Morning Comes

Finn had invited Puck over to hang out and play video games like normal. He thought it'd just be a regular, fun Friday night between bros.

So he had no clue what was going on when he got back from the bathroom, and Puck was sitting on the floor, totally silent. The tv had been turned off, the other boy was holding a notebook, and what really freaked Finn out was that Puck looked like he was about to cry.

He just kinda stood there like an idiot for a minute, until Puck cleared his throat and did his best to pull back on his normal badass attitude. He failed when he held up the notebook, started explaining, and his voice cracked. "So I know Kurt's off at Gargler school until tomorrow, and I was pokin' around in his room."

Finn gaped. "Dude, do you have a death wish? Kurt hates anyone besides the girls being down in his room!"

In a really weirdly calm voice, Puck cut him short. "Finn, shut up." He stopped for a second, and the way he held himself all still and tight reminded Finn of Puck back when Quinn was pregnant and kept cutting his friend down and blowing him off.

Puck restarted. "I was snoopin' around in Princess's room, lookin' for something juicy like gay porn or sex toys or whatever. And I was gonna write a note to say sorry for moving some stuff, give him some sort of bullshit excuse. And I found this-" He held up the notebook. "-under his bed and figured, what the hell. That'll work. Only-" Puck swallowed hard and shifted uncomfortably. "Only I was flipping to an empty page and I started reading, and… And…" The crying face was back as Puck helplessly held out the source of the trouble.

Finn hesitantly reached across and took it, half expecting to find some kind of really racy, handwritten porn inside. Except that wasn't what he found. And Finn was pretty sure he would have preferred the porn.

Writing this is cliché, yet I can't deny that the idea of being able to explain, even after death, why this was the only choice, is appealing.

It was a suicide letter from when they were sophomores.

And in Kurt's familiar handwriting was a list of all the abuses the jocks, including Finn and Puck, had put him through. It felt like getting sacked in football practice when you totally didn't see the guy coming, and he was twice as wide as you.

The letter ended by saying that, for his dad's sake, Kurt would give it another week before he did anything.

Eyes shooting back up to the top of the page, Finn recognized the date: two days before Mr. Schue took over glee club. By the time he managed to pull his head up, Finn was surprised to find himself sitting on the carpet next to Puck. Mumbling, he told his best friend, "This is… Puck, man, he almost-"

The other teen shook his head, face frozen in a pained grimace. "There's more."

Now, peering back at the notebook, Finn was terrified to turn the page and find out what else could be in it.

Kurt was strong. Kurt was always strong. He dealt with more than anyone else in Glee, in the whole damn school really. And he kept going, kept standing up again no matter how often he got knocked down. Kurt was the strongest, bravest person Finn knew.

And him and Puck and their old friends had almost killed Kurt.

Eventually, Finn swallowed and turned the page. And in that moment, he hated himself.

Finn was right. I'm a fag. A queer, cocksucking deviant. I'm a freak, a mistake, disgusting.

He remembered yelling that word in Kurt's room, aiming it at the blankets and the lamps and the decorations. And while Finn claimed he hadn't meant Kurt, he knew better. The teen had been scared of what the guys at school would say, angry at Kurt for having a crush on him, uncomfortable with how terrible he didn't think moving in with the Hummels would be. He liked Burt, he secretly thought Kurt was pretty awesome when he wasn't acting all love struck, and he loved seeing his mom so happy. He'd been excited to move in. But the world, the jocks, their entire homophobic town had convinced him that that excitement was wrong. And so he lashed out at the perceived cause.

He had known, as soon as the words were out of his mouth, that he had destroyed something. Kurt had stared at him, eyes huge and wet, hurt, so hurt, and afraid.

But Finn had never imagined this entry in the notebook. It spewed hate, a long recitation of every way that Kurt was "gay" and why each of those was sick. He had used the paper to call himself every disgusting insult anyone had thrown his way, and seemed so very sure that they were right and he was some kind of screwed up mistake.

This time, as the plans for pills and his dad being at the garage were laid out, the letter stopped half way through a sentence. Finn could guess who had come in and interrupted Kurt's pain, pulled him back from the edge.

Finn was so damn grateful for Burt. Without the man's support and love, he had no doubt Kurt would have given up a long time ago.

He couldn't meet Puck's eyes, knowing his friend must have read what Finn had called Kurt.

Puck had always been weird about Kurt, never calling him any of the bad gay slurs or hating him because he liked guys.

He had explained it once to Kurt, and Finn had listened in. It had been strange watching Puck bluster while Kurt had that You-are-an-enormous-idiot bitchface on. But Puck got quiet when he told Kurt that, as far as he was concerned, sex was sex. All the bullying wasn't about sexuality, it was about how Kurt was smarter and better than Puck. How Kurt had a fast tongue and the courage to be himself and that the smaller teen was so sure he was getting out of Lima and never coming back.

And Kurt had stared, appearing to mull it over, then said that Puck was a surprisingly sweet moron who needed to get over the belief that he would never leave this stupid, backwater town.

Pushing away the shame, Finn moved on to the next page.

