Author's Note: This is my entry to this year's Blaine Big Bang. I want to give huge thanks to idoltina and hummingbird-heart for being my betas, putting up with the British idioms that I didn't even realise were British and for being absolutely amazing all round. And a massive thank you to winsomela who drew me the most beautiful art. I'm so grateful that she chose to illustrate my story- Femy's art is truly amazing. You can find the art from the link at the end of the story, or by the masterpost on my LJ sundayrainbows.
Alternatively, this story can be read at my LJ (under sundayrainbows) or at A03 (under sundaysalvation)
This story is based on one of my favourite films Love and Other Disasters.
My Fantasy is My Reality
Act One
"The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams."
― Eleanor Roosevelt
The carpet was threadbare in patches and the pattern was so familiar, swirling, swirling and hypnotically attracting Blaine's attention entirely. He could barely put one foot in front of the other, dragging his lethargic body up the five flights of stairs to the small New York apartment that he shared with his friend, the one he had called home for the past few years. His curls were windswept, an unusual appearance for Blaine, but he hadn't had his gel the night before to tame the unruly curls and he hardly needed to keep a stash of hair products at his now ex-boyfriend's apartment.
He wanted nothing more than to fall face first onto the soft covers of his bed, bury his face in his pillow, and cocoon himself in the covers until he either underwent the chrysalis to emerge a butterfly or his hunger took hold of his limbs and got him to move.
Yet another relationship failed. Blaine rubbed his temple, slowly closing the ground that still lay between him and his apartment, feeling the residual chill of the March morning on his skin. He was hardly past his prime, being twenty-four and still fresh-faced like his Nana had said the last time he'd visited Ohio. However, with each ended relationship, Blaine felt his childhood dream slipping further and further away. A fantasy made up of a perfect man, a house in the suburbs, children's bikes thrown haphazardly on the front lawn. Where once he held on to that fantasy with a vice-like grip, Blaine felt as if he barely clasped it with his fingertips now.
He crossed the fourth floor landing and stopped at the bottom of the next flight of stairs for just a moment. The carpet was especially threadbare here because of the two children who lived in the apartment right next to the stairs. They would sit on the stairs and play, blocking the way down for all the upstairs tenants. Blaine had had to jump over the lively children many a time when rushing because he'd overslept and was late for rehearsals.
They weren't playing on the stairs now. The rational voice inside Blaine's head commented on the fact that it was before nine on a Saturday morning so of course the children wouldn't be there. Yet the overpowering voice of Blaine's heartbreak informed him that at least seeing those happy faces, laughing loudly as this doll saved the day against that evil burglar, would have lifted his sunken spirits somewhat.
Instead, he trudged up the final flight of stairs and crossed the entire length of the landing to stand in front of his door. He dug around in the pocket of his jacket, wrapped tightly around his torso against the cold wind that was blowing outside, making the new spring leaves rustle and goosebumps rise wherever the wind touched Blaine's skin. He tugged his keys out of the pocket, not caring that they might catch and snag against a loose thread and opened the door.
The TV was on in the living room. Blaine could see the light illuminating the couch, the flickering images across the screen and could hear the low hum of voices coming from whatever Blaine's best friend and roommate was watching. Tina was still in grad school and liked to take over the living room on days that she was revising or writing a paper. She would have the TV playing something that wouldn't distract her too much while she spread her books on the coffee table and typed with her laptop balanced on her crossed legs. Blaine would sometimes join her if she was watching a good show, but most of the time he would let her stay in the zone she always found herself in while working.
He prayed she was in that zone today, one where she wouldn't immediately spot him and thus leaving him able to walk across the apartment and start work on his cocoon of blankets. It wouldn't take much planning or coordination and then he could settle into his cocoon and relive his latest broken down relationship time and time again.
Luck wasn't on his side, however. He made his way down the short corridor that led from the front door to the living room, and as he rounded the wall that hid the front door from the living room, Tina looked up from her books. She had a textbook open on her lap, one on the armrest of the couch right next to her and two more open on the coffee table. She had stuck a pen behind her ear and was holding a highlighter in her mouth, although she took hold of it to smile at Blaine as he shuffled further into the apartment.
"You were out late last night," she said in such an amicable tone that it tore through Blaine's gloom like daggers. He didn't want to hear joy or happiness; he just wanted to wallow in his eternal misery. "I thought you and Eli were planning on just spending the afternoon together."
Blaine didn't reply to that. They had just been planning to spend the afternoon together, talking over the glaringly obvious problems in their relationship and to see if they could work a way around them. Blaine had gone into the conversation with hope. They liked each other, and they definitely could satisfy each other's sexual needs, so he had confidence that they could have worked things out. Yet there was no way to iron out any creases, ultimately leading him to trudging through his apartment and ignoring everything Tina was trying to say to him.
He reached his room and threw open the door, hearing the wood smack loudly against the plaster wall. His bedroom was dark; for some reason his curtains had been left closed, but Blaine was grateful for the blackness. The darkness suited his desire to wrap himself up in his blankets for years on end.
He had just kicked off his shoes and thrown his jacket onto the desk chair by his door when Tina walked in. She flicked the light switch on, making Blaine flinch away from the fluorescence. Her face was the picture of the concerned friend. Blaine hadn't even registered what she'd said to him and it was obvious she'd been trying to get his attention.
"Blaine, what's wrong?" she asked. While Blaine lay down on his bed, fully dressed and reaching out blindly for his pillow to bury his head beneath, Tina slowly approached and perched on the edge. The mattress sunk a little with the extra weight. She reached out and tugged on his sock-covered foot. "What happened?" she asked again.
Blaine couldn't ignore her. They had been friends for years, ever since Blaine had been forced to leave the sanctuary of his private school and go back to public school. Tina had been one of the first people to welcome the new boy into the senior class, and once the initial awkwardness of a new friendship was over, they had become firm friends. Tina had been by his side for all his heartbreaks, being a permanent pillar he could lean on. She also acted as his buffer from the ground after he plummeted from however high he built the relationship up in his head.
Although, recently, she'd been getting more and more impatient with Blaine's blank looks and dreamy sighs as he thought about whomever he was dating at the time. She had been especially vocal about Eli, spending many of the last three weeks pointing out the myriad of differences between the two of them. Of course she'd been right in the end, but he hardly wanted to hear her say 'I told you so' when what he really needed was his friend.
"What you wanted has finally happened," he murmured into the pillow. She made a questioning noise and he repeated himself, turning his head a little to the side to uncover his mouth and make his words just a little more audible.
"What did I want?" was her reply. Tina kept her voice low, like she could tell Blaine wanted nothing more than silence.
"Eli and I," Blaine replied after a moment. The birds were chirping happily outside, like they didn't care about Blaine's current emotional state, and Blaine took the time to listen to them before answering. "We're done."
"Oh, Blainey." Tina crawled across the bed to lie next to her friend, resting her head on the second pillow, the one Blaine hadn't pulled out of place. She slung an arm over Blaine's chest but when he didn't move into her embrace, she shuffled closer to hug him properly.
"I'm sorry." Tina still kept her voice low, barely audible over the singing of the birds outside. "I know how much you wanted it to work."
Blaine heaved a deep sigh. To anyone else, mourning the loss of a three week relationship with a guy Blaine hadn't known for very long before they started dating would seem implausible. It was nothing on the relationships that would break down after years of commitment, nothing like marriages that broke down for simple reasons like the spouses growing apart. In the grand scheme of love and relationships, Blaine's three week tryst with Eli could only just be classified as such.
Yet here he was, accepting his best friend's comfort and eternally grateful she wasn't uttering the dreaded words 'I told you so.' He felt his dream slip away even further, the clear picture he had once had of how he wanted his life to turn out was now blurred all the way from the edges to the center. It resembled a faded memory rather than the vibrant fantasy that had gotten Blaine through so many years in the past.
He hoped he could at least claw his way out of the pit of despairing emotion he was in right at that moment. A small optimistic part of his mind, one that Blaine was ignoring wholeheartedly, was repeating what it said in every situation like this. It was telling him that he'd be ok eventually, and that he'd find someone else. Someone else who'd be better than Eli ever was. Someone who may be Blaine's elusive true love.
Not that he was hearing the optimistic voice through his haze of despair and another relationship failing.
To put it bluntly, Blaine lived in his head. He was a fantasist. Ask any of his friends, family, or any ex-boyfriend who had gotten to know Blaine well enough. He'd had his picture perfect future in his mind's eye since he was in elementary school, eight years old and amidst a crowd of boys who still thought girls had cooties.
