Songbird

Summary: Blaine's a young songwriter who's stuck in a rut. Kurt's an independent cyborg with music software installed. Blaine knows that Kurt could totally be his meal ticket if he'd just freaking cooperate for once. Kurt just wants Blaine to understand that he's not just a machine, even if that means sitting back and letting him flounder. AU, Klaine.

Disclaimer: Not a chance.

AN: Sorry for the delay with this chapter! Real life caught up with me a bit, and then I got stuck in a little bit of a slump with how exactly I wanted things to go. Thank you all so much for your feedback and comments on the last chapter, I really appreciate it.

I hope you enjoy this one!

Chapter Ten: Starstruck

There were many things that Blaine had come to expect in mid-December. He liked to think that he was prepared for about anything this time of year living on the third floor as he was: early Christmas cards from family and the occasional friend and the even more occasional friend of the family, solicitors who wanted to know if he'd found the Lord, anyone who wanted to sell him a vacuum.

This wasn't to say that he was expecting the knock on his door at eight that snowy morning but he hadn't not been expecting it either.

He hadn't been expecting to open his door and see a veritable herd of people whom he'd never met before, all of whom were looking at him as if they'd known him all their lives.

The weirdest part about it was that they were all girls.

"Um…hi?" Blaine greeted hesitantly, covertly stepping into the middle of his doorframe in case one of them happened to be crazy or a murdering burglar or something.

"Hello there," a rather short, curvy dark girl stepped forward and thrust out her hand for him to shake, "You must be Blaine." Blaine had literally just opened his mouth to respond before she shot him a look and barreled on, "Kurt's told us all about you. I'm Mercedes Jones, and we're here to pick you up."

Funny, Blaine hadn't known that he'd had any sort of plans in the slightest…

"G'morning, Pride Parade—"

"Oh my God, Sanny!"

That was a voice he knew and Blaine whipped his head around just in time to notice that a gorgeous Latina had knocked on Kurt's door and that the taller boy had flung it open, sounding shocked and delighted as he threw his arms around her neck. And then it was a stampede to crowd around him, to exchange hugs and kisses and greetings. Mercedes stood back with Blaine, a funny little smile on her face.

"So, Kurt and I were talking last night," she began conversationally, "And we made plans to go shopping this morning. Turns out that the reverse Oreo trio over there decided that they were going to surprise him and asked me not to tell him they were in town before we all popped over. And what a coincidence, Kurt just so happened to mention as well that it would be fun if somehow it was arranged for you to come along too," Her smile widened and Blaine wasn't sure whether he felt like there was an omen or a blessing in his future, "Well, put two and two together. We've wanted to meet you anyway. And so here you are. You in?"

Kurt was too wrapped up to notice Blaine half-hidden in his doorway with Mercedes, soaking in the bright smile and unashamed volume in his voice.

He didn't think he could have refused if he tried.

"Yeah," he said without blinking and sealed the deal, covertly catching a low slap of Mercedes' palm on his.

"Good answer," she replied smugly, before calling out, "I know you're not gonna hang all over those girls and not so much as say hello to me, mister."

Not half a second later was Kurt flailing across the breezeway to half-tackle her, twirling her around and stopping just short of bumping into a wall.

"'Cedes, I know we just talked last night but good lord have I missed you," he said softly, dropping a kiss to her cheek and receiving one in return. "So much."

"Me too, boy, me too. And look what we found," Mercedes said breezily, pointing her thumb in Blaine's direction. "One short white boy who's probably going to get frostbite if he doesn't put some shoes on within the next thirty seconds, for your leisure and shopping pleasure."

Oh, hey. Come to think of it, everyone was actually wearing shoes. Kurt was not only wearing shoes, he was wearing knee-high lace-up boots, a scarf, and that awesome Burberry jacket. Blaine, on the other hand, hadn't thought too much about the cold until it was mentioned and then all of a sudden he was freezing, flying back inside to find something warm to wear that might be halfway matching. He missed Kurt's look of surprise and he missed Mercedes lean forward and say smugly into her best friend's ear, "Merry Christmas, honey."

Kurt had never once been kidding when he'd said that his friends were insane. Oh, Blaine often laughed it off and thought about Wes and David, thinking that there was no way that Kurt could beat that kind of crazy. No way at all.

There had always been several problems with that assessment.

One, Wes and David were both guys. They were insane but they were insane in a similar way and for similar reasons, complementing one another in their insanity.

Two, Wes and David were only two.

Three, Wes and David have been crazy, but they were the private school kind of crazy.

