(Disclaimer: I do not own Glee and I absolutely do not have anything to do with the Darren Criss songs "Not Alone" and "Categories," nor with the Toto song "Africa" mentioned within this story.)

*Thanks for the Brad info, Marte, if you didn't see the changes I made to the last chapter! I looked him up, and I'm so glad to be aware of the talents of the amazing Brad Ellis now!

*Hi to Angie, and hello to your friend in San Francisco too! Great job translating. It was just the way an American would have written that message. I was going to say that it would be Totally Awesome if they had Darren Criss write a couple songs for Glee, because he'd be great at writing something in the style of what Rachel would tend to write, or in the style of what Blaine would tend to write (he could do that in his sleep, he's such a versatile songwriter and composer) (am I hero-worshipping here? Probably. Yup.) but it actually does make much more sense for the writers and creators (Ryan Murphy et al) to write the songs themselves, since they know exactly what they're looking to convey, and they are music producers after all. Besides, they always tend to come up with things FAR better than anyone else could have imagined! Tonight's episode? Who saw ANY of that coming? Sheer genius. Perfect. You authors outside the U.S. will LOVE it when you see it! You can't wait. Trust me. Ah, but they still can never give us ENOUGH of what we are compelled to write into life here in fan fiction land… Klaine Klaine Klaine, right? So… here we go…!

Sorry about the delay in getting this chapter out.

Chapter 4: Another Song

The glow from the computer screen on Kurt's alabaster complexion currently lacking its usual rosy tints made him look much more sleepy than he actually thought he was.

After a long day of classes he was trying to get as much studying done as possible before Warblers practice. However, when a chat message popped up on his screen from Mercedes, asking what happened with Blaine at Breadsticks last night, he was surprised to notice how much more awake he could suddenly become.

His alertness kept increasing, along with his mental acuity, the more he chatted back and forth with her about his conversation with Blaine the night before and the other happenings in the pouring rain.

Wait so you're glossing over the best part here, Kurt. You didn't want him to stop doing what when you had to start the car? Did you just type that you liked the way his breath was warm on your neck? What was he doing at the time, Kurt?

Oh, calm down, he was only resting his head. He had brought his head down to rest you know, not on my shoulder, but more like in my neck. It was nothing. It was just a sweet friendly thing to do during that kind of a hug after the nature of what we had been discussing. All I was trying to say to you was that it was so nice when he sort of sighed and relaxed in, so I didn't even want to start the car or do anything that would make him move. But that was just ME, Mercedes. I'm sure he was only being a friend in a friendly hug, that's all.

Kurt. I don't get why you think last night established that you should stay Just Friends. People who are trying to be just friends do NOT bury their face in a friend's neck and proceed to breathe or sigh or anything of that sort into the friend's neck. You do know this, don't you?

Well Mercedes, we're just like that. We've always been just friends, and we've always done little things that are kind of touchy-feely or whatnot… it just doesn't always mean the same kinds of things that you think it should mean.

Whatever, Kurt. I think you should just kiss him again and see what happens. I bet Blaine won't be able to stop kissing you next time. But hey, that's just me. Don't listen to your best friend if you don't want to!

"Whoah, Kurt, it's almost dark out already, why don't you turn a light on?" Blaine had seen Kurt's open door with the light from the hall streaming into the darkening room rather than the other way around. He flipped the light switch on for him as Kurt typed out a quick "Gotta Go!" message to Mercedes and clicked out of the chat to get it off his screen before Blaine could see his name typed there.

Blaine walked over after Kurt smiled at him. "Man, you looked like you were in a trance about to be taken over by the computer in some kind of sci-fi horror movie. I think you're studying too hard again."

"Yeah, that must be it. Oh my, is it time for Warblers already?"

Glancing at his pocket watch, (Kurt almost melted every time he saw that gesture. It was so… old fashioned and stylish) Blaine reported that it was still early enough for them to go get a snack or do something to wake Kurt up before practice.

"I am perfectly awake. Why would you think otherwise?"

