It was a week after Regionals and words that Sam had said to Artie about a month ago still ran through Artie's mind as he lied in his bed like the music and lyrics to "Baby" ran through the closet-Bieber-fan's soul. I wish we were as close as they were, Sam had said in reference to Brittany and Santana. Of course, Artie knew that Sam had no clue what he was actually saying when he said the words, but they made Artie think a bit. He justified these thoughts like he justified liking the Biebs. Simply put, he didn't want for his love, Brittany, to have to take care of him all her life.
Soft fingers trickled down Artie's naked chest. They tickled Artie into a soft giggle. A mass of blonde hair inched toward his face. Brittany kissed his cheek. "What are you thinking about, boy lips?"
Obviously, she was thinking about kissing him. It was the best thing about dating Brittany. She couldn't hide anything.
"Sa—Santana." Whoo. He'd almost said Sam.
Brittany blinked a few times. "Wow. That must be deep."
Artie furrowed his eyebrows. He knew well that Santana and Brittany had some kind of relationship with each other that was deeper than most girl best friends. Lifting himself on his forearms, his body came up a bit. Brittany quickly put a pillow behind him and helped his to sit against it. She was looking into him.
"Do you feel different when you kiss her than when you kiss me?" Artie asked.
Brittany bit her lower lip. Artie could practically see the wheels spinning in her head. "I miss her sweet-lady-kisses." Her voice was low. She touched his arm. "Loving you clears some of the fog in my head."
Artie put his arm around her, and she nuzzled into his chest. He started to lightly hum a song they were rehearsing in glee.
Brittany lifted her head from Artie's chest and kissed Artie. She smiled when she pulled away from him. "Cherry chapstick is one thing, but knowing what you had for lunch makes me feel more smarter."
She was so adorable when she said incorrect things, but Artie found himself putting his hand to his mouth. He really needed to think about brushing more often.
"Can you sing me that rock song about Adverbs again? It makes me think of lolly pops."
"School House Rock," Artie idly corrected her. There were just stars in her eyes for him. But deep down, Santana was there. So, maybe Sam could be deep in his mind too. What the hell? We only live once, right?
"Lolly lolly lolly get your adverbs here," Artie started to sing.
First thing Monday morning, Artie came rolling up to Sam.
"Hey, dude!" Sam said exuberantly. He liked Artie. The kid was cool, despite being in a wheel chair. He'd managed to get a hottie like Brittany, right? Sure, Sam was with Santana, but he felt he could look at other girls.
Artie stopped right in front of Sam in the hallway. "I was thinking. You want to be close like our girlfriends. Why do you stick it out today with me? Get to know each other better?"
Sam's big mouth turned into a huge smile. He grabbed the books out of his locker and put them in his backpack and pushed Artie to the choir room for their home room.
"So, what do you do for fun?" Sam asked.
"Oh, you know. Cross country, dance, and take long walks on the beach."
Sam laughed. "That cross country trail sure is small in the woods." He popped Artie up into a wheellie and pushed his a bit faster.
He slowed down when Artie started talking. "Video games, reading, singing, Brittany. You know, boy stuff, I guess."
"Yeah, minus that reading stuff."
Artie pushed his fist back real quick and knocked Sam in the gut. It actually knocked some of the wind out of him. So, he had to stop and catch his breath. "I underestimated you, robo-boy." He had heard that Brittany had thought Artie was a robot at one point.
Artie rolled his eyes. "What about you, surf boy?"
"You know. I get cheated on, worship the Biebs, and see how much stuff I can fit in my oversized mouth." Sam laughed again.
"You don't say?" Artie used a strange tone he'd never used in front of Sam before. Was it seductive in nature? Sam swished his blonde hair back and forth to block the thought out of his head.
"Actually, working out, sports, comic boys, video games, and girls about do it for me. Oh, and new friends." Sam put a hand on Artie's shoulder and pushed him into the choir room.
Sam parked Artie next to the chair he was going to sit in.
Before the bell even rang, Rachel got up and started giving one of her impromptu speeches to the six glee kids that were in the room (including Tina, Mike, and Mercedes). As she spoke, Artie leaned toward Sam and spoke to him without moving his lips. "She probably talks while having sex. Poor Finn."
Finn! ARG! He shouldn't have sex anyway. Sam gulped back his pride. "Think a cock in her mouth would shut her up?"
Artie laughed hard enough that had he have been drinking milk, it would have came out his nose.
"What is so funny? Clearly, I'm trying to discuss something important. Me. Rachel Barry!"
"Sorry," both boys muttered.
Sam had been pushing Artie around all day, which had been a relaxation on his arms. It was also getting him to the cafeteria for lunch faster than normal. That was, until they saw Brittany standing in front of a large sign on white paper that said, "STOP BY THE ART ROOM TO GET YOUR HOMECOMING TICKETS." There was a drawn on stop light next to the words.
