I've had this idea for a while, so hopefully it's good. Might become a small multi-chapter story.

Set after 4x10: "Glee, Actually"

DISCLAIMER: I DON'T OWN GLEE, NOT ANY OF IT.

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Help is Around the Corner

This day would have been a great day for him. His mother baked him three batches of his favorite lasagna dish, his stepfather had given him a bonus on his monthly check right after giving him a whole week off of work from the tire shop, and he had just learned that his best friend was making a permanent, or more precisely, a very long and very temporary move back into town. This day would have been perfectly topped with a quiet and relaxing, much needed afternoon nap, except he had an appointment to go to.

Finn frantically tapped his fingers on the steering wheel of the car. This day marked his third therapy session with Dr. Sterling. His previous sessions had not been quite successful, fulfilling, and definitely not relaxing, at least on his part. He had five minutes left to decide whether to go inside the medical center, or to drive off, go back home, and take shelter in the warmth of his bed.

He remembers the day his mother and Burt came into his room and gave him a talk, or as others would say, an intervention. It had happened a few days after Christmas; the day after Burt had come back from his trip to New York. He was lying on his bed, flipping through his yearbook, quietly reading the parting messages his friends had written for him. He missed them terribly, he missed the old days and wished for everything to be back as they were, but he had nothing else to do, and he knew it was depressing, but he did it anyway. The moment he thought that things couldn't get any worse, his mom started to talk about how she wants him to see someone. Finn merely grunted and said that he wasn't ready to see anyone yet, the Rachel debacle was still too fresh, and getting back on the horse would be impossible since the saddle was gone. He was about to politely ask his parents to leave his room, but Burt was quick to respond to his speech, "Son, we're not talking about you seeing other people," Finn gave him a quizzical look, "What your mother means to say, is that we would like you to see a therapist."

"A what now?" Finn jumped off his bed letting his yearbook fall to the floor. His head jerking side to side as he tried to focus his eyes on both of his parents at the same time.

"Finny, you've just been so unhappy," Carol looked straight into Finn's eyes, as she stepped closer to her son to put a hand on his shoulder, "You go to work and that's all you do, work. Your coworkers say you don't even take breaks anymore, and from your history of working at the tire shop, your breaks used to be sacred for you. You come home eat and sleep, and from what I've noticed, you've been sleeping a lot more than you've been eating," Finn let his body drop back in a sitting position on his bed and stared at his socks, "And anyone who's ever known you, knows that you would rather eat a lot than get a full night's rest, but honey, your clothes are starting to look loose on you."

"I've also talked to Kurt and Noah Puckerman," Burt said as he noticed the quiver in his wife's lips, knowing that she was having a hard time continuing her speech, "They've told me that you don't talk to anyone anymore. Will Schuester even said something about how you decided to stop helping with the Glee club out of the blue. Your mother and I are worried that something might be going on with you, but you won't let anyone in to help."

"I'm not suicidal if that's what you guys are thinking!" Finn quickly replied, "I swear I'm not!" He violently shook his head, so much so that the details of his face started to blur, "I'd… I would never… Mom, Burt, I'd never hurt myself even if I felt like I was at the bottom of the world… Or even at the pit of the galaxy!" He could feel his mother's hand shake against his shoulder, and heard Burt come closer to where he was sitting on his bed.

"Son, we all know you're going through things right now. Your mother and I don't want to make assumptions on what it is that could make you feel so down. It could be what happened with Rachel, it could be that you didn't get into any colleges, it could just be that you feel like crap, it could be—"

"Finny, we just want you to be happy again," Carol quickly cut in, before Burt said anything else that could make the intervention a failure, "I really want to see that big smile on your face again," She brought her finger to Finn's chin and lifted his head up to face her, "I don't like seeing my baby this way… I don't like seeing you this down." A lone tear streaked her face, "Finn baby, if you don't want to talk to us, or if you feel like you can't talk to any of us, at least, please do this for me, but mostly for yourself. Please go see someone. A professional… a psychologist. We found a nice younger doctor that we thought you might like. Just let us know if you want to make an appointment, we'll be right behind you." Carol gave her son a heartwarming smile, as Burt gave his other shoulder a quick squeeze. Finn sat expressionless on his bed and watched his parents slowly make their way out of his room.

He knew he hadn't been the most joyous company but he had no idea that it was affecting his mother so much. In fact, he thought he was doing a good job at hiding his miserable state. Had he really gotten to the point where he lost control of his facial expressions? Had it really gotten so bad that others were starting to worry for him? It was true though, it's been a while since he cared for what happened to his life, his wellbeing. What with everything crumbling down in his life, what was the point of it all?

