Disclaimer: Not real, not mine, not making money from this
Not I; I must be found:
My parts, my title and my perfect soul
Shall manifest me rightly. (Othello, I.2.30)
The only two things that redeemed high school in Kurt Hummel's world were its transience and the dappled existence of one Blaine Anderson. Being but a temporary phase of his life, it had him convinced that he would, as an older and wiser adult, look back upon his teenage misfortunes with folded arms and smug expression, thinking, there, there was the blight he had found too much to bear at the brunt of its blow (Prom Queen in the post-Prom poster with the last stroke of its last letter rubbed out for all the world to see, before he'd torn it off the blu-tacked wall), he'd look back on it and find himself untouched by the slights of so long ago. He'd be untouchable. And then there was Blaine. Who had taken his hand and led him down Dalton's halls, awkwardly, now that he thought of it, since both their right hands were linked even though their feet were thundering out against the walls side by side, announcing, here we are, here we are, the change that's gonna come. Blaine, who's looking at him now from across the table with what is at best a dreamy expression (at worst, a vacant one), and Kurt re-appraises himself and wonders what exactly he has in him that could inspire such a look.
High school is merciful because it has a finite end that marks the beginning of college, liberation from the milling crowd that stares and points and condemns. High school is magical because Blaine has just transferred his chin from his right to left palm without taking his eyes off him. Kurt finds it difficult to reconcile the two.
"I love you."
Kurt is surprised when that declaration comes, plain and simple but sincere. He does not doubt its sincerity, only its premise. Because he'd learnt it from Blaine, stars-in-his-eyes-kind-of-happy Blaine who had curled their fingers together in a wordless demonstration that what they shared was all that mattered, not some damned trophy that would sit in the back of a display cabinet collecting dust as its second coat of gold. Under the canopy of trees at Pavarotti's burial he had learnt from Blaine that it was his right to be happy.
And now Blaine tells him he loves him; he loves how Kurt has found his way around happiness even after losing Nationals. It's like congratulating a schoolboy on a lesson well-learnt. Could it be that whatever Blaine had loved in him was unconsciously a reflection of what Blaine himself inspired, indivisible from Blaine's own constructed persona?
He cannot conceive such narcissism seated in the eyes that behold him. Blaine takes forever to blink. He cannot. It is one of those things he has yet to resolve.
"I love you too."
They lost Nationals because Finn and Rachel were unprofessional and snuck in a kiss where they shouldn't have.
They lost Regionals because Kurt and Blaine were silly enough to think that the world would be as happy about them being in love as themselves.
Kurt is young but feels old. (I'm beginning to see the light.) Singing that, with the potential outcome blackening the back of his mind, he'd seen his future, although at that moment on stage he definitely couldn't name what it was he saw. He only felt the pull in his stomach that accompanies a performance, a singling out of oneself to others. This is me. He'd felt nervous and proud, exuberant but afraid. What he definitely was not was a conscious placard for acceptance. Yet time and time again his parts (filial son, hyperventilating boyfriend, bullied gay teen etc. etc.) are taken by us, exaggerated in turns, each a metonymy for a point to be made (even here, if I may, in these words).
But Kurt does not want that. His exultation in being different is forever bogged down by its accompanying weariness. He is too young to carry all that weight. All Kurt wants to do is to sing, fall in love, contradict himself, be happy. He doesn't know why he isn't.
(But I think I'll be all right.)
Kurt storms into the room with Blaine close on his heels. Blaine has a hand on his shoulder, posturing concern. It is all too loud, too close. Kurt backs away. Blaine shows the smallest clue of losing his patience.
"Fine. What is it?"
"This," Kurt's hands fly up in an exaggerated indication of this school, its walls, its air, its enveloping presence, always so forgiving but suffocating in its need to forgive (why should he need to be forgiven?), "this," he tugs at the collar of his jacket, amazed at his own ingratitude (why should he need to be grateful?) and his eyes fall down to his shoes as it ends in a whisper, "you."
"Me?"
He breathes, hates that he is crumbling inside but his face is cold. The only thing that betrays him is his voice that increasingly takes on the characteristics of a treble's register (why is he always such a girl?), "Yes, you. But also me. And you."
Blaine folds his arms across his chest, the only hint of belligerence being the fine tilt of his chin that actually shows off his jaw line very nicely. He ignores Kurt's embedded admission of guilt, zooms in on his apparent own, "And what have I done?"