Admittedly, when he had been eight years old, his picture perfect future had involved the Presidency, fighting crime in a cape, and being married to whichever pop star he preferred that week.
When asked in class about what he wanted from the future, Blaine would always include having a house with a white picket fence, two dogs, three cats and a canary in his list of future desires. In art class he might draw what he wanted his future to look like as often as drawing a picture of his mom, dad and Cooper or drawing what the teacher asked him to.
His dreams matured as he did, morphing from superheroes and being the President to being a lawyer like his Dad and then a doctor like his Mom. The turning point in regards to his fantasy career was a family vacation to New York and Blaine's eye-opening trip to see Chicago on Broadway. Blaine had been ten years old at the time and while he was a well-behaved little boy, as his Nana so fondly said when remembering the whirlwind that had been Cooper when he was still in single figures, Blaine had been expecting an evening filled with boredom and disinterest. Instead, it was like he had been looking through opaque glasses and now he was properly seeing the world for the first time in his life. He had sat up in his seat, watching the musical with rapture on his face and then had proceeded to force his Dad to buy him the soundtrack from the merchandise stand before they left the theater to go back to their hotel. They had driven from Ohio to New York that week and Blaine had insisted they listen to the soundtrack over and over again on the drive back.
So now his fantasy included him performing every evening on stage to a sold out theater crowd. He could picture the audience dressed in beautiful gowns and smart suits and imagined the standing ovation they would give every one of his performance, like the one he'd given the actors that bright day in his memory.
Up until Blaine was thirteen, he had been careful when talking about his fantasies for his future. He had known about his desire to have a husband waiting for him when he got home from work, as opposed being like Cooper wanting a wife and knew that most boys his age were looking at girls rather than the boys like he was. At thirteen, Blaine had cautiously admitted that he didn't want a girlfriend but a boyfriend, first coming out to Cooper while he held a brand new Playboy magazine in his hands that would be hurriedly handed back to his well-meaning older brother. Then he'd come out to his parents and while it had taken them a while, they slowly warmed to the idea that Blaine was picturing a two-man household in his future.
However, one event in Blaine's adolescence cemented the notion that he was a fantasist, serving as the perfect example of how dreams can block reality from view entirely. A few months after the disaster of the Sadie Hawkins dance, fifteen-year-old Blaine had met someone he'd fell for within minutes. Jeremiah had been someone Blaine could look up to, as Blaine saw himself in Jeremiah's position, out and proud, and Blaine's inevitable crush grew exponentially with each coffee date they had.
Valentine's Day came around and Blaine had wanted nothing more than to express his feelings towards the older boy, leading to a naïvely chosen a song to serenade his crush at work. He had pictured Jeremiah smiling a toothy grin, blushing from the intent, kissing Blaine as a thank you and walking out of the Gap hand in hand with his new boyfriend.
Of course the reality had been one hundred and eighty degrees from his fantasy. A resentful Jeremiah cut all contact with Blaine, who was left with a broken heart and his dreams of Jeremiah kissing him on the cheek when he arrived home from a successful show shattered.
When he first met Tina, she had laughed until her mascara ran and her sides ached at hearing the recount of the story. The 'Jeremiah Disaster', as she fondly called it, was still the source of Tina's most convincing arguments that Blaine built relationships up in his head far more often than actually reading the signs in front of him.
He would meet a man, get to know them well enough to want to date them, and soon his nightly dreams would involve Peter or James or Eli as the husband who would walk around their home with his top button undone and a lazy smile on their lips. Blaine would work harder than he needed to with the man in their relationship, insisting that the forced smiles were real and the slow withdrawing was nothing more than his insecurities. And then when the man would eventually end the relationship, Blaine would see his dreams splinter and his heart break.
Blaine was in a never-ending vicious circle where his relationships would succeed in the fantasy and spectacularly fail in reality. He would mistake countless situations, misread hundreds of signs, and make a whole mountain range out of a few tiny molehills. Tina was forever telling Blaine that if he wanted to find the man that would be in his dreams for good, he had to stop shoving anyone into the role and actually look in the real world.
And yet, despite it all, Blaine's perpetual living within his own imagination is, in fact, the way he met the love of his life: the man who did have the starring role in his picture perfect future.
A week and a half had passed since the door closed on Blaine's relationship with Eli. Tina had been nothing if not the perfect friend in the years since she and Blaine had grown close. Thus she was well equipped to yank Blaine from the depths of his despair after another shattered fantasy and propel him onto the path that would send him out looking again.
There had been many an evening where Tina had joined her friend in snuggling under the blankets and watching old teenage movies. She had nudged him whenever Andrew McCarthy came on screen in Pretty in Pink, sighed with him over Freddie Prinze Junior in She's All That, and laughed raucously when they inevitably came full circle to watch Not Another Teen Movie. Tina had put on pot after pot of her mother's Chinese chicken soup recipe and shoved Blaine's favorite dishes under his nose every evening. She endured the trips to the mall that would inevitably lead them past a jewelry store and would link her arms through his to gently lead him away before he got misty eyed at the thought of proposing to the love of his life.
And then when the pampering to Blaine's romantic and emotional needs didn't work, Tina would decide that the approach with a proverbial slap around the face was needed.
That day, Blaine was due to be at rehearsals at midday. With three hours to go before he would be considered late, Tina burst into his bedroom and, in a swift, expertly practiced movement, pulled the covers away from his torso.
He sat bolt upright, having woken a good half hour before but enjoying the darkness that came from his cocoon of blankets. Blaine reached out, groping with both hands, to try and find the top of the covers and pull them over his head again but Tina just bundled them up at the end of his bed and waited, one hip cocked and one eyebrow raised.
"Tina, I've got ages until rehearsals," he finally said, his voice croaky with sleep. "Give me the blankets back."
Tina shook her head. "You are getting up, getting showered and coming to breakfast with me." She strode over to the window on the other side of the room and opened one of the brown curtains, bathing the dark room in sunlight. "Like you said, you have ages until rehearsals and I need you to help me decide where Mike and I should go on our date tomorrow night."
Mike was Tina's new boyfriend and Blaine's favorite for his friend by far. Not that Mike knew that: he was desperate to become close with his girlfriend's best friend, confronted with the situation that was stereotypical but true. A girl's male best friend was the most important person to impress as the new boyfriend, because if the best friend didn't like the boyfriend then there was little chance of the relationship going far. Thus every time Mike and Blaine were in the same room together, Mike would make sure to include Blaine in conversation, ask about his job or current relationship and try very hard and very obviously to get Blaine to like him.
He wouldn't let Mike know this just yet, but Blaine was already there. He liked Mike from the moment that he took off his thick winter coat and draped it around Tina's shoulders when the three of them were walking home from an off-Broadway play they'd attended together. Tina's jacket had been too light for the freezing evening and Mike hadn't even hesitated to give up his coat for his girlfriend. Blaine hadn't been dithering over whether he liked Tina's new boyfriend or not, but that had tipped the scale that moved Mike from merely the new boyfriend to one Blaine highly approved of and would consider a friend of his own in time.
Taking Tina's need for his advice into consideration, Blaine swung his legs off his mattress and began plodding across the warm fluffy rug that was underneath his bed and then onto the wooden floor that bordered his room. Tina took the opportunity to open the other curtain and then busied herself pulling Blaine's cover back into its rightful position on the bed, having been the one to displace it.
"Where does he want to take you this time?" Blaine asked, opening his closet and rummaging through the pants hanging up inside it. His gym bag that contained the clothes he wore to rehearsals was already packed and if he knew Tina and her habit of having long breakfasts, he'd have take the bag with him so he could go straight to rehearsals from the restaurant.
Tina settled on the remade bed. "To the same Chinese restaurant we always go to," she sighed. "I love Chinese food, I do. And of course China Town here is far better than the few Chinese restaurants we had in Lima, but sometimes I want to go for Italian. Or steak. Or even to a deli to have a salad-pasta combination thing. But not always dim-sum so frequently in the same place, they actually know our names when we arrive."
By the time Tina had finished telling Blaine all about her frustrations in regards to the current state of her relationship with Mike, Blaine had taken a pair of mustard yellow pants out of the closet and had stripped his night shirt off to pull a white polo over his head instead. "So you don't need me to help you decide where to go," he pointed out after he'd pulled his head through the neck and could look at his friend once more, "You've already chosen where not to go. That's half the choice."
"No, you aren't getting out of breakfast with me," Tina said, correctly seeing right through Blaine's statement to get to the root of what he was saying, "I need to you actually help me choose the restaurant."