Kurt, on the other hand, had six best friends, all of whom were girls, five of whom were currently packed into Kurt's car, and all of whom were completely insane in completely different ways. They had survived public school, they could survive a nuclear war if they had to using only their abs and Rachel's dog whistle pitch. Mercedes immediately claimed shotgun and so Blaine had been pulled in between Santana and Quinn.

Kurt had offhandedly warned them to be nice, and they looked disappointed, Santana dropping her hand from where it had it threatened to start rubbing circles into his collarbone.

"You're lucky," Kurt threw back from the driver's seat, "If Rachel hadn't decided to spend the day sucking face with Finn, she'd have probably claimed your lap."

If that wasn't the most terrifying thought that Blaine had ever been faced with, he wasn't sure what was. He already felt like he'd been thrown into the lion's den after being rubbed with raw steak.

"You know, Kurt –please don't do that, Santana, I'm not food- so much about you makes so much more sense right now."

Santana looked mildly disappointed but shrugged, lacing her fingers with Brittany's instead and squeezing. Blaine caught Kurt's face in the rearview mirror and he wasn't sure what was scarier: the fact that he was seconds away from bursting into peals of laughter again or the fact that he looked entirely unsurprised by Blaine's assessment.

"I did warn you, you realize. But now is not the time for thinking. Now is the time for war."

Blaine gulped.

"I am in heaven," Kurt was declaring two hours later, several shopping bags already hanging in the crook of his elbow. He'd lost Santana and Brittany somewhere in Frederick's of Hollywood (no, thank you) and Tina had been abandoned when she'd succumbed to the lure of hot pretzels. Quinn and Mercedes flanked him as he looked Blaine up and down.

"I'm happy that my suffering brings you such joy," Blaine quipped in reply. The words were harsh but his tone was good-natured and he held a bag of his own. "I'm surprised that you lower yourself to shop at the mall like us plebes, Fashion King."

Kurt smiled at him and stepped forward, holding up an oversized sweater to Blaine's frame, scrutinizing it.

"I'm not sure about this one. Besides, I've said it before, it's not always about what you wear, but how you rock it. Clothing doesn't have to be expensive to look good –it does often-" he amended with an imperious shake of his head, "But if you know what to look for, you can absolutely dress well on a budget. There's cheap and then there's, well, cheap. Just pull this on, I want to see how it looks."

Blaine rolled his eyes a little but nonetheless pulled on the sweater.

Kurt hesitated for the slightest moment before stepping closer, experienced hands reaching out to tug the fabric gently into place, stepping back to look at it from a distance. Just the simple gesture of adjusting his clothing had his heart pounding, and Kurt hoped that he wasn't going red already.

He was.

"I like it, but," he broke off, narrowing his eyes, "Blaine, do you like it? You can say no, you know. I won't be offended, you are allowed to have opinions."

Blaine glanced down at himself and then into the adjacent mirror, tilting his head this way and that, nibbling on his lip.

"It's not…really my thing," he finally said, and Kurt shrugged.

"Sad, but that's how it goes sometimes, outstretching a hand to take the garment and place it back on its hanger.

"You ought to get this boy a scarf," Mercedes insisted, "He looks like a scarf kind of a guy."

Kurt had just opened his mouth to say that no, he was the scarf guy out of the two of them when Quinn began to nod, a secretive smile curling at her lips.

"Oh, definitely. Mercedes is absolutely correct."

That cinched it.

Kurt didn't know how and he didn't know when but he definitely knew what and why, and he knew that Mercedes Jones and Quinn Fabray were plotting. Not just plotting either, plotting about him and absolutely plotting about Blaine, and Kurt shot them both a glare that said clearly I know what you're doing, stop it right now. Both girls shot him identical smiles and Kurt suppressed a shiver.

"I think that Mercedes and I are going to go find Satan and Brit. You guys go look at scarves."

And then they were gone and Kurt was left alone with Blaine, who looked just about as confused as Kurt felt.

"Is that normal, or is it as weird as it feels?" He asked, furrowing his brows. Kurt sighed.

"Oh, it's weird alright, even for them."

"Should I be scared?"

"Probably. I am," the younger boy muttered, picking at invisible lint on his jacket because somehow everything had gone according to their plan and he'd been left alone with Blaine. In the local mall. At ten in the morning. A hand absently reached down to pat his pocket and – Kurt groaned. Of course. Somehow, Mercedes had made off with his keys, too.

"What should we do?" Blaine asked. Kurt shrugged again.

"Screw it. Let's go look at scarves."

"It seems kind of like walking into a trap—"

Kurt just rolled his eyes and reached out to take Blaine by the wrist, pulling him along.

