d you have to say anything?”
“Because she told me to,” Santana says, simply. “You understand.”
7. be secret and take defeat from any brazen throat
She’s waiting for him in her office, correcting papers with a fire-red sharpie marker.
“Well, come on in, buddy,” she instructs, without looking up. “No need to close the door, though, since it’s not like there’s anything to hide. By tomorrow, thanks to the miracle of social networking, everyone’s going to know that you and I have been making the beast with two backs for the last four months. I’ve given Santana explicit instructions. Becky has been given the task of creating a Facebook group.”
“Why?” It’s the same question he had for Santana. It’s all Will can manage.
Sue puts down her pen and removes her glasses, pointing them in his direction. “You asked for this,” she says, harshly. “Remember? When Beiste found out about us thanks to your ridiculous slip-up in the faculty lounge, and you implied it wasn’t a big deal if people knew? I’m just accelerating the process of disclosure.”
“My kids,” he says, imploring her. “Sue, I didn’t mean the kids needed to know.”
“Did they cry?” She pushes her chair back, lifting her chin. “Is Finn Hudson’s heart broken after finding out that his favorite teacher’s not the saint he thought he was? Is Rachel Berry sitting shiva for you?”
“You’re heartless.” Will’s shaking with anger. “You’re horrible, Sue.”
“All I did,” she hisses, “was tell the truth. If you’re so humiliated by those glee kids of yours finding out about us –”
It’s like a light bulb’s gone off over his head. That word. “You’re trying to get back at me for the other night, aren’t you? You’re trying to get control.”
“To paraphrase the third greatest puppet philosopher of the late twentieth century, I don’t try, William. I do. I did. I’m sure Figgins won’t be too pleased to learn that his star informant didn’t disclose an improper relationship with the faculty member he’s been supervising.” She folds her hands behind her head, nearly purring with satisfaction. “You can kiss that promotion of yours goodbye.”
“I defended you to Shannon, you know,” Will seethes. “I told her she didn’t know you like I did. I told her you were kinder than you let on. But then you go and do this, when you know what it’ll cost me with those kids? I don’t understand it. I don’t get how you can be the way you are with your sister, and then turn around and stab me in the back.”
Sue pitches her glasses onto the top of her desk. “Don’t you dare,” she warns him, “don’t you dare bring Jean into this.”
“Well, whatever ‘this’ is, Sue, I don’t think I can do it anymore,” he says, simply. “Not after what you’ve done. Not after how you’ve done it.”
She shakes her head. “Unacceptable. This relationship is over when I say it’s over.”
“This isn’t a relationship,” he scoffs, unable to keep the bitter note out of his voice.
“Oh, William,” Sue says, and the corners of her mouth turn up in the saddest smile he’s ever seen from her. "Will. It is.”
He gapes at her. “But you told me months ago that you didn’t want – ”
“I remember what I told you. Apparently you’ve been too busy not preparing your glee club for Nationals to notice, but there have been developments. I can show you select pages in my journal, if you need a refresher.”
“You don’t need to do that.” Will’s astonished. “Were you, I don’t know, planning on informing me about these changes at any point in time?”
“Didn’t think it necessary, William, although I clearly overestimated your powers of observation.” She leans back in her chair, and stacks her legs on top of her desk, one foot crossed over the other. “Your toothbrush is in my bathroom cabinet. I’ve tolerated your presence during Ice Road Truckers.” A pause. “You met Jean. Believe me, Will, when I tell you: that’s a gift I don't give lightly.”
“Is this what you do to people you’re in a relationship with?” he asks, still not quite sure he’s actually having this conversation with her. “Embarrass them in front of their students, just so you can regain the upper hand?”
“I did what I had to do,” Sue declares. “To restore the natural order.”
“You liked it.” The observation springs from him unbidden, and he flings it at her like it’s something shameful. “The other night. You came harder than I’ve ever felt you come.”
