"Oh, come on!" Mike exclaimed, his knee restlessly jumping up and down. The turning circle on the screen of Puck's laptop was making him nervous.
"Dude, chill," Sam slipped his arm over Mike's shoulders and flopped onto the bed next to him. "So how's the other doing?" he smirked.
"We don't know! The goddamn connection keeps failing, it's like—"
"He's not 'other '," Puck growled, cutting Mike off mid-sentence. Truth be told, if the pop-up screen telling him that sorry, he wasn't going to get to talk to his boyfriend after a month appeared again, he would scream.
"Not yet, anyway. Don't think I don't see you pulling the ring out of your nighstand every night before you go to sleep, dude. You're all angsty and weird about it, as if he'd say no."
Puck scowled at Sam, hitting the refresh button one more time, almost automatically at that point. "You haven't even met him."
"You talk about him all the time, man, it's Kurt this and Kurt that, like he was here with us," Mike gave up on being nervous and flung himself backwards, sprawling his long limbs all over Puck's bed and groaning when his back hit the hard mattress.
"He'd never wear camo clothes. I'm pretty sure he threatened his Dad with a curling iron once when he attempted to take him fishing."
"What's he look like, anyway?" Sam perked up, munching on a sandwich he'd just pulled out of his inner jacket pocket, happily ignoring Puck's disgusted face.
"You know I won't tell you. And before you ask, neither will Frankenteen."
Sam scowled, a circle of tomato hanging from the corner of his mouth. "I bet you're embarrassed because he's a bigger stud than you."
Puck snorted in response, looking up when the door leading outside opened and closed nosily. Finn's gigantic form was coming towards them, his hair dripping wet and a towel slung across his shoulder – he had, apparently, found a different way to spend his free time.
"How's the gym?" Mike called, sitting up again. Finn came to a stop next to Puck's bed, shook off like a dog and gave them all a smile full of teeth (except the one he lost when he was fighting his brother for turkey on Thanksgiving two years ago, but he didn't like to talk about that).
"Boring, as always," he practically sing-songed. Puck, momentarily distracted, shot him a predatory grin.
"Don't even tell me. Berry was there again, wasn't she?"
"She's always there. She's so strong," Finn sighed dreamily and lay on his own bed, stretching his gargantuan limbs like a starfish.
"Dude, you're so whipped," Puck snorted, giving Finn's leg a good-natured poke.
"Says the guy who wears a pink bracelet because it was an anniversary gift."
Puck didn't comment – he turned his attention back to the computer screen. The tiny circle was still turning, obviously trying his patience. There was so little separating him from Kurt – he'd see him in just a few minutes and he won't even have to bother with hiding. Not now, not ever again.
He might poke at Finn and snap at Sam and ignore Mike whenever they were making jabs, but the truth was, it felt unbelievably good to talk about his boyfriend with the guys who've kept his secret for so long. It felt liberating to listen to their nagging, to try and deny how completely in love he was even though they all knew he was bluffing – it felt like freedom.
All of a sudden, the monotone turning motion stopped, catching Puck's attention. To his infinite surprise, the call he was trying to place finally connected and a buzzing sound spilled out of the laptop's speakers, the screen lightening at the same time, until he had a clear picture of the Hudmels' kitchen – and a closeup of Carole's face, apparently trying to figure out the connection problem. Puck smiled; the warm feeling that spread through his chest at seeing her making him shiver pleasantly.
"Hey, Mrs. H," he laughed and watched the one eye that was currently in sight widen before she pulled back and beamed.
"Noah!"
Finn, hearing his mother's voice, shot up in his bed, narrowly missing hitting the bottom of the bunk above with his head. "Mom!" he exclaimed, and proceeded to ruffle his hair with a towel, splashing droplets of water all over Puck's screen when he leaned closer. "What are you doing at Kurt's place?"
Carole giggled before turning the computer, the picture changing into a view of the whole kitchen. "Kurt's visiting, honey," she said, focusing the camera back on her face and running Finn down with a critical eye. "And why is your hair wet? I might be old, but I sure as hell know they have four seasons in Germany!"
Finn groaned, Mike, Sam and Puck bursting out laughing behind him. "We're inside, Mom. And I just got back from the gym."
Carole took a breath, probably gearing up for another round of advice, when a high voice rung from somewhere in the house, making Puck's laugh hitch in his chest and his muscles tense.
"Carole? Did it finally come through?"
