DISCLAIMER: I neither own Glee nor the characters. They are the property of Ryan Murphy and FOX. This is purely for fun. Enjoy!

Chapter Four: My American Hero

Finn didn't sleep very well that night at all; he didn't know whether it was from all the food he had shoved down his throat or the look of disappointment on his parent's faces during their argument, but something had kept him up all night long, tossing and turning. Maybe it was the secret that had been dancing in Rachel's eyes that had kept him up so late; he was aching to know what her plans were now that he was officially invited along for the ride, but she was probably just teasing him. There was no way that a beautiful, ambitious French girl like her would ever fall for a loser like him, so he didn't want to get his hopes up in vain. No, the unease he felt was definitely a result of the stress he was currently feeling about his future.

Yeah, that had to be it.

He woke up earlier than normal the next morning, probably due to his lack of sleep throughout the night. When he came downstairs to eat breakfast he spotted his mother in the kitchen and immediately felt guilty over their argument from the night before. She gave him a kind smile while she stirred her coffee which made him feel even worse.

"Mom?" He said, approaching her with hesitation. "I'm sorry about last night." She opened up her arms for a hug and he immediately fell into her embrace, holding her tightly and feeling like an over-sized baby.

"Me too, honey. We shouldn't have brought it up during dinner like that in front of Rachel and Kurt."

"No, I shouldn't have yelled at you like that," he said, pulling away from her. "It's not your fault that I don't know what to do with myself after graduation." She rubbed his arms tenderly and gave him a reassuring smile.

"We'll figure something out, Finn. I promise." The smile he gave her didn't reach his eyes as she grabbed her purse and coat. "I'll see you tonight. We can talk more."

"Yeah, sure," he said as she left the house for the day. He was still feeling bummed as he poured himself a bowl of cereal and munched away at it while Kurt and Rachel descended the stairs and joined him for breakfast. Rachel was wearing a bright pink dress today, her ever present white beret perched on her head as she smiled at him brightly from her seat across the table.

"Are you working today after school?" Kurt asked him as Rachel kept smiling at him in a way that made him self-conscious. Was there something on his face?

"Um, no," he said, picking up a napkin and rubbing his mouth just in case. There was nothing there. "I wasn't planning on it."

"We go to mall today!" Rachel said brightly as she popped a strawberry into her mouth. "You come too," it was more of a demand than a question and Finn shook his head.

"I really shouldn't. I promised Mom that we would talk about my post-graduation plans this afternoon." Rachel's face fell as a deep frown pulled down her lips.

"Mais Feen," she said, her lower lip trembling. "You say we see 'ze mall." Her big brown eyes were wide and pleading and he felt his resolve crumble under the weight of her stare. How could he say no to a girl like her? She looked so sad and he hated that he was the cause of it.

"You really want me to come?" He asked, rubbing the back of his neck shyly. Kurt was giving him a pointed look from across the table and he chose to ignore it.

"Bien sur!" She said, her face lighting up once more.

"Alright," he relented while one of Kurt's eyebrows raised in amusement. "I'll come."

"We can take my car to school today, we'll need the extra space since Blaine is coming with us as well. We need to start coordinating our outfits for Regionals." Kurt grabbed his bag and started to clean up from breakfast. "Come on guys, we're going to be late."

Finn obediently followed Kurt and Rachel to the car and took the back seat so Kurt could sit with Blaine after they picked him up. It was comfortable in the backseat with Rachel; she was mostly preoccupied with looking out of the window, but today the French girl turned to face Finn with the same mischievous smile she had been giving him all morning long.

"What is it?" He asked finally, feeling more than a little tense as she continued to stare at him.

Her response was a shake of her head and the same knowing smile.

And damn it was a pretty smile.

They arrived at school on time and Finn followed his friends through the halls of McKinely high school until they came across a barrier that set Finn's nerves on edge. The hallway was blocked off by Rick the Stick and all of his douchebag teammates from the hockey team. They were all carrying familiar white cups, filled to the brim with ice cold slushies.

It was a slushie blitzkrieg waiting to happen as Kurt, Blaine, Finn and Rachel stopped dead in their tracks. Rachel went to move forward, unaware of the clear and present danger, and Finn grabbed her by the wrist, pulling her behind him.

"Don't move," he ordered her. "Stay right here." He saw her nod her head from his periphery as he turned to face Rick and wished that he could rip that greasy mullet right off of his head.

"Where's the new girl, Hudson? She needs to be initiated."

"Fuck off," he said as Blaine stepped forward next to him in solidarity. At least he knew that Blaine could swing a punch if it came down to it. "Just leave her alone and there won't be any problems."

