Long Author's Note: This is a sort of crossover with Shameless, but you don't have to watch the show to understand this because it's quiet a bit AU. I got inspired to write this when I came across an article comparing Glee's Kurt and Shameless' Ian and for some reason I decided that I wanted them to be unlikely best friends and Blaine to be related to Fiona's boyfriend.

This was planned as a summer-y one shot but it ended up quite long.

I took the bus to Chicago nearly every weekend while I was studying abroad in Illinois, but all I know in the South Side is the 95th street bus station. My description of that part of Chicago is based solely on Shameless.

One thing about the last part of this story: I consider myself a total baby penguin when it comes to writing M rated stuff, so this was really difficult for me to write and I hope it doesn't totally suck.

Spoilers: Shameless: S01 – 03 Glee: S01 - 02

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters appearing on either show.

PART 1

When I was eight years old, my mother died in a car accident. My dad, Burt, he didn't handle it well. No one expected us to just accept it and get over it, but while I spent hours crying in her closet, my dad drowned his sorrows at a local bar. Eventually, we learned to live with our loss but while I stopped crying, my dad didn't stop drinking. My dad worked in a big auto repair shop that catered to wealthy clients with expensive cars, but when he started showing up at work drunk - if he even showed up - he was fired. During that time, I had to learn how to take care of myself. I taught myself how to cook because my dad lived off beer and the occasional burger at the pub and more often than not, he forgot to bring something back for me. When I ran out of clean clothes, I asked a neighbor to show me how the washing machine worked. And I started cleaning the house when I realized my dad wasn't going to do it.

We lost our house too when my dad couldn't pay the mortgage anymore and moved in with one of dad's drinking buddies. My parents' friends tried to help at first, but when my dad kept ignoring them or on bad days, insulted them, they stopped coming over until my dad's only friends were his drinking buddies from the pub. For a year and a half my dad and I lived with whoever had space and was willing to take us it. Now, my dad was six years sober and had gotten his life back on track, but it took me breaking my arm when I was ten to get him to see he had a problem.

I'd been in the hospital for three days when a social worker finally managed to track down my dad and her message was clear; either my dad would clean up his act or I would be put into the foster care system permanently. You could imagine my relief when my dad checked himself into rehab instead of choosing booze. While my dad seeked treatment, I was put with a family who housed a large number of foster kids. They admitted freely that they were only doing it for the money but they didn't treat me badly. It was the other kids in the house who made my life miserable. I'd broken my arm on the playground when an older boy shoved me off the jungle gym. At the Bailey's, my foster family, I suddenly had to live with older and meaner versions of the playground bullies. Two boys my age were different though. They didn't hit unless they were provoked. And when Ian saw that I was being harassed by an older kid, he and his brother Philip made sure the boy never came near me again.

They came from a similar background, only the Gallagher's mother wasn't dead but had abandoned them. Also, they came from a large family. They had an older sister called Fiona who was fifteen, and two younger siblings, Debbie and Carl, who were four and five. I didn't have much in common with Philip, who insisted that people called him Lip and who at nearly twelve, only wanted to talk about girls' boobs all the time, which I thought was gross. He was a lot taller than me and was already sneaking smokes with the older kids in the home. But Ian and I bonded during the short time we stayed with the same foster family. Ian had reddish hair, which set him apart from the rest of the family, and liked to play with action figures. While I wasn't a fan of the games – I preferred marrying off my Power Rangers – I was happy to find a boy who actually wanted to play with me.

The Gallagher brothers didn't stay long – apparently it was part of their life to spend a few days in foster care before their father somehow managed to get them back – and I was sad when they left. But they had taught me some valuable lessons and when the next older boy tried to harass me, I knew where to hit to cause the most pain. I wasn't strong like the older boys but I was quick and light on my feet, which I started to use to my advantage. I spent nearly all summer between fourth and fifth grade with the Baileys, but two weeks before school started again, my dad finally came to pick me up. He looked like a totally different person. He had shaved off his beard and cut his hair, he was wearing clean clothes and the bags under his eyes were gone. I flung myself into my father's arms the moment he crossed the threshold and refused to let go for a few minutes.

After I had packed my few belongings, my dad took me to my favorite diner where he told me what would happen next. He had found a job working as a mechanic in a small garage on 88th street, he would continue going to AA meetings to avoid social services taking me away again and we were moving to a part of the city where people who had no business there seldom went. Our new house was smaller, but after years of staying on people's couches, we didn't need much more. Together we fixed it up as best as we could. My dad taught me how to use different tools and I learned quickly that as long as I stayed in our backyard I was pretty safe. And the one time I did dare to venture outside a few days before school started, I got a pleasant surprise. The Gallaghers lived next door and I was going to attend school with the two boys I had met when I stayed with the Baileys.