"Once again, probably. But they're relatively harmless and if you can't beat 'em, join 'em. Or at least lower the suffering factor."

"By walking into a trap?"

"Exactly."

So at this point, Kurt had officially given up on reining in his intense like for Blaine in favor of trying to hammer into his head the concept that it was okay to take pride in one's alma mater but that yes, there were other colors in the spectrum besides red and blue. It was disconcerting enough to be expecting…something, anything, and finding nothing, but he'd realized he had a bigger problem when the first thing Blaine touched was a baby poop green monstrosity with knitted tassles and pompoms.

No.

No, this could not be allowed.

Everyone was entitled to something dubious (read: Tina and her propensity for clip-in hair extensions bought from the local Dark 'N Gloomy), but this was too much.

"How about this one?" Blaine asked, and Kurt cringed.

"It is primary orange, boy. Even if that color did look good on anyone, you own nothing that it would go with."

Blaine rolled his eyes at the assessment but nevertheless returned the scarf to its rack, shaking his head.

"Kurt, let's face it. You are much more qualified for this than I am."

"Do you wish you hadn't come?"

The words were out of Kurt's mouth before he could stop them and he wished more than anything that he could have taken them back. Blaine's eyes had widened. Kurt flinched. He knew better than to ask a question he didn't want to know the answer to, really, he did.

"No, never mind. Please don't answer that."

"Why would you think I didn't want to come?" Blaine asked after a moment's quiet, looking a little blindsided. "Yeah, I'm not all good at the color matching thing and I don't know why your friends thought I'd be the scarf guy, but I'm having a good time. Especially when I get to make you look like you swallowed a goldfish." And I get to spend the day with you. Kurt bit his lip.

"It's just…I'm having a lot of fun. But I don't want to if you're not having fun too. And my friends have been kind of yanking you around and messing with you all morning and we just sort of dragged you out at the crack of dawn—"

He cut off when Blaine took a step closer and reached out a hand, patting his cheek.

"Don't worry," he said firmly, "If I'm unhappy, you'll know."

Kurt lost his battle to lean against that touch like a cat.

"If you get bored, tell me though, okay?"

"Sure, okay."

The store was quiet and almost empty despite the looming of Christmas on the horizon. It was interesting, for all that they did together, the hanging out and the playing video games and the programming and the songwriting, they actually very rarely went out together, not like this and not usually during the day. With a shifty glance around him, Kurt slipped his hand into his bag and pulled out his mp3 player, upping the volume and draping the headphones around his neck so that the strains of music could just be heard over the sound of clinking hangers.

The silence went comfortable, and Kurt jolted when Blaine twined something around his neck. He glanced down and scowled.

"How dare you," he muttered, "Have you been holding out on me or did you just get lucky?" He picked up the end of the scarf wrapped around his neck and surveyed it, eyes taking in the mingling of green and blue and yellow. The softness of the threads tingled on his skin. "Can't match colors, my ass."

"Ah ah ah," Blaine replied, waggling a finger, "Still your doing. These are the colors in your apartment. If there was a sound effect for the act of my purposefully stroking your ego, what do you think it would be?"

Kurt smirked at him.

"Probably the words coming out of your mouth right now."

"Oh. I can handle that," Blaine mused and Kurt unwrapped his neck, fingers absently running patterns into the fabric. The itchy feeling in his hands was back, the one that made him way too aware that he wanted to reach out and do something. What that something was Kurt had little idea, but had the sinking feeling that in a perfect world, it would probably lead to him pushing Blaine up against a wall and kissing him senseless without having to escape to another country afterward. "Are you okay? You're all red."

Kurt reeled back, heat rising in his cheeks.

"I'm fine!" he declared forcefully, "Absolutely fabulous."

"As always?"

"As always." Kurt might have continued if not for the fact that is brain had caught up with his mouth, and he bit his lower lip. Treacherous, treacherous mouth. Blaine didn't seem to notice his internal monologue, thankfully. "Hey, Blaine?"

Aw, crap.

"Yeah?" the shorter boy replied.

"N-nevermind."

The ceiling was awesome, Kurt decided, twisting his hands together behind his back. He really had to get a better control on himself, otherwise he'd be blabbing to the world next about his intense attraction to Blaine Anderson, and that was only second-worst to blabbing to the man himself.

"O…kay," Blaine's eyes lingered on him a little longer than usual and Kurt squirmed. Blaine's eyes narrowed before he stepped forward, slinging an arm around his friend's shoulders. Immediately, he was tense. That was weird. "Did you get a chance to eat?" he asked suddenly, "I didn't. Let's go hunt down some breakfast. Lunch. Whatever,"

"I think the term is brunch," Kurt replied, setting the scarf back onto its rack.