She stood and came over to him, linking one of her arms through his and resting her head on his shoulder, looking up at him with big brown eyes. "And besides Blainey-days," Blaine couldn't help but smile at the old nickname, "you need to get out and see the world. See that there are still plenty of other men out there to take your mind off Eli. That's the thing that'll do you good."
Blaine hadn't exactly believed Tina when she'd dragged him from his bed claiming it was for Blaine's own good. Yet, it had actually worked.
Breakfast had been as long as Blaine had predicted, and he had been about as much help as he'd originally thought as well. There were times that Tina just needed someone to talk to, someone to show that they were listening as she talked her ideas out loud. Blaine had barely had to input any ideas of his own and had spent the meal sipping three cups of coffee and munching on the banana nut muffin that he favored. But he was in good company - the best company in fact - and the ambiance of a normal coffee shop had improved his spirits far more than brewing yet another pot in his kitchen would have.
By the time Tina had chosen the restaurant to take Mike to, Blaine had needed to rush off to make his rehearsals on time. She was taking Mike to a new Italian that had opened up in Little Italy and Tina had talked for a good half an hour about it's new reputation that was rapidly spreading through the city as a fantastic place to eat. Blaine had a mental image of the two of them, him and a new boyfriend going on a double date but he took a sip of his second coffee had those thoughts being washed away. He wasn't thinking like that.
A Chorus Line was having a cast change within the next few weeks and Blaine had managed to win one of the leads. It was his first musical on Broadway where he'd have a lead role, despite being one of sixteen other leads, and he had a solo to go with his part. He'd been overjoyed, his friends had been overjoyed for him and then had laughed when he crawled home after an exhausting rehearsal. Now that they were a few weeks from opening night, rehearsal intensity hadn't let up.
Despite having spent the day dancing across the stage, performing pirouettes and box steps and leaping clear across the stage, once he'd left for the evening Blaine had chosen to ignore the burning need to shower in one of the cubicles backstage in favor of hurrying home and returning to his cocoon. After the gruelling afternoon, his spirits from the morning had sunk once more. There was a gentle wind that greeted him that hadn't been there in the morning as he walked out of the backstage door, making the ends of his clothes fly up and flap like they were copying Blaine's routine. Even with the thick cardigan he'd pulled on to protect him from the cool breeze, he could feel the difference between the air rushing over his skin and the wind against the sweat on his back and forehead, making him shiver from the cold.
He tugged at the ends of his cardigan, wrapping himself up a little better, and set off down the street, his gym bag swaying with his momentum and rhythmically banging against his thigh. Despite it being mid-afternoon, the street was remarkably devoid of pedestrians. Blaine was used to having to weave his way in and out of the crowds, bumping into people and pushing his way past others, just to get to the main street and head towards the closest station.
While today's empty street was a blessing, with no intricate game of dodging the other people to play, Blaine's mind fell back on the only thing that he seemed capable of thinking about lately. Where had it all gone wrong with Eli? He hadn't made the whole thing up, that was for certain. He and Eli had been on dates where they had held hands, kissed under the awning of Eli's apartment building, and met up for coffee and a late breakfast on days when they hadn't spent the night together.
Even through his frantic thoughts that flew between possible reasons that his latest relationship failed, a voice that sounded suspiciously like Tina was reminding him in forceful terms that he and Eli had absolutely nothing in common. He could admit that at least. Blaine was an actor, a performer whose vocational life goal came in two parts: to originate a role that went on to become a classic, and to star in an iconic role and be compared favorably to the man who originated it. Eli's goals were to successfully get someone off a charge that they obviously had been guilty of and to bench press over 200 pounds. And he hated the theater.
There was evidence staring at him in the face, written in fiery letters across the sky, but Blaine's eyes were downcast and his thoughts were fixed on what had been the final straw that had led him to agree with Eli that it just hadn't been working. Could he even remember the details of that night? It had ended with Blaine's legs draped over Eli's shoulders and both of them panting against the other's sweat-soaked skin, but the next morning he'd walked out of the apartment with no intention of calling Eli back. Blaine couldn't even put his finger on the deed that had put the final nail in the coffin.
With his eyes fixed on the paving stones beneath his feet and his mind stuck in the past, Blaine didn't watch where he was walking and didn't see the man hurrying in the opposite direction. They collided, Blaine's bag dropping to the ground like a stone and the papers and envelopes the man had been holding fluttering to the ground around them.
"I'm so sorry," Blaine immediately apologized, sinking to his knees to gather up the envelopes that had caught on the wind and fluttered closer to him. The man was also crouched down to pick up loose papers that had fallen out of an open manila envelope. He grasped the papers to his chest as he picked them up, trying without success to order them with one hand.
The man and Blaine rose at the same time. Blaine lifted his head while holding out the pile of the stranger's belongings he'd collected and the repeated apology he was about to say stuck in his throat. It was entirely possible that the world had stopped turning, keeping Blaine is that exact moment as he looked at the man before him.
This man was utterly breathtaking. It was like Blaine had been seeing mere mockeries of men before now and hadn't realized, like the wool had been lifted from his eyes and he was seeing clearly for the first time. He hadn't even realized he had a type before now, but the man standing before him was so perfect in every way that Blaine was convinced he had a type now.
His blue eyes were shining, with colors from every corner of the rainbow reflected in his eyes, a kaleidoscope of blues and greys and greens. His skin was flawless, pale like it hadn't ever spent a day in the sun and his cheeks were rosy from the cold wind blowing around them or from the exertion of his fast paced walking. His hair was a light brown, streaked with natural bronze and golden strands, and styled to stand up away from his forehead and curl back on itself towards the crown of his head. His lips were pale like his skin but still managed to be full, inviting and even glistening after the man licked them absentmindedly. Before his eyes, they curled up into a small smile that lit up his face and made Blaine's heart skip a beat.
"Thank you," he said, snapping Blaine out of his moment of admiration and bringing him sharply into the present situation. The man awkwardly juggled the papers in his arms to free up one hand. But merely hearing him speak sent Blaine soaring back to the cloud nine he'd been residing on, and Blaine returned to his appreciation of the man.
His voice was musical, high enough to be a rarity in a man and definitely something Blaine wanted to hear for the rest of his life. He had just come from a hot, stuffy room where the same people sang the same songs over and over again, and hearing this man speak could only be compared to the joy someone felt at listening to spring birds sing for the first time after a long winter.
His fall from cloud nine back to earth was abrupt once more as the man finally freed a hand and reached out to take the pile offered to him. Blaine blinked once, twice and just barely resisted shaking his head to clear the cloud of love in between his ears. He already felt two feet tall, with huge hands, curls that looked even more like a lion's mane than normal, and the sweat on his brow from rehearsal was suddenly so obvious it could be seen from Ohio. He didn't want to make himself look like even more of a bumbling fool.
Blaine helped maneuver the envelopes and open letters into the man's hand, willing fate to allow their hands to touch. He had never wanted to accidentally brush a man's hand before and his hopes plummeted to the earth when the dropped belongings were handed over without any touch at all.
"Again, I'm sorry for bumping into you," Blaine mumbled, wanting to drop his eyes with embarrassment at the fumbled words coming out of his mouth but at the same time never wanting to take his eyes off the man before him.
The man shook his head. "I apologize as well," he said instead. The humble admittance that maybe he had been in the wrong made Blaine's opinion of him reach a new height. The idea that this man could have bumped into Blaine, could have disturbed Blaine's walk home, rather than the other way around was ludicrous. In Blaine's mind, this beautiful man just became a selfless and shining example of humanity at its best.
The man then smiled again, his lips pressed tight together and moved around Blaine to carry on walking. Blaine wanted nothing more than to call out, to reach out to this man, find out his name, or if he was gay and single and interested in maybe going out for coffee with the ungainly oaf who had walked right into him. However, his muscles weren't listening to his brain screaming at them to move. His legs didn't want to turn, his hands merely twitched by his sides and his arms didn't fly out to tap the man on the shoulder.
When he eventually did turn around, the man was a step or two away. Far enough that if Blaine had reached out, he'd have been stretching and looking like an even bigger fool than he already saw himself as. A glimpse of something white caught Blaine's eye and he swooped down for the abandoned envelope.
His eyes took in the dark writing, the name and address written in typed font. His eyes only glanced at the front of the envelope briefly before flying up to find the man again and call out.
Only once the man had turned around and looked curiously at Blaine again did he hold out the last envelope. Blaine's mind went into overdrive, clever pick-up lines disguised as simple sentences running through his brain, things that would make the man laugh and want to talk to Blaine for longer, maybe inviting him to the nearest coffee shop. It didn't matter that this was Broadway and therefore everything close to here would be expensive: Blaine would happily buy this man a coffee if he could spend more time with him. However, the connection between his mind and his mouth must have been loose and the only thing that came out of his mouth was, "Your letter."
