Extended Summary:

When Blaine Anderson was visiting the campus of Juilliard in the summer before freshman year. He was trying to memorize the locations of his future classes and seek out his future dorm... He never would've expected to come across the most beautiful boy he had ever seen, whose fluent movements would still hunt his dreams even months after their short encounter. Neither had he ever thought he could fall in love with somebody whose name he didn't even know...

However most things in life don't work out the way we expect them to, do they?

AU where Kurt and Blaine never met before they both attend Juilliard: Blaine is a freshmen studying Music and Piano and Kurt is the protégé of the world-famous ballet teacher. While Blaine is just an unknown newbie, he soon learns that Kurt isn't. Everybody knows Kurt and everybody worships him because Kurt has a gift. Because when Kurt dances the world seems to stops and nothing else is of importance anymore but Kurt. His movements hypnotize you till HE is the only thing that matters anymore. That is why Kurt has special single classes and every student and teacher at Juilliard adores him. However Kurt is also very lonely because he can never know if people care about him or if it's just his dance that as them captured. Will it be different with Blaine, or will he just break Kurt's already stricken heart beyond repair?

This story can also be found on Scarves&Coffee under the same name (however, there the single chapter parts have not been joint together).


A single ray of hope

Kurt was 17 years old when he got accepted into Juilliard.

It was always his dream to one day become a ballet luminary. To dance in the sold out ballet houses all around the world. Or to teach his passion to others so they would be able to achieve their dreams, just like his mother did.

However he never would have thought that when his dream finally came true, when he finally got the recognition he deserved – that it would mean this little to him...

But let's not get ahead of ourselves, shall we?

From the day he was born Kurt's parents Burt and Elizabeth Hummel knew that he was special. To what extension however they would only learn with time.

Kurt was quite the unusual little boy: He never liked to play with toy cars or action figures like all the others. No, Kurt only ever wanted to dance. And not just any dance – he wanted to take up ballet just like his mother had in her youth.

After a few fruitless attempts to get the kid to change his mind, Burt finally gave in and got Kurt for his third birthday (as he wished) a pair of rose colored ballet shoes. From then on he started to train with his mother every day.

Elizabeth soon realized that her little boy had an extraordinary gift. It wasn't that his technique was all that great, after all he had only been learning for a few months. But when dancing Kurt, he put his heart and soul into his every movement. Even without music his motions could make you start to cry or laugh without you even noticing it.

However not everybody thought that it was good to be different. Kurt had always had a hard time in school. It wasn't just his supposedly strange hobby or his love for school work but also his pale skin and fragile frame that made him the target of bullies since day one.

But Kurt never let it get to him. As long as after school he could come home and start pouring his, otherwise repressed, emotions into his dance he was content. And so his parents didn't see the need to interfere because it didn't seem like that big a deal.

Everything seemed to be going well until one fateful afternoon when the Hummel's got a phone call telling them that their barely 7-year-old had fallen down several flights of stairs. Kurt was lucky and got away with only a broken arm and leg and a pretty bad concussion.

But the injuries weren't what made this experience so decisive for Kurt's later life. It was the fact that nobody except for his parents seemed to believe him when he told them that he didn't just fall down all those stairs. No, he was pushed down by one of the older kids, who had been shoving him repeatedly even before that fatal afternoon. And even though there had always been many onlookers no one was willing to back up Kurt's side of the story.

So after 2 weeks of constant battle (which mostly consisted of very load conversation) first with the headmaster of the elementary school, later with the school board, Kurt's parents decided it would be better for him to be homeschooled by his mother than to go back to such an toxic environment.

What followed where the most agonizing months of Kurt's previous life because even though he and his mother were constantly home together, he wasn't allowed to dance until all his injuries had healed (which seemed to take forever). And even after that he had to take it very slow and start with light physical therapy to get all his muscle function back.

It took all of four months till Kurt's doctors finally gave him the ok to start dancing again. Of course such a long time without training took its toll on his technique and he practically had to start from scratch to get his muscles to work properly again.

But with all the extra time he had now that his mother taught him school work too, he was quickly able to enforce a new schedule allowing him to practice 3 and a half hours daily. So after several months during which he spend every free minute he got to practice he was able to regain all of his "lost" abilities before his eighth birthday.

