this is a love song [kum angst for ~sectionals]
title: This is a Love Song
rating: PG-13
fandom/pairing: Glee. Kurt/Sam angst creys. Implied past Kurt/Blaine and Sam/Finn as per canon.
spoilers: Briefly mentions a currently-ambiguous (I think?) spoiler for the Valentine's Day episode.
warnings: Future!fic wherein Sam stays in Lima and Kurt goes to New York to be brilliant and fantastic; angsty shit like always; nonsensical with strange phrasing and timing.
summary: It's all so familiar, in such a bad way.
words: 1634.
disclaimer: I do not own Glee, or FOB's "Bang the Doldrums".
a/n: For the gleeversechallenge "Jar of Hearts" which gave images and tflns and shit for inspiration. I chose the picture of the guitars, canyoutell? I'm not sure I'm happy with this because of one really painful part where there's no transition at all and it's so lazy, but I just like to crey because sam fucking evans so I'm not sorry.
It’s purely a coincidence, born of blameless location and spontaneous timing. Kurt needs sheet music, to rehearse for a part that he’s been wanting to throw his name in the ring for; Sam has never had the heart to leave Ohio (at least, not since -), and is, for the most part, precisely the same person he was in high school; Lima still only has one music store.
Kurt notices him first (there’s no doubt in his mind that he recognizes the head of reddish blonde hair; no doubt in his mind that those broad shoulders are ones he used to know; no doubt in his mind that it’s Sam Evans all over again), but pretends not to. It’s mostly because he’s Kurt Hummel, and because Kurt Hummel is now Kurt Hummel, who has no reason to remember the days of high school glee clubs and straight boy crushes. It’s partially because for as true as he may be Kurt Hummel, Sam is still Sam Evans.
Sam catches sight of him in a belated second place, and there’s a second when an expression crosses Sam’s face, like he’s finally seen the ghost he’s been wanting to for thousands of years and it’s more terrifying than he anticipated, but then he stifles it and dons a cheery grin before calling, “Hey, Kurt!” across the otherwise-empty store.
It’s with slow, deliberate body language which betrays his prior perception that Kurt turns in the direction of the back shelves of the store, in Sam’s direction. He hesitates briefly, and then lets a smile flicker over his features in the manner of recognition, and the clarity with which Sam perceives the unspoken falsehood behind the action is something like transparency.
Still, they smile at one another in careful politeness.
“Sam?” Kurt asks with the incredulous (but not unhappy; unhappiness would be much more difficult to subtextually convey a motivation for, and acting has never been Kurt’s first love) surprise that he’s learned to play with some believability. Sam hops, skips, and jumps an invisible and uneven path through a labyrinth of gaping cardboard boxes, approaching with no apparent caution.
As much is more than can be said for Kurt, whose atypically timid gait reminds him of days he’s always preferred to leave far behind him.
They stand for frantically and pensively few moments, staring at one another, before Sam is the one to bridge the abyss that feels more emotional than physical. He pulls Kurt into the one-armed bromantic embrace that Kurt thinks is a required skill for someone working in a store that obviously caters to the more idealized rock ’n roll image of musicians, and it by nature conveys a feeling of belonging and camaraderie that Kurt has never quite been able to accept at face value.
He returns it awkwardly, and Sam pulls away almost quickly enough to raise suspicions. He covers it with a mostly-casual, “How are you, man? It’s been ages.”
The pause that follows is less dramatic, and is used by both young men to assess the other, Kurt doesn’t think he’s wrong in assuming. Kurt, for one, sees the nostalgically same warmness of Sam’s eyes, and the revealing auburn tints to his healthy-looking hair. It feels like high school, in an indescribable way of misplaced sentimentality.
What Sam sees, as he peers at Kurt with green eyes that crinkle as though in sorrow, is unclear, but his countenance carries with it the unbridled awe of his innocence, and Kurt hopes that what he’s viewing is impressive. He hopes that Sam notices the harshly mature line of Kurt’s jaw (something that seems to draw attention and compliments from admirers of all identifications); the relatively novel upturn of his chin that reeks of a confidence that has always been most appropriately suited to Kurt; the way that Kurt is so much older, and so different from the boy that he was in high school, with his first boyfriend and the airlessness of a small Midwestern town.
“I’m doing really well,” Kurt replies eventually, calmness seeping into his voice finally. He says it as though there was never any question that he would be, and it’s unintentional self-assurance that feels more appropriate every time that Kurt finds himself hearing it without meaning to.