Blaine stroked a hand along Kurt's cheek, saying, "I guess it must have been the lighting in here when I first looked in. You look pretty good to me right now. But how about that snack anyway?" He flashed his best come on you know you want to expression, and Kurt was a goner.

It didn't occur to Kurt to relate that -Friendly?- caress back to what Mercedes had said, since his brain tends to shut down momentarily whenever Blaine touches him, which was also the case in the hall when they were heading for practice with their half-empty bag of Cheetos when Blaine reached up laughing at him and brushed some orange crumbs off the side of Kurt's mouth.

SPLASH!

The door to the choir room swung open and Artie, Tina and Rachel looked up to see none other than Brittany walk in with her arms held out to each side, blue and green Slushie leaving a multi-colored trail along the floor as she walked into the room with her head bent down, her hair also dripping Slushie along the floor. "Brittany!" Santana yelled as she crashed through the doors after her friend. The rest of them jumped up to go to her, but stopped short as she picked her head up and shook her hair out like a dog, and they saw that she was doing a whole lot of giggling. "That's cold. And tingly! Heeeheee that was fun!"

"Brittany," Artie started, with a stern and almost castigating tone, about to let her in on the fact that this incident should have been humiliating and awful and ask her if she was OK and offer her some sympathy, but all his plans simply got thrown out the window when he realized she really did think it was a fun experience, and who is he to make her feel any differently than how she naturally does, which to him, after all, is completely and utterly charming. "Come here, girl" is all he said next, and threw his arms out inviting her to hug him, Slushie ice and all.

Santana giggled and hugged Brittany from behind as well, joined by Tina throwing her arms around them all.

As the rest of the New Directions filtered into the room and took in this soggy and colorful scene, Rachel crossed her arms in front of her and said, "People. If the likes of Brittany are getting Slushied now, we are in serious trouble. It is getting worse out there. What do they want from us?"

"They want us all to be good little nerds and hide in the shadows, or else conform to exactly the way the average Cheerio or football player acts and dresses and, I don't know," Tina tried.

Artie pulled his head back from Brittany's giggling kisses on his cheek to ask, "Who Slushied you, Brit?"

"Heehee! Slushieed? That's what it's called? That's so cuuute!" Everyone looked at Britanny as she said this, with looks on their faces that could only mean is it really possible for her to have been that oblivious all this time?

Santana filled him in, "It was a couple of bottom-row-of-the-pyramid Cheerios, and they said 'have fun in GLEE CLUB, dork' when they did it. The total loser idiots. I mean, who says 'dork' anyway? What dorks!"

Mercedes started to reach out to touch Santana's arm since the girl looked like she was about to snap, but she stopped short when she noticed that perhaps she had already snapped and it may be the last time she sees her hand if she touches that live wire. As she watched Santana in this moment, she couldn't help but notice that there was definitely something else going on in this girl's head besides defending her friend. Her face had pain and a very-rare-for-Santana vulnerability in it, which made Mercedes feel like reaching out to her even more though she knew it would do no good. It was how Brittany looked when she clung to Artie that made Santana look at Brittany as though she'd lost something precious and was perhaps realizing it for the first time.

Puck almost pushed Mercedes out of the way to grab Santana into a hug, but he got a swift shove to the chest and a "Back off, Cassanova!" from Santana, followed by "Just because I'm pissed off at some dumb Cheerios doesn't mean you should swoop in and pretend to help so you can get a little somethin'-somethin' for yourself!"

It was not lost on Artie that it seemed a little out of character for her to brush off Puck so quickly and soundly.

Santana took Brittany off to the restroom to get her to at least wash off her face and hair, Puck stalked to the back of the room to sit by himself and brood, and the rest of them explained it to Mr. Schuster who had just passed the two girls on his way in to the choir room with a huge what the heck is going on here expression on his confused face.

"You know, I think it is getting worse lately," Tina mentioned. "In math class yesterday, Ms. Clark made me take off my spider web pattern scarf because she said it was distracting, and when I said that was ridiculous, nobody sided with me! I couldn't believe it."

Rachel said, "Well I think it's time we show them that we will not be intimidated, and really shout out our bold individuality!"