Two spots of color flower on Sue’s cheeks. “A momentary weakness. Likely brought on by insufficient egg in my evening protein shake.”
“Sure,” he says, sarcastically. “I know it always gets me off when I don’t eat enough egg.”
She glares at him. “You don’t understand anything. You’ve never had any power – you don’t know what it’s like when the thing you’ve made your entire life gets stripped away from you.”
Will laughs, astonished. “Are you seriously that self-involved?” he demands. “Have you ever, for a single second, thought about what you’ve spent the last two years doing to me?”
“There’s a difference,” she snaps. “You don’t know how to win. I do.”
He gestures between the two of them. “This - you and me - it doesn’t have to be about winning.”
“What else is there?” Sue asks him, and her voice is painfully sincere.
Will doesn’t know how to answer her, not in the way he wants to, where he'd make incisive observations and she'd have a revelation. He speaks in snapshots, instead. “Marathoning Ice Road Truckers,” he tells her. “Mocha ice cream that you won’t eat in front of me, but keep in the back of your freezer behind the extra-large ice packs. Singing Duran Duran under your breath when you think I’m not listening. The way you pull my hair in bed and I pretend I don't know that it's the part of me you like best.”
She folds her hands across her lap. “I’ve gotten used to you," she says, quietly, after a minute.
He understands exactly what she means. “Yeah,” he agrees, taking in the curved slopes of her shoulders against the chair; the slight incline of her head. “Me too.”
Except, Will knows, familiarity can’t do what he needs it to do: heal what he knows are their irresolvable differences. It’s what Will returns to with Sue, over and over again: the impossibility of suturing the gap between them, between their priorities, between their values and ethics (or lack thereof). She seeks out war. He craves creation. Will needs desperately to believe in that divide.
And then there’s his glee kids, whom Will can’t think of without the possessive pronoun, the children of his heart and throat. He knows he’s hurt them, even if he didn’t mean it; he still wants to call out after their retreating backs, use the empty phrases he knows so well: I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. Are you okay?
(To try and explain, with an image meaningless to anyone but him: sometimes, in the morning, she draws pictures with my shaving cream on the mirror.)
He thinks about the way Sue’s face softens in her sleep, like she’s finally found the one place that doesn’t require a crusade.
“Your kids,” she informs him, intruding on his thoughts with uncanny accuracy, “are gonna come around. Eventually. They love you, for some inconceivable reason.” Sue pronounces love with an odd emphasis, like it’s rusted in her mouth from disuse, and she doesn’t look at him when she says it.
“They’re not going to understand,” Will says, wearily. “How can they, when I don’t?”
Sue places her feet on the floor, and reaches across the desk towards Will, silently, holding out her hand, her palm up.
After a brief hesitation, he takes it, threading his fingers between hers.
Author:
ellydash Pairing: Will Schuester/Sue Sylvester
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: Slight dub-con, rough sex, references to pegging
Word count: 9,458 total
Spoilers: None
Note: This story is a follow-up to Sacrilege (but works as a standalone, so it’s fine if you haven’t read the other one first). Posted in two parts due to length.
Summary: Sue and the Cheerios receive second place at Nationals, catalyzing a (literal) explosion that results in Sue teaching a U.S. history class, with a newly promoted Will supervising. Sue’s not happy. Will’s out of his depth.
Part One
5. you with fire running in your veins: sit down in fire
It’s the unsurprising secret folded beneath the larger riddle of their coupling: how rough they get with one another in bed.
He receives the worst of it, by far: teeth marks, scrapes and light bruises he hides under long sleeves and collared shirts. It thrills Will, shames him a little too, when he catches a glimpse of his body in the bathroom mirror before showering and sees how she’s damaged him, how she’s left behind the ghosts of her fingers, her teeth, her nails. It’s their unspoken accord. Sue dictates the terms, and Will submits, letting Sue do to him with her mouth and tongue and toys what she does elsewhere with words: evisceration, annihilation, ruin. He falls apart with her.
