Fic: Shut Your Mouth (Finn, Ensemble) R (8/?)
Title: Shut Your Mouth
Author: hyperemmalawlz
Fandom: Glee
Chapter: 8/? - "Close Your Eyes."
Characters/Pairing: Finn, Ensemble.
Word Count: 3670
Rating: NC-17 overall; R for this chapter.
Summary: After the underwear incident, Karofsky and Azimio simply will not back off already when it comes to Finn. Things quickly go from bad to worse.
Spoilers: Up to 2x05, "The Rocky Horror Glee Show."
Warnings: Swearing, description of sexual assault, sexual references.
Author's Notes: Written for the glee_angst_meme, the prompt: "After the underwear incident, things get a whole lot worse for Finn. The football jocks won't stop taunting him, but it's worse than before: their comments get really sexual. Then they begin awkwardly touching him when they're alone. He wants to tell someone, but it isn't rape or anything so he figures he should just suck it up. And then Korafsky and Azimo corner him in the locker room and force him to give them head. They tell him he was asking for it, and he starts to believe it."
8: Close Your Eyes
He doesn't actually get many calls. Probably because he's refusing to answer his cell - he's terrified they will have gone back to sending him those texts, and that would probably be a very dumb move but Finn just can't-
Mom gives him the day off school, which isn't that much of a surprise. He doesn't know whether Karofsky and Azimio will be there, and he's pretty sure he doesn't really want to know. If Bieste said something, Finn thinks they could have gotten kicked out - but he doesn't want to take a risk. So he hides like a little girl.
Then the home phone rings.
Mom shoots him a worried look at its sound, before saying “I'll get it.” Just in case it's something-
Finn doesn't really want to finish that sentence.
“Hello?” asks Mom, sounding about as nervous as Finn feels. “Who is this?”
She lets out a visible sigh of relief. “Oh,” she says. “I'll check.”
She covers the talking part of the phone with her hand, and looks back at Finn. “It's Puck,” she whispers. “He wants to talk to you.”
Finn hesitates. Puck has been his best friend since elementary school, and really, when something this shittastic is happening, talking to him should be one of Finn's first impulses. But it's not. Because - Finn loves the dude, but he has been a crap best friend, no lie. What with babygate and everything. And Finn's dealing with the worst thing that ever happened to him, and he should trust Puck to be good with it, but he... kind of doesn't.
But it's Puck. Finn needs to talk to him.
He sighs and takes the phone, moving to press it up to his ear.
“Other way up, sweetheart.”
Finn blushes at his mom correcting him. It's been a long time since he had to use the home phone, okay?
“Y'Hello?” he says. There's an awkward pause.
“...Dude. Finn,” says Puck. “So... this is really uncomfortable.”
“I kinda noticed,” says Finn.
“You haven't been answering your cell.”
“Uh, yeah...” Finn hesitates - he doesn't want to explain about the texts. They make him feel like - why didn't you see this coming, dumbass? He doesn't want Puck thinking that too. “It's just... bad right now.”
“Okay, I don't know if you know, but - Jewfro put these pictures of you-”
“I know,” Finn cuts him off. “Uh, Kurt kinda rang and told us. It was... not great.”
“Yeah, he seems major league pissed. I totally dumpster'd Israel for that one, but Hummel punched him in the face. Again. Actually, he's really awesome for that, because Jewfro's scrawny enough Kurt can take him down, and he never gets in trouble for it because dude, it's Hummel.”
Despite himself, Finn smiles at that. “'Kay. Thanks. And tell Kurt thanks for me too.”
“Will do,” says Puck. “So, uh... you okay, dude?”
“...Not really?” Finn says. “Um, are Karofsky and Azimio... like... at school?”
“Nah. Went 'round to Azimio's with a baseball bat; whole family's legged it. Went 'round to Karofsky's with a tire iron; his mom and dad are freaking 'cause he ran off. Warning - they kind of think you're some homo who 'converted' their son or whatever, and is now crying rape to ruin his life further. I don't really know. It was all bullshit and kind of homophobic, so I got out of there.”
Finn nods along, but feels a little sick. Even if it's Karofsky's family, who kind of have an excuse - people think he started this? “Okay. Does anyone... not horribly biased think that somehow I was cool with this?”
“...Didn't want to tell you this, but kind of, yeah. People suck, dude. It's like, the guys on the team who call you deep throat - they'd love to think they're nickname was right. Not that you'd ever do that, course.”
Finn really hopes he's just imagining that weird doubting tone in Puck's voice.
