Preface:
I wrote this the day it happened, because like Kurt in this story, I deal with things by doing. I had to move, I had to make something to keep myself together. I posted it, but a couple of kind people made me realize it was just too soon, so I deleted it. If this story hurt or offended you in any way, I am truly sorry.
I'm reposting it now because a few people asked for it, hoping it would help them vent some of their feelings on this issue. If you aren't ready for this sort of thing yet, that's fine. It's okay to not want to say goodbye yet. People grieve at their own pace in their own ways. But please don't ask me to delete it or accuse me of trying to capitalize on Cory's death. It is literally impossible to 'capitalize' on fanfiction. This is a product of love, written to help me and others deal with a heartbreaking loss. I have as much right to grieve as you, and this story in no way infringes upon your existence; if you don't think it will help you, then please, don't read it. Find something that will make you feel better. I think we all just want to feel better right now.
Now, about the story…
It's more about the character of Finn than it is about Cory, though it's still dedicated to Cory's memory. Cory definitely deserves to be mourned over Finn, being a real person and all, but that doesn't mean Finn shouldn't be mourned as well. So I'm mourning them both, in different ways. Cory, I am mourning with blog posts and a kinder, more thoughtful attitude towards people in general. I am mourning him by looking closer than ever at the disease of addiction and how I can help the people it affects.
This story is my way of mourning Finn. We know he is going to pass away in the show, but that episode is still months away from airing. So for now, this is my way of grieving him and the impact he had on me and others. I've always liked him on some level and with Season 4, he had genuinely started to climb into my favorites again. I don't know if I'll be able to write him after this, but I certainly hope so. Finn Hudson is a wonderful character, one the most fun to write, and he can live on in our hearts and minds, if nowhere else.
I love you all. You're wonderful people. Thank you for everything you have done and been.
Lean Against The Wind
It comes during the post-regional celebration. Kurt's phone rings, he smiles, answers "Dad!" and the world stops.
Everything stops.
People mill around him, ask him what's wrong, but he can't say anything. Everything stops, inside and out, and for a moment, he can't breathe.
He's vaguely aware of being taken to a seat and fanned. His phone is in pieces on the floor. He must have dropped it.
They're still talking to him.
"What's wrong? What happened?"
He can't say anything.
And then Schue's phone rings and he doesn't have to. Suddenly, his teacher is pale-faced and pushing through the crowd and wrapping him in a wonderful, terrible hug.
The room falls silent.
"Guys, please, have a seat," Mr. Schuester rasps. "I have… I have some very bad news."
An accident, they said. Head-on collision, mechanical failure, no one at fault. Critical condition. In the ER. They don't know. They don't know.
They know. It's in their voices. They already know.
They pile in cars and convoy to the hospital. Messages are sent to everyone from everyone. Everyone except her. They can't tell her, not over the phone, not like this, not yet.
Blaine drives Kurt and a few New Kids. The car is dead silent. Even the radio is turned off. Blaine says nothing to Kurt, but offers his hand, palm-up on the console between them.
Kurt understands the gesture. He accepts.
He enters to find Burt and Carole clasped so tightly that there is no room for air between them. He is loath to break the moment, but then he sniffs and Carole looks up and opens her arms with please in her eyes and he runs. He runs to his family and becomes part of the broken circle, the circle that may never be whole again.
Then the others enter and the room is a clamor of sniffles and choked voices, chests bulging like dams buckling under the weight of grief. Over a dozen people cling together, holding each other like pieces of something precious. Everyone touches someone. No one is alone. They are connected, tied, together. Together they came. Together they wait to hear what they already know.
A doctor approaches and his words are soft as rain. Nothing they could do, internal bleeding, brain swelling, he felt nothing.
If he is the rain, Carole is the flood. She wails.
The dam breaks.
Together, they waited.
Together, they drown.
Kurt alone keeps his head above water. There's too much to do. Someone has to go tell Rachel. He offers to do it himself, insists that it must be done in person. Schue buys his plane ticket.
When she sees him, she smiles like the sun, bright and warm and lovely in all the best ways, and it makes him sick. Her face. She won't smile like this again. Not for a long, long time.
The sun fades. "Kurt, what's wrong?"
He shakes his head and takes her, precious, and sits with her on the couch. His mouth opens but nothing comes out. Words fail him. His voice betrays him.
And then he speaks, and Rachel is a canvas drained of paint, colorless and incomplete.
She cries, with no histrionics or melodrama. She cries truly and painfully, for no one but her, and it's destroying to watch.
He holds her, and soon they are asleep in each others' arms. When they leave, they walk like conjoined twins, side-by-side, leaning on each other because neither can walk alone.
Time heals just slightly. His wounds scab over, but the absence lurks like a pothole, ever-threatening to swallow him if he missteps.
Kurt plans. Arranges the funeral, sends out invitations, calculates costs, looks up addresses and old friends and new friends and reaches and stretches himself to breaking.
