Over the next few weeks it felt to Finn like the dam in his mind was getting quite a few holes, but very small ones. Every so often something would happen, like something he said or heard or occasionally thought, that would trigger either a feeling of familiarity or a short flash of memory. A sound, an image, like a split second of his life but not enough to really use for anything. Some of these were of Rachel, some of them not; one evening talking to his mom he caught a flash of an argument he'd had with her, something about Burt. He'd thought it over later and managed to get a greater sense of it, at least a general feeling that this was when she and Burt had started getting serious and he hadn't taken it too well. Sorry, Mom.
Sometimes he could get a bit more out of these, if he tried exploring them a little, some context: a sense of place or how he was feeling, a bit of what else was going on with him then, or extending them. But they were just snippets, they didn't seem to lead into much of anything else or really change him as far as he could tell.
So some memories were there, and that was great, but... Finn was dissatisfied with their limited effect on how he felt. Sure, he was feeling stronger, less beaten down from the frustration he'd had when not remembering anything, but everything was still in pieces and he felt like he was too. In some ways it was worse than not remembering anything at all, he was stuck in between remembering and not, unsure from one time to the next just who he was and what he knew. But he supposed it had to get worse like that in order to get better, if it – he – did really get better. And it was progress.
Sitting in his room one evening, his homework done, he considered some of the memories again, thinking about his fragments from Nationals and hoping he could get a bit more to fill in the gaps. Sometimes he seemed to but he couldn't be sure, he was a little afraid of pushing too hard because he might just be making new stuff up. As for other times... he looked at that picture of Rachel by his bed, focusing on his hand holding hers, and he knew himself, he could tell the care with which his large hand held her small one. Touching her engagement ring, confirming that the hand it was on was part of the most precious thing in the world and she was his. Evidence that he'd felt like that about her, once. But even with the picture to remind him, he didn't remember being there, doing that, having that feeling.
Finn knew he cared for Rachel, and when he thought about those memories he'd brought back, of Sectionals and her kissing him afterwards, of writing and performing his lines of that song at Nationals, of meeting her on the bridge, when he really sank into them then he knew he loved her. But when he wasn't... he really didn't know how he felt, even though he certainly thought about her a lot. He tried to explain this to the shrink, about how he had those things and feelings so strongly in the memories, but not nearly as much outside them, and he'd been told he needed to give it time and hopefully the memories would integrate better. But how could that happen when all he had was pieces that didn't fit together?
It was like playing a complex drum fill, you needed to know more than just what to hit and the order, you needed to get the movement right so it flowed, so you could actually get from one strike to the next in a way that worked. Having used this comparison during his psych appointment, Finn then spent the next ten minutes talking about drumming basics, which he supposed did at least give the doctor a good idea of how Finn related to things, but... it didn't produce any answers. Just six hmms and one statement at the end.
"You're missing not just pieces but also the transitions between the pieces you do have," Finn was told. Which was right, but okay he already basically knew that. Maybe now the shrink knew what he was getting at he'd have some advice next time. Or maybe these appointments were just to get Finn to talk and make sure he wasn't going off the deep end.
And how could the transitional stuff come back? How he'd been getting memories back, that had depended a lot on the uniqueness of the memories, big events that weren't like anything else. Transitions, the background rest of his life, usually you didn't even notice that stuff, but you needed it.
Finn fought for his memories, every flash he got he tried to get more out of, figure out how it fit with the rest. He'd never thought this hard about anything before, or even known he could, he'd never even worked anywhere near this hard for football practice or anything like that. But this was for his life, nothing else had ever mattered so much. Finn was determined to squeeze as much memories out as possible, and he'd keep at it now he had some idea of how to do it. I won't give up. I don't give up that easy... Finn broke off his contemplation as something else interrupted. School. Lockers. Rachel, younger, agitated. Himself, determined. 'I'm not just some guy you met at the music store you can just blow off.' Not going to give up, fighting to get her back. Jeez, how many times did I have to do that? He rolled his eyes at himself. How many times did you fuck it up, Hudson? God, this must be love for both of us to keep coming back, through all that.
These fragments were getting easier to have, the walls getting thinner, more pieces slipping through. But still pieces, small ones too, mostly just brief flashes that didn't come close to fitting together. He remembered more but they weren't really part of him. Most of them just sort of floated around, showing up when they wanted to but were hard to bring in deliberately or relate each other. And no transitions.
Meanwhile, the most important pieces were still gone. Memories of wanting Rachel, okay, and some of being happy with her, but none about getting her back. Or how they'd fallen for each other in the first place, or the various other steps they must have gone through to get from kids in their mid-teens who hardly knew each other to getting engaged two and a half years later. Not much of the big things that had made their lives what they had been. Maybe he'd have a chance to get those back when she was around again.