Wasn't he kind of the one who started that whole nickname?
“Okay,” he says. “Is Figgins doing anything...?”
“Pretending it ain't happening, basically. Schue seems major league pissed at him, though.”
Finn tried to tell Schue. Maybe, if he hadn't tried to make everything seem so cool, it'd be...?
“So, you know when you'll be coming back?”
“What?” Finn blinks at the sudden question. “Oh. Uh. I dunno, dude. When I can without, like, having some kind of psycho panic attack.”
“Cool. Take care, dude. And answer your damn cell so Berry'll stop bitching at me about you not getting her texts.”
*
The next day, Mom still lets him stay home. Unfortunately, she has to work - she tries to reason with her bosses, but it just doesn't work. She spends all her time the night before fretting and worrying if Finn will be okay home alone; saying she won't go if he still needs her.
He tells her to go. He'll be just fine.
She leaves around seven-ish, barely making Finn stir. He tries to get back to sleep.
He finds himself somewhere he doesn't know. It's dark. Wet. He can't see anything, and he can't stand up. There are like weights on his legs, or something.
Suddenly, he's choking. He doesn't understand it. There is something long and thick shoved down his throat; it's dull and flavorless, and he doesn't understand the point of it. What is this? Why is it making him gag? He does his best to spit whatever-it-is out, but really that just makes his throat hurt worse.
His back and legs are cramping, and he tries to shift to get it to die down, but they won't move - it's fucking creepy. He thinks he feels something dripping down his thigh, which is weird because he thinks he's kneeling and that's not where the water is, and it's actually kind of cold so it's not like he's sweating. The ache in his back is intensifying and heading lower, and he's not sure why.
He tries to swipe whatever's dripping down his thigh with his hand so he can check what it is (although he still can't see, he's not really sure how he's going to do that), but he finds his hands are stuck behind his back. No-one's talking, but he thinks he can hear laughter - not normal laughter; really weird, distant, inhuman laughter. Like he's surrounded by kookaburras. Which he's pretty sure don't actually live in the States, so what the hell?
He wakes up sweating and breathing hard. It was a nightmare, he realizes, and he squeezes his eyes shut once again. That makes him uncomfortable, and he looks back to check his digital clock (the analogue one across the room is easier to look at, but he tends to have difficulty figuring out the time from that unless he's fully awake). It's just about quarter past eight.
He should really try to sleep in - he usually does that when he can, it's not like he's got anything better to do, and... okay, it sounds dumb, but he'd kind of like to recover his strength. You know, since everything went crazy - he thinks sleeping might help.
He closes his eyes and rolls on his side, trying to get back to sleep again. It doesn't last long. His back is still sweaty and he kind of - he really doesn't want to have that nightmare again.
The nightmare wasn't even so bad. Dream Finn wasn't terrified or anything - confused, mostly. It hurt a bit, but nothing he couldn't handle.
That's kind of the problem. Dream Finn didn't know what was going on. Real Finn remembers the nightmare and knows it was a trauma flashback to what happened, but while he was in the dream... it was just a thing. It wasn't even an overly scary thing. And that makes Finn... feel kind of bad; like he's not fucked up enough or something. He always thought crazy trauma nightmares would be like, just reliving the experience exactly and feeling all those same emotions. This wasn't. This was a reliving, but not one he understood while having it, and that actually scares him more for some reason. Because his head has enough in it right now without his subconscious trying to make things worse.
Finn sighs and sits up. He just wants to sleep. Sleep and not worry about getting nightmares, and exactly their type.
(He can still faintly taste them at the back of his throat).
Logically, he doesn't have to worry. Even if Mom is out, Karofsky and Azimio have gotten what they wanted. And run off - even if he's pissed and Jacob for posting all that shit, it may have just scared the guys enough to make them stop. They can't do anything. They don't even know-
Finn frowns and bites his lip. Do they know where he lives? Might do. Jock stuff and all that. Hell, they found Kurt's house easy enough - can Finn...?
No, he tells himself. Doesn't matter. Don't panic.
He swallows deeply and pulls the sheets off, slowly walking toward the bathroom. He's pretty sure he's not going to get back to sleep now, and he really hates being sweaty, so he wants to take a shower. A door slams while he's walking there, and despite himself he jumps.
Come on, man, he thinks. Doors slamming? That's such a fucking cliche.
(Maybe he gives himself boyfriend points for using a Rachel word, but anyway.)
The water is hot and high-pressured, but he reminds himself not to stay in there for long. He doesn't really know why, but somehow he knows staying in there too long means something bad. So he does his best not to stay in there too long.
