A.N. Hi guys, here's my new one shot. Basically it's Carole's views of the events from when Finn joined Glee and then through my story Getting the Girl for Dummies. Although you can read this as a stand alone I would recommend reading Getting the Girl first, enjoy!
From Rite Rose Publishing.
A Mother's View
Looking back, I could tell the day my son fell in love. I was standing in the kitchen, cooking dinner when the door had opened and my son had walked into the room singing Journey's "Don't Stop Believin'" at the top of his voice although at the time it had sounded like he had forgotten half the words.
"Just a small town girl, living in a lonely world, she took the midnight train going anywhere!" he sang and then started humming the tune before breaking back out into song, "A singer in a smoky room!" he hummed again, "For a smile they can share the night, It goes on and on and on and on, strangers, waiting, up and down the boulevard, their shadows searching in the night, streetlight people, living just to find emotion, hiding somewhere in the niiiggghhhtttt!" he drew out the last note and then looked at me grinning. "Hey Mom," he said, grinning more widely, "How was work today?" he asked as his kissed my cheek and reached into the fridge for a can of Coke.
"It was fine," I told him watching him carefully as he downed near enough the whole can in 2 seconds flat.
"That's great!" he smiled at me again and then looked to the pan on the stove, "What's for dinner?" he asked.
"Spaghetti and meatballs," I told him and gave the pan a quick stir before turning back to him, "Are you ok honey? You seem a little ... different, a good different though" I hastened to add as his smile dimmed very slightly before returning in full force.
"Yeah Mom, everything's cool, I decided to stick with Glee today and we sang 'Don't Stop Believin' and Mr. Schue isn't leaving!" he exclaimed and went on to describe every member of the Glee club as he got out the plates and knives and forks for dinner. He talked about Artie and how hard he tries to keep up, Tina and how she is always more confident when she's singing, Mercedes with her attitude and incredible voice and then about Kurt and his fashion sense that he didn't really understand but it seemed to make Kurt happy. The next moment was when I knew, "And then there's Rachel" he told me. "Her voice is incredible! I mean I don't think I've ever heard anyone with a voice like hers, she can sing anything as well," here he paused, "She does scare me a little though because she's just so intense, you know? It's like she's got her whole life mapped out and she's so sure of herself, she's gorgeous too!" he laughed, "Not that I'd actually ever tell anyone I thought that because of Quinn but I know she'll get to Broadway with that voice and those looks."
At this point I knew that I really wasn't the one that he was talking to, it was like he was talking to himself about Rachel and I stayed silent and watched as his face lit up as he talked about her and their duet for 'Don't Stop Believin' and about the song she had sung as a request from Mr. Schue at the end of their rehearsal today. She had sung 'On My Own' from Les Mis. Now I'm not a very cultural person, I'm more the beer and pizza than the martini and fois grois kinda girl but I did go and see Les Mis with High school as our senior trip and I remember listening to that song and being so touched about the women's heartache over the man she loved being in love with someone else. I remembered the melody and the notes like they were yesterday and knew that if this Rachel could sing that song well at 16 she would go far but my son's faith in her was what clinched in for me. He never had faith like this in himself or even in current girlfriend. I hoped that he would realise what I already knew soon.
A few weeks after this, Finn came home miserable. He had been in a slump for a few days but he came into the kitchen and sat down without a word.
"Finn honey is everything ok?" I asked, concerned.
"Rachel quit Glee," he told me, looking forlorn. "Mr. Schue gave a solo to Tina from West Side Story and apparently it's her favourite and then Mr. Ryerson has put on this new show called Cabber... something and she's joined that as the lead and Quinn has taken over the female lead in 'Don't Stop Believin' and we're nowhere near as good. I also YouTubed that West Side Story solo and Rach would have been the much better choice," he sighed. I reached over and patted his hand.
"Maybe you should just ask her to come back to Glee," I told him, "She might if you tell her that YOU believed in her." There was another pause as he took this in.
"I can't ... we had this ... well I screwed up and didn't think things through as usual, thanks for listening Mom," he gave him a small smile and walked out of the room towards his own. A few days after that he told me he should have listened but Rachel was back at Glee and had saved them at the Invitational.
After this, things got a little quiet from Finn. He got a part time job at a restaurant but wouldn't let me visit him, he told me it was against company policy. I just put it down to teenage son being embarrassed of his Mom so stayed away but then I was walking past his room one day and he was singing to his laptop. As I looked closer I realised it was a sonogram and of course I immediately thought the worst. Unfortunately, the worst was true. Quinn was pregnant. My son was going to be a father at 16. He broke down when he told me and I held him as he cried feeling so many different things at once that it's hard to explain and then that evening Finn came home from dinner at the Fabray's with Quinn in tow. Those awful people had kicked their daughter out because she was pregnant, the fools! So I had my son and his pregnant girlfriend under my roof. By this point I had met almost all of Finn's team mates on Glee. Kurt, Mercedes, Tina and Artie had come to the house to see him at one point or another and the rest I knew already as either being a friend of Quinn's or Finn's team mates on the football team but I had still not met Rachel. Having Quinn around the house meant that I never heard Finn mention Rachel in the carefree way he used to nor did Quinn seem to react very well if her name was brought up. I felt sorry for Quinn because I had been in that situation before. Being with someone who, although they never said anything or even acted in a way that they consciously thought to hurt you, you could see was in love with someone else. By this point I could tell that if it wasn't for the baby, they would have broken up by now.
