A/N: Blaine and Kurt had both been struck by the same bolt of lightning, resulting in Blaine travelling back through time to Kurt's era a hundred and more years earlier. Kurt made him feel as if he had a friend in this strange new world he found himself in.
Kurt and Blaine walked silently for a few minutes, the sound of exultant frogs serenading them and the scent of the damp vegetation filling their senses. Kurt could tell Blaine was looking at him when he saw the stars shining in his eyes. "I'm not crazy Kurt. Other than having lost a century or so along the way, I seem to have survived being struck by lightning fairly well. I just… don't know how I'm ever going to get back again." Blaine sounded so distraught; Kurt didn't know how to respond. What could he say?
"I'm so sorry Blaine. I'll do whatever I can to help you. Please know that you have a friend, in any case." Kurt put his hand on Blaine's sleeve to reinforce his words. Blaine put his hand over Kurt's gratefully. It really did help to know Kurt was a friend, instead of being all alone here.
"Thank you. I appreciate that. I feel like Gulliver, in the land of Lilliput" Blaine said morosely.
"You refer to Jonathan Swift's work? I'm familiar with it! Is it still just as popular a century and more from now?" Kurt asked excitedly. He had very much enjoyed the story of a man marooned out of his milieu. Perhaps there were some parallels to Blaine's situation...
"You're not that short, you know." Kurt offered, his voice holding in a barely smothered laugh.
"Geeze, there are comedians everywhere...and every when. It's sad that I have to put up with short jokes, even here. I am so disappointed in you, Kurt." Blaine sighed theatrically, but with his amused grin easily visible in the faint moonlight.
Kurt let out the laugh he'd held in, glad Blaine had responded positively to his teasing remark, and they continued their journey, now nearing the outskirts of Lima. They began to pass the outlying houses, becoming closer to each other as they entered the village limits.
"Hey, I know that place." Blaine suddenly remarked. "It's a stately old house that's been renovated into a lawyers' office. The trim is painted all cream in my time, though." Blaine finally recognized where he was in Lima.
Blaine had indicated the Hastings House across the road. It had been built about ten years previous and had barely lost the bloom of newness, the green and white paint still quite fresh against the red brick. "Are all the other houses not still here then?" Kurt asked curiously. What stood in their place, then?
"Most of them are gone. There are mostly businesses in strip malls, fast food joints, gas stations and car dealers in their place now, and there's a Wal-Mart over there on the right…gas stations are places to refuel cars….and yes, cars are conveyances. Its a long story, Kurt. I'll fill you in sometime." Blaine gave up, too tired and depressed to try to explain. Where would he start?
Kurt accepted Blaine's deferral of his explanation. They were almost home, so they would be interrupted anyway, when Kurt introduced his new friend to his father. "Blaine, I'd like to keep the fact that you suffered a displacement from your own time from my father for now." Kurt wasn't sure yet if Blaine was truly lost in time or if he was simply lost in his own head, but either way his father would worry, if he knew about it. For now, he would prefer if his friend was simply a traveller, lost and alone and needing a friend, which Kurt was happy to be to him. They would find out more about Blaine's situation tomorrow.
"Sure thing. I don't blame you. He'd probably toss me out on my ass." Blaine said carelessly. "Oh, I'm sorry. ..on my ear. Better?" He smiled at Kurt cheekily. "I know swear words hurt your tender ears."
"Yes, that's better. I've used the words, Blaine. I just am more discerning about when I use them, and when I'm around ladies or someone I've just met, that isn't one of those times." Kurt protested tartly.
"I apologize, Kurt. I can control my mouth better than that. It's just that I usually relax around my friends, and I guess I consider you a friend." Blaine shrugged, with a quirk of his mouth.
Kurt felt a rush of pleasure at his words and laughed comfortably, as they circled his house back to the kitchen door. Only callers used the front one.
"Well then, let's get our asses into the house and we'll get some supper and then some rest. I too, am bloody tired." Blaine gave his friend a friendly pat on the arm as they entered the house, amused by Kurt's lame effort to swear though he knew that Kurt's presence was the only thing that was keeping him from devolving into the cowering kid inside him wailing 'how am I gonna get back home again'?
The kitchen was dark when they entered the house, with only the light of the smothered wood stove illuminating vague shadows in what Blaine thought was likely the kitchen. Kurt had banked the fire to smolder before he left, so the room enveloped them in warmth. He broke off a straw from the broom and lit the large oil lamp over the table, the light quickly swelling like a miniature sunrise, before he swung open the range's fire door and tucked in a couple more sticks of wood. He judged that was just enough to burn hot for a couple of hours and bring the temperature high enough to heat the water tank at the back of the stove and warm some supper for them.
