Title: Just Charming
Author: mybriefeternity (aka aspiringtoeloquence)
Word Count: ~ 17,300 total
Rating: PG-13 for language and sexual references
Beta: glassparade, with additional (and vital) input by idoltina and ohblainers. (Special thanks to Tina for the additional formatting help!)
Spoilers: Nothing for Season 4. This is AU from early S2, but there may be references to canon through S3.
Summary: Blaine Anderson has what could be his big break, starring as Prince Charming across from fellow newcomer Rachel Berry in a brand new musical. The experience, including meeting the enchanting new costume designer, promises to be life-changing. After all, you don't discover your-stage-self and self-confidence eight times a week in front of hundreds of people without it leaving some sort of mark.
Author's Note: This fic was prompted by inkystars, who won it in the Klaine Charity Fandom Giveaway. She asked for Broadway bound Blaine and Rachel with costume designer Kurt. I hope this fits the bill (and was worth the wait - I can only apologize, this got away from me a little)!
Also: I found out very close to the time of posting that there is a musical coming to Broadway based on the same story as the one featured here. I know nothing about it beyond the fact that it exists, as this story was written prior to my awareness, so any possible similarities are purely coincidental. Also, I don't claim to own any of these characters, so don't sue me please.


"-not sure that it really showcases my voice to full effect, and I believe that a rewrite - and perhaps putting my ballad back into Act I - would serve to underscore the emotional resonance of her journey. I know that the audience will deeply appreciate further insight into Ella's state of ennui-"

The director sighs deeply- not for the first time that day- possibly wondering if it's too late in life for a career change.

"Rachel... as I've already told you, we are not going to-"

"But if we just -"

"And, while the lyricist did appreciate your notes, he asked that you send all future communications through me. So, then, shall we go on? Quinn? Are we good for time?"

She gives a thumbs up, indicating another half hour before the next union-mandated break. He glances over to his leading man, who is leaning against a chair, flipping through his script with an air of resigned relaxation. "Blaine? Are you ready to go?"

Blaine stands immediately, grins. "Yeah, sorry. We taking it from the top of the scene again?"

"No, top of the page. After your monologue." He catches a figure in his peripheral vision, entering the house through the side-doors, settling into the dimness of the back row. He remembers to make a note on his legal pad for later.


"...and call for tomorrow's dance rehearsal will be at the same time," Quinn announces to the assembled cast, her fingers tapping on her thick stage manager binder as she checks things off. "Tappers will need their rehearsal shoes again. We're back in the rehearsal space tomorrow - I know it was nice to have the stage today, but we're not back in here for another few weeks. Okay, that's all I've got. I'll see you all tomorrow at 10am." She turns to the director. "Anything else, boss?"

"No, I - oh, yeah." He taps his finger on the yellow paper. "Ladies and gentlemen, we have our new costume designer." He silences the growing murmur of voices. "Yeah, I know, I know. Now, as I'm sure you understand, with previews, money-willing, in just over a month, and starting again from scratch, he has his work cut out for him. Quinn will be scheduling fittings around rehearsals, so check your emails, and for god's sake try not to make his job more difficult than it is, okay?"

"I'm so glad we found someone qualified," Rachel offers from the third row, voice raised to fill the house. "After that awful incident with Symona -"

Blaine turns in his seat. "On the bright side, Rach, maybe this one'll let you wear shoes."

Rachel's lips purse and she sniffs. "Concept production indeed..."

"I don't know, I kind of liked the whole grey theme," he replies with a grin, and Rachel straightens her spine, poised to attack.

It's usually best to cut her off before she gets a head of steam, and the way Quinn is rolling her eyes means the the patience in the room is probably dwindling. "Okay, thank you. Blaine and Rachel, if you could both go in for a fitting before rehearsal -"

"I have an extra voice lesson," Rachel says seriously, as though it's a state occasion. "But I can stay after, if that will work."

Quinn waves a hand to indicate that she'll check, and Blaine crosses his legs. "Before's fine," he agrees easily, and laughs when one of the ensemble members makes a face.

"Great - Kurt said he'd be here at 8:30," Quinn checks. "Preliminary fitting at 8:45? We probably won't use you until 10:30."

"Works for me."

"Excellent. Everyone else, fitting times will be emailed to you. Get some rest." Quinn snaps her binder closed definitively and tucks a strand of hair behind her ear.

As the group disperses, Blaine approaches the table, "Just so I don't embarrass myself, what's the costume designer's name? I mean, I'm assuming they'll be the one with the clothes and the harried expression, but..."

The director consults his notes, just to check. "His name's Kurt. Kurt Hummel." He shrugs. "I've never heard of him, but apparently he's the next big thing. Stephen and Marsha swear by him, anyway."

Blaine nods, pulls his bag over his shoulder, bumps shoulders with Quinn, who smiles. "Here's hoping for no leather pants this time, hey, Quinny?"

"Say what you like," she offers as she packs up her things, "I still say you made the hottest Fiyero the nation had ever seen."

