Blaine had lost Kurt.
His head was pounding, his sight was fuzzy, he was cold and alone in an unfamiliar place with no way home, he'd lost his cell phone…and there seemed to be a strange delay between the motion of his eyes and the changing of the landscape in front of him. All of that paled in comparison to that one excruciating fact, though: Blaine had lost Kurt. He couldn't find him. He'd stormed off feeling rejected, humiliated, like a total idiot…and come back to find Kurt had simply vanished. Like the dream Blaine always thought he just had to be.
In the months since that first incredible, life-changing, universe-rearranging kiss they'd shared in one of Dalton's quiet study rooms surrounded by the detritus of bedazzlements for Pavarotti's coffin, Blaine had thought constantly back to one day in particular: the day he'd first laid eyes on Kurt Hummel. It had always been an important day to him: the day he met his best friend. Kurt had struck him even then as extraordinary. Before he understood fully the importance of the day, he remembered the little flip-flop in his heart when he brushed past a boy on the stairs, just another face in a dark blazer, only to be stopped short by an outstretched hand and a soft, high voice saying "excuse me." He remembered the smile that came automatically—not from habit or rehearsal, but as a natural reaction for the first time in Blaine's recent memory—as he took in the pale, cherubic face that voice belonged to.
Of course, that face had turned out to belong to the best friend Blaine had always been begging the universe for. Blaine had never had a best friend, not at Dalton Academy and certainly not before that, at his old school. He'd been awkward, shy, too quick to apologize and not quick enough to speak up for himself…always a step behind his peers. The few friends he'd had had been older than him and treated him like a novelty, a caricature of a kid brother that they petted and passed around like a stuffed animal that each of them treasured for comfort and familiarity, but none of them actually knew him. And when they graduated and he was one of only a handful of out, gay underclassmen at his school…well, things had gotten really bad, really quickly, and Blaine hadn't had a single friend that was willing to stand by him and risk getting caught in the crossfire.
He'd escaped to Dalton, where he could reinvent himself and become Blaine Warbler. One of many Warblers, one of the elite set of singing, dancing, big-smiling, good-looking, dapper young men that all the teachers favored and all the other students cheered for and adored. He was praised for his voice, and he found that while he didn't know the first thing about making a friend, he knew instinctively how to work a crowd. For the three-and-a-half minutes that he performed a show-stopping pop number, he was golden and every person in that room was his friend. They fell in love with him, and he relished that fleeting, shallow love because it was all he ever got. None of the other Warblers knew his middle name, or had ever been to his house, or ever asked what had happened at his old school. They were nice to him, they admired him, they prized him for his talent. He could laugh, and somewhat relax, and enjoy their company. They were the closest things to friends he'd ever had. They knew he was gay and didn't care. He felt so safe with them.
He felt safe with Kurt at first, because at first he was just like everyone else: he saw Blaine's bright smile and long lashes, his impeccable manners and his tailored school uniform, and he reacted to it all accordingly: he was charmed. Then, Blaine pushed his luck by taking Kurt's hand—he was Blaine Warbler, he was untouchable, and he just had a feeling this one wouldn't mind the bit of flirting—and jogged him down the hall, positioning him front and center and leaving him with a sly smirk and a parting word—"excuse me"—before launching into the most blatantly flirtatious version of Katy Perry's "Teenage Dream" that he had ever dared to perform. He watched as the angel-faced spy—subterfuge was not one of Kurt's strong points—fell in love with him in the space of three minutes, just like everyone else.
But that was the end of the safety, because Kurt wasn't like everyone else Blaine had met. Kurt was like him. Kurt felt alone like he did, Kurt dealt every day with the kind of torment Blaine had run from. Blaine felt the stage smile slip as tears fell from Kurt's eyes, and he tried valiantly to keep his face a mask of cool sympathy as he told Kurt only a little of what he'd never mentioned to anyone at Dalton. He was surprised and terrified to realize that it still made him angry enough to want to throw his coffee cup across the room. He didn't give Kurt the sound advice he should have, probably. He felt too deep a connection with what Kurt was telling him—and was thrown too off-balance by the way Kurt opened up to him so easily—for that. Instead, he gave him honesty, just a little, but more than he'd given anyone else: he told him about being taunted, being angry, being ignored and feeling alone, knowing no one who could help would bother. He told him about running away and—something he hardly even admitted to himself, and never out loud—about how deeply he regretted it. He fed Kurt his own fantasies of a moment of strength where he confronted his oppressors, refused to be victimized by them any longer, and triumphed. He had never done it, because he had never thought it could end that way. Why did he think it would be different for Kurt?