Blaine offers to help, once. Tries to take the invitations and mail them himself. Kurt slaps him. He immediately apologizes, but Blaine understands. Kurt needs to do this. He needs to do everything, needs everything to do. Movement keeps him together, keeps him sane.
He has a question. Burt and Carole say yes, but one. Only one. He would want them to, but only one.
One song.
He tells the Directions, Old and New. They congregate in the choir room and pick, pick, and pick, but they cannot choose. Barbs fly and tempers flare and No. Not now. Not here, not with this, you do not treat each other this way. Please. Please.
Blaine stops them. "He meant too much." His voice is raspy and weak. He tries again, strong and firm. "He means too much. Too many things to too many people for one song."
"We only get one," Quinn says. "We have to choose."
And then Blaine gets up and starts writing on the whiteboard.
"What's that?" Puck asks.
"Something we can agree on," Blaine says. "Funerals are about the dead, but they're for the living. We're singing for everyone who ever loved him. We have to be truthful, to sing what we feel, and if there is one sentiment we all share, it's this." He finishes and steps back.
The Directions, Old and New, stare at the words and give their assent one by one. Quinn smiles and sniffs and Mercedes blesses him, Mike nods and Puck offers a tearful fist, Brittany cries and Santana holds her, Sam gives thumbs-up and Artie whispers 'true dat,' Tina squeaks and buries her face in Unique, who blows Blaine a sorrowful kiss. Sugar smiles and Joe Amen's, Marley sniffles 'yes' and Jake gives a quiet nod as he wraps around her. Kitty wipes her eyes with a 'whatever,' while Ryder plunges his reddened face into his hands and nods at the floor.
Rachel stops breathing and for a second, it seems she will burst, but she manages a nod through pursed lips.
Kurt looks at the words and feels them in his empty places, echoing in his heart and resonating in his bones. "It's perfect."
Blaine nods and Mr. Schue stands up at last. "I'm proud of you all. Please, know that," he says quietly. "Let's get to work."
Brad returns and arranges the song for piano. Kurt takes the first verse because he was his brother. Puck takes the second because he was his brother. They join for the bridge and then Rachel like a comet goes screaming into the finale because for a time, he was her everything. Everyone else is happy to offer harmony and backing. They just want to sing one last song for their friend.
So many people come to his funeral. Azimio Adams and David Karofsky, Matt Rutherford and Trent Warbler and Jesse St. James. All his teachers, faculty and staff, family and friends. Even Holly Fucking Holliday flies from God-knows-where to pay her respects. Rory Flanagan sends a card from Ireland so long and full of feelings that it hurts to touch. Kurt has to place it on the table to read it.
They smile and laugh and reminisce. They remember, because he can live in their memories if nowhere else. It's good. It's almost good.
And then it's time.
They line up at the coffin, one by one, and say goodbye.
Quinn leaves him with a whisper and a sob. Mercedes leaves him with a prayer. Blaine leaves him with a statement of gratitude from quivering lips. Santana leaves him with a finger kiss. Brittany leaves him with a tearful hug. Mike leaves him with a friendly pat and a couple of teardrops. Sam leaves him with a gentle hand and wept words indecipherable to all but him. Tina leaves him with a little trophy and a tiny whispered 'thank you.' Puck leaves him with a punch to his coffin and the most broken "fuck you" ever spat. Artie tries to leave him with a bro-fist and a smile, but he gets about six feet from the coffin before he's sniffling and shaking too hard to push himself. Sam comes back to wheel him out.
Joe leaves him with a small crucifix. Sugar leaves him jewelry. Unique leaves him with a gentle touch that smears mascara on his coffin. Kitty leaves him nothing but a long stare from tired, sad eyes. Jake leaves him with a silent, stoic nod. Marley leaves him with a few sniffles and a brave smile. Ryder… doesn't seem to want to leave him. He stops at the coffin and looks almost confused, and then he's heaving, great wracked sobs that no one expects. Jake and Marley run to him and now all three of them are hugging and for-real crying over a teacher, a mentor, and a good man who changed all of them for the better.
Mr. and Mrs. Pillsbury-Schuester leave him with gentle whispers of how proud they are, before Mr. Schuester falls apart in his wife's arms. For all his faults, he loved that boy like a son.
Rachel is next. She stops just short of draping herself over the coffin and whispers. For minutes she does this, and Kurt is almost worried for her when she finally breaks away. He doesn't know what she said, but she is just barely smiling through her tears as she walks away.
And then it's just the family.
Kurt approaches. He looks good. They did a good job with him. He must remember to send the mortician a thank-you note.
He doesn't know what to say to him. Kurt has loved him so much in so many different ways; as a friend, a crush, a step-brother, a brother. Now he can only love him as a memory. But he does. He does love him. He absolutely loves him and will never stop, so that's what he says. "I love you, Finn Hudson," he says quietly. "I love you." And that is how Kurt leaves him.
He walks away to wait for his family. Behind him, he can hear Carole keening in sorrow but he dares not look at her. Not yet. He has to hold it together. They've still got one more duty to Finn. One final performance to give.
