Title: Perfect, Chapter 1 (out of 3 chapters)
Author: larkin21, No beta.
Pairing/Characters: Gen-fic focusing on Dave, Kurt, and Blaine. Klaine exists but that relationship is not the focus. Slight one-sided Kurtofsky with some tension between Dave and Blaine. Brief appearances by Santana and mentions of other characters but otherwise just the three boys.
Rating/Warnings: R overall for language. A couple instances of homophobic slurs. No sexy times; just one Klaine kiss in chapter 3.
Word Count: 2,500+ for this chapter, will likely be ~15,000 total. Chapter two has been completely written but I have some edits to make. Chapter three is almost finished as well so there shouldn't be a lot of lag time getting the entire story up. I'll probably post chapter two tomorrow or Monday.
Summary: This story follows Dave, Kurt, and Blaine after prom. Somehow I've managed to drag a few hours out over 15,000 words.
Kurt looked at Blaine as he danced with him. He had a look in his eyes like he got when he was performing. Kurt couldn't help but wonder if that's how he was getting through this entire thing. Blaine always looked so at home performing. That's the only way he could possibly have built up the courage to dance with him in what he could only be described as "hostile territory."
As the song ended and they went to pose for pictures, Kurt realized that Blaine was probably in show mode to a certain extent but there was something else going on. It could be any number of things but Kurt felt it was mostly that Blaine got to be the hero at this dance instead of the victim. And probably Blaine was faking some of his enthusiasm for Kurt's sake, in the hopes that Kurt would start to feed off of it. That's basically the same as show mode, though, right?
Not that it wasn't helping Kurt. His smile was geniune for their posed picture, just not as wide as Blaine's smile. The dance floor was easier for him than getting his picture taken. The camera made him even more aware of the tiara on his head. On the dance floor, he could just focus on dancing with Blaine. Using Blaine's positive energy to gain confidence and have a pretty amazing time, all things considered. He started to wonder if everyone had a show mode. Even Dave seemed more relaxed and comfortable in his own skin when he was on the dance floor earlier that night. Well, when he wasn't slow dancing with a girl or on the verge of outing himself to the entire school, that is.
There were only a few songs after he was crowned before the jazz band started packing up their equipment and Figgins and Coach Sylvester started herding everyone out of the gym. Thinking about Dave on the dance floor made Kurt start to worry about where the boy might have run off and what he might be doing all alone with his thoughts. Looking at the smile still on Blaine's face as they made their way to the less crowded back exit, Kurt couldn't help but feel enormous guilt weigh on his shoulders. Blaine must have noticed something because his smile left his face immediately and he put his hand to the inside of Kurt's elbow as they walked side by side.
"What's on your mind?" Blaine asked softly, his eyebrows pinched in and angled up. He didn't change his stride at all, though. Kurt appreciated that Blaine knew not to turn this into a thing by making Kurt stop and talk about it but Kurt also knew that he wouldn't be able to leave that school yet.
"I need to find Santana," Kurt said with a pause before he continued more quietly. "So I can find Dave."
Blaine nodded and scanned the crowd, likely in search of a red dress and dark hair. He knew that Dave and Kurt had worked things out. Whenever Kurt recounted their most recent conversations or break-throughs, as the case may be, Blaine always told Kurt how proud he was of him. Given the opportunity, Kurt almost worried that Blaine would tell Dave how proud he was of him for apologizing to Kurt and making amends. He wasn't sure how that would go over with Dave. The fact is, Kurt has no idea if Dave hated Blaine as much as their two interactions would suggest or if Dave was just lashing out at Blaine in much the same way as he had lashed out at Kurt. Or somewhere in between. Either way, the idea of Dave and Blaine being in the same immediate space made Kurt's stomach tighten with worry.
"Listen, Blaine, I ..." Kurt didn't know how to finish his thought, though, and his feet stopped moving as his sentence trailed off. Blaine turned to Kurt, with another concerned look on his face.
"What is it?" Blaine closed the short distance between them and forced Kurt's attention just by ducking his head down and meeting Kurt's lowered eyes with his own.
