Disney
The first time he's asked if they can perform Disney songs is a few weeks after Sectionals, before Mr. Schue gets back from DC.
Now, don't get him wrong, but Disney movies were never really his thing, and every time Rachel would force him to watch them, he'd always fall asleep and never knew what was happening. Also, they were basically chick flicks for girls under ten.
Naturally, he says no right off the bat, and immediately gets the stink eye from every girl in the room. Briefly he wonders whether or not Rachel's gave them a special lesson on how to glare at him when she was visiting to see Grease.
They ask again when Mr. Schue announces that he's planning on getting married on Valentine's Day. He's in charge on entertainment, which has to be cheap but good, so naturally, Glee Club has to step up to the plate.
"We are not doing Disney, and the next person who asks why, won't get a solo at regionals."
"You're not even in charge, Finn. You can't make the call." Ryder states, rolling his eyes. The guys become far to cocky for his own good, now that he's dating Marley. However, he can hardly criticize considering his many attempts at dating Rachel and the change they had on him each time.
"Doesn't matter. I doubt Mr. Schue will want you guys to sing Disney songs."
They all groan.
They do Disney at the wedding.
In his defense, they (Artie) told Mercedes who told Quinn who told Kurt who told Rachel, that he wasn't letting them do Disney. So, when the entire former glee clubs is back together at Breadstick's (including Kurt and Rachel) and they start talking about the songs that they're singing at the wedding, naturally Rachel says that she's going to be singing 'Can You Feel the Love Tonight' from the Lion King, all hell breaks loose.
"Wait so Rachel can sing Disney songs, but the rest of us can't?" Tina asks glaring at him.
"Blatant favoritism, right there." Artie adds. "I mean we all know how she got him to change his mind." The table falls silent and his eyes land on Rachel who happens to be far to interested in her food to look up at him. He doesn't blame her. Despite popular belief, he and Rachel hadn't sorted out their problems, they never talked and this was the closest they had been since their conversation in the hallway after Grease.
"I had no idea that Finn was depriving you of singing some of the most romantic songs to ever feature on a soundtrack." Her voice is soft, with a joking edge and a lot more sarcasm then he's heard from her. "And Finn didn't know about my song choice, mainly because he is incapable of picking up a phone and calling someone."
Totally should've seen that coming. "Takes two people to have a phone call Rach. Haven't seen your name flashing up on my screen in a while."
"I shouldn't have to. I already told you all of this a few months ago. I knew you were stupid but I didn't know you were forgetful as well." She sends an indescribable look in his direction before taking Quinn's hand and dragging the blonde out of the restaurant.
"She didn't mean that," Kurt says. "Her musical theory teacher is giving her a hard time because of this song she and Brody sung for Madam Tibideaux before Christmas, she's been raging at everyone for the past two months. Don't be upset about it."
Rachel sings her stupid song with Puck. It's junior year all over again. Except this time, she's not singing with him to make him jealous, she's signing with him because she actually wants to because apparently Puck's now in New York with her and Kurt and is sleeping on the couch or whatever.
He's not sure what he's more upset about; that she's a love song with Puck willingly or that Puck's figured out that New York is where he should be.
"You must really like screwing up your life Tubs," Santana says after Rachel and Puck have finished. "I mean this is what, the second, third time that she's gone running into Puck's arms after a break-up with you. Does this mean we should be expecting a Finchel reunion sometime soon?"
Santana's kind of like him at the moment. Not really sure what she wants to do with her life anymore, and certainly doesn't know what to do with her relationship with Brittany now that Sam has somehow put himself in the picture.
"But, if it makes you feel any better, they're not actually together. Sure, they're sleeping together, but it's Puck and Rachel. It was bound to happen eventually and at least you aren't together." It doesn't make him feel better. Rachel's changed since moving to New York, like he knew she would, but some of those changes haven't really been for the better. Like the way she talks now; a mixture of sarcasm and bitterness (anger, if she's talking to or about him) and the way she wears her super short shorts which are basically her underwear and really tall boots. He doesn't really like this new Rachel, and he knows that there are very few people from Lima who do.
"Thanks Santana," he says anyway.
"Your welcome. Oh, and by the way, don't do Disney ever again."
"It wasn't my choice, and only Rachel and Puck sang Disney."
"That's what you think." Santana raises an eyebrow, smirks, then saunters away towards Kurt who's talking with Mercedes.
When the group number comes around, they end up singing a mash-up of a bunch of Disney songs. Rachel and Puck are standing near them laughing, and that's when Finn decides he's never doing Disney again.
