Puck had always said that in another life, Finn would have stayed and they would have never had to go through this in the first place.

It started the summer after they turned eighteen, in those long, waning days where graduation gave way to reality. One week Finn was helping his lifelong best friend study for a final exam, and the next week he was saying goodbye to the love of his life at a train station. He had four years in the Army stretched out in front of him, and somewhere between drinking a twelve pack in the back of Puck's truck at the old abandoned drive-in and hugging his mother goodbye at the base, Finn knew that it was time to finally grow up.

But before he had to say leave Lima, before he gave up everything he had ever known for the United States Army, Finn had three glorious months where he could pretend that he still had all the time in the world. Just like so many summers before that one, Puck had been there for nearly every moment. They both knew that there was this internal countdown calendar that they were both ignoring, but poolside afternoons and late-night field parties made it easy to ignore what was about to happen to all of them.

It was at one of those parties that Puck dared to kiss Finn for the first time. It was late, and the crowd was starting to thin out. He watched Santana and Brittany sitting close to each other by the fire and Blaine and Kurt dancing along to some Katy Perry song as Sam strummed along on his guitar. Finn was that loose, comfortable drunk he always got, so happy and carefree that he reminded Puck so much of the six-year-old kid who had first caught his attention in kindergarten.

"We should go for a walk," Finn declared suddenly, tugging impatiently at Puck's sleeve. "Yeah, let's go for a walk, Puck! C'mon, walk with me."

"Okay, okay," Puck chuckled as he allowed Finn to help him to his feet. He sling his arm around Finn's shoulder and led him in the opposite direction from most of their friends. He let Finn take the lead from there as he so often did, and it wasn't really too much of a surprise when they ended up flat on their backs, staring up at the stars, in the bed of his truck. A lot of really good nights had ended just like this, the two of them and a million dancing stars. Puck looked at his friend out of the corner of his eye. Finn looked almost lost. "What you thinking about?"

Finn closed his eyes for a long moment and then opened them again. "The days are getting shorter. Fall is getting closer," he mused softly. They still had a month, but it wasn't long enough to do all the things and say all the words they still had left. Finn propped himself up on his elbow and gazed down at Puck. "I'm really glad that I'm spending this summer with you. Thanks for staying here."

Puck smiled into the dark. "Where else would I be?" he teased, bumping his should against Finn's forearm. The former quarterback smiled at him goofily in a way that was so Finn that Puck literally ached from how much he knew he'd soon miss it. Just as he was about to change the subject to the Indians game they were going to the next week, Puck realized that Finn was moving closer to him. "Finn?"

"Shh, just let me try something...I have to try something."

And then Finn was kissing him there in the middle of some soybean field that belonged to one of the junior Cheerios and Finn tasted like mint Chapstick mixed with cheap beer and he was running his bare foot up Puck's shin in this way that made him shiver. Finn sighed into Puck's mouth as they both relaxed into the kiss at the same time, Puck reaching for Finn's hips to draw him down against him and Finn's fingers finding some kind of resolution in the fine hairs at the nape of Puck's neck.

Puck sort of figured they'd both wake up the next morning and act like nothing happened. Instead, Finn showed up just after noon with a bag of greasy cheeseburgers and kissed him on his way through to the kitchen as if it were just something they did. Puck had always been cooler than his best friend, so if Finn could play it off, he would just have to do it too. So nothing really changed except that their wrestling sometimes turned into makeout sessions, and Puck had a new-found habit of reaching for Finn's hand across the seat when they were driving through town.

"We should go get tattoos," Finn decided one day two weeks before he was scheduled to report. He had thought about waiting until he was in the Army to get one, maybe see if some of the other guys wanted to get one as a symbol of brotherhood. But the more he thought about it, the more he knew that it was something that he should share with Puck. He had been his brother first (and okay, it was creepy thinking about him that way when he had recently become very familiar with his dick) and he just wanted to do this with Puck. "I mean, I know you're not supposed to because of the whole Jewish thing, but it'd be cool if we did it together. We could get the same thing, I'd even let you pick."

"You really sure you trust me that much?"

Although Puck had meant it as a joke, the way that Finn stared at him was so serious. "I trust you with my life, Puck, I trust you with everything."

It was that seriousness that made Puck skip the pages of cartoon characters and meaningly tribal art when they finally headed to the tattoo parlor in Lima Heights. Instead, he had chosen this intricate Celtic knot that entwined his initials with Finn's without it being super obvious. Afterward, their sore skin covered by layers of taped gauze, they found their way to the Hudson-Hummels' roof to look up at those stars. Finn had snagged a few of Burt's beers from the fridge in the garage, and Puck was pressed close with his head resting on Finn's shoulder.

"What are you going to do after the Army?"

Finn shrugged silently. "I'll probably go to college, maybe become a teacher or something," he answered. "Maybe try to acting thing, I haven't really thought that far ahead."

"But you'll come find me, right? I mean, afterward, when it's done, you're going to come back to me, right?" Puck asked uncertainly. He knew that it cost him something to ask Finn that, but he wasn't sure what. "I'll be in LA, doing the music thing, and then we'll figure out a way to be together for real."

"Sure," Finn agreed, and neither of them wanted to know if he was lying. "It's just four years, man, it's going to go so fast. Think how quickly high school flew by, you know? I'll come home and we'll be able to do this for real and it's going to be great."

"You really think it'll be that easy?"

Finn grinned as he pressed a kiss to the top of Puck's head. "Of course, dude, trust me. I'm smart about these things."

Neither of them could have known that they wouldn't see each other for five years after Finn left for basic at Fort Knox. They hadn't had a clue then how life really worked. They only had the beginnings of a love that never really had a chance to thrive and matching tattoos. Puck and Finn had never planned to lose each other, but that was exactly the way it worked out.