Late Wednesday night Carole returned from the Dayton airport with the other half of the family: Burt and Kurt, flown back from D.C. and New York, respectively. Finn welcomed them back, getting a very searching look from Kurt, but it was late and both travelers had put in a full day before their flights, so they all headed to bed quickly. There would be time to talk tomorrow.

Talk at breakfast was limited, though – Kurt had morning plans with Blaine and Burt wanted Finn to go with him to the tire shop. Not wanting to rush things, Finn decided to wait, though Carole did ask Kurt how things were going at NYADA.

"Is it as fabulous as you'd thought it would be?" she asked.

"More," Kurt answered with a small grin. "They really push us hard, but everyone understands that, and we push each other too. And not just in the ways you'd think, either. Everyone's so creative."

"How does Rachel like it?" Carole continued, with a small glance at Finn.

Kurt swallowed, then took another few sips of his orange juice. "It's perfect for her," he said, giving them all a smile. "She's being challenged in ways she never imagined, and she's doing brilliantly. It's all rather intense." He lowered his eyes briefly, and Finn saw a small frown cross his features.

"I hope it's not all work," Burt put in.

"Not all. But even the fun is pretty out there, stretching what we do," Kurt answered. "And we've made some friends, they're great and they've really taken to Rachel." He glanced at Finn, who found himself frowning at this, though of course he'd want Rachel to make friends and be happy where she was. "A couple of older girls," Kurt elaborated. "Friendly, high-energy. They're great and they've been a big help."

"Help?" Finn asked this pointedly, concerned.

"Getting used to everything, NYADA, New York..." Kurt trailed off. "I'd better go, I have to meet Blaine." He got up and cleared his plate. "I'll see you all later, I'll be back by three at the latest."

Finn was definitely not convinced that this was all, and he promised himself he'd get it out of Kurt later.

Finn and Burt spent a bit of time at the tire shop, Finn telling Burt how things were going, and then returned to the house to grab a bite to eat and watch football.

Shortly before three Kurt returned, and ten minutes later Finn excused himself to go talk to his stepbrother. Thanksgiving dinner was planned for four, and they could already smell it.

"Hey," Finn said, leaning on the door frame to Kurt's room. Kurt looked up from where he sat on his bed, raising his eyebrow. Finn considered asking straight out about Rachel, despite Kurt's evasiveness earlier, but something about Kurt's expression stopped him. "Are you okay? Everything fine with Blaine?"

"Yes," Kurt replied, but he couldn't conceal his exasperation. "Well, it would be if we could get a little privacy," he admitted, waving Finn to sit down. "Their place is a madhouse, Thanksgiving Central for their relatives this year." He sighed. "Some of them didn't even know he was gay, though they do now."

"Are they, like..."

"Homophobic? No, not that we could tell. Just surprised. And he wanted to be extra discreet so they could adjust." Kurt groaned. "Oh well, he's coming over here tomorrow."

"Cool. I'm surprised you're not hitting the sales though."

Kurt made a moue. "We will, a little. But if I was completely interested in the sales I would have just stayed in New York, they're so much better there."

"Guess they would be." Finn remembered something about Kurt's plans for New York. "Did you get the place done up like you wanted?"

Kurt stared at this question from Finn. "Please don't tell me that you're actually taking an interest in interior design. Not that it isn't long overdue, but Blaine said you were starting to remember things, not losing yourself entirely."

Finn grimaced. "I just remember what you said before, about wanting to get it done before having to argue with Rachel about it."

"Oh. Yes. Well, she didn't argue about it."

"That's good."

"Not really." Kurt sighed. "I probably shouldn't be telling you this."

Finn frowned. He'd heard that a lot before. "But you're going to anyway. People always do when they start like that."

Kurt rolled his eyes, but continued. "She just wasn't interested. And not in an I-don't-care-that-much or an I-know-I-have-no-taste way, which might be unexpected but refreshingly honest, but..." Kurt trailed off, his face sad as he thought about it.

"But what?" Finn asked, concerned.

"I really shouldn't be telling you this."

"At this point you pretty much have to if you want me to not worry."

"You'll worry either way." Kurt swallowed. "She doesn't want to think about it at all. She won't even do anything with her own room, she has her things in there but she won't paint or do more than hang a picture. A single picture, the Nationals picture. I've tried to get her to do something, anything, at this stage she could paint it bright pink with yellow polka-dots and I'd be thrilled. I'd need sunglasses to go in there, but I'd be thrilled."