Disney seems to be a curse for him. Lets rewind twenty four hours to midnight, the night Spring Break begins. He's sitting alone in his room, looking over new sheet music for glee club when his phone starts blaring. It's Rachel.
"Hi Finny, I'm gonna sing you a Disney song just to make you angry. Because I like making you angry because when you're angry we have hot sex." He hears Kurt's laughter in the background, but no music. They must be in their apartment.
"Rachel, are you drunk?"
There's more giggling then a hiccup, then it sounds like feet running away. "Just a little."
"Where's Kurt?"
"Umm…Kurt where are you?" He doesn't hear anything but a splashing sound and laughter. "He's puking his guts out. I can hear it from my bed Finn bear. You should sing me a song, a Disney song because it makes you angry. But I don't want you angry because you can say mean things when you're angry and if you say mean things, then I'll cry, but if I cry then my pretty black eyes are gonna make me look like a panda, and I don't like panda. Well I like panda's but I just don't like panda eyes because they look tacky and as if someone was super duper drunk. Which I'm not. I'm a little drunk, but only a lot just not a little."
He rubs his hands over his face. If sober Rachel liked to talk, then drunk Rachel may well be the most talkative person alive on the planet, or in history.
"Finny bear, sing me… Under the Sea from a Little Mermaid. You have to do the funny Sebastian accent as well. But not meant Warbler accent but little red swimmy thingy Sebastian."
He will go to his grave denying it, but he knows all the words to every song in The Little Mermaid, so he starts singing. He sings until he can hear little snores from Rachel's end of the line. He hangs up once he's sure she's not going to wake up.
That night he decides that he's moving to New York and accepting his place at Columbia, if only to keep a closer eye on Kurt and Rachel.
During his freshmen year at Columbia University, Santana calls in that favor he's apparently owed her since high school. Personally, he can't remember anything happening, but considering he did out her, then he figures why not.
Until he finds out that the favor is him playing drums for some school musical. Only it's not her school (NYU, she transferred once she realized that she actually did hate Ohio and needed to move) that's putting on the show. It's NYADA.
And Rachel somehow managed to score the lead despite only being a sophomore. Of course, everyone he talks to neglects to inform him on who the leads are, because if he'd known that he would have to watch Rachel and Brody sing along to songs from Beauty and the Beast, then he wouldn't have been so willing to take the job.
On a side note, he's now completely certain that Disney will only ever bring about bad things for him.
The show isn't to bad. He doesn't really see any of the cast perform that much, and the one time he does, the understudies are performing because Brody's got exams in a few weeks and Rachel's been working herself to the bone with Broadway auditions and school and the musical so the director (who is really good friends with both Brody and Rachel) gave her the day off.
"No, I don't need you to come in to give Natalie and Stefan notes. Rachel, please go that tea that knocks you out for hours and hours, climb into bed and have a good day and nights sleep. Goodbye." Mitch hangs up the phone and shakes his head. "Sorry about that, the lead is a bit of a control freak."
"A bit? Come on Mitch. Everyone around here knows that the only reason you let Rachel have the role is because the two of you were fuck buddies while auditions were going on." His head snaps up to stare at Mitch who roles his eyes and shakes his head again.
"Would you rather me have cast Naomi in lead then? I'm sure she and Brody would have a splendid time working together. And then, Tisha, you can be the one to explain to them both that they should work together after all of that crap years ago."
Everyone falls silent and Mitch starts rehearsals.
"Are you sleeping with the director Rachel?" He asks her the first time he's seen her since the wedding. Her hair is longer, with more blonde at the ends, and her eyes are lined with heavy eye liner. She's wearing skinny jeans and thigh high black boots while her top is low cut and revealing. In truth, he thinks she's never looked worse.
"Not anymore. I slept with Mitch back before I even knew he was going to be directing this. Besides, Cassie had already given me the part since Naomi got kicked out of school." The look she's giving him is one of complete disdain, as if he was the scum on the bottom of her shoe.
He sighs. "Do you know what they're saying about you behind your back? They're calling you the next Cassie July."
She rolls her eyes. "I go to a performing arts school Finn. If we don't get the role we wanted, then we bitch to our friends and start making up rumors. It's really no different then high school especially in the way that I deal with it all."
"And how's that exactly? Proving them all right?"
"No, I deal with it alone." She turns on her heels and stalks off.
Opening night passes and the rest of the next two weeks fly by and before he knows it, he's at the NYADA dorms for the cast party. He sees her from across the room dressed in a black mini dress with Santana standing next to her. Their eyes lock as Mitch weaves the pair through the crowd and she offers him a small smile. He returns, because he's never been able deny her anything.