But he watched some hope come into the other boy's defeated, lonely face, and he gave him his number without really thinking about it, and from that moment forward he was never safe with Kurt Hummel again, because he'd allied himself with Kurt's struggle and let himself share some of Kurt's pain. As the weeks went by, as one lunch to make Kurt feel a little better turned into coffee and dinner and phone calls and texts every half hour, he realized that Kurt, in the span of a few weeks, knew him better than anyone ever had. Kurt had gotten through his shyness and completely sidestepped his stage presence to get at the boy he was underneath. It never occurred to him that he'd done the same with Kurt, and so he began to look at his new best friend as something magical, heaven-sent…and ultimately fragile. He lived in a constant fluctuation of elation at the perfection of what they had together and a terrible, crippling fear that he would find some way to mess it all up.
He almost did. He remained determinedly oblivious to Kurt's feelings for him, chasing after another guy on Valentine's Day and kissing Rachel Berry—not to mention actually trying to date the girl—and then throwing himself into his performance façade when things between the two of them began to get strained and weird. When Kurt called him out on it, it was like a slap in the face. He realized he'd been trying to get Kurt to keep looking at him like he'd looked at him that first day while he was singing "Teenage Dream," the way he'd looked at him when they finished rehearsing that duet in the common room. He had no idea why he missed that gleam in Kurt's eyes and that flush to Kurt's cheeks so much until he heard him sing "Blackbird." Sure, it was morbid to fall in love with your best friend while you listened to him sing a ballad for a dead bird. That didn't stop Blaine from practically melting into the floor from the sheer weight of what he felt as he looked at Kurt. He watched tears fall down his face they way they had that first day, watched him in pain and ached to make that pain disappear in any way at all, for even an instant. Oh, he thought bemusedly as he stared at the boy he undeniably loved with every modicum of his being, there you are. I've been looking for you forever.
Before Kurt, Blaine was a cardboard cut-out, a paper doll in a pretty uniform being moved across the stage by a child's pernicious, uncaring hand. With Kurt looking at him like that, smiling at him, talking to him…Blaine was awash in a sea of three dimensions and living color. He felt like Pinocchio, a real boy at last.
Earlier tonight, though, Kurt had looked at him another way: he was angry, he was hurt and—possibly the worst part—he was scared. Blaine didn't know how to deal with that, how to fix it. He'd seen Kurt get angry with him before, but Kurt had never actually yelled at him, and Kurt had never, ever been afraid of him.
He sat down heavily on the sidewalk, then yelped and jumped up as he heard a crack and felt something hard under his butt. Reaching back, he pulled his missing phone out of his pocket and stared at the cracked screen. Well, he thought, that's just brilliant. He managed to navigate to Google in spite of the broken screen, and before long he had called a cab to come get him, and then called Kurt. There was no answer to the second call, so he sat down to wait for his cab and laboriously type a text through his damaged screen, hoping that maybe Kurt would at least answer that.
Blaine had never been one to let himself get carried away. For one thing, he had never been in a situation where it was even a possibility. With Kurt came new joys, but new challenges, too. Blaine wanted. He wanted things he'd never thought about wanting before. Sure, there had always been that yearning for something, but that was just a feeling, warmth in his stomach and an ache in his groin, a frustration to be addressed and nothing more specific than that. With Kurt, those wants began to get very specific.
It started small: he just wanted to kiss Kurt's ears. He had no idea why, but he thought kissing Kurt's ears would be great. He felt the skin of Kurt's cheek under his hand when they kissed, and wondered what it would feel like to run his hand down Kurt's sides while he kissed him instead. He tasted the insides of Kurt's mouth, and wondered what other parts of Kurt might taste like. He nearly went out of his mind once, when Kurt gave a soft, breathy moan against his lips when they were kissing, and Blaine wondered if Kurt would make more sounds like that if he were to—
—that was when Blaine typically pulled back, kissed the tip of Kurt's nose, and changed the subject. Or, if he were having these thoughts by himself that was the point when he locked his door and turned up his music so his parents wouldn't hear if he made any noise.
It didn't bother him that they weren't more sexual with one another. He knew Kurt was uncomfortable and inexperienced when it came to sex, and it wasn't like he had a ton of experience himself. They had talked about it, and they had decided to take it really slow. Slow was good, and so far slow had been more than enough because, truth be told, Blaine knew more about the mechanics and the precautions than Kurt did, but he was at least as terrified of the intimacy and exposure of the act. He had no idea how to even begin to handle that aspect of it.
Then Kurt had started the conversation again. Blaine had no idea what made him think about it, unless Kurt was secretly dealing with just as much quality self-service alone time as Blaine had been lately, but Kurt brought it up and that made Blaine think about it. Well, made him think about it more. And then it just seemed to be everywhere. That thing Kurt said in the hallway about Taylor Lautner, and that little hint Kurt dropped in the coffee shop with Sebastian about all the "firsts" they had to start crossing off their list. It terrified Blaine, but it excited him too, to think that Kurt actually wanted him like he wanted Kurt, to think that they might navigate this scary/exhilarating new experience together, and that it might be okay to be that vulnerable and that exposed…if it were with Kurt.