"You're not going to get any of these?"

"Not sure yet, I'll think on it and see how I feel later. Besides, the thought of foiling whatever sort of plan my girlfriends cooked up is high on my priority list."

"You know what's high on my priority list?"

"Hmmm?"

"A very, very large cinnamon roll."

A warm, sweet, gooey, unrollable cinnamon roll. High in carbs, sugar, and likely to go straight to his hips.

"That might be the best idea I've ever heard in my life."

A cinnamon roll might have been the best idea that anyone had ever had ever, but a cinnamon roll by itself couldn't quite beat sharing one with Blaine, who kept drizzling more and more sugar glaze over it until neither of them could even see the roll anymore for the veritable ocean of sugary goodness and extra cinnamon.

"Ten bucks say Santana and Brittany got kicked out of the lingerie store for being inappropriate."

Kurt snorted and sent stink eye across the table at Blaine.

"Four years of high school with those two. I am nowhere near stupid enough to take that bet. How could you tell that they were…?" Kurt fumbled for words and Blaine shrugged.

"Involved? I dunno, gaydar? Or maybe it was the fact that when we were all walking together, Santana had her hand on Brit's butt the whole time? You'd have to be blind to miss that."

"The double standard of the whole thing reeks," Kurt muttered, slightly huffy. "Two guys want to hold hands in public and everyone averts their eyes and thinks that the devil's upon us. A girl walks by actively groping her girlfriend and everyone thinks it's the hottest thing since the Sahara Desert. Not sure whether I ought to be offended as a gay guy or as a man in general."

Blaine's brain never had a chance to catch up before he thoughtlessly leaned over the table and brushed his lips to Kurt's cheek.

"Not quite an asspat, but—oh, oops."

Kurt's jaw had dropped the moment Blaine had kissed him and now all he could do was stare in shock, pink rising high on his cheekbones. It seemed like the entire food court had missed the whole thing but Blaine was floundering, recoiling slightly and raising his hands in surrender.

"Oh my god, Kurt, I am so sorry. Please don't be pissed at me—"

"Sticky," Kurt declared.

Blaine froze.

"…huh?"

"Your lips were sticky, and now my cheek is sticky too. What are you going to do about it?" His voice held a challenge and Blaine shifted, openly confused at why he wasn't getting pummeled into the ground.

"Ummm… I'm going to offer you my napkin and plead eternal forgiveness. "Blaine gulped, going a little pale. "And if it won't get me beaten up, ask you out to dinner, but not for forgiveness. Just…just because I want to."

It was Kurt's turn to still this time, staring Blaine steadily in the eyes. He could feel his head swimming just a little bit as if he couldn't quite believe that he'd really heard what he thought he'd heard. He couldn't possibly have heard what he'd thought he'd heard. But he must have, because Blaine was watching him with a look of stark terror and still waiting for a response.

A response.

From him.

About a date.

"You mean what I think you mean…right?"

"If what you're thinking that what I mean is that I want to go on a date with you, then yes."

Freezing, then something clicked, and Kurt was feeling the most potent elation he thought he'd ever experienced in his life.

And then Blaine found himself with an armful of Kurt, uncaring of the fact that now people were watching, flinging his arms around him and squeezing him tight.

"Yes!" the taller boy exclaimed emphatically into Blaine's neck, and Blaine could feel the smile on his face. "Yes, yes, yes, yes, definitely yes!"

Finally, he pulled away, realizing with a jolt that yeah, they were totally in public and that might be just a little bit of a problem with this crowd. The cinnamon roll was gone though, and Kurt's heart felt like it was going to explode with happiness.

"Shall we go find my girls?" he asked, unable to subdue his smile in the slightest, "They might be wondering why their plot went awry."

"Somehow, I feel like their plot went exactly as they wanted it to."

As Blaine got up to join him and laced their hands together, he eyed the proud, imperious look on his maybe-soon-to-be-boyfriend's face and the way a simple sway of his hips screamed out yeah, you'd better be jealous just as blatantly as Santana's had, walking fearlessly.

Blaine knew better than to try and emulate that sway, but he thought maybe, just maybe the half smug, half over the moon smile the curled at his lips did the same thing just as well.

AN2: YES, THANK GOD THEY'RE FINALLY GETTING SOMEWHERE. I thought that the angsty chapters were hardest, but they had nothing on this one, my goodness. I hope you liked it! Please review if you liked it or even if you hated it, praise and criticism are a writer's life blood.