He’d asked Sue once, confused, why she enjoyed going down on him if she got off on being dominant, and she’d sighed with irritation. “It never fails to astonish me,” she’d informed him, “how exceptionally, extraordinarily terrible you are at understanding simple power dynamics. There’s nothing submissive about giving a blowjob – and you know what, Will? That phrase is insulting. I’m not giving you anything. You are giving me the most sensitive and vulnerable part of your body to do with what I please.”
Tonight, it’s taken Will nearly fifteen minutes of persuading to get Sue into bed, and he’s got a sneaking suspicion that the bottle of sour Iowan wine they’ve consumed has something to do with her capitulation. She’s curled on her side, facing him, with an expression of boredom that doesn’t falter as he unzips her jacket, slides an impatient hand underneath her tank top. It’s the first time Sue’s let Will near her body since the night she’d attacked him in his bedroom, after Nationals.
“You have great breasts,” he observes. “It’s a shame they’re always hidden away under a tracksuit.”
Even lying down, her head on a pillow, Sue manages a look that’s replete with condensation. “My look is outstanding. If you think I’m gonna change it just to satisfy the greedy, milky eyes of an oversexed vaudevillian, you’re higher than Willie Nelson at a Pfish concert.”
“It’s the world’s loss, then.” He pulls down the tank top, exposing her breast, and takes the nipple between his teeth, biting gently. “Take this stuff off, will you? It’s in my way.”
Sue sighs (in annoyance? pleasure? it’s always hard for him to tell), but she sits up and shrugs off the jacket, pulls the tank top over her head. Will reaches behind her to unfasten her bra.
“Failure,” she observes, as he struggles with the clasp. It’s her standby invective, the word she retreats to when she doesn’t feel like expending the effort to harvest another witticism. The corner of her mouth twitches a little, and she tosses the unhooked bra at him; she knows her insults are like sparks to the wick of his body.
“Hey, I’m not the one who just got humiliated on national television,” Will retorts, not thinking, and immediately cringes after the words leave his mouth. Oh, shit. Too far. Way too far.
She jerks away from him, instantly tensing. “What did you just say to me, Will Schuester?”
Will looks at her, startled. Clearly she’s furious with him, that’s not unexpected – and honestly, Sue’s got a right to be angry that he’s rasping at her still-fresh wound. But there’s something else in her voice, humming below her anger: a low lilt of intrigue.
Sue’s staring at him, propped up on her elbow, still imperious even half-nude. “Well?” she adds, and now he knows what he’s hearing: a challenge. She’s throwing down a gauntlet, to see if he’ll retreat or pick it up. She’s done this with him a few times before, tested him to see if he’s willing to chase her up another escalation. Usually, he backs down. I didn’t mean it. You’re right. Whatever you say.
He’s tired of acting like the Nationals catastrophe didn’t happen, tired of pretending it hasn’t sparked this troubled shift between them. She’s been sharper with him over the past two weeks, methodically annihilating those small shards of humanity he’s managed to excavate, and Will’s coming to realize that even he can’t take her undiluted abuse much longer.
Something’s got to change. Even if the fallout means he goes back by himself to the shrieking silence of his apartment; even then.
“You heard me,” he tells her, heart picking up pace. One of them needs to confront it. “I said I’m not the loser here, Sue. You are.”
She’s on top of him almost before he realizes it, snarling into his neck and ear and hair, her nails biting at his arms. “No one calls me that,” she hisses, and then she’s yelping in surprise as he manages to top her, hands gripping her shoulders, pressing her back against the bed. Her hands flare helplessly, trying to grab at him, to pull him off. She wasn’t expecting him to fight back; he can tell.
For a moment, they dance like this: he pushes his hands into her, the heels of his palms grinding just above her collarbone, and Sue aims for Will’s chest, his stomach, whatever flesh is closest. Her eyes flash with the apprehension of a cornered animal.