Finn stared, aghast. "What's wrong?"

"It's your room too, that's what's wrong." Kurt shook his head. "If you were there she'd probably get all adorably pigheaded and try to get her own way about it, but you're not there to argue with about it so she can't bring herself to do anything at all. As for the rest of the place, she lets me pick everything, which is almost the same problem for me, it's not nearly as enjoyable getting it the way I want it when I realize why it's so easy. The whole thing is yet another 'you'll get what you want in the worst possible way'."

"At least you get what you want."

"I get what I thought I wanted. That's so overrated."

"Yeah, I suppose it is." Finn thought for a moment. "Quinn was like that," he said. "I figured I should want her, and I guess I did at the time, but..."

"But what?" Kurt prompted, curious.

Finn shrugged. "I don't miss her, or even think about her. We were good on paper, I guess, but it wasn't real." He paused, not really wanting to expose himself too much, especially with his thoughts and feelings still so fragmented, but he did want to talk about this. "Not like Rachel," he admitted.

"Do you think about her a lot? Rachel?" Kurt asked.

"Every day." Finn paused. "How is she, Kurt? Really?"

"You really want to know?"

"Yeah, of course. What's going on?"

Kurt grimaced. "A whole lot of work," he said. "Of course NYADA is intense, and Rachel's always been very driven, but this is beyond that. Some weeks she spends all her spare time in the rehearsal rooms, she's only at home to sleep really." He frowned, seemingly not wanting to continue. "And sometimes not all that much of that," he finished in a small voice.

Finn was stunned. "Why? Is it the same thing, that I'm not there?"

"A lot of it's that. She won't even spread her things out, like she's leaving space for you but then she can't stand to look at it. And at night..." Kurt looked straight at Finn, and Finn could see the tears in Kurt's eyes, finding them spring into his own too. "She dreams, sometimes. Good dreams, bad dreams, well they're all bad really, because she wakes up alone in a bed too large for her, wanting you. I can hear her. And she's worried about you too, she knows there's nothing she can do, and you're probably right that giving her updates all the time would make her worse, but..." Kurt sighed. "What do I tell her, Finn? What do I tell her when I get back to New York, because even if she doesn't ask how you're doing she's going to want to know, and it'll just twist her up inside if I don't have something to say. And I miss you too, you know. None of this is easy."

Finn blinked back tears. He'd thought things would be better for her, they'd reconnected a lot before she left and she knew he was working on remembering, but he hadn't considered how lonely she would be, especially in a place where he was supposed to be with her. A place where he had been with her, too, he remembered their date in New York a bit and there was a lot there to remind her. She'd seemed all right, when he'd seen her on his birthday. He hadn't told her how he was doing, he hadn't wanted to bring her hopes up and dash them each time, and that was still probably better than the alternatives, but he hadn't thought about just how hard she would have it anyway. He swallowed. "So is this what you meant before, that these new friends are helping with?"

"Some of it. They're great, she's a lot less lonely, and she's told them all about you so it's easier, she doesn't have to hide herself. She can't be too much in a shell around them either, neither of us can. It helps. And they help me make sure she takes breaks every now and then."

"So she doesn't work too hard."

"Yes. She puts a lot of effort into her work anyway, she's even more driven than she used to be, and for Rachel that's saying a lot. She's in the December show, she's going to be amazing, and she's focused very much on that."

"To take her mind off me." Finn stared ahead. He wished he knew how to help her, how to fix himself. But he had too many holes, too much still forgotten and conflicting. He just had to hope she could get through it until more came back. Until he was enough himself.

"Like that's even possible." Kurt paused to blow his nose, then refocused on Finn, who still stared off, listening. "She isn't stopping herself from thinking about you, Finn, she can't. The two of you didn't get engaged in high school because you were looking for that – Rachel originally didn't plan on making any significant personal attachments until she was already a star. Then she met you, and that all went completely out the window. To her benefit, I must add, she made a lot of friends too, and she's a better person. But you showed her what she really needed, and she can't turn that off. So she's not getting her mind off you, she's just channeling her pain and loneliness. Being an artist is like that."

That last phrase hung in the air as Finn's mind drifted. Being an artist...