"You didn't have to spend the entire tour squeezing me into those pants - twiceon matinee days."

Quinn veers off with her keys near the doors to shut the building down.

"You'll like Kurt," she says with certainty, apropos of nothing.

He leans into the wall. "Why?"

"I just... I met him yesterday, and I think you'll get along well." Her expression is soft as she backs away.

"What does that mean? Quinn... Hey, Q, you guys are playing that gig on Saturday, right?"

"If I can get everyone together to practice before then," she calls across the house. "See you tomorrow. And... wear something nice!"

Blaine considers asking why, but she has already disappeared through a side door. He shrugs, slides his sunglasses onto his head, and wonders if his favorite jeans are clean.


The costume shop is cluttered, to say the least. There are racks of clothes everywhere, fabric swatches spread across the large worktable in the center, mannequins in various states of undress. When Blaine peeks his head it at 8:40 the next morning the only indication that there's anyone alive in there is gentle humming drifting from the back of the room, sweet and clear, punctuated by the occasional curse.

"Um... hello?"

There's a muffled shout, then a hand waves from behind a rack. "Hi! I'll be out in a second. Sorry, I just -"

"It's fine. Can I help?"

A head pops out, and Blaine blinks. It's a very nice head, with an amused expression, and really nice eyes. And it's followed by a body. Which is also nice. Very, very nice.

"You," the very nice head-body-person says, running a hand over his hair, "must be my Prince Charming."

And damn if Blaine doesn't have to bite his tongue to avoid saying he'd certainly like to apply for the position.

"Blaine," he offers with a wave, too far away to shake hands without capsizing a rack or two.

"You must be Kurt Hummel."

Kurt flashes a smile, picks up a folder off the desk. "So sorry for the..." he trails off and waves a hand towards the general chaos. "I'm a little shorthanded right now, and as you can see everything seems to have been shoved in here kind of haphazardly. But I've been putting a few things together, based on what was already here -" he smirks at the flash of panic in Blaine eyes. "Ah, yes, my predecessor had quite the eye. I'm hoping you won't mind if I take it all in a slightly different direction." Blaine snorts, relieved, and Kurt continues. "I'm just not sure you could pull off that level of sequins, you know?"

He's still smiling, a little unsure, so Blaine offers a huff of false annoyance. "I'll have you know that my second summer in rep I did Cabaret - and I rockedthe sequins."

Blaine can see a flash of teeth now, and as he shuffles through a rack Kurt appears to be stifling a giggle. "Typical. Ask an actor a question and he gives you his resume."

"Goodbye Girl," Blaine says automatically. "Good movie." Kurt look surprised as he curls his fingers around a hanger.

"We have less time than I'd like, so I'm improvising around this for previews, and we'll rework anything we need to." He hands Blaine a shirt, pulls a sketch out of the pile. "I'm thinking something like thisfor the ballroom - I have boots for you to try, and a jacket - can you try that on first? There's pants hanging in the dressing room. Let me know when you're done and I'll come check the length."

He takes a moment as he's leaving to let his eyes drift over Kurt, who is examining a pile of scarves draped over a chair. He's gorgeous, yes, but more than that, his outfit is interesting- which, okay, isn't all that surprising, given his profession, but the asymmetric handprints on his navy blue turtleneck, peacock brooch pinned to lapel of the striped blazer that's hanging next to a satchel on the desk... they're all different, a little more intricate than he's used to seeing, even in New York theater. And even without his second cup of coffee this morning he's feeling awake, excited, and he knows that a large part of that has nothing to do with rehearsals, or the bar he's supposed to be meeting friends at afterwards.

"...Blaine? Did you need something?"

He comes back to himself, realizes that Kurt is watching him stand frozen in the doorway.

"No, I - I'll just be a second."

He knows he's blushing as he moves to the door, and it's only catching a glimpse of Kurt reflected in the hall mirror, smiling after him with a flush of pink in his own cheeks, that he feels a little better.


"So," he asks as Kurt pins a hem into his pants - of course they're too long, his pants are always too long - "how did you end up here, anyway?" When Kurt looks up, raises an eyebrow, he stammers. "I mean... not that I'm not glad - you're - I just - you know..."

Kurt lets out a chuckles as he removes the last pin from between his lips. "I know what you meant. It's unusual circumstances, and I'm young for this job. The short answer is... luck."

"Luck?'

"One of my teachers from school, she directs and... knows a lot of people. She hired me to costume a couple of shows after graduation, which led to several small theaters, which led to assistant designing for off-broadway, which got me seen by someone who liked what they saw, which got me a few jobs... which led me here."

"Oh." He takes a breath. "Sounds like more than luck to me."

Kurt half shrugs. "How about you?" He taps a knee, and Blaine stands up straight as he begins to adjust. "How does one become Prince Charming?"

"Hours of practice in the bathroom mirror," Blaine says seriously.

"I can imagine."

"If only I were kidding. But... I don't know, I guess was in the right place at the right time," he shrugs. "Out of college I wasn't really getting anything -"

"I know that feeling."

