Title:Can't be normal (1 of 3-4ish)
Author: pterawaters
Rating: R
Character(s)/Pairing(s): Puck/Kurt, Finn
Genre: AU, friendship, romance
Warning: transgendered FTM!Puck, slash
Spoilers: Fairly AU, references a few things from seasons 1 and 2
Disclaimer: Glee is not mine, at all.
Author Notes: This is a fill for ice-whisper's awesome prompt. Posted at puckurt and glee-genderplay. I'm sorry if I get any details wrong. I tried to do my research!

Summary: Puck always knew he was a boy, even if his body didn't agree with him. He had an awesome mom, a dad who couldn't deal, and moved to Lima for a fresh start. It worked and no one besides Puck's family and his best friend knew about who Puck used to be. Not even Puck's boyfriend.

"Hey, Norah!" one of the boys called across the playground. "What happened to your hair?"

"Yeah," another kid broke in. "It's all short now. You look like a boy."

Puck hated each and every one of the kids at school, so she growled, "I like it better this way. You gotta problem with that?"

"Oooh," Johnny Lim sneered, getting right up in Puck's face. "Little girl thinks she can-"

Without waiting for the kid to finish his sentence, Puck slugged the guy as hard as she could, smirking when he started to cry. As the teacher led Puck to the principal's office for the third time that week, Puck muttered, more to herself than to anyone else, "I'm not a little girl."

Puck listened in as her mother spoke to her best friend over the phone, holding back tears as Ruth told Carole, "I just don't know what to do. The teasing has gotten so much worse since Norah cut her hair and now that Eli left…"

Puck hated being the reason her parents broke up. She hated the fact that her father would never, ever accept the fact that she'd been born in the wrong body. She wasn't his little girl, she was a boy and no amount of drinking or hitting Puck with a belt would make her change her mind.

"…no, I don't think so. Maybe it would be better to wait until after this summer, Carole … Well, Norah's birthday is in June, and that's when the therapist is letting her start hormone treatments. She'll pass better as a boy after a few months of that … No, I know they're only eleven, but Finn's voice is already changing, isn't it? … Norah wants that, too."

Having grown up hearing about his mom's best friend, Carole, and her son Finn, Puck did feel jealous. She'd met Finn a few times, but the last time was a few years ago and she could barely remember what he was like – just that she envied him so much for being able to wear the clothes he did and play the sports he did. All Puck could play was the stupid co-ed softball and soccer at the Y, but she was damn good at them. Hopefully the medicine the doctor was going to give her would let her grow real muscles that would make her even better at sports.

Hopefully people at school would forget that Puck was a girl once she looked and sounded more like a boy. Hopefully they would stop teasing her for wearing sports jerseys and jeans instead of skirts. She hated anything pink, especially since that was all her Nana Connie would buy – pink dresses with ruffles and bows. Puck got grounded for a week after burning the last monstrosity out in the driveway, but she thought the punishment was totally worth it to see that bastard go up in flames.

Ruth spoke again, her voice high and excited as she asked, "Oh, would you really? Carole, that's too much! … No, I'll talk to Norah and Sarah first, but definitely put in that call … September, yeah. Thank you! … Hugs for Finn! … Bye!"

When Puck's mom left the kitchen, she almost ran into her, stopping short and saying, "Oh, there you are!"

"Hey."

Ruth shook her head at Puck's less-than eloquent greeting and then smiled, saying, "I have good news for you. You remember my friend, Carole?"

"Sure."

"Well, she's going to try to get me a job at her hospital so we can move to Lima at the end of summer."

Puck sighed, "That's so far away…"

"It's not, really," Ruth insisted. "And I've been wanting to move back ever since Nana had her fall. Plus, by the time we move, you'll be able to pass better for a boy. Isn't that great? No one there will have to know you're a girl, Norah."

"Noah," Puck insisted. "Ma, I told you to-"

"Noah," Ruth broke in, hugging Puck close. "That's right. No-ah. And your therapist said we should start using 'he' and 'him' and 'his', didn't she?"

Puck nodded. "I'm not a girl."

"I know you aren't, sweetie," Ruth insisted, squeezing Puck again. "You'll see. We'll move and everything will be great."

Puck scoffed and rolled her – wait, his – eyes. Without his dad around anymore, Puck wasn't sure anything would ever be great again.

"Hey, um, dude," Carole's son said when Ruth reintroduced Noah to him. "It's good to see you again."

Putting on his best boy-voice, which was getting easier and easier because of the hormones, Puck said, "Hey, Finn. You too."

"Wanna play some Halo?"

Puck grinned and nodded, giving his mom one last look before following Finn to his room. "Sweet cowboys, dude," Puck laughed, pointing at the wallpaper.

Finn blushed a little bit and shrugged. "Gimme a break, man. I picked them out when I was, like, four."