"No way," he said, malice dripping from his every word. "She fits all the criteria for a slushie facial; she's new, she joined the glee club and she hangs out with you losers."Rick turned to laugh along with his other friends, and when he turned to face Finn once more, he was shocked as Finn cocked back his arm and landed a hard punch right to the face.

The cup went flying out of his hand and a massacre had begun.

Bright purple slush was flying through the air as Finn tackled Rick to the ground, his fists flying everywhere. When Rick called him a loser something inside of him had snapped and he lost all control of his emotions as he released his frustrations on the hockey captain. Blaine got pulled into the fight as well, and Finn saw Kurt dragging Rachel away from the messy fight as the goalie jumped on Finn's back and tried to pry him off of Rick. People were slipping all over the place on the slick floor as Rick landed a hard punch right into Finn's gut, knocking out the air and leaving him gasping for breath.

"What is the meaning of this?" A loud roar could be heard behind him and all motion stopped as Coach Beiste hovered over the cold and slimy fray. Finn looked up at his coach with true fear in his gaze as she tried to remain balanced on the slippery floor. "Hudson, Anderson, you're coming with me! The rest of you report to Figgins! MOVE IT!" The boys all scrambled to their feet, trying not to fall on the sticky hallway. Finn was covered in slushie all over; it was soaked all the way down to his undershirt and he could even feel it swimming in his shoes. He followed Beiste to the locker room and she pointed towards the showers.

"Get clean and meet me in my office. We have a lot to discuss." Blaine and Finn were obedient as they followed orders, showering quickly and changing into spare gym clothes.

Blaine was the first one to speak when they arrived in Beiste's office, and the coach did not look happy. "Ma'am, I would like to preface this meeting by saying that this incident was not our fault. The hockey guys instigated us and threatened to slushie the new girl. We were just trying to protect her."

"I understand that, Anderson, but you can't fight on school grounds, either of you. Figgins is going to deal with the hockey team, but I want to know why two upstanding guys like you would resort to such petty violence?"

Finn shrugged his shoulders, the word loser still echoing in his mind as he thought of Rachel and the image of her covered in purple slush. He couldn't just let Rick get away with that. "I'm sorry, Coach. It won't happen again."

"It shouldn't have happened in the first place," she sighed deeply and wrote them both passes for first period. "I hate to do this but you're both serving detention with me on Saturday." Shit, his parents were really going to kill him. First Pillsbury was on his case, now Bieste was too. Blaine groaned and let his head fall back while Finn tried not to picture Burt's angry face. "Now get going and stay out of trouble."

"Yes, Coach Beiste," they said in unison as they left the locker room.

Blaine shoved his hands in the pockets of his gym pants as they made their way through the halls and Finn turned to him with a grateful smile. "Thanks for having my back today, Blaine. I really appreciate it."

"Yeah, no problem. I'll never let a bully walk over me or my friends ever again and Rachel didn't deserve a slushie facial. She's a sweet girl."

"Yeah," he agreed, picturing her shocked face from this morning and hoping she was okay. "She's great."

He felt Blaine nudge him playfully in the side. "You don't have a thing for her, do you?" Blaine asked while Finn blushed crimson.

"N-No way!" He responded, a little too quickly as he looked away from embarrassment. "She lives in my house."

"Yeah, but like, the way she smiles at you. . ." he said as Finn's head snapped up. He'd noticed it too?

"What?" Blaine brushed it off with a wave.

"I'm probably just reading into it too much. Kurt is finally starting to rub off on me," he said with a grin as he entered his classroom. "See ya later, dude."

"Yeah," Finn said to himself as he continued his trek to first period alone, his head still filled with questions that needed answers. "See ya."

It was a long and tedious morning for Finn as he struggled to remain focused during his classes. His mind was currently stuck on Rachel and even after trying countless distractions, which included actually doing his work and paying attention, he still couldn't get the French transfer student out of his mind.

At least he knew he wasn't crazy; Rachel really had been staring at him funny and even Blaine had noticed, so he knew that something was up. He didn't want to ask Kurt to translate for him because he was too embarrassed to get caught asking about the exchange student and even more worried about what her response would be.

It was driving him insane.

All he had to do was wait until lunch and then he would be sure. If she was still staring at him funny then he was going to say something about it. He couldn't be awkward around her forever.

Unfortunately for Finn, she wasn't in lunch with Kurt and the rest of his friends. He approached his step-brother and asked where she was and he said that she had disappeared to call her dads. Apparently Paris was six hours ahead of Ohio and noon was the best time to call them. He couldn't help but feel the sting of disappointment when she arrived right before the bell rang. At least she sat down right next to him.

However, she refused to look him in the eye.