Everything was great from then on, until his mother got into a car crash on her way home from the grocery store and was killed. After that nothing was the same anymore. The house seemed colder without her warming presence and his dad didn't laugh anymore. He only just barely managed to let a small smile grace his lips for Kurt's sake, but the boy could easily tell that it was forced.

For the first week after her death all Kurt could do was cry. He just didn't find a reason to do anything else until his tears ran out. Suddenly he felt utterly alone in the big house that was once so full of life and happiness.

It took him all of 3 weeks and several talks with his father to put on his worn-out ballet shoes again and make his way down to the basement which contained a large mirrored practice room with laminate flooring and a long holding bar across the wall on left side of the stairs.

At first he didn't know what to do with himself. His mother had always told him what to dance or how to move but she was gone now - she wasn't there to tell him anymore, couldn't ever teach him all her secrets. For the millionth time in the past month tears started to shimmer in Kurt's glasz orbs but unwilling to let them fall again he stubbornly closed his eyes.

And that's when first he felt it...

It was as if a totally new aura was surrounding him. The voice of his mother from their first dance lesson sounded strongly in his ears:

"Put your arms up like this... Shoulders square – good. And now slowly lift your weight to it put on your toes. That's it - you got it, sweetie!"

He didn't need any music because he wasn't just following the emotions given to him by others. No, he was simply expressing his own in the only way he knew how...

After that most things got easier with time. Of course he was still mourning his mother but he wasn't desperately sad anymore. He had found his outlet, his way to feel close to her again. And that made it easier for Kurt to cope with his loss.

His father hired a private tutor for him. To afraid that he would lose his son too if he send him back to school where he just wasn't safe.

7 years later found a now 15 year old Kurt Hummel more or less in the same situation. His tutor stayed until he turned 11. He then managed to convince his father that he could easily do the work alone and that's what he did from then on. He was an exceptionally bright kid never one got under an A- and still managed to train 6 hours per day in the basement. His technique had improved greatly and Kurt now even danced most of the advanced pieces flawlessly.

Kurt loved to learn something new whether it was school, ballet, cooking or even just fashion related. He was a very passionate person and easily obsessed with his hobbies. Until his dad would finally put his foot down and give him the choice of either coming to dinner or not being able to dance for two days (well there obviously wasn't much of a choice there).

At age 16 he came out to his father (only a formality really) and told him he wanted to attend The Juilliard School in New York to become a famous ballet dancer. Burt Hummel had always known that his son was too big for small-town Ohio and that he would have to let him go eventually. However this didn't make the day he first heard of Kurt's future plans any easier to endure (his baby boy was growing up after all). But nevertheless Burt promised him to always love and support him - no matter what.

And that's what he intended to do – life seemed to have other ideas...


By the time Kurt turned seventeen he seemed to have everything planned out. He managed to finish school with a perfect GPA of 4.0 and got his high school diploma. He and his dad had talked for a long time until Burt Hummel finally agreed to sign the permission slip allowing Kurt to apply to Juilliard one year early.

Since it was quite unusual to send in an application at such a young age and even rarer with grades like Kurt's, they assumed that he had a pretty good chance of getting in.

Even though Burt knew next to nothing about the ballet he was still convinced that once they saw his son dance they would welcome him with open arms. And much to Kurt's embarrassment he told everybody that his little boy would be attending Juilliard in the fall (despite many protests from Kurt).

Needless to say that every resident of the Hummel house was absolutely thrilled when the letter from the school arrived telling them that Kurt was one of the finalists. He was requested to come to New York and perform in front of the admissions committee at the end of July.

To Kurt it felt like he was finally reaching his destiny - everything seemed to fall into place. And he couldn't remember ever being this happy since the day his mom had passed away.

But as they say: Nothing good can last forever.

Kurt was in the middle of his daily 30 minute stretch before his practice when he got a call from the hospital telling him his father had been brought in an hour ago. He barely managed to put on some normal shoes before he was already heading out the front door. He might have sped a little on the way to the hospital and run over a few red lights (sue him his only living relative had been rushed to the ER).

When he arrived at Lima Memorial he frantically sought out the front desk and practically screamed his Burt's name at the nurse sitting there. After several minutes spent anxiously waiting for his father's file being located and the doctor being paged. The man finally appeared in the hall and took him to the room. He informed Kurt that his father had suffered from a severe heart attack while working at the shop, and due to the lack of oxygen to his brain had fallen into a coma.