Mike nodded his head in a mild-mannered and completely supportive way, (as he always does) but everyone else looked a bit worried.

"No, I mean on stage. Like at Regionals!"

Now most of them (except Puck and Finn, who reserved the right to hold off on reacting in any way until after they'd heard the whole story) began to lean forward in their seats a bit, interested.

"I think we should show that we are not hiding our uniqueness or conforming to anyone else's status quo, but we are instead celebrating our differences and our unique fabulousness!"

Artie asked, as Brittany returned and sat in his lap before Mr. Schuster gave her a look that made her slide over to sit in the chair next to him instead, "How do we do that in a song on stage? Like… act it out or something?"

"No, silly. We'll pick a song in which each one of us can individually shine! Each person can have solo lines and dancing parts and whatever star talent makes us unique! I mean of course, I'll probably have to sing most of the melody, just to give it continuity and all," (eye rolls all around the room at this, along with a groan from Santana and a scoff out of Puck) "but it will be one big group of people all supporting each other's individuality!"

Mercedes kicked in with, "No, guys. I see her point. I think it really could work. We could figure out how to each take different lines in a song and totally make sense with it. It could be like a bunch of people on stage, all looking like they're total misfits or too different for their own good, but then you put it all together, and they're all showing total solidarity for the concept of staying true to your individuality."

Finn asked, "I thought we were doing Blaine's song for Regionals. It's awesome."

"Yeah, we ROCK that song," Rachel answered. "Of course we're doing it for Regionals. It makes us sound gorgeous, and it's truly moving. But we need something to follow it that will knock their socks off, like a one-two punch!"

Kurt was finally singing a solo in one of the songs the Warblers rehearsed tonight. It was one of the classics of all classic songs done by acapella groups, Toto's "Africa." Kurt and Kenny took the leads on this one, and it was smooth and rich and beautiful.

Kenny was a natural bass, but was singing in a low tenor, almost baritone range for the song, and Kurt was bringing his voice down to the same, so each brought a unique and interesting quality to the same notes. They switched off practically every other line, from Kenny's opening "I hear the drums echoing tonight," to Kurt's final "Hurry boy, it's waiting there for you," with the rest of the Warblers bursting into instant perfect tight eight-part harmony, joining Kenny and Kurt who held prominent notes floating above the Warblers all along the chorus,

"It's gonna take a lot to drag me away from you,
There's nothing that a hundred men or more could ever do,
I bless the rains down in Africa,
Gonna take some time to do the things we never have."

Blaine seemed unable to stop his eyes from shutting in rapt appreciation at the sound of Kurt's voice blending incredibly with Kenny's every time they joined together which they did on the long-held words at the end of a few of the lines. It was just that Kurt's voice... did something to his poor heart. Ah, this is what fangirls mean when they say a famous singer's voice makes them melt.

Kurt loved the quality of all their voices blending together as one well-tuned instrument, but he had been shot down yet again last week when he had brought up how great they sounded and performed at the Gap Attack, the way they let loose and danced and sang with more abandon than they normally do in performance. He had the audacity to suggest that they try to imbue that spirit into their regular performances, and it was the opinion of the majority of Warblers to keep their sound as-is. Their regular sound is what is expected by everyone in the audience who respects and is impressed by their long tradition of excellence. Oh boy, whatever that means!

This evening, as they went through all their drills that got them into such perfect step with each other and created such gorgeous and perfectly executed harmonies, Kurt's mind kept getting drawn back to the other choir room, the one at McKinley where his crazy and wacky friends could spend those few precious hours together within those particular doors, just letting their hair down and being entirely themselves. No matter what crazy came out of any one of them during each rehearsal, they all supported each other. All their crazy only added to the spirit of that club. He was feeling very lonely for those friends right now.

This almost-undetectable brooding was not lost on Blaine. As they were leaving practice, he leaned into Kurt's shoulder as a way of giving him a nudge, and asked, "Hey, what was weighing on your mind in there tonight?"

"Oh, nothing. Maybe I was just tired after all."

"Come on, Kurt. I can tell when something's bothering you."

"No really, I'm perfectly fine."