"Oh." Again the man struggled to free a hand, nearly losing three sheets of paper covered with handwritten notes on them before giving up. He slowly let the large pile of papers fall a little away from his chest, creating a space for Blaine to slip the envelope in to. He looked up expectantly, smiling that same tight-lipped smile, and waited patiently.
Blaine took the hint and stepped forward, over his forgotten gym bag, to reach the man and slip the envelope on top of the great pile in his arms. Once again his brain screamed at his mouth to speak, to say anything witty or impressive to keep the man there, ordering his arms to reach out and indicate that Blaine could held with the load if the man liked.
But his motor skills failed him for a second time and the man turned to walk away. Blaine's eyes followed him as he walked, wanting to keep him in his sights for as long as possible now that speaking to him again was out of the question. Blaine took in the man's long legs and inevitable height he'd have over Blaine when they would be standing with scant inches between them. The pants he had on were a matte grey color and framed his ass, drawing Blaine's eyes like a beacon. The blue scarf that Blaine hadn't even noticed complimented the man's eyes flapped over his shoulder, waving goodbye to Blaine as the man walked away.
Heaving a deep sigh, Blaine finally picked up the bag lying dejectedly at his feet. He took the time to straighten the polyester strap and slide it comfortably onto his shoulder, face still turned towards the direction his perfect man had walked in, eyes still desperately searching through the growing crowd of people to find someone he knew he couldn't.
And when he turned to leave to continue on the journey he'd been on before being smacked out of his brooding over Eli, Blaine was forever grateful he had managed to discover the man's name from the addressed envelope. At least he could dream about him, and once his daydreams were over he might even be able to overcome to overwhelming odds against him look for the man he now wanted to spend the rest of his life with.
For the second time in as many weeks, Blaine walked into his apartment in a daze. His gym bag was dangling from his hand, brushing against the threadbare carpet of the hall outside. He abandoned it entirely once he'd closed the front door behind him. He just didn't have the desire to carry it across the apartment length right now. He dropped his keys into the small, shallow bowl Tina's mother had bought for the two of them without really looking at it, using the force of habit to know where to drop the keys so that they wouldn't clatter into the bottom of the glass dish.
Blaine looked over the long expanse of his apartment and started the trek to reach his bedroom. He really should have chosen the room closest to the door. He could have used the bedroom right by the front door more than ever now.
Tina wasn't sitting on the couch this time, although her veterinary coursework was spread out over the coffee table and the TV was muted. That meant she was either in her bedroom on the phone to Mike talking about their date the following evening or in the kitchen heating up some tea to give her enough energy to get through yet another night's study.
Blaine paused at the junction between the small hall to the front door and the living room, standing just to the left of Tina's closed door. He strained his ears, listening out for any movement or any sign of life coming from Tina's bedroom. For a few seconds he could only hear the wind rustling the leaves in the trees outside their apartment and his heartbeat. There was no sound coming from Tina's bedroom: no laughter, no pacing like she liked to do when on the phone, no squeak of bedsprings that told Blaine she had sat down to talk. The silence meant that his ever-loving and well-meaning but endlessly nosy best friend cum roommate was in the kitchen. The open-plan kitchen where, unless Blaine was very lucky and she had her back to the living room, Blaine would undoubtedly be spotted and interrogated for the reason to his so oft-repeated near-catatonic state.
He took a deep breath to steel himself, glancing over his shoulder to the gym bag by the front door. Even turning back for it could cost him precious moments that he couldn't afford to lose. Tina might be rummaging in the cupboards for a tray right now and as soon as she found what she needed, she'd be back in view and grab his attention. He just wanted to slip into his room, collapse face-first on his bed like he'd done two weeks ago and then wallow in the knowledge that he was likely never to see his perfect man again. He didn't want to rehash the encounter and have someone other than himself, someone he cared about and whose opinion he trusted more than anyone else's, tell him that he wasn't going to see the man again.
Blaine sent a quick prayer up to whichever god he didn't believe in who may or may not be listening in at the time, before stepping forward. At least the apartment building was new enough that there were no creaking floorboards in their apartment. That would be something straight out of a bad comedic movie.
He almost made it the entire way across the apartment and was within touching distance of his bedroom door when a voice rang out.
"Oh, Blaine - I was wondering when you were getting back." Tina said brightly, coming out of the kitchen holding a tray laden with a teapot, two mugs, a plate of cookies and a bowl filled with the Chinese sweets Tina's parents sent her every week. She smiled widely in his direction as she rounded the couch, set the tray on two open textbooks and retook her seat on the couch. Only then did she glance back at her friend and beckon for him to join her.
There was no chance of slipping away now, not after last time when she'd followed him into his bedroom to investigate his lack of response after his breakup with Eli. Blaine took the offered seat after he'd walked back to the front door and retrieved his gym bag, throwing it towards his bedroom and ignoring the loud thud it made when his shoes collided with the wooden doorframe.
Tina was pouring out two mugs of tea, the jasmine scent wafting in every direction and lulling Blaine into a sense of security. Did the man like herbal tea, or was his hot drink of choice a coffee? How Blaine would have loved to have known, then learned the best way to prepare whichever hot drink was the favorite option.
"So how were rehearsals then?" Tina asked through a mouthful of jasmine tea. She had finished pouring the cups while Blaine stared into space, lost in his own head, and had even slid the second mug and saucer across the glass table so Blaine didn't have to stretch to reach it. He picked it up, cradling the china in both hands and blew gently on the tea to stall in answering her question.
However, Tina just stared at him with those brown eyes that were so expressive and almost hypnotic in the way that she could extract information that she didn't even know she wanted. After the well-meaning breakfast in the morning and her insistence that there really were other fish in the sea for him, it seemed worse. It seemed like years and seconds since Blaine's brain had short-circuited after seeing the man of his dreams, although realistically it was half an hour at most. Surely he could keep the news from Tina for longer than thirty minutes, even with her hypnotic stare that normally dragged information without any resistance.
"They ran really late today," he said, speaking to the teacup rather than his friend. A scowl settled on his face as he remembered the disaster that had been rehearsal of the afternoon. Repeating the finale over and over and over again until three people had just given up and stormed out, loudly claiming that Cassandra July truly was the devil incarnate.
"Cassie had us practicing the finale over and over again," Blaine continued while Tina nodded to show that she was listening, even if it was with a vague interest that a friend has for something they know very little about, "For some reason, it didn't sit right with her and she treated it like we hadn't been learning it for the past few months."
"She just wants you to be good," Tina pointed out, popping a sweet into her mouth and chewing. Blaine shook his head when she offered him the bowl.
"Yeah, sure, but Cassandra July wants us to be one machine that moves and thinks just like her." He shook his head again, hearing the choreographer's continual shouts in his head as he recounted the day, "And that's not going to happen with the size of the cast we've got. You know how many parts A Chorus Line has. How are we all supposed to be little Cassie Julys?"
The jasmine tea was still steaming, the smell wafting up across his nose and the steam making his cold skin tingle just a little. Glancing toward where Tina was watching him with a small smile on her lips, Blaine reached over to replace the mug on the saucer and then asked, "Did you speak to Mike about your date tomorrow?"
Her small smile turned into a large one and she nodded. "He was a little surprised when I immediately said no to our normal restaurant, but when I told him that I really did want to check this new place out, he was okay with it."
Blaine paused in his never-ending thoughts about how he had met his perfect man and would likely never see him again, taking the moment to really look at his friend. In the morning at breakfast, she'd been as happy as a child on Christmas morning even while complaining that Mike was taking her to the same restaurant, a date that was becoming stagnant and habitual. She had been determined to talk at Blaine as she brainstormed for an alternative place.
Even now hours later, she was so relaxed while talking about Mike and thinking about her new boyfriend. Blaine hadn't seen her like this for a while. She had been swamped with researching for a paper for the past few months and her relationships were as woeful as Blaine's during that time. Then Mike had come along and Tina had lit up like a Christmas tree.
"I'm so glad you're happy with him, Tina," Blaine commented after a few moments of companionable silence. She looked at him, shocked, and he realized that while he'd made it known that he liked Mike and supported the relationship, this must have been the first time he was actually telling his friend that he was happy for her. He gestured towards the pile of books and papers surrounding her before continuing. "With all the time you put into your studying, you more than deserve to be so happy with someone."