At least this time, he won't wind up jerking off in the shower. Yeah, not going to be in the mood for awhile.
He wraps a towel around himself way higher than normal - like a girl would, just above where his boobs would be. It's probably some kind of trauma making him act like this, although that doesn't really make sense, because hey - didn't take off his clothes.
He realizes he didn't bring actual clothes to the bathroom. Well, that was dumb. Normally, he'd be cool with it, but - he kind of doesn't want to walk back to his room in nothing but a towel. Which is... dumb, because he walked here in his boxers and slept in them as well, and they hid less, but... his brain isn't always so rational.
But a towel can be pulled away. Easy. Like, no effort... he can't even make a show of keeping it on, and given how bad he's been at-
Whoa. He cuts off his own fucked-up thought process - he can't feel like that. There's no-one even in the house; he's not hiding from anyone. They wouldn't come here.
Or they would.
He's either major league paranoid, or in denial.
To keep himself calm, he dries off enough so he can put his boxers under the towel. He feels a little less exposed. He starts the long walk back to his room, to put on proper clothes - thick sweatpants and a long-sleeved shirt, plus a heavy sweater. Really, it's way too hot for all that, but he does it anyway - and clearly god is still fucking with him, because it's November. He should be able to dress like that by this point
He sighs and looks toward the door. He should go and like, do something - eat. Okay, he's a teenager so he like never eats breakfast, but that's normally thanks to school. When he's home, yeah, he eats in the morning. He eats all the time. He likes food.
Which often has bad effects, which leads to stupid decisions, which leads to-
Dammit.
He was trying to forget about context for a little longer yet.
Finn does head towards the door, but he doesn't walk out. He gently shuts it - trying not to jump at the sound. Then he walks back to the bed, and sits cross-legged on it.
He gets bored and fidgety pretty quickly.
He's sweaty in his heavy clothing, and that makes him feel more uncomfortable. He won't take the sweater off though, like a sane person, so instead he just opens his window. It doesn't do much good, but it gets him back up, and he starts pacing.
He's nervous. And he doesn't really know why.
He darts and dodges randomly over his room, and winds up collapsing against his door. Dude, relax. What are you scared of?
Well, that's obvious. Logical or not, he's scared of them.
Finn sighs, and then suddenly sees something out of the corner of his eye. A photo he has up on the wall. Football team, late 2008 - freshman year. He cut it out of his thunderclap, because he was so proud of himself for being the quarterback (he was a freshman). Yeah, they didn't win a single game, but that kind of wasn't the point. He was still kind of dumb and believed they had a team spirit or something.
He swallows hard. Karofsky and Azimio are there - Karofsky was always kind of off-again-on-again when it came to the team, for some reason - and Finn just...
He tears the photo down and rips it in two before he really realizes what he's doing. Well, that was kind of dumb. He was proud of himself that year, dammit; that's why he hung the photo up in the first place.
It's like in all those Lifetime movies Mom watches - he shouldn't let them take that from him, right?
He looks more carefully at the photo, now the side he is on and the side those two bastards are on are separate. People looked at him... differently. He can see it in the photo, even though no-one's actually looking him. Old Finn would never have seen this coming. New Finn didn't see it coming either, but that was because New Finn was a dumbass with a major case of denial more than anything - New Finn couldn't acknowledge that he was in that much trouble; that they would take it that far (New Finn should probably stop thinking in third person just about now).
It just wouldn't have happened to Old Finn. People like Karofsky and Azimio wouldn't have been able to come up with an excuse. They wouldn't have gotten away with it - Old Finn (well, Old Puck more likely, because Old Finn still wasn't so great with the being proactive thing) could've had them down somehow like that.
He's not going to blame himself for this. He's not. That'll go bad. Just... he guesses he kind of didn't remember he wasn't Old Finn anymore.
Finn winds up tearing himself more specifically out of the picture in his hands. He's not really sure why, but... it's like a reminder. He was that dude. He is that dude. He can be that dude.
And it wasn't okay to do this to that dude.
He carefully lays the photo down on the bed, and stares at it for a moment. And then he winds up turning to his wardrobe. He flings it open and rummages through, not really sure what he's looking for.
He gets his hands on something, and gulps. Basketball uniform.
He looks more, and finds his old football uniform, from freshman year and when his growth spurt was sort of still going - he was so fucking proud to pass six foot. He finds his baseball uniform too. He finds a lot of different uniforms - he plays a lot of sports. He throws them onto the bed too.