Was he hallucinating or something? This morning she was practically staring holes right through him and now she wouldn't even look him in the face. Now he was the one staring at her throughout the end of lunch and when the bell rang he followed her out of the lunch room and grabbed her by the wrist so he could talk to her. She gasped when she turned around and looked him in the eye and for a moment he thought that he saw fear in her gaze.

He let go of her wrist instantly. Maybe the fight this morning had scared her? Maybe she thought he was nothing but a huge barbarian and a thug?

"Are we still going to the mall today?" He asked her as a light blush spread across her face.

"Oui," was all she said with a nod of her head before she practically ran away from him in the other direction. He felt like garbage for the rest of the day, wishing that there was a way for them to communicate easier so she could understand. He didn't mean to get into that fight, he was simply trying to protect her. Didn't she realize that?

She was still avoiding his gaze when they met up by Kurt's car after school. In fact, she was incredibly quiet throughout their trip to the mall and even Kurt's efforts to start a conversation with her in French were in vain as she closed herself off from everyone.

Her infectious happiness returned, however, one they arrived at the mall. She took one look at the giant building and the stores it offered and couldn't help but smile and jump around from store to store. She pulled them all into Macy's and Finn branched off from her and the boys so he could pick up a new sweater to replace the sticky one that was still in his gym locker at school. Wandering around the mall was a welcome distraction from his hectic week and all the problems he'd been facing up until now. Eventually he found a decent shirt and paid for it, using his height as an advantage as he sniffed out Rachel, Kurt and Blaine in the store. He saw his step-brother with Blaine by the cologne case and looked around for Rachel, who was nowhere in sight.

"Hey," he greeted them while he looked around for the familiar bright pink dress. "Where's Rachel?" Blaine's eyes shot open from shock as Kurt turned around to face Finn with concern in his gaze.

"We thought she was with you," he said, his face becoming deathly pale. "She was following you when you walked off, we thought you were together this entire time." Panic instantly shot through his system like a drug as his pulse began to race.

"No way, man, I thought she was with you." He looked at the crowd around him and not a single person in his periphery was wearing a white beret. Rachel was lost in the mall with no way to find him and he could feel a burst of adrenaline shoot through his system. "We'll split up. You two take the upper levels and we'll meet at Starbucks. She has to be in the mall somewhere, we just have to find her."

"Finn, the girl barely speaks English," Kurt said as they quickly ran throughout Macy's.

"So start yelling in French!" He called to them, splitting apart and letting the adrenaline in his veins fuel his search for her. She must be terrified, he thought to himself as he pushed through the sea of people. He went through every section in Macy's and she was nowhere to be seen as he continued his frantic search for her. "Rachel!" He called out over the heads of the people around them. There was no answer as people looked at him like he was crazy.

"Fuck!" He cursed liberally, exiting the Macy's and entering the long and crowded corridors of the mall. She didn't even have a cell phone that he could call, and he doubted that she would be able to follow his directions back anyway. He needed to find her, and he needed to find her now.

He ran towards the food court, where the crowds became thicker and more dense. A bright flash of color grabbed his attention as he looked across the mall where the Auntie Anne's pretzel station was. A short girl with a white beret was clutching a bag to her side and looking at her surroundings in confusion. He cupped his hands around his mouth and called to her. "Rachel!" The girl turned immediately and Finn heaved a deep sigh of relief as he recognized the family guest. He started to run towards her and she did the same, quickly closing the distance between them as his panic subsided.

"Feen!" She yelled. "Feen!" He slowed down as she approached him, but she seemed to pick up speed and crashed right into his chest, wrapping her arms around him and burying her face into his shirt.

"Whoa," he said, looking around him to gauge other people's reactions. No one even seemed to notice them, so he wrapped his arms around her tiny frame and realized that she was shaking. "Are you okay?"

"Non," she said, sniffling lightly as she looked up into his eyes. She was visibly upset as her eyes filled with tears. "Do not go." His heart broke for her as he noticed the panic on her face. His arms tightened around her body as he rested his cheek on her soft, white beret.

"I'm not going anywhere, Rachel. I've got you." Her body was warm and soft and pressed up against him in the most intimate way, so he pulled back to give them some space.

"I was so lost," she said, shaking her head. "I no understand the signs." She looked up at him and the same yearning from this morning was now plainly visible in her gaze once again. If only he understood what it meant. He started to walk them towards Starbucks and quickly texted Kurt to tell him that the French girl had been found. "'Ze mall is too big."

"Why did you leave Kurt?" He asked her as she clutched his sleeve, too afraid to let go as they walked through the mall together, side by side.

"I want to talk to you," she said sadly, looking away from him.

"Okay," he said, shrugging his shoulders. "What do you want to talk about?"

"C'est le problème," she sighed. "I do not know 'ze words."

