Fic. Need You to Need Me
Title: Need You to Need Me
Author: alicebluegown16
Rating: PG-13
Characters/Pairings: Kurt, Finn, Will, Finn/Will, Kurt/OMC, Finn/OMC, Finn/OFC, mentions of past Finn/Rachel, and past unrequited Kurt/Finn
Summary: Kurt is Finn's gay Obi-Wan.
AN: For the winn prompt meme: Kurt finally figures out it isn't a matter of Finn not being gay, it's just that he's not Finn's type and Finn brings WIll to some sort of family event. Basically, one day I realized my Finn/Will series was severely lacking in Kurt. Which makes no sense because if Finn ever started dating guys, you know Kurt would be all up in that kool-aid. So, this is my retcon of why no Hummel. The series in chronological order Adorable, Do Over, Breakfast of Champions, Like Grown Ups, Nice Boy, and Complicated. (and I Might Know the Word, which is technically loosely part of the series, but is mostly just porn.)This story can be enjoyed alone, but I'm conceited enough to hope that reading the rest of them makes it better. Plus, I'm kind of an attention whore.
Warnings: Star Wars as metaphor. First time writing Kurt Hummel. First time ever writing second person point of view. I have no reason why it's written in that form, Kurt was just very insistent and I couldn't argue. Feedback is much appreciated.
Spring semester of your senior year in high school is kind of crazy.
New Directions wins at Nationals again which is freaking fantastic because everyone worked their asses off and you actually have a solo (and miracle of miracles Figgins finally springs for plane tickets, which is a relief because it’s in California and you know someone would end up getting murdered and/or left on the side of the road if you all had to take a bus again.)
You get into NYU and even though you roll your eyes and scoff like there had never been any doubt, when you open the acceptance letter your hands are shaking with ‘Thank God, thank god, they want me, I’m getting the fuck out of here’ soul deep relief because out of sheer stubborn if I make a backup plan I’m already conceding possible defeat stupidity you didn’t apply anywhere else except for OSU.
You and Sam break up. You’re not even really surprised, it hasn’t felt right for either of you for awhile and you’ve felt him pulling away for months now. You’re mostly just pissed off that he does it before you can and that he does it with some trite ‘It’s not you, it’s me’ speech. You cut him off with a crisp “Yes, I know it’s you. It’s you being an idiot and not knowing what you’re giving up and you getting into a different school and you being too chickenshit to say you want the freedom to fuck other people. I think we’re done here.”
Finn finally ends things for keeps with Rachel which is great since this means she won’t be invading your home anymore and because they’ve been in a long ugly death spiral for what seems like forever. And also because you’re still in that shameful everyone deserves to be as miserable as I am stage of the breakup cycle.
The two of you spend the next three weeks on the couch watching gory horror movies and cheering on the killers, screaming ‘Die, bitch, die’ at the television loudly and enthusiastically enough to worry your dad and have him threatening to send you both to a therapist.
Finn sits on the couch with you, his shoulder a warm welcome weight and when he asks if you want him to beat up Sam, you laugh and then finally, finally cry for the first time.
And then one day Finn confesses to you that he kissed a boy and he liked it.
Which is…you’re not sure what it is.
A couple of years ago, this was your fantasy. But now it’s Finn, your brother, and he’s freaking out and all you feel is a wave of protectiveness.
Of course, this is once you get over the immediate instinctive response of hitting him upside the head with a DVD case and calling him an asshole for letting you angst and swing in the ‘Woe is me, for I am crushing on a straight boy’ wind all that time.
“Dude, I’m sorry, okay! I don’t know what I am right now. I mean, I loved Rachel. I loved having sex with Rachel-don’t make that face at me, Kurt. I’m not going to pretend what I had with her wasn’t real just cuz it ended and you don’t like her---but Ian was really cool and hot and kissing him was pretty awesome and then he kind of pressed up against me and I realized Holy shit, that’s his dick and I’m actually more than okay with that, and what the fuck does that mean?”
There’s another detour when you realize Ian means Ian, the green eyed baritone from Boston Finn spent most of the weekend at Nationals hanging out with.
