The next morning Finn was haunted by his dreams, of how they'd felt but also how tenuous they had been. Sure, his dreams usually disappeared when he woke up anyway, but if these were more than just dreams, if they were partly old memories like he'd been hoping, shouldn't they stick around more? He tried to grab onto the last wisp of his dream, that feeling of Rachel with him, but it was slipping away, and he still had no memory of having done it before.

Finn shunted that concern aside. He was making new memories just fine, so what about the actual things he'd done at Rachel's, two days ago? She'd been so clear that some of it had been something that only he, the Finn who knew her, could do. Could he remember doing that, maybe use it to get a bridge to doing it before?

He started in on the memory exploration exercise that the shrink had given him at their last meeting. Remember being there, he told himself. And he saw Rachel's room, saw her in front of him, so close and vulnerable and beautiful, looking up at him with love and hope. He'd definitely felt a lot just being close to her, a powerful attraction. Okay, I have that, he said to himself. Did it feel new or like I'd been with her before? He didn't know. That attraction, much stronger than anything he'd ever felt, that could have been new. Renewed, anyway, not something that was triggering any memories. Moving closer, anticipating that first kiss... not like he'd done it before. A first kiss was special. And that kiss had definitely been extra special, electricity, discovering how incredibly good her mouth felt and tasted and how right it felt to kiss her. Maybe he'd just always been attracted to her like that, he had been wondering why he'd gotten together with her and that could be why. Of course she hadn't forgotten how to kiss him, though she'd let him lead and it hadn't felt experienced. Just really awesome.

And then... huh. Hazy to nothing, like it all faded out when he'd lost himself in the moment. Literally lost himself, apparently. She'd told him about that thing he'd done, kissing her neck – but he didn't remember that really, even though the first part of the kiss was so vivid. He'd been there but not really present, and all he had were vague impressions. Next thing he really knew was coming back to his senses and feeling her body beneath his on her bed. And that special place on her neck, he didn't know where that was even now.

So was he remembering when he'd done that? Or was it autopilot, just more obviously than other times he'd done something automatically? He supposed it was good that it confirmed that the memories were still there. The scans had suggested some were, but what he'd done (or what his subconscious, or his instinct had done) confirmed that those boarded-off memories included Rachel. Included being with Rachel, kissing her, and presumably also loving her.

So if he could just get them back... but he didn't seem any closer to being able to access them properly, assimilate them back into himself, than he was before.

He groaned and turned over, then caught sight of his clock. He was doing an early shift that day and getting a ride into the shop with Burt, so he'd better get moving.

Mid-morning he felt like someone was watching him again, but tried to shrug it off. A moment later his co-worker Warren tapped him on his shoulder, and nodded towards the entry.

Finn turned, and was slightly relieved to see that it was Rachel. He walked slowly over to her, and she met him just inside the door.

"Hi," he said quietly, reddening a little as he found himself looking at her lips.

"Hi." She blushed a little too. "I hope you don't mind, Kurt told me you were here this morning."

Mind what? That she'd come, or that they obviously kept tabs on him? He supposed it didn't matter. "No, that's okay, I guess you have to find out how I'm doing somehow." That kinda covers both. He swallowed. "I've been thinking about what you told me," he admitted.

She looked hopeful. "And?"

"And?" Oh. "And nothing, I guess. Just thought you should know, I've been thinking about it. What it might mean."

"Oh." She showed a flicker of disappointment, but covered it quickly with a smile.

"I don't remember doing it."

"Well, no, I didn't expect you would, yet."

"No... I don't just mean from before. I don't even really remember doing it the other day." He saw her eyes widen. He moved closer to her, steering her into a corner so they could talk in confidence. "I remember being with you, in your room, and kissing you -" he blushed. "And, uh, it was really great and I've been thinking about that too -" he saw her smile return at that, genuinely happy. "But then it's basically nothing, really hazy. That thing you described, I don't remember doing it at all."

"Oh." She pressed her lips together. "So that was all subconscious?"

"Yeah. Automatic. Instinctive, I guess."

"What do you remember next?"

"Well, uh... I could feel a bit of what I was doing, fragments, hazy, not like I was in control of it at all, and then, uh... I was... um, with you, and uh..."

Finn was stumbling over his words, cringing at even trying to have this type of discussion with someone who was almost a total stranger as far as he was concerned. And somewhere deep down there was likely a part of him that just wanted to pull her into the break room and make out. Which would probably be really incredible, that kiss... Finn pulled himself sharply from the fantasy. He didn't know her well enough, he couldn't just use her. And he certainly couldn't trust himself to try something like that, if his instincts took over he might do almost anything, and then he wouldn't even be able to enjoy it or remember it properly. Or stop himself if he went too far.