He files that away for later. "...I got a few rep seasons, a swing understudy, then swing on two tours, I worked my way up to featured ensemble - then I got called in for Wicked's at the last minute. I thought it was for ensemble, Boq, maybe, if they were desperate but... well, after that I got offered the workshop for this. Or something like it."

Kurt smiles. "A dream job."

"Of course. You should have seen the look on my friend's faces when Wickedwent through Columbus."

Kurt yelps and brings his finger to his mouth to suck on it. Blaine keeps his eyes deliberately on the wall in front of him. "Sorry, you're... you grew up in Ohio?"

"Westerville, yeah."

"Lima."

"No way." There's another connection, another thread he hadn't expected. "Do you go back often?"

Another small smile. "Holidays. My family's there. You?"

"My family's there too." He stops short of mentioning the last time he visited.

He doesn't know if Kurt senses the shift in mood, but he brushes his hands together. "There... done, for now. I'll let you get to rehearsal. I think I have three ensemble members next, then your leading lady this afternoon."

He smirks despite himself. "Ah, Rachel... "

Kurt eyes him warily. "What does that mean?"

"She's... Rachel. A star, a dear friend, and a force of nature." When Kurt doesn't look any less concerned he smiles, offers a hand to help him up. "You'll see."

Kurt tilts his head, takes his hand, and Blaine would be lying if he said he wanted to let go.

"Thank you," he says sincerely, heading for the door. "I'm so glad to be working with you."

Kurt's quiet "it's mutual" as he swings his bag over his shoulders floats around in his head for the rest of the day.


"...perhaps a little direct and unorthodox in his approach, but what he said about pastel tones and my skin really resonated - oh, Blaine! Here!" He shifts his script into his other hand so he can take the coffee Rachel is holding out, leans to listen to the conversation she's having with several cast members outside the rehearsal hall. "As I was saying, he has such innovative ideas, you know, about the manifestation of Ella's connection to her clothes. And while I disagree on some points-"

"He talked her out of the pink ball-gown," Tina mutters to him as she uses him for balance and stretches her hamstrings. "This guy's a miracle worker."

"Mmmm," Blaine hums into his cup. "Speaking of miracle workers, where's your groom-to-be? I need him to go over the new ending of "More Than I"."

"They're having a choreography meeting, at which the Dance Captain's presence was requested," Tina explains with an eyeroll. "Which is apparently why I was dragged uptown at the crack of eight o'clock."

"You poor baby," Blaine sympathizes, steadily ignoring the tugging on his arm. "You know, I think - Rachel what is it, and why can't it wait until I've finished my drink?"

"I was just saying that Kurt seems very good, doesn't he?" Her eyes sparkle with something Blaine recognizes as potentially dangerous. "Very competent."

With Rachel avoidance is always the most likely escape route. "Mmm, yes. Speaking of which, did I tell you how much I enjoyed your run-through of "Pumpkin Promenade"? That last note-"

"Yes, thank you, but as I was saying, I really think that Kurt will be an asset to our group -"

"He seems like he knows what he's doing, yeah -"

"I'll bet he does," grins one of the male ensemble members, who Blaine is beginning to realize that he never liked anyway. "He's seriously hot."

He realizes that he's not the only one glaring when Rachel clicks her tongue impatiently. "My point is, Blaine, that Kurt is a very intelligent, funny, talented individual, whose insight-"

"What are you trying to get at here? Because the last time you talked about someone this much it was because you'd started doodling hearts all over your script. God, please tell me we're not doing this again." It isn't beyond the realm of possibility for Rachel - she can be woefully intense about these things.

Rachel scoffs. "Of course not. As beautiful as our children would doubtless be, I think I'm really not his type."

It's on the tip of Blaine's tongue to say that that didn't stop her with the chorus member from the extremely short-lived revival of Love Never Dies, but he doesn't quite have it in him. Besides, he's sort of distracted by the thought of Kurt, because yeah, he'd certainly suspected that their inclinations might be compatible, especially when Kurt mighthave actually been checking him out, but it was still nice to have some outside confirmation. "Well, you never know."

Rachel waves a dismissive hand. "I know these things, Blaine. As the product of a loving same-sex relationship I can recognize the -" at Blaine's raised eyebrow she deflates a little. "Fine. I added him on Facebook. But now I can provide you inside informa-"

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Blaine Anderson, don't you go pretending like you weren't all moony-eyed yesterday, although having finally met Kurt I can certainly see why. He's very-"

The rest of the cast is arriving, and someone opens the doors to the studio. Blaine shoots a pleading look to Tina, but Mike has returned and they're busy being adorable and in-love. As happy as he is for them, right now it's really inconvenient.

Typical. "Rachel, this is not a thing you need to get involved in. You're imagining things."

"Oh, really? I'm imagining the way he asked me about you?"

They're moving in to drop their bags near the wall, and Blaine really can't stop himself from replying, "He asked about me?"

"Well, as I was telling him about my dream of starring in a revival of Funny Girl-"

"And how soon was this after you met him?"