He lifts one leg over hers, and carefully straddles her hips, sliding his hands down to restrain her upper arms. Sue’s mouth drops open, and her hands fall to her sides, thumping against the mattress. She’s pinned. She stares up at him.
“Let me go,” she demands, but the fury’s gone from her voice.
“No,” Will snaps. The thrill of denying her something she wants makes him almost light-headed. He shuts his eyes briefly, feeling the low, lovely tremor of lust shake him, and he doesn’t have to look down to know he’s already half-hard, quickly growing.
“You’re disobeying me?” A telltale pink flush spreads slowly over Sue’s face and neck. Oh, Will thinks, recognizing the familiar marker of her arousal, watching her squirm slightly under him. Isn’t that interesting.
“Yeah, I am,” he says, looking closely at her. “We’re going to do this my way, for once. Whether you like it or not.” He pulls his t-shirt over his head.
“Say it with more conviction, Schuester,” Sue mocks, but she’s taking in his torso with greedy eyes. “You can’t command a glee club made up of sexually ambiguous bottom-feeding teenagers. What makes you think you can make me do what you want?”
In response, he wrenches down her tracksuit pants and underwear past her thighs and licks a deliberate, slow stripe across her lower belly, just above the pubic mound. Sue shudders as his tongue drags over her skin. “More,” she orders, trying to thrust his head between her legs.
He resists, pushing back against her hands, and lifts his head. “No.”
Sue’s face darkens, although it isn’t clear whether it’s anger or lust causing the change. Maybe both. She fists a hand in his hair, pulling hard to show she means business, and he cries out, frustrated; she’s not going to get the advantage here. Not tonight.
“I know what you want from me,” Will pants, trying to pry her hand out of his hair, “even if you can’t admit it. It’s why you haven’t wanted to touch me for the last two weeks. Fucking me isn’t working for you anymore, is it, Sue? Topping me?” He tears the hand free. “You want me to take a turn. Make you beg for a change.”
“You’re weak,” she sneers, and reaches down to fumble at the zipper on his khakis. “You think you can make Sue Sylvester beg? That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve heard since John Boehner’s last press conference. Buddy, you couldn’t make a drowning man beg for a life vest.”
Will realizes, with an accompanying kick of desire low in his stomach, that it’s not a denial.
Sue’s breathing hard.
He lets his hand drop back to her breast, thumbing the erect nipple. She hums in her throat, a sound like irritation, invitation.
“Feel good?” he asks.
“Pathetic,” Sue says, hoarsely, reaching into his khakis.
Will grabs her wrist and pulls her hand up towards him, isolating her index finger. He watches her face while he draws her inside his mouth, circling his tongue around the fingertip like he does to her clit, like he’s done to her strap-on.
At the press and suck of his tongue on her, Sue swears and arches, just a little, against the mattress, her chest rebounding with the quick oscillation of her breath. Her other hand moves down between her legs. He follows it with his eyes, fascinated, as she slips two fingers inside herself, before he remembers that Sue doesn’t get to control what happens here.
Will bites down on the finger in his mouth to remind her, and her hips jerk up against her hand in response to the pain: once, twice.
“No,” he tells her, “you don’t get to do that,” and he yanks her left hand away. It smacks against the mattress, without resistance. She watches as he pulls off his pants and boxers, staring at his twitching cock, full and slick at the tip; she slowly draws her index finger out of his mouth.
“Well, look at you, William.” There’s no confidence in Sue’s voice, no real wit, just the shaky tenor of increasing need. “You’re almost butch enough to wear my strap-on.”
He leans over her, naked now, rubbing deliberately against her thigh. She’s staring at him, flushed and wanting. “You’d like that tonight, I think,” he observes, realizing the truth of it as he speaks. “Getting fucked with your own cock.”
“God, Will,” she whimpers, and purses her lips together to stop the yes he knows is bursting in her throat.
