"I don't know, I just have to figure out who I am…without Rachel and without you."
Those words, a disconnected cell phone and a cloud of dust trailing after him were all that Finn left Puck with when he took off from Lima in his beat-up red truck. It had been a year since they had graduated from McKinley, and Finn had two semesters of college under his belt and no real clue about what he wanted to do. Rather than the inane pool parties and all-night ragers that most of their friends had planned for the summer months, Finn was determined to figure out what came next. He had allowed everyone around him to define who he was for so long – quarterback, glee captain, stepbrother, son, fiancé, best friend – that he had never really been able to figure out who he was without those titles.
Most people would have expected Puck to be the one who took off to parts unknown; after all, he had always been the type. Finn, on the other hand, was always reliable and ever-faithful, the kind of guy that everyone counted on. Puck wasn't sure what he would do with that kind of pressure, and maybe that's why he understood Finn's need to escape. His best friend needed to clear his head, and Puck could give his best friend the time and space to figure stuff out.
But just because he understood didn't make it any easier to accept. He was used to seeing and talking to Finn every single day. But now, with no timeline of how long he'd be gone, no roadmap for where he was headed, no phone number to reach him, all Puck could do was wait.
It was almost a year before Finn finally called Puck. He hadn't planned to be away from Ohio for so long, but when a month had turned into three and summer had given way to fall, Finn had known he was no closer to figuring out who he was than he had been when had left. He'd sent a postcard with a Texas postmark off to his mother with an apology. Puck had gotten one a few weeks later with a stamp from Vermont. That was the only time he had reached out to anyone back home until he slid a quarter into a pay phone outside an old abandoned rest stop near Tucson.
The phone rang three times before Puck's voicemail picked up, and this is what he heard: "If you're calling about my truck, I sold it. If this is Tuesday night, I'm boxing. If you've got something to sell, you're wasting your time, I'm not buying. If it's anybody else, wait for the tone, you know what to do. And P.S., if this is Lima, I still love you."
Finn dropped the phone to the ground, the receiver bouncing hollowly on the cracked cement beneath his sneakered feet. He couldn't believe what he heard. What kind of guy would build a whole voicemail around the vain hope that Finn might call? What kind of guy would publicly confess he loved his best friend? Finn knew all of Puck's different tones and inflections, and the voice on the phone had been as serious, as honest, as vulnerable as he had ever been. That wasn't the voice of just a best friend; no, that was the voice of a man who was in love with Finn.
He waited three days before he worked up the courage to call again. He was somewhere outside Kansas City when he found another pay phone at a gas station. Finn had no idea what he was going to say if Puck actually answered this time. He had spent all those hours driving trying to figure it out to no avail. However, Finn was granted a temporary reprieve when the phone rang three times and clicked over to voicemail once again.
"If it's Friday night, I'm at the Indians game. And first thing Saturday, if it don't rain, I'm headed out to lake and I'll be gone all weekend long. But I'll call you back when I get home on Sunday afternoon. And P.S., if this is Lima, I still love you."
Finn walked straight inside the gas station and bought a cheap disposable cell phone and an hour's worth of minutes before he called Puck back. This time he left his number but not another word, not even his name or an explanation about where he had been. And then he climbed behind the wheel of his trusty pick-up truck and pointed it east on I-70 toward home.
He was still a few hours outside Ohio when his phone rang on Sunday afternoon. Finn had kept it in arm's reach since Kansas City, the radio down and the ringer up loud. His fingers trembled as he picked up the phone. He knew he had to say it or he might never get the courage again. Without giving Puck a chance to say a single word, Finn jumped right in.
"If you're calling about my heart, it's still yours. I should've listened to it a little more…then it wouldn't have taken me so long to know where I belong. And by the way, dude, this is no voicemail you're talking to. Can't you tell? It's me, man, Finn, and I love you."
Puck chuckled on the other end of the line. "Dude, I still love you."
FIN.
Author's Note: Inspiration and select lyrics from Blake Shelton's "Austin."