"- and he said he could see that I make a very strong leading lady. And I told him I'd always known I was meant for this-"

"Rach-"

"-and then he asked me if I'd known you before the show, and so I told him about Joseph, when we met-"

"You didn't?!"

"-and he thought it was adorable."

His brain is squeaking really!?, but he manages to frown. "Rachel, you need to-"

Quinn opens the door again, and the cast starts moving. Rachel continues to babble about her duty as his friend, and helping him help himself. It's around " - some of the best relationships are based on a mutual friend's selfless intervention- " when he sees Quinn smirking, and narrows his eyes.

At the end of rehearsal Quinn is making announcements, and she asks if he can drop by for another fitting the following evening. He gives her a look, and her answering doe-eyed stare does nothing to calm his nerves.


The next day is fairly catastrophic. An ensemble member sprains her wrist during the dance call for "The Godmother's Lament", several people seem to have entirely forgotten their blocking since the last time they ran the end of Act I, and Blaine's pretty sure that the guy playing his footman didn't manage to enter on cue once. His own voice cracks on the high note in "Just Charming", which has never happened before, and even Rachel's sort of pep talk at break (all true greats have off-days) doesn't do anything to lift his mood. He's ready to go home, curl up with his cat and eat a bowl of pasta, watch something truly terrible on TV, maybe, and Quinn's reminder that he has to meet Kurt in half an hour really just deepens his despair. He doesn't have the energy to be engaging or interesting right now, and Kurt is going to see that, see that he isn't always Blaine Charming, and then Kurt's going to marry some hot blonde guy with an accent and chiseled everything, who doesn't have to go over the choreography to the finale four times in the same day to get it right.

And Blaine will be left with his pasta.

Logically he knows that the show isn't doomed. They'll work through it, tomorrow will be better. Hopefully Leila's arm will be fine, they'll work Act I, Mike will put them all through their paces. He knows that, and he's been in shows that were in far worse shape.

He just wants to get to tomorrow as soon as possible, and he's pretty sure it shows.

Which is why he isn't surprised when Kurt looks up from a sketch, at a desk in the newly organized shop, to find him in the doorway, smiles, and then his face drops. "You okay?"

"Fine. Bad day, that's all. You have something for me?"

Kurt doesn't look too sure, but he takes the cue. "...yes. I found a great uniform for you, for early in Act I. It'll need some alterations-"

"Let me guess, hemming?"

"-but I think it'll work really well. One of the team dressed it up, and she has a good eye. Oh, and I have a few ideas that I want to run by you."

He smiles weakly and drops his bag on the table. "Sounds good." Everyone else is gone already - it's well after seven, and there's enough time until the show goes up that no one seems to be panicking yet. He leans against the doorjamb.

Kurt eyes him, hesitates. "You know, if you don't want to do this now we could probably reschedule-"

"No, no, I'm sorry." He shrugs. "I'm just tired. I don't mean to be difficult."

Kurt laughs. "This is your version of difficult? Dress an opera, Blaine. Then talk to me about difficult."

He waves his hand in the direction of the men's dressing room. "The clothes are hanging in there. Call me when you're ready." He turns away, adds over his shoulder "And, by the way, I've been told I'm a good listener."

Blaine can't help but hold his head a little higher, even manages to muster a little smile as he goes to find the promised finery.


"-it's just a little frustrating, you know? To work at something for this long, and it's still..."

Kurt chuckles as he considers the seam of a jacket. "Oh, believe me, I know."

"And I know it will be better, I do, but Rachel wanted me to go over to her place with a couple of people and run through the songs, and I just - I just want to take tonight to wallow a little, you know?"

"There's nothing wrong with that. You want some space, that's not a crime."

"I know, and she wasn't even mad, I just -" He bites his lip, because this is something he
shouldn't say. It's the kind of thing that gets taken out of context, and he's known Kurt for days, and it's incredibly stupid. "I just wondered today why they cast me, why I took the role - okay, no, I know why I took it -"

"Why?" asks Kurt calmly from the floor, folding fabric around Blaine's ankles.

"That's what I'm saying-"

"No, I mean, why did you take the role?"

Blaine blinks at him. "I'm an actor with precious few credits to my name, in one of the most competitive cities on Earth, who was offered a role in an original musical with a fairly high likelihood of being on Broadway. I'd have been insane to say 'no, thanks, I'd rather sit at home and watch season four hundred of America's Next Top Model'."

Kurt tilts his head. "Yeah, but... I've seen you in rehearsal. You're not just... in it for that, are you?"

"Well, no, of course not, but -"

"So what did you see in him?" When Blaine's eyebrows furrow he clarifies. "What did you see in Charming?"

And Blaine gets what he's saying - even though the role turned out to be different from what he thought, it was one of those auditions where he'd walked out saying 'god, I gethim. Please let me get it.'