In Sam’s premature nod, offered before Kurt has all the words out, there’s the implication that he never had any question about it, either, and whether it’s because it was always bound to be fact or because he had a kind of unnecessary faith in Kurt Hummel is something that Kurt would rather not have explained to him.
“Yourself?” Kurt asks, out of something more than just diplomatic politeness. The word burns like a curiously bitter pill on his tongue, and when he swallows it, he’s left with more unpleasantness than relief, because Sam seems to need to consider the question before knowing how to answer.
A smile crosses Sam’s face, a smile that means something Kurt can’t put a name to, and he glances up at Kurt from under his lashes. “I’m doing good,” he says. Kurt can’t figure if it’s genuine or just a platitude offered as consolation, and it makes him more uncomfortable than he’d like to admit to anyone.
He averts his gaze to the stands and amps forming the narrow walkway that the shop affords. Kurt doesn’t know anything about guitars, doesn’t particularly want to know anything about them, but tries to look fascinated by a red-and-black decorated one with an intimidating shape to it. He opens his mouth to note, casually, that it looks like something Puckerman would like and do you two still keep in touch? I remember you were close but it doesn’t come out as anything like he planned.
“I think about you a lot,” Kurt hears himself admitting, not in a blurted show of lost control, but in a quiet tone that is simply matter-of-fact. There’s no embarrassment to the words, and he feels the inflection of a hopeful promise bubbling up on his tongue. He reaches out a hand to steady himself, but finds that his posture isn’t wavering even a little like he half-wishes it would, and instead lets his fingertips brush the creamy white neck of an old model that he thinks Sam might find gaudy.
From the corner of his gaze, Kurt sees that Sam smiles a wry half-grin before replying, “I’m sorry to hear that.”
A pause fills the air between them; a chasm caused by undeserved self-deprecation and cutting realism brought to mind through silence. Kurt’s mind wanders; Sam looks as though he allows his to do the same.
Kurt stares unseeingly at Sam, wondering about what it could be that runs through his mind as he gnaws on a plush lower lip and hides his eyes behind strands of overgrown tresses. He wonders if Sam thinks about all the what-if’s of their high school years passed; if Sam ever remembers plaid shirts and black eyes, hero-worshipped crushes and unsent Valentines that ended up crumpled into colorful balls stuffed at the bottom of trashcans.
Kurt thinks about them, sometimes. Thinks about what it could have been like, how things could have been. But more often than that, he likes to imagine, whenever he finds himself in the mood to reminisce. He likes to look to the future, likes to think about dreamy could-be’s that only live in the realms of happily-ever-afters; likes to imagine flirty laughter and dry lips, third dates and sacrificial surprises.
It’s Kurt who says, determined, “Can I kiss you,” not as a question, because maybe the answer is obvious, or maybe it’s just inconsequential.
It’s Sam who tilts his head to the side like he doesn’t understand where Kurt intends for it to go, but who nods anyway and points out with dry humor, “You’re a few years late on that one.”
Kurt kisses him with fierce longing bordering on a desperation that he doesn’t want to put into words, and it feels something like ironic teenage purity again. His hands scrabble for hold on Sam’s hips; Sam’s grip either side of Kurt’s face with the incoherent touches of a person who can’t find any other way to express that he just wants because it’s selfish to say anything that he desires out loud.
But then they separate, and their eyes flutter open.
Things are just as the same as before, generally, but there’s a heaviness that can only be described as disappointment that lingers in the air.
“I’m sorry,” Kurt says first, not specifying what he’s sorry for because he’s not - it’s only something that he’s sorry about.
A wince crosses Sam’s face, and he shrugs with visible discomfort. “Don’t -”
He doesn’t finish that particular sentence. Kurt doesn’t try to use his imagination.
“I do, too, sometimes. Think about you. A lot…a lot more than I should. Not, like, in a weird way or something, you just - cross my mind a lot. Y’know how it is?”
Kurt smiles, not happy but at least not inhibited, and reaches for Sam’s hand, before deciding en route not to, and resting on the wiry strands of the guitar stood next to him.
“I think I have some idea of it,” he answers. He runs the pads of his fingertips along the strands; wonders absently how many times the motion has to be repeated for calluses to start forming.
He doesn’t have anything else to say, and waits for Sam. It feels familiar, bittersweet like a melancholy wistfulness for a few short years that Kurt doesn’t have any rational desire to return to.
