1.
He's not sure how he got here.
It probably had something to do with Puck, the best friend that he's had since he was, shit, probably, like, six years old. He can't actually remember. And that may have something to do with all those damn shots said best friend has been shoving in front of him.
The same ones he downed without thinking, but it's all Puck's fault. It's always Puck's fault. This time it's not so bad, drinking with his best friend on a Thursday night. Yeah, he has to work tomorrow, but he wasn't thinking about that when he failed to get that promotion today and then Puck was talking about this bar—next thing he knew, there was a shot of Jack Daniels in front of him.
So they're at this scummy little bar on the east side but it's actually not horrible. He gets why it appealed to Puck. The whole place smells like old, spilled beer and lingering cigarette smoke, even though he hasn't seen a light since he walked in. All the wood is dark and stained, rough at the edges, and worn through its varnish in certain places where people have rubbed up against it too much. There's a rusted up old sign that says "Little Red Rooster" that he guesses would be called the 'focal point' of the room or something like that and the windows are all dark red stained glass. On the other hand, it's pretty modern in a way that's not trying to be too modern. There's a band playing tonight (some kind of indie set-up; Puck says they're hipster douchebags, but Finn thinks they're alright. Quinn would like them.) but there's no room for any kind of dancing; meanwhile, one corner's got European football on a nice TV and there's a small crowd of younger guys around it. The bartenders are busy and not super friendly, but the beer is good, and apparently, so is the Jack Daniels.
"We came on a bad night," Puck declares, grimacing at the guy beside him. He's got to be just over twenty-one, sputtering at a waitress and about to tip off his stool. "Place is filled with fuckin' college kids. I mean, there's a reason I never went back after high school. These little shits."
Finn shakes his head, feeling his buzz. He's pretty sure his best friend didn't go back because he couldn't afford it and wasn't getting a scholarship with his grades, but Finn's not going to say that. "Yeah? Well, good thing. Turns out it's all a waste of time."
That earns an eye roll and Puck nods at one of the bartenders, gesturing for another round. "You're being a dumbass. Okay? So what if you lost an opportunity this time? There'll be more fucking promotions. You have a job, man. Suck it up," he looks him dead in the eye and pushes a new shot glass toward him, "And drink it up."
So they do.
He's, like, three beers and five (six?) shots into it, when he gets a call from Quinn. The music is just loud enough, the bar just crowded enough, for him to miss it completely. After another beer, Finn goes to the bathroom and stops in the hallway after to check his phone. His fingers click all the wrong buttons and he ends up opening two different apps before he makes it to the three unread messages he's been missing. One's from Will, a buddy at work, who he thinks says something about that asshole Cliff who got the job instead of Finn, and then the other two are from Quinn. 'How'd it go?' she asks. 'Worried about you' comes next.
It makes him feel like a total jerk, because Quinn's the kind of person who actually cares about other people's—other people, now, and they're, like, friends. Well, more than. They spend a lot of time together, tell each other almost everything, do stupid stuff like watch Batman marathons on Friday nights and debate between Michael Keaton and Christian Bale for the best dark knight. They'll go to that new retro-inspired roller rink and leave after an hour because they suck so bad, only to go get a drink at their favourite bar and grab pizza on the way home. And sometimes they kiss. That's a recent development, and he likes it, but he's not exactly sure what they're doing. He's afraid to ask.
So obviously he should have called her, but he didn't and now she's worried and he feels terrible. At the same time, he feels a little pleased that she cares at all.
Anyway, he finds the actual call option on his phone after he screws around with it for a little while and starts calling her back. Maybe it's late and maybe it's not a good idea but that's not something he cares about right now. He figures she must have fallen asleep on her sofa again because she doesn't pick up; instead, he's put through to the voicemail, where he slurs through his explanation. He doesn't give a whole lot of details about the day—just says, "Cliff got the job so I got drunk." He tells her, in perhaps more than enough words, that he's with Puck at some bar, that they're okay, and that he's going to stay at Puck's place tonight.