In black suits and ties, the Directions, New and Old, hold the most important show circle of their lives. They join hands to disperse the pain and slowly but surely, they find their strength. And when their throats are clear and their voices are stable, Puck gives the only benediction they need. "For Finn."
"For Finn," they echo.
They take the stage in the chapel and Kurt takes the mic. "We had some trouble finding the right song," he says quietly. "A little arguing, a little knife fighting. You know how Glee Club is."
Laughter. Music to his ears.
"But in the end, we all managed to agree on something. This might not seem like the typical funeral song, but it's from the heart. From all of our hearts. So Finn, wherever you are, I hope you can hear this. I hope you understand. This one's for you."
He steps back, and Brad begins to play, soft and lilting. Kurt waits a few measures and then his voice carries the melody like a silk cradle.
"I dig my toes into the sand,
The ocean looks like a thousand diamonds,
Strewn across a blue blanket,
I lean against the wind,
Pretend that I am weightless,
And in this moment, I am happy, happy."
The others join him and they sing. In perfect harmony, they sing the chorus. They sing of beaches and stars and a sky full of wonder, of love and life lived without fear. "The world's a rollercoaster, and I am not strapped in. Maybe I should hold with care, but my hands are busy in the air, saying…"
Rachel takes them into the finale, starting whisper soft and building and building and building and they build with her until the sound explodes out of them. If the first chorus was a soft admission, and the second was a statement of truth, then the final is a battle-cry to the heavens, a wail of heartbreak and loss and lives that will forever be missing one thing. Their final note echoes in the chapel for what feels like minutes. It's the one thing they could all agree upon, the words on the whiteboard, the truest words they've ever sung.
"I wish you were here."
It's over.
They're in the graveyard. Everyone is milling about and talking. The sun is shining bright. Birds are chirping overhead, and the grass is exceptionally green. Finn is in the ground.
It's over.
Sam and Santana sit on the ground next to Brittany as she plays with stray flower petals. Rachel has a lively conversation with Marley, Quinn, and Mercedes, while Jake and Mike stand off to the side and quietly comfort Puck. Tina, Joe, Sugar, and Unique talk on the way to their cars, while Kitty pushes Artie over the uneven ground towards the pavement.
It's over.
"You alright there, bud?" asks a rough-voiced, red-eyed Burt.
"Yeah," Kurt says with a hurried nod. "I'm fine. How's Carole?"
"I think… I think she'll be okay," Burt answers, with a nod to the side, where a red-eyed Carole looks at a rambling, bashful Ryder like he might be the least or most important thing in the world; she hasn't decided yet.
Kurt quirks a brow.
"Kid says Finn changed his whole life," Burt explains quietly. "Helped him more than any teacher he's ever had. He thought his mom should know that."
Kurt's eyes widen. That explains his little breakdown, at least. "You think it'll help?"
"I think so," Burt sighs. "I hope so."
"Me too," Kurt says, staring off.
It's over.
"What about you?" Burt asks. "You sure you're alright?"
Kurt nods. "I'm fine," he says.
Burt's eyes are uncertain. "Okay. Let me know if you need anything, yeah? I'm always here for you."
Kurt smiles and Burt walks off.
He takes a single step after him and it hits like lightning through metal bones.
It's over.
Finn is in the ground. His voice, his laugh, his little half-smile, his clumsy feet and giant frame; it's all in the ground and it's never coming back. They'll never see him again. He'll never graduate college, never become a teacher, never make a difference in the life of another student. He'll never get married or have kids or be a father or grandfather or uncle. He won't be Kurt's best man at his wedding; he won't be Kurt's anything. It's over, just like that. No drama, no greater meaning, no purpose or point, just emptiness where a person once was, nineteen years of life and love and struggles and triumphs reduced to a name on a tombstone. He's dead.
Finn is dead.
Kurt is paralyzed. He can't move. He can't breathe. He can't think or speak. He knows it's coming, he can hear the water rushing, knows he is about to drown and he only has time to call one name. It's not who he expects.
"BLAINE!"
And he's there, wrapped around him like a cloak. Kurt sobs into his shoulder as Blaine pats and rubs and soothes him as best he can.
He clings to Blaine. Clings for dear life because over and over, his life has taught him that precious things disappear and nothing is forever. So he will cling to those he has left and hold them like the gifts that they are. Because even if they have to go, he wants the precious things in his life to know they are precious, wants to cherish and keep them as long as he can. So he will show them. He will make sure that they know.
As he breaks away from Blaine and runs to Carole, he can only hope that Finn died knowing he was loved. By Kurt. By everyone. He hopes Finn knew.
He did.
~The End~
In memory of Cory Monteith
Lyrics are from "Wish You Were Here" by Incubus. There are many wonderful songs about grief, death, and mourning, but Glee for me is at its best when it does something just a little unexpected. So instead of a song about death, I chose a song about life, about embracing the wonder and beauty of each moment, even with the sadness of knowing the one you love can't be there to share it with you. I hope that came across.