“If you ask me, I’ll do it.” He reaches down between their bodies and fists himself, pulling, the friction incredible. Sue lifts her hips, appealing wordlessly for his attention, and Will finds her swollen clit with his thumb, brushes it lightly. She gasps, bucking against him. The raw sound pulls at Will, makes him want to forget this game he’s started, to spread her legs and fuck into her until he can’t hear or see or speak.
He slides his thumb away, trembling, and Sue mewls at the loss of pressure, her mouth open and red and panting.
“Ask me.” Will doesn’t recognize his own voice; it’s cracked, wrecking against the walls of his throat. “Sue. Ask me. Ask me.”
There’s nothing but their labored breathing, and then, she whispers: “Please.”
It’s quiet, but it’s there: shaking out of her, a broken plea. Will has to bite down hard on his lower lip to keep from coming.
“Please, what?” he manages, and cups her face in his hands, panting. He wants to hear her say it.
“Please,” Sue repeats, her voice thick, and says the word again, like she doesn’t know what else she can tell him. There’s no more script. “Will – please.”
He kisses her then, a fierce careless knocking of teeth. Sue whimpers into his open mouth and he thinks, I’m in, I’m under her armor. And then, an illogical wave of panic: Don’t let me get trapped here.
The strap-on harness Sue keeps in her bedside table drawer fits him surprisingly well, considering it’s adjusted for Sue’s hips, not Will’s. He struggles into it, nestling his pulsing cock into the fabric pouch, fastening the Velcro straps, rolling on the condom she always insists on using when she fucks him. Without a word from him, Sue flips over onto her stomach, rising to her hands and knees, and he realizes she’s assumed the position she likes him in best.
His hands grip her hips, shaking. She reaches back between her legs for the plastic cock, guiding him, and Will can’t wait anymore; he pushes, gasping, into her cunt, a deep desperate thrust that drives a shattered moan from her throat.
“Beautiful,” he breathes, meaning her, meaning the way she’s opening for him. It’s the closest he knows he’ll ever get to an endearment with Sue, and when Will bends down against her back, Sue’s dildo all the way inside her, he whispers it again, into her damp skin: “Beautiful.”
Her arms tremble and she cries out the first notes of her climax, beginning the hot, wet quake that ruins him.
6. you melt my wings and call it fun. I should run
In the aftermath, Will’s mute. He can’t find the right words.
Throughout the weekend, he scrolls continuously through his iTunes, hoping that Nirvana or Soundgarden or maybe Air Supply will give him a solution, provide him with lyrics in the absence of prose, but there’s no help there.
Sue doesn’t call him. He wonders if she’s as embarrassed as he is. Probably more so. He’d mocked her to her face, called her a failure, and worse, he’d made her like it. He’d taken her humiliation and her loss of control out of the workplace and into bed with them. Will’s face turns hot at the memory of it, thinking of the wet drone of her skin against his demanding fingers; the way she’d gotten on her hands and knees for him without being prompted.
It occurs to Will then that an embarrassed Sue Sylvester, with the added variable of time, mutates into a vengeful Sue Sylvester. His stomach twists, unpleasantly, and the familiar sense of trepidation he’s come to associate with Sue steals up his spine, settling like a small, charged nub in the back of his neck.
On Monday afternoon, after a day of successfully avoiding Sue in the hallways (he’s a coward; Will understands and accepts this), he steps into the music room for glee rehearsal and breathes a quiet sigh of relief. It’s a refuge of sorts for him, the only place where he can forget about the mess he’s made of his personal life, and he silently thanks whatever guiding force gave him this sanctuary.
“So,” he begins, rubbing his hands together, taking in his kids’ expectant faces. “You’ve prepared songs for today that have to do with power, right? Tina, what’d you come up with?”
Tina beams. “I did some googling, like you said, Mr. Schue, and I discovered that before she was an actress and a spokesperson for CoverGirl, Queen Latifah actually made music!”