"Being an artist... is about expressing your true feelings in the moment," Finn said slowly, softly.

"That's one way of looking at it."

"That's – she told me that. Rachel."

"When?"

"In... the library."

"That's where."

"I don't know when. Before."

"Are –" Kurt saw the look of mixed bewilderment and concentration on Finn's face, and moved to sit next to him. "Are you remembering this? Right now?"

"Yeah," Finn breathed.

"Do you –" Kurt stopped as Finn waved him off sharply. Finn had closed his eyes, his face screwed up in thought as he visualized where he'd been and what he'd been thinking and feeling back then.

"Sitting down in the aisle," Finn muttered. "Feel like crap, couldn't control myself, ruined everything, ruined her chance, she must hate me. Good to see her though, glad she found me, that she was looking for me." He shook his head and opened his eyes. "All I got."

"It's not like you spent much time in the library."

"Probably why I hid out there. She must've looked everywhere. And..." he looked puzzled. "Even though I'd been hiding from her I was glad she'd found me."

"Like you wanted her to make the effort?"

"Yeah, maybe." Finn swallowed. "Wanted to see her but wanted to know that she wanted to see me. Feeling guilty but happy that she's there."

"And she told you about being an artist, about expressing yourself."

"Yeah. To make me feel better about what I'd done. Losing control. Doing what I felt in the moment." Finn's eyes were closed again.

"And what were you feeling, in that moment?"

Finn's lips parted and he leaned slowly towards Kurt.

"Uh, Finn..." Kurt put a hand out and shoved his stepbrother back. "Not Rachel."

Finn opened his eyes and shook his head sharply, shocking himself back to reality, to now. "Sorry," he said, embarrassed. "Got lost. Like I heard her, not you."

"That's okay." They sat in silence for a moment, both looking at the floor, letting the embarrassment dissipate. Kurt eventually cleared his throat. "So, kissing her... was that what you were doing then or what you were thinking about?"

"Um..." Finn shook his head. "Both?" he continued hesitatingly.

"That doesn't exactly narrow it down," Kurt commented, frowning. "The two of you kissed a lot. But losing control and kissing her... hold on, it's Nationals." Kurt's voice raised in excitement. "It has to be."

"We won Nationals, I've seen pictures. Doesn't sound like anything got ruined. Or..." Finn suddenly became more alert. "Do you mean Nationals in New York?"

"Yes, New York. Why are you interested in that suddenly? Do you remember anything from that?"

"Yeah, I remember the song, writing it, performing it. It's really split, I'm so frustrated before but I feel great when we do it." Is it more of that, something to fit the pieces together?

"Must be the group number. 'Hey-hey-hey you and me...'?"

"Yeah, that one."

"What I'm thinking about was right before that performance."

"But I felt really great. Amazing, on fire. Not like I'd screwed up."

"We didn't know it was a problem until later."

"What are you talking about?" Finn stared at Kurt. "I know I don't like to be told stuff, it's better if I can remember, but all these hints are playing with my head. And it's a hole between stuff I do remember, it's been driving me nuts for weeks. Out with it, Kurt, please?"

Kurt took a deep breath. "Actually I can show you. But this could be tough, or weird, or whatever. Risky, anyway, from what you've said about looking at yourself in pictures."

"what do you mean?"

"There's video. And I don't know what it'll do for you to see yourself, a self you don't remember being."

"Oh." Finn frowned. "Yeah, sometimes it can just push the memory further away, my shrink says. If it doesn't feel real." But he thought momentarily, intrigued. It would be hard to know about it and not watch it, and he'd wondered about that hole for so long, afraid that if he pushed at it too hard he'd make something up. "But at least I can't confabulate it, right? It has to be real if there's video."

"Well video can be faked. But this isn't, I was there. Me and over a thousand others."

Finn thought about it. Yes, it was a problem, but he really wanted to know, not just because of Kurt's hints or because he'd been thinking about it in the memory flash, but because it could answer his question about that gap, when he reunited with Rachel. Maybe even how he'd changed her mind. He nodded. "Okay."

Kurt brought out his laptop, cued up a video, and started it. They saw an empty stage, heard some rustling in the crowd, then the initial chord played, and Finn saw the two of them, himself and Rachel, entering the stage from opposite ends.

face to face and heart to heart

Looking at himself, walking on stage, hearing himself start to sing, when he didn't remember any of it – Finn started to panic at the discontinuity. "Shit, I can't do this," he muttered. He snapped his eyes closed and lowered his head.