They didn't think he would make it.

Even after hearing all the hard facts about his father's condition Kurt refused to believe that Burt would leave him so utterly alone in the world. So he ignored the doctors and nurses pleading for him to let his father go, and instead spent every waking hour of the next three weeks on his dad's bedside. He talked to him, read to him, pleaded with him to wake up and told him how much he loved him and that he couldn't lose him too, over and over.

But there was no use.

23 days after Burt had been rushed to the hospital he died from a second heart attack. When Kurt got to his room (like every day before this) at the beginning of visiting hours Burt's bed was empty and the room had already been cleared. The nurses (who all knew him be now and had sent him several pitying looks in the past) sat him down in one of the waiting room chairs until the doctor appeared. Kurt didn't listen to him talking about how his dad's heart just couldn't handle it anymore and had stopped beating at about 4:15 this morning. He already knew that his father was gone and that he was now truly alone in the world. Why should the details of it happening make him feel better?

The funeral was small but tasteful (it had to be since Kurt was the one organizing it). For once Kurt didn't feel like dressing up (but he did it nevertheless of course). The whole thing was a very quiet affair: There was no preacher since neither he nor his father were even remotely religious. And since he had been his father's only living family, for Kurt it was all just a blur of condolences and speeches from Burt's friends about what great man he had been (Kurt couldn't think of anything to say, so he just didn't and watched everything quietly). After 40 minutes they lowered the coffin into the ground. And that was it. Everything was over, just like that.

Kurt stayed at the cemetery for a long time after the other guests had left and stared at the headstone and the engravings on it:

"Elizabeth Hummel, loving mother and wife. "

(And the newer, slightly darker one below) "Burt Hummel, devoted father and husband. Rest in peace. ".

He felt like crying but didn't think he could manage to (considering how much time he had spent crying in the last days, he honestly doubted that he had any tears left). It had only been 6 days, but to Kurt it had felt like 6 years in the least. At sunset, 5 hours after everybody else had gone Kurt finally left the cemetery behind to drive back to the now empty house that once was his home.


Burt's three-week-long hospital stay and the funeral left Kurt with an amount of bills that even the sale of his father's garage and his childhood home could just barely pay off.

Fortunately since his father had already signed the emancipation papers when he applied to college, at least now child services couldn't interfere with his plans. After some calculating Kurt found he just had enough money for a one-way ticket to New York and a week in a crappy motel left.

Of course Juilliard being not just some school but the best in the whole country, tuition there is sort of steep (meaning every semester costs a student about 30.000$). Needless to say there was no way for Kurt to get that kind of money (nobody would hire a 17-year-old without experience and the bank refused to give him a student loan without any securities for something as „uncertain" as ballet).

His only chance was the „Special Honors Scholarship", which was Juilliard's way of giving exceptional talent the necessary resources to make it big. Every semester one candidate was chosen by every faculty for whom the entire costs of their education at the school would be covered. Considering the amount of applicants every semester the chance of being elected were about one in a million.

But it was Kurt's only option left so he sat all his hopes on being that one. He knew he had the talent in him, he just had to make them see it, too.

If he failed he would need to find a job soon (unless he wanted to be homeless, which he didn't) and find a new dream. But he wouldn't think of failure now because he had onechance to show them all of himself, one chance to make it right. And he intended on taking it.

So on the 25th of July Kurt Hummel found himself getting off a plane for the first time of his life and stepping into the city of his dreams to get to the audition of his lifetime.


The room was already full of people when Kurt arrived – a consequence of having to take the subway to get to the school. It was only five hours ago that Kurt's plane arrived at JFK and in order to not miss his big audition Kurt made his way directly from the airport, with his suitcase still in hand.

A wise call because as it turned out using the subway on you first day in in the city (and without any further help or guidelines) is more complicated than thought: After 30 minutes spend searching for the right connection and finally managing to buy his ticket – Kurt had to learn that NYC-Subways often delay. So after having pushed his way through several not so friendly strangers on the crowded sidewalks of the city, Kurt finally arrived at Juilliard with only 45 minutes to spare before his audition – which was just barely enough time for changing and stretching his still pretty stiff muscles from the two-hour-flight – never mind going through his routine one last time before the performance of his lifetime.

