All canon dialogue taken from the gleetranscripts Tumblr!
In Kurt's mind, McKinley High School had exactly one thing going for it: the wifi was unblocked, thanks to Figgins' total technological ineptitude.
(And, okay, glee club was also decent sometimes, when everyone wasn't infighting over solos and relationships. It still gave Kurt more stress headaches than he really wanted to have, though.)
This complete access to the Internet allowed Kurt to scroll through his Tumblr pretty much whenever he felt like it, so his queue could always be stocked and he could be in near constant contact with his small collection of Internet friends. Sure, his blog wasn't massively popular, but he got enough messages swooning over its aesthetics that he wanted to devote as much time to it as possible to keep it looking good.
He had only one rule: everything he posted had to be black and white, with the occasional text post thrown in for fun or as a life update. If Kurt was being honest with himself, the black and white reflected how muted and somber he felt outside of the Internet, like his world was just dreary, interchangeable shades of gray.
Kurt shook himself and focused back on his phone, where a new post had shown up in the "black and white" tag he tracked.
bowtiebirdie: hey guys, what's up? I'm new here and hoping to find some good b+w blogs to follow as inspiration - like this post if you think I should give you a look!
Kurt normally ignored posts like this one, but the poster's URL sounded intriguing - after all, Kurt himself used "blackbirdsinging" as his nom de plume, which wasn't so different from the mystery blogger's choice. He clicked through to the newbie's blog and was pleasantly surprised to see photos and tags that indicated some shared interests between them, too: music, men's fashion, even some old films. Kurt thought he was going to crack the screen of his phone, he hit the follow button so hard.
He then navigated to bowtiebirdie's ask box, noting the initial "B" and "he/his" pronouns in B's sparse 'about me' section. Kurt used those details to write his message.
Hi, B. I noticed you in the black and white tag and decided to come take a look at your blog. Have you really seen Casablanca 22 times? I'm impressed! - K.
Kurt hit send and hoped his message actually got through - he knew how shady Tumblr's messaging system could be, especially on mobile. When he got home and logged in on his laptop, he was gratified to see a response waiting in his inbox and a follower count that had increased by one.
hello, K! yes, I really have seen Casablanca 22 times - it's my go-to sick day movie. what's yours? - yours curiously, B.
"I love the Internet," Kurt said quietly, pulling up a new message and beginning to type.
He got so caught up chatting with B that he almost forgot to structure his queue for the next day.
Not every day could be as good as the day Kurt started talking to B, though. Sectionals were coming up, and the boys had "volunteered" Kurt to go spy on one of their competitors, the Dalton Academy Warblers over in Westerville, because "c'mon, an all-boys' school? Totally homo, Hummel, you'll fit right in."
"Yeah, whatever, Puckerman," Kurt said to himself as he hopped out of his car. "You'll just miss me the least if I get beat up for spying, don't act like you're doing some kind of favor for my nonexistent love life."
Kurt grumbled internally as he wandered into the building and down a staircase, scanning the crowd to find a plausible target. Ooh, hair gel boy is cute. Maybe he knows where the Warblers rehearse.
"Excuse me!" Kurt said, quickening his steps so hair gel boy would know he was talking to him. "Um, hi. Can I ask you a question? I'm new here."
Hair gel boy turned around and Kurt almost forgot how to breathe. "My name's Blaine," he said, offering his hand to shake.
"Kurt." He shook Blaine's hand, feeling a tingle of electricity shoot up his spine and make him blush. "So what exactly is going on?"
"The Warblers!" Blaine said, and no, Kurt's job couldn't possibly be this easy. "Every now and then they throw an impromptu performance in the senior commons. Tends to shut the school down for a while."
"So, wait, the glee club here is kind of cool?" Kurt asked, dumbfounded.
"The Warblers are like rock stars," Blaine said, smiling winningly at Kurt. "Come on, I know a shortcut."
Kurt let Blaine pull him down a nearby hallway, brain spinning so much in his head that he could have sworn they were going in slow motion. He'd expected snooty rich boys who sang boring arrangements of older songs, not this all-consuming excitement and warm welcome.
His brain only got fuzzier as they arrived at the commons and Blaine began to sing Katy Perry's "Teenage Dream" in a manner that Kurt had to describe as flirtatious. For the first time in months, Kurt felt giddy, happy to be alive and watching this boy sing. He even noticed how colorful the room around him felt, so warm with sunshine that the all the polished wood of the decor seemed to be glowing.