Will attempts to hide his wince. They’re all so young. “That’s right, Tina. Did you choose something by the Queen?”
“U.N.I.T.Y,” Tina announces. “It’s got this amazing feminist message about how men shouldn’t call us bitches and hoes.” She glares at Artie. “It’s girl power before the Spice Girls invented the term.”
“Okay, good.” Will looks around the room. “Anyone else?”
“Mr. Schue?” Santana’s raising her hand. “Wanna tell us why you picked this theme? Because usually you make up theme weeks when your personal life is exploding. Everyone knows Ms. P-H ditched you for Hot Carl, so it can’t be her. We’re all dying to know what drama bomb went off.”
“That’s inappropriate, Santana,” Will replies, automatically. “And honestly, just because I selected a theme for you guys to explore doesn’t mean it has anything to do with my personal life. Give me a little more credit than that, okay?”
“Hmm,” she says. He really doesn’t like the knowing tone in her voice. “So it’s not Ms. P-H. Who else at this school do you have a bizarrely intense relationship with? On the faculty, I mean.”
“Santana –”
“You and Coach Sylvester seem to know a lot about one another’s personal lives,” she continues. “I mean, like a weird amount. Okay, so this morning, during our meeting, she made this joke about the creepy way you shave your face in the morning before school, making shapes with the foam and stuff. It wasn’t really funny, but it got me thinking: how does she know how you shave your face, Mr. Schue? Why would she be in your bathroom in the morning before school?”
Meeting? What meeting? “This is not an acceptable conversation,” Will interrupts, flustered, “and unless you want me to take you to see Principal Figgins, I’d recommend you stop talking about this, right now.”
His glee kids are wide-eyed, watching him. All of them.
“Suit yourself.” Santana procures her nail file out of an invisible pocket in her skirt, drags it across her index finger. “I’m just saying that this little power-induced crisis you’re having might be linked to your new coziness with Sue.”
“I don’t get it,” Puck says, turning to Santana. “What does Sylvester have to do with anything?”
“He’s doing her, Puckerman,” Santana snaps, and Will’s jaw drops in astonishment.
Finn lets out a disbelieving laugh. “That’s not true, right?” he asks. “Right, Mr. Schue? I mean, she’s evil. She’s our enemy. She wrecked the music room right before Christmas, she leaked our set list last year, she’s done everything she can to destroy us. And she’s really mean to Coach Beiste, who’s pretty much the nicest person ever.”
“I heard that,” Artie chimes in.
Rachel’s staring at Will, and Will, with horror, sees the beginnings of comprehension blooming on her face.
“You asked me to report to you,” she whispers. “I thought you were worried about me, about us, the students – but it was her all along, wasn’t it?”
“Rachel,” he tries. “Rachel, please.”
“I don’t know how I could’ve been so blind. It’s the classic hate turns to love story. Doris Day and Tony Randall in Pillow Talk. Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton in Taming of the Shrew.”
Who gets to be Elizabeth Taylor in this scenario? Will thinks, irrationally. Sue or me?
“Except,” Rachel continues, “that this isn’t a timeless film masterpiece. This is real life. This –” Her voice wavers. “This is a betrayal.”
“Deny it, Mr. Schue,” Finn cuts in, loudly. “You’d never do that to us. Just deny it, okay? Please.”
Santana’s smirking. “He can’t deny it, Finn ‘n Out, because it’s true.” She flips her hair behind her shoulders. “Coach Sylvester told me herself.”
In the sickening silence that follows, Will reaches out with his right hand, finding the edge of the piano, grabbing it for stability. He can’t believe what he’s hearing. He believes every word of what he’s hearing. “Santana, what, exactly, did she tell you?”