“Finn, you slut! You made out with some guy you just met that weekend? And worse than that, you didn’t tell me about it immediately!”
“Kurt! Sexual identity crisis over here! Focus!”
Finn’s got his hands buried in his hair and it looks like he sort of wants to cry.
“I’m not saying it’d be a bad thing if I were gay and I know Mom and Burt would be cool about it, but I’ve been so sure I was straight most of my life, ya know? It’s not like I want to run out and have sex with Puck all of a sudden.”
When you mutter, “Good, if you did, you’d probably catch something.” he actually lets out a choky little laugh.
“I mean, back in the day when you were crushing on me, I never wanted to make out with you. And you’re gay and it’d be like totally convenient since we live together. So what the fuck does all that mean? Did Rachel, like ruin me for girls or some shit?”
And it turns out the one thing worse than getting the ‘It’s not you it’s me’ speech? Is this. Being told actually, it totally, totally is you. And even though you don’t look at Finn that way anymore and haven’t for ages, well, there’s a reason the song I Want You to Want Me is so popular.
But you tuck that all away in the triple locked box labeled ‘Do not open under pain of pain’ in the back of you mind and calmly point out that not being attracted to a particular person doesn’t mean anything except that person just isn’t your type.
Finn looks up at you with the adorably befuddled expression that always allows him to skate by on way too much.
“How am I supposed to know what my type is?”
“Finn Hudson, I guess it’s time for an education.”
That summer is Finn watching all of your Queer as Folk DVDs and you giving lectures with titles such as ‘The Prostate and Why It’s Awesome’ and ‘Blowjobs for Dummies.’ You introduce him to the joys of slash fic and when he makes a joke one day about you being his Gay Obi-Wan, you toss in a couple of Qui-Gon/Obi-Wan stories in the batch of links.
But despite all your efforts, at the end of the summer, Finn’s still slightly confused.
‘Okay, so the stories were awesome. Like, Episode I is now not nearly as sucktastic as I originally thought when I pretend that Qui and Obi were having hot Jedi mind sex in all their scenes. And ignoring the fact that Bryan’s a total asshole, he’s still fucking hot. And so’s Michael. And Ben. Ben’s really fucking hot. In fact, Ben’s even hotter than Bryan. He’s got that whole sexy professor thing going for him. But the lesbians? Also really hot. And I still like boobs, Kurt. You know, as a concept.”
Then the light bulb comes on over your head and you could kick yourself for being so unimaginative
“Finn, did you ever consider the fact that perhaps you’re bisexual? That you like both?”
Finn screws up his face in distaste.
“Soooo, I’m just slutty?”
“No, it just means it’s the person, not the gender that matters.”
You start a lecture on the Kinsey scale, but quickly abandon it in favor of simply saying, “You kissed a girl and then a boy and you liked both. And there’s nothing wrong with that. Ugh, I can’t believe I’m having to explain your sexual orientation to you. I blame the close minded heteronormative school system, I really do.”
And just like that, it’s as if your assurances are the seal of approval Finn needed.
Once he’s got a name for it, a label he can cling to, he insists on telling Carole and your Dad about it. (You almost die when he sums it up with ‘Bisexual. Not just for drunk sorority girls anymore!’)
Your parents are both slightly bewildered but supportive. You love your Dad for not automatically assuming this is all somehow your doing or asking if this means the two of you are together.
Carole cries a little but she rushes to assure Finn it’s not because she’s disappointed, but because she knows this is going to possibility make things more difficult for him. “You’re my baby, Finn. Anything that might potentially make you hurt makes my heart hurt.” She takes your hand. “It’s the same way with you, Kurt.”
Sometimes you wonder how anything can be heard over the sound of how awesome that woman is.
And then it’s Fall and Finn’s in Columbus and you’re living the dream in New York.
It’s nothing like you thought it would be.
The city was supposed to be your salvation. Instead it’s dirty air that feels like it’s under your skin, in your clothes, your hair, burning your lungs. Sharp elbows, people shoving, stepping on your feet and ruining your shoes, rushing at a breakneck speed to catch the subway and getting there just as the doors close and it pulls away.
