FIC: Spring Fling
From a Tumblr prompt by gleefulgigi, who wanted to see Adam discover the existence of "Pip Pip Hooray!"
“Oh, my goodness. This is marvelous! You’ll definitely want to keep this.”
Kurt looked up from the box of clothes he was separating into piles for laundry, dry-cleaning and giveaway. His father had just shipped out a dozen boxes full of things that Kurt had stored in the attic, dramatically noted in bold black marker as ‘IMPERATIVE!!!” to have with him once he moved to New York. He was both appalled and amused now to realize how many of those once-vital possessions were now neither wanted nor needed. Clothing that had gone out of fashion or no longer fit his taller and more muscular frame. Pictures and souvenirs from high school that now carried more pain and regret than they did pleasure. Papers and knick-knacks that simply had nowhere to go in the increasingly crowded Bushwick loft.
This was the first day of spring, and as neither he nor Adam had classes today, Kurt had decided it was time for a little spring cleaning. Neither Rachel nor Santana had wanted anything to do with the project (Kurt had been relieved, not wanting to give his nosy roommates free rein over his private, and potentially embarrassing, mementos.) and they had each fled to more interesting pursuits.
Adam had volunteered to come over and help Kurt sort through the chaos and Kurt had been surprised to realize that he didn’t mind the idea of Adam gaining a look into his past. Perhaps it was because Adam had voluntarily, blushing the entire time, allowed him to see a photo album his mother had sent from England, complete with one photo of a chubby baby-Adam wearing nothing but a face full of chocolate custard and a smile. Kurt knew there was nothing quite that incriminating in these boxes. Not unless Dad had unexpectedly packed the baby book Kurt’s mother had made and faithfully kept updated until her death.
Oh, dear…
“What?” Kurt demanded nervously, watching Adam chuckle and perform an odd little dance of delight from his cross-legged position on the floor. “What did you find?”
Adam grinned at him, gesturing with the thick blue spiral notebook he held in his hands. “You never told me you were a playwright! Never mind that you had such a talent for witty dialogue and song lyrics!”
A groan worked its way up Kurt’s throat and he hid his face in his hands, taking an abrupt seat on the end of his bed. “Noooo. Tell me I didn’t pack ‘Pip Pip Hurray!’ in these boxes!”
“Indeed you did,” Adam agreed, leaning forward and playfully swatting Kurt in the knee with his notebook. “This is delightful, Kurt.”
The blush coloring Kurt’s cheeks grew brighter. “It was just a little personal project I did the summer before my senior year. I showed it to a few of my friends and my family, but none of them got it. Blaine said it was cute, but I could tell he was only humoring me. Is it … I mean, you really do like it?”
“I do,” he said firmly, the amusement in his eyes giving way to a tender understanding as he took note of the disbelieving hope in Kurt’s question. “It sounds like you may have had a case of playing to the wrong crowd, which happens to the best of us on occasion. However, as a former Citizen of the Realm, you can trust me when I say that this is spot-on. It could use a bit of polish and fleshing out here and there, of course, but the fact that you turned out a full-fledged original musical at that age is astonishing. You should consider signing up for the ‘Introduction to Stage: Craft and Writing’ course next semester. Professor DeVilla would weep for joy to have a student like you.”
Kurt took the notebook, which he now remembered tossing away in a box; considering it the first in a long series of failures that would come to define his eighteenth year. As he gently turned the pages, rereading the lines and lyrics he had spent so many joyful hours creating, Kurt smiled, remembering how much pleasure he had felt from working on this project. “This was my favorite song,” he said, tapping a page and passing the book back to Adam. “It doesn’t have any music, most of the songs don’t, but I had fun writing this one.”
Adam read the page eagerly, his lips moving slightly as he read and laughed. “Britain’s Public Relation”, I like that.”
Reading the song over again, he began to hum a soft tune, restarting a couple of times with a pause to consider the words in between. Eventually he began to sing Kurt’s lyrics to his off-the-cuff tune, smiling broadly as he watched an expression of shocked excitement begin to build on Kurt’s face.
“That’s it,” Kurt breathed. “That’s exactly how it was supposed to sound, accent, jaunty attitude and everything! How did you do that?”