"Are you hungry, Blaine? There is some fresh bread and butter and a wedge of cheese in the ice box, and I believe there is also some chowder left over from our lunch I could reheat to go with it if you'd like. The water to wash with will take some time to warm before bed time."
Kurt shared a glance with Blaine who stared at him, taken off-guard by his smiling side-glance with the warm lamp light illuminating him. Blaine was taken aback with his new friend's breathtaking eyes. He needed to choke off that right now, though. If Kurt wasn't gay, and the last thing he wanted to do was to estrange his only friend with unwelcome advances.
"Yeah, I'm starving actually. I was going to grab some lunch at the mall when I got there. I had some chips and a Coke at Wes' before I left his place, though." Blaine tried to sound blasé, and shrugged off the intimate atmosphere of the room, with just the two of them there. It was hard to remember the strange turn his life had taken when that thunderstorm came up so fast, when he watched Kurt, feeling strangely comfortable in his presence.
Kurt merely nodded at Blaine's confession of hunger, deciding the items he'd listed were likely edibles of some sort. It felt to him like Blaine was an exotic foreigner, perhaps like Ali Baba, come alive from the pages of his story book. Blaine watched him unwrap the cloth from around the loaf of bread, place it on a plank of wood and saw off some slices, and put them and the cheese on a plate beside the bowl of freshly churned butter. He poured the crock of soup into a pan over the cooking section of the stove to warm and dipped a tumbler of water for each of them from the bucket, before he rinsed out the tea pot with another and set the kettle to boil. Kurt decided he would make mint tea, more restful for the stomach in the evening than the black china tea he preferred in the mornings. It took a few minutes before the soup was steaming in bowls in front of them, as they each devoured a sandwich with it.
It took longer to do the same things, but they'd ended up somewhere familiar to Blaine when they sat down to eat. They had finished their meal, with their dishes pushed to the centre of the table and silence had settled over them again. The mint tea was nearly gone and Blaine was distracted from stressing about where he was, by watching Kurt blinking sleepily. He suddenly pictured himself holding him and letting him sleep in his arms, so he could kiss him awake in the morning. Oh good grief, Blaine, cut it out! There are more important things to think about than how hot Kurt was. Get a grip on your hormones!
Kurt rose tiredly from the table and poured a couple dippers of tepidly warm water into a white granite dishpan on the dry sink. He set the dishes in the water and was about to wash them when Blaine touched his arm and volunteered to do it for him. Everything seemed to take twice as long as it did in his time, so no wonder Kurt seemed exhausted. Kurt let him wash their dishes, instructing Blaine to rub the cloth on the block of homemade soap on the edge of the dry sink, before he scrubbed the dishes with it. It was tedious, but it worked well enough. Kurt dried the dishes, and put them away again with his father returning home just as they finished.
"Dad, how was your visit with Mrs. Hudson? Did you have a nice dinner with just the two of you? I see you wisely waited until it stopped raining before you came home." Kurt had a teasing note in his voice that made his father laugh. He thought he'd been secretive, but Kurt had been told by Mrs. Hudson's son Finn, that he had been asked to make plans to visit with a friend, and leave her to entertain her suitor in scandalous privacy. Finn had warned Burt that he'd better have honourable intentions toward his mother, before he left, so Burt quietly assured him he would soon ask him for his mother's hand in marriage. He had intended to tell Kurt tonight too, but found he wasn't alone in the kitchen, and put it off
"Dinner was great, and so was the visit. Who is our visitor, Kurt?" Burt had his hand out in a friendly welcome, before Kurt could introduce Blaine.
"This is Blaine Anderson, Dad. Blaine, this is my father, Burt Hummel. We met quite by chance today. I was on my way home from a visit with the Jones' when the sky grew dark as night and terribly ominous. Rain was blowing sideways with the wind and the sky turned an even more dreadful colour. Then a blast came out of the heavens and I was suddenly looking up from where I lay in the road. Blaine was struck senseless by the same bolt. When we regained our senses, we assisted each other back to the Jones' cabin, to seek shelter from Anita until the storm passed. She gave us dry clothes and refreshed us with hot tea. Blaine is unable to continue his journey tonight, so I knew you wouldn't mind that I extended an invitation to him to stay the night with us."
"Of course I don't mind. You're welcome to stay here, Blaine. I can't believe you both survived being electrified by a bolt of lightning. You both could have died today! What were you doing out in such a storm, Kurt? You should have taken shelter under a tree or something."