"No, Finn, look at it," Kurt pressed. "Look at that guy, look at his face, it's plain as day what he's feeling. Look at him, listen to his voice, make it feel real."

Finn forced his eyes open to look at the screen, focused on that face, his own face, and the raw need written on it.

Kurt's voice came in his ear, quietly, insistently. "Do you remember being that guy?"

It was a crappy video, but Finn could almost feel like he was meeting his own eyes, seeing the intensity with which they were looking at Rachel. As he flicked his eyes over to her image, for a moment he was there. On the stage, singing his own words, needing her, loving her, knowing that she loved him but was pulling away. Needing to feel her lips on his just one more time, sure that if he could only kiss her she would understand, she'd feel it too and she couldn't walk away. Closing in.

And then, finally, as they finished in front of each other, seeing her rise to him as he lowered to her, and feeling the rest of the world go away as their mouths met. Electric. And feeling that familiar smouldering inside flare up to consume them both.

Finn breathed for a moment, watching himself on the screen, feeling the echo of that kiss, and then, the same exhilaration he remembered from the performance of the group number, only a hundred times more strong.

"Yes."

Sudden silence descended, with the video over; Kurt's breath caught as Finn's answer registered. "You do?"

"Yeah. It's..." Finn closed his eyes again, his emotions washing over him. "Some of it. It's hazy. But I feel it." He exhaled. "That was risky, Kurt."

"What, I should have let you bail?"

"I don't know. You rolled the dice with my head, not cool." Finn frowned. "But something worked so I can't be mad about it."

"Good," Kurt responded. Then, more quietly, "So what did you remember?"

"Being there, kind of. How it felt. But... more like I was remembering being there...?" Finn was puzzled. The memories overlapped, but not the clash he'd had before, more like it faded from watching it to being there and back again, back and forth.

"Remembering remembering?"

"Yes. Like I'd..." Finn groaned. "Of course, I would have watched this and remembered being there, so that's what I'm tapping into."

"So as you watch the video now, you remember watching the video before, and back then you were remembering actually being there?"

"Yes." Finn shook his head. "I need whole new verb tenses to classify what's going on in my head," he complained. "Holy shit this is complicated. Accessing a memory by remembering a previous time when I was thinking about it." He sighed. "Well it's there, that's what counts I guess, even though it's still really fuzzy. And now I know."

"Now you know what?" Kurt asked curiously.

Finn frowned, not really wanting to dump out private thoughts, still struggling with what he knew and felt, and certainly how to express it. "I remembered writing my lines for the other song, and how I felt, so frustrated about how things were with Rachel, and then in performing it I felt so awesome... but I didn't know how I got from one to the other."

"And now you do."

"Yeah." Finn thought about those times again, wondering if the memories would fit together, especially with one running into the other, but... they didn't really. Maybe because one was indirect. Or maybe he did need some mental grout to stick them together. "Just gotta give it time I guess. But it's hard, especially with how Rachel's doing, I need to get this worked out."

Kurt sighed. "Maybe I shouldn't have told you all about that."

Finn shook his head. "It's hard enough not knowing what has happened, if I also don't know what's happening now I really am going to lose it." He ran his hand through his hair. "I'll think about what you should tell her," he said softly. "Maybe send a message, she needs to know I'm thinking about her."

"Yes, she'd like that."

"I do remember her," Finn admitted. "It's not much, but I do and it's good. It's coming, you saw how it happens sometimes, flashes when something's similar. It's just all in pieces, islands, no continuity and it's different times and feelings. I just have to keep working at it."

"I can't imagine what that's like."

"Really, really weird. Pieces, what I know changing all the time, not really assimilated either." Finn exhaled. "In a lot of ways it was easier before I started remembering. Still glad I do, though, even if it means right now I don't really know who I am." Just have to hope.

"Hmm."

"You sound like my shrink," Finn commented. Then he realized the time. "Hey, shouldn't dinner be ready by now?"

Kurt chuckled. "Oh, I think you know who you are," he said, winning him a mock glare from Finn. "Come on, let's go feed your brain. I got tired just watching you wade through that, I don't think I've ever seen anyone try that hard to think."

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