Tina replaced her mug on the saucer, having picked it up to sip the jasmine tea thoughtfully only moments ago, and leaned closer to Blaine. She held out her arms, beckoning with her fingers. Blaine took the hint and followed her lead, sinking into Tina's arms while she hugged him, for her own sake as well as for his.
"So do you, Blainey," she murmured in his ear. "I know you're still upset over Eli, but when you find your real perfect man, he'll be more than you've ever dreamed."
As she spoke, Blaine's mind moved from the possibility of someone to the man he'd met today on the street. It was like he had stepped out of Blaine's dreams and into the complicated, never standing still, hectic world of Blaine's reality. As he hugged Tina to him, hearing her say that she would find his dream, his fantasy, Blaine wondered if he'd ever bump into the man again; focusing on the likely possibility that he worked around where Blaine had walked into him, rather than on the negative glass-half-empty view he'd had only a few minutes ago.
"Blaine?" Tina's voice broke through Blaine's reverie and brought him back to the present. She was trying to extract herself from Blaine's arms and he hurriedly let her go, sitting back against the comfortable cushions and then changing his mind to reach out and take hold of his mug again. The change of scent from passion fruit to jasmine again only made Blaine wonder what scents were hidden away in the products of his dream man's bathroom.
Tina's hand took hold of Blaine's knee and shook it ever so slightly, gaining his attention. "You want to tell me what's on your mind?" she asked, but before Blaine could reply, she continued, "Is it Eli again?"
Blaine shook his head. "Not Eli. I'm not really worried about him anymore." He tried to act nonchalant about it, saying that poignant phrase as if he were still talking about his afternoon's gruelling rehearsals.
"That's a change from earlier. Earlier this very morning, in fact." This time she nudged Blaine's knee with her sock-covered foot. "What happened to make you change your tune?"
Blaine's mind filled with the image of the man, his eyes locked with Blaine's own from underneath long lashes. Blue eyes, a delicate nose, lips that seemed to naturally smile, hair that was swept away from his face almost artistically. Blaine heard his voice in his head, that musical tone and way of speaking that he somehow recalled even after hearing only a few sentences. He saw the envelope, the last letter than he'd picked up, the one that had revealed his perfect man's name.
A smile grew on his lips as he thought and Blaine's entire posture relaxed in a way that he hadn't been in the past week. A posture that spoke volumes about how his mentality had taken a turn for the optimistic from the thoughts turning over in his mind that Eli was just another in a long list of failures and how he'd never find his dream, to thoughts that sang about the living fantasy he'd met earlier, drowning out the notion that he wouldn't meet his perfect man again.
"I, um," Blaine momentarily tried to avoid Tina's intense gaze but gave up and looked at his friend, seeing her growing excitement for him, "may have met someone just before I came home."
Tina gasped. "What? Oh my god, Blaine. Tell me everything." She leant towards him again and took hold of one of Blaine's hands in both of her own. "Where did you meet him?"
"We just met in the street." Blaine shrugged like it was a nonchalant memory but the smile that was still growing on his own lips was making it impossible to hide how blissful he felt reliving that moment. "He was walking in the opposite direction and we just bumped into each other. Tina, I can't even begin to explain, but everything I ever thought about love at first sight before now was proved completely wrong. I felt like I was seeing the man I've been looking for forever."
"That is so romantic Blaine," Tina whispered, as if keeping her voice serene might preserve some of the romance, "What's his name?"
"Sebastian Smythe." Blaine said as thought about that letter, with the name that would be engraved in his memory forever. "I think that's how you pronounce it."
Tina repeated the name of Blaine's perfect man, testing the name out for herself and then nodding in approval. When she spoke, her voice grew louder with excitement. "What's he like? Are you two going out on a date any time soon? And when do I get to meet him?"
"Well, you get to meet him right after I do."
Silence filled the apartment. If they were outside in a field, the crickets chirping would have been the loudest sound by far. Tina had been staring at Blaine with a love-struck expression on her face, swept up in the idea that Blaine had met someone new so quickly after his breakup and subsequent low emotions over Eli. And with Tina's disbelieving look, the voice that Blaine had squashed started shouting louder again, telling him that despite how happy he may have just been reliving the memory of meeting his perfect man, he was as likely to bump into Sebastian again as he was to be cast tomorrow as the next Tony in West Side Story. That negative voice that only this morning was whispering that Blaine wouldn't find his perfect man, resumed telling him in no uncertain terms that he would be better returning to his original plan to wallow in his cocoon of covers once more.
"You haven't met him yet?" Tina's face had hardened but she kept her grip on Blaine's hand, tightening it as her disbelief was voiced with a piercingly high tone, "What does that mean? How do you know his name if you haven't even met him properly?"
"It was on one of the envelopes he dropped. It was open and addressed to him." Inside his mind, that negative voice was shouting again for him to give it up, but the eternal optimist, that same optimistic streak that kept dreaming of his ultimate fantasy, was arguing back. "Look, Tay-tay," he said, adding the old nickname he and Tina used so often in their senior year, "I know you don't understand, but I really feel like he's the one. The man I've been waiting for and dreaming about my whole life."
It took a while for Tina to reply, staring at her friend with unblinking, judging eyes. When she did finally speak, her tone wasn't incredulous. It was sarcastic, and she accompanied her words with a sigh. "Of course he is."
Tina's sarcasm didn't matter. Blaine knew how he felt, and the feeling in his whole body was that he'd had that moment of realization that that man was the one. Tina hadn't agreed, but she'd just have a funny anecdote to talk about in her best woman's speech and Blaine's wedding to Sebastian Smythe.
One of Tina and Blaine's friends from when they had gone exploring together in New York after Tina first moved to the city was an aspiring chef just like her mother. Marley's mom had been a chef in a prestigious restaurant that had closed in the January of the previous year due to a severe lack of patrons after they had been slated in a review by a particularly harsh critic. Milly Rose, Marley's mom, hadn't been the chef on duty that day, so when the word got out that the renowned Milly Rose was opening her own restaurant with her daughter, the excitement that rose through patrons of the old restaurant was infectious.
Blaine and Tina had received their invites to the grand opening of Rose, the new all-day restaurant that was the talk of the town. Mike was unavailable that evening – he had gotten word that his expertise was needed immediately to fix a problem with the understudies in the musical he was working on – so Tina had linked her arm in Blaine's and had demanded he take her as his date.
"You can't turn up to a restaurant opening without a date on your arm. We'll have to be each other's," she argued, slipping in her chosen earrings for the evening while she stood in Blaine's open doorway. "Plus, it'll be good for you. It'll take your mind off Sebastian."
Blaine's response had been to shake his head. He had been staring at Tina from the mirror while he'd tried to fix his red bow tie and then decided that he was far too uncoordinated that evening. Sebastian Smythe with his perfect eyes, inviting lips and flattering clothes had been the only thing on Blaine's mind since they'd met. He hadn't spoken of him much, but his dreams during the night and day had featured the man.
Tina knew her friend and had taken to doing precisely what Blaine had wanted to avoid. She would periodically slip into conversation that Blaine should start going back out with one of his friends from NYU and Tisch that he hadn't quite lost contact with, or maybe he should to come with her out for drinks with a few of her post-grad friends. Subtlety had never been her strong suit, so when the periodical hints that Blaine should start to look for someone else failed to spur her friend into action, Tina would comment that she didn't really think it was healthy for Blaine to be so fixated on someone he hadn't really met.
"I know you're forever living in your head with your dreams," Tina would say over dinner, or over a commercial while they sat together to watch something on TV, "but you will never have that fantasy of yours come true unless you find someone real. And," she would add to preempt Blaine's retort, "not someone who is real but who you just met for a second."
So Blaine kept silent at Tina's frankly correct assessment that attending Marley's restaurant opening with Tina as his date would get his mind off his newly begun single state and the man of his dreams slipping away like a leaf in a gale.
When Tina and Blaine finally arrived outside Rose, they smiled with pride at the restaurant. There was a small line of customers outside but no one looked impatient or angry at being kept waiting. The outside of the restaurant was beautiful and simplistic, with large windows that revealed the inside, black faux-wooden window panes and the name written in silver calligraphy on the awning over the door.
They walked straight past the line of people without glancing at it and through the door, hearing the chatter of the customers as they enjoyed their food and seeing the room they had watched being built from an empty shell now full to bursting. Blaine's smile grew slowly as he took in the restaurant. He'd seen it before of course, as he had been one of the people Marley had sought approval from. However, there was something about seeing Marley's dream come to life that gave him hope. Not just that this would succeed for his friend but a small part, a selfish part, thought about how his dream may come true.