"What are you doing?" Artie asked.
Brittany slowly turned toward Artie, her pulled up hair falling over her shoulder. "I've been waiting for the sign to change since third period." She pointed to the stop light that was colored in red. "The waiting might have made me color blind. Everything looks green."
Artie grabbed her middle and pulled her on his lap and held her. He nodded to Sam to keep pushing them. Sam obliged.
"I forgot my Pokeballs or else I would capture the creature that's following us?"
Artie looked back at Sam. "Are you talking about Sam?"
"Oh right. Sometimes I forget he's a human. I thought he was so cute the first time I saw him that he had to be an Eevee evolution."
Artie always got a bit excited when Brittany followed one of his dorkier lines of living. And Pokemon had been one of his top dorky fetishes as a kid. How many cards of those little creatures did he have? Enough to make some money on the net if he ever sold them. His mind was lost in thought for the rest of the ride to the cafeteria.
After going through the line, the three of them joined up with Puck and Lauren. Santana joined them shortly after, given Sam a quick kiss on his forehead. Artie had a wave of jealousy wash over him.
Sam stabbed his fork into his salad. As he raised it to his mouth, Artie noticed that the lettuce had brown crusted around the edges. "How do you eat that?"
Lifting his shirt, Sam said, "Gotta take care of the abs. They are essential to getting every darked-headed-wonder." Sam rubbed them, then put his shirt down. He brushed his fingers through Santana's hair.
She pulled her head away and slapped his hand. "Unless we're mackin' then your fingers don't go through hair that took an hour to curl just right."
Puck laughed. "You have so much to learn about your girl."
"Because you are the vast fountain of knowledge on Santana." Santana rolled her eyes and bobbed her head with sass.
"I vasted once. It made me super hungry," Brittany added in.
"Are you going to eat that?" Lauren asked about Brittany's untouched spam. She stabbed it with her fork and ate it in two bites.
"I love when you do that." Puck put his arm around Lauren.
Artie's arm brushed up against Sam's arm, which was cold and smooth. It sent chills through him. Brittany rubbed his neck at the same time. So, he blamed it on that.
Sam moved his arm away quickly and scratched it.
A quick excitement passed over Puck's eyes, but quickly extinguished. He seemed to look over the table to see if anyone was paying attention to him. It made Artie stop focusing on Sam and pay some attention to Puck. Finally, Puck mouthed that he got a B on his Geometry test.
Artie gave him a thumbs up.
"Secrets do not friends make," Sam commented.
"Puck and I were talking about doing a trio with you this week in glee." Artie came up with something quick. He knew that Puck didn't like everyone getting into his business about his grades. "Maybe you guys can come over to my house tonight to rehearse."
Puck scowled at Artie. His Puck-Pout took over the scowl, though. "Lauren and I already have plans tonight."
"We do?" Lauren asked with a hint of challenge in her voice.
"Well, you don't know because I was planning on surprising you."
"Oh, right. You better have a box of doughnuts and condoms to go with this surprise."
Puck's eyes widened. "Tonight? Finally!"
"No tutu breath. Your knees are too wobbly for this." Lauren modeled herself with her hands.
Santana made a mock gag noise.
Brittany just twirled her hair. "You guys will sound amazing together." She picked up her pudding-filled spoon and lightly touched it to Artie's nose and pulled her hand away. "Sexy bunch for sure." She extended her tongue and licked it off.
"That's about three shades of gross." Santana looked between Lauren and Brittany.
Sam had spent the whole day at school with Artie. No doubt, the kid was smart and hilarious. So, getting a chance to sing with just him and Puck seemed pretty cool to him. Well, glee-cool, which was so far off base from school-cool.
Sam helped Artie get into his car and put the wheelchair in the trunk. He got in the driver's side and revved up the car. The radio was lightly playing a cd that had a lot of recent songs that Mr. Shew had introduced to them as possible national songs. To Sam, there was always opportunity to improve his place anywhere. But he pushed these thoughts behind and focused on Artie.
One hand on the steering wheel, he put his other on Artie's leg. "Does it hurt?"
Sam caught Artie looking down at Sam's hand on his leg with a long, sad face. "No. I can't even feel your hands there. Sometimes I get a phantom pain—like people get when they lose their arms or legs all together—but mostly, I don't have any feeling down there. Except my penis."
A light chuckle escaped from Sam. "TMI, dude."
"The only thing that really hurts is that I can't always do normal things boys or all teens do. Such as drive."
Sam barely noticed changing his foot from the gas to the break. He never even thought about the fact that Artie couldn't drive. "It's kind of a sweet deal that someone always gets to take you around thought." Sam tried to be supportive.