Over the next few years, Ian and I became best friends even though I preferred to read in the backyard while Ian wrecked havoc with his siblings. He was also the first person I came out to when I was fourteen and instead of getting punched like I had feared, Ian kissed me. Nothing more ever happened because we knew we worked better as friends and at the time, I felt nowhere near ready to be in a relationship. Ian didn't want a relationship either. He preferred to make out with the closeted jocks of the neighboring high school and just have fun, something that I as the hopeless romantic that I was, couldn't understand. We both knew that our environment wouldn't be kind if anyone found out about our preferences, so we made a pact to keep each other's secrets. Ian and I were about to start high school, and we both knew that the only way to make it out in one piece was to stay in the closet and pretend to like girls.

"Lip found some of my magazines today," Ian told me while we hid out in the Gallaghers' RV. I turned my head and waved the smoke wafting in my direction away. I loved to sing and all this second hand smoke I was constantly inhaling couldn't be good for my voice. I had tried smoking once or twice and while I could handle the occasional joint, cigarettes just weren't for me.

"Fuck! What did he say? Did he give you that bruise?" I asked, narrowing my eyes. Ian shook his head.

"No, he was cool, I guess. Got that chick he is tutoring to blow me under her dinner table because he thought I've never had a hummer before," Ian chuckled and I made a face.

I didn't care if my friends called me a prude. I didn't want to lose my virginity to just anybody. I wanted to fall in love and be in a committed relationship first. But unfortunately no one was out at our school – Ian and I included. It just wasn't safe for us soon to be sophomores.

"So how did you get that bruise?" I questioned Ian instead of asking what I really wanted to know. If it wasn't gross doing that with a girl. Because the answer would probably be something crude like a mouth being a mouth.

"Oh, her dad caught us and chased me and Lip around the house. We had to jump out of the window and I fell. Nothing to worry about though. I've gotten worse at ROTC training."

I rolled my eyes, but bit my tongue. Ian knew too well how I felt about his after school activity.

"So did you tell Lip about Kash as well?" I asked, eager to change the subject. Another cloud of smoke wafted in my direction, but it smelled differently, and so I accepted the joint after a beat.

Ian was 'dating' the owner of a small grocery store in our neighborhood. I was the only one who knew about it, because Kash was Muslim, married and had two kids.

I inhaled deeply before I tried to blow the smoke out of the window. "I wish that stuff didn't smell. I need to change my clothes before my dad comes home. You know he doesn't like me doing this stuff," I grumbled after I exhaled another cloud of smoke.

It was another thing we often discussed. Who was better off – I, who's dad cared but was pretty strict about curfew, school, drinking and smoking or the Gallaghers who could do what they wanted but were pretty much raised by their older sister Fiona, who had just turned twenty-one.

Ian rolled his eyes this time before he replied. "No he doesn't know about him. It's none of his fucking business."

"I still don't get why you are dating him. He's married and has kids. It's never going to go anywhere," I just couldn't help it. I was a romantic at heart and this just didn't sound romantic.

"He's nice to me and he's amazing in bed. What more do you want," Ian smirked and I looked away.

"But what about love?" I asked after another drag of the joint.

Ian shruged. "Dunno. What I do know however is that you're never going to find what you're looking for in this part of town."

I stareed at the ceiling of the RV. Ian was right about that and it sucked.

"So who's the new guy?" I inquired, pointing at a man in his late twenties who was making out with Fiona in a corner My dad had left town for a convention and told me to stay with the Gallaghers while he was gone.

We both knew that it wasn't about me being in a better environment but not being home alone. My dad just worried about me, especially now that I finally had the courage to tell my dad I was gay. Lip finding out about Ian and not flipping had been the push I needed to be honest with my dad, and luckily my dad had positively surprised me.

"Oh, that's Steve. Fiona met him at a club downtown. Seems like a cool dude so far."

I eyed the guy critically. He was attractive but I had never been a fan of blatant PDA. The one time I had nearly walked in on Ian and Kash had been bad enough. Before I could voice my disapproval though, I nearly got hit in the head with a bottle of beer.

"Seriously Hummel, you catch like a girl," Lip exclaimed and I scowled while Debbie punched her older brother's shoulder.

I hated nothing more than being called a girl. It wasn't my fault my voice was higher than my peers' and caring about the way you look didn't make you a girl.

"No seriously, if you ever want to get some action around here, you at least have to act like a guy," Lip continued undeterred until I shoved him hard.

"Yeah, that's what I'm talking about," Lip, raised his hands in surrender and I rolled my eyes. I should have learned by now to not get offended by what Lip said.

"And I could get a guy if I want," I snarked, crossing my arms over my chest after making sure the younger Gallaghers weren't listening to our conversation.

"You wanna bet on it. I'm sure I could get a guy to blow me before you could."

I huffed because I didn't just want to find a guy to blow me, but I also needed to prove that I could get a guy before Lip could.

"So what do you propose we do? I can't just go up to a guy here. The guys in school would kill me if they found out I like guys."

Lip just smirked. "Don't worry about it. I get the fake IDs and Ian finds us a bar."

By the time we were shaking on it, I was already regretting agreeing to the bet, but what was done was done and I couldn't afford to show weakness in front of the older Gallagher brother.