By the time you graduated from McKinley you were fairly popular and if not liked by everyone, at least known, even if it was for the sheer novelty factor of being one of a handful of out and proud students. You were a big fish in a little pond, but in New York where everyone seems effortlessly more fabulous, clever, sexy, just more, you’re a minnow in the ocean.
Your first few months are a blur of too much coffee and not enough sleep, a towering pile of homework, projects, deadlines, clawing homesickness in your throat, elephant sitting on your chest loneliness. You miss your Dad, you miss Carole, you miss your friends that became family when you weren’t looking. God, you even miss Rachel.
You miss Finn most of all.
Who seems to be doing just fine without you.
When he tells you about Brett, you almost keel over.
He’s obnoxiously blasé about losing his virginity to a random one night stand.
“Eh, I figured it’d be easier that way. Less pressure if I sucked or made a really weird O-face, then it couldn’t come back to haunt me. Besides, I just got out of a mondo-serious relationship; I’m allowed to sow some oat, right?”
“Yeah, but Jesus, Finn. You’ve been there less than a week. Was he waiting for you in your dorm room when you got there with a bow on his head? If that’s what freshman orientation means at Ohio State, then maybe I want to be a Buckeye.”
This sends Finn into a long excited ramble about how freaking awesome it would be if you were at the same school and how you could be roommates again and it’d rock because you already had the two years of practice at it and dude how is he supposed to survive college without his Obi-wan?
You just grin and let it wash over you because it’s nice to know that somewhere out there is someone who still needs you.
Brett’s the first of, well, at least if not many, then a respectable number for a guy who dated the same girl all through high school.
There’s Craig the Dance major and Dave the engineering grad student (“Kurt, I don’t understand a single thing he’s saying, but he’s got this whole nerd-hot thing going on that is so fucking sexy), and Paloma the foreign exchange student (“Remember, what I said about boobs? Yeah, as a concept, hers are amazing.”)
And then suddenly you put it all together: Craig who dances, Dave the sexy nerd, Paloma from Spain, Ian’s green eyes, even his stupid crush on Ben the dreamy professor from Queer as Folk.
“Finn, didn’t you say that Brett had curly hair?”
“What?”
“Brett-remember, the random hook-up about three hook-ups ago? Curly hair. Did he or did he not have it?”
“Uh, yeah. Why?”
You laugh for about twenty minutes. Sliding to the floor, tears in your eyes, howling with laughter.
Because Oh God, you just put two and two together and got four.
And apparently Finn still totally sucks at math.
“Finn, Finn, oh my God, sweetie. Stop. Stop dating the parts and just go after the whole thing before it starts to burn when you pee.”
“Wait, what are you talking about?”
“Mr. Schue, you dumbass! You’re totally crazy in love with him! And on anyone else the fact that you’re still carrying a torch for our high school choir director would be pathetic, but because it’s you it’s kind of adorable. Or some combination of the two. Adorathetic? Pathorable?”
There’s such a long stretch of silence you half worry Finn’s jumped out the window of his dorm in embarrassment.
“You…you knew about that?”
“Finn, everyone knew about that. You used to stare at him like he was the greatest thing in the world since pockets. I don’t know, I guess we all though it was some weird man crush/teacher’s pet/daddy issue sort of thing. But it’s not, is it?”
Floodgates opening.
In the time it takes for Finn to exhaust the topic of Will Schuester: Curly Haired White Boy Rapper of My Dreams, you manage to brew a pot of tea, make a sandwich, and finish two games of Solitaire on the computer.
“And you never said any of this to him before? You could have been having hot choir room sex all this time! That room’s acoustics were made for it.”
“Uh, because it would have been illegal? And mostly because I don’t think he’d be interested.”
You remember a long bus ride back from Nationals, Mr. Schue staring at a sleeping Finn with some heart squeezing mixture of want and longing and guilt. You remember the way he’d always be the first one to praise Finn, the first one to rush to show him the proper dance steps and how patient he’d be when Finn took forever to master them, the way he always seemed to be touching him.
Plus, you’re about 75% sure he and Bryan Ryan used to fuck.