After seeing him practically run into the preparation room – not even changed – most of the other contenders shook their heads at his antics, some even smirked (thinking they had already overthrown him just by showing up earlier or maybe that he was as careless with his dancing as he seemingly was with looking up the time of is appointments).

Kurt however didn't mind them at all. He could've been totally alone in the room and it wouldn't have changed anything because in only 30 short minutes he'll be standing in front of the six most famous ballet instructors of the world. He will have to show them that he has what it takes, that he's special. And convince them to let him continue doing what he loves and enable him later be able to do for other what they did for him.

But before that he would have to show them all of him without any of the barriers he constantly puts up, now, simply to protect himself from anymore hurt. Kurt has to make himself vulnerable again in order to reach his dream. And that's what scared him most of all: The knowledge that he would be laying his fate into the hands of complete strangers and they would decide if he was worth their efforts...

Needless to say he was practically dying inside and shivering with anticipation all at once: He had never danced in front of anybody who wasn't his mom or dad or an old camcorder he used for self-corrections, this would tell him if he was truly as good as he sees himself, as good as his mother always said.

And being Kurt Hummel he naturally wouldn't beg down from a challenge: He might have lost his parents and the only home known to him but he wouldn't give them his last resort, too. Not without a fight first...

Just as he had finished his warm-up and his thoughts began to become frantic (again), a woman appeared in the doorway calling out his name.

This was it. In just a few short moments his future will be set for him. After one short demonstration of his abilities it will be decided if he will get in with the needed scholarship or will have to look for a job to survive in the city while figuring how to proceed further. The next five minutes will decide if Kurt spend the last 14 years of his life chasing after what was only wishful thinking, and will be roughly woken up by reality hitting him.

He stepped into the room breathing harshly and feeling his heart practically beating right out of his chest, stopping in front of a vintage looking wooden desk where his idols (and possible executioners) sat. After the formal introduction and a few neutral instructions, soft music notes began to trickle from the surround-sound-system.

Kurt had debated a very long time over his audition piece because he wanted it to be perfect. Of course he loved to dance to the classic instrumentals, but that was just a too safe choice for him (too boring, frankly). After thinking trough all his options and seeing that he only had this ONE chance he decided he might as well go all in...

So he didn't use any of the traditional routines, but chose to create his very own from scratch. Even going as far as to not use the original song but recording himself singing in his high and clear voice, and putting even more of himself out there.

As the first notes of "Think of Me" filled the air Kurt found himself relax and just going where the music told him to...

His audience watched enraptured and seemingly unable to pull their eyes away from the dancing boy while he perfectly managed several consecutive Pirouettes on Dedans, followed by a Capriole in a Grande Allegro section and even going as far as doing a Split-Jump before finally finishing in a Grande Plié.

The room went silent after the music stopped and everybody seemed too scared to even let out a breath, which was unnerving to Kurt since it was not their future on the line here.

No matter what their decision would be he couldn't bring himself regret spending all his time training and perfecting his ballet steps. After all it was what connected him to his mother. And basically the only thing keeping him sane after losing not only her but also his father. No he would never regret even for a second...

How could he, really? He probably would be dead by now if he hadn't had an outlet for all the grief he was feeling. When he danced he finally felt free from all the pain and suffering because he put all the emotion he had, all of his soul into it – and that's also what it made so magical for everybody else.

Just as Kurt was about to decide that he must've been so terrible they didn't even have to courtesy to tell him and leave to room to at least save some of his dignity. His thoughts were interrupted by the sudden sound of clapping in the silent room.

It startled him at first, he had never heard about anything like this happening before (like ever) but suddenly all six luminaries were out of their seats and applauding to him. He couldn't believe it: He'd done it – they liked him and he would get his chance to learn and perform. His hopes weren't crushed. He would live his dream and maybe finally find some happiness along the way.


They didn't understand it, but everybody felt drawn to Kurt after seeing him dance: His pure soul had made a connection with his audience and lifted them up with itself until he stopped and they dropped down again, but they could never get enough and always felt the need to see him again – that's what made Kurt such a good performer, but it's also what would make him so very lonely...