Puck startled a little when Finn called him "man," but he was also kind of relieved – and a little curious if Finn even remembered when Puck was the girl that would come to visit, Norah. Sure, he wanted as few people to know what was under his shorts as possible, but it would have been nice if at least one friend knew he wasn't normal. Nodding, Puck replied, "I wanted fire trucks, but my dad was an asshole and made me get teddy bears instead. It was hella lame."

Finn dropped down on the floor in front of his TV and held out a controller for Puck. "Sorry he like, left or whatever because of…" and yeah, okay, maybe Finn did remember who Puck used to be. "I know how much it sucks not having a dad."

Puck clamped his mouth shut and took the controller, sitting down beside Finn and starting up the game. He didn't want to talk about how at least Finn's dad had died doing something awesome and hadn't given up on him the way Puck's dad did.

The first day at his new school, Puck went wearing his normal, baggy clothes and with his hair freshly buzzed. Nobody looked at him twice, except to ask someone else, "Hey, is that guy new?"

He made sure to keep his voice low and was glad for all the muscle weight he'd put on over the summer. Hell, he looked like one of the butchest boys in seventh grade, hands down. Puck walked with a swagger and smirked at the girls that flirted with him, even if he wasn't quite sure he wanted to flirt back.

He felt like a new man.

"No, dude!" Finn cried, throwing down his controller in frustration. "You killed me again! How is that fair?"

"It's fair because you suck and I'm awesome," Puck explained with a laugh, putting his controller down too and reaching for the chips. "Don't feel too bad about it, though. I practiced that whole last year before we moved when I didn't …" Puck sighed and looked down before admitting, "When I didn't have any friends."

"Those jerks at your old school were idiots," Finn announced, grabbing the bag of chips from Puck's hands and shoving a handful into his mouth. "You're like, the coolest guy I know."

"That's because everyone else you know is a Lima Loser," Puck replied, grabbing the chips back and wrestling with Finn a little bit before he won. "And all those dudes at school only think with their junk."

Finn went quiet for a moment and Puck wondered if he'd said something wrong. Then Finn asked, "Do you ever wish you had … you know … boy parts?"

After a few seconds of embarrassment before he realized this was Finn and he wasn't being mean, just curious, Puck replied honestly, "Only all the fucking time."

Finn sighed and said, "At least you don't have to think with it, constantly. I swear, last weekend when we accidentally had skin-e-max for a few hours, I practically skinned the thing. I couldn't help myself."

"And you think I can?" Puck replied, setting aside the chips for now. "I'm on effing steroids. I feel like I'm gonna get carpal tunnel in my wrist any day now, I jerk off so much."

"But, how does that work?"

Looking at his friend, Puck leveled a glare on him and asked, "How do you think?"

"I don't …" Finn replied, confused and blushing again. "I guess I don't really know what one looks like."

"Oh, fuck no," Puck replied, punching Finn in the arm. "This is not turning into a game of 'I'll show you mine if you show me yours.' No fucking way."

"That's not what I meant," Finn replied, shoving back at Puck. "Forget it. I just figured if I knew more about how girls worked, maybe I'd actually get a girlfriend, like you."

"Wendy's not my girlfriend," Puck insisted. "We just made out once. And I don't know, dude, it wasn't all that great."

"But Wendy's boobs are huge!" Finn cried. "How could it not be the best thing ever?"

Looking over at his friend, Puck tried to think about explaining how making out with Wendy had just been peer pressure and it was like kissing his sister and there was this fear that she would sit on his lap or something and realize he was missing a cock. Then a flash of kissing Finn – something he'd never done or even thought about before – flew through Puck's brain, stirring that deep ache of want in his belly. Puck sighed because wasn't it enough that he was already as weird as he was and said, "I don't know, dude. Maybe I'm gay."

"Ohhhh," Finn nodded. "That totally makes sense."

Insulted, Puck asked, "Why? Because I have girl parts? I just want to be a normal guy. I want to date chicks and be the stud of McKinley, not some freak with a vagina that makes him attracted to other dudes."

"Yeah," Finn nodded. "That sucks. You know, I had the biggest crush on you when we were little."

Not really sure where this was going, because Finn tended to be random that way, Puck merely replied, "Okay?"

"But now you're a dude, so I'm just sayin'…" Finn left his words hanging there with the implication that he was over whatever crush he'd had on Norah now that she was gone.

Puck scoffed and replied, "Like I'd date your sorry ass, anyway. We're bros, man. Like, best friends."

"So we gotta find you some other dude to date," Finn insisted. "Are there any gay dudes at our school?"

Puck had his suspicions, but as far as he knew none of those guys had 'fessed up to being gay. Besides, "How much does making out with one girl mean, anyway? Maybe I just gotta try out a bunch of them until I find the one that works for me."