But even if he could get the big stuff, if he couldn't get the transitions – it would be like that china cup of his mom's that he'd accidentally broken when he was seven. She'd put all the pieces back together and repaired it, as well as could be done, but you could still see the joins, and even some gaps where some of it had just turned into dust and couldn't be put back. It was still better than losing it, he realized later that the cup had some significance for his mom that she never admitted to him, why else hold onto it after that, but it was never the same. Smooth curves marred by lines and gaps. It looked sort of right, if he squinted and didn't touch it, but it wasn't.
He didn't want that, not for his life and how he felt. He needed something more like the stuff they used at the windshield repair shop to fill in all the chips and cracks, make everything like new again. He made the mistake of using this comparison to Puck one night between Call of Duty games, and had to put up with two plus weeks of comments about "mind grout". At least someone was getting amused out of this.
Hopefully they'll integrate, he'd been told. Huh. They hadn't yet, even the ones from Sectionals hadn't filled in and he'd had them for over a month now.
So he should 'give it time', sure, fine, but it's not like Belhaven had a girl like Rachel waiting for him to love her again. Not that there was another girl like Rachel, between the little he remembered and the time he'd spent with her, he knew she was one of a kind. Not always in the best way, but when you love someone you take the package deal and the package just works. He'd worried a little that maybe the love was all in the past and that's why it wasn't coming back, but he'd seen himself briefly in those pictures Kurt had showed him from the Fourth of July, and he had looked very happy then, just two days before the accident. What he was trying to bring back was real. But he couldn't be with her if he had to actively remember loving her in the past to do it, it needed to just be there, him now really loving her now. Part of his flow, his transitions, himself.
So even though he was putting things in place to get his future going, Finn knew his life was still on hold until he could recapture those feelings and get some sense of continuity in himself.
Staring off in thought, Finn's eye caught on his drum set in the corner. At least those transitions he could do. It'd help reinforce music for him, too, since it seemed to be what helped most. He settled on his stool, grabbed his sticks, and set his iPod to his drumming playlist, on shuffle. Shuffle kept his reflexes sharp and might even spring something on him unexpectedly that could help out.
He smirked as he heard the opening of "Back in Black", always a good one to play. And he started singing along, too, not in imitation because he didn't want to trash his voice, but to get into it more, start to think the words too, hope to make them real. To be back.
Transitions. Easier to get them when you didn't think about them, of course, drumming or not.
Finn drummed on, thinking about what Belhaven had said previously about patterns. Performances were good, because the pattern had been repeated, making it stronger. Repetition also got in the way, because there were different memories – but the performance itself was likely to be stronger than a rehearsal.
But it was much easier to fall into repeated patterns, like... Finn grinned as he realized he'd drummed most of "Back in Black" without really thinking about it, he'd practiced it so much. The pattern was ingrained. But that wouldn't help him remember one time he played it, he didn't even always think about it, and by now he couldn't really remember learning it in the first place.
He still felt it, though, felt the song and its rhythm reverberate through him. He finished the song and stopped the music while he thought about this.
Okay, so it might not work for memories. But he wasn't just trying to recapture memories, he wanted feelings too. Was there something he would have done a lot with Rachel, something that he would only have done with her? It might not help him remember any actual events, but it might help him feel the same way again, and make the remembered feelings more part of himself.
He winced as one rather obvious answer came to mind. But Finn thought more, about what Rachel was like, according to what he'd seen, what she'd said, what others had said about her... and he realized there was one thing that he must have done a lot with her that there was no way he would ever have done on his own, or with anyone else.
Finn frowned. It was probably going to be pretty unnatural, trying that without her, but... worth a try I guess. He could always do it again with her when she got back. And it would be better if he could do it in her room, like they probably would have before. He dug out his phone and called Rachel's home number.
"Hello, Mister Berry? It's Finn. I was just wondering, there's a big favor I'd like to ask of you..."
Some awkward discussion ensued, but Finn explained what he wanted to try doing and why, and Rachel's dads were soon on board with his experiment.
The next Friday evening Finn went over to the Berry house.
LeRoy answered the door and showed him up to Rachel's room. "We'll be downstairs if you need anything, Finn," he said, then left him alone. They'd gotten everything ready for him, even had a body pillow laid out for him if he wanted to use it.
He took a few minutes to look around first. Certainly he remembered it from when he'd come to see Rachel that one time before, but aside from that it didn't seem familiar. But he shouldn't force these things, he needed to just relax and take it in, hope it could feel natural even if he didn't remember it. Of course she'd moved some of her things to New York, her computer obviously gone, and he let himself be a bit nosy and look inside the closets. A lot of clothes still there, but plenty of space to show a lot was missing, too. He recognized the cherry dress he'd seen her in twice, but there was no sign of the pink one that haunted his dreams, the one she'd worn to the fair. Nightgowns at the end... he ran his fingers along them, they felt good to touch, but this was getting above and beyond a look around. He didn't really have permission since her dads had agreed to not tell her what he was doing, and his fantasies about her were already getting out of hand without him looking through her lingerie.