Blaine tilted his head in disbelief. He thought everyone knew not to go near a tree when there was lightning, and couldn't help saying so. "Actually, under a tree is not a very good place to be in a storm. They act like lightning rods. Kurt and I were probably struck because we were near some trees." Blaine said softly.
"I had no idea it was going to get so bad, so quickly. " Kurt interjected. "It was ominous and cloudy when I left there, but it had been so all day. The deluge blew up so quickly, I had no chance to reach shelter. Blaine too, I believe." They looked at each other and smiled at surviving their mutual brush with death.
"Well I'm glad the good Lord still has plans for one or both of you. Will Blaine be staying with you in your room tonight? Our parlour couch is not very comfortable, but if you prefer privacy we could make up a pallet in there for you."
"He can sleep with me, Dad. He won't get any rest on that plank of a couch in the parlour." Kurt interrupted quickly. He was fine with sharing his bed with Blaine. They were already well acquainted and they'd shared a near escape from death. He wanted to continue their association for longer, before their paths likely parted forever tomorrow. It was quite common practice to share your bed with a house guest, though Kurt hadn't actually shared since his Aunt Katherine had briefly visited five years previously. The Hummel's seldom entertained company.
Blaine glanced to Kurt in confusion. He was going to sleep with Kurt tonight? Oh good lord. Had these people never heard of a guest room? He hoped that his attraction to Kurt stayed under control, or he was going to be stuck here without a friend, and right now that meant too much to him to give up. He had half talked himself into asking to sleep in the parlour, but he really didn't want to stay alone in there either, realizing that terrrified kid inside him wasn't too deep below the surface. He watched Burt take a ewer down from a shelf curiously and fill it from the cistern at the back of the stove.
"Well, I'll let you take care of him then, Kurt. See you in the morning, boys. You don't need to come to the shop tomorrow, Kurt. We'll be fine without you until Blaine gets home. Good night." He went to the stairway and went up to bed to read for a bit by the light of his lamp.
"We should probably go to bed soon too. I find I'm quite tired." Kurt said, with a warm sleepy note in his voice that made Blaine want to enfold him in his arms. He merely nodded his agreement, feeling pretty whacked himself. Kurt took down another ewer and began to fill it with repeated dips of a long handled cup from the heated water in the cistern.
"The outhouse is at the right of the backyard, if you want to take that candle with you out there." Kurt offered to let Blaine go first, not noticing his freaked out look as he filled the ewer.
An outhouse! Ew, yuck. Oh well, if that was the deal, he didn't have much choice but to figure it out. Blaine lit the candle and reluctantly went on an expedition in the dark, grateful it wasn't pouring rain anymore. He found his way to a small wooden hut and opened a creaky door to find a well-worn board with a circular opening in it. He daintily perched himself on it and listened to the echo coming from quite far below, while he had a long overdue leak. It really wasn't all that bad, he decided. He'd expected it to smell worse than it did.
Kurt added another larger piece of wood to the stove and buried it in the ashes, banking the fire again to smolder overnight, hopefully without it going out. He took the candle from Blaine when he returned and went outside before bed too, leaving him in the kitchen with a small oil lamp. It was far easier in the summer, and less smelly in the heat, to just go outside than empty his chamber pot in the morning, which they were forced to do in the winter months. Blaine waited for him to return in the dim silent house, feeling the fear creep up on him again when he was alone. He took the ewer himself before he let Kurt light their way up the stairs.
Blaine followed behind his host, trying to keep his eyes on the stairs instead of watching Kurt's ass at his eye level. It was probably lucky that he could see almost nothing in this light, because he fully intended to treat Kurt with the respect he deserved. Kurt pushed open the wooden door for him, and Blaine entered his dim room. The patchy moon light illuminated his way to his washstand, before Kurt followed behind him and the shadows lengthened on the wall. He watched Kurt set down the lamp carefully on the bedside table.
Kurt then poured half the water from the jug into a basin on his washstand. "You can wash first while I disrobe. Would you, um…like to borrow a nightshirt to sleep in?" The night had remained quite warm, the humidity keeping the air nearly as warm as the day had been. Blaine blinked at Kurt blankly, wondering what he should say. He normally slept in only his boxers during the summer. Would that freak Kurt out?
"Well…what do you usually sleep in? Do you wear a nightshirt?" Blaine had never seen anyone actually wear a nightshirt, other than Ebenezer Scrooge, but maybe it went for normal now. He would only wear one if he had to, to keep Kurt from being uncomfortable.
"I wear them only in the winter, but it has to be really cold. I hate the dreadful things. They tend to knot around me till I feel like I'm going to strangle." Kurt self-consciously quirked his mouth at him.