Sebastian's face flitted in his mind's eye again and he focused on that so much so that he missed Tina dragging him further into the restaurant toward the table set for four at the back.
One person sat there already and she stood, threw out her arms wide to embrace both Tina and Blaine when she saw who had arrived. Unique was Marley's best friend, as old a friend to Marley as Tina was to Blaine, and the four of them had become close together.
She was a tall woman, curvaceous and beautiful and had a personality that was loud and hard to dislike. She was dressed in a red dress complete with flowing sleeves, a black thick belt around her waist and heels that made her tower over Blaine, although she could tower over him with ease even in flat shoes. Unique was one of those people who just dressed fantastically, knowing exactly which colors to pick out and which cuts would flatter her shape. Her talent for personal fashion brought Sebastian into Blaine's mind again, with his oh so skinny pants and bright colored shirt that looked so flattering and on-trend that Blaine knew Sebastian was just like Unique in regards to fashion.
"Hey, Earth to Blaine." Unique's voice broke through Blaine's thoughts. He shook his head to clear away the mist to see Tina and Unique staring at him, evidently having already tried and failed to get his attention before.
"Sorry," Blaine said, and shook his head again. "How are you, Unique?"
"Oh, Blaine, I just so happy for Marley." Unique's smile was infectious, and had both Blaine and Tina smiling in response. "My girl has done so well and she deserves it entirely."
The three took their seats at the table, Tina pausing before sitting down to shrug her cardigan off her shoulders and hang it on the back of the comfortable beige faux-leather armchair. The fourth seat stayed empty but Blaine could guess who it was for: Marley's new boyfriend Jake, who had met both Unique and Tina before tonight but who would be introduced to Blaine for the first time. They'd been meeting for the afternoon and after the long day of rehearsals he'd forced his way through, Blaine hadn't been able to leave work early enough to make the journey from the dance studio to Central Park to join his friends.
One of the many servers showed up at their table a few minutes later, holding his small notebook and a pen in readiness. "Can I get you anything?" he asked, dreadlocks falling around his shoulders.
Tina hurriedly opened her menu to see if there was a drink she wanted but Unique held a hand out to indicate the empty chair next to her. "We're still waiting on somebody," she said, and their server nodded before leaving to attend to another table.
Unique looked back at Tina to continue their conversation about her studies but Tina's eyes were fixed on the menu, a tender expression on her face. The menu had been the only thing Marley had kept a secret, feeding them a few dishes she wasn't too sure about but keeping the majority close to her heart.
"There's my chicken soup here," Tina commented in a voice that was filled with emotion. Blaine and Unique followed suit to look over the menu and sure enough, 'Tina's Chicken and Lokshen Soup' was one of the featured appetizers. Listed in the entrées was a chicken, cream cheese and herb dish that Unique loved to cook whenever they visited her apartment for dinner. Blaine's eyes fell on the desserts and discovered a chocolate and coffee cheesecake that he knew was selected for the menu because of him.
"She's put her soul into this place," Blaine commented, pride and affection for his friend swelling again. Marley had hinted that she wanted her friends to be a part of her dream, friends that meant the world to her. Writers would dedicate a book to people they cared about, actors would thank their closest friends and influences in award acceptance speeches. But Blaine felt having a dish inspired by him on the menu in the most anticipated restaurant of the year topped any of those.
"My girl certainly knows a thing or two about making us cry," Unique said, and Blaine glanced up to see unshed tears in her eyes. He reached out to grab her hand, but Unique pulled away to fetch a tissue from her purse, dabbing expertly under her lashes to stop any mascara from running.
To lighten the mood after all three had felt a surge of affection for their friend, Blaine asked, "So tell me about Jake."
Immediately, Unique and Tina exchanged a conspiratorial look. Unique was the one to lean forward and let Blaine in on the secret. "She has made such a good choice this time. He's a sweetheart and so good for her, but that boy of hers is one fine piece of man." Tina was nodding fervently from beside her. "He's not exactly your type, but Tina and I certainly appreciate-"
She stopped speaking and sat upright like something had shocked her, smiling to someone over Blaine's shoulder. As if summoned by Unique's words, someone was walking up to the table and Unique quickly stood to greet him with a friendly hug. The laugh that rang out when she hugged him betrayed nothing about how she'd been singing praises for his physique to two people, one of whom who had yet to meet him.
He turned around to see the man he presumed was Jake, and smiled a warm smile at Marley's new boyfriend. While Blaine had met some of Marley's previous boyfriends, he hadn't gotten to know any of them well. They had been nice enough, and had left their mark as any relationship did on a person, but none of Marley's exes were much to write home about. Jake, on the other hand, was as tall as Unique, his hair cut close to his head and was wearing an open plaid shirt with a plain grey T-shirt underneath. He carried himself differently compared to Marley's exes, tall and proud, and while Blaine couldn't really judge as he was just looking at one half of the couple, he got the feeling that Marley and Jake would be one of those couples. The couple that looked perfect together and were the people walking hand in hand down a street, leaving a trail of strangers wishing they had a relationship just like that. Jake smiled his greeting to Unique as she stepped up to hug him and then gave Tina a hug as well before holding out his hand for Blaine to shake.
"You must be Blaine," he said in a voice deeper than Blaine expected. "Marley talks about you all the time."
"And it's nice to meet you too," Blaine replied. Something about Jake, even through his air of an attitude, made him smile. By the end of the evening, he would feel the same as Unique about Jake in regards to how well he fit as Marley's boyfriend.
The four sat around the table, ordered their food and talked of little things that a group of friends would turn into full blown conversations. All four had the chicken soup, Tina even admitting that Marley's addition of carrots and leeks to the recipe made the soup just that little bit nicer. They were tucking into their entrées, complimenting the food through mouths stuffed full, before one of the two women of the hour turned up.
Marley was dressed in a knee length skirt but had the whites of a chef over her outfit and was smiling like the cat that had finally gotten the canary. Her eyes flicked over the dining room, the customers happily munching on the food she had prepared with her mom, and her friends at the table followed her lead to overlook the room.
"Do you guys like it?" she asked eagerly, pausing next to Jake's chair as she looked expectantly at some of the most important people to her.
"Of course we do," Blaine said emphatically, seeing his dinner companions nod their heads along with him. "Marley, this is fantastic."
She blushed in response and perched on the very edge of the armrest of Jake's chair. He slid his hand around her waist and rested it on her thigh, high enough so that one would know they were dating but nowhere high enough to encroach on disrespectful territory.
"And how you included us and our recipes in the menus," Tina added, awe and emotion in her voice. She couldn't finish her sentence and just shook her head with a smile for her friend.
Marley's blush deepened. "I just wanted to thank you guys for being good friends. Putting dishes inspired by you on the menu was one of the ways I could do that." She leant against the side of Jake's body and Blaine had to admit that they made a cute couple. Would he and Sebastian have made a cute couple?
A waitress came up to Marley, her blonde hair tied in a tight ponytail high on her head, and whispered in her ear. The waitress returned to the kitchen only after Marley nodded, then she turned to her friends again.
"Mom needs me back," she explained. "But I wanted to come and check on you guys. Blaine, you should definitely try that chocolate and coffee cheesecake."
Blaine laughed and nodded to say that that would be the exact dessert he ordered. The four of them watched Marley return to the kitchen, greeting the tables that she passed to make sure the customers were pleased whether they were friends, food critics, or the lucky public who had managed to book a reservation at the restaurant opening.
"I'm so proud of her," Jake murmured while he watched his girlfriend walk away, then he blushed as he remembered he sat with his girlfriend's closest friends. Blaine ducked his head to hide a smile. He'd been right: Marley and Jake were one of those couples.
"So Jake," Tina asked as they waited patiently for their desserts to arrive, "I've met you twice and I don't actually know what you do."
Jake laughed, took a huge gulp of the wine in his glass and then looked right into Tina's eyes as he spoke, almost like despite the good feelings between them, he expected her to judge him. "I'm doing the graduate program in Dance at Tisch."
"Do you want to be on Broadway?" Blaine asked, cutting over whatever Tina had opened her mouth to say. He didn't recognize Jake from NYU, but that may be because Jake had moved from the college where he finished his undergrad to complete his graduate program at Tisch. "I went to Tisch as well, so-"
But Jake was shaking his head. "I think I'd rather be an choreographer for Broadway or maybe an instructor in a dance school here. I'll leave being on the stage for you actors."
"You should talk to Tina's boyfriend," Blaine informed Jake, gesturing to Tina as he spoke, "Mike's a choreographer for Broadway shows. He's doing Top Hat, right, Tina?" She nodded in response while Jake sat back in his chair and whistled. Knowing someone who was choreographing a musical where the part was first played by Fred Astaire would help him immensely.
