"Before I say anything, I'd like to thank all of you, all the fans that have stuck by me over the past few months. I want to send a giant thank you to all the people that voted for the hook of an unknown artist on a major track. I want to thank all of you that shared in my excitement when my hook and vocals were used on that track. I want to thank all of you that bought 'Holy Grail' when it dropped and I want to thank all of you that continued to believe in me as the song sky rocketed to the top of the charts. Thank you all so much for believing in me when you had no reason to.
I cannot offer you much in return for your support but I hope what I have will suffice. Tonight, at midnight, I will be releasing my debut album, entitled There You Are, on my Bandcamp page. It will be free for the first twenty-four hours as a thanks to all of you. I understand that this is short notice and I want you all to benefit from this.
For those of you that are willing and able to spend the $15 that I'm asking for this album, I have another little something. With the purchase of my album, you will receive a 15% code for tickets to my concert tour, which starts next month. I'm really looking forward to it and, more than that, I'm looking forward to seeing all of you. Thank you again for your support. God speed."
BlaineAnderson: It's been almost a month since I announced the tour and the album. The album is still selling like crazy and the tour isn't doing so bad either. Who has a ticket to the NYC show at Webster Hall tonight?
Blaine tossed his phone down on his neatly made bed just after sending out the tweet. Well...not my bed, not anymore. Once he left for the tour, he was certain his soon-to-be ex-husband would change the locks, and that was fine. Most of the musician's belongings resided at his brother's house in Brooklyn these days. The few exceptions were the items that Blaine was packing at that exact moment. It was the beginning of a new month -October, the beginning of his international tour -I can call it that because we're going to Toronto. That's in Canada.- and the beginning of his new life. Blaine couldn't wait.
It'd all started a year prior, just as a fruitless summer full of shows at local dive bars and burn out spots turned into a fall of doing exactly the same. During that time, as the heat subsided and leaves began to fall from the trees, Blaine began to sink into a funk. It was as if his career -one that hadn't fully started yet- was taking residence in the middle of a quick sand pit. It felt as if the musician was sinking and there was no one to help him. Or so he thought.
One person Blaine Anderson always knew he could count on was Santana Lopez. She was fun and witty, and everything Blaine needed when he was in a funk. She recognized the aura of melancholy surrounding her friend almost instantly and began making suggestions.
"Let's do another demo tape! That guy, Artie, from before is totes willing to help with it again."
"No."
"Let's try at a larger venue again. It never hurts to try."
"No."
"Let's make a sex tape."
"What? No!"
Like all her suggestions, the one Santana made early one September afternoon was immediately shot down. "Arrogant Overlord is holding a 'hook' contest. He's looking for an artist in the area to write the hook for one of his songs. You should enter."
"No."
Luckily for Blaine and his future career, Santana did not relent that day as she had many times before. "Oh, come on!" She insisted. "You're an amazing musician and he's pretty freaking famous! Winning this could totes make you like...a superstar."
Blaine liked the idea -loved it actually- but he could not see the contest going any better than the many shows he'd done recently. He could not imagine the contest working out in his favor when having a talent scout in the audience -coerced into the building by Cooper of all people- had not. A self-fulfilling prophecy of failure loomed heavy over Blaine's head. "It's a waste of time, Tana. I'm not going to win so there is no point in entering. Besides, isn't Arrogant Overlord that rapper that's always talking about 'his bitches this' and 'his bitches that'? I don't want to be associated with that!"
Santana rolled her eyes. "Yes, but that was before. He's trying to clean up his act. He wants to make music now, rather than 'club bangers'. And there is a point in entering. The point is I already printed out the contest guidelines and ink ain't cheap." Santana tossed a stack of stapled papers down before her friend. "I want my investment back and we know your broke ass can't pay for ink so..."