Kurt throws his arms down as if that's not even a question to be asked, "What you are, you're always so...rehearsed, conforming to a type, you—" he's at a loss for words, but the words soon form themselves, rising up from where they've germed over the past week, "play roles, like now, you're the understanding Blaine, and I know I'll have to cave in, because you're so nice." He turns away to the window, "It's all wrong," (why is nice wrong?)
"So you're saying I'm acting,"
"That is not what I meant—" because now Blaine has hurt written over his face and Kurt regrets, wants to retrieve all those imminent tears that are soon to fall.
"This is me, all right, me." The me you fell in love with, that's part of me too, although that was left unsaid. Blaine leaves the room, too polite to slam the door, and that's a problem too.
In a sea of blue, Blaine's pink sunglasses scream for attention.
"Mr. Anderson, what are those—" the teacher twirls his hand somewhere around the region of his right temple for lack of a word to describe that pink thing poised on Blaine's nose, "Remove them at once; they are an aberration on humanity."
"With all due respect, sir, I cannot."
"I don't suppose I need to ask why not?"
"Just proving a point, sir, that I'm not conforming to a type,"
There are wolf-whistles and much whooping before the teacher is resigned to raising a warning eyebrow to close the matter. The class falls quiet. Later Blaine marches out of those heavy doors and stumbles into Kurt, who is appropriately shocked. Blaine answers with a look on his face that says, what? what is the matter?, and someone lightly jostles Kurt from behind in good, well-meaning fun. What are you doing, Kurt mouths, but Blaine shrugs, happy, nonchalant, links arms with him and walks him to his next class. They're surrounded by a sphere of humming laughter. Kurt wants to bury himself in a hole in the ground from embarrassment, or pride. Blaine grins at him; he can't see his eyes but he's damned sure they're twinkling (because the edges of his face are crinkling up just so) and he wants to smack him, or kiss him, senseless.
He wonders how Blaine can make him feel so contradictory. It's one of those puzzles he has yet to solve, but on some days there's just no need to.
That entire pink-sunglasses-wearing, to-hell-with-whatever-you-think attitude, Blaine knows, that's a type too. But that's him, all those parts (estranged son, devoted boyfriend, confident gay teen etc. etc.), they're all him.
He loves Kurt, loves how he is so violently himself. He wants to tell him that, spell it out to him in an invented alphabet exclusive to the two of them that he feels so fortunate to be singled out as the one to love him for the sum of his entire person.
He'll have a chance to do so, later, before the end of the season.
"Do you remember when I said it was me, too? I mean, at fault,"
"Yes," Blaine drawls it out like a diphthong, the first sound deeper than the next.
"Well, I have," he pauses and takes a breath, as if preparing to deliver a high note, "this idea that none of this will last."
For a moment Blaine panics. "This?"
"No, I mean this. Here." Deep down, they both know it. Blaine has to admit that the best Dalton can offer Kurt is a haven, not a home. For Kurt it is worse: he's pretty sure one day Dalton is going to purge him like he's some virus, some blight on the school's landscape. Some birds just don't take too well to warmer climates.
Blaine doesn't know whether he should be relieved. He wants what they have to live forever. He wants to say something comforting but can only come up with empty, encouraging silence.
Blaine kisses him chastely, always a gentleman, needlessly a gentleman, he realises, as Kurt parts his lips and draws two teasing strokes up the tip of Blaine's tongue with his own, leaving Blaine pleasantly surprised at this first attempt at forwardness on his part, welcoming it by rocking towards Kurt on the balls on his feet (no lifts) in an attempt to match him, in intensity if not at least in physical height.
Kurt twines his arms around him, holding on tight, his strength drawing up from the roots of his being, and deep down he guesses, no, he knows, that even if this will all one day come to naught, for now it is enough, enough for the man he will grow up to be.
Overhead the clouds threaten rain. Kurt descends those huge amphitheatre steps and surveys the horizon, dots of red and blue drawn back to Dalton's stone walls for cover. He turns and makes to follow and that's when Blaine catches sight of him, beaming. He waves, his face lit up by a thousand suns and Kurt breathes (one of those deep, ragged breaths that leave his shoulders with a shudder). The distance between them matters so little because soon enough Blaine has caught his hands and flung his book bag to the ground (Kurt will deliver a lecture on exactly how to respect a Burberry, but that's later), and together they stumble up the flight of steps in a mock rain dance, their young faces lifted up to receive the first of so many blessings.