"I - I guess I liked that they were trying to make a different story. Well, no, not a different story, but -" he shifts his weight, winces when he moves straight into a pin. "Aaah, sorry. My bad. No, I just... Prince Charming was always perfect in the stories, right? Rich, kind, happy, with the castle and the family... but when I was all grown up, and got over my crush on him, I wondered about him a lot. About how things were for him. And the song they gave us to audition was "All I Am" - it's "Just Charming" now, I don't know if you've ever-"

"I have the demo on my ipod," Kurt confesses, and Blaine's stomach flips.

"- wow, well, suddenly he's not this perfect Prince, he's this guy who's looking for something, isn't sure what it is, but he's not as put together as everyone thinks." He shrugs. "I really love that about him."

"He's real," Kurt says quietly.

"Yeah." Blaine's pretty sure they're having a moment, but he is historically bad at determining these things. "Can I tell you something?" Kurt nods. "It felt kind of like fate when I got this." He bites his lip. "In college I had to write a proposal for a Playwriting class - we all had to take one, and most of my friends did the minimum word count, talked about how they'd put music to a stage version of Die Hard, or the latest rom-com."

"What did you do?"

He makes a face. "I wrote twenty five pages about how I'd like to adapt Cinderella switching the genders, or even just playing with the dynamics. I talked about how maybe there's another story. I didn't think she needed to alwaysbe saved. Sometimes everyone does." He finally looks; Kurt's eyes are still fixed on him. "I got an A minus. My font was too small."

"You should write it."

He lets out a bark of laughter. "What?"

"You should write it out," Kurt says, still looking calmly up at him from the floor, legs folded to the side, conviction in his voice. "Your Cinderella. If you want to see it. Even if you never show it to anyone, it's a story that deserves telling."

He laughs, because he doesn't know what else to do. "Yeah, maybe someday."

"I hope you do." Kurt pauses, holds eye contact for a moment and patting his foot. "Okay, I'm done prodding now. Feel free to go about your evening."

He's taken aback all over again by the realization that he's just spilled at least some of his guts to a stranger. It's odd, not to mention probably utterly unprofessional. "Thank you - I - I'm sorry to have unloaded that on you. I usually-"

"Please, no, it's - I'm glad to have helped you let it out. Even a little."

"It did, a lot." He moves behind the curtain to get his own clothes. "Thank you."

When he's ready to leave, picking up his bag and lingering in the doorway, he notices the cheap coffee-maker whirring in the back corner of the shop (far from any stainable fabrics). "You're not planning to work all night, are you? Now I feel like a slacker."

"Just want to make sure the team has everything they need for tomorrow, so we can get things done." Kurt absentmindedly twirls his pencil, and Blaine finds himself wondering if it's a stress habit, how long he's been doing it, why it started. "It's no nonfat mocha, but it does the job. I won't be more than an hour or two. Go, you've had a long day too."

"Rachel likes you," he blurts out, because his brain seems to have been separated from his mouth. "I mean, not like... fourth grade. She just said she thinks you're good. At your job."

A look crosses over Kurt's face. "I'm... glad? I think. She's intense, but... I guess I like her too."

"You managed to talk her out of the pink gown and live to tell the tale. I think you're destined to be friends for life."

"I'm not sure yet how I feel about that."

"I don't blame you." There's a long pause. "Well, I'd better-"

"Yeah, me too. See you soon." Kurt grins. "I hope I get to read your play one day."

Blaine lets out his breath in a half snort. "My dreams of being a playwright were pretty short-lived."

He thinks he detects a hint of bitterness in Kurt's almost inaudible reply. "That doesn't make them any less worthwhile."

On the way back to his apartment he decides to indulge, and picks up a pint of fudge ice cream and a bottle of rum. He spikes his hot chocolate, tells Tabitha the tabby about his day, and, when it's getting towards time to go to bed asks her whether she thinks Kurt's right. And then whether she thinks Kurt would ever go out with him.

She swishes her tail, wanders out to the kitchen, and he decides she's probably right on both counts.


The next day is better, of course, and even Quinn's gentle prying over lunch (and Rachel's less gentle prying for the rest of the day) does little to rattle his nerves. He spends that night singing his way through the soundtrack to Gypsywhile he cleans his kitchen, Tabitha watching him suspiciously from her perch on the counter. He's meeting a friend for brunch in the morning, so he should go to bed at a reasonable hour, but he finds himself sitting in front of his computer with a blank document open.

He doesn't do much, but after twenty minutes he saves a half page of notes as 'Blaine Attempts Words - Cinders,' and goes to bed with a smile on his face.


It's another couple of weeks of gentle prodding by his friends before he sees Kurt again. Well, no, that's not true, exactly. Kurt's been around a few times - in and out of the theater, watching a run-through, coming in to talk to someone on the production staff while a scene is going on. But Blaine doesn't have the chance to do more than wave most of those times, and if he likes to think that those blue eyes linger on him longer than on anyone else (for exampleChandler, who, okay, is a nice guy, but can't seem to contain his energy for more than five seconds, and is it really necessary for him to bounce around like that while Kurt's here? It's very distracting to those members of the cast trying to work), well, that's something he's allowed to keep to himself.