"Just before you pulled away," she stated.

"Yeah." He frowned, his face tight.

"It scares you," Rachel said softly. "That you're doing things you don't understand." He stared at her, thrown by her knowing this. "No, I can't read your mind," she explained. "Just your face."

"I wish you could read my mind, at least then somebody could," he joked ruefully. "I wish I could read my mind."

"At least we know it's there." Rachel gave him a small hopeful smile.

"Yeah." It's just really hard to deal with there being more than one part of me. He exhaled. "I don't know what to do," he admitted. "About you, about anything."

"That's okay."

"No, it's not," Finn insisted. "I can't just go on instinct, my instinct is out of control, obviously. But it's not okay that I don't know what to do about you, I don't want to hurt you and I seem to keep doing that."

Rachel gave a small pout. "Then it's not okay. But it's what we have to deal with." Her eyes flickered down, then back up at him. "I know it's hard for you, to talk to me and open up to me, when you don't really know me. But please don't hide what you're going through from me, or pull away because you're confused or afraid that you'll hurt me. We're in this situation together, even if it doesn't seem that way to you." She swallowed. "I don't know what to do either. And it's not okay with me that I don't know how to help you. I hope we can figure it out together."

Finn nodded, not really sure what to say to that, but mostly understanding what she was saying. He couldn't entirely stop hurting her, the whole situation hurt her. She would be hurt as long as he was. "Okay," he said finally. "I get it, I think. I'll try, anyway."

"That's all we can do."

"Yeah." He looked down into her face again, once more feeling the effects of her being so close, wondering if kissing her again would feel as good as the first kiss had. But he couldn't trust himself. He swallowed. "I, uh, should get back to work," he said.

"Okay. I'll see you soon, I hope."

"Yeah. Soon." And he meant it.

In the late afternoon Puck showed up at the shop and offered him a ride.

"Let's just relax," Puck said as he drove, and a few moments later they pulled up at the school. There were some cars already there, and Mike and a few others from the football team were on the field nearby. "You've had a lot of drama going on, let's work off some steam. We thought you might like to pass the ball around and run some plays. Get your head out of all that girl and family stuff. I'm sure you still know how to throw a football."

"Sure." Finn grinned, getting out of the car and walking with Puck to the field. "Just like old times." He paused. "You're not going to call your quarterback 'kid', are you?" he asked Puck pointedly.

Puck grinned back. "Depends. Are you going to play like you're fifteen?"

Finn grimaced. "Hard to know, but I hope not. Point taken, anyway." He met his friend's eyes with a meaningful look and nod, acknowledging that they were talking about a lot more than just football.

"Good. Because it's been a long time since I played with a fifteen-year-old."

Finn smirked. Puck was leaving himself wide open to this. "That's not what I heard," he commented.

Puck rolled his eyes at Finn's zinger and thwacked him on the arm. "Not even. These days that's jailbait, Hudson." He jerked his head towards the field. "Come on, let's see what you've got."

This was just a pick-up game without proper gear, so they took it easy. But Finn found himself loosening up, enjoying having the ball in his hands again, and definitely enjoying calling the plays and successfully executing them. Being quarterback meant you were in charge, and it was a power Finn had been feeling he'd lost; he felt that familiar combination of tension and ease return, and it made him happy.

After a while it was getting into early evening, and many of them had other things to do.

"One last play. Let's try a 20 left twist," Finn called out. The others formed up, he took the ball, faded right, faked the handoff to a right-moving player, then moved left and passed long to Puck, who had moved in a zigzag pattern downfield. Puck caught it in triumph and ran to the endzone, spiking the ball with a celebratory yell that was echoed by the other players.

They came back together at midfield for high-fives. Mike, though, stared at Finn. "Finn – that's a Beiste play," he said.

"Crazy monster," Finn replied, grinning.

"Not beast. Beiste. Coach Beiste. She's only been our coach for the last two years, you don't even remember her," Mike insisted. Finn looked back, stunned, starting to understand the importance of Mike's words. "But you just called and ran one of her trick plays."

Puck, too, looked at Finn in shock, as did some of the others. "He's right, dude," Puck said, tapping Finn on the arm with the ball. "We learned that play late last summer, right after she invented it. And it's a tricky one all right, you have to know exactly where I'm going to be even when I'm not going the right way. If you didn't know it, you'd never have pulled that off."

"Wow." They had reached the bleachers, and Finn sank down on the nearest one. Several of the others called out their goodbyes and left.

"You're getting your memory back, man," Mike said.