That day, that single conversation, was the starting point for the rest of Blaine's life. With much poking and prodding from Santana and his brother, Blaine sat down and wrote lyrics that he felt would soften the rapper's verses. He used his own experiences to write what he felt was a masterpiece of epic proportions.
And baby, it's amazing I'm in this maze with you
I just can't crack your code
One day you screaming you love me loud
The next day you're so cold
One day you're here, one day you're there, one day you care
You're so unfair, sipping from your cup 'til it runneth over, Holy Grail
And his feelings were correct. Blaine won the contest by a landslide. Once the rapper's team placed Blaine's lyrics on the Arrogant Overlord website as an option, the votes poured in like water down a raging river. The Arrogant Overlord camp was pleased and Blaine was flabbergasted. Never in a million years had he expected to win.
Once Blaine was announced as the winner, his life sped up dramatically. Within weeks of his win, the young man was stood in a recording booth, turning his written words into a vocalized work of art.
The single dropped the first week of October and was a runaway hit. It quickly soared to the top of the hip hop and pop charts. Overnight, Arrogant Overlord -a name Blaine did not understand until he realized that rap names did not have to be understood- became a relevant, household name again. Along with him, Blaine Anderson became a success story. Everything happened so quickly that Blaine barely had time to catch his bearings before being thrust into yet another opportunity created by the smash hit song.
By November of the previous year, Blaine was traveling around the world, promoting the single and, with it, the release of Arrogant Overlord's upcoming album. He was asked many times while on this publicity tour if he had music of his own to put out and had to regretfully reply that he did not. Truthfully speaking, Blaine had tons of music that he was ready to put out but his music had to ride backseat to the rapper's; it was part of the contract he'd signed when he was announced the winner of the contest.
New York City. Toronto. Tokyo. Mexico City. London. Paris.
Blaine visited each and every one while promoting the single. At each stop, he smiled a bit, played the part of entourage member for Arrogant Overlord, and sang his heart out when it was required. He was so grateful for the opportunity that he did not ask for additional press moments or shots at solo publicity. "I'm just happy to be here." Blaine was quoted as saying time and time again.
Truth be told, Blaine was just happy to be there. He was happy to be part of something great until it was not great anymore. At the height of the song's popularity, Blaine learned just how quickly he could become irrelevant. The experience was eye opening.
Blaine received the call early that he would be performing alongside Arrogant Overlord at the MTV VMAs. Initially, he was ecstatic, over the moon with excitement. He spent the remainder of that evening calling everyone he knew and then swearing them to silence. He even shared the news with his husband, who seemed less than thrilled. It didn't matter, they were already on the outs and Blaine was still riding his hit single high. Eli's feelings on the matter were irrelevant.
A few weeks before the VMAs, Blaine and Arrogant Overlord were rehearsing their performance when Blaine was pulled aside. He was told that pop diva, Shayla Rae would be replacing him for the performance and that there was no use in fighting it because the wheels were already in motion. Blaine, being Blaine, did try to fight the ruling, however. That was when he learned the extent of what he'd given up when he signed the contract following the contest. While he still owned rights to the written lyrics that he provided, he did not own any part of the recorded song, thus making it impossible for him to make decisions regarding it. Blaine was simply a puppet that was expected to dance when it was requested. Likewise, he was expected to leave when it was requested. That week, just before the VMAs, his leave was requested and Blaine was forced to oblige.
The Video Music Award performance of 'Holy Grail' was a 'gawker, twerk fail' as Blaine liked to call it. Not only was the performance publicized as one of the worst in VMA history due to its raunchy, not family friendly nature and its complete irrelevance to the song, but fans of the song wanted to know where 'the cutie that sang the hook' was. As 'the cutie that sang the hook' Blaine couldn't help but smile as he perused the internet the day following the performance.
After he was let go from the VMA performance, Blaine was no longer required to associate with the song. While he loved the work he'd put into it, he hated what the song had become. It was a mainstream nightmare that made Blaine's teeth ache and his head hurt. Blaine did not like being part of the muss and fuss of that world. So, he began to work on the simpler side of things. He'd built a tiny fan base during his time with the single and he hoped to capitalize on that. The following October was when he received his chance.
