Disclaimer: I do not own Glee.

a/n: I warn you, dudes and dudettes—this is not a Kurtofsky fic.

I titled this "Faster" because the Janelle Monaé song was the first thing in my head when I started thinking of a title, mainly for the chorus: Faster and faster/I should run. I looked up the lyrics, because Hell if I know all the words to any of her songs (there are just so many words I can't), and though the first two verses of the song are kind of out of context, because I don't ship Kurtofsky at all—it's kind of unrealistic after the way Dave has treated Kurt, though I suppose it could happen under specific circumstances, and that would be pretty and nice to me—I really like the rest of it for this fic. So. /end rant

It wasn't that he hated Kurt. Or, rather, it wasn't that he despised Kurt—he did hate him, in the kind of sad, spiteful way people hate those who have similar traits that they simply handle better, like one girl with big hips hates another girl with big hips, because the other girl knows how to clothe those hips so they accentuate her small waist. Dave hated Kurt the way a closeted teenager hates the flamboyant boy who came out of the closet despite the fear and despite the judgment. He hated Kurt, because Kurt had all this…stuff that Dave didn't, and Hell if that didn't sting more than a little. He was on the goddamned football team, he was supposed to be a tough guy, to be able to stand up to people, but there he was, so scared of the way his father would look at him, so scared of getting called the same names he threw at Kurt.

It was just…how else was he supposed to cope? To see the kid walking down the hall with his girly clothes and girly friends, not looking for the scorn in people's faces as he pulled books from his locker, not caring as he strutted out of the choir room. All that confidence that Dave would never have, and how the hell else was he supposed to cope?

So he pushed him into lockers, called him 'Lady Lips' and homo, sneered and swaggered and acted as straight as he knew how to even as he admired the way the kid's shoulders filled in his shirt, or the way his jeans hugged his ass, the way his cheeks filled with pink as his eyes widened in the terror that, honestly, Dave hated seeing. But he wasn't going to stop, because he was a scared little boy dealing with a scary, scary thing. How else was he supposed to cope?

How else? Someone tell him, please—he would give anything to find a fucking coping mechanism that didn't make him feel like…like…shit. Because it felt like shit to have that itch in his brain that made him shove Hummel into lockers whenever he saw him, to get so sad and angry when he saw the kid smiling at something. To knock a phone out of his hands and shove him so hard that Dave's shoulders hurt, to ignore him when he ran after, shouting and then he had to insult him again, because fuck fuck, he was in the locker room, what do I do?

Because that was the question. That was the fucking question.

What do I do?

"Well guess what, ham hock," Kurt said, voice dripping with emphasis and anger and just— "You're not my type."

"That right?" was all Dave could manage, face held carefully hard and menacing. He didn't want to do this. He didn't have the energy or the patience to do this, not now and not ever.

"Yeah," Kurt replied, eyes sparking angrily. "I don't dig on chubby boys who sweat too much and are going to be bald by the time they're thirty."

Oh—goddamn, he was just so…angry, or something. So fucking angry.

"Do not push me, Hummal," he gritted out, raising his fist, watching as Kurt glanced down, watched that little tic of fear in his mouth, just wanted him to go away.

"You're gonna hit me? Do it," Kurt said, jutting his jaw in the universal symbol of aggression, flinching as Dave slammed his locker shut.

"Don't push me!"

"Hit me, because it's not gonna change who I am," he went on, nostrils flaring, that fear still in his face even as his eyes flashed a challenge, triumph, and rightness. "You can't punch the gay out of me any more than I can punch the ignoramus out of you!"

"Then get out of my face!" Dave shouted, at the end of his tether, self-control flying out the window faster than you could say 'homo'.

"You are nothing but a scared little boy who can't handle how extraordinary ordinary you are!"

And then Dave was kissing him, lips crushed against his, because goddammit, Kurt was the only out gay guy he knew, and even though he hated him, he hated him out of admiration, and admiration made things complicated in teenagers' heads. Admiration ran around dressed up as Like and Love and Lust, all those evil L words, because it didn't know that it was bad to lie like that to people. Admiration didn't understand how fucking hard things were without it interfering, without it making him see how much courage was packed into Kurt's tiny little pointy-nosed body, without it making him like all that courage, not to mention that pointy nose, and god the way that hair fell across his forehead…

Kurt just looked horrified after he pushed Dave away, eyes wider than Dave had seen them, fear and triumph and all of that gone to be replaced by horror, hand pressed to his mouth.

Tears sprang to his eyes, and fear and mortification, and he hit the lockers and ran. That was all he ever did, really. He just ran and ran and ran.

Dave sighed, dropping his head into his hands, feeling cold everywhere.