Kurt couldn't help the small smile that pulled at his lips. Blaine was so earnest and he tried so hard to make things right. Even things that really didn't concern him. If something was worrying someone he cared about, Blaine worried too. Hell, he was even coming up with solutions for the McKinley football team for the championship and supporting them before he was even dating Kurt. Stuff like that still floored Kurt. He had only met one of the football players at that point. If one could call that confrontation on the outside stairwell a proper introduction. Unbidden, images that first meeting between Dave and Blaine flashed before his eyes.
Dave's retreating form suddenly turning back around and quickly taking the steps two at a time, hands up and forcing Blaine roughly into the fence ...
Right. Focus.
"I just worry how Dave will react, you know? I mean, it's bad enough I haven't looked for him until now." Kurt paused and fidgeted with his jacket pocket. Blaine just waited silently. "I'm just not sure you should be there when I find him ... at least not until I have a chance to assess everything."
Blaine pulled his lips in under his teeth, nodding slowly. "How about this ... we split up. You stay inside and check some places where he might be in here. I'll head outside and see if his car's still in the parking lot. Call Santana while you're looking, I'll call you after I scan the parking lot, ok?"
"That's perfect, Blaine. Thank you. And if you see him, just call me right away." Blaine snorted and nodded his head again. "Don't take it personally or anything, Blaine. I just don't know how Dave feels about you. You have to admit that you don't have a good history."
"Neither did the two of you," Blaine answered with a slightly condescending smile.
"Fair enough," Kurt responded, slowly nodding his head. He couldn't help feeling slightly annoyed at his boyfriend's desire to see the best possible outcome right now. After two nearly catastrophic meetings between the two of them and a particularly awful night for Dave, Blaine's quiet optimism bordered on insanity. With an impatient huff and no attempt to conceal his own condescension, Kurt continued, "And soon, we'll see if we can build a friendship for the two of you too, sweetheart. Priorities, though, ok? Right now, we need to focus on Dave and how he is."
Blaine nodded seriously and gave Kurt's hand a quick squeeze, perhaps tighter than necessary but Kurt appreciated the gesture anyway.
Kurt didn't wait to make sure that Blaine was on his way before he was scrolling through his contacts to look for Santana's phone number as he made his way towards the boys' locker room. He mentally started composing a list of other possible places where Dave could be but he really hoped the locker room would be the only place he'd have to check.
Feeling confident about his chances, he decided to put off calling Santana. There were a couple reasons why he'd rather not involve her. He wanted to tell himself that he didn't want to deal with her crazy in addition to Dave's problems. Sure, Santana had been nice enough after "Dancing Queen" but upon very little reflection, he knew that Santana probably didn't take the fiasco that was the prom queen announcement much better than anyone else. So he didn't want to hear her biting remarks as she would inevitably take out her misplaced jealousy on Kurt. He didn't want her fake compassion when she undercut her offer to ramp up Bully Whip protection with snide comments about his gender-fucked fashion sense. Her words, not his.
To be honest, if only with himself, Kurt knew that he was worried about how contacting Santana could effect Dave. He knew next to nothing about their beard relationship. As far as he knew, the two couldn't stand each other and barely tolerated being in the other's company. Or they had developed a genuine friendship in which they supported each other as they took turns peeking through the cracked door of their closet. Kurt suspected it was neither extreme but he couldn't imagine a scenario in which it would be kosher to bring Santana, or anyone else, into whatever crisis Dave might be going through now. It was bad enough that Blaine was in on it. If Dave wanted Santana or anyone else around, great. But Kurt wasn't eager to send out invitations to Dave's misery.
As Kurt pushed open the locker room door for the first time in months, he wondered at what point he became as protective of Dave as Dave had been of him through his service in the Bully Whips. Kurt didn't have much time to consider that train of thought, though, as he startled at the pitch dark locker room. Fumbling for a light before the door could swing shut and cut off all light sources, Kurt tried not to panic. Luckily, the switch was right where it should be but the presence of light did little to slow his adrenaline rush.
"Why didn't I consider how scary an empty locker room would be in the middle of the night?" he muttered to himself.
