"C'mon man, help me out a little!" Finn grumbled as he helped me down the hall.
"I told you I didn't want to wake up yet! Couldn't we have stayed at Puck's?" I complained sleepily, sagging against him. It was late and we were probably going to get it tomorrow for being out so far past curfew, but what did I care? My top priority was getting back in bed so I could sleep. "Can't you go any faster?"
"Not when I'm practically carrying you!" Finally having reached my room, Finn gave me a light shove and I landed face-down on my bed with a small "Oomph." Behind me, Finn called goodnight and shut my door behind him, and I shut my eyes and finally fell back asleep.
"You know, when I woke you up on Saturday you hadn't moved at all from when I dropped you?" Finn asked while we made our way to our lockers. The news didn't surprise me. I'd slept for so long my back was stiff the entire weekend, and not even another pot smoking session Saturday night at Puck's had helped. At least then we just spent the night, saving Finn from carrying my half asleep ass through the house.
"At least my dad and Carole didn't say anything about the sonic booms your feet made when they were stomping around your room. Seriously, you've got to do something about that." I opened my bag, searching inside to see which books I needed for today. In reality I was just busying myself until I could find Blaine. All weekend I had waited to hear from him, and all weekend my phone was silent.
"Yeah, I thought it was kind of weird we didn't get in trouble. Speaking of weird..." Together, we watched Puck approach, a grimace attached firmly to his face.
"Puck, it's like 70 outside, why are you wearing mittens?" I asked, pulling my books out of my locker.
"You never did take his nail polish off." Finn pointed out, suppressing a laugh.
"I never... what? Nail polish?" Stilling my fingers, I took another look at Puck's gloved hands. I searched my head for any memory of painting his nails and came up empty. "I don't know what you're talking about."
Throwing a glance over his shoulder, he pulled off a mitten and shoved his hand in my face. "I don't know how to get rid of this crap besides using pliers to rip off my fingernails." Charcoal Grey- Rachel's color? And suddenly I did remember- the memory but a fuzzy little snippet- painting his nails. I cringed and wondered how many other ridiculous things I'd done at Puck's over the weekend and already forgotten.
"Go find Rachel, she has nail polish remover in her locker, she'll help you." I sighed, closing my bag and locker with haste. This was so embarrassing. My fingers tugged at my sleeves involuntarily, and I tried pushing those thoughts aside. How many times did I have to make a fool out of myself before I could die of embarrassment? Santana and Brittany stalked up, and I used that as my cue to leave.
"Nice to see you're finally wearing a glove, Puckerman." I heard Santana remark as I walked away.
"I chopped all my fingers off during wood shop and I don't want to scare off any hot chicks with the gore! God!"
I didn't see Blaine until lunch. It was by chance that I'd actually gone, since the past week's "meals" had taken place in the bathroom. He caught me walking down the hall on my way too my bathroom of choice and looped an arm through mine, pulling me towards the cafeteria and into the lunch line.
"I missed you this morning," Glancing down the line to see what today's options were, my stomach clenched. I was so hungry, so much so that it was difficult to ignore, but as hard as I tried to not listen to the voice in my head that chanted 'fat' over and over again, I couldn't.
"Oh you did, did you?" Was he flirting? We grabbed our trays, moving up in the queue. Nervously I chewed my lip, watching menu items slop onto plates. Gross. So gross.
"You know what I mean." I chided. Now it was our turn, and our conversation halted. Choice after choice I denied, waiting to be offered something that wouldn't make me gain even more weight overnight. From the corner of my eye I saw Blaine shoot me a worried glance, and I said yes to what I was being offered, hoping to deflect any suspicion. It was then that I decided I should be more careful around him. He was much more observant than Finn.
I managed to find two seats next to each other at the end of the Glee Club's usual table while Blaine picked up some napkins from the condiment stand. While the everyone laughed at Puck- who was trying and failing to eat lunch with his mitten clad hands- I stared down at my tray and wondered how the fuck I was going to do this. Of all the things I had to say yes to, spaghetti? Because I totally needed to shove carbs down my already-too-fat throat. I took my time swirling my straw around in my drink. Tomorrow I'd have to find a way to sneak to the bathroom without Blaine catching me.