It's Quinn that does it. Well, Quinn and Wes, because Quinn is a fink, and Wes doesn't know how to mind his own business.

It was pretty much over when he went to the gig Quinn's band was playing at a local bar, and after their set she settled at a table with them and nodded to Wes. "So, has he told you why he's all lovelorn, yet?"

And it's not like his friends haven't noticed him being a bit distracted, but for most of them he'd been able to attribute it to purely show related nerves, and with the others he'd been vague enough with that they hadn't pried.

So much for that.

Quinn tells Wes that Blaine has a crush on the costume designer (which is so not what is happening, because he is nottwelve, a declaration that earns him two identically angled eyebrows), and that he's too much of a scaredy cat to ask him out. Blaine counters this by citing unprofessionalism in the workplace, even if he was interested in Kurt (he is sointerested in Kurt). It's flimsy even to his own ears.

What follows is equal parts pep-talk and berating, until he finally manages to distract Wes by asking about the law firm he's interviewing for, and a guy from the bar comes over to talk to Quinn.

He's pretty sure that conversation is what prompted Wes to start texting him inspirational quotes by various world leaders, and Quinn to pointedly mention to him at the end of rehearsal a few days later that some members of the crew will be working late for the foreseeable future.

She's halfway down the stairs to the street when he puts two and two together and finally calls after her.


A few steps from the door he stops, cups carefully balanced in the holder, because the sound from the shop that he'd thought at first must be the radio is, now that he can hear it properly, not actually the radio at all.

It's so much better.

"- with so much to discover, those paths yet unknown..." A clear voice is hitting every note. "Every day I'm searching for the person I could be..."

Blaine can't help it, he picks up his line of the duet. It's one of the most awkward lyrics in the song, one he's been fighting since he got the first version, but at the moment it seems beautiful. "I don't know where or who he is but I hope I find him to be free."

Kurt squawks, swears, and pushes his chair a half foot back from the desk. "Blaine," he breathes, eyes wide, "I was just -"

"You have an amazing voice, Kurt." He settles onto the nearest table, avoiding the sewing machine. "It's so rich, I can't believe - do you perform, please tell me you perform. I'm sorry I scared you, I just..." he trails off.

When Kurt replies, it isn't what he expected. "Is that coffee?"

He starts. "Oh, yeah. I just brought you a nonfat mocha -"

"You know my coffee order?"

Of course I do,he wants to say, but he's trying to gauge how Kurt feels about that. "You mentioned it. Last time. Well, you mentioned it in passing, and I sort of guessed. And then I checked with Quinn, to see if she'd heard you give your order to someone at a meeting, or anything. I hope I'm not disturbing you, I can go -"

"You know my coffee order." It isn't a question this time, and so Blaine places the cup on the desk and returns to his perch.

"Well, yeah."

Kurt curls his hands around the cup. "Thank you," he says, quiet until a smile breaks. "I'm going to need this tonight if I'm going to work out Rachel's changes in Act II."

"I know at least one of the dressers they're hiring. She's amazing."

Kurt lifts his cup and toasts him briefly. "I know they're good... I just want it to be perfect." He takes a long sip, makes a pleased noise, a half-hum half-moan that feels like it soaks into Blaine's skin. When he opens his eyes they're grateful and tired. "Thank you, seriously. I owe you."

"No, you don't." There's another long pause. "Now, seriously, your voice..."

He laughs dismissively, leans back in his chair a little. "I had no idea you were there..."

"It's amazing, Kurt. You're amazing. You do perform, right? You must have had training."

"I... went to NYADA for musical theater," Kurt confesses, blushing like it's a dirty secret instead of one of the best performing arts schools in the country. He shrugs. "I still do vocal exercises, but... I'm out of practice. I haven't had time for a lesson in a while."

"You sound great," Blaine says redundantly, because his brain is still sort of broken at the thought that he might be able to get Kurt to sing some more, because that was Kurt's voice. "It's insane you're not performing, Kurt, really."

Kurt breaks eye contact and lets out a huff of breath somewhere between a laugh and indignation. "There were a lot of casting directors who didn't believe that."

"So... you aren't auditioning?" He doesn't mean it to sound as accusatory as it does. "You stopped?" He blinks. "I mean, there's nothing wrong with that -" (except there so, so is), "I just -"

"I don't really want to talk about it," Kurt says, hand fidgeting around his cup. "I - can we talk about something else?"

Blaine swallows. It's the first time there's ever been a moment of real discomfort beyond the awkwardness of new acquaintance, and it doesn't sit well with him. "Sure. I didn't mean to interrupt - well, I did, but just to give you coffee, I don't want to -"

"No," Kurt says quickly. "No, it's fine, thank you, seriously, it's time I took a break. I appreciate it."

He hesitates. "Before I change the subject, I just want to say one thing, and then I'll leave it alone." He sees Kurt tense. "No, I just - I really hope I get to hear you sing again sometime."