"I don't know – I mean I threw the play, but I don't know how I knew it," Finn blurted out. "I don't remember learning it, or really what it is."

"You don't remember Beiste riding my ass about it until I got the timing right?" Puck asked. "'Cause you sure seemed to enjoy it at the time. Took me a while to get the movement right so I'd be just where you were going to put the ball, and I had to do a lot of pushups every time I screwed up."

"No, I don't," Finn admitted.

Puck hit the dirt and started doing pushups. "Anything coming back to you now?" he called out.

"Well I'm pretty sure I've seen you do pushups before," Finn said wryly. "Other than that, no."

Puck jumped back to his feet. "Well don't sweat it, dude," he said. "Just relax. Things are starting to come back, you don't need to push it."

Yeah, Finn thought. But despite his elation at definitely having recalled something, he was dissatisfied that it was still just subconscious. He'd accessed the memory and made use of it but he couldn't consciously remember it. Like gaming, and driving, and some of the stuff at work, and kissing Rachel... he could do things instinctively but didn't know how he could do them or remember doing them before.

"Let's run it again," he said. He needed to make this something he could do deliberately, really remember. Or at least do it when he wanted to.

But when the remaining players set off from the line, he only sort-of did the fake, and when it came to the pass – incomplete, nowhere near where Puck was. Try again, relax into it. He got the ball again, tried to relax, tried to let it all flow. And when they started moving again, he still had no clue where to throw, and eventually just spiked the ball hard in frustration.

He wasn't remembering. He could just do stuff, maybe, but he couldn't control it or think about it. Just like with Rachel. He hunched over, his head down, jaw set in anger at himself. Why couldn't he remember?

"Hey." Mike came over and leaned down to him. "You okay?" He caught Finn's pained look. "Right, sorry, dumb question. But don't worry about it so much. Everyone has things they can only do if they don't think about it. At least you could do it the first time, that's something, right?"

Right. Maybe. It was just so much less than what Finn needed.

The other players dispersed, leaving Finn with just Puck and Mike.

Mike checked his watch and frowned. "Need me to stick around?" he asked, more to Puck than to Finn.

Finn shook his head dumbly, and Puck motioned to Mike that he could go.

"Okay then. But you know I'm here, Finn. If you need me, and even if you don't. Okay?"

Finn nodded, choking back the tears that threatened. "Yeah, sure. Thanks Mike."

"No problem." With that, Mike jogged back to his car.

After a moment, Finn straightened up and wiped his eyes. "Still seem to cry like I'm fifteen," he commented to Puck, trying to make light of it. Or ten.

"Actually you never quite grew out of that. And what you're going through really sucks, so don't beat yourself up about getting all emotional." Puck clapped him on the shoulder. "Come on, let's head home. You must be starving, and I sure am."

Finn followed Puck back to the car, and Puck started driving him back to his place.

"Sorry for losing it back there," Finn said eventually. "I get so frustrated, it's like everything's just out of reach."

"But you're remembering some stuff, right?" Puck asked.

"That's just it," Finn answered slowly. "I don't know if I am. I'm not really remembering, not to think about anything, there's just stuff I can do. But it doesn't feel like me doing it, I can't do it if I'm paying attention at all, I can't even seem to trigger it much. And I had stuff like that already, gaming, driving, basically ever since I woke up there have been things I was just doing, extensions to stuff I could do automatically before. I just notice it more now, it's different stuff. More obvious."

"But that play -"

"It's the first time I played football since I woke up. And, uh, other stuff..." he trailed off.

"'Other stuff'?" Puck asked quizzically.

"Yeah, uh..." Finn frowned, staring at the dashboard. "It's, um..." he took a deep breath. "Rachel."

Puck pulled over suddenly, put the car into park, then looked intently over at Finn. "You were doing something with Rachel."

"Yeah," Finn said softly. "Um, not much, not once I realized I was, just... oh hell." She didn't want me to tell anyone about this, it was private. Or maybe she just meant the details 'cause it was special. And I'm not going to tell Puck that I basically jumped her.

"You are engaged, you know," Puck reminded him. "She's the one you're supposed to be doing stuff with."

"And I don't really know her. But I kissed her -"

"About time."

Finn rolled his eyes. "Yeah I guess so. It was totally amazing, so I get that."

"Doesn't sound like a problem to me."

"Yeah, well, then I got into it. And there's something I did, she swore me to secrecy about what and I don't really remember anyway, just how she described it later, but there's something about how I did it that's just me. Special. But I don't remember doing it, I don't know how, it was just autopilot like running that play."

"Still not seeing the problem."

