Kurt, although terrified from Finn's horrible driving, was more than excited to see a cluster of his best friends waiting for him outside of school.

He waved at them!

"Hey Kurt!" cheered Mercedes, a large African American girl with shoulder length black hair. She held her large beaded heart necklace while she waved, and turned to Tina and Artie who were waiting patiently behind her.

"Hey guys! Ready to win Nationals?" Kurt hopped out of the car, as Finn went to drop it off in the senior parking lot.

"Lets cool it with the Glee talk, Kurt, we still need to get through first period." Said Mercedes.

"Senior year," he paused, "Isn't that weird? Feels like yesterday you and I were roaming the great halls of McKinley for the first time."

"Yeah, I remember my first slushy-facial like it was yesterday… oh wait." Giggled Mercedes

They all laughed. It felt strange being able to laugh about things like that now. Kurt hadn't been slushied all summer, and internally he took a moment of silence for all of the ruined outfits he had thrown away the previous year.

It had been exactly one summer since Karofsky had been expelled and reinstated at McKinley. He wondered if this year would be different. Magical even. Kurt had missed his friends.

"Listen, I get you two are seniors, but Artie and I still have a-whole-nother year left." Tina piped in.

"Yeah, I'm happy for you guys, but we should really get to class before anyone has the chance to gang up on us out here."

Artie's light-up wheels were reflected into his glasses as he maneuvered to enter the school. Kurt followed suit.

As they entered Mercedes shot out a hand to grab Kurt's forearm. She pulled him aside excitedly, "Kurt, this year is going to be so great!" She was bursting with enthusiasm; her voice raised an octave at the end of her sentence.

"Mercedes, like you said we haven't even had first period yet." He placed an arm over her shoulder as they walked, smiling bigger than he had in weeks.

"I know, I know, but… you just missed it. I saw my future husband. I swear by it." She had a hopeful glint in her eyes and her fists balled up in front of her waist. Showing teeth she continued, and "Five minutes earlier you could have seen him too! I think he's new." She said it both confidently, and sarcastic. Kurt was thoroughly intrigued.

He raised his eyebrow questioningly. "New meat, at McKinley?"

"Oh Kurt. Just wait. He is so fine. I can't even handle it. Look for him so we can talk about it at lunch!" She nodded.

"And what exactly am I looking for Cedes?" he sarcastically replied. Head tilted down, lips pursed playfully. Kurt really was beautiful.

"You'll know him when you see him, Kurt. Trust Me." Mercedes gave him one last nod before disappearing into her first period class.

I wonder if he's gay! Kurt beamed at the thought of it. He checked his schedule and walked towards his favorite class. And off I go to AP French. With one deep breath, Kurt reached into his bag, pulled out his notebook and entered class deliberately stopping one among many of his frequent internal monologues.

Dalton had been a three-hour drive from his new neighborhood. He was sure no one knew about his sexuality here, and that's how he wanted to keep it.

His palms felt sweatier than usual. Okay, back in the closet Blaine. He paused and dropped his eyes to the pavement. This is absolutely fucking ridiculous, but I can do it. He didn't want to go through this again, but his dad… and the kids here… he didn't know anyone… what if they were like the others before Dalton?

He peddled faster, and reached a small bike rack next to a group of students restlessly standing outside his new school. They were staring at him, so he felt compelled to smile at their expectant faces. He left his earphones in so he wouldn't have to talk to them.

They instantly turned back into their huddle. The bigger girl was giggling to the others. They hate me. He shook as he locked up his bike, sucked up what courage he had, and walked into the school.

Why couldn't he be as confident with kids his age as he was with people like Burt? He felt himself getting lost in thought again. Jesus Blaine its just high school, two more years and you're finally on your own. Go with it. Breathe. He took a breath. All right, where's my class?

After awkwardly sitting through two classes, and a couple of locker shoves, Blaine realized he needed to create pull in McKinley's student body. That way he wouldn't just be the new kid. It would be harder to pick on him that way. Blaine had seen a good-looking guy with a Mohawk earlier, and he seemed pretty cool. No one really messed with him in the hallway. How could he be more like that guy?

In both of his classes everyone just stared at him. He felt so uncomfortable, like they all knew his secrets or something.

Blaine's third class was U.S. History, a subject he particularly didn't care for but he was still good at it. As he opened the door he scanned the classroom quickly, waiting for the weakest face to make eye contact with him. All he had to do was act like that Mohawk guy…. Or maybe even act how David used to. I can't believe I'm about to resort to his standards.

That was it! No one ever messed with David. If he could be like that, maybe people would lay off. Attitude Blaine. Don't give-a-fuck Blaine. Hah, this is rich. Come on… there has to be someone in here tha-

It was then that Blaine met her eyes. She had badly dyed pink hair, and the saddest expression he had ever seen. Bingo.

He felt the stares burning into him as he crossed the room for the empty seat next to her, but this time he did not feel awkward about it. He felt, sexy. It was compelling. He felt like nothing could touch him. He had finally grasped the concept of who he wanted to be this year.

At his first school he was just Blaine. Regular run of the mill, bow tie wearing Blaine. Gay Blaine. He was the soon to be motherless Blaine. Miserable, beat up, bruised ego Blaine. He had come quite a long way since then. At least he thought he had. He had been so naïve, to think the world would accept him for who he was. It was because of this that he had been subconsciously switching character every year. Month-to-month even.