"Ah," he said, finally starting to understand her behavior around him. There was definitely something that she wanted to say to him, but she didn't know enough English to get her point across. "Then maybe you can tell Kurt and he can translate it for me." A certain panic entered her gaze and she shook her head.

"Non, 'zey are mes secrets. I tell you." She seemed really adamant about it so he didn't want to push her. She leaned her head against his arm and he enjoyed the simple contact as she refused to let him go.

"I thought you were mad at me today," he confessed suddenly. "After the fight this morning."

"Mais non!" She said, gripping his t-shirt tighter. "I was sad," she tried to explain.

"Why?"

"C'était ma faute," she said. "You fight because of me."

"Well, I was trying to protect you," he admitted, a deep blush warming up his face. "I didn't want you to get attacked like that."

She stopped walking, and since she was currently attached to his arm, he slowed down to a halt as well. The look in her eyes was so intense it was scary, but he couldn't look away. Her eyes hypnotized him in a way that he couldn't understand and he stood there like a fool as she reached up onto her tiptoes and placed a soft, sweet kiss on his cheek. His heart clenched tightly in his chest as he stared at the tears gathering in her eyes.

"Merci bien, Feen." She leaned into his embrace once more and this time he didn't hesitate to wrap his arms around her. "When I learn 'ze words, I tell you mes secrets."

"Rachel. . ." he said, holding onto her tightly as his heart pounded in his chest.

"I promise," she said breaking from their embrace and meeting his eyes once more. The urge to lean over and kiss her was almost too strong to ignore as her soft pink lips beckoned to him, pulling his face down almost to her level. She gazed up at him and their bodies unconsciously moved closer as she licked her lips in anticipation.

A shrill yet familiar voice suddenly rang in his ear as he noticed Kurt and Blaine running up to them and screaming at the top of their lungs. Finn backed away from Rachel quickly, right before Kurt pulled her in for a tight and smothering hug.

"Oh God, I haven't been this scared since the DVR forgot to record Bette Midler's HBO special." He spoke to her quickly in French while Blaine and Finn started to lead the group out of the mall. Kurt kept shooting Finn these weird looks that he didn't understand as he was conversing with Rachel and Finn took it upon himself to drive them all home, dropping off Blaine before returning to his parents house.

No one was home when they entered the house and Finn watched as Rachel immediately went into the kitchen to start making dinner. He wanted to help her, or at least keep her company, any excuse to be near her or spend time with her, but Kurt quickly pulled him upstairs and shut his bedroom door behind him as he squared off against his brother.

"What's up?" Finn asked, not liking the way his brother was glaring at him from across the room.

"What's up? What's up? A lot of things are up right now, Finn. First, how about you explain that fight to me this morning, huh? You got my boyfriend in trouble because of that fight." Finn leveled Kurt with a single look.

"Did you honestly expect me to just stand back and allow her to get slushied?"

"We go through it every day!"

"Yeah, so? She didn't deserve it!" Kurt's eyes narrowed in suspicion.

"You really do have a thing for her, don't you? I saw the way you two were looking at each other all day." He threw his hands in the air, frustrated that no one believed him.

"No!" Kurt did not seem convinced as he continued his rant.

"Because all day long she wouldn't shut up about you. First you protected her during the fight, then you found her in the mall. Now every word that comes out of her mouth is Feen this and Feen that and Feen is tall and Feen can sing and Feen is beau and. . . "

"What?" Finn asked suddenly. "What was that word?" Kurt's eyes shot open when he realized what he had said. "Bow?"

"Beau," Kurt repeated. "It means handsome." Finn's mind was racing at light speed as his mind was fixated on Rachel. "I'm just making it worse, aren't I?"

His focus turned to his brother and Finn sighed deeply. "Look, Rachel is a great girl, but there's nothing going on between us. I swear." Kurt rolled his eyes and he continued. "She can barely speak English and I don't know a thing about her!" There was a knock on the door and Kurt opened it to reveal a smiling Rachel, staring directly at him.

"I make more pâtisseries, Feen," she said brightly, holding up a tray. "Pour vous, mon héros Américain." Kurt gave him a pointed look as he struggled to keep his voice steady.

"Thanks, Rachel. I'll be downstairs in a minute." She nodded once and bounced off with a smile while Kurt stared at Finn with an expression that clearly screamed 'I told you so.'

"For you, my American hero," Kurt translated with a smile. Finn suddenly felt lightheaded as he thought about the meaning behind her words. Did she really think about him that way? "Will the wedding be here in Lima or will we have to travel all the way to Paris for the nuptials?" Finn tried in vain to ignore his taunting as he followed Rachel and the delicious baked goods downstairs, calling to his step-brother over his shoulder.

"Just shut up and let me enjoy my hero pastries in peace."

Merci mille fois, mes amis!

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