It shouldn't be able to get worse. But it did.

Two lines. Two simple, basic lines.

Dad is my world. If he dies, so will I.

Finn hated remembering the week Burt was in a coma. He had been so obsessed with a stupid grilled cheese sandwich and football and getting to second base with Rachel.

Meanwhile, Kurt was falling apart. It took the glee club, people who claimed to be Kurt's friends, way too long to see that. Finn had eventually figured it out, staring at Kurt in the library. The smaller teen had been even more pale than normal, and he was sitting so still while silent tears kept running down his thin cheeks.

It wasn't until later, after Burt had woken up and Finn was eating the damn sandwich that he finally started wondering where Kurt had stayed while his dad was in the hospital. What he had been eating, how much he had been sleeping.

Who had taken care of Kurt?

And Finn had subtly asked around, and realized that no one had. For all the days the smaller boy had been waiting, paralyzed, for his father to either wake up or die, he had been on his own.

At the time, the jock had brushed it off, made himself ignore it because he was angry and ashamed and guilty that he hadn't helped Kurt at all. He shoved it down inside and pretended he didn't know, didn't care. Now, he had to face it. Had to acknowledge that because Kurt had felt so cut off, so alone, he had planned to die with Burt, if worst had come to worst.

It was the last entry, though, the page that was dated two weeks ago that Finn could guess had been what really broke Puck, because now it was breaking him too, making it impossible to breathe or think or understand.

It feels like an endless nightmare. I want to escape so badly. But there's nowhere to escape.

The abuse has gotten worse, and no one seems to notice. After a particularly bad locker slam last week, I just sat there for a moment, breath knocked out of me. And Mercedes, who had been at my side when Karofsky shoved me, didn't so much as yell after him. Instead, she looked down at me on that disgusting school floor and laughed, called me a drama queen.

When she didn't even offer a hand to help me up, I nearly cried.

Brittany gave me a hug the other day and all I could feel was the pain of the bruises across my back and sides and chest and arms. But the pain isn't the worst, it's the fear. I don't know why Karofsky is so determined to make my life hell. All I know it that he's taken it on like a personal mission from God. And I walk through the school each day, flinching at every noise, at every movement I see out of the corner of my eye, just waiting for him to strike out. I can't sleep, and when I eat, the anxiety is terrible enough that it comes back up.

I just want to be able to not be afraid for an hour or two.

And despite all of this, not one of my friends sees how bad it has gotten. They all shrug it off, as though the years of being beat on and ripped down and tormented more than any of them should have no effect. I'm human. "If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die?"

They cut me and I bleed. They mock me and I ache. They push and push and push until I don't want to stay here anymore, even if it means being drastic and stupid. It's that simple.

So why does no one seem to recognize that fact?

It's a lie when they say it will "get better". It won't.

I want it to be over. That's all. I want it to be over.

…

Kurt found them that way, dazed, on the floor of Finn's room.

He'd come home early for the weekend, and when he walked in the house had been quiet. Except Puck's old red rustbucket truck was parked out in the driveway, so the other boy and Finn had to be there somewhere. Hoping to spend some time with them, catching up on McKinley gossip, he had quickly put together a plate of healthy snacks and headed up to his step-brother's room. Walking in, smiling, Kurt had stared for a moment, not comprehending the morose display the pair of boys made. Then he noticed what Finn was holding, recognized the writing, the tear marks on the paper, and the plate of veggies had fallen headlong to the floor.

Any other day, he would yell and scream and demand to know why they had been snooping through his things. He would probably still do that tomorrow, when the fury finally built up.

For now, though, they both wore the same look, horrified and miserable and scared. Puck was staring at Kurt as though waiting for the countertenor to attack him, kill him. And Finn appeared to be two seconds from slitting his wrists out of guilt.

So Kurt pulled the anger back in, tucking it away for another day, walked over and knelt in front of his slumped friend and brother, reaching out to take the notebook and toss it away. In the soft, comforting tone he remembered his mother using when he was child and woke up with nightmares, he assured them, "That's not how I feel anymore. Whenever I wrote in there, I thought… I thought it was what I wanted. That it would make things easier, for my dad and everyone, and that I would finally be free. But then Karofsky threatened to kill me."

That made both of them shoot up straight, finally able to focus on something new, something they could aim their negative contemplation towards.

And Kurt laughed, a sound that was light and untroubled. "And, yes, he made me so very afraid. Because that was when I realized I didn't want to die. I wanted to live. To shake the dust of this idiotic little town off my boots and make a name for myself somewhere that would accept and welcome me, that would applaud me for simply being myself.

"I don't like Karofsky, and I doubt I ever will. I'm still afraid of what he could, or might, do, but- But he's also the reason I'm never giving in to thoughts like that again. I'm going to fight every step of the way to stay alive and fabulous and happy. He can't stop me from having that, and neither can anyone else."

Puck was the first to move, lunging forward to pull Kurt down into the tightest hug he'd endured in his life. And Finn was only moments behind, wrapping his absurdly long arms around the both of them, helpless tears dripping down his face.