The glow dimmed a little, though, when Blaine and his friends Wes and David asked if Kurt would mind chatting with them in the refectory for a while.
"It's very civilized of you to invite me for coffee before beating me up for spying," Kurt said once they were all seated.
"We're not going to beat you up," David said.
"You were such a terrible spy - we thought it was sort of endearing," Wes chimed in.
"Which made me think that spying on us wasn't really the reason you came," Blaine said, fixing Kurt with a knowing look.
Kurt took a deep breath before deciding to just ask. "Can I ask you guys a question? Are you guys all gay?"
"Uh, no. I mean, I am, but no, these two have girlfriends," Blaine said, making Kurt's heart skip a beat.
"This is not a gay school," Wes explained. "We just have a zero tolerance harassment policy."
"Everybody gets treated the same, no matter what they are. It's pretty simple," David said.
Blaine took that moment to ask David and Wes to leave, allowing for more private conversation. Kurt couldn't say he wasn't grateful - the other two boys seemed friendly enough, but he didn't feel that instant zing of connection with them like he did with Blaine.
The feeling of connection only increased as Kurt and Blaine had a heart-to-heart about their mutual experiences. By the time they'd each finished a second cup of coffee, the boys had exchanged phone numbers with the promise to meet up again some time soon to continue discussing the newest issue of Vogue once Blaine had found the chance to finish it - Kurt had made an offhanded reference to it earlier in their conversation, causing them to take a turn from the serious to the sartorial, and they had only branched out from there.
He's so perfect, Kurt thought as he climbed the stairs up to his bedroom that night. I can't believe a guy like him exists in Ohio.
Kurt flipped open his laptop lid, realizing with a start that he hadn't replied to B all day on Tumblr. He dashed off a quick message before scrolling through his dashboard, uninterested for once in all the black and white photos he saw. They seemed so - unfitting for his current, more positive mood.
A flash of yellow caught his eye, making him stop scrolling and look closely at the picture. One of the more general photography blogs he followed had posted a snapshot of a vibrant yellow bird flying in the sunlight over a park somewhere. The bird itself was the only colorized object in the otherwise black and white photo, and it struck a chord in Kurt.
"Perfect," Kurt said to himself. "I think it's time to revamp my aesthetic a little."
The effusive message he received later from B saying how cool the photo was and how unique he found Kurt's new blogging style sealed the deal.
Kurt kept tweaking his blog's aesthetic as the weeks passed by, though he refused to admit that how he felt about Blaine was the reasoning behind his changes. As he and Blaine got closer, Kurt got more willing to add more splashes of color to his posts, going so far as to add a light pink pinstripe to his background as Valentine's Day approached and Blaine hinted at having a crush on someone.
(When that someone else turned out to be a clerk at the Gap named Jeremiah, Kurt instantly removed the stripe and deleted all the posts he'd reblogged with even a hint of pink or red in the last month. Those particular colors just made him feel like a fool.)
On the plus side, he at least had B to talk to whenever Blaine's feelings left him confused and hurt. They never talked much about their lives outside the Internet, upon mutual consensus - Tumblr was their escape, not a place to keep hashing over problems that they may never fully resolve. Kurt kind of appreciated having that outlet, too, because it was nice to know that he could come home most days and just talk about trashy reality shows with B without worrying about being too forward or obvious like he did when he and Blaine had their coffee outings. He had even gotten B to join him in posting semi-colorful photos instead of solely black and white edits, allowing them to get a good read on each other's moods before even speaking some days.
Kurt knew B would send him a worried message when he went back to only posting black and white photos one cold March morning.
K, what's wrong? Why are you so colorless all of a sudden?
My bird died, B. I hadn't had him for long, but he gave me so much hope. I'm in mourning for him for the foreseeable future.
I'm so sorry, K. Let me know if there's any way I can help.
Kurt thanked B for his kindness and continued getting dressed, trying to plot out an appropriate funeral song to sing at Warbler practice that afternoon. He knew the boys wouldn't mind a brief diversion from Regionals rehearsal for something so important, but he didn't know how to best eulogize Pavarotti.
At least, not until he remembered his URL.
Kurt grabbed his old cassette from his closet and hurried off to school, glad that one minor part of his day was working out in his favor.
"Kurt, can I talk to you for a moment?" Blaine asked later that day, peering into the room where Kurt was working on Pav's casket.
