*how Mike Chang went to Asian Camp (and came back with a vampire)
GLEE FANFIC; MIKE x TINA; for the prompt table challenge at gleeverse
*Based on a conversation with misskitty373 about the Situasian being probably the longest-lasting Glee couple out there.
This has gone from being the prompt table of DOOOOOM to one of the best damn things I have ever written. I hope. Not that I've ever written Asian Fusion before, but I had the best intentions of leaving my comfort zone, and writing fluffy, WAFFy Mike x Tina... and then this [surprisingly chaste] monstah was born. Somehow, it's all Mike. Even when Tina's in the same sentence as him. burntheflaws is a terrible influence -_-
For Samkit Sethia, who used to give me the same advice Matt gives Mike in this fic, in true spirits of erstwhile best friends.
Also, even in fic, I refuse to believe Matt talks.
HOW MIKE CHANG WENT TO ASIAN CAMP; and Came Back With a Vampire
By hipokras
Mike hasn't really talked to Tina much. They have a more fundamental, wordless, soul-connection thing going. (Not to mention completely imaginary.) (He doesn't mention this.)
The untold story behind 2.01 Audition
.
diamond;
In sunbeams, he traces Apollo's lines.
silence;
She accompanies him in electronic quiet, gaze trained on the ivory keys dipping underneath her nimble fingers, while her hearing echoes and crashes with the sound of him gliding across the floor.
reality;
Mike shows up on Monday only to realise he's the only one in the cabin. Well, him, and a bunch of eleven-year-olds giving more attention to their fancy phones than they ever would their future girlfriends. He's not entirely sure how he's supposed to do this without Tina.
She likes kids.
They make him nervous. Their challenging, beady stares insinuate they're more intelligent than him.
Can this be a very unreal dream? He considers coughing, getting their attention, wondering what Tina would do. He hasn't got a clue. His brain sort of shuts down when she walks into a room.
spring;
On Tuesday, Tina still hasn't reported for duty, but Mike learns from his head counsellor that she's sick with the flu. He's bummed that this must be the worst summer she's probably ever spent, so he breaks into the kitchens one day before lunch, and resolves he's going to make her chicken soup.
(With tofu, if necessary, if she's vegan. Mike hasn't really talked to Tina much. They have a more fundamental, wordless, soul-connection going.)
(Not to mention completely imaginary.)
(He doesn't mention this.)
The chef kicks him out without ceremony, brandishing a ladle threateningly and cursing what are unmistakably Cantonese death threats. Mike retreats with his life clutched in his hands, and discovers that Tina is already there. Sitting in the mess. Hair pulled into two untidy braids. The sour look on her face implies she hates the flu.
She might even death-threat it if she knew the right words.
"Hey," says Mike, sliding into the bench opposite hers. She looks up from her toast, and nods.
Excellent. They've gone from never really speaking to each other in Glee club (he's always had Matt and football and the locked door of his room) (she's never really cared about how other people judge her) to him receiving a non-committal nod from her. In his book, this is like putting a man on the moon. The proverbial step.
She doesn't really say anything else, just quietly butters her toast and chews; he figures her throat is too sore for her to regale him with non-stop stand-up comedy. The blue streaks in her hair are really loud this morning, like they're saying, You can't silence my individuality.
They sit in silence for what is probably several years, but it passes by for Mike like a flash of light on a sunlit spring day.
never;
It takes him five tries to ask her for her number. He gives up, thinking he's never going to find a way to be able to do this. It takes him a while to realise it is totally legit for camp counsellors to exchange numbers in case of emergencies.
He chickens out each time he has to ask, and ends up talking about the flying car from Harry Potter instead. The last time, he'd started talking about the Asian MIT side-characters from the movie 21, so now she probably thinks he's some kind of compulsive gambler.
Matt is not very helpful when Mike Skypes him for advice. Halfway through, Matt's headset breaks down, so he has to e-mail his words of wisdom.
Grow a pair.
spinning;
"5-1-2," she finishes; his head is still spinning as he walks away, phone in his white-knuckled hand.*
He texts her number before he's ten feet away from her.
-_- is all that she says.
years;
For some reason, Mike had thought being counsellors at the same camp for the entire summer would mean being friends with Tina Cohen-Chang. He's not sure why. He's on good terms with her boyfriend, Artie, sure, but he's never really had a chance to talk to Tina.