He shrugged. “Three years arranging music for the Apples and four years of musical composition classes, I suppose. And I didn’t do much. The song was already here, it was just waiting for the right person to come along and hear it.”
Wide-eyed, Kurt picked up the melody and started to sing his song, a smiling Adam joining in with an impromptu harmony. As they finished, Kurt ran a hand through his hair. “I can’t believe it. Do you think you could do that with the other songs? I can read music just fine, but writing original music turned out to be a little outside my skill-set. And please don’t tell Rachel I said that, she’d gloat forever.”
“Your secret is safe with me. As for these songs, they’re far too good to be languishing unheard in a box. If you wouldn’t mind asking a few of the Apples for some help, I’ll bet we could get this fully scored and stage ready by the end of the year. It would make an amazing Finals presentation project for you. Maybe you could enter it into the Spring Fling contest. That’s primarily made up of original first and second year student compositions, though anyone is welcome to participate and it counts for class credit with nearly all of the professors.”
Startling him, Kurt flung himself off the bed and into Adam’s fumbling embrace. His voice shaking and a little tearful, even as he laughed, Kurt said, “I would love that. If you and the Apples would be willing to help me get it ready, I’d be more than happy to share the academic credit. I had such love and high hopes for this little play once. Thank you for helping me to find those feelings again.”
“You’re more than welcome, love,” Adam said gently, kissing his hair. “Now, what do you say we clear up this mess and go grab some lunch while you consider what needs to be done to polish up Broadway’s next great musical.”
Kurt laughed and hugged him again. It was amazing to be supported and believed in this way. “I’d love that.”
Helping him to his feet, Adam then accepted a helping hand of Kurt’s own as he unwound his long legs and stood. “Off we go then.”
As they quickly cleaned up the papers and clothes left scattered around Kurt’s bedroom, returning them to a semi-orderly condition, Adam began to sing the new song again, louder and more confidently than before. Kurt quickly joined in; a note of triumph ringing through his voice.
With the unexpected resurrection of ‘Pip Pip Hurray!’, Kurt’s old, nearly forgotten dream began to live again.
THE END
“Oh, my goodness. This is marvelous! You’ll definitely want to keep this.”
Kurt looked up from the box of clothes he was separating into piles for laundry, dry-cleaning and giveaway. His father had just shipped out a dozen boxes full of things that Kurt had stored in the attic, dramatically noted in bold black marker as ‘IMPERATIVE!!!” to have with him once he moved to New York. He was both appalled and amused now to realize how many of those once-vital possessions were now neither wanted nor needed. Clothing that had gone out of fashion or no longer fit his taller and more muscular frame. Pictures and souvenirs from high school that now carried more pain and regret than they did pleasure. Papers and knick-knacks that simply had nowhere to go in the increasingly crowded Bushwick loft.
This was the first day of spring, and as neither he nor Adam had classes today, Kurt had decided it was time for a little spring cleaning. Neither Rachel nor Santana had wanted anything to do with the project (Kurt had been relieved, not wanting to give his nosy roommates free rein over his private, and potentially embarrassing, mementos.) and they had each fled to more interesting pursuits.
Adam had volunteered to come over and help Kurt sort through the chaos and Kurt had been surprised to realize that he didn’t mind the idea of Adam gaining a look into his past. Perhaps it was because Adam had voluntarily, blushing the entire time, allowed him to see a photo album his mother had sent from England, complete with one photo of a chubby baby-Adam wearing nothing but a face full of chocolate custard and a smile. Kurt knew there was nothing quite that incriminating in these boxes. Not unless Dad had unexpectedly packed the baby book Kurt’s mother had made and faithfully kept updated until her death.
Oh, dear…
“What?” Kurt demanded nervously, watching Adam chuckle and perform an odd little dance of delight from his cross-legged position on the floor. “What did you find?”
Adam grinned at him, gesturing with the thick blue spiral notebook he held in his hands. “You never told me you were a playwright! Never mind that you had such a talent for witty dialogue and song lyrics!”