He looked around the room more, just absorbing it. The Nationals picture was gone from before, she must have taken it with her, but there were a lot of framed posters up, all from Broadway shows. He spotted the one from Fiddler on the Roof that Puck had mentioned, and had a brief irrational flare-up of ire that Puck had known because he'd been here. Yeah, okay, he was jealous that anyone else had felt how great it was to kiss her, though it was completely obvious that there wasn't anything beyond a kind of combative friendship between those two. Who that other guy was, on the other hand, the one he'd been worried about coming between him and Rachel in his New York memories – no idea, other than "jackass". Though he hadn't dared sink into those memories much, the painful ones, whenever he tried he started feeling all twisted inside over something that was long since fixed. The guy he'd become had very strong feelings.
But back to what he was here for.
Finn went to Rachel's bed and laid down, pulling his legs up to fit onto it. It was too short for him really, though no more so than his old bed. He wrapped himself around the pillow and let his head fall against it with a sigh. It had been a long week with work and school, and he was pretty tired, so the pillow was welcome. It seemed to smell like her, strawberry and vanilla. He took a few deep breaths, inhaling the scent and relaxing himself, thinking about some of the memories he'd brought back. The one in the hall... that was a really good one, feeling her stroking up his chest and fingering his jaw, the intimate feeling of that deep kiss... when he sank into that one, he definitely loved her, couldn't get enough of her. Or at least the person he was then loved the person she was then, and he remembered what that felt like.
Then he pressed 'Play' on the remote, and Funny Girl started.
Finn didn't find the movie appealing to him, but it was a biopic of an old stage actress so he hadn't expected to be interested in it. But it was okay, it wasn't annoying.
He did find himself wondering what Rachel's love for this movie said about her, aside from her love of Streisand and musicals, that song she sang, and her unconventional looks. But she was far more beautiful than the actress in the movie was. Did Rachel think about herself like that, not realize how beautiful she was? But he caught himself, that wasn't what he came to do.
Don't think about that or actually watch the movie, he told himself. I wouldn't have before, not really. Just think of Rachel, being with Rachel while she watched it. Wrapping her in his arms, feeling her hair against his cheek, breathing in her scent. Like when she'd snuggled up to him as they rode the Ferris Wheel at the fair. Finn held the pillow more tightly to him and buried the side of his face in it, his eyes mostly closed.
Eventually he fell asleep while the movie continued.
He woke up again as it was finishing, with the star doing her final number. And she was a great singer, no question, but he'd rather be sung to by a live Rachel any day than someone in a movie, no matter how great or famous. That must have really been something, having a girl who'd sing to me, he thought. Cool. Hope I sang to her too. And he hoped that they'd have a better ending than the movie did.
He took the movie out, tidied up after himself, and took a last look around Rachel's room before leaving. Her dads, sitting around the living room reading, looked up at him as he came slowly downstairs. He gave them a small smile.
"So... did you do what you intended to?" LeRoy asked.
"I fell asleep," Finn admitted sheepishly. "Got about halfway through, I think, then woke up at the end. It felt fine."
Hiram smiled. "I think you usually dropped off eventually," he said. "A lot of the time both of you fell asleep. We used to look in on you, after all."
"Of course." Finn nodded. They didn't seem at all agitated by remembering this, so he figured he'd been the good guy he wanted to have been, respecting her boundaries and all that. Though they had been about to move in together, so it was really apparent that eventually her boundaries had gone away, at least with him. Hopefully only with him. He wondered what her dads had thought about that, but there was really no way he could ask. "It didn't seem to be that kind of thing anyway, anything you'd have to worry about," he commented to them. Just Rachel's favorite comfort evening, or so he figured, watching the movie she loved while lying in the arms of the guy she loved. He felt good that he'd been part of that for her, even without remembering it. Or being interested in the movie.
"You know we're going to see her next week, for Thanksgiving, right?" LeRoy asked.
Oh, Finn knew that all right. He'd been annoyed at first, worried that she wasn't going to come back, that he would hardly see her again. But the way he was now, pieces there, pieces missing... he was glad he didn't have to go through that all with her, not now and not in such a short time. They'd have more time at Christmas.
"Yes," he said. "You... you'll make sure she's okay, right? I mean of course you will, you're her dads, but if you could do it for me too..." Finn babbled a little. He knew he didn't need to tell them to take care of their own daughter, of course they would, but he also didn't want to leave it unsaid. "I'd really appreciate it." Hiram nodded, while LeRoy gave him a strange smile. "And thank you again, for tonight. I don't know if it did anything, but it might fill in the background in my head a little."
As he went to sleep that night, Finn wondered: Did he feel any different? He decided against looking into it much, it seemed as though anything he'd found might be too tenuous to survive a strong look. But he felt better for having done it, and more hopeful that as pieces came back they might have something, some background continuity, to attach themselves to.