“That you guys have been fucking since January,” Santana says nonchalantly, and there’s a collective gasp from the group. “She gave me other information, too, but I forgot it on purpose because, seriously, gross. Although there was one very interesting detail Sue mentioned that I wouldn’t mind sharing. You know, in the name of glee club solidarity, or whatever.” She gazes, pointedly, at Will’s crotch, and Will has never, ever in his life, wanted anything more than the ground to open up and claim him.
“My personal life,” he says, finally, “is none of your business. Any of you. Got that?”
The look on Finn’s face is the worst of all, Will thinks. It’s bigger than disappointment: it’s disillusionment. Finn’s forehead is wrinkling like someone’s told him the moon is purple, or that rain is dry.
“Guys.” Will hears the pleading note in his voice and hates himself for it. “Let’s just change the subject. We’ve got a lot of work to do.”
“Not today, Mr. Schue,” Mercedes informs him, standing up, and she walks out of the music room, her back straight and her head high. After a brief hesitation, Finn follows her. Rachel flounces out behind him, but she’s lacking her usual flair.
The last one to walk out is Santana, and she dawdles, smiling at him. “It’s not that big of a deal,” she tells Will. “Everyone will get over it. Eventually.”
He resists the sudden, wild impulse to shake her. “Why, Santana? Why’d you have to say anything?”
“Because she told me to,” Santana says, simply. “You understand.”
7. be secret and take defeat from any brazen throat
She’s waiting for him in her office, correcting papers with a fire-red sharpie marker.
“Well, come on in, buddy,” she instructs, without looking up. “No need to close the door, though, since it’s not like there’s anything to hide. By tomorrow, thanks to the miracle of social networking, everyone’s going to know that you and I have been making the beast with two backs for the last four months. I’ve given Santana explicit instructions. Becky has been given the task of creating a Facebook group.”
“Why?” It’s the same question he had for Santana. It’s all Will can manage.
Sue puts down her pen and removes her glasses, pointing them in his direction. “You asked for this,” she says, harshly. “Remember? When Beiste found out about us thanks to your ridiculous slip-up in the faculty lounge, and you implied it wasn’t a big deal if people knew? I’m just accelerating the process of disclosure.”
“My kids,” he says, imploring her. “Sue, I didn’t mean the kids needed to know.”
“Did they cry?” She pushes her chair back, lifting her chin. “Is Finn Hudson’s heart broken after finding out that his favorite teacher’s not the saint he thought he was? Is Rachel Berry sitting shiva for you?”
“You’re heartless.” Will’s shaking with anger. “You’re horrible, Sue.”
“All I did,” she hisses, “was tell the truth. If you’re so humiliated by those glee kids of yours finding out about us –”
It’s like a light bulb’s gone off over his head. That word. “You’re trying to get back at me for the other night, aren’t you? You’re trying to get control.”
“To paraphrase the third greatest puppet philosopher of the late twentieth century, I don’t try, William. I do. I did. I’m sure Figgins won’t be too pleased to learn that his star informant didn’t disclose an improper relationship with the faculty member he’s been supervising.” She folds her hands behind her head, nearly purring with satisfaction. “You can kiss that promotion of yours goodbye.”
“I defended you to Shannon, you know,” Will seethes. “I told her she didn’t know you like I did. I told her you were kinder than you let on. But then you go and do this, when you know what it’ll cost me with those kids? I don’t understand it. I don’t get how you can be the way you are with your sister, and then turn around and stab me in the back.”
Sue pitches her glasses onto the top of her desk. “Don’t you dare,” she warns him, “don’t you dare bring Jean into this.”
“Well, whatever ‘this’ is, Sue, I don’t think I can do it anymore,” he says, simply. “Not after what you’ve done. Not after how you’ve done it.”
She shakes her head. “Unacceptable. This relationship is over when I say it’s over.”
“This isn’t a relationship,” he scoffs, unable to keep the bitter note out of his voice.
“Oh, William,” Sue says, and the corners of her mouth turn up in the saddest smile he’s ever seen from her. "Will. It is.”
