Disclaimer: Glee is not mine.
IX
Right after glee and the war declaration by Rachel, Finn and Quinn, Puck is at the Hummel-Hudson house. The boys need time to prepare their songs for the audition. They decided to rehearse their song at Kurt's house because his sound proof basement has the perfect acoustics.
Tina is not with them just because Mike had apologized to Kurt about the intervention as soon as the glee meeting had finished and Tina had said they need to exchange hot Asian kisses. Puck and especially Kurt can survive without seeing their famous and very public displays of affection.
Kurt and the jock are in the living room and they are going to the kitchen to reach the basement door when Carole greets them coming down the stairs.
"Hi, Kurt, Noah! Finn is not home, he's at Rachel's rehearsing for something... I'll tell him you were here," she says, turning to the kitchen where Burt is sitting.
"Hi, Ms. H.," Puck smiles politely. "Actually, I'm not here for Finn. Kurt and I need to rehearse as well."
"You and Kurt," she says, turning to look at them skeptically.
"Yes, Carole, Puck is going to spend quite some time singing songs in a basement with the gay teenager of this house... Problem with that," Kurt asks bitterly.
"Kiddo, don't talk to Carole like that, she didn't say anything bad. Usually Puck is here to see Finn," Burt tries to calm his son down. He rises from the kitchen table and walks toward the trio.
"Why are you two singing together, anyway?"
"Today we convinced Mr. Schue to give us the chance to prove ourselves good enough for a solo at Regionals," Puck says proudly.
"But, Finn said he was going to sing with Rachel... Why has Mr. Schue agreed to auditions if he had already chosen the solos? Is that why Finn was so upset?" Carole is looking at Puck accusatorily.
"Mr. Schue realized it's unfair giving solos according to favoritism. It's just fair that everyone in glee club has the chance to have his moment. We are the 'New Directions', not 'The Rachel and Finn Show'," Kurt responds, glaring at the woman.
"And are you going to blow this chance, too," Burt asks Kurt.
"No," Kurt answers before they hear the door being opened and Finn and Rachel enter the living room.
Before Finn can even think to speak, Rachel is already speaking.
"Hello, Mr. and Mrs. Hummel-Hudson! I hope it's not a problem if we end up here. We need to rehearse for glee and your basement, Mr. Hummel, has the perfect acoustics to practise my talented voice..."
"What?!" Kurt yells.
"She said the basement is good for singing in it," Finn explains unnecessarily to him.
"I know the basement is good for singing in; it's my basement!" Kurt responds, annoyed. "You are not rehearsing in my basement!"
"Kurt, don't be so selfish," Rachel says, waving him off and walking toward the basement door.
"No! Stop! That's my room! You can't go to my room! Dad, that's my room!" Kurt says to his father.
"Come on, son, can't you all sing together in the basement?"
"It's not just the basement, that's my room!"
"It's my room, too," Finn says.
"Yeah, it was before you called me a fag!" Kurt screams.
"I apologized for that," Finn whines, making puppy dog eyes at his mom.
"It's Kurt's room and he doesn't want you there; deal with it, Hudson!" Puck says, annoyed. Finn's whining is giving him a headache.
"But we need to rehearse!" Rachel is screaming, too, now.
"Not in my room!"
"It's your fault we need to audition. The least you can do is let me rehearse in an acoustically perfect room!"
"MY room! You keep forgetting that detail! It is my room and you are not going in my room, you Hobbit!"
"Okay, that's enough!" Burt yells to make them hear him. "All of you, get in the basement, sing, dance, kill each other, I don't care but do it in the basement so I don't have to listen to you!" Burt glares at the four teenagers in front of him.
Kurt returns the glare before turning to Rachel.
"If you make a step in my room, I quit glee. You'll have the solo but no Regionals," Kurt says with his hand on his hip and a 'head bitch' face on.
"You know you can't... I'll do what I told you this morning."
"You are such a bitch!"
Carole and Burt gasp at that, too shocked by Kurt's unusual language to respond.
"Don't talk to her like that!" Finn says, towering over the brunet.
"Or what?" Puck says, threateningly. "Touch him or call him any name and I swear to god I'm going to hurt you!"