The uniforms are like the photo. It's all about that dude; the one who had some kind of power over everyone, that meant no-one could touch him. Finn doesn't know what he did while he was that dude, but...
He turns around to open the bottom drawer on his chest of them - it means kneeling down, which is not helpful, but he deals. He keeps the old thunderclaps in there, and even his stuff from junior high. He pulls out the first few books and opens them, looking for photos of himself. There are a lot. He remembers when he always used to get nagged into joining a whole bunch of clubs around yearbook time, for the sake of the clubs' rep - back when he was a good thing and all.
He pulls the photos out and puts them on the bed, arranging them around the one from the football picture. The clothes are taking up too much room on the bed, so he throws them off. His room is already really messy with his clothes, so he makes sure to throw them where he can actually see them - onto the desk and the fan on the ceiling and his bookshelf. There's one piece of clothing he doesn't throw of, though; the torn halves of his letterman jacket. He hadn't quite saved up enough to buy a new one. He bites his lip and tries to pull each half on - doesn't really work with the two layers he already has on, and it makes him way too hot again, but he keeps it. Even if it's about to fall off anyway.
With the extra room, he can spread the photos out to look at them all at once. He was that guy; he knows that. And that guy might not have always been great - actually, he was kind of a douche. But he was a safe douche.
Can Finn be selfish about this for like, five seconds?
Finn stares more at his impromptu-collage on the bed. He doesn't want to disrupt it, but moving at all kind of does that, even when he tries not to - he still needs to breathe. If he tries to sleep there, it'll get fucked up worse - he'll either have to move the damn thing, or he'll crush all the photos.
(He doesn't want to ask himself what's so damn important about it yet.)
Finn bites his lip and looks to the wall above the headboard. He then starts checking through his bedside drawer - is he out of that sticky stuff for posters?
*
He's got like five photos left in the pile and is kind of wondering where they're gonna go when he hears a knock on the door. “Finn? Are you okay in there?”
He looks back anxiously, and sees the clock - it's one-thirty; she said she'd be home about now. Shit.
He suddenly remembers that he like never remembers to close his bedroom door - even when jerking off, most of the time he accidentally leaves it open (most of the time Mom isn't even on this storey, okay?), which has led to some seriously awkward moments in the past, but whatever, he's seventeen, it's not like she was surprised.
“Uh...” he hesitates. He hears the door open.
“Baby, are you - Holy shit.” She gets seriously less tactful as she opens the door and sees. Her eyes are stuck on the wall for a few seconds, before she checks out what he's done with the rest of the room. His eyes follow hers around, and a sinking sensation settles in his stomach. He's got clothing covering most of the furniture like it's from God or something. His clothing is completely insane - three layers in like mid-seventies degree heat, one item of which is broken. He has a whole stalker-tastic photo montage on the wall, except it's to himself, which probably makes it even creepier.
He designed himself a trademark Room Full O' Crazy, and kind of didn't notice 'til she came in.
Mom walks into the room cautiously, pulling his basketball uniform from off the chest of drawers. “Finn, sweetheart, what are you doing?”
He bites his lip and shrugs, although the latter's mostly to stop the halves of the letterman jacket falling off. “Thinking,” he says. “Looking at photos.” He looks down, ashamed, to some empty space on the bed. “Maybe having a minor psychotic breakdown?”
She sighs and walks over to the bed, sitting down gingerly. “Sweetie...” she looks anxious, “did something... else happen while I was out? Something small that just...”
Finn shakes his head. He knows she just said 'something small', but - does she think they'd come here too? Is he actually... you know, safe in his house?
How does he even ask that question.
“I, uh... I had a nightmare?” he offers weakly. She looks crushed.
“Baby, I'm so sorry,” she says, and he shakes his head again.
“It's cool.” Almost defensively, he grabs the photos he hasn't stuck up yet, and puts them in his lap.
She bites her lip. “Can I ask...?”
He shrugs. “I just...” He looks up at the photos again, not looking her in the eye. A beaming, fifteen year old, weirdly-hatted, in-the-Renaissance-club-for-all-of-five-m
inutes Finn Hudson beams down at him.
“I was that guy once, you know?” he says. “And... people respected that guy. Even assholes.”
When he finally looks back at her, she looks like she's about to break in two. “Oh... Come here, Finn,” she says before wrapping her arms around him tight, mumbling into his hair. He stares at everything he has strewn over the room over his shoulder, and realizes he's starting to cry. Mom obviously doesn't seem to mind, so he just lets it happen.