Their first attempt at friendly conversation had sort of ended in disaster. Okay, maybe not sort of.*
After they lost the Regionals completion in a blaze of suck that could only be called epic, the girls put together the whole idea of singing to Mr. Schuester. Mike thinks there are few things as gay as serenading your choir director with your gratitude. (Just because he's in a group of singing misfits, one of whom actually is gay, and pretty awesome, doesn't mean he stops being a guy.)
(Technically, a tasteless, insensitive dickwad, but he could have turned out worse.)
He's on board with everything, until they're all sitting onstage, and someone sparks off a chain reaction. Confessing one tiny secret about themselves that changed after a year in Glee. He doesn't know what compels him to not lie, or talk about his Batman boxers, but Mike says:
"I was afraid to dance outside my room."
And then they sing To Sir, With Love, and Mr. Schuester cries a bit, and tries to be motivational. No one really notices Mike's confession, except Matt, who always knew, but now he's just a little bolder and less afraid. He waits by the water cooler for his turn, and suddenly Artie's girlfriend is standing next to him.
"Nice hair," he tells her without sarcasm, nodding at the shiny blue streaks. "Extensions?"
She scoffs, pushing out her lower lip in disdain. "Natural." Her steel-toed black Gothic boots look a little scary. Overall, this is a scary girl.
"I heard what you said," says Tina after a while. Even the impatient tapping of her foot is rhythmic. "About... your dancing. You're a really good dancer. It's just a shame you didn't have the balls to do anything about it until recently."
Mike is aware that his mouth is open. She shrugs; I'm giving you the nasty medicine, take it or leave it: it's that easy.
"Says the girl who has to stand out in order to not be invisible," he retorts. Tina's eyebrows hike upwards, and he wants to clamp both hands over his mouth as though he can magically push the words back down his throat. But he sees her forehead furrow in matching hostility, so he doesn't stop. "You must have some serious esteem issues."
"At least I don't hide in my room to express them." The corner of her mouth hooking upwards in a mirthless smile, she walks away before he can formulate a comeback. Against his conscious will, he finds himself mumbling, "Good one." *
On Friday, Tina walks into Mike's cabin, the one he shares with the head counsellor and another guy, and asks to borrow his headset. He's confused, but he hands it over, wondering if she's going to use it to Skype with Artie.
"Thanks," she says, before she leaves. She's traded up her camp sweatshirt for one of her old blue tops and black fingerless gloves, and Mike is yelling "Waaiiit!" as he chases after her into the blinding sunlight outside.
"Yeah?" Tina is staring at him, eyebrows raised in concern, probably for his mental safety. But she's also smirking, and he nearly forgets what he was going to say.
"How did you get into the boys' cabin?" he blurts out, when her eyebrows don't lower themselves. She boggles at him.
"Er, through the door?"
This doesn't really answer his question, but Mike's brain also doesn't function clearly when he's around Tina. So he just nods, takes a deep breath, and prepares the tactical retreat. "Hey, Chang!" she calls out after him. He turns, heart banging wildly between his ears.
"I'll give this back in two hours, okay?" she says, brandishing his headset.
"No problem."
"Bring the Rocky Road, and I'll see you in the mess."
Ice cream is the monopoly of camp counsellors.*
There is a smudge of blue glitter on the shiny black plastic of his headset, and that's how he notices she's painted her nails. When he comments on the fact, she beams at him, and gives him a thumb's up.
"Where's my ice cream?" she demands a split-second later. He obligingly produces the tub. It's strawberry, because chocolate chips are infuriatingly popular. He's afraid pink isn't Goth enough for her. Tina just dips her spoon, and digs right in.
"How's Artie doing?" he asks, mostly to keep up with current affairs.
"Watching a whole lot of movies," she says. "I think he wishes we could have the summer together."
Mike says nothing, regretting having brought this up. He wants to be the next Usher, not a relationship counsellor. Thankfully, she isn't one for dwelling too much either. "Let's go swimming afterwards," she says, twisting around in her seat and pulling her feet up, so that her knee is touching Mike's through the ripped leg of his jeans.
She glances down for a second. "Nice pants," she smirks.
