a/n: Thanks for the reviews and encouragement to keep writing this story. Yes, my first "chapter" was really short - - I tend to prefer my writing "short and sweet" - - like Blaine. Ha ha. And I'm afraid I didn't watch Glee much last year and only got really hooked this year, so some of my information might be a little sketchy - - for purposes of this story, Kurt is 16 and a sophomore, Blaine is 17 and a junior. Please review!

"Stop it," he said, twisting his mouth away and shoving. He stood leaning against the gatehouse, out of breath from the passionate onslaught, and glared angrily. "I told you, it's over. I don't want this anymore, and you have to leave me alone."

The older man was breathless too, but gasped out, "Who the hell do you think you are?" The man was handsome, and might have been distinguished when he wasn't wild-eyed with anger, pushing back at his slightly graying hair with shaking hands, as he was now. "After everything I've done for you, you have the nerve to dump me?"

Blaine's eyes flickered uneasily and he softened his voice. "Look, I know I owe you a lot, Miles, but I can't help how I feel. You know things haven't been right between us for a long time, and there's somebody else I have feelings for- -"

"Somebody else?" Miles shouted. "Oh, hell no. I made you. You're nothing without me. After I spent three years making you somebody worth even bothering with - - teaching you everything you know - - you think you'll walk away and give it all to some stranger? Who is it?"

"It doesn't matter, Miles - -"

"It's that little public-school queen that you're always hanging around with, isn't it?"

"Don't talk about him like that," Blaine said angrily.

Miles fell silent for a tense moment, and when he spoke again his voice was deadly quiet. "Okay, Blaine. I get it. You've been with me since you were fourteen … you want to sow a few wild oats with another kid your age. Go ahead and do him, get it over with, but I still expect to see you just as often as ever."

"I don't know what's going to happen with Kurt. I don't know if he feels the same as me, not for sure," Blaine said shakily. "But whatever happens, he's made me realize that I have to end it with you - - that I don't love you. I may have only known him a few weeks. But you never made me feel like he does, not in three years."

Miles raised a hand and Blaine flinched away, but the older man dropped the hand and laid it on Blaine's face wistfully.

"So beautiful. Like Tom Ford and Cary Grant had a baby," he said softly. "And yet, you were such a mess when I found you. Remember? Poor, uneducated, unkempt. You were nothing, until I showed you how to dress and act and got you into this school. You're still nothing, Blaine, nothing, without me."

"Kurt doesn't talk to me like that," Blaine said faintly. "He doesn't try to make me feel bad about who I am."

"Maybe because he doesn't know who you really are," Miles said mockingly. "Just the face you've put on that I gave you."

"This is a waste of time. I said it's over, and that's it," Blaine said, trying to sound strong. He turned to go but Miles grabbed his arm roughly.

"Get this straight, Blaine. I say when it's over – not you."

Blaine jerked his arm out of Miles's grasp, but the man kept talking after him. "You leave me, I pull your scholarship. You wanna go back to public school, loser?" he called cruelly. "It's a tough world out there without someone to take care of you."

Blaine slowed down, his hand on the gatehouse wall.

"That's right, Blainey. Back to your old group home, your old public school, no more music scholarship, no more Warblers," he said, making mocking jazz hands at him. "Think about how that'll be for a while before you decide. I'll give you a few days to think about what side of the bread the butter's on - - mine or that little twit who's caught your eye."

"If you pull my scholarship, I'll tell the school trustees about us," Blaine lashed out. "I was underage when it started- - you'll get fired."

Miles raised his eyebrows, annoyed. "If you open your mouth about how you got that scholarship, everyone will know you're … well, they have words for what you are. And Dalton doesn't give scholarships for that. You'll be let go, even if they believe you."

There were a few stray crows still lingering in the woods despite the cold weather, and Blaine could hear their cawing and beating wings as a flock of them flew out of the brush behind Miles, who stood expectantly waiting.

"I hate you," Blaine said shakily.

Miles smirked, moving closer and putting an arm around the boy's waist, ignoring the cringe he got in return. He placed a soft kiss on Blaine's cheek. "That's okay."

Mercedes hadn't been able to keep up with Kurt, and hurried, out of breath, out the gate of the Dalton campus where she'd seen him run out. Looking up and down the street, she saw him huddled with his knees against his chest, sitting under a tree in the park across the street.

"I'm sorry, Kurt," Mercedes said, plopping down next to him on the cold, hard ground. "I know you liked him."

Kurt's thin white hand tightened over his arm, and she rubbed it gently. "It hurts when you realize the other person can't return your feelings," she said. "I know how that can be."

"I thought he was flirting with me, that he just was holding back from making a move because of - - everything going on with my old school," Kurt said, his voice muffled by his arms. "I feel like an idiot. I mean, look at what he has - - a grown up boyfriend, sophisticated, mature. I'm just a stupid kid to him."

"Kurt, don't you think he's a little too old? I mean he looks like forty. Don't you think that's weird?"

Kurt looked up and wiped his nose on a bright purple pocket square he kept hidden in his jacket pocket, one outlet of his vivid personality that he clung to in secret. "He's the head of the music department here," he explained.

Mercedes' eyes widened. "Kurt, a teacher? In the department Blaine studies in? Don't you think that's kind of inappropriate?"

"Well, it's legal. Blaine's over sixteen," Kurt said dully. "If that's what he's into, older guys, then obviously there's no hope for me."

"I should go back there and tell him off but good," Mercedes said viciously. "He led you on - -"

"He never asked to be more than friends," Kurt pointed out. "It's not his fault I fell for him."

Loyal Mercedes shook her head emphatically. "It is his fault. He flirted with you – let you think he was single – "

Wearily, Kurt got up. "It doesn't do any good to dwell on it. I'll just steer clear of him from now on," he said despondently. He couldn't bear the sight of Blaine now that he knew that he had misread the other boy's signals. He knew he wouldn't be able to look at him again without seeing him in someone else's arms, and he couldn't hide how that made him feel, he wasn't one who was able to make his feelings invisible. But he dreaded the next weeks without him. Dalton had been hard enough, the tough schoolwork, the uniforms, the 'new kid' strain, the living away from home. Dalton without Blaine as even a friend was going to be … completely empty.