The broken jacket falls off, but it's not a big deal.
Author: hyperemmalawlz
Fandom: Glee
Chapter: 8/? - "Close Your Eyes."
Characters/Pairing: Finn, Ensemble.
Word Count: 3670
Rating: NC-17 overall; R for this chapter.
Summary: After the underwear incident, Karofsky and Azimio simply will not back off already when it comes to Finn. Things quickly go from bad to worse.
Spoilers: Up to 2x05, "The Rocky Horror Glee Show."
Warnings: Swearing, description of sexual assault, sexual references.
Author's Notes: Written for the glee_angst_meme, the prompt: "After the underwear incident, things get a whole lot worse for Finn. The football jocks won't stop taunting him, but it's worse than before: their comments get really sexual. Then they begin awkwardly touching him when they're alone. He wants to tell someone, but it isn't rape or anything so he figures he should just suck it up. And then Korafsky and Azimo corner him in the locker room and force him to give them head. They tell him he was asking for it, and he starts to believe it."
8: Close Your Eyes
He doesn't actually get many calls. Probably because he's refusing to answer his cell - he's terrified they will have gone back to sending him those texts, and that would probably be a very dumb move but Finn just can't-
Mom gives him the day off school, which isn't that much of a surprise. He doesn't know whether Karofsky and Azimio will be there, and he's pretty sure he doesn't really want to know. If Bieste said something, Finn thinks they could have gotten kicked out - but he doesn't want to take a risk. So he hides like a little girl.
Then the home phone rings.
Mom shoots him a worried look at its sound, before saying “I'll get it.” Just in case it's something-
Finn doesn't really want to finish that sentence.
“Hello?” asks Mom, sounding about as nervous as Finn feels. “Who is this?”
She lets out a visible sigh of relief. “Oh,” she says. “I'll check.”
She covers the talking part of the phone with her hand, and looks back at Finn. “It's Puck,” she whispers. “He wants to talk to you.”
Finn hesitates. Puck has been his best friend since elementary school, and really, when something this shittastic is happening, talking to him should be one of Finn's first impulses. But it's not. Because - Finn loves the dude, but he has been a crap best friend, no lie. What with babygate and everything. And Finn's dealing with the worst thing that ever happened to him, and he should trust Puck to be good with it, but he... kind of doesn't.
But it's Puck. Finn needs to talk to him.
He sighs and takes the phone, moving to press it up to his ear.
“Other way up, sweetheart.”
Finn blushes at his mom correcting him. It's been a long time since he had to use the home phone, okay?
“Y'Hello?” he says. There's an awkward pause.
“...Dude. Finn,” says Puck. “So... this is really uncomfortable.”
“I kinda noticed,” says Finn.
“You haven't been answering your cell.”
“Uh, yeah...” Finn hesitates - he doesn't want to explain about the texts. They make him feel like - why didn't you see this coming, dumbass? He doesn't want Puck thinking that too. “It's just... bad right now.”
“Okay, I don't know if you know, but - Jewfro put these pictures of you-”
“I know,” Finn cuts him off. “Uh, Kurt kinda rang and told us. It was... not great.”
“Yeah, he seems major league pissed. I totally dumpster'd Israel for that one, but Hummel punched him in the face. Again. Actually, he's really awesome for that, because Jewfro's scrawny enough Kurt can take him down, and he never gets in trouble for it because dude, it's Hummel.”
Despite himself, Finn smiles at that. “'Kay. Thanks. And tell Kurt thanks for me too.”
“Will do,” says Puck. “So, uh... you okay, dude?”
“...Not really?” Finn says. “Um, are Karofsky and Azimio... like... at school?”
“Nah. Went 'round to Azimio's with a baseball bat; whole family's legged it. Went 'round to Karofsky's with a tire iron; his mom and dad are freaking 'cause he ran off. Warning - they kind of think you're some homo who 'converted' their son or whatever, and is now crying rape to ruin his life further. I don't really know. It was all bullshit and kind of homophobic, so I got out of there.”
Finn nods along, but feels a little sick. Even if it's Karofsky's family, who kind of have an excuse - people think he started this? “Okay. Does anyone... not horribly biased think that somehow I was cool with this?”
“...Didn't want to tell you this, but kind of, yeah. People suck, dude. It's like, the guys on the team who call you deep throat - they'd love to think they're nickname was right. Not that you'd ever do that, course.”
Finn really hopes he's just imagining that weird doubting tone in Puck's voice.
Wasn't he kind of the one who started that whole nickname?
