School = an evil conspiracy to make sure I don't have free time.
I just needed to get that out there…
Song: Neil Diamond's "Dry Your Eyes." Is good song, but I only used a little of it.
You will review? Complaining about having to actually wait for updates again, or making me feel better about having school by saying the chapter turned out well anyway are both valid reviewingnessthings. I know that's not a word.
Alex: That Name Again
Puck and Alex had stayed the night at Meg's and waited to begin the drive to Lima until the next morning. They still wouldn't arrive until eight or nine. Puck had wanted to call ahead, but Alex stopped him by saying everyone would be up late and gathered together for New Year's Eve anyway. He still didn't want to go. He still thought maybe he'd change his mind.
"This food is shit," he said and hoped it would annoy Puck into kicking him out of the car even though he knew it wouldn't.
"Yeah, but it's cheap."
Puck wouldn't let Alex drive. He said he'd made the drive up, so going back down wouldn't be any worse.
"Sorry I pulled you away from having a real part in a real musical." Puck smiled in a way he probably thought was charming. "But, hey, you can always audition for more parts after you graduate."
"You're assuming I'll be able to get a part again." And that he would graduate.
"Well you got this one. It's like proof that you're as good as you keep telling us you are."
"Puck, I got this part by sleeping with the guy in charge of casting."
"Oh." Puck's eyes darted over the road nervously. "That's fucked up, man."
"You think?" He took a bite of his burger to avoid having to say more.
The jock fiddled with the radio but couldn't find a decent working station. "We'll be in Lima pretty soon," he said once he had given up on finding music. "Will you text Quinn for me? Just to ask where she is." The quick glance he shot at Alex said 'you don't have to mention yourself, so stop glowering' clearly enough.
Alex shrugged and texted her. She replied almost immediately, and he read it out for Puck, "Finn's. Where are you?"
"Say, 'About an hour and a half from Finn's.'"
Alex did. Then he dropped the phone back into Puck's lap. When another text came in, he declined to check it.
"You can do… it? It doesn't freak you out?"
A few times already Alex had pretended to be confused to avoid answering Puck. This time he really was lost. "Come again?"
"Sex."
"Oh. Why not? It's as much a tool as my voice." He managed not to flinch. He had used it as a tool, but it didn't feel much like one.
Puck frowned. "I don't believe any of that. Sex may not mean much to me or Santana, but I know it does to you. And your voice is more than just a tool."
"Sex seemed like something special and important back when I was a virgin. Now I know it's just something bodies do." Lying had gotten easy. He had freaked out while having sex after killing Robin, even though the guy was nice and even kind of cute, if a little on the chubby side. Luckily, only Alex himself had noticed. He could lie about plenty of things now.
"Fuck."
Alex didn't know if Puck meant it for an argument or not, so he ignored the expletive. They remained silent the rest of the drive. The shaking in his hands and knees didn't start until Puck pulled up in front of the house Alex could remember having lived in. It wasn't his house. It was Kurt's house, and he wasn't Kurt anymore.
Quinn had obviously been watching for Puck because she ran out from the house before the jock had a chance to open Alex's door and force him out of the car. She reached the boy and threw her arms around him just after he had opened the passenger door. Then she turned her head to see what Puck was looking at instead of her.
"Oh God, Kurt."
He slammed the door back shut and locked it. Alex didn't want to deal with these people. With crying and 'welcome home's and everyone calling him by a name he didn't want to use anymore. Puck had the keys, so it was a useless gesture. The jock just unlocked the door and pulled Kurt out with Quinn's help.
Some of the others were coming out of the house now. They had already begun to exclaim Puck's name (how long had he been gone?), but their voices fell when Alex cam into sight. Then Mercedes rushed to him crying and Rachel darted back into the house. When Rachel returned, Mercedes was still clinging to Alex and babbling incoherently. Puck and Quinn had moved out of the way.
Behind Rachel came Finn, Carol, and Burt. Fuck, it was Burt. His father. What was he supposed to do around Burt? The man would expect to find his son, not the husk Robbie had left behind. Alex tried to pull away from Mercedes and run for it, but Finn reached his side before he could and began dragging Alex to the house.
"Oh, thank God. Kurt, I was so…" Burt choked on tears he didn't want to let out and finished the sentence by throwing his arms around the boy. Alex trembled and tried not to move too much. Their hugs felt like restraints.
Everyone talked to him, but all at once. He couldn't understand most of it, but it all amounted to 'Welcome home. Thank the God you don't believe in that you're back. We missed you. Kurt. Kurt. Kurt.'
It felt wrong to be called by that name again.
They dragged him inside, set him on the couch, and piled themselves all around him. Puck sat on Alex's right because he had brought him home. Burt sat on his left side because he was the boy's father.
"How did you find him?" It was the first coherent thing anyone had said. Strangely, it came in Rachel's voice.
Puck shrugged and looked at Alex. He couldn't know how much Alex wanted to share yet, and at least he had the decency not to give it all away. "Luck, mostly," he said.
