~Kurt~
Kurt awoke the next morning to the smell of maple syrup and a slight burnt smell. Knowing anything about his family that meant that his dad had tried to make toast and it came out all black with charcoal clumps of ash falling off, flaking around the plate they'd been scraped onto. Kurt sighed, not really wanting to leave his old bed. That was something else he had missed from Ohio, his bed. His pillows were in that perfect smushed position that cradled his head and the blankets were tangled around his feet. The heater for the basement was on high because of the drafty winter chill that liked to creep down especially into the basement.
He somehow managed to drag himself out of the warm comfort of his soft sheets to drag his feet lazily across the floor. His eyes were still only half open from having just woken up and he stumbled on a few steps. Kurt's mind wasn't working to its full capacity yet, having just been woken before it was ready. It reminded Kurt of the times when he'd get up for school two hours early so he could wake himself up and get ready in time to fully function in his learning environment.
He slowly grazed his hand along the white wall as he made his feet carry him to the kitchen. He threw a good morning to the occupants of the table before sleepily making himself a cup of tea with two sugar cubes. He'd never been a coffee person, not able to stand the bitter taste. Tea, however, actually tasted good with a bit of sugar and also had different herbs that helped when preventing different types of cancers. Kurt held the cup in his hands for a minuet, letting the warmth of it seep into his naturally cold fingertips before he took the first sip, letting it warm him up from the inside.
He sighed contentedly before sitting down across from his father and Carol, giving them a small smile. He pretended to ignore them when they looked pointedly at each other. Carol set down her spoon in her cereal bowl and clasped her hands together, looking at Kurt expectantly, waiting for an answer from the petite boy. Kurt in turn gave her his full attention, hoping whatever was coming wouldn't mentally harm him in anyway. Of course, nothing could be as he wanted it at this time of year.
"Good morning, dear." She said cheerily at first, misleading Kurt's intuition into thinking that whatever was coming was something good.
"Good morning." He said plainly in return, still trying to wake himself up from his seemingly numb stupor.
"So, um, would you like a plate of food? I made pancakes and there's cereal if you want anything else." Kurt agreed to have a small plate of food, but when Carol made no move to get up he started to understand that something was wrong.
"What?" He looked between his step-mother and his father, both of which were giving him a look that said he needed to stay calm.
"Well, Finn got in early this morning." Kurt's breath hitched in his throat, knowing that somewhere in the very house he sat in, was his step brother, whom he hadn't seen in over four years.
"Oh." Was all Kurt could muster up as a response, gripping his cup a bit tighter than before.
"Yeah," Burt began to throw his two cents in, seeing Kurt's face drop about ten fold. "And we were actually going to go pick up one of those left-over Christmas trees by the edge of town." Kurt just looked on in turn, not having anything to say. "We would like it if you would go with us-"
"But we completely understand if you need more time to get settled." Carol cut Burt off quickly, jumping in to explain that Kurt wasn't obligated to participate in this particular activity.
Kurt would have said no, not wanting to deal with anything Christmas related right now. Especially so soon after…well, after everything. With the way his father and Carol were looking at him though, it was obvious that they'd be crushed if Kurt were to decline their polite offer to accompany them. It was, after all, the first time he'd seen them in such a long time. It was to be expected that they'd actually want to see him while he was here. So he could only say yes. It was kind of worth the sure to come pain to see their faces light up with joy and Carol practically bounce over to the stove to get Kurt his food.
She had barely set the plate down in front of him when Kurt heard a door upstairs close. Kurt's heart began hammering in his chest, beating against his rib cage violently. Slow footsteps fell on the stairs, descending the flight of them and making their way down the hall. Kurt didn't look up for the longest time, but the entire room had gone silent as another person entered the kitchen. All oxygen had now escaped the small, shaky boy and all that was left was a desperate feeling to blot quickly into the living room. Of course Kurt wasn't a coward, so he gently lifted his eyes up.