“Well, it’s not illegal anymore. You’re an adult-ah-at least you’re eighteen and that’s the magic number that counts. Say something. If he’s receptive great. If not, then maybe you’ll finally put it behind you and stop trying to find a Mr. Schue replacement. It’s creepy and if it keeps up I worry you’re going to steal a lock of his hair and grow your own Mr. Schue in a jar.”
You half figure Finn will never have the guts to actually go for it, but then there’s a message on your voicemail over Thanksgiving break (Carole was unsuccessful in guilting you to come home for the long weekend.) A frantic babbling voice mail about Will and sex and pancakes and love, and thank you, thank you, thank you, best brother ever, thank you. You think he calls you Obi-wan a couple of times.
And after that it’s all Will all the time, every phone call, every text message, every Facebook posting. At first you try to be supportive and then it’s trying not to let your boredom show in your voice and then it’s finally just finding excuses to not even answer the phone when you see Finn’s name on the caller ID.
It’s stupid and petty and immature, but you can’t help it. You haven’t gotten laid in almost six months and Finn is cartoon hearts in his eyes, seconds away from running off to Massachusetts and adopting a Cambodian orphan, blissfully in love with the very first guy he ever seriously dated. The confused little padawan has become the master and you think you’re slightly justified in being a little bitter.
Of course, you go back to Lima for Christmas. You’re too terrified to tell Carole otherwise.
You barely see Finn, he’s always heading out the door, almost always going to Mr. Schue’s (Will, you have to keep correcting yourself. If he’s dating your brother, you’re not going to make it even weirder by still calling him by his last name) just as you’re going over to see Mercedes, or Quinn, or Tina (they pump you for every fabulous detail about your glamorous life in New York. You name drop, you exaggerate, and sometimes just out and out lie. You find excuses to leave early and then pretend not to notice when they try not to look hurt. You know they assume you now believe you’re too cool and sophisticated for them.)
You spend a lot of time driving around Lima. The 24 hour Wal-mart, the lone Starbucks, the skuzzy outlet mall, the high school that suddenly seems way too small. You remember, no, this is what it really feels like to suffocate.
You remind yourself that you are Kurt fucking Hummel and you didn’t survive slushies and dumpster tosses and stupid narrow minded homophobic bullies to crumble now.
You return to New York even more determined to make the city your bitch.
You discover that the mantra fake it til you make it is just as effective here as it was in high school.
When you get shoved on the sidewalks, you shove back.
Anyone stupid enough to step on your shoes is very quickly told to get the fuck out of your way.
You speak up in class more.
You start making friends.
You shop.
You kiss a lot of boys.
You take some of them back to your apartment and do a lot more.
By the time you’re packing up to go home for the summer, you actually have some real stories to tell your girlfriends and you’ve managed to halfway convince yourself that you’re not bothered at all Finn’s ‘Hey, Kurt, dude, call me back sometime, please?’ voicemails stopped ages ago.
Your dad insists on taking the family out to dinner, “someplace fancy for the big city guy” he promises.
Finn asks if it’s okay for him to bring Will.
“That’d be cool with you, right? I mean he was your favorite teacher and all. And he’s dying to know all about how you’re doing out in New York.”
He wants to bring a date to your big welcome home family only dinner.
You’re so furious you can barely wrap your mind around it.
And damnit, what the hell is wrong with you because you say yes, you can’t turn Finn down when he’s looking at you so hopefully.
You bite your tongue to keep from screaming at him “Of course I like him, Finn! I wouldn’t have suggested you two get together if I didn’t like him, but that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t appreciate you attempting one evening outside of his presence!”
Instead you smile and say of course it’d be cool.
Will brings Carole flowers and laughs when she hits him on the shoulder with the bouquet and tells him he doesn’t have to suck up anymore that he’s already won, she gives in, she likes him. He just kisses her on the cheek and claims it’s force of habit now.
The restaurant is fancy.
It’s classy and expensive and totally out of your dad’s element and you’re touched he made such an effort, he even wears a tie, one of the maybe five dozen expensive silk ones buried back in his closet that you finally gave up and stopped buying for him years ago.
