Prologue - Fairy Boy
Title: Fairy Boy aka "Waiting for my Fairy Godmother to Arrive"
Author: FearfulLT
Rating: Pg-13
Character(s)/Pairing(s): Kurt/Blaine (sorta), Kurt/Puck endgame.
Genre: Drama/Angst
Warning: Fairies, silliness, and a general lack of respect for canon.
Spoilers: Set somewhere in season two.
Disclaimer: I don't own it and I'm not making any money from it, this is pure entertainment.
Author Notes: Oh my God has this been a long time coming. It was supposed to be for the fic I didn't write challenge... and then time got away from me and now it's, what, definitely more than a month late. Oh well.
Summary: Original summary, modified summary - The troublemaker sprite Puck has just one chance left to avoid exile. The task? Be a fairy godmother and find this Hummel kid True Love. Before prom night. Sure... no problem.
Word Count: 1762
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This kid, Puck thought, eyebrow raised as he observed him from a safe, invisible distance, was even more of a fairy than he was. And, given the bluish, gossamer wings that sprouted from Puck’s back, that was quite a feat.
To be honest he didn’t really want to be here, sitting on the low brick wall outside the kid’s school. But rules were rules (fucking rules) and so there he was, watching the poor pansy boy getting pushed around by a small group of red-jacketted teens who clearly needed an attitude adjustment.
Puck was currently undergoing an attitude adjustment himself. Or, to put it a bit more honestly, he’d recently been demoted after pissing off the wrong pixie. That had been strike two, actually. Strike one had gotten him booted out of Oberon’s court, and strike two had kicked him even further down the food chain. Now he was under the supervision of The Godmother, a surly old bat-winged sprite named Sue, who had given him this shit assignment and this even shittier wand and told him to get results or get lost. Since Puck didn’t really want to spend the rest of his life in exile, banished and disgraced, he’d grudgingly taken the wand and set off to find his assignment.
This kid.
Who was currently being tossed into a dumpster.
Puck sighed to himself and fingered the ridiculous, star-topped wand that he was expected to carry about for the duration of his assignment. It was a mark of office, supposedly used to focus a fairy’s natural magic and enhance it. In reality it was more of a regulator, ensuring that any bit of magic he might perform wouldn’t attract the attention of any human not in his charge.
That whole ‘not attracting attention’ clause was also why he was sitting here invisible and not actually doing anything. True, it was a douche move to just sit there and watch those kids bully his charge but what was he supposed to do? He doubted Sue would be the least bit understanding about it if he tried to interfere.
The bullies left, trailing off in one big group and congratulating themselves. Puck resisted the urge to set any small fires in their vicinity and instead waited for the kid to climb out of the dumpster.
Slowly, carefully, one dainty white hand hooked over the rim, closely followed by its partner. A pale face with rosy lips and cheeks peeked out over the top, blue-grey eyes wary. When the boy saw no-one else around he sighed, expression relaxing into something sadder. Resigned, Puck thought. The boy looked resigned, as if this sort of thing happened every day. The boy hoisted himself out of the dumpster with enough grace to imply that he’d done this sort of thing plenty of times before. Feet firmly on the ground again he brushed clinging paper debris from his jacket and smoothed his hair, obviously taking the time he needed to compose himself again.
Puck looked down at the inside of his wrist and the name he’d scrawled there earlier. Kurt Hummel. He sighed and tucked the damn wand into the waistband of his kilt, then jumped down from the wall. He started towards the kid, cleared his throat, and realised that he was still invisible to the human eye just a few steps away from him. He dropped the illusion and watched the kid’s eyes pop wide open.
“Kurt Hummel?” he asked, just to be sure.
The boy squeaked. Actually squeaked. Pale hands flew up to cover his mouth. “I’m hallucinating,” Kurt said. “I’m hallucinating a man in a kilt.”
“Fairy,” Puck corrected, jerking a thumb over his shoulder to point at his wings. “And, dude, you’re not hallucinating.”
A slightly hysterical giggle escaped from behind Kurt’s fingers. “A fairy,” he repeated. “I’m hallucinating a fairy in a kilt...” His head cocked to the side slightly. “And an offensive t-shirt. With a mohawk. Oh my god, I’ve gone insane.”
“Do you, like, wanna sit down before you hyperventilate or whatever?” Puck asked, starting to feel like maybe he’d taken the wrong approach here.
“That may be a good idea,” Kurt agreed, hands finally lowering again as he cast about for a seat. Seeing none, eventually he settled on just sitting on the ground, legs curled up underneath him.
Puck stood there a moment or two in silence, arms crossed as he tried to figure out how to fix this. He couldn’t think of anything, so he just decided to throw caution to the wind and announce; “So I’m your ‘fairy godmother’. Name’s Puck. ‘Sup.”
Kurt looked up at him, staring in silence for what seemed like a ridiculously long time, mind obviously trying to wrap around this very odd scenario. “Puck,” he repeated eventually. “Your name is Puck and you’re my... fairy godmother?”
