The Warbler is a Tramp – Chapter Ten
The letter was sat on the side table in Kurt's hotel room the following morning, the cursive script spelling out Blaine's name visible from the bed. Kurt had been awake for over an hour, lost in his thought about the curious envelope while the early morning sun peaked in past the curtains.
Bunching up his pillow, he burrowed his head into the plump material and huffed his frustration. He didn't know what to do.
On the one hand, Jeremiah asked him to give the letter directly to Blaine, and while Kurt never said he would, it seemed rude to not do as asked. On the other hand, Kurt's job the night before had been to keep Blaine away from his ex-boyfriends, so surely it would be best to give it straight to Wes? The responsibility would be out of Kurt's hands then.
More pressing in Kurt's mind was the itch to open and read the letter, find out what Jeremiah had to say.
"This is stupid," Kurt said, and rolled onto his back. "It's none of my business."
And yet, something Quinn said was troubling him:
'Blaine was pretty beat up about the break-up.'
Would Blaine want to hear from someone who broke his heart? Would the letter convince Blaine to get back together with the actor? Everybody had noticed Blaine was in good spirits lately. Well, minus the issue he had with Kurt's contract. Jeremiah could very well derail that progress.
His instinct was to call his dad and ask his advice, but from the sounds of it he already thought Kurt was too invested in Blaine's life. Rachel would probably blab the information to someone in the cast of her latest play. Santana would tell him to read it and find Jeremiah's Achilles heel. David, Trent, Jeff and Nick were too close to the situation. So who did that leave?
He picked up his cell phone from beside the letter and dialed Mercedes' number. She had flown over a few days prior to prepare the guys for the NTAs now that their period of absence in the public eye was over. After a brief conversation, Mercedes hung up and soon was rapping her knuckles on Kurt's hotel room door.
"How long have you been working with the guys?" Kurt began when she'd settled on his bed.
"Two years next month. Why?"
Kurt fidgeted with the hem of his sleep shirt. "I was pretending to be Blaine's plus one last night – there was a seating plan screw up – and at the after party, Jeremiah cornered me."
"You mean, Blaine's Jeremiah?" Mercedes grimaced. "... Oh."
"Yeah. Oh."
"Is that the problem? Baby, did he hurt you? Cos' if he did-"
"No," Kurt assured her, startled she'd jump to that conclusion. He picked up the envelope and placed it between them on the bed. "He gave me this and asked me to pass it on to Blaine. And I don't know-"
"- whether you should give it to Blaine, burn it, or let someone else know," she concluded for him.
"Help me!"
She turned the envelope over in her hands, stroking her finger across the singer's name.
"Honestly? I wouldn't give it to Blaine," she said.
"Really?"
"Hell to the no. That man," she shuddered. "I only ever caught snippets of the crap Jeremiah put Blaine through. You'd be amazed what people talk about in front of Sugar and I, when she's doing their make-up and I'm dressing them. He wasn't… good to Blaine. We were all kind of relieved when Jeremiah was caught with his dick up another guy's ass."
Mercedes gasped and covered her mouth with her hands, eyes wide and panicked. "Please tell me you already knew about that?"
Kurt could only gawp at her. "…Okay, I already knew about that."
"Damn!" Mercedes planted her face in the duvet. "Forget I said anything. I shouldn't even know."
"But how do you know? Not even Quinn could tell me that much."
"Sugar's got this way of getting people to talk to her." Mercedes' voice was muffled by the duvet. "And she nearly always blabs it to me after they're gone, sometimes she doesn't even wait. I think Jeff let the cheating information slip."
"And the rest of it?"
Mercedes straightened up again and shook her head. "I'm sorry, baby; I shouldn't have told you even one secret. Blaine might tell you eventually. Until then, just know that Jeremiah was never good for him. Don't let him fool you with the nice-guy routine. He's not."
"Okay," Kurt acquiesced, although 'nice' wasn't the word Kurt would have used to describe Jeremiah last night. Oily, perhaps. Arrogant fit him nicely too.