It was funny to see him again. Kurt wasn't sure why he was so shocked at how…ordinary he looked. He had pictured Finn differently now, maybe with longer hair and a different wardrobe, some slut permanently attached to his hip, almost hippie in a way. Instead, he just looked like Finn. He had the same short boyish hair cut, the same awkward tall height that made him stand out freakishly from the room's other occupants, and he even had the same Old Navy shirts and jeans, a basketball tucked under one of his arms. Of course the hippie look would have been a bad thing, but some things about Finn staying the same were bad too. For instance, that dopey side-ways grin he always gave off. It was the same smile that used to make Kurt's legs give out beneath him and make his heart turn to jell-o. But he refused to be that Kurt a long time ago, it wasn't going to stop now just because this was the first time he'd seen the charmingly dense boy.
"Kurt!" Finn exclaimed, looking shocked to find the smaller male sitting in the kitchen where they used to fight over who got the last piece of toast in the mornings.
"Finn." Kurt nodded in reply to the other male's surprise at seeing him. Finn just turned stupidly to look at his mother, mouth gaping open a bit in confusion. It was the same look Kurt used to remember him having when he'd help Finn with math.
"Oh, honey," Carol pat her son on the shoulder before directing him to the table to sit in the seat across from Kurt. "I told you he was here last night." Kurt watched as Finn racked his brain for a minuet before obviously remembering the conversation held about Kurt without the young man's knowledge of it taking place.
"Oh yeah." Finn said dully before tossing the basketball in the air and making it spin on his finger. Kurt shook his head lightly, staring at his uneaten food before pushing himself away from the table, his chair scraping lightly against the tiled floors. His dad and Carol looked at him confusedly, but when Kurt's eye landed on Finn, the taller male was trying to see if he could move the basketball between each finger without stopping its continuous spinning.
"I'll be downstairs. Let me know when it's time to go." Kurt told everyone over his shoulder as he stomped out of the kitchen.
He let out a shaky sigh in the hallway, the sigh coming out more like a growl than anything else. His hands had tightly curled into fists. His fingernails dug painfully into the skin of his palms but he was too mad to care. 'Oh yeah' that was all he got as a greeting. He hadn't seen his step brother in over four years! Not days, weeks or months; four years! Kurt was furious to say the least, he would have thought he deserved at least a 'Good morning' but apparently that had been too much for Finn.
Kurt didn't end up going downstairs but instead found himself standing in the doorway of Finn's old room. Sports posters lined the walls, which had the cowboy wallpaper Finn simply refused to leave behind when he and Carol finally moved in with the Hummels, underneath the posters. There was Finn's way to small bed with his plain dark blue bed covers that no doubt had many stains from when he and all his past girlfriends stayed in them. Even Finn's dresser, which had 'F + R forever' carved into the side facing the wall, was still standing just as Kurt remembered it from the last time he'd been in this room. He walked into the room slowly, floorboards creaking under the slight weight he put on them, and gently sat at Finn's desk, which still looked unused after all these years. Apparently everything in this room was still the same except the man that resided in it at night.
Kurt wasn't sure why he'd come up here, he had nothing to gain or loose from seeing it. Nor was he sure why he was expecting it to look different than it had before. Either way, he felt sad almost. He sat staring at the room from the corner where the desk was set up. He brought the back of his hand up to his face to wipe away a few unfallen tears, still not sure why he felt sad being in here. It wasn't until a memory from the past kicked up that he really felt horrible though.
Kurt's heart pounded in his chest as he stood outside Finn's door. One of his hands was raised as if to knock on the wooden door in front of him, blocking his path inside the room, and the other hand was supporting a small tray with two sandwiches and a plate of some cookies. He wasn't quite sure why he'd instantly jumped at the opportunity to bring up some food for Finn and his guest so Carol wouldn't have to do it, he just had. His hand seemed frozen in mid-air unable to move forward just slightly to press against the door and beckon Finn to answer it. After a nod and mentally telling himself that he could do this, he knocked and waited.
Finn looked surprised to see Kurt behind the door, holding out the tray of food for him, instead of his mom. It hadn't been that long since Finn and Carol had officially moved in and both boys were kind of keeping their distance from each other so they wouldn't have another incident with feeling awkward around each other. Sure Burt had cleared out the spare room so Finn could have his own room, but neither wanted anything to happen so they'd been playing it comfortable.