Sam clears his throat, then looks at Kurt with a blank smile that means nothing beyond Can I help you? “So anyway - what was it you came in for, again?”
rating: PG-13
fandom/pairing: Glee. Kurt/Sam angst creys. Implied past Kurt/Blaine and Sam/Finn as per canon.
spoilers: Briefly mentions a currently-ambiguous (I think?) spoiler for the Valentine's Day episode.
warnings: Future!fic wherein Sam stays in Lima and Kurt goes to New York to be brilliant and fantastic; angsty shit like always; nonsensical with strange phrasing and timing.
summary: It's all so familiar, in such a bad way.
words: 1634.
disclaimer: I do not own Glee, or FOB's "Bang the Doldrums".
a/n: For the gleeversechallenge "Jar of Hearts" which gave images and tflns and shit for inspiration. I chose the picture of the guitars, canyoutell? I'm not sure I'm happy with this because of one really painful part where there's no transition at all and it's so lazy, but I just like to crey because sam fucking evans so I'm not sorry.
It’s purely a coincidence, born of blameless location and spontaneous timing. Kurt needs sheet music, to rehearse for a part that he’s been wanting to throw his name in the ring for; Sam has never had the heart to leave Ohio (at least, not since -), and is, for the most part, precisely the same person he was in high school; Lima still only has one music store.
Kurt notices him first (there’s no doubt in his mind that he recognizes the head of reddish blonde hair; no doubt in his mind that those broad shoulders are ones he used to know; no doubt in his mind that it’s Sam Evans all over again), but pretends not to. It’s mostly because he’s Kurt Hummel, and because Kurt Hummel is now Kurt Hummel, who has no reason to remember the days of high school glee clubs and straight boy crushes. It’s partially because for as true as he may be Kurt Hummel, Sam is still Sam Evans.
Sam catches sight of him in a belated second place, and there’s a second when an expression crosses Sam’s face, like he’s finally seen the ghost he’s been wanting to for thousands of years and it’s more terrifying than he anticipated, but then he stifles it and dons a cheery grin before calling, “Hey, Kurt!” across the otherwise-empty store.
It’s with slow, deliberate body language which betrays his prior perception that Kurt turns in the direction of the back shelves of the store, in Sam’s direction. He hesitates briefly, and then lets a smile flicker over his features in the manner of recognition, and the clarity with which Sam perceives the unspoken falsehood behind the action is something like transparency.
Still, they smile at one another in careful politeness.
“Sam?” Kurt asks with the incredulous (but not unhappy; unhappiness would be much more difficult to subtextually convey a motivation for, and acting has never been Kurt’s first love) surprise that he’s learned to play with some believability. Sam hops, skips, and jumps an invisible and uneven path through a labyrinth of gaping cardboard boxes, approaching with no apparent caution.
As much is more than can be said for Kurt, whose atypically timid gait reminds him of days he’s always preferred to leave far behind him.
They stand for frantically and pensively few moments, staring at one another, before Sam is the one to bridge the abyss that feels more emotional than physical. He pulls Kurt into the one-armed bromantic embrace that Kurt thinks is a required skill for someone working in a store that obviously caters to the more idealized rock ’n roll image of musicians, and it by nature conveys a feeling of belonging and camaraderie that Kurt has never quite been able to accept at face value.
He returns it awkwardly, and Sam pulls away almost quickly enough to raise suspicions. He covers it with a mostly-casual, “How are you, man? It’s been ages.”
The pause that follows is less dramatic, and is used by both young men to assess the other, Kurt doesn’t think he’s wrong in assuming. Kurt, for one, sees the nostalgically same warmness of Sam’s eyes, and the revealing auburn tints to his healthy-looking hair. It feels like high school, in an indescribable way of misplaced sentimentality.
What Sam sees, as he peers at Kurt with green eyes that crinkle as though in sorrow, is unclear, but his countenance carries with it the unbridled awe of his innocence, and Kurt hopes that what he’s viewing is impressive. He hopes that Sam notices the harshly mature line of Kurt’s jaw (something that seems to draw attention and compliments from admirers of all identifications); the relatively novel upturn of his chin that reeks of a confidence that has always been most appropriately suited to Kurt; the way that Kurt is so much older, and so different from the boy that he was in high school, with his first boyfriend and the airlessness of a small Midwestern town.
“I’m doing really well,” Kurt replies eventually, calmness seeping into his voice finally. He says it as though there was never any question that he would be, and it’s unintentional self-assurance that feels more appropriate every time that Kurt finds himself hearing it without meaning to.
