"Well, I think that's it!" Kurt said as he tacked up the end of one last strand of twinkle lights.
The apartment was a work of art. Through the magic of thrift stores, flea markets, and even a bit of dumpster diving, Blaine and Kurt were able to decorate their home in a way that was both chic enough for Kurt and kind on their wallets.
"It looks amazing, Kurt. Your interior design skills really are first rate!" Blaine said, stepping down off the chair he had been using to help him trim the doorway. "And look..." Blaine pointed up toward the top of the doorframe. A tacky little sprig of plastic mistletoe hung merrily from the opening.
Kurt rolled his eyes playfully but stepped to the door and swept his boyfriend into a dip that had his blood rushing to his head. Kurt kissed Blaine hungrily, as if they hadn't been physically intimate for months, instead of the mere hours that it actually had been.
Blaine gasped to catch his breath as Kurt set him back on his feet and steadied him before letting him go. "All this time and you still manage to take my breath away, Kurt," Blaine said, almost reverently.
Kurt smiled lovingly at Blaine and then turned to grab his cell phone from the table so he could take a few pictures and send them to his dad. "Oh hey, what's this?" he said, pointing at a wooden house-shaped object on the living room table and looking expectantly at Blaine for an explanation.
"It's an Advent calendar. It's used to count down the days until Christmas. Behind each number is a space for a piece of candy or other tiny trinket." Blaine gently jiggled the door with the number 1 on it to demonstrate to Kurt how it worked. "I may have already stocked the calendar with something for you, baby. Go ahead - open the first door and see what's inside!"
Kurt rubbed his hands together excitedly and pulled open the first door. "It's a...Scrabble tile?" he asked in confusion. It had the letter H on the front of it. "Why a Scrabble tile?"
Blaine gave him a cryptic look. "You'll understand more as you open more doors," was all he would say.
Kurt shrugged and set the letter to the side to think about later. He couldn't help but feel a little disappointed - a letter didn't seem very exciting, and he could REALLY use a piece of chocolate right now. Why couldn't there be candy in that box somewhere?
The next day, Kurt pulled open the door with the 2 on it and found another Scrabble piece. This time, it was a letter M. The day after that, an E, and the day after that, a U. He sighed; if this goofy little idea of Blaine's was meant to make Kurt more excited for Christmas, it wasn't working.
On the twenty-fourth day, Kurt opened the last door and, to no one's surprise, removed one last tile. He gathered together the small pile of game pieces and looked to Blaine. "Now what?" he asked.
"I don't know, Kurt. Maybe someone's trying to tell you something?" Blaine suggested, and he went into the kitchen to cook the two of them some breakfast. Kurt laid out all the tiles flat on the table and turned them right side up.
AEEHIKLLLMMMMORRRTUUUWYY
Kurt played around with the letters, making random words as he saw them. Mortuary. Teamwork. Hemiola (thank you music theory class for that one). Ukelele. He sighed - this was getting nowhere fast.
As he studied the pieces, he noticed that there were enough letters to spell his name. Maybe the message Blaine was trying to convey was addressed to him specifically. Removing the letters that spelled his name left him with much fewer tiles to work with.
AEILLMMORRUWYY
Again Kurt played around with the letters and formed new words. Earworm. Memorial. Armoire. Wait... was Blaine going to get Kurt the new armoire he wanted for Christmas? He set the letters that spelled armoire off to the side and studied the rest, and then immediately tossed the offending tiles to the side with a huff when he realized that LLMUWYY spelled absolutely nothing of meaning.
"Frustrated?" Blaine came into the room wearing his Please Kiss the Chef apron that had seen far better days. Kurt had been trying to get him to get rid of it for ages, but Blaine argued that he ALWAYS got a kiss whenever he wore it, so why would he want to get rid of it? Kurt couldn't argue, since Blaine was usually so adorable that he couldn't help but kiss him, so he decided to pick his battles with that one.
"Why do you do this stuff to me, Blaine?" Kurt whined. "Do you enjoy seeing me suffer?"
Blaine chuckled. Ignoring Kurt's accusation, he said, "Why don't you use a word unscrambler app?"
"A wha - oh! Great idea!" Kurt said, excitedly pulling out his phone and tapping a few buttons.
"I will give you a hint - the Kurt Hummel part is right, so you only need to worry about the other letters." Blaine leaned over and kissed Kurt on the cheek as he went back to the kitchen to check on their meal.
Kurt, immediately lost in his own world, absently touched his cheek with one hand as he quickly did a Google search for the right app. He typed in Word Unscrambler, but every app he found wanted to take his letters and make one giant word out of it. He wasn't sure exactly what to search for - he knew what he wanted it to do, but he wasn't sure what words to use to help him find it.