He gapes at her. “But you told me months ago that you didn’t want – ”
“I remember what I told you. Apparently you’ve been too busy not preparing your glee club for Nationals to notice, but there have been developments. I can show you select pages in my journal, if you need a refresher.”
“You don’t need to do that.” Will’s astonished. “Were you, I don’t know, planning on informing me about these changes at any point in time?”
“Didn’t think it necessary, William, although I clearly overestimated your powers of observation.” She leans back in her chair, and stacks her legs on top of her desk, one foot crossed over the other. “Your toothbrush is in my bathroom cabinet. I’ve tolerated your presence during Ice Road Truckers.” A pause. “You met Jean. Believe me, Will, when I tell you: that’s a gift I don't give lightly.”
“Is this what you do to people you’re in a relationship with?” he asks, still not quite sure he’s actually having this conversation with her. “Embarrass them in front of their students, just so you can regain the upper hand?”
“I did what I had to do,” Sue declares. “To restore the natural order.”
“You liked it.” The observation springs from him unbidden, and he flings it at her like it’s something shameful. “The other night. You came harder than I’ve ever felt you come.”
Two spots of color flower on Sue’s cheeks. “A momentary weakness. Likely brought on by insufficient egg in my evening protein shake.”
“Sure,” he says, sarcastically. “I know it always gets me off when I don’t eat enough egg.”
She glares at him. “You don’t understand anything. You’ve never had any power – you don’t know what it’s like when the thing you’ve made your entire life gets stripped away from you.”
Will laughs, astonished. “Are you seriously that self-involved?” he demands. “Have you ever, for a single second, thought about what you’ve spent the last two years doing to me?”
“There’s a difference,” she snaps. “You don’t know how to win. I do.”
He gestures between the two of them. “This - you and me - it doesn’t have to be about winning.”
“What else is there?” Sue asks him, and her voice is painfully sincere.
Will doesn’t know how to answer her, not in the way he wants to, where he'd make incisive observations and she'd have a revelation. He speaks in snapshots, instead. “Marathoning Ice Road Truckers,” he tells her. “Mocha ice cream that you won’t eat in front of me, but keep in the back of your freezer behind the extra-large ice packs. Singing Duran Duran under your breath when you think I’m not listening. The way you pull my hair in bed and I pretend I don't know that it's the part of me you like best.”
She folds her hands across her lap. “I’ve gotten used to you," she says, quietly, after a minute.
He understands exactly what she means. “Yeah,” he agrees, taking in the curved slopes of her shoulders against the chair; the slight incline of her head. “Me too.”
Except, Will knows, familiarity can’t do what he needs it to do: heal what he knows are their irresolvable differences. It’s what Will returns to with Sue, over and over again: the impossibility of suturing the gap between them, between their priorities, between their values and ethics (or lack thereof). She seeks out war. He craves creation. Will needs desperately to believe in that divide.
And then there’s his glee kids, whom Will can’t think of without the possessive pronoun, the children of his heart and throat. He knows he’s hurt them, even if he didn’t mean it; he still wants to call out after their retreating backs, use the empty phrases he knows so well: I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. Are you okay?
(To try and explain, with an image meaningless to anyone but him: sometimes, in the morning, she draws pictures with my shaving cream on the mirror.)
He thinks about the way Sue’s face softens in her sleep, like she’s finally found the one place that doesn’t require a crusade.
“Your kids,” she informs him, intruding on his thoughts with uncanny accuracy, “are gonna come around. Eventually. They love you, for some inconceivable reason.” Sue pronounces love with an odd emphasis, like it’s rusted in her mouth from disuse, and she doesn’t look at him when she says it.
“They’re not going to understand,” Will says, wearily. “How can they, when I don’t?”
Sue places her feet on the floor, and reaches across the desk towards Will, silently, holding out her hand, her palm up.
After a brief hesitation, he takes it, threading his fingers between hers.