"Please don't, Kurt. Don't, don't, don't ever, ever, Kurt, please-"

"I'm sorry, dude. So, so sorry. And if you do something like that, I'll bring you back somehow and kill you again and-"

Kurt let himself be held and reveled in the comfort. It was one thing to know, logically, that they cared for him. It was another thing altogether to have proof of how much they worried for him. How much they loved him.

They ended up on Finn's bed, all in a line, with Kurt squished in the middle despite his protests, and watched Pirate Radio, a guilty pleasure of the countertenor's. Things went back to normal.

Except that the best friends were always watching the slimmer boy out of the corner of their eyes, and had started acting far more tactile, throwing an arm around him or grabbing his hand to drag him somewhere or snuggling close if they sat next to him on the couch. The kind actions, he really didn't mind. He welcomed the gentle touches, the refusal to flinch from possible contact with him. The wariness though, was merely annoying.

There was really a single choice if he was to make it clear to them that he was not going back down the hazardous road of self-loathing. In the best style of any member of New Directions (despite technically being a Warbler now), he snuck into his McKinley and crashed the glee club's class on Monday.

He was skipping school, which he really couldn't afford because the class work at Dalton was absurdly complex compared to McKinley's. Still, he had to make Finn and Puck see that he was okay, now. Not fragile or breakable, not any longer.

He had called Brad ahead of time (The man had been Kurt's piano teacher for five years and had privately admitted that the countertenor was the singular student at the public school that he didn't utterly loathe.) and the man was prepared, launching into the opening chords of the song as soon as the teenager stepped into the room, precluding any excited attacks by his friends. And he lifted his head, sang, and let himself get lost in the slightly altered lyrics which now reflected his thoughts exactly.

"Oh, ooh.

"I found good friends. I found a place that's safe. The tide comes in, I watch it all wash away. But I'm keeping it steady, and that's just how I was raised. Head held up walking tall into each breaking wave."

Letting himself take in this dysfunctional group that he still considered his family, he watched the light of awareness come on in the eyes of Tina and Mercedes. They had both seen him, time and again, get up and keep going despite whatever was thrown his way. They had taken courage from his persistence and were proud of their friend.

"'Cause the devil's in the details and he's taking his toll, sending good men down the foot trails of some lost lonely souls."

Next it was Quinn, nodding slowly. She was aware of what it was to be treated like garbage, to see everything she cared about come crumbling down around her, forcing her to rebuild herself.

"And I say oh, oh, rain don't change the sun. Jealous is the night when the morning comes, but it always comes."

He saw the chorus catch Brittany, who bounced and grinned. In the important ways, she had always been smarter than the rest of them.

"So I'm working hard, I don't sleep till it's light. Ain't calling in favors, I can't swallow my pride, no!"

And there was Santana, biting her lip and eyes burning. He had invariably respected her because he was familiar with the facade she wore, pretending nothing could touch her. And she was a little kinder to him than she was with anyone but Brittany in return, since she knew he was aware and would never call her on it.

"And the world's on a mission, they want to tell me my rights. But they ever show up around here, they're going to be in for a fight."

Now Mike was nodding, doubtless remembering the locker room fight he had instigated with Karofsky, and how Kurt had followed it up by thanking the boys but telling them it was his problem, not theirs.

"'Cause the devil's in my hometown, and I ain't telling him no. 'Cause it's my family, it's my loved ones, that I'm scared to let go."

That line made Sam lean in and listen harder than before. Kurt had met his siblings, met the blond's parents, and he was mindful of how important Sam considered family.

"Oh, ooh! Rain don't change the sun. Jealous is the night when the morning comes. But it always comes!"

The one he knew the least was Lauren. Still, she was staring at him with grudging respect.

"Follow the track of my needle, oh, woah, oh. Can't you be good to my people? So why's there no peace? No break, no relief?"

Those were the words that finally hit Rachel. She had seen what her fathers were forced to endure, and was beginning to admit that Kurt had been put through just as much as either of them. And it wasn't fair.

"Ooooh!

"Can I be blamed if I am angry? Can I be saved if I'm barely clinging to hope? I'm clinging to hope."

Artie tilted his head. He had long believed he knew anger, at the world and life and friends and family and himself, better than any of them. He was stuck in his wheelchair for life, and he hated it. Now he had to identify that Kurt might be just as acquainted with the emotion, though.

"When I say, oh, oooh. Rain don't change the sun. Jealous is the night when the morning comes! But it always comes.

"It always rains down on us. And like the hot sun lying on a cold, dark stone, it's still our home. It's still our home.

"So if you ever feel like you are alone, after the night the morning comes."

Kurt hadn't glanced at the important two yet. As the song slipped away, and he finally convinced himself to peek toward them, Puck and Finn were already out of their chairs and across the room, and he was back inside that compassionate, warm, not-quite-suffocating hug from Friday and he gripped them back.

The words were too quiet for anyone else to hear. Still, the larger boys felt them through each bone in their bodies and wanted to cry in gratitude when Kurt murmured, "I'll be fine. I promise. Because it doesn't matter how bad it gets, or how dark, since now I know that morning always comes."

And they believed him.