"I was chasing Mimi during scavenger hunt earlier, and I fell. Okay?"
"Outsmarted by a ten-year-old." Tina licks her ice cream contemplatively, and nods. Her smirk widens around the spoon. "Sure."*
Afterwards, she comes with him down to the lake. She's only wearing flip-flops and her signature camp sweatshirt down mid-thigh, but he can see the bikini straps where the wide collar slips. The gravel path is treacherous where it slopes down the bank to the lake, and Mike makes the jump in one easy bound.
Glancing over his shoulder, he sees her stranded uncertainly at the top of the bank. Their eyes meet for one uncertain second, and she holds out an unwavering hand. He grasps tight, both her hands, and coaxes her descent. "Thanks," she tells him, once she's standing on level ground next to him. Then she throwing off her polyester top and kicking off her footwear as she makes a run for the water.
Mike stops to watch for an unblinking moment as she dives with a splash. He can feel the droplets on his face, and makes a show of wiping them with his sleeve so that she won't see the grin on his face.
(It's not as if he doesn't notice her staring at him, either, when he yanks the plaid shirt off over his head.)*
The best summer of Mike's life is drawing to a lazy close on Wednesday. Their game of Monopoly (Spongebob Edition) has been abandoned in favour of swapping playlists. Tina loves musicals, he's learnt. Mike has seen only one Broadway show in his life: Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. He'd lied about a bowling game with his cousins to get the other footballers off his back, and he'd gone to see Norbert Leo Butz like it was porn.
It cracks Top Ten on Best Nights of His Life.
Now, he gently unhooks the earbuds of her iPod earphones, pausing Think of Me. "Who're you texting so much?" he asks curiously.
"Artie," she mutters, not even looking up. "I'm reaching home in two days, and I wish he was even remotely enthusiastic about the fact."
Mike doesn't say anything, quietly slips the earbuds back in place. He scrolls though her playlist, wondering if he can play something that dramatises his current situation in song. Real life is never that karmically perfect. Mike just feels thirty perfect years (for each day that he's spent with her) slip through his fingers like crushed glass.
star; [acrostic]
Twinkles bright the gleam in your eye
If I see you trying not to laugh
Notwithstanding the sight of
Asian techno-geniuses tripping on their shoelaces to imitate my hip-hop groove.
air;
Tina stays in touch even after they reach home. At first, it's obligatory commenting on all the photos they've been tagged in together. He Likes her comments, but he doesn't really know what to say. She starts leaving him funny messages on his Wall, and he doesn't realise it when he replies in full sentences instead of politely smiling emoticons.
When she mock-insults Jay-Z, Mike has the guts to respond with >:| instead of his usual :) He's not afraid she'll reject him if she gets to know him.
She's also smart enough to keep her relationship with Artie entirely private, so he doesn't really know what's going on by stalking her on Facebook, and he's not shameless enough to ask.
Nine days after camp ended, she texts him: Address??
He doesn't know what to make of it, so he asks, Where r u? Il pick u up.
I can walk. Still got the use of my legs.
He drops the damsel in distress syndrome, and answers her first question. She shows up on his doorstep, thirty minutes later, holding up an Evil Dead DVD and a couple of its sequels.
"Um," he says eloquently, eyeing the plastic boxes.
"Good answer," she says, pushing past him into his house as though she lived there. She tosses the DVDs and a tub of Rocky Road ice cream on his couch, and turns to face him, hands on her hips. "If you tell me that you want to spend all summer indoors, watching crappy movies too, I will punch you in the throat." As though eyes flashing like grenades weren't menacing enough, she snapped, "Is that understood?"
"Peachy," he said, trying to keep his face expressionless. This doesn't look like a good time to mention Evil Dead and Bruce Campbell is the best combination on Earth since, well... probably Charlie and the Angels. Instead, he ducks into his room to fish out a pair of bowling shirts, and offers to take her out instead.
Some people need girlfriends the way they need to breathe. Mike figures just having Tina in his life is worth the lack of oxygen to his brain every time she simply smiles at him.
"I think you're great, Artie, but you're a terrible boyfriend. You ignored me for weeks this summer!"
"I was playing a marathon round of Halo, woman!"
"And then when we did get together, all you wanted to do was watch Coming Home over and over. Mike tries to be into what I'm into. Like his abs."