"Blaine," he shouted. "What kind of app is it that I'm actually looking for? It was your suggestion so you better help me figure it out!"
Blaine came back to the door, chuckling. He wiped his hands on a dishtowel very slowly and thoroughly before speaking, ramping Kurt's impatience up to astronomical levels. "I believe what you are looking for is an anagram finder."
"ANAGRAM! That's it!" He spent a few more moments stabbing his touch screen with his finger before he finally found what he needed. "Here we go! Anagram Solver. That's what I need!"
Kurt's big grin turned to a deep frown as he viewed the search results. "This is ridiculous! 'Lawyer Oil Rummy'? 'Immoral Yule Wry'? What the hell kind of anagrams are these?" He scrolled down the list slowly - it was a long one - mumbling to himself the whole time. As he reached the bottom of the page, Kurt gasped.
He gently set his phone down and gathered the letters together one final time. He rearranged them into four words and pushed them in front of the letters bearing his name.
WILL YOU MARRY ME KURT HUMMEL
Kurt stared at the words in front of him, his mouth hanging slightly open. This couldn't be happening, could it?
"Open the last door," Blaine said softly from behind him. Kurt started; he had been so engrossed in his descrambling task that he hadn't heard Blaine approach him.
Kurt looked over the calendar but found no number 25.
"The words Merry Christmas - try it, that's one more door."
Kurt used his fingernail to gently pry open the final door on the calendar. It was a little tougher than the other doors because this particular calendar had been altered to fit one additional opening, and it was a tight fit. Finally, the door popped open, and Kurt peeked inside.
"ohmygod," Kurt whispered. He tipped out the contents, and a shiny, white-gold ring accented with a smattering of tiny sapphire chips fell into his hand.
He stared silently at it for perhaps half a beat too long. Just as Blaine was getting worried, Kurt looked up at him with teary eyes.
"Oh, Blaine..." he said, his voice wobbling, but the tiny smile on his face telling Blaine that this was indeed a good thing. Blaine let out a quiet sigh of relief before taking Kurt's other hand in his.
Blaine knelt down before Kurt on one knee. He opened his mouth to speak, but no sound came out. He shut his mouth with a pop and a horrified look spread across his face.
"I - I had this speech all planned out, and now I forgot what I was going to say." His lip quivered, betraying his efforts to keep from crying.
"Blaine, sweetie, just ask me," Kurt pled softly.
He took a deep breath, wiped his eyes, and, after a moment to gather his thoughts, he tried again.
"That first day we met, when I grabbed your hand and we ran down that hallway, I felt something. It was a tingle in my hand that went up my arm. At the time, I wrote it off to static electricity, but it never happened in the company of anyone else. Only you. And as our relationship grew, I realized that it was the universe trying to tell me something.
"I felt something similar during my awful transgression, but it wasn't a pleasant feeling; it was angry. It was like it was saying, what the hell are you doing? This isn't right. And when you finally agreed to be mine again, it was obvious what its message was. It was telling me, 'this boy is the one. Don't ever let go.' And I don't ever plan on it.
"So Kurt Hummel, my best friend, my one true love, will you marry me?"
Kurt was silent for a few moments. "Damn, Blaine. For forgetting your whole speech and having to make something up on the fly, that was pretty incredible."
Blaine waited for him to continue with his answer, but it seemed as though Kurt was waiting for something.
"Well?"
"Well what? You're the one who hasn't put the ring on my finger yet."
"You're the one who hasn't said yes yet!" Blaine said exasperatedly.
"Oh yeah," Kurt chuckled. "Of course I'll marry you."
Blaine sighed with absolute relief. "Oh thank God." He took the ring and slipped it on Kurt's ring finger where it looked as though it had always been there. It just looked right.
Blaine wrapped his arms around Kurt's neck,. and Kurt responded by pulling Blaine closer to him by his hips.
"I love you," Kurt said.
"I love you too, Kurt," Blaine replied.
Kurt leaned in and kissed Blaine firmly on the lips. Just as Blaine was beginning to respond and attempt to deepen the kiss, Kurt pulled back and slapped him upside the head.
Blaine jumped backwards. "Hey! What was that for?" he complained.
Kurt smirked. "THAT was for making me wait all month for you to get to the damn point!"
A/N: Just a short little story for Christmas - you probably won't see me again before the New Year (too much choir and work makes misskaterinab a dull girl) so happy whatever-it-is-you-celebrate, and a joyous New Year of happy Klaine (god, I hope, anyway - I'm sick of them being engaged off-screen. Let's have them be engaged on-screen, shall we?)