"I don't know what the hell I'm doing, that's the problem. It's like that other part of me just steps in and takes over and does whatever it feels like. I can't turn it on and off, I can't control it, and I don't know what I'm doing. Or saying. I called that play and I don't even know what I said to call it." Finn huffed in frustration. "I feel like I was a zombie."

"A zombie that can play football pretty well." Puck pulled back out into the road, resuming their drive.

"Not helping."

"Sorry, hard not to be a smartass. But go easy on yourself," Puck said. "It's all still really new, it hasn't been that long yet."

"I guess." But I can't get things done like this – and how am I supposed to get to know Rachel or try to trigger memories if stuff like that happens?

Puck fiddled with his car stereo. "You need something to take your mind off it."

"Sure," Finn said, exhaling, trying to calm himself back down. "Music would be good. As long as it's not something I'm supposed to know but don't."

"This is new, it's been out for just over a month and you hadn't had a chance to listen to it yet, you told me so, uh, just before. New Rush album."

"Oh, hey." Finn had seen it on his iPod but hadn't had a chance to listen to it, so yeah, this would be new.

"This track has a great bass line – even by their standards – I'm thinking about working on it. And check out the drums. We'd go great together on this if we gave it a shot." Puck gave a feral grin. "It's called 'The Anarchist'."

Finn smirked. "Sure you're interested in the bass line," he said with a touch of sarcasm.

"Hey, listen. You will like these drums." Puck hit 'Play', and the music kicked in, first the drums, then the lead guitar, finally the bass.

And yeah, Finn could sink into the music, the driving bass line and the drums. And the drums were great, probably way more intricate than he'd ever do, but he could get into them anyway. He started feeling the piece, anticipating the progression and airdrumming the basics along, relaxing as he felt out the new song in the same way he'd done for years with new material. He was probably better at doing that now but at least it didn't feel alien, and he was in control. And this was a brand new song that he'd never heard before at all so he knew this was all him, now, consciously doing it. He started feeling more alive, more himself, even laughing when his predicted drumbeats screwed up.

He settled into it further as the song segued into what should be the chorus. But then suddenly a lyric line registered clearly: (*)

a missing part of me that grows around me like a cage

Finn froze. It was too close to how he felt, what he was trying not to think about.

Puck noticed his shock and heard the line as it repeated. He slammed his hand against the stereo knob to turn it off. "Shit. I am really fucking sorry, dude, I didn't think," he blurted out. He drove on in silence for a couple of minutes, finally pulling up at the Hudson-Hummel house. He turned to Finn, looking intently at him.

"Guess I'm oh-for-two on distractions, huh," Puck said ruefully.

Finn shrugged, still staring at the dashboard. "Everything's a minefield, Puck, don't sweat it." He looked over at his friend, starting to unclench a little. "They were great, really, until. Beats obsessing over it all the time." He exhaled. "And I have to deal with this stuff one way or another anyway. However I can."

"Up for anything more tonight?" Puck asked.

"Think I'll drum for a bit, actually. Good idea, really. Thanks. And for the ride. See you tomorrow."

Back in the house, Finn went to the kitchen to scrounge some food. He found a plate set aside with leftovers; of course they'd known he would be late and hungry. His stomach unknotted enough for him to eat, and then he headed up to his room to drum. He should probably let his mom or someone know he was home, but he didn't really want to talk to anyone right now, so he figured they'd know as soon as he started playing.

But before heading to his kit, Finn went to his computer and quickly put together a new playlist: every rock instrumental he had, plus some songs that had nothing to do with women, relationships, or life (which didn't leave much, though "Juke Box Hero" and "Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap" still made the cut). Feeling slightly sardonic he threw in "Crazy Train", hoping that maybe he'd be able to handle his situation a little better if he could laugh about it.

Satisfied that he had a set that wouldn't blindside him, he sat down at his kit, warmed up, and started to play with the music. And eventually he eased again, finding comfort in the familiar movements and sounds, enjoying the feel of executing something that he'd practiced so often, largely automatic but not completely, still consciously alterable. And he felt present, his attention on his drumming, his mind otherwise quiet as the rhythm flowed through him. As with playing quarterback, drumming meant he was in charge, setting the rhythm. Of course when he practiced this was an illusion as he played with recorded music, but he could still add fills and accents as he wanted. He added counter-rhythms to the existing drums on one track, just to see how it would sound and prove to himself that he could.

Temporarily he felt whole, even though he knew that was an illusion as well.

But when he went to sleep that line burned in his mind again, reinforcing how trapped he felt by his inaccessible memories: (*)

a missing part of me that grows around me like a cage

Though hearing it put into words did make him feel a little less alone.

* "The Anarchist", performed by Rush, lyrics by Neil Peart.