Finn and Will are in suits and ties as well and they make bedroom eyes at each other-correction, they make about to start fucking at any moment right next to the breadbasket eyes at each other and it almost makes you want to vomit.
Every look, every touch, every casual display of affection is maddening. You remember almost having a heart attack the first time Sam held your hand in public.
And here’s Finn. Finn laughing and fake apologizing when your dad jokingly asks if he’s going to have to sit between them.
Finn the golden boy, Finn the perfect son.
God, he’s even better at being gay than you. Finn suddenly decides he likes boys one day and his dream guy is waiting for him the second he steps out of the closet. The dream guy you pointed him towards. Hell, he’d probably still be screwing every person with curly hair who could halfway carry a tune if it hadn’t been for you. No angst, no doubts, no second guessing, no slurs, no dumpster tosses. Oh, but he’s bisexual. That’s even better because if he gets tired of it, if it ever does start to get tough for him, he’s got an out, he can just go back to dating girls, no problem.
By the end of the evening you’re not so much eating as merely stabbing viciously at your food. Carole puts a hand on your arm when your comments start to blur the line between witty and sarcastic and just plain mean spirited.
Your big fancy dinner ends in Will leaving before dessert is served, your dad glaring at you and giving you the whisper yell of ‘what the hell is wrong with you’ that is guaranteed to instantly make you feel like a four year old, and you and Finn sitting on opposite ends off the back seat not looking at each other.
The absolute second you get home, you’re sprinting down to the basement and slamming the door.
You have exactly three seconds before it slams back open and Finn’s looming over you. Despite yourself, you let out a little eep noise of fear. You’ve gotten used to him as your big goofy overprotective jock brother. This is one of the rare times you ever remember Finn using his height to intimidate.
“What the fuck was that, Kurt? Is that the kind of bullshit you’re learning in New York? You were a complete and total immature little brat tonight. You embarrassed yourself, you embarrassed Mom and Burt, and you made Will uncomfortable. That’s a pretty shitty thing to do considering how much he cares about you.”
He’s crossing his arms and glaring at you, Will Schuester’s knight in shining moderately priced suit, and you’re even more irrationally pissed off.
“Well, no one ever doubted that he’s a very caring teacher. Some students more than others, right?” Your voice positively drips acid.
You want to be a temper tantrum throwing kid right now. You want to live down to all his expectations because you look at him, so calm and sure and righteous and you realize despite the awesome apartment and the impossibly more expensive and fabulous new wardrobe and the don’t fuck with me attitude and the pretty boys you kissed whose names you can’t remember, you’ve just been playing at being a grown up this whole year when somewhere along the line Finn became an actual one without any say so from you.
You want a fight. And fuck him for not giving you one.
Instead he’s pinching the bridge of his nose and looking at you with such disappointment.
“I asked you point blank if you wanted me to invite Will and you said it was cool with you. All you had to do was say no and I would have told him the three of us could get together some other time. Instead of you stewing all night in a passive aggressive funk and ruining your own dinner.”
“Well, I lied. I’m sorry! Maybe I was just in shock that you’d actually do something so inconsiderate and oblivious as to invite a date to a family only event. What the hell were you thinking? Oh, it’s Kurt’s special night. Better bring Will along. Just in case I get bored we can sneak off for a quickie!”
You recognize the look on Finn’s face. It’s the one he gets right before he says something that makes you want to punch him.
He doesn’t disappoint.
“Are you-are you jealous? What the hell, Kurt! It’s been three years. I thought you were over that stupid crush!”
You let out a howl of rage and shove him hard.
“Fuck you, Finn Hudson. Contrary to what your perfect boyfriend may tell you, you’re not that irresistible and your dick’s not magic. I’m not some sad little high school loser anymore and I have a much higher standard than the first dumb jock who treats me halfway decently.”
“Then what the fuck is your fucking problem?”
“My fucking problem is I miss my brother, you stupid jerk!”
And then you burst into tears which is just so cliché and melodramatic you’re ashamed of yourself.
Of course, you’d be an idiot to think that crying (even crying all over Finn’s suit jacket when he immediately wraps an arm around your shoulder muttering ‘Aw, jeez. Aw, Kurt, c’mere, c’mon, dude, don’t-don’t cry’ the second the tears start to fall) would instantly fix everything.
