Finn

They had been on parallel journeys for as long as Will could remember: sports, glee, cheerleading girlfriends, failed pregnancies. The last one he wished they didn't share, for both of their sakes.

Finn had seemed so small that day, despite the fact that he towered over Will's own 6 ft stature. He looked more like a lost little boy that the star quarterback as he collapsed into his teacher's arms.

"Hey. It's okay. It's okay."

Will blindly flipped the pages in the magazine full of smiling parents and happy babies. Movement to his left drew his eye and he watched as the proud father leaned his head against the expectant mother's belly. Something inside Will's chest tightened as the door over his left shoulder opened. Before he knew it, Finn was going on about fetal mutations.

"Thank you for taking us today. I was too freaked out to drive."

Will, of course, told him it was no problem. Finn slouched down in the seat with a sense of helplessness, making him seem smaller than he actually was. Adoption. Will couldn't imagine the thought of giving his baby away.

"This sucks. You get all of the stress and worry and none of the control."

The door opened again and out stepped Quinn.

"It's cool, Mr. Schue. You wouldn't understand."

Will wished he didn't.

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The day started out like any other: alarm, coffee, intentional run-in with Emma, minor explosion with Sue, three classes, lunch, glee, two classes, another minor explosion with Sue, freedom.

Trips to the ER were nowhere on his agenda.

Kurt had come careening into his office at 11:07 yelling something about pain, water, and ruined Ferragamos. Rachel followed him in and translated: Quinn was in labor and her water broke all over Kurt's shoes.

Will's first thought was Get Quinn to the ER. His second was, Where's Finn? Although Finn had gotten very good at pretending, Will knew that he was dreading this impending birth almost as much as Quinn was. This baby should have been Finn's. And if Terri had gotten her way, it almost was Will's.

Will jogged down the hall and literally carried Quinn to his car after she collapsed into his arms. Puck jumped into the backseat as everyone else piled into Kurt's SUV, save Finn. He insisted on driving himself.

As soon as Finn got into his car and not Kurt's, Will knew they wouldn't be seeing him anytime soon. He paced the waiting room, hoping to see Finn's tall frame come bounding through the automatic doors, but after an hour, he was still a no-show. With instructions to Rachel to call him if there was an update, Will set off down the maze of halls in search of his student. Rachel's admonishment that they weren't allowed to use cell phones in the hospital fell on deaf ears.

After 30 minutes of searching, Will finally found him.

Finn stood at the end of the hall, looking through a large window. As Will drew closer, he saw rows and rows of pink and blue bundles, nestled snugly in their plastic bassinets.

He cleared his throat. "Making new friends?"

Finn jumped and shoved his hands in his pockets, as if caught sneaking a cookie. He backed away from the window and sat down on a bench in the hallway.

"Shouldn't you be back with Quinn?"

Will sat down next to him. "I think I'll keep you company. Quinn has enough for the moment."

They sat in comfortable silence for the next few minutes. Will knew that if Finn wanted to talk, he would talk. Until then, Will vowed to keep his mouth shut and just be there.

"They're smaller than I thought they'd be."

"Huh?" Will looked at him, confused.

Finn gestured to the window. "The babies. They're really small."

Will smiled. "Well yeah. They are when they first come out."

"I know it can't be easy for you to be here, Mr. Schue."

Will chest tightened. "No. No, it's not. But then again, I'm not exactly alone in that department, am I?"

Finn lowered his head, a tear sneaking down his face. "I just can't be there. Not yet."

"No one's asking you to be, Finn."

Finn let out a bitter laugh. "That's the problem: no one's asking me. No one wants me there and I should have been there." Finn leaned his head back, banging it on the wall. "In another life, I would be." Finn tried to discreetly wipe the tear from his face but another one took its place. "I never liked hospitals."

"Me neither." Will inhaled and the disinfectant burned his nose. Emma would feel at home here. "I fell out of a tree house when I was eight and knocked myself out."

