Faith
Every single night, Kurt Hummel follows the same routine. It starts with rigorous vocal and dancing exorcises after he comes home from school, and then comes cooking dinner for himself and his father and watching the latest episode of Top Model or American Idol, depending on the day of the week. Later, he'll find himself searching the internet for the latest trends and gossip, while usually doing some online shopping on the side. After that, he rids himself of his precious designer clothing and accessories and takes a long, hot shower, cleansing himself of all the bad memories that his day included. Sometimes, when he's feeling particularly down, he'll substitute his shower for a lavender-scented bubble bath.
There is one thing that Kurt doesn't remove for his nightly routine. A little golden cross hangs around his neck from the time he wakes up in the morning to the time he goes to sleep— and the ten hours in between as well.
It is small enough that he can easily tuck it into his collar, hiding it in the folds of his clothing, and the chain is thin enough that it is nearly invisible against his pale skin; he remembers a time when it stood out against the pasty complexion of his mother's chest, looking harsh against her nearly translucent skin. He remembers her reaching around her neck with shaking hands to undo the clasp on one her final days, and leaning forward to place it in his hand. She closed his fingers around the cross with her own frail ones, and whispered, "Don't ever lose faith, Kurt. No matter what happens, remember you are the most wonderful son I could have ever asked for, and I love you so much..." A tear slid down her cheek as she leaned in to kiss his forehead, her lips dry and chapped against his skin. "I love you so much..."
It's the last time he hears her voice, because he isn't there the day she dies. He remembers the phone call, and his Uncle picking him up from school to take him home. He remembers understanding that he wouldn't ever see his mom again, and crying so hard he thought his chest might break open. Shaking fingers undid the tiny clasp of the chain, and did it up again around his neck. A crying child held the last thing his mother gave him close to his heart.
Every day, Kurt unconsciously touches the cross and thinks about his mother. Sometimes he closes his eyes and imagines that she's watching over him from heaven, smiling at him every time he does something she'd be proud of.
It is one day after Cheerio practice that he makes a huge mistake. The weather is nice, the air warm but no humid (a miracle in Lima), and he decides he might as well enjoy it after a gruelling practice. He takes the long way around the school to the parking lot, humming softly to himself as he passes the football field. Though the season is over, several of the guys who were on the team— most of them, actually— still make it a habit to practice their plays after school when the weather is good, and they are doing just that as Kurt skirts around the outside of the goalposts.
He hears their jeering laughter and inwardly winces; it has been weeks since he'd had a dumpster incident, and he wants to keep it that way, so he speeds up a little. Kurt refuses to look over his shoulder even when he hears them following him, coming closer; he refuses to acknowledge the fact that they intimidate him.
"Hey, faggot," one of the larger players says, as he runs up behind Kurt and clamps a strong hand down on his shoulder. "Not running away from us, are ya?" The others laugh jollily, and Kurt sighs; trying (unsuccessfully) to push the hand off of his shoulder.
"Of course not, it's always a pleasureto talk to you," he says facetiously, adding an eye roll for emphasis, "But if you don't mind, boys, I have somewhere I have to be." He makes to step forward, but one of the other guys grabs his arm and yanks him back.
"Not so fast. Don't ya want to go for your daily dive? Or are you too high-and-mighty now that you're a Cheerio?" The player sneers at the word, wrinkling his nose, "Come on, guys, let's put the fag in his place."
Kurt is pulled backwards, his feet dragging along the ground uselessly as they pull him around to the dumpsters. He tries kicking out at the Neanderthals once they reach the parking lot, with the vague hope of breaking free and making a dash for his car, but a swift punch to the stomach stops that idea in its tracks. Gasping for breath, Kurt has no choice but to be dragged towards the stinky, metal hell they intend to throw him in. He's glad for once that he was already planning on taking a shower when he got home, and was already going to throw his uniform in the wash; an extra few stains wouldn't do it much harm, since the material was surprisingly easy to clean, and cheap to replace if need be.
Though he has been through the same routine countless times and knows the drill, Kurt tries to escape when they lift his feet from the ground. He has a moment of panic when he can no longer feel the world sturdily underneath him, and he fights back; bucking and kicking at the guy holding his feet and twisting his arms to try to free them. The larger teens laugh at his efforts, refusing to let go of the squirming countertenor.