In Sam’s premature nod, offered before Kurt has all the words out, there’s the implication that he never had any question about it, either, and whether it’s because it was always bound to be fact or because he had a kind of unnecessary faith in Kurt Hummel is something that Kurt would rather not have explained to him.
“Yourself?” Kurt asks, out of something more than just diplomatic politeness. The word burns like a curiously bitter pill on his tongue, and when he swallows it, he’s left with more unpleasantness than relief, because Sam seems to need to consider the question before knowing how to answer.
A smile crosses Sam’s face, a smile that means something Kurt can’t put a name to, and he glances up at Kurt from under his lashes. “I’m doing good,” he says. Kurt can’t figure if it’s genuine or just a platitude offered as consolation, and it makes him more uncomfortable than he’d like to admit to anyone.
He averts his gaze to the stands and amps forming the narrow walkway that the shop affords. Kurt doesn’t know anything about guitars, doesn’t particularly want to know anything about them, but tries to look fascinated by a red-and-black decorated one with an intimidating shape to it. He opens his mouth to note, casually, that it looks like something Puckerman would like and do you two still keep in touch? I remember you were close but it doesn’t come out as anything like he planned.
“I think about you a lot,” Kurt hears himself admitting, not in a blurted show of lost control, but in a quiet tone that is simply matter-of-fact. There’s no embarrassment to the words, and he feels the inflection of a hopeful promise bubbling up on his tongue. He reaches out a hand to steady himself, but finds that his posture isn’t wavering even a little like he half-wishes it would, and instead lets his fingertips brush the creamy white neck of an old model that he thinks Sam might find gaudy.
From the corner of his gaze, Kurt sees that Sam smiles a wry half-grin before replying, “I’m sorry to hear that.”
A pause fills the air between them; a chasm caused by undeserved self-deprecation and cutting realism brought to mind through silence. Kurt’s mind wanders; Sam looks as though he allows his to do the same.
Kurt stares unseeingly at Sam, wondering about what it could be that runs through his mind as he gnaws on a plush lower lip and hides his eyes behind strands of overgrown tresses. He wonders if Sam thinks about all the what-if’s of their high school years passed; if Sam ever remembers plaid shirts and black eyes, hero-worshipped crushes and unsent Valentines that ended up crumpled into colorful balls stuffed at the bottom of trashcans.
Kurt thinks about them, sometimes. Thinks about what it could have been like, how things could have been. But more often than that, he likes to imagine, whenever he finds himself in the mood to reminisce. He likes to look to the future, likes to think about dreamy could-be’s that only live in the realms of happily-ever-afters; likes to imagine flirty laughter and dry lips, third dates and sacrificial surprises.
It’s Kurt who says, determined, “Can I kiss you,” not as a question, because maybe the answer is obvious, or maybe it’s just inconsequential.
It’s Sam who tilts his head to the side like he doesn’t understand where Kurt intends for it to go, but who nods anyway and points out with dry humor, “You’re a few years late on that one.”
Kurt kisses him with fierce longing bordering on a desperation that he doesn’t want to put into words, and it feels something like ironic teenage purity again. His hands scrabble for hold on Sam’s hips; Sam’s grip either side of Kurt’s face with the incoherent touches of a person who can’t find any other way to express that he just wants because it’s selfish to say anything that he desires out loud.
But then they separate, and their eyes flutter open.
Things are just as the same as before, generally, but there’s a heaviness that can only be described as disappointment that lingers in the air.
“I’m sorry,” Kurt says first, not specifying what he’s sorry for because he’s not - it’s only something that he’s sorry about.
A wince crosses Sam’s face, and he shrugs with visible discomfort. “Don’t -”
He doesn’t finish that particular sentence. Kurt doesn’t try to use his imagination.
“I do, too, sometimes. Think about you. A lot…a lot more than I should. Not, like, in a weird way or something, you just - cross my mind a lot. Y’know how it is?”
Kurt smiles, not happy but at least not inhibited, and reaches for Sam’s hand, before deciding en route not to, and resting on the wiry strands of the guitar stood next to him.
“I think I have some idea of it,” he answers. He runs the pads of his fingertips along the strands; wonders absently how many times the motion has to be repeated for calluses to start forming.
He doesn’t have anything else to say, and waits for Sam. It feels familiar, bittersweet like a melancholy wistfulness for a few short years that Kurt doesn’t have any rational desire to return to.
Sam clears his throat, then looks at Kurt with a blank smile that means nothing beyond Can I help you? “So anyway - what was it you came in for, again?”