"So what do you wear to sleep?" Blaine prayed that Kurt's answer wasn't 'nothing'. He'd had a couple of dates with some boys but other than some tentative and halting exploratory making out in his car, he had never had a man's body completely next to his, much less in a bed. It sounded great, at first thought, to sleep with Kurt naked, but he knew it would soon turn into a major problem, if he wasn't allowed to touch.
"I usually just go without, but I'll wear my under-clothes, if that makes you uncomfortable." Kurt waited nervously for his response. Was Kurt feeling anything close to what he was? Trepidation, excitement, nerves? Crap, now he was freaked out at sharing a bed with a boy he wanted to treat with extra care, since he was his only lifeline.
"Ah…yeah, wearing our under-clothes works fine for me. We call them 'shorts' where I'm from though." Blaine said shyly, feeling a little awkward.
"All right then, shorts it is." Kurt said with a shy smile in return, unhooking his suspenders with his thumbs and beginning to undo his fly buttons. Blaine stood and stared for a minute before he realized he was going to look creepy if he watched Kurt for much longer. He turned and went to the washstand, finding a bar of lightly scented white soap on a saucer beside the basin. He took a flannel square from the pile on the corner of the wash stand and did the best he could to clean up.
By the time he finished, Kurt was down to his weird under pants, likely waiting for his turn to wash, while he turned down the bed. Blaine wrung out the flannel square and draped it over the wash basin and then lowered his own suspenders. Kurt stepped over to the wash basin and carefully poured out the water he had used into the chamber pot beside the wash stand, refilled the basin and began to wash his face. Blaine found himself staring, while Kurt couldn't see him looking. His pale skin glowed in the light of the candle. His arms and legs were long and leanly muscled, with a light dusting of brown hair, though his chest appeared to be completely hairless. Blaine watched his muscles moving under his skin, betting Kurt was much stronger than he looked at first glance.
Just heaving the water jug around, bringing in firewood and walking everywhere would keep you in that great shape without having to work out. Blaine sighed with exasperation, and prayed for strength. Kurt had a truly hot body….and he was going to sleep next to it tonight. Kurt was his friend, so he had to restrain his body's impulses toward inappropriate behavior.
Kurt dried his face with a towel and turned to smile at him. "You sound like you're tired too", completely unconscious of how amazing he looked in that light.
Blaine nodded his agreement, realizing it was true as he sat on the bed and pulled his legs out of the pant legs. "I didn't realize how tired I was until I saw your bed."
He folded his pants over the same chair Kurt had left his on. Everything was cotton and wrinkled easily, so he would have to take care not to toss it onto the floor like he might do at home. He put his feet into the bed and sckooched down until he could lie down and pulled the covers up over him. He sighed again, the feeling of safety and warmth unexpectedly relaxing, as he felt the bed shift and the springs creak when Kurt got into bed next to him. He felt secure here, even though he was so far away from everything and everyone he knew, adrift in the tides of time.
"Good night Blaine. I hope everything looks better in the morning." His friend said in the dark, after he blew out the lamp.
"Thanks Kurt. Sleep well." He turned on his side facing away from Kurt and was surprised to feel relaxed and sleepy in only seconds. In only a moment or two he was asleep, his even breathing telling Kurt he must have been completely exhausted.
Kurt lay in the dark, staring upward until Blaine unexpectedly rolled onto his back. He watched his new friend sleeping then, admiring his eyelashes lying on his cheeks in the moonlight. He felt a protective concern for Blaine that seemed a bit intense considering they had only met hours ago. He truly hoped they would stay friends, once he'd found his way home, his first male friend.
Now that he'd had time to think rationally, he realized that Blaine couldn't really be from another time. That must be a flight of fancy created by an electrical charge scrambling Blaine's brain. He didn't care. Blaine was sensitive and very sweet. He found himself completely captivated by him.
Kurt took a moment to think about that feeling, knowing it wasn't quite the way he should feel about another man he'd only just met. He had admired other boys at times, though he didn't much care for most of their behavior. Boys were often rude and completely insensitive. He admired some girls too, since he had more in common with them. But he was so terribly excited to have found a boy who seemed more like him than anyone he'd ever met before, um…baring his mental imbalance, of course.
The immediate connection he'd felt to Blaine had surprised him, considering his uneven temperament. Perhaps they were meant to be close friends, like he and Mercy were. He had to ensure Blaine didn't guess his growing attachment toward him, or he would certainly lose his friendship. Eventually the long day made him yawn and settle into sleep beside the comforting presence of his new friend.