Kurt, deciding on a whim that maybe he shouldn't give up so easily, continues to try to wiggle from their grasp— and manages to get a foot free. He swings his running shoe towards the crotch of the player holding his other foot, and he promptly drops it so that Kurt lands unceremoniously on his behind.
"Oh, now you're going to get it, ass-pirate!"
One of the guys lunges at Kurt, grabbing him by the front of his shirt and hoisting him into the air. Another guy pulls his arms behind his back, holding on tight so he can't fight back if he tries again. Kurt's completely helpless, and his whole body goes slack on instinct as the guy holding him raises a fist.
He should never have fought back. He should have known it would just get worse.
He turns his face away slightly, closing his eyes silently praying that they didn't break his nose. When he doesn't immediately feel the pain of impact, he opens one eye experimentally. The guy holding him laughs— Charlie, was it? — and grabs at his neck.
"Hey, look here, guys. Hummel's wearing a cross."
Kurt inwardly curses as the guy— Chuck, his name was definitely Chuck— wraps his sausage fingers around the delicate chain and yanks. It comes free of Kurt's neck, leaving a red line where the metal dug into the skin at his throat. Chuck dangles the pendant in front of Kurt's face, waving it tauntingly.
"Don't you know you're a sinner, Hummel?" Chuck says, getting right up in Kurt's face so that Kurt can smell the smell of stale beer and Doritos on his breath. "Doesn't the Bible condemn people like you? Doesn't it say you queers are going to burn in hell?"
Chuck can tell he's getting to Kurt by the way his eyes are burning, but Kurt refuses to show weakness. He refuses to let them win, so he stares defiantly back, saying nothing. "Being what you are, you don't deserve this." He waves the precious trinket around haphazardly, and Kurt literally wants to throw up.
The other guys are hooting and hollering in agreement; even the ones who aren't Christian are telling him how much of a sinner he is and throwing gay slurs at him. Though still attempting not to react to their torments, Kurt's eyes widen when Chuck swings his mother's cross back and then throws it in the general direction of the football field. There isn't even a glint off the metal to indicate which direction it went— something inside Kurt breaks and his eyes begin to water with dismay.
Now compliant, Kurt is once again grabbed by the armpits and ankles, and hoisted into the air. He is weightless for a moment as he sails limply over the side of the dumpster, then gravity kicks in and he flies headlong into the trash, hitting his skull off of the opposite side of the dumpster with a sickening crack. They slam the lid closed on him anyway, leaving him alone in the darkness. He can still hear their laughter as they saunter off, their day's work finished— no doubt high-fiving and congratulating each other on a job well done.
Kurt's head is on fire for what seems like hours as he tries to find something to hold onto his disorientation; he's dizzy, and a dull throb at the side of his head is slowly becoming a migraine. It might have been only a few minutes later that his hand finds the lid and pushes it upwards, filling the cramped space with daylight. He hisses at the light, as it burns his eyes, and he quickly clamps them shut; how could such a good day have gone so wrong?
Noah Puckerman is not a predictable person. He isn't a stupidperson, either, like so many of his peers believe he is. And so, staying after school to get help with his Spanish— Mr. Shuster is the best teacher ever— wasn't all that uncommon. (He needs to pass with a C+ in order to stay on the basketball team, anyway.) Not that he would ever let the other jocks and popular kids know that; it could tarnish his reputation as a stud.
Leaving late that afternoon, Puck sees an unusual sight. It's unusual only because he is not a part of it; Hummel getting tossed in the dumpster is not, in itself, all that unusual. With a huge sigh, he starts walking in the direction of the parking lot, where his truck is parked, waiting for him. He figures walking right past the commotion won't seem un-stud-like, not helping Kurt, but not hurting him either. That was basically his promise to the queer kid after joining Glee, anyway.
"You don't deserve this." He hears one of the guys say, drawing back a hand and throwing something in Puck's general direction. Puck raises an eyebrow. Thatwas out of the ordinary. They generally only threw Kurt in the dumpster, or slushied him in the hallway; very rarely did they go after his possessions.
Puck watches, feeling somewhat stunned as Kurt is tossed violently into the dumpster, banging his head of the side. Ouch. The guys— Puck's teammates, for God's sake— simply close the lid on him, without bothering to check if he's alright. They walk off, laughing and slapping each other on the back.