Kurt tore his gaze away from the hustle and bustle of New York City long enough to stare down at his feet. One of his tan boots -Well...not mine. I stole them from my dad's closet because he kept wearing them to the shop- was rebounding off the inside of the cab door as he swayed his foot to and fro. Kurt was nervous, more so than he had been since high school. In the past year, he'd single handily decided that his band was taking an indefinite hiatus from music, moved back to Ohio, cut off all contact with his girls, reopened the lines of communications with them, and decided to move back New York City so that his band could reunite. Kurt Elizabeth and the Dirty Diamonds would live to see another day. Or so Kurt hoped.
It all started the previous October, almost a year to the date. Kurt woke up late one morning with a pounding headache and a stomach that enjoyed making the motion of the ocean. When waves of nausea were not crashing against him, the thump, thump, thumping of his head was. That morning, like most mornings that year, Kurt could not seem to win. The night before he'd gotten a little too drunk, which meant that morning he was a little too hung over. He called it 'the band life'. Whenever questioned about his questionable activities or the questionable men Kurt kept around like toys waiting to be played with, Kurt always responded with those words.
"It's 'the band life'." He'd say.
Or, "This is how my band lives."
That wasn't true, not entirely. While The Dirty Diamonds, which consisted of Kate -their drummer and Kurt's best friend since college, Emily – a sick bassist that gave the legendary Tia Von Titz a run for her money, and Chelsea – the self-proclaimed 'most sought after keyboardist in the world', liked to party and drink in excess, they never did so to the caliber that Kurt did. The girls never lived up to the partying standards of their vocalist, guitarist, fearless leader, and good friend. Whatever level the girls took their party to, Kurt multiplied that by ten and strapped an explosive to it.
Such wild antics were what landed Kurt in the position he found himself in last October. When he woke that morning, Kurt could not make heads or tails of where he was. He'd drank so much the night before that he barely remembered who he was. As he pried his eyes open, Kurt quickly began to realize that he was not at home. In fact, he was in a home that he did not recognize at all. Kurt's next realization was that he was naked...in a strange bed...next to a man that he could neither name nor place a face with. The man's messy mop of ginger curls covered his face, leaving Kurt to wonder what that face looked like. The fact that Kurt could not identify the man next to him caused the musician's stomach to drop for reasons that would have made his high school self sick.
Kurt Hummel was no angel, that much was evident, but he was also no devil. That morning in October, Kurt woke up next a man whose name he could not remember and whose face was a blank slate in the young man's mind. It was the third time that week that Kurt woke up next to someone he could not identify. It was the ninth time that month. To say that Kurt was, once again, disappointed in himself was an understatement.
Later that evening, Kurt made a decision. Rather than staying and living 'the band life' with his girls in New York, Kurt needed to make a change. He did not want to continue waking up next to men without names or faces. He did not want to continue to pass people in coffee shops and restaurants that knew him only in the sexual sense. So, he called his father and asked if he could move back home. While Kurt left out some of the finer details in his matter, he did make his father aware that he was trying to make some changes in his life for the better. Burt readily agreed, wanting nothing more than to help his son succeed.
That night Kurt packed what belongings he could into what luggage he owned and flew back to Ohio. He did so without consulting his friends and kept his distance for quite a while. It was the second hardest thing he'd ever done.
Kurt spent the months that followed working in his father's home office. Running multiple auto garages in the area was a ridiculously overwhelming job for the eldest Hummel but he refused to take an assistant or ask for help. He always insisted that running six of the most successful garages in the area was just as simple as running one. Kurt knew otherwise and, more than that, Kurt knew that his father was secretly grateful for the company and the help.