"Speaking of boys," Unique interjected, efficiently changing the subject, "Blaine, I know you and Eli ended, but is there anyone else on the horizon for you, boy?"
Immediately blue eyes, brown hair, a blue scarf, figure hugging grey pants and a breathtaking moment flashed before Blaine's eyes. He could see Tina watching him with a raised eyebrow, daring him to tell Unique and Jake about the man from his dreams whom he'd never meet again. He was spared answering right away by the arrival of their desserts, but as soon as their waiter left them, he was scrutinized again.
"Um, no, not really," Blaine started to say but Tina cut him off.
"He met someone, Unique," she informed them, but before Unique's happy smile could fully form, she explained the rest. "Blaine just doesn't know who he is."
Unique's smile dropped from her face and her eyebrows creased together to show her confusion. "So you met him online? Or at a blind date thing?"
"No, it's not like that." Blaine shot Tina a glare for explaining his situation with Sebastian so poorly. "I saw him on the street and while I know his name, I don't know how to contact him."
The moment when Unique realized what Tina had been saying and Blaine had said was visible on her face. "Oh, so you met him once and now you're in love." Tina nodded emphatically while Blaine lowered his face in embarrassment. That was an entirely correct assessment, if a little blunt. "What's his name?" Unique asked after a few minutes of the four of them tucking happily into their respective desserts. Tina looked up sharply and shook her head, but Unique only slapped her on the arm to stop her disagreeing. "We'll be like detectives and find him for you."
As she spoke, Blaine pictured the scenario. Sebastian stood in a beautiful suit, maybe wearing an ascot rather than a tie, smiling at Blaine with Unique, Tina, Marley or even Jake standing behind him. Sebastian would be pushed forward by whichever of Blaine's friends had found him and he would stumble towards Blaine. Or maybe they'd meet in the middle, throwing arms around each other and kissing like they both knew they had each found their dream man.
So Blaine told Unique Sebastian's name and where he'd bumped into his man, wishing that somehow fate would be on his side for once.
They were in Rose that evening for a massive meal prepared by Marley just for them. Blaine sat next to Tina on one side and next to Sebastian on the other. He held Sebastian's hand in his own, long fingers interlaced with his, and while he wasn't looking at the man of his dreams, Blaine was entirely conscious of whatever Sebastian was doing.
Right now, the love of his life was delicately eating the chicken and lokshen soup, but his eyes were flicking over the crowd of Blaine's friends, almost like he was nervous about being here.
Blaine broke off his conversation with Mike and Tina and turned to his boyfriend, tugging on his hands to gain Sebastian's attention.
"Are you okay, Bas?" he asked, stroking the back of his hand with his thumb.
Sebastian dipped his spoon into the soup, letting the liquid and chicken pieces swirl in its wake, and looked at Blaine. His eyes were like a kaleidoscope of colors ranging from blues to greens and were always filled with the emotion coursing through Sebastian's veins at the time. Right now, Blaine looked into those eyes and saw the nerves.
He leant closer and rubbed the back of Sebastian's knuckles a little firmer. "Why are you nervous?" He made sure to keep his voice low so that he didn't accidentally embarrass his boyfriend and make his nerves more palpable.
"I just want your friends to like me," Sebastian replied in an equally low voice. He returned Blaine's calming stroking with a squeeze of his hand.
Blaine didn't laugh, although he wanted to dismiss the notion with a wave of his hand and chuckle until his sides hurt. He had told Sebastian that his friends already did like him, having heard all the stories from Blaine, and tonight was the time for his friends to introduce themselves to Sebastian.
"Bas, they love you already," he reassured his boyfriend, "You have nothing to worry about."
"Your friends are so important to you Blaine," Sebastian murmured back, his voice a little higher than normal due to his nerves. "I guess I don't want to give them an excuse not to like me."
"What could you do to make them not like you? And I told you, they already do. I talk about you all the time, so they practically know you by now." Blaine gave Sebastian a small smile, one side of his lips curling up a little higher than the other. "And what's not to like?"
Sebastian returned Blaine's smile with one of his own and responded to Blaine's tease by nudging him lightly in the shoulder. His expressive eyes were focused on their joined hands and Blaine followed his gaze. There had been so many times when Blaine had still been single and had seen Tina holding hands with Mike, Marley with Jake, Unique with whoever she was dating at the time, and he'd wished for someone whose have could fit perfectly with his own like puzzle pieces. Gazing at their interlocked hands, fingers tightly pressed against the back of the other's hand, Blaine had a comfortable feeling that this was one of those moments, that one of his single friends could be looking at him and Sebastian right now and wish that they had a relationship even close to Blaine's.
"And besides," Sebastian commented a few moments later, still keeping his voice down, "Mike and I are practically in the same boat, so we can always hide from you together if we need to."
Blaine laughed, ducking his head as he smiled. "Mike does seem to love you."
Blaine sat back in his chair after speaking, seeing the nerves had drained a little from Sebastian's eyes. He knew it was probably a little creepy but there were some points in the day when he just liked to watch whatever mundane task Sebastian was doing at the time. Sometimes he woke up first and watched Sebastian sleep, his eyelashes curling and barely touching his cheeks. Other times, he'd be collapsed on the couch after an intense day of rehearsals before that evening's performance and Sebastian would be bustling around the kitchen, cooking where Blaine could watch through bleary eyes.
He felt a thrill of happiness run through him. Blaine knew he was lucky to have found Sebastian again, but he also knew that now that he had found him again, this was it. He was going to have forever with Sebastian. His fantasies had come true.
Whatever Blaine had imagined when Unique declared she would help find Sebastian for him, he hadn't pictured her turning up to a meal that he, Tina and Marley were going out for with a huge smile on her face and a conspiratorial look in her eye. They had agreed to meet for a late lunch with the invitation open to their boyfriends but it was just the three of them that had made the firm plans to go to a restaurant they hadn't been to yet that was only a few streets away from Rose.
"Aren't you cheating on your new place?" Tina had joked when Marley opened her menu and scanned the selection for possible meal choices.
Marley had laughed, her eyes downcast and still focused on the menu, but she didn't reply beyond that. In the first few days of her restaurant being open, it had thrived and she'd been as busy as a bee. Blaine had stopped in after work the previous day to grab a styrofoam bowl filled with the chicken soup and while he'd stuck his head around the kitchen door after he'd been given his takeout, he had said barely two words to Marley or her mother. Milly had demanded Marley take the afternoon off so she could go out to eat with her friends, although she was heading straight back to the restaurant afterwards. As was Blaine to his rehearsals; the opening night for the new cast of A Chorus Line was just over a month and a half away and the director was piling on the extra rehearsals, wanting to make the change from the old to new cast as smooth as possible.
"So how's Jake?" Tina asked after they'd ordered. Unique hadn't arrived yet but she'd sent them a text letting them know that she was on her way and they should order without her.
Marley's smile grew wide and cheesy, showing off all her teeth and making her eyes crinkle. "Great. Really great. I know he's not the kind of guy I normally date but-"
"Good," Tina interrupted, cutting right through her sentence. "All of your exes were boring. Jake's really cute. Even Blaine thinks so."
Blaine had been sipping at his Coke through the straw and only half listening to the conversation, but he jerked his head up and let the straw fall from his lips when he heard his name. "What does that mean?" he asked, his eyes wide as he frantically tried to pick up the thread of the conversation.
"You and Marley normally have such different taste in men," Tina explained, waving a hand between the two of them like she was batting the air. "But you agree that Jake's cute."
"And I think he's good for you," Blaine added, cupping one of Marley's hands in his own and squeezing a little. She turned her hand over and looped her fingers through his in response, smiling as well.
"I did hear about what happened with you," she said a moment later, her tone carrying no judgemental undertones. Even her eyes were wide and innocent, looking for all intents and purposes like a friend asking after someone's love life. However, Tina gave a snort of laughter that she tried to stifle, unsuccessfully, and Marley's eyes flicked over to their friend almost like she was trying to telepathically tell Tina to shut up.
Blaine sighed, let go of Marley's hand, and grabbed his drink before sitting back in the wicker chair. He hadn't spoken much about Sebastian since the night he'd told Jake and Unique, both of whom had obviously filled Marley in as soon as possible. But he hadn't stopped dreaming about him: from simple romantic dreams of the two of them on a boat on the Hudson River, with the lights of New York blinking in the distance behind them; to dreams filled with passionate sex where Sebastian's legs were tight around Blaine's waist, or Blaine was pressed against the glass shower wall and Sebastian was behind him, arms around his torso. Through all the dreams he'd been having since he'd met and lost Sebastian, there had been the hope that they would find each other again. Futile hope, but ever present.