"Everything—Everything's fine, Q. I'll talk to you tomorrow, okay?" He pauses for a second, smiles. "And thanks for checking on me. You're amazing. And I love you. You know that, right?" He leans his head against the hall walls, bumping it on the edge of a frame. Swearing, he rests it back more carefully and waits for the room to stop spinning. "I mean, you're not the same girl from high school that drove me crazy. You still drive me crazy but it's, it's different, like…" Some girl walks out of the women's washroom and eyes him as she breezes past. He doesn't miss the smirk on her lips. She bumps into him the next moment, an accident not likely, which sends his phone clattering to the floor.
"Oh," she gasps, airily, "I'm sorry. I didn't see you there."
He's already grabbing for his phone, on his hands and knees in the dark trying to feel for it. The woman joins him there a second later, finding his phone and handing it to him. "I'm—hi," she says, smiling sweetly.
They get back up and he offers her a smile, but not much else. Finn's more interested in what the hell he was doing before she knocked into him. Knocked some sense into him, more like. The screen of his phone is fine—the fall did no damage—but it does say "Call Ended", the numbers 2:06 flashing beneath, which means he's an idiot. "Shit."
"I'm sorry?" the woman pardons, leaning forward to hear him better.
"Oh, uhh," Finn runs a hand through his hair and squeezes his eyes shut tight. 'Shit,' he thinks. His mind is on other things right now. "I'm gonna—thanks for the, um." He points to his phone and brushes past her, heading straight for Puck. The guy's already by the door, so Finn figures that he must be thinking the same thing as him. A minute later, the pair of them stumble out of the bar, smelling like the honey lager and cigarettes that the bar never had.
…
Puck lives four blocks west from the bar, which is only maybe two streets away from where Finn works. When he wakes up five minutes before he has to be there the next morning, it's easy to splash his face with some cold water, steal a swipe of Puck's deodorant and a spritz of his least sleazy cologne, and go into work in the same clothes he wore the night before.
Thank god for Casual Fridays.
He sits through two meetings, three drawn out phone calls, and one very achy head before he's graced with his lunch break. He didn't bring anything to eat in his rush over to the office and he might feel too sick to eat even if he did, so he just fills up his mug with more coffee and sits at his desk, pretending to work through it.
He's saved from it by the one person he really doesn't want to be saved by, not today, not right now, and maybe not ever at this point. He's still really embarrassed and the thought of his sloppy drunken message makes him feel even more nauseous, but she sets a brown bag on his desk and holds a fresh blue button-down in front of him, so he's going to try to ignore everything else.
He takes the shirt from her and tries his best to resist a blush and actually look at her. Laughing gently, he says, "You really didn't have to do this."
Quinn shrugs prettily. "I know. I just thought you might need it after last night." At that, he shakes his head a little, cringing. Quinn tries not to smile, but she fails. Definitely fails. So she nods towards the bag and adds, "It's a grilled cheese. There's some Advil in there, too."
Honestly, it sounds like a four course, gourmet meal to him. Despite his embarrassment, he's entirely grateful and tries to convey this with a look. "Thank you," he says firmly, just in case she didn't get it. Quinn blinks and gives him a touch of a smile. So he pulls a chair over, tells her to sit, and while he gobbles down the grilled cheese sandwich, she nibbles at her own organic flatbread lunch.
It's nice, just to sit there and eat, but he holds his breath the whole time. She obviously got the message. She's just not saying anything about his drunken confession of sorts, and he's not sure what to think of that.
They chat about a variety of things, like words spaced by silences and punctuated with laughter. He tells her about Puck the night before and his love for Jack Daniels, making note of his own newfound distaste for the stuff. She laughs at that, calls him "poor baby." He rolls his eyes, and once she's moving on to the topic of his non-promotion, calling Cliff a d-bag, it's like everything's back to normal.
Except that after she packs up her lunch, she kisses him on the cheek where that blush is beginning to form again, and he spends the next four days in a nervous state, just waiting for her to mention his slurred and sputtered 'I love you.'
She doesn't (not until years later).
Here starts a new series of drabbles based on 8 Ways To Say I Love Youby R. McKinley which you can find through a quick Google search or on Thought Catalog. I'm not sure if I'll finish them all or how often this will be updated, but I'm trying to get through it as quickly as I can and I'm on a writing spree right now (just finished my first semester of university; creativity was limited and I need an outlet!) so hopefully we'll see them all finished before I go back to school! I know I'd like that.
As always, let me know what you think.