"Alright. Let's get a bite to eat; it'll make me feel better. I have some mac and cheese up in the third floor lounge we can whip up!"

"Blaine, how is it that you are always thinking about food? How much can one guy eat in a day?"

"Hey, I'm a growing boy!"

Kurt checked out his toned arms as he gestured to come along, and his –ugh… perfect shoulders, and oh my gosh that chest he has yet to get a real glimpse of but the way even a button up shirt can't help but cling to certain shapes and contours there, gulp stop looking Kurt, he had to agree, yes, he is a growing boy indeed, in all the right athletic ways. OK I must find a way to stop thinking like this!

"Are you coming? I don't want to let you go back into a trance in front of your computer again and risk losing you to some evil cyber world forever!"

Over mac and cheese, (Blaine actually eating his and Kurt pushing his around the bowl with a fork) Blaine coaxed the confessions out of Kurt that he was missing the unmitigated creative expression of his friends in glee club, and the way they all just act so entirely like themselves around each other, and he even managed to get Kurt to spill that was feeling a little stifled by the homogenous conformity of the Warblers. Blaine suggested that last part, and Kurt merely admitted that he was right.

Blaine wanted to show that he completely understood, and it was causing the most uncomfortable squeezing of his heart to see the wistful look on Kurt's face in this moment. He ached to change that look, and didn't even think to stop himself from reaching out to run his hands alongside Kurt's face and let his thumbs seek to smooth out that beautiful and should-never-be-furrowed forehead. He gave him a small smile, which Kurt briefly returned but quickly broke eye contact and looked back to the untouched mac and cheese.

They washed their dishes and returned them to the shelves, and talked about the different large personalities of everyone in Kurt's old glee club. "The thing is, they support each other when they're together, because in the halls of that school, everyone is constantly being forced into some kind of box or group or label."

"Categories."

"Yeah. I guess. But they, we, don't want to have to be just any one thing," Kurt finished his train of thought, "so when we're together we get to be all that we truly are, and that's really… nice."

Blaine was drying the last dish and didn't notice when Kurt sank down onto a chair looking miserable after the next thing he said, "We get put into categories all the time, I guess because that's the way our brains work. We want to categorize things."

Noticing, he pulled another chair over to sit next to him and rub Kurt's back, saying, "Oh, no Kurt, I'm trying to say that I don't think anyone should even have any category. I like to think that I really have no category. I like to think that none of us do." He ran his fingernails soothingly back and forth across Kurt's back and asked, "Hey, what's wrong?"

"Oh, I suppose I'm just melancholy tonight. I'll get over it." He looked up into Blaine's eyes, and this time when he had the urge to move some curls back into the rest of Blaine's silky mane, he didn't stop himself. I guess we're just friends who can run our fingers through each others' hair, and rub each others' backs, which he's been doing for a WHILE now actually, and it's kind of more than just a friendly caress, it's more like… maybe we're friends who can kiss too… ugh, that's too far… whatever, we don't have to figure this out right this second. I'm just not going to stop doing this if he doesn't have to stop doing that…

"Do you want me to play you the song?" Blaine asked, pulling Kurt out of the reverie he was having with Blaine's surprisingly soft hair.

"What song is that?"

"Oh I guess I didn't say. I have a song all about how we put people into categories. Since I don't like that we do, it's kind of my love note to that idea," he said with just enough sarcasm to make his point.

Kurt let his fingers work their way down that gorgeous hair until they rested on Blaine's neck and then continued to his jaw and under his chin to tilt his head up to make eye contact again. "OK. Let's go." Why am I not bold enough to figure this out RIGHT NOW? And pull him into figuring it out right along with me.

While Blaine was moving his piles of books and papers off the couch in his room, Kurt paused in the middle of the room for a moment and looked like he was remembering something. "Blaine, Can I ask you something?"

"Sure," Blaine said, gesturing for him to come join him on the sufficient amount of sitting area he had cleared.

"It's something I've been wanting to ask you about for a while, actually. Do you remember on Valentine's Day, when you said…"

Blaine interrupted him, while dropping his head into his hands, "Ugh, Kurt… Can we pretend that never happened? I had no idea what I was saying. I don't even remember what I was babbling about. I must have sounded like such an idiot."