~Tina and Artie, Audition
-- finis --
*Based on a conversation with misskitty373 about the Situasian being probably the longest-lasting Glee couple out there.
This has gone from being the prompt table of DOOOOOM to one of the best damn things I have ever written. I hope. Not that I've ever written Asian Fusion before, but I had the best intentions of leaving my comfort zone, and writing fluffy, WAFFy Mike x Tina... and then this [surprisingly chaste] monstah was born. Somehow, it's all Mike. Even when Tina's in the same sentence as him. burntheflaws is a terrible influence -_-
For Samkit Sethia, who used to give me the same advice Matt gives Mike in this fic, in true spirits of erstwhile best friends.
Also, even in fic, I refuse to believe Matt talks.
HOW MIKE CHANG WENT TO ASIAN CAMP; and Came Back With a Vampire
By hipokras
Mike hasn't really talked to Tina much. They have a more fundamental, wordless, soul-connection thing going. (Not to mention completely imaginary.) (He doesn't mention this.)
The untold story behind 2.01 Audition
.
diamond;
In sunbeams, he traces Apollo's lines.
silence;
She accompanies him in electronic quiet, gaze trained on the ivory keys dipping underneath her nimble fingers, while her hearing echoes and crashes with the sound of him gliding across the floor.
reality;
Mike shows up on Monday only to realise he's the only one in the cabin. Well, him, and a bunch of eleven-year-olds giving more attention to their fancy phones than they ever would their future girlfriends. He's not entirely sure how he's supposed to do this without Tina.
She likes kids.
They make him nervous. Their challenging, beady stares insinuate they're more intelligent than him.
Can this be a very unreal dream? He considers coughing, getting their attention, wondering what Tina would do. He hasn't got a clue. His brain sort of shuts down when she walks into a room.
spring;
On Tuesday, Tina still hasn't reported for duty, but Mike learns from his head counsellor that she's sick with the flu. He's bummed that this must be the worst summer she's probably ever spent, so he breaks into the kitchens one day before lunch, and resolves he's going to make her chicken soup.
(With tofu, if necessary, if she's vegan. Mike hasn't really talked to Tina much. They have a more fundamental, wordless, soul-connection going.)
(Not to mention completely imaginary.)
(He doesn't mention this.)
The chef kicks him out without ceremony, brandishing a ladle threateningly and cursing what are unmistakably Cantonese death threats. Mike retreats with his life clutched in his hands, and discovers that Tina is already there. Sitting in the mess. Hair pulled into two untidy braids. The sour look on her face implies she hates the flu.
She might even death-threat it if she knew the right words.
"Hey," says Mike, sliding into the bench opposite hers. She looks up from her toast, and nods.
Excellent. They've gone from never really speaking to each other in Glee club (he's always had Matt and football and the locked door of his room) (she's never really cared about how other people judge her) to him receiving a non-committal nod from her. In his book, this is like putting a man on the moon. The proverbial step.
She doesn't really say anything else, just quietly butters her toast and chews; he figures her throat is too sore for her to regale him with non-stop stand-up comedy. The blue streaks in her hair are really loud this morning, like they're saying, You can't silence my individuality.
They sit in silence for what is probably several years, but it passes by for Mike like a flash of light on a sunlit spring day.
never;
It takes him five tries to ask her for her number. He gives up, thinking he's never going to find a way to be able to do this. It takes him a while to realise it is totally legit for camp counsellors to exchange numbers in case of emergencies.
He chickens out each time he has to ask, and ends up talking about the flying car from Harry Potter instead. The last time, he'd started talking about the Asian MIT side-characters from the movie 21, so now she probably thinks he's some kind of compulsive gambler.
Matt is not very helpful when Mike Skypes him for advice. Halfway through, Matt's headset breaks down, so he has to e-mail his words of wisdom.
Grow a pair.
spinning;
"5-1-2," she finishes; his head is still spinning as he walks away, phone in his white-knuckled hand.*
He texts her number before he's ten feet away from her.
-_- is all that she says.
years;
For some reason, Mike had thought being counsellors at the same camp for the entire summer would mean being friends with Tina Cohen-Chang. He's not sure why. He's on good terms with her boyfriend, Artie, sure, but he's never really had a chance to talk to Tina.