"Anyway, before we were interrupted, I was going to say I was late. My grandma likes me to help her finish her puzzles, and I actually ended up having to Google the answer so I could come to class." He laughed, sliding in between Mike and I. The press of his body against mine sent heat to my cheeks, quickened my pulse. I scolded myself for being so doofy and mimicked his actions of unwrapping my fork and eating.
"At least you finished it," I said, waiting for my stomach to stop clenching. Sometimes it was hard to decide which hurt worse- not eating, or eating after not eating for a long time. Why hadn't I payed attention and chosen something less atrocious? "I don't think I've ever finished one. For some reason, I'm terrible at them."
He smiled at me, a simple gesture that made me feel a whole lot less terrible. Even if it was only for half an hour, I was glad I had some company other than myself.
"Do you know what you want to sing this week?" He asked, and upon seeing my confusion, added, "You know, for 'Disney week'?" I shook my head in response- I hadn't even considered what I might sing- and then asked him the same.
"I'm stuck between two right now, it's so hard to decide!" His enthusiasm was catching. For the rest of lunch we continued our light talk, with me shoving my food around and occasionally taking a bite so as to not raise suspicion. For once I was actually disappointed when lunch ended, realizing it meant parting with Blaine until Glee; losing the anchoring effect his body seemed to have when it was pressed against me.
"Okay, now, you'll all pull straws and whoever gets the short one has to go today." Mr. Schue announced. A collective groan sounded from the room, a shuffle as we all stood to pull our straws. It seemed like a lot of effort for something so silly. I crossed my fingers that I wouldn't have to go since I had nothing prepared and, to my luck and probably everyone else's, Miss Rachel Berry was first to go. She squealed in delight, rushing around to get everything ready for her performance.
I stepped back to my seat and spent the entire time examining Blaine's cardigan and my shredded cuticles.
It was Thursday night and I hadn't heard from Blaine since Glee on Monday, which to me didn't even count since Rachel spent forty-five minutes belting out the Disney medley she'd prepared. I loved her, but not enough to put up with that.
I dragged myself down Puck's basement stairs and into his makeshift living room. Not seeing Blaine since Monday was almost worse than not seeing him between the time that I came back to McKinley and he transferred from Dalton. I'd become used to seeing him, even if it only was for a short while. Being without him at school was hell. My only refuge was the blade I now carried in my pocket at all times, and the pot Puck so freely dispensed in his basement.
Again I checked my phone while giving Puck a weak wave for a greeting. Finn was already in his usual spot, failing at rolling a joint due to his overly large and clumsy fingers. While he continued doing nothing but getting pot all over the place, Puck produced a stack of VHS tapes from the corner of the room, blowing a thick layer of dust off the topmost box.
"Let the marathon begin!" He proclaimed, inserting a tape into the VCR with a little more energy than was necessary. We sat silently, watching the Disney logo fade in and out. With Finn still concentrating on his task and Puck wholly absorbed with the television screen, a comfortable silence blanketed the room.
"So were those your sister's tapes?" I asked eventually, during a break in the dialogue. Puck's head snapped around quickly, and he answered with a loud, "No bro, these were mine. You got a problem with that?" I shook my head in hasty response, and he continued, muttering to himself, "I freaking love Disney."
The night progressed in much the same manner; I was as cloudy as the room by the time The Little Mermaid made its way on screen. Puck stared teary eyed at the screen while Ariel sang, and I found myself nearly shouting, "I'm gonna sing that tomorrow!" while pointing excitedly at the unfolding scene. It was going to be great, I knew it. My biggest hope was that Blaine would finally be there to see me sing. And that Mr. Shue wouldn't get on me for skipping four times in one week. And that Rachel wouldn't try to-
"Oh my god! My mom's calling! Ohmygod what do I do?" Finn shot out of his seat, fumbling wildly with his phone. "What if she smells the pot? Ohmygod, she's going to KILL me!"