"Aside from Jeremiah drama, how was the rest of the evening?" Mercedes asked. "I'm sorry I didn't see you, I had to leave right after the guys performed."
"It's okay. The whole evening was really awkward though." He wrinkled his nose. "Like, I was running after Blaine the entire time, trying to keep him away from all these guys I know he's slept with. Which didn't work because the seating plan was messed up. And then Chandler Keihl was hovering over me like a puppy, and that Sebastian guy tried to proposition Blaine at the after party, and with the Jeremiah thing too, it was just… tiring."
"Sebastian Smythe was there?"
"Oh yeah," Kurt griped. "That was a lovely encounter. The guy's an actual asshole. He made me so angry my teeth hurt. You know what I mean?"
"He's also the son of the CEO of Canary Records, so you might want to keep that opinion to yourself at the offices," Mercedes warned.
Kurt's mouth hung open in disbelief. "You're kidding, right?"
"I wish I was. Our lives would be a lot simpler if he wasn't."
"What do you mean?"
"Well, Jonathan Smythe introduced Blaine to Sebastian," she explained. Kurt leaned forward in his interest. "There was this big dinner a few years back that all of the artists signed to the label were invited to. Blaine and Sebastian were sat next to each other and they hung out a few times afterwards from what I can tell. Somewhere along the line Sebastian introduced Blaine to Jeremiah, and everything went to hell from there."
"Sebastian knows Jeremiah?"
"Sebastian grew up with Jeremiah," Mercedes corrected. "They've been best friends pretty much since birth."
"But, Blaine's slept with Sebastian, right?" Kurt said, trying to arrange this new information in an order that made sense. "That's why I was trying to keep them apart last night. Was that before or after Jeremiah and Blaine were a thing?"
"Oh, that was definitely after." Mercedes' laugh was humorless. "It's the one hook up I know Blaine is ashamed of. I don't think he even remembers it. Blaine was drinking more after Jeremiah and he really can't hold it. But the guys gave him so much shit for it for weeks after, and he's never truly lived it down."
"Sebastian hooked up with his best friend's ex? What the hell kind of friend- actually, you know what, we shouldn't be talking about this." Kurt picked up the envelope and smoothed out a triangle that had folded over in the top left corner. "It's Blaine's business. I shouldn't even be asking. I'm sorry."
"No, you're right," Mercedes agreed. "So about the letter…"
"You think I should give the letter to Wes," Kurt summed up.
"I think that would be better, if it's not a conflict or anything," Mercedes confirmed. "Have you read it?"
"No," Kurt said. "It's sealed and not addressed to me, so it wouldn't be right."
Mercedes surveyed him, her smile fond. "I see why..." she murmured to herself.
"See why, what?"
"Why he likes you," she clarified. "I better go. The guys are on that late night talk show tonight to announce the next album's release date. What's it called?"
"Alan Carr: Chatty Man," Kurt said, without even pulling up his schedule.
"I need them to choose something to wear. We've had a lot of designers sending their clothes for them, and I need to know which ones I need to send back sooner rather than later. Can you make sure they're with me by 10.30, please?"
She kissed Kurt on the cheek when he nodded his assent and slipped from his hotel room. Kurt took a deep breath, the silence suddenly uncomfortable, like the walls were trying to listen as he dialed the number for Wes and held the phone to his ear.
"Hi, Wes. It's Kurt. I've got something to give to you, and I don't think you're going to like it."
Kurt heaved a sigh of relief when he finally shut Wes' hotel room door behind him. Who knew one tiny envelope could cause so much drama?
Thirty-three minutes he'd been questioned about the envelope: What had he been doing at the time it came into his possession? Why hadn't he brought it straight to Wes? Who else knew about it? Had he opened it? What had Jeremiah said?
"In exact details please. Full disclosure is imperative," Wes said.
Imperative? Anybody would think it was a national security issue, the way the manager was reacting. All Kurt knew for sure was that he'd had the overwhelming desire to scoff at the entire situation. Laugh. If for no other reason than to stave off his growing irritation.
Surely this was pointless mollycoddling? Blaine wasn't a child anymore. He could look after himself and make grown up decisions. When were his team going to catch on to this?