"Oh, Blaine… No… That's not… No, I was only thinking about when you said you worked for theme parks. I've been wondering ever since, where you worked, which park, what you did..."

"Ah! That I can talk about all day! Well, actually, the one that made a huge difference to me was one I didn't even actually work at. Disney. My brother was in the college program at Disney's Animal Kingdom last summer, and I went to spend a month with him in Orlando, so we could share an apartment instead of him staying in the college program housing." By this time, Blaine was resting his head on Kurt's shoulder as he reminisced.

"Let me tell you, that place is gay friendly if any place on the planet is."

"Really?" Kurt asked. "I mean I guess the park might be, but the people who work there too?"

"Oh yeah. I mean my brother had a girlfriend there who got to work at the Haunted Mansion, and they used to sneak me in for the best breakfast at one of the cafeterias in the tunnel under the Magic Kingdom. It's this one huge tunnel system under the whole park, that's how all the cast members -that's what they call the staff there- get around. They call it being off-stage. And it's so funny, because when they are off-stage, out of the sight of the guests so they're no longer in character, it's actually pretty common to see two princesses kissing, or Goofy and Buzz Lightyear kissing. It's so funny. The makeup takes forever and it's made to hold up in the Florida heat, so when they're on break, they're still in costume and makeup and everything. It's great."

"Man, I'd love to see that," Kurt said, leaning closer in to Blaine.

Snuggling a bit more, but still using his hands to gesture along with his story, Blaine continued, "You know, being there and hanging out with all his friends, and meeting so many people who treat everyone with such friendliness and warmth… it made me really understand for the first time that there really is a whole different world outside of stupid high school. You just feel like you're trapped with these same people all the time, like it's your whole world, your whole society, that forced world of high school where you have to spend so many hours every day with those same groups of people categorizing each other constantly. When I got back, I couldn't even stand the thought of going back to my old school. I'd had a taste of what it's like to choose your own society, you know?"

"Oh, is that why you wrote that song?"

"Oh yeah, I was going to play you the song! I almost forgot. No, the song is just about how silly it is to put people into categories… Here, you can reach my guitar better from there." Kurt very regretfully broke contact and moved away from Blaine momentarily to reach for the instrument and hand it over.

By the time Blaine was starting in to the chorus the second time, Kurt felt like it was already an old familiar song and it felt like he should be singing along. He didn't, because he was enjoying the sound of Blaine's voice singing softly next to him.

Seems like the categories,

Got nothing to do with you or me,

With you or me.

Seems like the ones who love us,

They don't even know just what that means,

That's how it seems.

He was just about to say… something, if only he could come up with the right thing to say, or maybe he should do… something, maybe just take the guitar out of Blaine's hands when he's done and… oh, what though?... when his agonizing was interrupted by a text message buzzing in on his phone. It was from Rachel.

Kurt! Can I stop by again on Sunday and this time actually work on writing together? I need another song.

A/N – "Categories" by Darren Criss – you must look it up and listen to it!

Time again to invoke my disclaimer on not intending copyright infringement and apologies for typing out some of the lyrics of a song that is someone else's property!

SO… "Categories" is an awesome song that can only be heard online at this time. Check it out on YouTube, where fans post their videos of him performing live concerts and such. He hasn't recorded this one yet, or if he has, *squeezes eyes tight wishing wishing wishing!* he has not released it yet. *still wishing! Please, Darren, please!* "Categories" by Darren Criss.

If you search for the recording by ennaxor, (which is also the one with the best sound quality) you will hear his introduction to the song at that show, from which I completely stole his words about it being his "love note to that idea" and so forth. Yeah, I stole words from a real person and gave them to a fictional character. They were just such good words!

Next time, we venture out to the city for a little adventure. And both boys will be getting some badly needed advice from friends. I hope. Everyone needs friends to tell you when you're being stupid and clueless, right?

Please feel free to review and tell me if I am being stupid and clueless in any aspect of my writing, BTW! Thanks!