“Yeah.” Puck shrugged defensively. “So what?”
“Assuming...” Kurt paused a moment, then continued, “assuming I choose for the moment to believe you and that you’re not in fact a stress-induced hallucination or the first sign of early insanity... You’re a man.”
“Fairy.”
“Fairy man.”
“So?” Puck asked, not seeing the point.
“So how can you be my fairy godmother?” Kurt replied, the question tinged with a hint of lingering hysteria. “And why would I have a fairy godmother in the first place? Why wouldn’t I have known about this beforehand?”
“It’s the name of the job,” Puck explained dryly, “’fairy godmother’. That doesn’t automatically mean you get some chick in a puffy pink dress or whatever.” Sometimes you’d get a disgraced sprite with a chip on his shoulder. “And there’s a long freakin’ waitlist to get a fairy godmother, ok? Someone put your name down and hey, years later you get to the top of the list.”
“Does everyone get a fairy godmother?” Kurt asked, looking no less confused and no more reassured of his own sanity.
“No,” Puck scoffed. “So consider yourself lucky.”
“In case you hadn’t noticed I just climbed out of a dumpster,” Kurt said archly. “I wouldn’t call myself in any way lucky. I’m still questioning whether or not I can still call myself sane.”
Seeing that this was going to be a sticking point and wanting to get the whole sanity issue over and done with, Puck stepped forward and poked Kurt with the stary point of his wand. Right in the bicep. Startled by the painful poke, Kurt leapt to his feet, quickly covering the offended bicep with a hand.
“What was that for!?” He demanded, horrified to discover that the sharp point of Puck’s want had actually poked a tiny hole in the fabric of his shirt.
“To prove I’m real?” Puck replied, thinking it should have been obvious.
“Fine,” Kurt agreed reluctantly, carefully exploring the hole in his sleeve. He eyed the wand warily for a moment, then switched his focus to Puck’s face. “You’re real, and I’m probably sane.”
“Probably,” Puck agreed, casual while awkwardly tucking his wand into the waistband of his kilt.
“And I should probably get home,” Kurt added after a moment. “It can’t be a good idea to stand around in the school parking lot talking to a strange... fairy.” Kurt blinked, then narrowed his eyes a little. He stared hard at Puck. “Can other people see you? Or am I just standing here talking to myself? As far as anyone could tell, I mean.”
Kurt felt that it was a valid question. After all, in the past few minutes his understanding of exactly how sane and normal the world really was had been shaken up a little. In the space of less than ten minutes he had been tossed into a dumpster, and just when he’d regained his composure he’d suddenly found himself talking to a man with wings who had appeared out of thin air and claimed to be his fairy godmother. It was a lot to process even apart from the implications regarding his mental health.
“Right now?” The fairy-man asked, giving another shrug. “Sure. I’m not invisible or anything. Anyone rocks up right now they’ll be able to see me.”
“And the... wings?” Kurt pressed, gaze flicking to the bizarrely dragonfly-like appendages sprouting from Puck’s back.
“Nope. Only you can see those.”
“Of course.” Nothing was ever that easy. “So,” Kurt summarised, “you’re a fairy named Puck who has assumedly been assigned to be my ‘fairy godmother’. Anyone can see you, but I’m the only one who can see your wings. And I haven’t lost my grip on reality.”
“Yup,” Puck agreed.
“And do you have powers? Because I’m not sure I’m in the right frame of mind to drive home just now.”
“I got limited powers,” Puck admitted grudgingly. “I can conjure a bucket if you need to hurl, but I can’t teleport you home.”
“Oh? That’s handy.” He was only being a little sarcastic. It was good to know that if he ever needed to throw up that there would be a bucket and he wouldn’t have to risk ruining his shoes. “What else?”
“Dude, conjuring shit doesn’t impress you?”
“I’m just trying to get a handle on the situation here,” Kurt replied, a little strained. “It’s not every day a boy gets a fairy godmother.” And there was that hint of hysteria again. Kurt took a couple of deep, calming breaths before he dared to glare at the source of his problems. The mohawked fairy who was currently looking at him like he was the weird element. “Please. I’d like to know the full scope of this new development to my life.”
“Ok... I can be invisible,” Puck explained, clearly going through a mental list of things he could (though it was more like what he was allowed to) do. “I can do mood lighting. I can change your clothes or fix your hair. And I’ve got enough juice for one big wish when you need it. You know, standard Cinderella shit.”
“So you’re like my personal stylist?” Kurt arched an eyebrow. He crossed his arms, a small detached part of him still thinking about how insane it was to be having a conversation like this (with a fairy) in the school parking lot.
“Whatever.” Puck shrugged, fingertips flicking the star on top of his wand. “Anyway, I’m here til you find true love.”
“True love?” Kurt repeated. “In this town?” He laughed humourlessly. Nothing was ever that easy. “Well,” he said, uncrossing his arms and deciding it was time to make his way home, “I guess I’d better get used to you then.”