Finn's mother smiled sunnily on the screen. "Yes, sweetie, come on down!"
Puck could swear his heart was beating way too loud and fast to be humanly possible. There were light steps echoing through the speakers and he was holding his breath, not able to tear his eyes away from the screen to look at Sam and Mike, who where probably staring at him, confused.
After what felt like five eternities, but probably wasn't more than five seconds, Kurt's skinny jeans and black sweater finally came into view before he pulled in a chair and sat down. The second his eyes connected with the camera, Puck found himself drowning in them like so many times before, the world around him blurring and falling into background.
Kurt smiled, wide and bright and uninhibited, and Puck most definitely didn't feel like crying. The brunette opened his mouth, the first syllable of his greeting just about to slip out—and the damn circle appeared again, screen turning black and making Puck feel like the universe was dicking with him on purpose.
"Fuck," he cursed underneath his breath, the charm falling off and the rush of blood in his ears coming back.
When he turned his head to the right, he found Sam and Mike staring at him with the same expression in their eyes; he couldn't quite figure out what it was.
"Was that—"
"You mean—"
They spoke at the same time, then stopped. Mike took a deep breath.
"That was Kurt?" he asked, and Puck didn't like the tone one bit.
"Yes," he bit out, not really caring if he sounded a tad too defensive. He could hear Finn sitting up slowly somewhere behind him and could clearly imainge his shoulders hunching, preparing to protect his bother's honor like so many times before.
"He's a little…eh…" Sam looked like he really wanted to say something.
"Effeminate?" Finn growled, low and dangerous.
Mike shrugged. "Yeah, but…I mean…fuck, Hudson. I'm not trying to suddendly turn into a homophobe here, so lay off."
There was no movement behind Puck's back.
"Look, we just…expected someone more like you, okay?" Sam tried again, waving his hands, pieces of pickle falling out of the sandwich he was still holding. "I mean, you were talking about how he likes designer clothes and all that, but you're kind of…"
"Crude," Mike finished. "We didn't…geez, I won't finish this sentence without offending someone, will I?"
Puck allowed himself to crack a smile. "Probably not."
"Kurt just…looks like he has high standards. By which I'm totally not trying to say you're not a very decent guy, because you are, but it's kinda unlikely to come across a couple that looks so…different, I guess."
Sam was nodding along empathically, his usually calm demeanor giving way to a frantic reassurance. "On the outside, is what he means," he said.
Puck could literally hear Finn deflate; his own muscles loosened a little as well. "So you're not being jerks because he knows what his ass looks good in and doesn't care if it happens to be chick clothes?"
They shook their heads in unison. "Hell no, man. It's kinda apparent that he has more fashion sense than the four of us combined. And he's gotta be something special – I mean, he's obviously got both of you wrapped around his little finger."
"That I do," came a laughing voice from the computer – they haven't even noticed the call jumped back on. Puck turned his head so abruptly he heard his neck crack, his eyes latching onto Kurt's and holding on like a dying man to a lifeline.
"Hey, Noah," his boyfriend said, bangs falling over his left eye just a little bit, batting his eyelashes like the damn tease he was and smiling that smile. Puck felt himself melt on the spot.
"Hey, baby," he replied, completely aware of his voice sliding into an awed half-whisper and butterflies exploding low in his belly; he didn't care.
"And did I detect the heavenly sound of Finn's voice in the background?"
Finn stuck his head in front of the screen, his hair still wet and dripping onto Puck's lap, waving like an idiot. "Hi, bro!"
Kurt scoffed and shook his head a little, then shot his brother a radiant smile. "Hi."
Puck could hear rustling to his right; a few seconds later, Sam's and Mike's long bodies folded into his bed, pushing him over to the edge. On the laptop screen, Kurt grinned.
"Mike and Sam, I presume?"
And really, there was no way anyone could've resisted the Kurt Hummel charm.
Two hours later, they were all still chatting happily, Finn voicing his longing after Carole's apple pie, Puck dutifully reporting on how everything was the same, and Kurt spilling all of Finn's embarrassing teenage stories with a devillish grin. It felt like home, even though they were thousands of miles away.
"You know," Mike whispered from the top bunk later that night, with everyone else already asleep, "I think you should ask him the next time you call."
"Totally, dude. You're, like, three times more whipped than we thought," Sam grumbled from the next bed over. "Plus, if you ask him now, you can get straight to celebratin' when we go home in three months."