The belief that the locker room was indeed empty did not calm his fears. He held his phone tightly in one hand and with the other, he pulled his scepter from the makeshift holster on his kilt. He had been rather proud of himself at the time when he realized that one of the last minute details he'd added to his suit was the perfect place holder to rest the scepter elegantly on his hip. It would have provided him more comfort now if it hadn't been the perfect place for the delicate scepter but instead the heavy Scottish weapon Finn thought would have gone great with his outfit. It was better than nothing, though. As he heard random noises, from dripping faucets to a loud cricket chirping, Kurt fluctuated between picturing the opening scene of crappy horror films to wondering where the hell Dave could be. He spent as little time as he possibly could in the locker room, practically running for the door after checking to make sure that Dave wasn't hiding in the showers.
Taking a couple deep breaths with his back firmly against the lockers across from the locker room door, Kurt checked his phone for the time. 11:51. Probably less than an hour since Dave fled the gym and maybe 20 minutes after the band stopped playing. Kurt decided that since the first place he thought Dave would be turned out to be spectacularly incorrect, he should probably at least get in touch with Santana. As far as he knew, Dave was long gone. Scrolling back to her number again, he pressed send and huffed in annoyance when she didn't pick up and the call went to voicemail.
"Santana. This is Kurt. Call me as soon as you get this message."
Kurt hung up the phone, re-sheathed his scepter (though "sheath" wasn't really the most appropriate word for the tasteful buckle on the right hip of his kilt), and made his way toward the next place on his mental list: his French classroom. Admittedly, he felt rather arrogant to have that place on his list. After all, the locker room had more significance to Dave than just that one moment with Kurt. The French room, though, was all about Kurt. Dave didn't even take French. Kurt tried to rationalize that it was close to the boys' locker room. He'd pass his French room almost wherever he went after leaving the locker room.
Kurt wasn't surprised at all to find the room locked so he moved onto the choir room. There was little reason to honestly believe that Dave might have gone there to escape either. When he saw from a distance that the door was open and a light on, he started to wonder if maybe one week in Glee a couple months ago had made Dave come to see the choir room as the safe place that Kurt and other Glee club members saw it as.
Sadly, the choir room was completely empty. Whoever was in there last had just left the light on and the door open, perhaps expecting to come back or for someone else to use it before the night was over. As Kurt debated in his head whether he should go across the hall to the auditorium or down the hall towards the cafeteria, his phone rang. Santana.
"Good evening, Miss Lopez," Kurt answered, aiming for calm and confident.
"Hey baby. Was screening calls earlier but since you sounded like someone had pored cold water down your panties in that message, I thought I'd find out what's up."
"Classy, Santana. And my panties are fine. Just wondering if you and Dave were heading to Puckerman's after party."
"Me and Dave, uh? You always play it so cool, don't you, Princess? Or should I address you as Your Majesty the Queen now?"
"I would say neither but I know it's no use. Anyway, what are you two up to?" Kurt was working hard to keep his growing impatience out of his voice but Santana's attitude wasn't helping.
"'Us two' aren't up to anything. Far as I know, that bitch is still at the school. He put his keys in my purse as soon as we got to prom. When I called from his car telling him that I was leaving, with or without him, and that he better get his royal ass to the parking lot, he told me to fuck off and that he'd pick his car up from me before morning. Not a bad idea, really. Anyone sees his car at my house will think we're fucking. He really has proven to be a good beard. If not a shitty running mate."
"So you took his car and just went home? How was Dave supposed to get home?"
"What do I care, Your Highness? All I know is he was still at the school when I called him because I could hear the band playing that pansy ass last slow song on his end of the line. He'll probably just walk home after he's finished crying his eyes out and everyone else is long gone. That is, unless you go back and rescue your king from his own tears."
"Good night, Santana."
"Sleep tight, Your Excellency."
Kurt actually snorted at that one before he ended the call. Suddenly, full-blown panic hit him. Blaine was supposed to go to the parking lot to look for Dave's car and call as soon as he finished checking the parking lot. If Dave's car was gone, and had been since before they left the gym, why the hell hadn't Blaine called him yet? Shit, why did Kurt think it was such a perfect fucking idea for them to separate?
Thanks for reading! More to come soon ...