Finn looked up. "Really?"

"Yep. They kept me overnight. It was awful."

"I busted my head open during my first football season. Twelve stitches. My mom freaked out."

"I bet." They fell into companionable silence again, the occasional cry from the babies on the other side of the glass echoing down the hall.

"I didn't want Quinn to give her up."

"I know." Without tearing his eyes from the wall in front of him, Will placed a hand on Finn's shoulder.

"I'm sorry I haven't made it easy on you."

Will leaned forward. "What do you mean?"

"With glee and everything. It can't be fun trying to choreograph numbers that always place me and Puck farthest apart, especially since we're the two tallest."

"I work with what I've got."

Finn kept his head leaning against the wall and closed his eyes. "I can't remember if I ever thanked you for telling me to stick with glee."

A wave of guilt settled in Will's stomach. "You don't have to thank me."

"Sure I do. Without glee, I don't know what I would have done when all of this," he gestured around the hospital, "broke." Finn leaned forward, as if making sure Will knew the truth in his words. "I would have lost my mind, Mr. Schue. Glee's kept me sane."

"Well, I have something to tell you. And this is not the time or the place, but since we're on the topic…. Listen, about getting you into glee." Will swallowed hard. "I did something that I'm not proud of. At all."

Finn cocked his head at him, thoroughly confused.

Will held his breath and dug his hands into his knees, willing the words out of his mouth. "I placed the pot in your locker. That was me."

Will waited for the explosion, waited for Finn to tell him that his favorite teacher was just knocked off his pedestal and that no amount of apologies could fix his place in Finn's eyes. And as Will waited for this inevitable reaction, Finn surprised him yet again.

His student merely shrugged, "At this point, I couldn't care less." And then he laughed. "Mr. Schue, does this mean you smoke pot?"

Will was so taken aback by the lack of confrontation that his mouth gaped open for a moment and then he burst out laughing.

"No, Finn. I don't smoke pot."

Finn continued to chuckle. "Because I'm sure that would be a pretty funny sight."

Will shakily released his breath, the weight in the pit of his stomach dissipating.

"So, how long have you been carrying that around?" Finn raised his eyebrow in question.

"Months. Since the day you joined glee."

Finn nudged his shoulder. "No worries, Mr. Schue. We're cool."

Will's phone rang and both men jumped. Will fumbled for a moment before extracting it from his pocket and flipping it open. "Rach? Everything all right?... uh huh… Tell them, I'll be there in a bit." Will clicked the phone shut.

"Well?" Finn was trying to hide his anxiety yet failing miserably.

Will's face broke out into a bittersweet smile. "The newest member of New Directions is 7lbs 2oz and 21 inches long."

Immediately Finn stood up and ran his hand through his hair. "How long do I have?"

Finn's urgency alarmed Will. "For what?"

"To meet her. I wanna meet her before they take her away."

The second those words left Finn's mouth, Will's heart broke.

"You've got time."

Finn took off down the hallway. Will listened as his footsteps faded away and he bowed his head in his hands. The footsteps skidded to a halt and Finn's voice piped up.

"Mr. Schue, I need you to come with me for this. I – I can't do this alone."

Will lifted his head to look at Finn, who looked much smaller silhouetted under the harsh glare of the fluorescent lights and surrounded by nothing but white walls.

He stood and walked towards him. "You're not alone."

And Will kept his promise, showing Finn how to properly support the baby's head, holding him when he cried, and never leaving his side even as they wheeled away the baby that should have been his for the last time.

As they left the hospital, Will couldn't offer any words of condolence, but he could attempt words of wisdom. "Don't ever forget her."

And when Finn returned to school the next day, he found the tiniest pink sock he had ever seen sitting in his locker with a note: "Found this on the floor of the hospital room. Thought you might want it."

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When Will and Emma had their first daughter, Will asked Finn to be her godfather.

When Finn had his son some years later, he happily returned the favor.