"Yeah, that sounds good," Finn nodded, picking up his controller again. "C'mon. I wanna try to beat you once more before Mom says we have to go to bed."

Puck smiled uneasily because he wasn't as sure about the plan as Finn seemed to be, and cried, "You're on!"

"Fuck, did you see what those seniors did to that fag, Hummel?" Puck overheard one of the sophomores say to his friend while he was sitting in study hall, trying not to think about failing math class. "They threw him in the dumpster before school this morning!"

"What a fag," the friend laughed. "I wish I would have seen that."

Puck grit his teeth and tried to focus on his book. If he failed out of freshman math, Coach was going to throw him off the JV football team, just when Puck was starting to fit in for once. Sure, he had to be really careful not to let anyone besides Finn see him without a towel around his waist, but he'd been doing pretty good so far. Coach hadn't even noticed he wasn't born a boy.

Puck was also really careful not to look at any of the other boys when he was in the locker room. He knew everyone thought he was straight because of all the girls he'd made out with, but he wasn't. Puck wanted to date a boy, make out with a boy, have sex with a boy. But then, he didn't want to be thrown into the dumpster either.

The next morning, he saw it happen. Both football teams, JV and Varsity, were out back, with one of the seniors pushing an unimpressed-looking Kurt Hummel in front of him. The guys picked him up and threw him into the garbage and Puck knew he had to keep pretending to be straight. If people found out he was gay, maybe they'd take a closer look at him in the locker room or notice that he never used the urinal and they'd figure out he wasn't biologically male.

The teasing and name calling would start all over again and Puck just couldn't handle that. Not yet.

"How have you been these past three months, Noah?" Puck's therapist asked, perching his clipboard on one knee as he spoke. "Everything alright?"

Puck shrugged, sighing when Doctor Nelson gave him that look that said he had to explain or he wasn't getting out of here on time. "I'm good with being a guy. I feel comfortable or whatever. Confident. I mean, I'm the stud of McKinley and I made Varsity football for next year."

"That's fantastic," Nelson nodded, "but…?"

"But I don't think I want to date girls. Like, everyone's expecting it of me and I've made out with a bunch but they're not…" he sighed in frustration, hoping the guy got it before Puck had to go into too much more detail.

The doctor nodded and asked, "Are you attracted to anyone, Noah?"

"Guys," Puck admitted. "I think I wanna be with a guy. But I'm a boy and I don't …"

"Say what's on your mind," Nelson prodded gently.

Puck ground his teeth for a moment before telling the doctor, "I don't want it to be like before, at my old school. If people find out I like guys they're going to find out I wasn't always like this and they're going to make my life a living hell."

"And you know this because…?"

Puck frowned at the way Dr. Nelson said those leading questions, like Puck was stupid for stopping in the middle of a thought, when really he just had to figure out which words to use and how to convince the guy to keep prescribing his hormone therapy. "Because there's this one kid in my class and he's pretty girly and everyone thinks he's gay. They throw him in the dumpster, dude. Like he's garbage. And he's just gay. If everyone found out I'm trans and a homo or whatever, they'll kill me. I swear they will."

"Hmm," the doctor sighed. "That is a legitimate worry, Noah. High-school children don't have the best track record when it comes to accepting those who are different. You've had it fairly easy since moving to Ohio, and I can see why you wouldn't want to give that easy lifestyle up."

"Damn straight."

"But," the doctor continued, and Puck hated that word so much. "You're living in the closet again. Don't you remember how much happier you were after transitioning? Don't you think the same could be true of letting those around you know your preference?"

"Being a dude is one thing," Puck muttered. "Especially since I had that growth spurt and worked up all these muscles. Everyone respects me. Nobody respects a gay guy, no matter how many muscles he has."

"Think about it," Dr. Nelson insisted. "Take the next three months and think about it. Don't date any girls and only date boys if you feel comfortable doing so. We'll speak about this again when I see you next."

"Fine," Puck sighed, nodding his head. "I'll think about it." Anything to get Nelson to write that prescription, because without that, Puck would lose his muscles and his facial hair and start growing boobs and maybe even start bleeding – a possibility he loathed ever since he found out about periods in fifth grade.

When he got home, Puck looked at himself in the mirror and decided that while he did look pretty male, he needed something a little more badass. If he was the worst motherfucker around, no one would give him crap for being gay. Digging the clippers out from under the sink, Puck took off the guard and shaved the sides of his head down to the scalp. There. Now he looked less like a mama's girly-boy and more like the boy he felt he was on the inside. The only thing missing was his cock, but he doubted he'd ever be able to afford the surgery to get one installed.

Whatever. It wasn't like he was going to need it anytime soon.

I would really appreciate any reviews you'd like to leave. Thanks!