“Okay,” he says. “Is Figgins doing anything...?”
“Pretending it ain't happening, basically. Schue seems major league pissed at him, though.”
Finn tried to tell Schue. Maybe, if he hadn't tried to make everything seem so cool, it'd be...?
“So, you know when you'll be coming back?”
“What?” Finn blinks at the sudden question. “Oh. Uh. I dunno, dude. When I can without, like, having some kind of psycho panic attack.”
“Cool. Take care, dude. And answer your damn cell so Berry'll stop bitching at me about you not getting her texts.”
*
The next day, Mom still lets him stay home. Unfortunately, she has to work - she tries to reason with her bosses, but it just doesn't work. She spends all her time the night before fretting and worrying if Finn will be okay home alone; saying she won't go if he still needs her.
He tells her to go. He'll be just fine.
She leaves around seven-ish, barely making Finn stir. He tries to get back to sleep.
He finds himself somewhere he doesn't know. It's dark. Wet. He can't see anything, and he can't stand up. There are like weights on his legs, or something.
Suddenly, he's choking. He doesn't understand it. There is something long and thick shoved down his throat; it's dull and flavorless, and he doesn't understand the point of it. What is this? Why is it making him gag? He does his best to spit whatever-it-is out, but really that just makes his throat hurt worse.
His back and legs are cramping, and he tries to shift to get it to die down, but they won't move - it's fucking creepy. He thinks he feels something dripping down his thigh, which is weird because he thinks he's kneeling and that's not where the water is, and it's actually kind of cold so it's not like he's sweating. The ache in his back is intensifying and heading lower, and he's not sure why.
He tries to swipe whatever's dripping down his thigh with his hand so he can check what it is (although he still can't see, he's not really sure how he's going to do that), but he finds his hands are stuck behind his back. No-one's talking, but he thinks he can hear laughter - not normal laughter; really weird, distant, inhuman laughter. Like he's surrounded by kookaburras. Which he's pretty sure don't actually live in the States, so what the hell?
He wakes up sweating and breathing hard. It was a nightmare, he realizes, and he squeezes his eyes shut once again. That makes him uncomfortable, and he looks back to check his digital clock (the analogue one across the room is easier to look at, but he tends to have difficulty figuring out the time from that unless he's fully awake). It's just about quarter past eight.
He should really try to sleep in - he usually does that when he can, it's not like he's got anything better to do, and... okay, it sounds dumb, but he'd kind of like to recover his strength. You know, since everything went crazy - he thinks sleeping might help.
He closes his eyes and rolls on his side, trying to get back to sleep again. It doesn't last long. His back is still sweaty and he kind of - he really doesn't want to have that nightmare again.
The nightmare wasn't even so bad. Dream Finn wasn't terrified or anything - confused, mostly. It hurt a bit, but nothing he couldn't handle.
That's kind of the problem. Dream Finn didn't know what was going on. Real Finn remembers the nightmare and knows it was a trauma flashback to what happened, but while he was in the dream... it was just a thing. It wasn't even an overly scary thing. And that makes Finn... feel kind of bad; like he's not fucked up enough or something. He always thought crazy trauma nightmares would be like, just reliving the experience exactly and feeling all those same emotions. This wasn't. This was a reliving, but not one he understood while having it, and that actually scares him more for some reason. Because his head has enough in it right now without his subconscious trying to make things worse.
Finn sighs and sits up. He just wants to sleep. Sleep and not worry about getting nightmares, and exactly their type.
(He can still faintly taste them at the back of his throat).
Logically, he doesn't have to worry. Even if Mom is out, Karofsky and Azimio have gotten what they wanted. And run off - even if he's pissed and Jacob for posting all that shit, it may have just scared the guys enough to make them stop. They can't do anything. They don't even know-
Finn frowns and bites his lip. Do they know where he lives? Might do. Jock stuff and all that. Hell, they found Kurt's house easy enough - can Finn...?
No, he tells himself. Doesn't matter. Don't panic.
He swallows deeply and pulls the sheets off, slowly walking toward the bathroom. He's pretty sure he's not going to get back to sleep now, and he really hates being sweaty, so he wants to take a shower. A door slams while he's walking there, and despite himself he jumps.
Come on, man, he thinks. Doors slamming? That's such a fucking cliche.
(Maybe he gives himself boyfriend points for using a Rachel word, but anyway.)
The water is hot and high-pressured, but he reminds himself not to stay in there for long. He doesn't really know why, but somehow he knows staying in there too long means something bad. So he does his best not to stay in there too long.