Kurt meets his eye, and if his smile is a tiny bit forced Blaine is just glad it's there. "Thank you."

Then they start talking about the latest season of The Bachelor: Paris. Kurt's expressions, the sound of his laugh at Blaine's imitation of Troy, the blonde surf instructor who had gotten drunk at the pool party on this week's episode and fallen in the pool, are almost enough to distract him from his newly discovered love of Kurt's voice.

Almost.


"Why can't they see
That I just want to be
More than I - I mean me - I mean I...
I don't know anymore
"

The cast members who haven't already left for lunch are laughing, and it's a gratifying feeling. He tends to forget that Charming is funny, that his search for himself (and, in this song, correct grammar) comes across with a kind of harried, befuddled sweetness. It's what he aims for, every time, but getting a laugh as he paces the studio, letting out a frustrated noise as Charming loses his train for thought ("More than I -me -we, oh god, what's it all for?"), gets distracted ("And every time I think I'm there/ I find that - oh my god, my hair!), departs even further from the perfect mold that every Prince Charming he's seen has fit into. The lyrics can easily not work - they're muddled if the timing isn't right, and there's a fast section towards the end that he still has to practice under his breath on the subway every day, just to make sure he's still got it down. It's in the middle of that section during this particular rehearsal that part of him detaches from the lyrics and hears a clear, singular laugh from the corner of the room.

He turns, and Kurt is there, leaning against the inside of the door. Rachel's on one side of him, beaming, and he can see a couple of the ensemble members eyeing them speculatively from their positions by the mirrors. He focuses on Kurt's smile, right in his eyeline as Prince Charming sings to himself about wanting to find someone who appreciates him for who he really is.

There's applause after the final note, Quinn calls a lunch break for everyone remaining, and Blaine takes a swig from his water bottle, eyes locking with Kurt, leaning on the piano across the room.


After Kurt has had his discussion with the production staff Rachel links her arm through his and announces that he is joining them for lunch. Although lunch plans with Rachel are news to him, Blaine immediately assures Kurt that he's completely welcome to join them for Thai (Rachel makes a face but she got him into this mess, so she can deal). Quinn waves off her invitation, and makes broad hints to Rachel that she should too, but in the end the three of them plus a few assorted cast members make their way down the block to the ridiculously cheap hole-in-the-wall that Blaine discovered during his first month in the city.

Lunch is loud and filled with laughter; the restaurant is used to them by now, and they push together tables, squeezing in to make sure everyone gets room (that's what Rachel says, at least. Blaine privately suspects that the way he and Kurt are shoved into the corner is deliberate, although he's certainly not complaining).

Their thighs are pressed together under the table, and that knowledge is a constant thrum in Blaine's head. As he watches Kurt laugh with Rachel, have an earnest discussion with Kyle and Michelle about the rumored revival of Phantom, wrap noodles around his spoon and fork and take careful bites, it feels comfortable. Even with the undercurrent of something in the corner, his heart speeding up on a couple of occasions that their eyes meet over the bowl of vegetables.

He tells Quinn about it later, when she drags him out for a beer after rehearsals, but by the time David and Wes have arrived, and they've all switched to shots, he's reduced to saying things like "Quinny I just want to take his smile and, like, roll in it, and touch his cheek with my fingers to feel it, and his laugh is like magic, you know? And I want to lick him all over, and his legs -"

It's at this point that she scoops him off the leather of the booth and prods him into a cab, reiterating what she's been saying all evening, and pointing out that the law of averages predicts that Rachel was always going to have to be right about something eventually.

As he rolls into bed that night he sends a painstakingly typed out text to the newest contact in his phone, humming something that's almost a waltz until everything fades away into blissful rest.


His phone is very loud, and so are the cars on the street below him - which seem to have entered some kind of competition to see whose horn can be hit the most number of times in succession - and so is the world in general. Blaine is pretty sure that he could sleep for a week, but sadly, although he doesn't have rehearsals, he promised to meet Rachel at her apartment at noon so they could go over the scenes they'd felt least confident about. When he grabs his phone off the nightstand - and he forgot to charge it, great - he has three text messages. The two most recent are from Wes and Rachel: an enquiry as to whether he's alive and a request for him to bring brunch, respectively, but the third is from just after 3am and is a simple "I see someone's enjoying their night off...and the feeling's mutual!"

Blaine furrows his eyebrows as he tries to work out why Kurt would feel the need to send that at 3am.

Sent: 2:38am
goodnighht kurt i hope you enjoy you'renigti love you're snile and everytinga bout nd im glad youre my friend

Well, that sort of explained it.

He indulged himself with a faceplant into his pillow, because really, tequila-Blaine?but it could have been a lot worse. At least he hadn't- well. There were many more catastrophic things that he could have said.

He texts Rachel back in the affirmative, decides on the bagel place on the corner, and informs Quinn that he's never drinking with her again.


"Rachel - open the door! - I swear to god, these vegan pastries are ten times heavier than normal bagels. I think they're made with rocksor something, so if you don't open the - oh, th - oh. Hi."