Blaine shrugged, remembering Marley's statement and hearing the unasked question about what he thought of it. How else could he reply?
"We'll just have to find you someone to take your mind off him," Marley commented, although she did that eye flick towards Tina again before she spoke.
Wanting nothing more than to get the attention off of him and his strangely hectic yet uneventful love life, Blaine nodded towards Tina, and Marley looked right at her this time. "You should ask Tina what happened with Mike last night."
Marley looked back at Blaine for confirmation that this was juicy gossip and Tina shot Blaine a look that told him she was unimpressed he'd brought it up. Luck was on her side, however, and Marley barely had time to investigate before Unique arrived at their table. She frantically pulled her shawl away from her neck, yanked the chair out, and took her seat. She took a few seconds to settle in her chair and calm her heavy breathing before looking from Marley to Tina and then settling her eyes on Blaine.
"You will never guess what happened to me today," she announced, her eyes twinkling and her voice, although breathless, filled with excitement.
The waiter arrived over Unique's shoulder and she barely spared him a glance while she ordered a drink, declining any food as she claimed she'd already eaten, and she waited until the glass of lime tonic water arrived before continuing. Blaine's mind ticked over all the possibilities that could have Unique so excited. They ranged from having met someone, to winning a cash prize of the exact right amount for surgery to her new interior designing company firing one of the founders before it even took off properly. A small part of Blaine was screaming that maybe it had something to do with him, spurred on by the way she had fixed her eyes on him as she spoke.
As the pause between Unique speaking and continuing her story grew, Marley and Tina leant in close as well. They had anxious looks on their faces, excited to hear what had their friend so animated. Finally her drink arrived, and Unique took a long sip before speaking. She was obviously thirsty but the wait had intensified the desire to know what had happened. Blaine felt like taking the drink away from her and holding it ransom it until the story was revealed.
"As you know, we were looking for an advertising company to spread the news about Spotlights," Unique informed them, talking about the company she'd helped start up. The part of Blaine that had screamed in delight went quiet upon hearing that the story didn't start with 'I've found Sebastian'.
"Well, last week, we went to speak to this ad exec that we were recommended. Someone who works at a company called Copper Media." Unique's eyes, although sweeping over all three of her friends, kept resting on Blaine as she spoke, "And the guy we were meeting, most boring man you've ever met, kept throwing in all these ideas about how we should advertise through paper media."
"I thought you were looking for advertising through the internet?" Marley interrupted, knowing far more about the vocational state of her best friend than either Blaine or Tina did.
Unique nodded. "And that's what I told Mr I-Talk-Way-Too-Much. So he asked his secretary to bring in one of the junior partners in the firm. This guy, called Chandler Khiel, came in to the meeting and started giving us all these ideas about online advertising." Her eyes went from Tina to Marley and then rested on Blaine once more, the smile on her lips growing with each word.
"And then when I said I preferred his ideas to the first man's, he introduced himself and invited us out for lunch to talk a little more about business. This week," Unique continued after another dramatic pause and a sip of her drink, "we met again over lunch and Chandler kept talking about how he was bringing in his mentor to the meeting, who apparently is a genius and rarely around."
While she spoke, Blaine looked from Tina to Marley and saw the same feeling he was having reflected on their faces. They were happy for Unique and, of course, they were all interested in what was taking place in their friend's life. However, this story was going down a road that didn't seem to lead to any destination, let alone one that warranted the exuberance with which she'd begun the tale.
"So this other guy walks in and he's totally cute," Unique said, she winking at Blaine, "and starts giving us other ideas about our website. It was just me and Chandler before then and that's when Chandler realized we hadn't been introduced." She paused once more for dramatic effect. "So Chandler tells me that this guy's name is Sebastian Smythe."
Blaine swore his heart stopped. He definitely stopped breathing. The sounds of the restaurant dropped away, leaving nothing but the rush of blood roaring in his ears. The only thing that registered in his mind was that the voice, the one that had quieted when Unique started her tale about her new company, cheered for joy.
Sebastian Smythe, his Sebastian. Unique had found him? It was less than a week since he'd told her about his newfound love, and barely over a week since Blaine had thought he'd lost the man of his dreams into the crowds of New York City forever.
"You- you found Sebastian?" he stammered, his eyes as wide. He held out his hand in Unique's direction and she grasped onto it, giving him an anchor to the world where he would have preferred to float away to a dreamland where he was actually meeting the love of his life.
Unique looked altogether pleased with herself. "That's right, baby," she said with a smile and a squeeze to the hand she held. "That's not all. We were out for a meal - that's why I'm not eating anything now - and with Chandler there, after business was finished we just started talking."
Blaine just knew that Tina and Marley were laughing in disbelief and would be leaning closer to catch everything Unique was saying. His entire focus was on her, his eyes never breaking contact with hers.
"Talking about what?" he asked, his voice shaking with shock. He could meet his Sebastian. All he had to do was get Unique to set them up, and that now she was working with the man it would be so easy.
"About lots of things," she replied, her face earnest but gaining a slight red tinge, "from work to life and relationships and stuff."
"Is he gay?" Marley interjected, her voice breaking in through the cloud of nothingness that blocked Blaine from anything other than the recount of Unique meeting his Sebastian.
She nodded once and Blaine's hand flew up to cover his mouth. He almost burst into a cheer, that joyous voice inside his head momentarily breaking out of his control. Sebastian was gay and he was available to meet and now Blaine really could fill the role of love of his life with a person rather than the memory of one.
"He seemed very intrigued about what I told him."
Unique's latest sentence also broke through the haze but this one was like an arrow piercing a patch of fog. "What you told him?" Blaine's voice had lost its shock and now there was a frantic note present. "What did you tell him?"
"Nothing." Unique's blush grew exponentially. She shared a look with Tina and Marley before changing her reply. "Okay, everything."
"Oh god." This time Blaine's hand was over his mouth out of despair rather than joyous surprise. Sebastian would think he was a freak; some crazy stalker and desperate fantasist rather than someone who he would want to meet and spend the rest of his life with, like Blaine was picturing.
"Blaine, he seemed really flattered," Unique insisted, "A bit too interested, to be honest."
"I can't believe you told him all about my crush," Blaine said through his hand, his voice muffled. Unique looked confused, and if he'd been looking at the others at their table, Blaine would have seen Tina and Marley looking confused as well. Unique went to ask why he was so mortified when they hadn't even met properly yet but Blaine pre-empted her question. "There's no way he'll like me now." He dropped his hand from his mouth to grip at the yellow fabric of his pants before continuing, "Not after hearing that whole story. He'll think I'm some desperate stalker freak."
"You are a desperate stalker freak," Tina said, raising her eyebrow, but the other three acted as if they didn't hear her input.
"I'm sure it won't make a difference," Marley said in such a convincing tone of voice that Blaine turned away from the one other person who had met Sebastian to look at her as she spoke. "And Unique can introduce you properly this time."
"Um, yeah, that's the bad news."
Blaine snapped his head to look back at Unique so fast that the joints in his neck clicked in angry protest. Her blush had faded but she was now fixing Blaine with a look of pity. In the end it was Marley who questioned what the bad news actually was.
"Sebastian was only helping me and Chandler out today because he doesn't live or work in New York," Unique told them, squeezing Blaine's hand that she still held in a form of moral support.
Blaine swallowed hard. "Where does he live?" he asked, his voice losing the mortified tone and returning to shock.
"Los Angeles."
For the third time, Blaine covered his mouth, this time out of despair. Now his brother had more chance of meeting Sebastian than he did, after Unique had met him, talked to him and found out so much more vital information just for Blaine. It was like treasure being kept just outside Blaine's reach, and every time he stretched to grab it, the treasure moved just that little further away. A tantalizing image of Sebastian held just outside his reach.
"We'll find you someone to take your mind off him," Marley said in a voice that was meant to be soothing. Blaine just sat with his mouth covered, his elbow resting on the arm of his chair and ignored the beautiful bowl of risotto that the waiter put before him.
He'd never meet Sebastian now. There had been a chance that Blaine's luck would hold out and he'd bump into him again in the streets of New York. But with his permanent residence being in Los Angeles, he had absolutely no chance. Blaine could feel the despair welling up inside him, the thoughts of whether he'd ever find someone to share his dream with taking over in his mind. He may need to take Marley up on her offer to set him up with someone after all.
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