"Hey, what's up?" Finn asked him stupidly. Soon after though he realized why Kurt had obviously come up and took the tray from him, smiling awkwardly. Behind Finn, Kurt could see someone sitting on the end of Finn's bed, a gaming controller in one hand and the other running through bright blonde locks.
"Kurt? Dude, Kurt!" Kurt's attention snapped back to his step brother, eyes filling with guilty confusion. "I said is that it?"
"Um, yeah…" Kurt mumbled incoherently and looked around Finn once again. This time Finn's eyes followed Kurt's and he smirked a bit.
"Do you wanna come play video games with us? I mean, you don't have to play if you don't want you can just watch." Kurt looked up at Finn in shock, not only had he seen him making googley eyes at his new friend but he'd basically invited him to let him set Kurt up with the new kid. He only nodded and stepped in the room when Finn stepped aside.
Kurt blinked and looked around at the room again. He and Sam had obviously hit it off, of course, and it was a good memory, but that was just what made it even sadder. He took in a shuddering breath and brushed his bangs out of his eyes, preparing to get up. Before he did though he glanced over Finn's desk, something catching his eye. Though Finn had hardly ever used this desk since he was always downstairs with Kurt helping him with his homework, there was a crumpled piece of paper in the far corner. It was small and looked like it hadn't been touched in ages, but yet it was still there, making Kurt wonder. He grasped it, the paper crinkling slightly in his hand. He started to unfold it carefully, wondering why he was so worried about what was on the paper. Knowing old-Finn, the Finn that Kurt used to know, it was probably something like old math notes.
"Kurt!" Kurt nearly jumped out of his skin, quickly crumpling the paper in his hands and stuffing it in his jeans pocket. He looked up with wide eyes at his dad, mentally sighing. He would have thanked the gods, but he didn't believe one existed. I mean after making him gay, making his entire childhood one big game of tease-the-homo and the killing off his mother and his boyfriend on Christmas, how was he actually supposed to believe there was one? If there was, then god had totally screwed him.
"Dad, I was just-"Kurt tried to cover for himself after being caught in Finn's room.
"There you are!" Carol said, coming up behind Burt and wrapping her arms around him. "We've been looking everywhere for you, we were just about to go Christmas tree hunting." Kurt sighed when he saw that they weren't mad at finding him in Finn's room, and followed them downstairs, forgetting about the paper he had stuffed in his pocket for now.
Burt and Carol were trying to gather up four portable-cups for hot chocolate, meaning that they'd probably end up tearing the kitchen apart while they searched, and no one knows how long that could take. Kurt decided to go ahead outside and wait in the car. He pulled on a sweater and put on a jacket over it. Weather was not nice to him and it definitely wasn't nice to designer clothes. Usually the heat made him freckle and burn and even the slightest cold breeze would give Kurt frost bite, plus designer sweaters were never warm and other clothes didn't account for the heat, so fall and spring were always Kurt's favorite lines. Around winter that did mean he usually had to go traipsing around with a puffy ugly jacket over his beautiful sweaters. Kurt also pulled on some gloves, just for added effect and also to complete his winter look.
He stepped outside and closed his eyes, trying to breathe in the cold air, always finding that cold air always seemed fresher than warm air. Instead of getting a lung full of fresh, bitingly-cold, air, he got a lung full of chalky silvery death. He coughed and glanced to his left, completely surprised to find Finn leaning against the edge of the porch with what could never be mistaken for anything else, a cigarette.
"Oh my gosh, Finn!" Kurt shrieked out. He quickly stepped forward and snatched it away from him. He looked at it like he was holding a used piece of gum with his bare hand before he quickly tossed it down and tried to step on it, not even realizing until after that his girly shrill had been the first thing he'd said to Finn yet. He ignored the burning in his cheeks and turned back to the taller male, looking at his angered face as though he'd grown three extra heads. "What if my dad or Carol had seen you?" Then Kurt remembered, he wasn't talking to teenage, good hearted Finn. This guy standing in front of him was practically a stranger, and with the way he was look at Kurt it was pretty obvious he was one to Finn as well.