But he hated to cause his mother so much pain. He loved his mother and would do anything for her. So he made his way out of his room and to the kitchen, where he knew his mother would be found fixing a cup of hot cocoa for everyone. "Hey Mom?" he started, looked his mother square in the eyes and gave her a small crooked smile, "I'll do it." Burt, who was sitting on a stool by the island counter of the kitchen, stood up and took the mugs from his wife's shaky grasp before she dropped them. Carol walked to her son and gave him a fierce, yet soft hug, and allowed Finn to drop his head in the crook between her neck and her shoulder. She stroked the back of his head as she cooed comforting words, which surprisingly made him feel slightly better.

That's how it had all started, at least how he remembers it. They were lucky to be able to make an appointment for the following week. His mother insisted on driving him to his first session, making him feel like the biggest 19-year-old baby that ever lived in Lima. It didn't matter to him at the time, she was the main reason he was getting professional help in the first place. But after that first session, he decided that he would drive himself for the upcoming ones. He convinced his mother that maybe it was best that he do this by himself.

You're doing this for mom, he thought to himself, You're doing this for mom, so get out of the damn car and get inside the office before your third session runs out of time. Finn turned the engine off, and quickly made his way in the office.

"Mr. Hudson! How lovely to see you today, I was starting to think you weren't coming. Dr. Sterling is ready for you, so you can just go in any time, deary." Ms. Welch, the office's main receptionist said. She reminded Finn of a much perkier, much more unorganized, and much more unkempt version of Ms. Pillsbury. Actually, had it not been for their almost twin-like physical similarities, Ms. Welch wouldn't remind him of Ms. Pillsbury at all. She would just be a very energetic, middle-aged cat-lady who wore mismatched and oversized clothing.

Finn inhaled a massive amount of air before he knocked on the door, and as the freshly breathed oxygen was out of his lungs, he opened the door to the room where he would spend the remaining 45 minutes left in his third session with the cool Dr. Sterling.

Dr. Andrew Sterling was not your stereotypical therapist. He wasn't a balding old man, nor did he have thin reading glasses hanging at the tip of his nose. There was definitely no lounge chair in sight in his office, so there was no lying down facing the ceiling as his patients talked. What replaced it however, were two reclining leather chairs facing each other. Dr. Sterling once explained to Finn during his second session that it was not fair for his patients to be comfortable for an hour of talking, while he would be stuck with a stiff-looking armchair. Finn had nothing against Dr. Sterling at all, in fact, if he wasn't his therapist, Finn probably would like the guy had they met in a different setting under different circumstances.

"Finn! You're late! What happened?" Said the young doctor.

"Ah… Well, you know. Traffic and whatnot." Finn said, shrugging his shoulders as he removed his coat and found a comfortable position on the chair.

"Traffic in Lima?" The man chuckled disbelievingly, "Come on, what really happened?"

It's been two weeks since Finn had last seen Dr. Sterling. The young doctor's friendly demeanor always came as a shock to Finn, and he knew that it would take a while to get used to it. But no matter how nice and cool Dr. Sterling was, Finn was almost sure that he would never feel comfortable sharing his feelings to a stranger. But his mother was right, maybe it might take someone who doesn't come from his comfort zone of family and friends to open up about his recent issues. Maybe it takes a stranger to make light on some things, and maybe Dr. Sterling is the right person for the job.

"I…" Finn fiddled with the string of his hoodie, secretly irritated that the left one is extremely longer than the one on the right, "I guess… Well I was just in my car really… In the parking lot… and…" He looked out of the office window and only just realized that the man's view was the parking lot, and that his car was just in the perfect angle to be seen from the inside, "I was in my car trying to decide whether to come in, or to just ditch today's session. And I think… Dr. Sterling, I'm just starting to think that maybe this was such a bad idea."

"Hey now Finn, I told you to call me Drew. Dr. Sterling is my father." Drew sat further back in his own reclining chair and asked with genuine concern, "What made you feel like ditching today's session? Did something happen over the Christmas holidays that makes you feel like this today?"

It's your third session dummy, Finn thought, if you don't start talking about your problems then maybe you shouldn't have agreed to seeing a therapist at all.

"Finn? Are you still with me?

"Uhh… Yeah. It's just… I've graduated from high for…I don't know, is it six months now?" Finn looked up at the ceiling and made a show of counting the months that have past with his fingers. "Remember when I told you that I was helping with the McKinley musical production of Grease?" Drew nodded, "Well, I didn't tell you the whole story. The thing is, my ex and my brother both came to the show unexpectedly. I mean, sure, Mr. Schue gave them an invite, and so did the rest of the Glee club, but I just honestly didn't think that they'd actually come. You know, plane tickets are not exactly cheap, and they just seem to come flying back to Lima all the time. It doesn't make sense to me, but hey, who cares? They were there end of story."