Their first attempt at friendly conversation had sort of ended in disaster. Okay, maybe not sort of.*
After they lost the Regionals completion in a blaze of suck that could only be called epic, the girls put together the whole idea of singing to Mr. Schuester. Mike thinks there are few things as gay as serenading your choir director with your gratitude. (Just because he's in a group of singing misfits, one of whom actually is gay, and pretty awesome, doesn't mean he stops being a guy.)
(Technically, a tasteless, insensitive dickwad, but he could have turned out worse.)
He's on board with everything, until they're all sitting onstage, and someone sparks off a chain reaction. Confessing one tiny secret about themselves that changed after a year in Glee. He doesn't know what compels him to not lie, or talk about his Batman boxers, but Mike says:
"I was afraid to dance outside my room."
And then they sing To Sir, With Love, and Mr. Schuester cries a bit, and tries to be motivational. No one really notices Mike's confession, except Matt, who always knew, but now he's just a little bolder and less afraid. He waits by the water cooler for his turn, and suddenly Artie's girlfriend is standing next to him.
"Nice hair," he tells her without sarcasm, nodding at the shiny blue streaks. "Extensions?"
She scoffs, pushing out her lower lip in disdain. "Natural." Her steel-toed black Gothic boots look a little scary. Overall, this is a scary girl.
"I heard what you said," says Tina after a while. Even the impatient tapping of her foot is rhythmic. "About... your dancing. You're a really good dancer. It's just a shame you didn't have the balls to do anything about it until recently."
Mike is aware that his mouth is open. She shrugs; I'm giving you the nasty medicine, take it or leave it: it's that easy.
"Says the girl who has to stand out in order to not be invisible," he retorts. Tina's eyebrows hike upwards, and he wants to clamp both hands over his mouth as though he can magically push the words back down his throat. But he sees her forehead furrow in matching hostility, so he doesn't stop. "You must have some serious esteem issues."
"At least I don't hide in my room to express them." The corner of her mouth hooking upwards in a mirthless smile, she walks away before he can formulate a comeback. Against his conscious will, he finds himself mumbling, "Good one." *
On Friday, Tina walks into Mike's cabin, the one he shares with the head counsellor and another guy, and asks to borrow his headset. He's confused, but he hands it over, wondering if she's going to use it to Skype with Artie.
"Thanks," she says, before she leaves. She's traded up her camp sweatshirt for one of her old blue tops and black fingerless gloves, and Mike is yelling "Waaiiit!" as he chases after her into the blinding sunlight outside.
"Yeah?" Tina is staring at him, eyebrows raised in concern, probably for his mental safety. But she's also smirking, and he nearly forgets what he was going to say.
"How did you get into the boys' cabin?" he blurts out, when her eyebrows don't lower themselves. She boggles at him.
"Er, through the door?"
This doesn't really answer his question, but Mike's brain also doesn't function clearly when he's around Tina. So he just nods, takes a deep breath, and prepares the tactical retreat. "Hey, Chang!" she calls out after him. He turns, heart banging wildly between his ears.
"I'll give this back in two hours, okay?" she says, brandishing his headset.
"No problem."
"Bring the Rocky Road, and I'll see you in the mess."
Ice cream is the monopoly of camp counsellors.*
There is a smudge of blue glitter on the shiny black plastic of his headset, and that's how he notices she's painted her nails. When he comments on the fact, she beams at him, and gives him a thumb's up.
"Where's my ice cream?" she demands a split-second later. He obligingly produces the tub. It's strawberry, because chocolate chips are infuriatingly popular. He's afraid pink isn't Goth enough for her. Tina just dips her spoon, and digs right in.
"How's Artie doing?" he asks, mostly to keep up with current affairs.
"Watching a whole lot of movies," she says. "I think he wishes we could have the summer together."
Mike says nothing, regretting having brought this up. He wants to be the next Usher, not a relationship counsellor. Thankfully, she isn't one for dwelling too much either. "Let's go swimming afterwards," she says, twisting around in her seat and pulling her feet up, so that her knee is touching Mike's through the ripped leg of his jeans.
She glances down for a second. "Nice pants," she smirks.
"I was chasing Mimi during scavenger hunt earlier, and I fell. Okay?"