"But I can never go anywhere alone."
Sam petted Artie's hair. "I'm sorry."
Artie laughed. "You didn't do this to me."
"I'm starting to feel like we are as close as Brittany and Santana now. It's so cool." Light bubbles formed at Sam's lips when he said that. It was an embarrassing problem he had sometimes due to his large mouth.
"Not quite," Artie said, seemingly off-hand. Then, he pointed to the house that he lived in. A one story, little house.
Sam pulled into the parking space, turned off the car, and got out Artie's wheel chair. He helped the boy get back into it and wheeled him up to the house. There was a nice little ramp at the door for Artie. At the door, Artie pushed the doorbell and their house keeper came and opened to door for them. She had a surprised look on her face at seeing the two boys, but it quickly turned upward into a smile.
As Sam pushed Artie toward where he was directed. He studied the little house. It was very clean and everything seemed to have a place. There was something telling about how Artie dressed. It was visible in the house.
There was a snack and drink laid out for Artie on the kitchen table. He turned a brilliant shade of red that Sam had to secretly smile.
"You can get anything to eat or drink that you want. My mom kinda treats me like a three-year-old sometimes."
Sam got a bottle of water out of the fridge and sat down at the kitchen table, where Artie had already started snacking on the peanut butter crackers his mom had made for him. Such a sweet gesture. Everyone that loved Artie really seemed to love him. So, Sam had to make a joke to knock out all this sentimental crap from his head. "Works when you date a three-year-old."
"Trust me. She's not." Artie wiggled his eyebrows, but that was hardly noticeable next to his cracker crumbs being spit across the table.
Sam laughed at the peanut butter hanging from the corner of Artie's mouth. He stared for a little bit too long.
"What?" Artie asked with a small nervous laugh.
"Just... Napkin?" Sam handed him one.
After snack time, Artie directed Sam, who was once again pushing him, to his room. Artie suggested they play Smash Brother on the Wii. He didn't really feel like singing. He felt like getting to know Sam instead. Blondes seemed to have that effect on him.
Their conversation turned dark as they started the battle. Artie tended to be a bit of a dirty player. "Do you ever miss being with Quinn?" As soon as he asked the question he was walloping on Sam's character on screen.
"Rude. And unfair," Sam quickly commented back.
Artie laughed as Sam tried to get him back. But Artie quickly overtook him and knocked him out of the game, then started on the computers. Sam could focus on a conversation better not playing.
"Quinn was okay. But I'm happy with where I am now. Santana's pretty cool too. And so are you."
"Me? Cool. I'm not cool."
"Shut up. Yes you are." Sam ruffled Artie's hair.
"Are you trying to mess me up?"
Sam hummed a "mmmhumm."
Artie looked right at Sam and continued to kick the character's asses on screen. "Give that a shot now." Artie smirked.
"Lame."
"Like your skills at this game?"
Sam picked up a pillow from Artie's bed and hit him in the back of the head with it. Artie purposely fell out of his chair.
Just as Artie had calculated, Sam jumped down on the floor and was profusely asking Artie if he was alright. Artie took the moment and put his arms around Sam's neck and pulled him down on top of him. Without a second thought, Artie pulled Sam's face toward his and kissed him. His big lips were warm against Artie's. It surprised him a little that Sam actually kissed him back. When Sam pulled away quickly, Artie freaked, just saying, "You wanted to be as close as Brittany and Santana."
"Right..." Sam dazed.
It was strange. Sam was looking at Artie in a whole new light. The day had been something amazing. But it all came down to this moment. Whatever he decided to do with the kiss that Artie had just laid on him.
Sam just sat dazed.
"I just thought—" Artie started.
Sam hushed him. "Don't think." For reasons beyond Sam, he was feeling drawn to those lips. Artie tasted like lip gloss. It was confusing for him as to whether he wore it or was kissing Brittany a lot. And if he was kissing Brittany so much, why did he need to kiss him.
Sam stood abruptly. It just felt right.
Artie tried to pick himself up off the floor. There was a sorrow in his eye that made Sam weak at his knees. He scooped the boy up in his arms and carried him over to his bed. He placed him down, turned his back on him and took steps toward the door. Before he placed his hand on the handle, he looked back at the sad Artie and rushed back over. He leaped up into the bed and landed right next to him.
A smile took Sam's face and contagiously jumped over to Artie's. Before Sam could stop himself, his lips were on Artie's again. The hell with it. He liked Artie. And why shouldn't they kiss since they liked each other. Maybe it was gay. But It really wasn't to Sam. It was just something shared between new friends. Who knew? Maybe they could have a life with the two girls and themselves. What could be better than living with three other people that were so amazingly cool?