The next thing to happen was that Finn arrived home in the middle of a school day and he looked absolutely furious.
"Finn!" I said in alarm, jumping up from the sofa where I had been watching afternoon TV, "What's wrong?"
He didn't answer immediately; instead he was pacing the room. I watched him, completely shocked. I had never seen him this angry before, he was always such a passive person unless he was on the football field. He kept pacing until he finally stopped and turned to look at me. "Quinn lied," he told me, only adding to my confusion, "The baby isn't mine," he continued. I'm ashamed to say that my first reaction was relief but then anger, after a few minutes all I felt was pity, for both Quinn and my son. "I'm so stupid Mom!" he yelled out of nowhere, causing me to jump, "We never even had sex, what kind of moron believes that you can get your girlfriend pregnant by coming early in a hot tub when we BOTH HAD SWIMSUITS ON!" he screamed out the last part. "If I was even a little bit ok up here," he pointed to his head, "I would have KNOWN that and I never would have been put through this, I never would have put you through this!" he kicked the door shut so hard that it bounced back towards him and he had to put his hands up to stop it. He was silent for a few seconds before he continued, "It's Puck's," he all but whispered and my heart dropped. "They all knew, all of them at Glee knew," he laughed, humourlessly, "And the only person who was honest with me, the only person with the decency to tell me is the one person who I've been a jerk to ... TWICE!" he kicked the door again, this time it slammed shut and stayed firmly in its frame, "You'd be so ashamed of me Mom, I used her, I thought I could get a scholarship through my singing with Glee to help provide for the baby so I kissed her and pretended we might have a chance despite the fact I knew Quinn was pregnant ... what kind of person am I?" he asked, tears filling his eyes and he finally sank down on the sofa. I sat down next to him and pulled him into a hug. This was such as mess. By trying to do the right thing all of them had done the wrong thing ... except, by the sound of it, Rachel. She had got her son back into music, she had come back to Glee and saved them, she had helped Finn get his job (how she had never asked), she had stuck by Finn and Quinn and finally she had told him the truth. If she ever met this girl she would have a lot to thank her for.
The next few days thing were tense around the house. I was still slightly angry at Quinn but I couldn't stay mad at her no matter how much I wanted to. I let her stay as well. Some people may not have agreed with that decision but I was not going to kick her out of this house like her parents had kicked her out of her own besides I knew she was punishing herself enough. At night when I walked past the spare room I could hear her crying herself to sleep. Finn was quiet and thoughtful all the time and I was so proud of him for going to sectionals and helping the group once Mr. Schuester had told him about the other schools cheating. When he came home that evening, he had smiled for the first time since he had found out about Puck and Quinn and hugged me.
"We did it Mom!" he said happily, "We won Sectionals! You should have heard Rachel, she just belted out that song like she'd been singing it every day for all her life and she looked awesome and so happy and then we all sang and they loved us! We got standing ovations for every song!" at this he picked me up and spun me around, "I'm gonna go look up some other songs we can do!" he smiled before racing towards his bedroom. Every day after that things started to get better. A few days after sectionals, Finn came home and asked me if I knew what the different coloured roses meant, I was confused but told him all I knew and then Mrs. Fabray came to visit Quinn. After a tearful time they both decided that she would move back in to their home and she would look after her until the baby was born, at which time Quinn had decided to give the baby up for adoption. She would then go back to school. Finn told me that he was talking to Puck now but he didn't think he could ever trust him again, but I know Finn, he will because he knows that everyone can make the worst mistakes. After this he came home from school and asked me what the most romantic thing his Dad had ever done was. He hardly ever asked about his Dad, I think more because he knew how upset the topic made me so I told him as best I could about the night he had cooked for me and we'd stayed up all night talking about anything and everything. He was confused about this and asked why that was so romantic, surely girls wanted to be showered with gifts and taken fancy places. I smiled and told him that if you truly like someone then if they go to the effort of doing something purely for you and wanting to know things about you then that is the most romantic thing in the world.
I knew that everything had finally sorted itself out when Finn came home one day about a month after he had won sectionals with a beautiful young woman standing next to him. She looked nervous but was clearly trying to hide it.
"Mom, this is Rachel," he introduced, smiling down at her whilst barely sparing me a glance, he paused for a brief second before he continued, "She's my girlfriend." Rachel looked up at Finn, smiling softly as he took her hand in his and turned to smile brightly at me.
"Mrs. Hudson, it's a pleasure to meet you," she said, extending her right hand for me to shake but I ignored it and to her surprise, I pulled her into a hug instead.
"It's so nice to meet you Rachel, Finn talks about you all the time ... he clearly wasn't exaggerating about you," I grinned as I watched the blush flush across her cheeks before winking at them both, "Please call me Carole."
They've both grown up so much and have had to make some hard choices along the way but here we are and I'm crying already. After all, it's not every day your only child marries the love of his life.
The End.
A.N. And there we have it :) please review, thanks, Nicki