At least this time, he won't wind up jerking off in the shower. Yeah, not going to be in the mood for awhile.
He wraps a towel around himself way higher than normal - like a girl would, just above where his boobs would be. It's probably some kind of trauma making him act like this, although that doesn't really make sense, because hey - didn't take off his clothes.
He realizes he didn't bring actual clothes to the bathroom. Well, that was dumb. Normally, he'd be cool with it, but - he kind of doesn't want to walk back to his room in nothing but a towel. Which is... dumb, because he walked here in his boxers and slept in them as well, and they hid less, but... his brain isn't always so rational.
But a towel can be pulled away. Easy. Like, no effort... he can't even make a show of keeping it on, and given how bad he's been at-
Whoa. He cuts off his own fucked-up thought process - he can't feel like that. There's no-one even in the house; he's not hiding from anyone. They wouldn't come here.
Or they would.
He's either major league paranoid, or in denial.
To keep himself calm, he dries off enough so he can put his boxers under the towel. He feels a little less exposed. He starts the long walk back to his room, to put on proper clothes - thick sweatpants and a long-sleeved shirt, plus a heavy sweater. Really, it's way too hot for all that, but he does it anyway - and clearly god is still fucking with him, because it's November. He should be able to dress like that by this point
He sighs and looks toward the door. He should go and like, do something - eat. Okay, he's a teenager so he like never eats breakfast, but that's normally thanks to school. When he's home, yeah, he eats in the morning. He eats all the time. He likes food.
Which often has bad effects, which leads to stupid decisions, which leads to-
Dammit.
He was trying to forget about context for a little longer yet.
Finn does head towards the door, but he doesn't walk out. He gently shuts it - trying not to jump at the sound. Then he walks back to the bed, and sits cross-legged on it.
He gets bored and fidgety pretty quickly.
He's sweaty in his heavy clothing, and that makes him feel more uncomfortable. He won't take the sweater off though, like a sane person, so instead he just opens his window. It doesn't do much good, but it gets him back up, and he starts pacing.
He's nervous. And he doesn't really know why.
He darts and dodges randomly over his room, and winds up collapsing against his door. Dude, relax. What are you scared of?
Well, that's obvious. Logical or not, he's scared of them.
Finn sighs, and then suddenly sees something out of the corner of his eye. A photo he has up on the wall. Football team, late 2008 - freshman year. He cut it out of his thunderclap, because he was so proud of himself for being the quarterback (he was a freshman). Yeah, they didn't win a single game, but that kind of wasn't the point. He was still kind of dumb and believed they had a team spirit or something.
He swallows hard. Karofsky and Azimio are there - Karofsky was always kind of off-again-on-again when it came to the team, for some reason - and Finn just...
He tears the photo down and rips it in two before he really realizes what he's doing. Well, that was kind of dumb. He was proud of himself that year, dammit; that's why he hung the photo up in the first place.
It's like in all those Lifetime movies Mom watches - he shouldn't let them take that from him, right?
He looks more carefully at the photo, now the side he is on and the side those two bastards are on are separate. People looked at him... differently. He can see it in the photo, even though no-one's actually looking him. Old Finn would never have seen this coming. New Finn didn't see it coming either, but that was because New Finn was a dumbass with a major case of denial more than anything - New Finn couldn't acknowledge that he was in that much trouble; that they would take it that far (New Finn should probably stop thinking in third person just about now).
It just wouldn't have happened to Old Finn. People like Karofsky and Azimio wouldn't have been able to come up with an excuse. They wouldn't have gotten away with it - Old Finn (well, Old Puck more likely, because Old Finn still wasn't so great with the being proactive thing) could've had them down somehow like that.
He's not going to blame himself for this. He's not. That'll go bad. Just... he guesses he kind of didn't remember he wasn't Old Finn anymore.
Finn winds up tearing himself more specifically out of the picture in his hands. He's not really sure why, but... it's like a reminder. He was that dude. He is that dude. He can be that dude.
And it wasn't okay to do this to that dude.
He carefully lays the photo down on the bed, and stares at it for a moment. And then he winds up turning to his wardrobe. He flings it open and rummages through, not really sure what he's looking for.
He gets his hands on something, and gulps. Basketball uniform.
He looks more, and finds his old football uniform, from freshman year and when his growth spurt was sort of still going - he was so fucking proud to pass six foot. He finds his baseball uniform too. He finds a lot of different uniforms - he plays a lot of sports. He throws them onto the bed too.