Everyone went silent after that. No one wanted to ask the next question, but they all wanted to know which of them had killed Robin. At this point it should have been obvious; Puck would only have written that if Rob had literally killed Kurt Hummel.
Finally Tina licked her lips and asked, "Wh-which of you…?"
Alex declined to answer. "I thought your stutter was fake." He crossed his arms but kept his feet spaced so he could get up and run for it if they gave him a chance.
"Everyone stutters sometimes." She turned her eyes to the floor.
Alex frowned. Everyone was still staring at him. Some of them didn't look as happy as before. Well, fucking good. Maybe he could prove his point to Puck sooner than he thought. "It was me." He said. "Puck wasn't even there at the time."
No one had a response to that. He hadn't expected them to.
"Where did you stay for the week and a half since… then? Both of you, actually." Quinn had decent control over her voice, but she still sounded nervous.
Puck answered when Alex didn't. "I stayed in my mom's car. Kurt was with a nice lady named Meg. She works in a theater and apparently found him staring longingly at it." He tried to smile and make it funny but failed. Everyone had noticed by now that "Kurt" wasn't happy to be "home."
"Is that how you found him too? By scoping out theaters?" Carol was the first of the family to recover. Well, she had always been more of a friend than a mother.
Puck nodded. "I didn't really think it would work, but Kurt's strangely predictable enough that it did."
What was that Alex smelled? A poorly concealed attempt to make him feel like he was still the same show tunes-loving boy who left Lima? Fuck, but Puck was a moron.
"I'd rather be called Alex." He managed not to flinch when he felt Burt pull away in shock. That had been his intent; it shouldn't have bothered him so much.
"Kurt," Puck stretched the name into a plea and a warning. And unintentionally an accusation.
Alex shook his head.
Some of the girls were crying again silently. They understood well enough then.
Finn didn't. "What the hell, Kurt. It's your name; why would you say you want another one?" He looked like an oversized puppy that had just been kicked until it fell, then kicked some more.
"I just don't feel like Kurt anymore." He hadn't for a while now.
Burt forced another embrace on Alex as he lost control over his oh so fucking fatherly tears. "You don't have to feel like anything. You'll always be my son, no matter what, and I'll always love you for it."
It was exactly the sort of thing that used to make him feel better, exactly the sort of thing Burt had always said to him. Said to Kurt. All it made Alex feel was uncomfortable.
Everyone went silent again. There were still questions no one had the courage to ask. Since they were the same questions Alex lacked the patience (or courage) to answer, he let them wait. He tried to scoot as far from Burt as possible, but Puck refused to give him any extra space. The older Hummel kept his hold on the countertenor anyway.
"When you were gone," Puck cut through the awkward gap in conversation, "Mr. Schuester wanted everyone to sing for you. I told him it was stupid because you weren't around to hear it, but you are now. So…" He shrugged before leaving the room and returned tuning a guitar a few moments later.
Most of the others stared at Puck like he'd grown a wart on his nose, so Alex wasn't the only one unused to having Noah Puckerman be the guy to smooth out any situation at all ever. The jock didn't seem to notice even though he looked at everyone before beginning, like he wanted them to feel included in his song somehow.
Dry your eyes and take your song out
It's a newborn afternoon
And if you can't recall the singer
You can still recall the tune
Alex heard the plea in the song. 'Please stay here with us,' it said, 'Please learn to be Kurt Hummel again because we can't live without him any longer.' It pissed Alex off so that he almost didn't notice when the song continued, 'Please don't cry for the loss of him. Whatever he calls himself, Kurt has come home to us. Show him he can live again.' It was nauseating.
Alex scowled, tried to ignore it, and focused on his cuticles instead. He needed a manicure.
And it was more than being holy
Oh it was less than being free
And if you can't recall the reason
Can you hear the people sing
A few of the others joined their voices with Puck's. Alex knew it was supposed to be something like heartwarming. This was how a glee club welcomed a friend home and told him everything would be alright. Alex avoided meeting their eyes because he didn't feel at home and nothing would be alright. They just didn't know it yet.
Right through the lightning and the thunder
To the dark side of the moon
To that distant falling angel
That descended much too soon
And come dry your eyes
When he had finished, Puck left the guitar leaning against the wall and reclaimed his seat beside Alex. At least he knew enough by now not to smile encouragingly. The others tried it though, and found that all it gained them from Alex was a glare. He needed to make them see that he wasn't their Kurt anymore. And when they did, he would return to New York and live a life that left him feeling less smothered and trapped than this one did.
~.x.~
This is, I think, the first time we've had a song that wasn't sung by the viewpoint character.
And here we have jerk!Kurt. When he insulted Robin, it was awesome 'cause he was standing up for himself (and occasionally someone else too). Not so much now.
You should totally review. Because Kurt returning to his family is a MAJOR event, and I want to hear what you think of it.