Dalton proved to be a healing fortress for him. Not only did he get to stay away from his father for months at a time, but also he had also finally made friends! Blaine never really had those before, and the Warblers were everything to him. Wes and Jeff had begun to teach him that being gay was okay, and he was so close to believing them before his dad ripped him out of there. Blaine remembered some of their inside jokes, his past gel addiction among one of them. Always, with the gel…. He laughed nervously under his breath.

Pulling his shades up to rest on his curls, he slid into the chair next to the girl very deliberately. He saw her stiffen with, what was that? Anxiety? Resentment?? Stop second-guessing yourself.

"Hey." He nodded at her.

"…" Her big eyes shot at him, he felt like he was being deflated. Courage Blaine. C'mon, you can do this. It's just a girl. You don't even like those.

"Uh, I'm Blaine. I'm new." He extended a hand in her direction, but it wasn't accepted. He quickly retracted it.

"And what do you want, Blaine? A date?" She spoke slowly, her voice telling him she was extremely uninterested. The girl's eyebrows rose, as she waited for a response.

He had to think on his feet. How do I pick up girls? He decided on throwing her a false signal to get her attention.

"Well… no." He made sure to look taken aback by her statement. He was doing this right. She clearly had issues. He knew because panic darted into her eyes. "Actually, I was going to ask if I could borrow a pen? I left my house pretty quick today, and didn't grab one."

She handed him one, not even looking in his direction. Her arm simply hung off of the side of her desk, holding it towards him. This was stupid. She's almost better at pretending to be someone else than I am. He just wanted to grab her attention somehow, and he wasn't even sure it was working.

"So, what year are you?"

"…."

He took it from her. Blaine wasn't a very patient person; his attention span was more puppy-like than human. With his inept ability to focus, and growing frustration he went into a mini-tirade, "Listen, I don't get what your problem is, but considering no one else has even so much as looked at you in the past five minutes, I'd say your pretty insignificant in the sociological scheme of things here. So-"

"I'm a senior. The name's Quinn." She smiled. Well that wasn't hard.

"Well Quinn, it's nice to meet you. Thanks for the pen." His vocal tone matched that which is used to speak to small children. Blaine knew how to flirt. He was even better at that than academic work. A simple tilt of the head, and a smile that crinkled his whole face was all it usually took to make a stranger swoon.

Quinn broke eye contact and looked straight ahead, biting her lip. Blaine wished he could be attracted to her. She seemed like a lovely girl. If she was a little less… rough, he was sure his dad would approve of her too. She had a gentle face, and angelic features. He wondered how she got her skin so smooth, it couldn't be like that naturally.

"Hello students. My name is Mr. Legge. Welcome to U.S. History! Here is your syllabus, if you look at the bottom there's a contract there that- where are you going?"

Blaine had started packing up his things. Holding out his borrowed pen for Quinn to grab. As soon as she reached to take it, he shoved it in his pocket and turned towards the door. He wanted her to watch. "I'm," he looked up quizzically and gestured with his hands, "Bored."

The class produced a subtle hum in the background.

"We have not begun the lesson yet, please sit down" The teacher clearly felt uncomfortable.

Blaine laughed.

"Please have a seat."

He could feel Quinn eye fucking him from behind. She was a bad girl, right? They liked this kind of stuff. He had seen it on TV. Why couldn't he be bad boy Blaine for a day? He removed all expression from his face, and just stared at his teacher.

"Mr. Anderson, please sit down."

He left, Quinn gaping behind him. Oh my fucking God. I can't believe I just did that. That was kind of cool though, right? I mean. I didn't come off as weird or anything? He was high on adrenaline. What if I could do that to my dad?

That did it. It always fucking did it. Every time. He always had to think of his dad. There was that flash of pain. Followed by the anxiety. Both followed by the need for a cigarette.

He disappeared down the hallway remembering all the things he wasn't good at, and suddenly he realized that he hadn't done a single thing yet to find Mr. Hummel's son.

He didn't even know how he was going to mess with "Kurt" yet. You're so dumb. Why are you even trying to pull off this cool kid act? You already have so many personas to play. You're gay. You're a pansy. You're pathetic… his father's words. How can you pull down some kid when you can't even keep up with yourself? Does it really matter, getting back at him?

An hour later he was in trouble. His U.S History teacher had found him smoking outside when class ended, and quickly brought him to see Mr. Figgins, the principal.

"Listen, Blaine. Mr. Anderson, it is important to follow the guidelines given to us from the school. All of that can be found in this handbook. The only thing I can do is to give you a verbal warning, but next time it will not be so pleasant. There will be consequences to your actions. Okay?" Principal Figgins sounded like he was reading the back of a pamphlet.

The speech had been much longer, but Blaine had been consumed by thoughts the entire time. He accepted the booklet from Principal Figgins. He had missed the first half of lunch, he was starving… and the exhaustion from both pretending to be straight and from the previous night didn't help either.

"Yes sir, very sorry, it won't happen again." He half meant it. His new self scared him a little. But, his only option was to be strong. He had to have the courage to act how he was supposed to be.

Courage.

He was wondering if he was getting the meaning right.