It’s not even the start of fixing things after you so spectacularly napalmed all your bridges.
But it’s the start of the start.
“You’re a fucking douchebag.” is the first thing Finn says to you once you stop crying. The two of you are sprawled on your couch. You’re pressing a damp washcloth to your eyes to keep them from getting puffy and you feel like a wrung out dishrag.
And Finn just called you a douchebag.
You glare at him as fiercely as you can with your nose currently running like a leaky faucet.
This is not the brotherly heart to heart you were expecting.
“You’re the one who cut off all contact first, remember? If it wasn’t for updates from Burt, for all I knew you’d dropped out and become addicted to meth.”
You start to open your mouth, but he holds up a hand, cutting you off.
“And while I’ll fully acknowledge I was totally over the top obnoxious when Will and I first got together, you could have just told me to shut the hell up instead of ignoring me. It’s not like the only reason I was calling you was so that I could brag about my boyfriend. I wanted to talk to you, Kurt. I wanted to tell you about how I ate thirty four French toast sticks at the midnight breakfast. About how during finals week I got kicked out of the dining hall for dancing on the table and singing La Vie Boheme on a dare. I wanted to bitch about my roommate leaving his used EZ-Mac bowls everywhere. I wanted to ask you whether or not you thought I should apply to be an RA next year. And you were like, fucking Nowhere Man.”
“I’m sorry.”
You realize with sudden clarity you’re going to be saying that a lot this summer.
“I’m sorry, but things between you two were so perfect and you were so sure about everything and so fucking happy and I was in New York, where I’d always dreamed of being and had never been more unhappy or unsure and I felt like if I told anyone I’d be admitting that I was a complete failure, so I just…didn’t.”
You can’t believe it when Finn throws back his head and laughs.
“Dude, you think my relationship with Will is easy? That we’re a perfect couple? You have no fucking idea how many issues that man has. Jesus, I had to practically tie him up and force him to be happy. You know, metaphorically speaking. Not in the fun sexy way. That came later.”
It takes you a moment to realize he’s not entirely joking and the big spill your guts heart to heart is momentarily put on hold by you gaping like a fish and gasping out “You-wait-Mr. Schue-you-ohmygodfinnseriouslydetailsrightnow!”
“No. I’m not going into details. He’d already kill me if he knew I told you that much.”
“But despite everything else, you do love him, right?”
“Yes.”
That one word answer and the soft little secret smile accompanying it says more than the thousand upon thousand of gooey over the top vows of eternal devotion he used to make about Rachel in high school.
And then you’re getting Serious Business Finn, which is a Finn you didn’t even know existed.
“Course, that doesn’t just suddenly fix everything, but it sure as hell helps. You know, that and an elaborate reward system involving large amounts of blowjobs. And talking. Lots and lots of talking. Even then, 90% of the time? I’m still stumbling in the dark, man, making it up as I go along. But if I ever get anything right it’s because of you. If I don’t second guess, it’s because you taught me there’s nothing wrong with being myself.”
You have no idea how exactly you taught him all that since you haven’t yet mastered the lesson yourself, but Hey, you are Obi-wan, so maybe you really are that good.
That summer is the summer of lots and lots of talking and lots and lots of apologizing-to your dad, to Carole, to Quinn, Tina, and Mercedes (who pulls you into a rib cracking hug almost the second the words are out of your mouth. “Kurt, sweetie of course I forgive you. Now don’t ever fucking do it again, hear?”)
It’s also the summer of lots and lots of Star Wars because your first weekend home Finn declares the two of you are going to have a marathon viewing of all the movies.
“All of them all of them?”
“All of them all of them. Even the ones with Hayden Christenson.”
“Am I-am I being punished?”
Finn throws an arm around your shoulders and pretends not to hear your squawk of outrage when he musses up your hair.
“Of course not, Kurt. This is us bonding. And maybe also kind of a little bit punishing you.”
When Finn casually mentions Will’s Ewan McGregor crush, (“Mmm, he’s got good taste. You know, present company excluded.”) you insist Finn invite him over to watch with you.