Dr. Sterling wasn't quite sure what to make of Finn's somewhat incoherent speech. This is the first time Finn had openly talked about much of his problems, and this was a first for both of them. It was Finn's first time to open up about things other than his mother and Burt and the tire shop. If this is the first time that Finn talked about his feelings, then it was definitely the first time that Dr. Sterling heard him talk about any of it. "Was that really the end of the story Finn?" the young man shook his head no to the doctor, "Ok, so tell me, what happened? Really, in full detail, if you can."

"Sheesh… Full details huh? How about… How ab—well long story short," Finn sighed not quite eager to recount the argument he and Rachel shared at the end of the show in the hallway, "Well, I'll just say that, the show was great, but I may have shared a conversation with Rachel, that may have ended super duper badly. It was so bad Drew. It was like… Like I let my head do all the talking while my heart was just… My heart decided to take a dive down the highest cliff of Mt. Everest. I told Rachel that I wanted zero contact with her. I guess I was so hurt from the things happening between us, you know. Things got bitter, and recently, I can't find myself talking to her without saying something that I'll regret later." Finn played with the zipper of his sweater, pulling it up and down, taking solace in the high pitched zip-zip sound it made.

"You know Finn, sometimes it's just better to let things out of your chest. No matter how much pain it causes others. There are times when you have to let others know how you truly feel in order to get past troubled you could be going through."

"Yeah well, I just feel like I'm not getting past anything."

"Why is that?"

"Well, like you probably guessed, the no contact rule I set between Rachel and I completely backfired because, my head kept telling me that I did the right thing, that the only way to get through things is if I didn't have Rachel around. 100% no Rachel, out of sight, out of mind." He laughed darkly, "That was such a bad idea. Especially since my heart non-stop felt like it was about to explode from all these… feelings. But then… Then Christmas came around, and let me tell you; I actually successfully did my part in the no contact rule, I survived a couple of weeks of not talking to Rachel at all. But then just a couple of days before Christmas, she totally set nukes around the rule and bombed it to shreds."

Dr. Sterling smiled at Finn, proud that he was finally making some progress, "So Rachel was the one to break the rule huh?"

"Yeah. She called right after a winter recital or something like that… Then she tells me she won the show, whatever that meant." Dr. Sterling would have missed the quick smile that etched Finn's face had he not been staring at his patient, who on the other hand, has been intently staring at his sweater during his whole talk, "But it was bad timing. That was only a couple of days after I brought Glee to its impending failure. We lost sectionals. They lost sectionals, and it's all because I was such a bad mentor. If I just actually did the job and forgot about myself for a minute, I would have noticed the tension between these two girls. Then maybe I could have done something. Maybe New Directions would still be the national champs to beat this year." Finn took a deep breath after realizing that he had forgotten to breathe as he spoke, "But noooo, Finn Hudson was put in charge of Glee club, Finn Hudson leads everyone the wrong way, Finn Hudson is a failure, and Finn Hudson is such a loser he would let his old Glee Club be a loser like him."

Upon realizing how much he had actually expressed, Finn immediately glances at the clock hanging next to a child's drawing of a purple unicorn. 3:56, have I really been talking for that long? Just four minutes left until I have to go. After discovering the time, Finn stands up from his seat and awkwardly jerks his hand toward Dr. Sterling for a shake, "So…uhh… I guess I've spoken too much already. For today, I mean."

"Finn, when you're in this room, sitting on that very comfy chair, you can never talk too much. That's why I'm here, and that's why you're here. You talk, I listen, and I'm honestly here for you." He gives Finn a smile, which he hoped conveyed the authenticity of his words, "Like I said earlier, sometimes you just have to talk and talk, until you feel like you've said all you can feel. You do that so that one day, when your mind has had too many emotions to bear, you don't just suddenly explode. Alright?" He waited for Finn to nod before finishing with, "Since we're almost out of time, I want to end today's session differently," he reached for his notepad on the small, round coffee table that separated the two chairs, "I want you to remember what you talked today so that we can talk about it next week, okay? And don't you think I'll forget because I wrote it down on this post-it note as a reference!" He held up a small fluorescent-colored sticky-note paper with his left hand, stood up and shook Finn's hand with his right hand. "I'm glad to see you're making progress Finn."

"Uhh… Sure. Thanks Drew. And I guess Happy New Year? I'll see you again next week." Finn made his way out of the office, gave Ms. Welch a quick goodbye wave and trudged his way to the car. He started to make his drive back home, when he thought, that actually went a little better than I thought it would, maybe it IS a good day after all. Finn shook his head thinking that he might have gone a little crazier after his session. Of course it hadn't gone well. He never got to the point of anything he started to say, and well, it was just so damn uncomfortable talking to another man about his irrelevant manly feelings. That didn't matter, because next week, he'll have another appointment to go to.

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So I hope you liked it.

If you read it, THANK YOU.

Please review, comment, criticize, PM me, favorite, follow, I dunno send sugar cookies?

OH… And Happy New Year to all of you!