"Get out of my house, you little punk! What do you think – you can come to my house and talk to my step-son like that?" Burt shoves Puck to the door.
"Dad! No! Stop it!"
"I don't like him!" Burt explains to his son, still trying to kick Puck out of the door but he was held back by Carole and Kurt.
"I don't like Rachel but she's still here!" Kurt complains.
"It's okay, Kurt. I'll call you later," Puck says, walking out of the living room.
"No! That's not fair, Puck, stay!"
"You want him to stay so you can turn him?" Finn accuses him before he's being sent crashing against the wall by Puck.
"Don't talk to him like that," Puck says to him in a low, scary voice.
Burt holds back Puck while Finn turns to Kurt again.
"Did you see that? What do you think people would do when they see what you do to him," he says accusingly.
"What are you talking about?"
"You are corrupting him!"
"Shut up, Hudson!" Puck tries to free himself from Mr. Hummel without success.
"I bet you would like it, wouldn't you, Puck?" Finn says to the jock. "As long as you have someone to fuck you don't care; everyone knows what a whore you are!"
Before anyone can react, Kurt reaches up and slaps his almost-step-brother right in the face.
"Kurt, you are out of control!" Rachel accuses him, reaching her boyfriend. "If you don't contain yourself and apologize to Finn, I'll tell everything to your dad!"
At that the room fell silent.
"Tell me what?" Mr. Hummel asks.
"N-nothing?" Rachel is sure that isn't supposed to sound like a question.
"Tell me what," he asks one more time.
Rachel is silent. She really doesn't want to tell him. It's not right to tell something like that in that way and, more important, if she tells him, Mr. Hummel would probably lock Kurt in a clinic and she can kiss goodbye to Regionals.
"I've got an eating disorder," Kurt barely whispers but the room is so silent everyone can hear it.
"What does that mean," Burt asks, not sure if he has got it.
"I'm anorexic," he says, keeping his head down to hide the tears.
"No, you are not," Burt says stubbornly. "That's a girl thing."
Kurt snorts, "Well, I'm gay so apparently it's a girl and fag thing," he says, glaring at his father.
Kurt grabs Puck's wrist and drags him out of the house. They get in the jock's truck and they are out of the drive-way by the time Mr. Hummel runs out of the house, yelling at his son to return in the house. They silently agree to ignore him and Puck drives them away.
Puck is driving around Lima for an hour before he finally talks to Kurt.
"What the hell just happened?"
"I told my dad the truth; he compared me to a girl – and now we just passed this house for the third time," Kurt says monotone.
"Don't get me wrong... Tina and I were going to talk to you about telling your dad but... why did you do it," the jock asks, keeping his eyes on the road but sneaking a look at the brunet.
"I don't know, I was angry... and I'm tired of lying," Kurt says with a feeble voice.
"Okay," Puck says, but it's not okay, what are they going to do now? "What are we doing now?"
Kurt sighs. "Now, you are going to drive to your house where I'll spend the night, if your mom agrees. If not, can you take me to Tina's?"
"No, you'll sleep with me. I mean... in my house... you and me in the same house!" Puck is blushing as he clarifies his statement.
Kurt giggles at that. Blushing Puck was definitively something new.
"Anyway," the brunet continues, "tomorrow I'll talk to my dad... I don't want to think about it now."
"But... what if he sends you in some clinic far away from Lima?"
Kurt looks at him, puzzled.
"I'm eating now ... so I can convince him. I'm already getting better and I don't need a clinic," Kurt explains.
"Are you really getting better?"
"I don't know. I guess I am getting better. I don't want to go in a hospital. I don't like hospitals," the brunet says, turning to the window.
"You are not going anywhere. Tina says we are going to come with you," Puck nods at his own statement.
"You can't come with me in a clinic, or in the hospital!"
"Well... so you are not going anywhere. You say it... you are getting better." Puck isn't sure why but the idea of having Kurt so far away is not that appealing.
"Hi, Ma," Puck calls out to his mom, entering the kitchen of the Puckerman house with Kurt on his heels.
"Hi, Noah... Oh... hi, Kurt! That's the second day in a row you are here, Kurt... Has Noah kidnapped you," she ask seriously.