Puck shakes his head and is about to run to see if Kurt is alright (he's not all that bad a guy, ok?) when something shiny in the grass catches his eye. He bends down and snatches it up, pausing for a second to wipe the dirt from it. It's a small cross, a lot like the one that Quinn always wears, on a thin gold chain. He closes his fist around it and shakes his head, making his way over to the dumpster. People could be so horrible, it was sickening. If someone ripped a Star of David from hisneck, there would be a path of broken noses and chipped teeth left in his wake; then again, it wasn't as if Hummel had the body strength to do that, especially if it was six-to-one.
The metal lid clangs open before Puck gets there, and a disoriented-looked Kurt pushes himself up and out of it, falling to the pavement with a thud. Puck jogs the last few steps and offers Hummel his hand, which Kurt blindly takes to pull himself up.
"Thanks, Finn—" He pauses, looking at his would-be rescuer dubiously, "Err, Puck."
Kurt narrows his eyes, looking at Puck with mild confusion as he reaches up and rubs the bump forming on the side of his head and blinks repeatedly to get rid of the stars in front of his eyes. Puck feels a surge of anger at being mistaken for his ex-best friend, but shakes it off and shoves the chain towards the smaller teen.
"This is yours, right?" he asks, and Kurt takes it, his hands shaking slightly.
"Y-yes," he mumbles, examining the cross with a shocked expression. "Why—?"
Puck puts up his hands in defence, cutting Kurt off. "I don't care if they throw you in a dumpster, throw food at you or whatever— but it is notok to fuck with a dude's religion, no matter how gay that dude happens to be." He shrugs. "If someone did that to Rachel or me, I'd probably punch them in the face. I might be a bad Jew, but no one messes with my Star of David... I don't see why a cross is any different."
Kurt opens his mouth to say something, but promptly shuts it. He takes a good look at the clasp, which is miraculously unbroken (it must have opened when Chuck pulled on it) before reaching around his neck and fastening it back in its place. He looks at Puck, who is still standing in front of him, and gives him a curt nod.
"Thank you."
"You're welcome."
They walk towards the parking lot in silence, and each is thinking about something different.
Kurt is confused at Puck's actions, but thankful nonetheless— he didn't know what he would have done if he had lost his mother's cross. He would have searched for hours, maybe never finding it in the vastness that was the football field, eventually giving up and losing all faith that there was someone watching over him. He would have cried over the loss of something so precious to him— it might have even felt as bad as losing his mother all over again.
Puck is wondering why the hell he is being so nice to the gay kid, even if they were in Glee together. As much as Puck is all for the 'sticking up for your own' rule of camaraderie, Kurt really wasn't his teammate anymore, and they were never really friends, either. He wonders, vaguely, if his act of altruism will put him on Kurt's good side. As much as he doesn't particularly like the flamboyant little weasel, it wouldn't be a bad thing to have someone in Glee on his side, since everyone seemed to be against him now.
As Kurt gets into his car, he sees Puck across the parking lot, having trouble starting his engine. He considers, for a moment, leaving him stranded— Puck has done a lot of horrible things to him, after all— but then touches the cross on his chest and shakes his head. What would his mother have said to such thoughts?
He turns off his own engine, and reaches under the back seat for his emergence tool box, pulling it out and closing his door. "Need help, Puckerman?" he asks, making his way over to the now-smoking truck. Puck frowns, but nods. "Pop the hood."
Kurt instinctively rolls up his sleeves— though really, a little grease isn't going to make all that much difference after being tossed in a dumpster, but whatever— and begins looking at the damaged machine.
"Think it's fixable?" Puck says and Kurt jumps, having been so absorbed in the engine's workings that he forgot he wasn't alone. He nods.
"I think so. All I need is a wrench, and a little faith," he replies, smiling at Puck as he roots through his tool box. Puck smirks and leans against the side of his truck.
"Thanks, Kurt, I appreciate it," he says, and it's one of the first honest things he's ever said to the guy, but it feels good.
Kurt chuckles and murmurs a, "You're welcome, Noah," before assessing the work its going to take to fix the problem.
Overall, nothing has changed. They'll still shove each other in the hallways, make snarky remarks about each other's sexuality, and fight for the few solos Mr. Shue wanted to give to people who weren't Rachel and Finn— but Kurt feels like something has changed. Because, for once, he had faith in something he can actually see— Noah Puckerman isn't really all that bad a guy. And with that notion, he sets to work fixing the guy's car for free.
One act of altruism deserves another, after all.
"We can help the others
who fall along the way.
Help them find the courage
to face another day.
All we need is just a little faith."