Kurt decided to take the stairs back down to his room, in the hope the exercise would work off the irritable energy simmering beneath his skin. He heard the sniffling before he'd even rounded the corner and spotted her, Quinn, perched on the stairs just above his floor. She was hunched over her legs, iPhone clasped in front of her.
"Quinn?"
Quinn grasped at the handrail flanking the stairwell and hauled herself to her feet. Her hand swiped at her face distractedly, pink in the cheeks from being caught in a vulnerable state.
"Go away, Kurt," she said, and turned to climb up the stairs. Her heel caught on the edge of a step and she fell forwards, only just stopping herself whacking her chin on the steps with her hands flat against the wood.
"Woah woah, Quinn."
Kurt took the remaining stairs down two at a time to help her, but she tore away from his grip and stumbled up to the landing he'd come down from.
"Go away. You didn't see this," she hissed.
"No, no, of course not." Kurt took another step down the stairs to reassure her. "I won't say a word."
She wiped at her bloodshot eyes again and smoothed her shoulder length golden hair back into place, readjusting the headband which kept her bangs out of her eyes. She nodded defiantly and turned to head round the corner.
"Quinn?" Kurt asked hesitantly
"What?"
"Are you okay?"
"Just peachy."
And then she was gone from his sight, heels clip clopping against the wooden stairs. Kurt continued on his way, mind buzzing with brand new questions. He spotted her iPhone from the corner of his eye, in the exact spot she'd been moments before.
Scooping it up, he was surprised to find that not only had it not locked itself, a picture was still on display. He made to shut the phone off but paused to study the little girl captured with a little smile. She couldn't be any older than five or six, with long blonde hair fashioned into two plaits. Ribbons tied them at the ends, framing her chubby, rosy cheeks. It struck him how oddly familiar her almond-shaped brown eyes were. Not that he could place them.
Beneath the picture was a simple message:
Look who misses you! - Beth.
He carried the phone to his room, thinking it would only rile Quinn up if he followed after her now. Even to hand the phone back to her.
The message was from somebody called Shelby, so the picture had to be of Beth. Who was Beth to Quinn? Was she a mother? An aunt? An older sister? He knew so little about her outside of their work duties, he realized. Where in the US was she even from?
This is wrong. He shouldn't be snooping, especially after he'd refrained from doing so to Blaine. She deserved the same courtesy. Locking the phone, he was considering how to return it to her without actually going up there, when someone banged on his door three times.
Puzzled, he peeked through the spyhole. It was Blaine.
"Hey," Kurt said, opening the door. "I was just about to see if anyone could give this back to-"
"-Who the hell do you think you are?" Blaine snarled.
"I-" The hand holding the phone fell limply to his side. "What?"
"Next time you're given a letter to pass onto me, hand it over to me! Messages from people I know in my personal life are nothing to do with my fucking team. Especially not Wes, Kitty, Quinn or anyone who works for Canary Records. Least of all, you."
Kurt took a step back, frightened by the cold fury in Blaine's eyes. They were almost black, the golden warmth he was used to twinkling back at him, barely rimming his pupils.
"Blaine, I-" Oh god, he was right. He was so right. "I'm sorry, I - I didn't know what to do with it. Jeremiah didn't give me a chance to refuse it and everyone told me to give it to Wes," Kurt hurried to explain.
"And it didn't occur to you that maybe that letter might have contained something I wouldn't want them to see? Fuck, Kurt, if you had brains you'd be dangerous-" He cut himself off. "I can't believe I thought I could trust you."
"You can trust me!" Kurt said shrilly. "I took some bad advice. I didn't mean to upset you."
Blaine shook his head at Kurt, shoulders slumped, fists clenched at his sides. "Just... stay away from me. If I need to be somewhere, send me a text."
"Blaine, please…"
He wasn't listening. As he watched Blaine stomp away and jam his finger into the elevator call button, Kurt slumped against the door frame and banged his head against the flat edge of the wood. He felt like he'd been slapped across the face. Hard.