There’s no denying your little gesture of reconciliation is a bit awkward in the beginning.
It’s the first time you’ve seen him since the disaster of a welcome home dinner, the first time you’ve seen him in your house (although you know it’s far from the first time he’s been there), the first time you’ve really let yourself see him as Will, Finn’s boyfriend and not Mr. Schue, your former teacher (who Finn apparently ties up sometimes and ohmygod you have to stop thinking about that because it makes your ears turn red and you’re convinced he has to know you know.)
But then Will says in this pompous dramatic voiceover tone “And yeah, verily there was a sound heard around the world as all nerds rose up as one and declared ‘Virgin birth? What the fuck kind of bullshit is that?’”
You’re so shocked hearing him curse that you’re immediately caught up in a giggle snort loop of doom. And with that, the tension is broken and the whole afternoon devolves into one long Mystery Science Theater 3000 snark-fest with much throwing of popcorn and general mayhem and yells of ‘Die, puppet, die’ whenever Jar Jar Binks shows up.
“Hey, Will, if I had asked if you were an angel the first time we met, would we have been able to skip all the angst about our age difference and just get right to the fun stuff?”
“Did he just say yippee? Oh my God, he totally did. Don’t mind me, I’ll just be over here quietly weeping over the fact that George Lucas decided to cast as the future Lord Vader some random extra from a production of Oliver!”
“He’s like a father to you? Who the hell takes an actor like Ewan McGregor, who could have sexual chemistry with a lampshade, and casts him as a father figure?”
“A lamp shade, Will? Are you fucking serious?”
“Shhh. Don’t judge, Finn. Ewan McGregor/Lampshade is his secret OTP.”
“No one understands my pain and angst. I’m gonna show them all, then they’ll see…yeah, he’s definitely Luke’s dad. Nice to see the emo apple didn’t fall far from the whiny little asshole tree.”
You make a temporary escape from the cringe inducing dialogue to get drinks and snacks.
You come back downstairs and find the two of them kissing and you’re forced to concede that yes, they really are absolutely box of kittens covered in rainbows adorable.
At the end of August, Finn drives you to the airport. There’s an Obi-Wan poster rolled up and carefully tucked in your suitcase.
Finn insisted on buying it for you and you promised to hang it up even though it clashes horribly with your décor.
After all, there are worse things in the world than Ewan McGregor staring down at you (and yes, you concede that it should by all rights be Alec Guinness since he was the original, the best, and the actual real life Gay Obi-wan, but really, is there any doubt which one you’d rather look at every day?)
You reassure yourself that it won’t look so bad once you find a tasteful frame for it.
Finn gives you a huge bear hug before you go through security, makes you swear you’ll call the second you land and tells you he loves you.
It’s definitely not the way you thought it would be when you finally heard the words.
It’s better.
***
A month into the new semester you’re on your cell with Finn, laughing as he tells you all about his Sports and Recreation in the Ancient World class, which to everyone’s shock he absolutely loves.
“Kurt, dude, you should have seen it, it was fucking awesome. The professor is going on and on about how these Greek wrestlers would like, oil each other up before each match, roll around in the dirt naked, and then scrape the oil and dirt off of each other at the end of the day. And all the football players in the room who totally just signed up for the class because it filled their Gen Ed history requirement and it had the word sport in the name have this terrified ‘what the fuck did we get ourselves into’ look on their faces.”
“Finn, aren’t those the exact reasons you signed up for the class?”
“Well, yeah, but that was before I knew we’d be busting out the wooden swords and playing Gladiator on the quad.”
You’re not really paying attention to your surroundings and you turn the corner and slam right into another person, sending books and papers flying everywhere.
He apologizes profusely and insists on helping you pick everything up even though you were the one at fault.
His name is Byron.
He’s sweet and funny and really cute despite being kind of shy and geeky, which is something you’ve never really been into before.
Byron’s another recent Midwestern transplant to the city and the way he blushes when he says “From Riverside, Iowa. You know, like Captain Kirk” makes your stomach flip.
He thinks your Obi-wan poster is awesome.