The uniforms are like the photo. It's all about that dude; the one who had some kind of power over everyone, that meant no-one could touch him. Finn doesn't know what he did while he was that dude, but...
He turns around to open the bottom drawer on his chest of them - it means kneeling down, which is not helpful, but he deals. He keeps the old thunderclaps in there, and even his stuff from junior high. He pulls out the first few books and opens them, looking for photos of himself. There are a lot. He remembers when he always used to get nagged into joining a whole bunch of clubs around yearbook time, for the sake of the clubs' rep - back when he was a good thing and all.
He pulls the photos out and puts them on the bed, arranging them around the one from the football picture. The clothes are taking up too much room on the bed, so he throws them off. His room is already really messy with his clothes, so he makes sure to throw them where he can actually see them - onto the desk and the fan on the ceiling and his bookshelf. There's one piece of clothing he doesn't throw of, though; the torn halves of his letterman jacket. He hadn't quite saved up enough to buy a new one. He bites his lip and tries to pull each half on - doesn't really work with the two layers he already has on, and it makes him way too hot again, but he keeps it. Even if it's about to fall off anyway.
With the extra room, he can spread the photos out to look at them all at once. He was that guy; he knows that. And that guy might not have always been great - actually, he was kind of a douche. But he was a safe douche.
Can Finn be selfish about this for like, five seconds?
Finn stares more at his impromptu-collage on the bed. He doesn't want to disrupt it, but moving at all kind of does that, even when he tries not to - he still needs to breathe. If he tries to sleep there, it'll get fucked up worse - he'll either have to move the damn thing, or he'll crush all the photos.
(He doesn't want to ask himself what's so damn important about it yet.)
Finn bites his lip and looks to the wall above the headboard. He then starts checking through his bedside drawer - is he out of that sticky stuff for posters?
*
He's got like five photos left in the pile and is kind of wondering where they're gonna go when he hears a knock on the door. “Finn? Are you okay in there?”
He looks back anxiously, and sees the clock - it's one-thirty; she said she'd be home about now. Shit.
He suddenly remembers that he like never remembers to close his bedroom door - even when jerking off, most of the time he accidentally leaves it open (most of the time Mom isn't even on this storey, okay?), which has led to some seriously awkward moments in the past, but whatever, he's seventeen, it's not like she was surprised.
“Uh...” he hesitates. He hears the door open.
“Baby, are you - Holy shit.” She gets seriously less tactful as she opens the door and sees. Her eyes are stuck on the wall for a few seconds, before she checks out what he's done with the rest of the room. His eyes follow hers around, and a sinking sensation settles in his stomach. He's got clothing covering most of the furniture like it's from God or something. His clothing is completely insane - three layers in like mid-seventies degree heat, one item of which is broken. He has a whole stalker-tastic photo montage on the wall, except it's to himself, which probably makes it even creepier.
He designed himself a trademark Room Full O' Crazy, and kind of didn't notice 'til she came in.
Mom walks into the room cautiously, pulling his basketball uniform from off the chest of drawers. “Finn, sweetheart, what are you doing?”
He bites his lip and shrugs, although the latter's mostly to stop the halves of the letterman jacket falling off. “Thinking,” he says. “Looking at photos.” He looks down, ashamed, to some empty space on the bed. “Maybe having a minor psychotic breakdown?”
She sighs and walks over to the bed, sitting down gingerly. “Sweetie...” she looks anxious, “did something... else happen while I was out? Something small that just...”
Finn shakes his head. He knows she just said 'something small', but - does she think they'd come here too? Is he actually... you know, safe in his house?
How does he even ask that question.
“I, uh... I had a nightmare?” he offers weakly. She looks crushed.
“Baby, I'm so sorry,” she says, and he shakes his head again.
“It's cool.” Almost defensively, he grabs the photos he hasn't stuck up yet, and puts them in his lap.
She bites her lip. “Can I ask...?”
He shrugs. “I just...” He looks up at the photos again, not looking her in the eye. A beaming, fifteen year old, weirdly-hatted, in-the-Renaissance-club-for-all-of-five-m
inutes Finn Hudson beams down at him.
“I was that guy once, you know?” he says. “And... people respected that guy. Even assholes.”
When he finally looks back at her, she looks like she's about to break in two. “Oh... Come here, Finn,” she says before wrapping her arms around him tight, mumbling into his hair. He stares at everything he has strewn over the room over his shoulder, and realizes he's starting to cry. Mom obviously doesn't seem to mind, so he just lets it happen.
The broken jacket falls off, but it's not a big deal.