"Dude, not cool!" Kurt flinched at Finn's harsh tone, and watched in shock as he just reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out another. He didn't have the heart or stomach to watch as Finn lit the new one and basically ignored Kurt completely, despite the smaller males' obvious discomfort. Luckily the front door opened and Burt and Carol headed out, locking the door behind them.
"You," Carol directly pointed at Finn, Kurt's dad handing Kurt his hot chocolate, "are not taking that in the car with you." Kurt was completely stunned at the lack of yelling Carol was doing after seeing her son with a cigarette. Of course, Kurt only had to remind himself, yet again, that he'd been gone for four years and a lot had changed.
The car ride was almost silent. If it weren't for Carol and Burt talking quietly up front of Carol's car the entire ride would have been silent, which is a shame because the entire ride took about an hour. The entire time Finn kept his gaze turned towards the world outside of his window, his fingers drumming impatiently on the side of his seat. Kurt sighed and tried to tune Mr. Sulky out of his thoughts, instead leaning his head back and focusing on his dad and Carol's frantic whispering up front.
Kurt was glad when they'd arrived, really needing to stretch his legs. Lima Ohio was such a small town, so they'd actually had to travel outside of Lima to be able to pick up a left over Christmas tree. Kurt got out of the car as quickly as possible, almost choking himself with his own seat belt in the process. Up just a few feet ahead was a completely dead looking Christmas tree lot. Kurt glanced up at the sign that read 'Christmas Trees, its pine-licious' overhead. Then inside the lot Kurt could see a few small bushes that could apparently be passed off as trees and browned tall trees with no more pine needles. He sighed as his dad put a warm arm around his shoulders and pulled him towards the lot, a huge smile on his face.
Kurt didn't think that they would find anything but they had barely walked in when a man, two times his dad's size, headed towards them. Kurt would never admit that he actually coward behind his father right then, but he did. The guy had a beard and beer-belly, mostly looking like one of those scary biker guys that Kurt knew would probably beat up a small petite gay boy. Of course nothing was as it seemed, because the man and Kurt's father actually hugged! Okay, so it wasn't exactly a hug but more of one of those embrace and slap each other roughly on the back type of things that guys liked to do.
"Hey! Teddy! You got our tree all saved up?" Kurt peaked around his father's shoulder and looked at the now brightly smiling man.
"Sure do!" He said proudly. "Ah, Carol!" Carol stepped forward and gave this guy a hug.
"Ted! You're looking great, that new diet working out for you, huh?" Ted kissed Carol's cheek and nodded, still smiling like crazy.
"And Finn, how ya' doing, son?" Ted grasped Finn's hand tightly in his and for the first time since Kurt had seen him, Finn actually smiled.
"I'm getting by, you know how it goes." Ted gave him a shrug in return, and turned away. Kurt instantly saw the change in Finn as he sunk back into the quite mood of his Kurt had seen that Finn had become so fond of.
"Ted, I'd like you to meet my son, Kurt. I've told you about him before." He father pushed Kurt in front of him, making the small male freeze and lock in place. This guy was huge and his father was just putting him out there. For the first time in his life, he was glad is fashionable sweater was hidden. He didn't want this guy to get all homophobic on him. Now he just had to refrain from talking and-
"Sure, sure!" The guy practically scooped Kurt up into a hug, and Kurt couldn't help but hug back. This guy was so warm and…friendly… "Great to finally meet you, you're dad's told me all about you! I hear you're into all that fancy clothing and decorating and stuff?" He asked when he'd freed Kurt from his bear hug. Kurt could only feebly nod in return. "Good, cause we have a few different trees for you to choose from and I sure don't want to be the one to clash with your decorating, so I'll let you go ahead and choose the one you guys take home, huh?" Kurt couldn't help but smile.
"That-that'd be great!" Kurt was actually really stunned. All his life every tough looking guy had always been extremely homophobic to him and would rather have his head served for their dogs' dinner than try to adapt so both he and them could be comfortable. He was in shock to say the least.
The rest of their tree hunting experience was narrowed down to three different trees. They would all go great in their living room, but Kurt really didn't want to decide. He'd done his job as a professional designer and now he couldn't choose. Mostly because he honestly didn't want a tree to remind him of what a horrible time of year this was. Ted had been greatly kind to all of them, even Kurt, and given them all refills of hot chocolate, but now all Kurt wanted to do was collapse and crawl back under his anti-Christmas rock.