"What? Oh, my gaga, no, Ms. Puckerman... no!" Kurt is confused, she really thinks Noah could do that?
"Princess, she's just messing with you," Puck laughs at him. "Anyway, Ma, can Kurt stay the night," he asks his mother with a pair of puppy-dog-eyes that for Kurt are better than Finn's.
"Another sleep-over," she says, laughing and pointing at Puck's pink nails.
"No!" The jock is resolute. "Today is male bonding. Video games and action movies…"
"All the action movies in the world can't make up for your sleep-over," Sarah, Puck's sister says, entering the kitchen. "I thought you were a badass. Badasses don't have pink nails... Hi, Kurt!" She turns to Kurt with dreamy eyes.
"Hello, Sarah! You know, only real men can wear pink," Kurt says in defense of the jock.
"True," Ruth agreed.
"Yes, Kurt, I think you are right," Sarah says sweetly, giving her brother a 'what the eff' look.
"Sarah, did you know Kurt loves tea parties," Puck asks.
"Oh, wow! Kurt, we need to have a party right now!" Sarah begins dragging a horrified Kurt up the stairs.
'That's what you get when you paint the Puckasaurus's nails in pink,' Puck thinks smugly.
"Okay, Noah, I want the truth. Why is this kid here, two days in a row? What's wrong," Mrs. Puckerman asks with her best 'I'm your mother do what I say' look.
Not that this look worked very well with Noah in the past. Actually, it always causes Noah to do the exact opposite of what she asks.
'Don't have sex with the rabbi's daughter' or ' don't have sex with older women', 'don't drink – you're underage', 'don't drive my car, or any car, when you are drunk', 'stop playing with the matches', 'stop telling your sister she's adopted' and last, but not least, 'don't get anyone pregnant until you are married and have a job'. He never listens so it's a little shocking for her when Puck sits on the kitchen table to answer her question.
"Kurt doesn't eat," Puck says, looking at his hands.
"He's not hungry? It's okay, maybe he has the flu or that stomach bug that's going around now. You should have seen the hospital the other day, this guy_"
"No, Ma. Kurt is not eating... in general... He stopped eating months ago. The only thing he eats is an apple at lunch time... and he eats that just because I force him," Puck explains to her with a sad expression on his face.
"Oh my... what... I... what..." Ruth is speechless. And she is a Jewish mother – she's never speechless.
"Ma... I don't know what to do…"
"You... have you told his family," she asks when her ability to speak is back.
"That's why he's here."
"What?"
"We were at his house, Finn and Rachel were there. They were being annoying and Rachel was blackmailing him about it and he was tired of hiding it so he told his dad."
"But... why isn't he with his dad? Why is he here?"
"When he told his dad he compared him to a girl. Kurt got mad and … now we are here."
"Oh." That's the best she can come out with at the moment.
"What if his dad locks him in a clinic?"
"Noah, honey, these places are made to help people who have Kurt's problem."
"He doesn't want to go there and he's already getting better! He's eating!"
"That's not enough, honey," she says, looking at her son with sympathetic eyes.
"I'll make him eat more... If he keeps eating, they can't take him away right?" Noah is looking at her with hopeful eyes.
"It's not only about the food, Noah. It's about the reason he stopped eating in the first place..."
"But who's gonna watch over him if they take him away?" Puck's voice is desperate.
Ruth knows her son well enough to know it's not normal behavior for him to be so attached to someone who's not her or Sarah but it's not the right moment to discuss this; Noah is probably not ready yet.
"Listen, son, I'll discuss this with Kurt's dad if that makes you feel better and tomorrow, while you two are in school, I'll talk to some of the other nurses and doctors at the hospital. Maybe a clinic is not necessary but… I don't know. Now, go save your friend from your sister. He's gay but that doesn't mean he's not going to choke her after the fourth cup of 'tea' with her."
Puck kisses his mom's cheek before running upstairs.
"Sarah! Leave my Princess alone!"
A/N: Hi bella gente! It take me some time but, finally, that's the new chapter...as usual I couldn't have done this chapter without my beta (GayforKurt).
Anyway...what do you think about this new part of the story? Like it? Hate it? Let me know, I love reading your reviews and suggestions.
Have a good they!
Ciao!
Franky