Together, Hummel and Hummel worked long and hard through the months to continue the level of success that Burt strove for over the years. They made a great team. Burt handled the hands on work while Kurt did his best to establish some sort of system for his father's receipts, memos, logs, and work orders. They were a complete mess when Kurt arrived and when he left the following year. There was simply no system available that Burt could commit to.
After taking a few months to reevaluate what he wanted from life, Kurt began trying to contact his old band mates. He owed them an explanation and an apology. Unfortunately, the calls he made months after his departure did not go as he'd hoped.
The call to Chelsea had been awful. She'd spent the first five minutes cursing at him and the next five minutes turning his apologies into subtle threats.
"...and I'm so sorry."
"Yeah, I'll make you sorry."
"I really do apologize."
"I'll make you apologize. You don't want any of this!"
Once she was finished harassing him, Chelsea disconnected the call. Kurt did not get a chance to fully explain himself.
The call to Emily was worse. Emily was one of the most kindhearted people that Kurt knew and she sounded positively devastated when he called her. Kurt hated making her feel like that, hated making her question whether or not she'd been a good enough friend when he needed one.
"Was there a reason that you didn't talk to me about how you were feeling? Did I do something that made you feel like you couldn't come to me with your problems?"
She hadn't. Emily was easy listening and thoughtful. If Kurt had thought to share his self-loathing feelings with anyone, it would have been Emily. Unfortunately, he hadn't. When it came down to fight or flight, Kurt chose flight every time.
The last call Kurt made, the one he dreaded most, was to Kate. As his oldest friend of the three women, Kate was the one he should have turned to in the face of danger. She was the one he should have called when he woke up next to yet another stranger. Kurt couldn't however. Though Kate would have eventually explained why Kurt's feelings were completely understandable and tried to get to the deeper meaning behind his shallow actions -she was a psychology graduate and she spent much of her time trying to psychoanalyze the people around her- their conversation would not have started out like that. If Kurt had called Kate, the drummer would have shaken her head and then told him how disappointed she was in him. The thought hurt almost as much as the reality of the scenario would have. So, Kurt chose the road more often taken and high tailed it back to Ohio, away from the faceless men and the disappointed stares of his friends.
Unlike Chelsea's never ending rant and Emily's inquiries of friendship and loyalty, Kate listened to Kurt. She did not speak while he spoke, she simply let him tell his story. When he was finished, Kate asked her friend a single question.
"So when the hell are you coming back?"
"Soon?" Kurt replied with the inflection in his voice that made it a question. He was completely taken aback by her complete lack of interrogation on his departure. Kate seemed not to care about why he left and only about when he would return. The idea warmed Kurt's heart. He knew the others girls likely felt the same but were too shocked by his sudden reappearance to ask show it. Hearing it from Kate made Kurt want to get back to New York as soon as possible. "Really soon. I'd like to get the band back together. I know I just disappeared and I forced a hiatus on us but...if you'll have me..."
"Uh duh!" Kate responded without hesitation. "We can't be Kurt Elizabeth and the Dirty Diamonds without Kurt. I mean, we could just be The Dirty Diamonds but then Chelsea has to sing lead and she has to be really drunk for that."
"Trust me, I know. I remember that time I had laryngitis and she had to sing lead while I played in the background. We practically had to buy the bar to get her to do it and then she kept almost falling off stage."
"Awww...those were the days." Kate mused from the other end of the line.
The two stayed on the phone into the wee hours of the morning. They discussed everything from Chelsea's on again, off again, relationship with her Capitol One card.
"Sometimes she loves it and sometimes she hates it."
They discussed Emily's sudden lust over a mulch-instrumentalist named Dani Alvarez.
"...and we're at a show and Emily just reaches out and tries to touch her. It was hilarious. It was at the Blaine Anderson show we all went to a few weeks ago."
Kurt sputtered, tripped over his words, and nearly chocked on the coffee he'd been trying to down since they hit the 4 a. m. mark. He had to meet his father at the shop by seven, so there was no use attempting to sleep. In hindsight, he almost wished he had ended the conversation sooner.