His phone beeps as he's heading home.
A whole new world, new fantastic point of view, no one to tell us no or where to go, or say we're only dreaming- welcome to my world, Finn.
The only problem is, he's not sure he wants to be apart of her world anymore.
Turns out, and it seems the only person who's surprised is him, that he doesn't really get much say in anything when it comes to Rachel. He's well aware of her persuasive techniques, having been on the receiving end of them for the majority of his high school life, but he didn't know that they would still work a charm on him.
Basically, she sends him texts every couple of days; Disney lyrics from just about every Disney song he knows, and even some he doesn't, but he looks those ones up.
"Why is she doing this to me Santana?"
"Because she's Rachel Berry and you're Finn Hudson and no matter the state of mind you're in right now, you love her more then anything and she knows that and is currently exploiting it."
"Meaning?" He's just come from an hour and a half long lecture on biology since he's still trying to decide on a minor, and his brain went kaput about ten minutes in and hasn't recovered yet.
Santana rolls here eyes in a very Rachel way. "Meaning she's slept with a lot of guys, but none of them have really romanced her. And you know the princess, she still believes in fairytales and happy endings, and believe it or not, she still believes in one with you. She's got her shit together, now you just have to get yours together."
He runs (like, literally) into her in central park. He doesn't think it's an accident.
"Hello Finn." He's kind of taken a back by how Rachel her voice sounds. "Fancy seeing you here. You know, if you ever feel like serenading me, this would be the ideal location." She's like the more self confident version of senior year Rachel. He likes it better then slutty, sarcastic Rachel, he decides.
"I'll keep that in mind."
"Well until you decide which song you're going to sing to me, we should go have coffee or something. Not right now, because I have to go meet Brody, but some other day, once you've finished classes. Congratulations, by the way, on getting into Columbia. I always knew you could set your mind to anything you wanted. Well, I'd better go. Call or text me Finn."
With that she's off and he's fallen into the black hole that he might as well call being in love with Rachel Berry again. His phone buzzes moments later and he smiles when he reads the message.
If your heart is in your dream
No request is too extreme
When you wish upon a star
As dreamers do*
They meet up a week later. He's surprised to realize that nothings changed much. The ease that they talk to each other is still there from high school. There's not awkward pauses when they openly talk about the relationships they've been in since they've broken up and Rachel admits that she was wrong to say what she said to him that day when they were working on the show.
"I guess I was just so desperate to change and so many people were telling me that I should, that I did it. But then I realized, thanks to you, that I could change, but I had to find the balance between the two Rachel's.
"Have you found it yet?"
"I think I have."
Once they've said they're goodbyes, he immediately receives a message from her.
Trust in me, just in me
Shut your eyes and trust in me
You can sleep safe and sound
Knowing I am around*
He texts her back with a simple, 'I do'.
He. Hates. Disney.
End of story. Nothing good will ever come of Disney. Ever. Especially not for him. Disney makes his life suck and he honestly thought that after five years they'd be over the Disney thing.
Yeah, no. Nice try though.
His students want to do Disney for the school recital. Like really, those movies and songs are ancient and he knows that they don't like doing old music. The Journey fiasco of last year ring any bells?
"Finn, they're young children!" Rachel tells him one morning while he's getting ready for work. "I performed Disney songs when I was there age."
"Yeah, and look how you turned out," he mutters under his breath only to be met with a bar of soap to the head. "What I meant to say, is that you turned our lives into a Disney princess story."
She scoffs. "Is that so?" she asks, peering around the shower curtain. "Then when was the last time you rescued me from a tower, or found my glass slipper or turned back from being a horrible beast because you loved me that much."
"I didn't mean it like that." See, here's the thing about twenty three year old Rachel. She's a lot like high school Rachel, only, like wittier. As in, if he says something completely stupid (or anyone else for that matter) she'll have some sneaky mean comment to add into conversation, and most of the time someone won't even know that she just insulted them (him). "I meant, the amount of drama and stuff."
She's silent for a few moments and he almost thinks he's won their little…whatever it is. "I guess we could call you putting me on that train a noble sacrifice, but things like that more belong in some medieval time period. Especially with the mentality that a man can make a woman's decisions for her."
"Look, we're not going to see each other for a couple of days now that you're going away with Kurt, so I don't want to argue, but I'm not doing Disney."