"Shut up you doofus, she can't smell through the phone!" My words felt thick and inarticulate on my tongue. Fuck, was I high. I tried shifting positions, hoping it would clear my head. "Just answer it!"
Puck pressed talk and shoved the phone against Finn's face, motioning for him to act like a normal, not completely stoned teenager. I watched Finn's face pale, though he managed to keep up his end of the conversation fairly well. Lucky for him, he wasn't too bright to begin with.
After a few minutes he snapped the phone shut, his body sagging against his chair. "Friday night dinner is now tonight night dinner. They want us to meet them at Breadstix in an hour."
My mouth gaped and I now understood why he paled so quickly while talking to Carole. We were fucked.
An hour and fifteen minutes later and we were stumbling over our feet into Breadstix. After the call, Puck gave us a quick lesson in sober-up-right-fucking-now. Thankfully he had eye drops handy, along with Febreeze for our clothes, but not much else could be done. I seemed to have a better grip on myself than Finn did, but then again I had smoked less. Puck had done his best to prepare us for what I considered the apocalypse, and I was hoping that maybe our parents would be less observant than usual.
Eventually we found where our parents were sitting and slid into the booth across from them. A quick hello later and Finn and I were hiding behind our menus and treating out dry mouth with Coke. If there was one thing I could be glad about it was that I was so hungry my stomach felt like it was turning inside out, and I had more options than my eyes could focus on to choose from for dinner. I tried to take my time ordering, thanking the obnoxiously tall menus for shielding my vibrating face from my dad. Unfortunately for me, I couldn't delay any longer and was forced to hand the menu back to our waitress, exposing my high self for all I was. Our parents started making light talk, and I only tuned in when I realized they were talking about Glee.
"So, how does Schuester expect you guys to do well in competitions if he keeps canceling Glee Club?" My dad questioned over his glass of wine. My heart thundered in my ears.
"What are you talking about? Mr. Shue's had us working overtime to get us ready!" I could have killed Finn. My next best option was stomping on his foot, and I couldn't even do that without anyone noticing. All eyes were on me, my hand frozen around my glass. I longed to be one of the beads of condensation forming on the surface, to be able to roll away and disappear.
"Kurt? You told me he was canceling Glee." This time it was Carole who was interrogating me. I stayed silent, my words stuck in my throat. Training my eyes downward, I inhaled steadily, trying to keep myself together. It wasn't really being in trouble that upset me, it was getting caught. Because if they found out about this so easily, who's to say they wouldn't find out what I'd been doing to myself? Internally I shuddered, folding my hands in my lap so I could shred the skin around my fingernails.
"Nah, he hasn't shown up. Or he leaves early." I shot Finn the most intense glare I could muster given that I felt like I was about to explode. My dad cleared his throat from across the table, shifting into police-dad mode.
"Kurt, you're grounded." I licked my lips, unable to respond. Instead I nodded, digging my fingers into my arms where the cuts and bruises were. Maybe I could slip away for five minutes, just to bring myself back into my body. "Not because you're skipping Glee- if you don't want to go, that's fine- but because you lied to me, and you lied to Carole."
I felt terrible. A sharp, sickening feeling rose in my chest. I was being an awful son, an awful person. What would my mom say about this all if she were here? And that made me feel even worse, because she wasn't here but at least I had my dad, and look, I was treating him like crap. I deserved to be run over by a bus.
"Finn, you too." My dad continued.
"...What?"
"You're grounded too. Straight home after school for the next two weeks." Seeing the protest on his face, my dad added, "Maybe that'll teach you both not to come to dinner high."
Okay wow! It took longer than I intended for me to finish this. I got caught up in my own head for a while, and only had the motivation to write after all the Klaingst during 'The Break Up.' Hopefully I can keep up a little better and get these out faster, because I feel bad for stringing everyone along! (Also, I had intended on putting Kurt's performance in this chapter, but I'm moving it to the next one because it seems to flow better that way.)
Anyway, thanks to everyone who reads this, and thanks to everyone who reviews this. It really makes my day when I see people are actually interested in the stuff that spews from my head.