"Yeah, of course, Blaine. What's up?" Kurt said, looking up from his bedazzling in genuine curiosity as Blaine sat down next to him.
"I've, um. I've come to a couple of realizations today, Kurt," Blaine said carefully, like he was weighing every word in his mind before saying it. "One is that, well - Kurt, there is a moment when you say to yourself oh, there you are. I've been looking for you forever. Watching you do Blackbird was a moment for me about you. You move me, Kurt."
Kurt forgot how to breathe. Blaine didn't help the matter by choosing that moment to lean in and kiss him.
"That was - I'm not disappointed in that realization, Blaine," Kurt said once they broke apart, feeling like his brain might have melted out his ears. "Not in the slightest. But you said you had a couple?"
"The other one's a little harder for me to verbalize," Blaine said, pressing his lips together briefly. "Kurt, do you happen to have a Tumblr?"
"...Yes?" Kurt said, wondering why that was the harder realization for Blaine to talk about.
"Would it happen to be named after the song you just sung today?" Blaine asked.
"It wou- wait," Kurt said, freezing in place. "Are you - B?"
"Guilty as charged," Blaine said, rubbing a hand over the back of his neck sheepishly. "I only put it together when you told us about Pav's death and then sang that song. It was all too convenient."
"That explains why you and B had such similar taste in TV shows," Kurt said, putting the pieces together himself. "God, how did we not figure this out months ago?"
"We rarely ever talk about real life stuff on Tumblr," Blaine pointed out. "And it's not like our first initials are giveaways."
"And maybe neither of us is as perceptive as we'd like to give ourselves credit for," Kurt said with a laugh.
Blaine snickered along with Kurt. "That, too."
"So, wait. Then you have to know…," Kurt trailed off as another realization struck him.
"Know what?" Blaine asked, looking genuinely lost.
"Know why I started adding more color to my blog," Kurt said. When Blaine just shook his head, he continued, "Blaine, it was you."
Blaine choked a little. "It was me? But you reblogged that first picture before I'd even gotten online that night."
"No, Blaine, you you, not B. When we talked at Dalton that first day, after you sang Teenage Dream...that was the happiest I'd felt in a while. Suddenly, I didn't want to only blog in black and white any more," Kurt admitted, ducking his head and blushing. "You made me want to add more color to my life."
Before Kurt knew it, Blaine was kissing him again, harder and more passionate than before, which Kurt didn't know was possible.
"You inspired me to do the same, Kurt, and not just as K," Blaine said after they'd broken for air, though he was still holding Kurt's cheeks and leaning in close. "When K told me about how he'd decided to make a change to his blogging style after an encounter he'd had that day, I thought of you and how interesting you were, how I'd actually felt engaged in a conversation for the first time in a while, and decided to do the same. You brought the color back to my life, too."
A snippet of song floated through Kurt's mind at Blaine's phrasing, making him giggle in near-hysteria as his emotions kept churning.
"Why are you laughing?" Blaine asked, sounding hurt and pulling away slightly.
"No, Blaine, I'm not laughing at you," Kurt said, grabbing Blaine's hand where it had fallen to his side. "I just - I thought of -" he began to sing, "Before you met me, I was alright but things were kinda heavy-"
"-You brought me to life," Blaine chimed in, smiling at Kurt with so much affection in his eyes that Kurt felt lightheaded. "I get it."
"I guess you really are my teenage dream," Kurt said, laughing quietly. "God, I think I want to-"
"Want to?"
"Blog in full color now," Kurt finished.
"I'm feeling the same way," Blaine said, completely serious. "In fact, I kind of have an idea."
"Do tell," Kurt said, intrigued.
"If we went out into the gardens - and held hands?" Blaine said. "Not showing our faces, of course, if you don't want to, but our joined hands against all the spring flowers-"
"I like it," Kurt said, stopping Blaine's rambling. "Just our hands for now, yeah, but that sounds perfect, B."
"Really?"
"Really," Kurt said, squeezing Blaine's hand. "After all, we need a cute picture if we want our story to go viral." He winked.
Blaine just laughed, a bright sound that Kurt never wanted to stop hearing. Blaine's laugh was more colorful than any picture Kurt could possibly put on his blog, though the photo they ended up taking of themselves did come close.
(The photo also went viral, just as Kurt had jokingly predicted. It eventually became the motif for their future, as they did retakes with rings on their fingers for their wedding invitations and a third, smaller hand added when their adoption got processed. Of all the themes one's life could have, Kurt was glad he got that one.)