"But Finn, not letting children sing Disney songs is basically like not going to the zoo when you're a child. It's basically child neglect. Or whatever the teacher equivalent is. Besides, it's a right of passage to dress up like Sebastian the Crab-"
"You mean the 'red swimmy thingy'-"
"Or as one of the animals from the Lion King. I thought we agreed to never bring up drunken college phone calls again." The water shuts off and Rachel appears, towel wrapped around her securely. She's pouting as she saunters towards him. "I don't want to fight either baby, but I just think that you should let those little cuties pies sing a Disney song for their recital showcase, whatever it is."
He just shakes his head and moves away from her as her hands snake around his waist.
"I demand Disney!"
"Not gonna happen. And how old are you? Five?"
She smirks and he swears under his breath. He and that smirk are very good friends(read: whenever that smirks appears, so do any clothing either of them may be wearing.) and he knows there's no getting out of this. "If I was five I wouldn't be able to do this." She stands on her tiptoes and brings him in for a deep kiss. "But like you said, I'm five so…" she walks away. "You should have done Disney, Finn."
Rachel's giving him the silent treatment. Not unusual, they do live together after all and she is almost impossible to live with (he seriously doesn't know how Kurt did it for four years) but this is the serious I'm-trying-to-make-a-point type silent treatment and it's lasted nearly two weeks.
"Just let her have her way man," Brody tells him over beer. Turns out that he's a pretty decent friend when his heads not stuck up his ass. "We both know you won't be getting laid anytime soon if you don't."
"It's just the basic principle of it all. And god, why does sex even have to come into the equation?" His head falls to the table while Brody chuckles.
"She's Rachel Berry dude. I've been there; had blue balls for months after she found out about me and Cassie during her Freshmen year. Look, Disney isn't so bad. Isn't that how you guys got back together?"
"Yeah, but they're seven year olds. Don't you think they're a little to young to be singing about romance and stuff?"
"The movies are musicals. Find a song that is age appropriate and have them perform it. Like Hakuna Matata, or one of those other songs."
He's silent as he finishes his beer. "You know what, I've got an even better idea."
"Thank-you for coming with us Ms. Berry. It was super cool getting to be inside and actual theater." He hears Gracie say.
"You're very welcome. Anything to encourage the arts." Is Rachel's response to Gracie, though he knows it's directed at him. "Speaking of, have you guys come up with a song for your showcase?"
He freezes, the full impact of what's about to happen finally dawning on him.
"No. Mr. H still won't let us sing a Disney song." Travis is talking now. Tom is standing beside him and looks up questioningly. He nods his head very slightly.
"Actually, Ms. Berry, Mr. Hudson wanted me to tell you that he's refusing to let us sing a Disney song unless you agree to marry him. He also wanted me to show you this." Tom pulls out the box with the ring in it. He's been working for a while now, and he's not in high school anymore so he went all out and bought a new ring.
He risks a glance at Rachel who is alternating between staring at the ring, staring at him and staring at Tom.
"Well," she says clearing her throat as she does so, "you tell Mr. Hudson that I refuse to negotiate with terrorists, therefore he has to ask me himself, face to face."
Tom runs back to him. "What do I say now Mr. Huddy?"
"Stick with the plan."
Tom runs back. "I'm sorry Ms. Berry, but the statement still stands. You have to tell me if you'll marry Mr. Hudson or not."
Rachel laughs and bends down to whisper something in Tom's ear. He runs back to him and smiles widely.
"Looks like we're doing Disney after all Mr. Hudson."
He laughs as Rachel walks over to them and kisses his cheek sweetly. "Yes I'll marry you if you let them sing a Disney song." He pulls her into a hug and begins to sing softly into her ear.
Baby, I knew at once that you were meant for me
Deep in my soul I know that I'm your destiny
Though you're unsure why fight the tide
Don't think so much, let your heart decide
Baby, I see your future and it's tied to mine
I look in your eyes and see you searching for a sign
But you'll never fall till you let go
Don't be so scared of what you don't know
"Finn?" Rachel asks tracing a pattern over his back. They've been together for six years now and he still loves it when she traces patterns on his back "Do you like Disney yet?"
"Yeah, babe. Course I do."
"Good." She stops her drawing and kisses his shoulder blade instead. "Because I was thinking that we could have a Disney themed nursery when the baby comes."
"Sure babe, you can have a Disney themed nurs-" wait. What?
"Finn?" she asks.
"You're pregnant?" he turns onto his back and stares at her smile. She has been glowing lately. She nods, a smile slowly stretching across her face. He puts his hand on her stomach and rubs around in circles. "Hello baby, I hope you like Disney."
I don't own Glee, or any of the Disney songs that I've used in here.