A groan worked its way up Kurt’s throat and he hid his face in his hands, taking an abrupt seat on the end of his bed. “Noooo. Tell me I didn’t pack ‘Pip Pip Hurray!’ in these boxes!”
“Indeed you did,” Adam agreed, leaning forward and playfully swatting Kurt in the knee with his notebook. “This is delightful, Kurt.”
The blush coloring Kurt’s cheeks grew brighter. “It was just a little personal project I did the summer before my senior year. I showed it to a few of my friends and my family, but none of them got it. Blaine said it was cute, but I could tell he was only humoring me. Is it … I mean, you really do like it?”
“I do,” he said firmly, the amusement in his eyes giving way to a tender understanding as he took note of the disbelieving hope in Kurt’s question. “It sounds like you may have had a case of playing to the wrong crowd, which happens to the best of us on occasion. However, as a former Citizen of the Realm, you can trust me when I say that this is spot-on. It could use a bit of polish and fleshing out here and there, of course, but the fact that you turned out a full-fledged original musical at that age is astonishing. You should consider signing up for the ‘Introduction to Stage: Craft and Writing’ course next semester. Professor DeVilla would weep for joy to have a student like you.”
Kurt took the notebook, which he now remembered tossing away in a box; considering it the first in a long series of failures that would come to define his eighteenth year. As he gently turned the pages, rereading the lines and lyrics he had spent so many joyful hours creating, Kurt smiled, remembering how much pleasure he had felt from working on this project. “This was my favorite song,” he said, tapping a page and passing the book back to Adam. “It doesn’t have any music, most of the songs don’t, but I had fun writing this one.”
Adam read the page eagerly, his lips moving slightly as he read and laughed. “Britain’s Public Relation”, I like that.”
Reading the song over again, he began to hum a soft tune, restarting a couple of times with a pause to consider the words in between. Eventually he began to sing Kurt’s lyrics to his off-the-cuff tune, smiling broadly as he watched an expression of shocked excitement begin to build on Kurt’s face.
“That’s it,” Kurt breathed. “That’s exactly how it was supposed to sound, accent, jaunty attitude and everything! How did you do that?”
He shrugged. “Three years arranging music for the Apples and four years of musical composition classes, I suppose. And I didn’t do much. The song was already here, it was just waiting for the right person to come along and hear it.”
Wide-eyed, Kurt picked up the melody and started to sing his song, a smiling Adam joining in with an impromptu harmony. As they finished, Kurt ran a hand through his hair. “I can’t believe it. Do you think you could do that with the other songs? I can read music just fine, but writing original music turned out to be a little outside my skill-set. And please don’t tell Rachel I said that, she’d gloat forever.”
“Your secret is safe with me. As for these songs, they’re far too good to be languishing unheard in a box. If you wouldn’t mind asking a few of the Apples for some help, I’ll bet we could get this fully scored and stage ready by the end of the year. It would make an amazing Finals presentation project for you. Maybe you could enter it into the Spring Fling contest. That’s primarily made up of original first and second year student compositions, though anyone is welcome to participate and it counts for class credit with nearly all of the professors.”
Startling him, Kurt flung himself off the bed and into Adam’s fumbling embrace. His voice shaking and a little tearful, even as he laughed, Kurt said, “I would love that. If you and the Apples would be willing to help me get it ready, I’d be more than happy to share the academic credit. I had such love and high hopes for this little play once. Thank you for helping me to find those feelings again.”
“You’re more than welcome, love,” Adam said gently, kissing his hair. “Now, what do you say we clear up this mess and go grab some lunch while you consider what needs to be done to polish up Broadway’s next great musical.”
Kurt laughed and hugged him again. It was amazing to be supported and believed in this way. “I’d love that.”
Helping him to his feet, Adam then accepted a helping hand of Kurt’s own as he unwound his long legs and stood. “Off we go then.”
As they quickly cleaned up the papers and clothes left scattered around Kurt’s bedroom, returning them to a semi-orderly condition, Adam began to sing the new song again, louder and more confidently than before. Kurt quickly joined in; a note of triumph ringing through his voice.
With the unexpected resurrection of ‘Pip Pip Hurray!’, Kurt’s old, nearly forgotten dream began to live again.
THE END