"Kurt, dear, can you run and get my camera for me? I wanted to take a few pictures of all of us together." Carol gently asked him while fluffing up the branches of one of the trees left.
Kurt only nodded and grabbed Carol's keys to the car; all of his energy drained, and headed back towards the car. On his way there he caught sight of his dad and Finn up ahead, standing only a few feet away from the car. His dad had an almost vice grip on Finn's wrist. The hand attached to that wrist held another one of those cigarettes Finn had seemed to become so fond of as well. From what he could tell at this distance, neither of the two males were very happy with what the other was saying. Kurt decided to inch forward a bit and get into hearing range but ducked behind one of the telephone wiring poles when he thought he'd gotten as close as he could without the other two noticing.
"Look, I don't know what's going on with you lately, but you never usually have this attitude when you're here. Somehow I have a feeling this has something to do with Kurt." Kurt clutched Carol's keys tighter in his gloved fingers at his dad's assumption. He couldn't see either of them but by the way his dad continued, he was pretty sure Finn had nodded. "Do you know how much that kid has gone through? You already know about his mother's death at this time of year, but have you made any effort at all to try and find out why, suddenly, after four years of almost no contact he's just come back home? No you haven't. Well, you know why? It's because he's broken, Finn, broken. Your mother tried to tell you about Sam's death when you got hear last night but instead you just stormed up to your room and locked yourself in."
"S-Sam's death?" For the first time, Finn sounded like normal Finn. He sounded scared and naive like the innocent teenager Finn that Kurt was so familiar with. Kurt's breath hitched in his throat.
Of all things, he did not want his father talking behind his back about how pathetic and weak Kurt was. Instead he decided to make his presence known, coming out from behind the telephone pole and walking straight for them. It was obvious that both males knew they'd been caught doing something they shouldn't have by the guilty looks that covered their faces, or in Finn's case, just flashed across before disappearing. Kurt was struggling to hold himself together as he approached the others. Kurt shoved the keys into his father's had roughly, glaring daggers at his stepbrother.
"Carol wants her camera." He bit out sourly before actually running in the opposite direction, not quite sure where he was headed. And Kurt hated to run.
"Kurt!" He heard his dad call weakly behind him but he just ignored it, instead continuing to run away.
Kurt knew he couldn't just run away from what was trying to eat him alive. Of course, just as he thought that, his clumsiness kicked in and he tripped, falling roughly into the cold, dry dirt. His hands stung behind his gloves, but he didn't care. Instead he pulled his knees up to his chest and sucking in a chilly breath of air, trying to calm himself. Sadly, it wasn't working like he thought it was and instead he had started shaking, because he was getting upset or because he was cold, Kurt wasn't sure. Perhaps it was a combination of both. Slowly, Kurt felt tears slide down his cheeks, creating a burning cold feeling behind them.
Kurt sniffled as he heard footsteps crunching on the dirt, getting closer until they came to a complete stop in front of him. He didn't need to look up to know that Finn was standing over him, arms crossed across his chest and looking down at Kurt awkwardly. Kurt's tried to cover up his slow streaming tears but couldn't, so instead he just looked the other way, seeing the car not far away in the distance. Though he was quite impressed with himself for how far he'd run in a short amount of time. All praise was gone though when Finn slowly slunk down in the dirt next to him, refusing to look at Kurt just as much as Kurt was refusing to look at him.
"I saw you trip." Kurt turned now to glare a small glare at him. "It was kinda lame, but funny." Kurt had to blink to make sure but the corner of Finn's mouth had turned up just the slightest of slights, yet it had. Then Kurt couldn't be mad at Finn anymore, instead he rolled his eyes and let out a small breath of laughter. Finn slowly took one of Kurt's hands clutching tightly to his knees. It wasn't much, but it said a lot of things that needed to be said between the two. It explained each of their pent up aggression, frustration and fear of seeing each other for the first time in four years. It wasn't much, but it said a lot, and it was just what Kurt needed before he was ready for the next hit to take hi, by surprise.