"Blaine Anderson?" He squeaked.
Kate was silent for a fraction of a second. It was as if she was trying to figure out how Kurt didn't know who Blaine Anderson was. "Umm... yeah! You know, the guy that sings the hook on 'Holy Grail'. You've heard the song right?" Of course Kurt had, everyone had. Reluctantly, Kurt replied in the affirmative. In response, Kate took off with the topic of Blaine Anderson. Apparently, she and the girls were big fans.
"...so we're thinking, if he does a tour like we think he's going to do one, then we should all go. By that time you'll be back here and we can get the band back together, maybe play a few shows while we follow him around the country. I haven't talked to them about the band thing yet -obviously- but how does it sound? I think it'd be a great idea."
"Yeah. Great." Kurt answered, sounding less than enthused. Truth be told, an entire tour of nothing but Blaine Anderson was not exactly what Kurt called a good time, not after the things they went through years before. Then again, an entire tour of reconnecting with his closest of friends sounded like exactly what the doctor ordered.
The remainder of Kurt's year passed in a far more pleasant fashion. He received a call from Chelsea just before Memorial Day. She told him that, though she was still angry, she wanted them to be on good terms. She loved him like the brother she never wanted -her exact words- and could not fathom losing him from her life.
"That's why I was so mad at you. I couldn't believe you would just leave like that."
Kurt apologized once again and was pleasantly surprised when his friend did not turn his apology into a threat.
Next was Emily. She called just as June was turning into July. This time, she allowed Kurt to explain his situation without interrupting him. She then accepted his apology.
By August, the group was on friendly terms once again. They were beginning to discuss Kurt's return to New York and the possibility of putting out new music before the year's end. The latter wasn't likely but that did not stop the topic from coming up once in a while.
They'd also begun to discuss the possibility of a refresher tour, one in which they got themselves back into the swing of things. The band's 7,000 plus twitter followers believed that a refresher tour was exactly what the hiatus-ed band needed to get back into their groove.
UrMomsPizza: And maybe you'll finally release a fucking album.
One of their followers tweeted. The idea was not half bad. Who knew where the year would take them.
In September, Blaine Anderson released his album and his tour dates. Kurt purchased the album, rather than obtaining a free copy. He felt obligated to do so. He made it through half of one song before deleting the album from his computer and sending the email with the album's download link straight to his trash folder. He just couldn't.
His girls could, however. The girls made it their mission to memorize each word of each song. Kate and Chelsea then made it their mission to set up tour dates that coincided with Blaine's tour. They were fairly successful. While the band would not be playing shows in every city, they were able to secure spots in cities for most of Blaine's tour. They made sure they were playing either the day before Blaine or the day after. Thus, the Kurt's Dirty Diamonds Second Act Tour came to be.
Kurt recognized the area as his cab zoomed in and out of traffic to reach his final destination. Had Kurt just gotten off a plane to New York for the first time, he would have been petrified. A year and a half in the city taught him, however, that the controlled chaos of New York traffic was to expected and appreciated. If someone was driving like this in Lima there would have been six or seven accidents by now.
As the taxi neared Kurt's final location, a tiny bar near Webster Hall -the one that Kate insisted on meeting him at- Kurt's heart began to race. Since he'd opted not to buy a ticket to any of Blaine's shows, he was less likely to see him during the tour. The reality of not having that weight on his shoulders was a great help. Kurt simply was not ready to face Blaine Anderson yet, not after the way things transpired between them almost seven years prior.
Kurt was, however, ready to see his friends. Though the first few days would be awkward and the last leg of the tour would likely make them or break them, Kurt was excited to see his best ladies. He was excited to see the country. Most importantly, Kurt was ready to take the first steps down the long road that would be the most exciting, fun filled, heart breaking, and therapeutic adventure of his entire life.