"Outsmarted by a ten-year-old." Tina licks her ice cream contemplatively, and nods. Her smirk widens around the spoon. "Sure."*
Afterwards, she comes with him down to the lake. She's only wearing flip-flops and her signature camp sweatshirt down mid-thigh, but he can see the bikini straps where the wide collar slips. The gravel path is treacherous where it slopes down the bank to the lake, and Mike makes the jump in one easy bound.
Glancing over his shoulder, he sees her stranded uncertainly at the top of the bank. Their eyes meet for one uncertain second, and she holds out an unwavering hand. He grasps tight, both her hands, and coaxes her descent. "Thanks," she tells him, once she's standing on level ground next to him. Then she throwing off her polyester top and kicking off her footwear as she makes a run for the water.
Mike stops to watch for an unblinking moment as she dives with a splash. He can feel the droplets on his face, and makes a show of wiping them with his sleeve so that she won't see the grin on his face.
(It's not as if he doesn't notice her staring at him, either, when he yanks the plaid shirt off over his head.)*
The best summer of Mike's life is drawing to a lazy close on Wednesday. Their game of Monopoly (Spongebob Edition) has been abandoned in favour of swapping playlists. Tina loves musicals, he's learnt. Mike has seen only one Broadway show in his life: Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. He'd lied about a bowling game with his cousins to get the other footballers off his back, and he'd gone to see Norbert Leo Butz like it was porn.
It cracks Top Ten on Best Nights of His Life.
Now, he gently unhooks the earbuds of her iPod earphones, pausing Think of Me. "Who're you texting so much?" he asks curiously.
"Artie," she mutters, not even looking up. "I'm reaching home in two days, and I wish he was even remotely enthusiastic about the fact."
Mike doesn't say anything, quietly slips the earbuds back in place. He scrolls though her playlist, wondering if he can play something that dramatises his current situation in song. Real life is never that karmically perfect. Mike just feels thirty perfect years (for each day that he's spent with her) slip through his fingers like crushed glass.
star; [acrostic]
Twinkles bright the gleam in your eye
If I see you trying not to laugh
Notwithstanding the sight of
Asian techno-geniuses tripping on their shoelaces to imitate my hip-hop groove.
air;
Tina stays in touch even after they reach home. At first, it's obligatory commenting on all the photos they've been tagged in together. He Likes her comments, but he doesn't really know what to say. She starts leaving him funny messages on his Wall, and he doesn't realise it when he replies in full sentences instead of politely smiling emoticons.
When she mock-insults Jay-Z, Mike has the guts to respond with >:| instead of his usual :) He's not afraid she'll reject him if she gets to know him.
She's also smart enough to keep her relationship with Artie entirely private, so he doesn't really know what's going on by stalking her on Facebook, and he's not shameless enough to ask.
Nine days after camp ended, she texts him: Address??
He doesn't know what to make of it, so he asks, Where r u? Il pick u up.
I can walk. Still got the use of my legs.
He drops the damsel in distress syndrome, and answers her first question. She shows up on his doorstep, thirty minutes later, holding up an Evil Dead DVD and a couple of its sequels.
"Um," he says eloquently, eyeing the plastic boxes.
"Good answer," she says, pushing past him into his house as though she lived there. She tosses the DVDs and a tub of Rocky Road ice cream on his couch, and turns to face him, hands on her hips. "If you tell me that you want to spend all summer indoors, watching crappy movies too, I will punch you in the throat." As though eyes flashing like grenades weren't menacing enough, she snapped, "Is that understood?"
"Peachy," he said, trying to keep his face expressionless. This doesn't look like a good time to mention Evil Dead and Bruce Campbell is the best combination on Earth since, well... probably Charlie and the Angels. Instead, he ducks into his room to fish out a pair of bowling shirts, and offers to take her out instead.
Some people need girlfriends the way they need to breathe. Mike figures just having Tina in his life is worth the lack of oxygen to his brain every time she simply smiles at him.
"I think you're great, Artie, but you're a terrible boyfriend. You ignored me for weeks this summer!"
"I was playing a marathon round of Halo, woman!"
"And then when we did get together, all you wanted to do was watch Coming Home over and over. Mike tries to be into what I'm into. Like his abs."
~Tina and Artie, Audition
-- finis --