Instead of revealing a hungry or annoyingly chirpy Rachel Berry the door has swung open and Kurt Hummel is standing in the doorway.

"Hi," Blaine offers, because his brain seems to have entered a constant loop reminding him that he's wearing ripped jeans and an old henley, which is not exactly his outfit of choice for being in the presence of fashionable people whose opinion he cares about and whose lips he wants to taste.

"Blaine," Kurt says with surprise. "Hi."

"I'm sorry - I... I don't mean to interrupt. I was supposed to be meeting Rachel -"

"She didn't say - sorry, come in, here - let me take those. She's in the shower." Kurt takes the bag of bagels and goes through to put them on the kitchen counter, and Blaine is sort of confused.

"I... uh, didn't know I was going to see you today."

"Rachel asked me over." He clears his throat. "Obviously. She and the director decided that her hair needed to be a shade lighter, and I made the mistake of admitting I'd helped my best friend dye her hair pretty frequently."

"You mean Rachel decided."

Kurt smirked as he pulled a mug from a cupboard. "I suspect you're right. Coffee?"

"Please. Only if you're making it anyway."

"After a full morning of all thatI could use another cup." He turns to fiddle with the machine. "Or five. How do you..."

"Oh, here, there's a -" and Blaine's moving to help, point out the little button on the side, because he's rehearsed enough at Rachel's to know how her appliances work. But now he's pressed up to the counter, leaning slightly into Kurt to reach, and Kurt smells really, really good, even with the smell of what he now knows to be dye permeating the apartment (he bets that if he had his face pressed to Kurt's neck it would smell even better).

"Thanks," Kurt says quietly, and after a long moment he moves to spoon out coffee into a filter.

"I'm here to rehearse," Blaine says unnecessarily, because he's a little more relaxed now that he knows why Kurt's here, but what if Kurt thinks he and Rachel are having some kind of salacious backstage affair?

Kurt replies, "I figured," but there's a little tilt to his mouth. "An actor's work is never done."

"Would you like a bagel? I brought breakfast. Rachel didn't tell me you were here, but I always bring extras - just plain, nothing fancy. Or I have vegan things for Rachel, you could -"

"Plain bagel is fine," Kurt assures him. "Thank you."

They settle at the kitchen table (which is also the dining room, because this isNew York) and start eating, Blaine's theory being that if Rachel can't send him a goddamn text to let him know that the person he might possibly have a huge crush on is at her apartment, then she can eat by herself. He does put the vegan cream cheese in the refrigerator, though, because he is a forgiving sort of person.

After about five minutes Rachel appears, toweling her hair dry, and pours herself a cup of coffee. "Blaine! You're early."

He looks away from the napkin drawing Kurt just made - of the expression on Rachel's face when he suggested platform heels - with reluctance. "No, I'm not. You told me to be here at noon."

"Oh, did I?" she says breezily. "How forgetful of me." He'd have to be dense to miss the look she shoots him. "So, what have we been up to?"

Kurt's hands are wrapped around his mug (pale pink, emblazoned with the words My Dads Think I'm A Star!) and he traces the rim with one finger. "We were just talking about Marion Cotillard's flawless beauty. And Blaine was sharing tales of his glamorous acting life, up to and including his collaborations with the up-and-coming Ms. Berry."

"And I'm hoping Kurt was about to start telling me about his own performing experiences," Blaine adds, and avoids Kurt's eye when he looks up in surprise.

Rachel has settled herself into a chair with her own cup, and is tearing into a scone with determination. She has a bagel waiting on her plate, and Blaine expects her to speak, change the subject to something a little more Rachel-oriented but...

She catches Blaine's eye in the short pause. "What? Don't let me stop you."

Blaine blinks - he doesn't often see Rachel turn down an opportunity to dominate a conversation. He meets Kurt's gaze again, a mix of nervousness and something a little darker (should I not have brought up the singing again?), opening his mouth to change the topic himself, when a chirp sounds and Kurt reaches for his phone.

"And that's my cue to leave," he says after a few seconds, "sorry for intruding on your rehearsal time -"

"No," Blaine really doesn't want to have screwed this up. "No, you don't have to go, you can stay - right Rach? - we won't get started for a while, and Rachel has the whole bagel to get through, she'll nibble at it, she's like a bunny, honestly -"

Kurt's already standing, moving to stand behind Rachel. "I'm supposed to meet someone for lunch," he shrugs. "I'll leave you to it." He squeezes her shoulders. "Make sure you use that conditioner, and it'll look great, okay?" He leans into the half hug she's reaching up with. "Let me know how it looks."

"I'll send you a picture," she promises, "thank you so much. And I'll let you know if I get those tickets."

Kurt nods, turns to Blaine. "It was... really nice to see you."

"Yeah... I mean, you too. It was nice to talk a little."

"So I'll... see you?"

"Yeah, definitely."

After the apartment door clicks shut there's a long silence, and Rachel raises an eyebrow at him over her cup.

"Shut up," Blaine says to the world at large.