So Blaine had sex on the brain. Add alcohol, shake well, and what do you get? A big freaking disaster cocktail, that's what, and no pun intended.
Blaine groaned and rolled over, burying his face in his pillow in shame. He'd called Kurt at least ten times by now, but he just wasn't answering, and Blaine was starting to get worried. He looked at the clock: it was 2 a.m. He'd been home for two hours, thankfully finding an empty house as usual and racing up to his room to check facebook and see if Kurt had posted anything at all, or sent him a message. There hadn't been anything, and Blaine had tried to call him several more times before giving it a rest and falling onto his bed, exhausted and feeling slightly sick. He'd been there ever since, just worrying about Kurt. His bed was the most comfortable place to be when he was silently berating himself for doing something stupid; he knew this from vast previous experience.
"Ughhh," he groaned again, voice muffled by the pillow. He had hurt Kurt, scared him, pressured him for sex, betrayed his trust and made him feel neglected by dancing with another guy…all in one night! Way to be efficient, Blaine. How did even I manage to mess up this spectacularly? I should win an award.
No wonder Kurt wasn't answering his phone calls. He had been so carried off in this blissful, alcoholic haze where all he could think about was how much he wanted Kurt; how he was sure Kurt wanted him back. He was a lot of things, but subtle wasn't one of them, and Blaine wondered if his boyfriend had any idea how incredibly sexy he could be when he was acting possessive. Blaine had felt the beginnings of that familiar, aching want then, in the bar, and then again when they got to the car. For some stupid reason he'd thought, this is it. This is the moment.
"I want you, Kurt. I want you so bad," he confessed. There were other words pouring out of his mouth, too. He wasn't really paying attention to what they were or whether they made any sense. He just wanted Kurt to want him back, to feel the way he made him feel. When Kurt's raised voice and upset face brought him back to reality, the rush of rejection and defensiveness rolled over him before anything else even had time to get in line.
He should have begged forgiveness right then and there. He should have gotten down on his knees and implored Kurt to have mercy on this hapless, drunken asshole. But did he do that? No, of course not. He got angry. He walked away. He left Kurt in the parking lot, alone, even when Kurt called out to him. It didn't take long for his head to clear, for some of the rejection to stop throbbing quite so hard and fade to the background, and for other feelings to assert themselves. Feelings like shame, guilt, mortification, and a desperate desire to sink into the ground up to his eyebrows and never resurface. But by the time that happened, by the time he ran back to the parking lot with an apology on his lips and tears threatening to spill from his eyes, Kurt had been gone. Blaine had lost him.
Blaine woke the next morning to his phone ringing, and sat up so fast he nearly fell out of the bed. Ignoring the lurch of his stomach and the pounding behind his eyes, he scrambled to reach his phone and looked at the screen before he remembered that it was cracked. Still, he could see the unmistakable outline of a heart-shaped, ivory-skinned face around the damaged area, and his heart couldn't decide whether to leap for joy or sink in dread. It was Kurt. He answered.
"Hello?" His voice was still hoarse.
"Hey, Blaine," Kurt said, and Blaine almost melted with relief. His voice sounded guarded, but he didn't sound mad. Blaine's words nearly tripped over themselves on their way out in his rush to apologize.
"Kurt! I'm so glad you called. I'm so sorry about last night, I can't believe I was such a total asshole, please—"
"Blaine," Kurt interjected, and Blaine shut up immediately, his dread coming to the forefront. "Not now, okay? I'm still…last night was bad. I'm not ready to talk about it yet. Can we talk about it tonight, in person? I need a little time to think."
Blaine swallowed hard around the foul-tasting lump in his throat, and nodded before realizing that Kurt couldn't see him.
"Sure," he said, voice hoarse for an entirely different reason now. "I'll…see you after the show?"
"Yeah," Kurt said. "I'll see you then."
"I love you, Kurt."
"I love you too," Kurt replied without hesitation. His voice sounded sad, but Blaine's heart began to re-inflate at the sound of those words. He had messed up, badly. He knew that, and he knew he was going to have to make up for it. Kurt wasn't quite ready to hear his apology yet, either, but…he still loved him. That was all Blaine needed to know to know they were going to be okay.
Author's Note: This happened as a kind of sequel to "I'll Be Waiting," from Blaine's point of view this time. I adore him, so I can't help but crawl inside his head from time to time, and this episode is one that provided a lot of crawl space. You will never convince me that Blaine isn't secretly one of the most insecure, self-flagellating people in the world, and so that's what this is: the missing pieces between his storming off in the parking lot and that moment with Kurt on stage. Because however easily Kurt lets him off the hook, I can't believe Blaine ever lets him self off so easily. So, angst angst angst, I hope you enjoyed it, in that painful way we all love a little angst. Also, this is dedicated to Bethany Autumn, bellachica, Melissa, and eustilly, for the reviews that inspired me to write it.
- The Raisin Girl