Thursday: Never Looking Back

It was quite clear from the outset on Tuesday that Kurt was having transition troubles. There were some things that were obviously easy - like being instantly popular. Blaine remembered how it was to go from the bottom right to the top at a speed that rivaled hopping on a rocket ship. He'd practically gotten whiplash. Kurt was faring better with being an instant starlet, but then again Kurt had transferred in before his old school had almost completely destroyed him. Blaine felt a bit of prideful heroism seeing that smile on his friend's face every time someone ran up to give him a high five. Kurt definitely wasn't scared of anyone here.

There were other things that were definitely a struggle. Maybe Blaine's assertion that a jacket was all he needed hadn't quite been accurate. So Blaine had started in on the efforts of trying to guide Kurt into the Warblers and show him how to blend. Which would have been a lot easier had Kurt been, well, talking to him.

Aside from their conversation about solos, Kurt had barely even noticed him it seemed. Sure sometimes he caught the kid looking at him from across the room or down the hall but there wasn't any talking. Not even on their phones. He'd had to find out the reason for Kurt's transfer from Mercedes. Not even Mercedes herself - he'd stumbled on it from her Facebook. From a very public and unabashed status about homophobes at McKinley. Which had been shared from Rachel's wall. Which meant that she hadn't even been the one to write it. He liked Mercedes, of course. And Rachel, what he knew of her. But that was something he'd absolutely expected Kurt to tell him himself.

Blaine had definitely tried to call and text Kurt, but he'd never gotten a response. In theory, it would make sense for Kurt to be a bit more withdrawn. That was what he himself had done when he transferred here. Except Kurt wasn't withdrawn. He was making friends left and right. Everyone was fascinated by him. Everyone wanted to know more about him.

So on Wednesday Blaine had thought maybe he was just hanging out with new friends, getting to know this new place and meeting all the new people. He knew that the Juniors had decided to have a get together, maybe that's where Kurt was. Hanging out with his new classmates.

Until he'd found out that no, Kurt hadn't gone to that. Apparently he'd gone straight home and holed up in his room for the night. If his new brother was accurate, and seeing as Mr. Hummel didn't seem to be too tight on curfew and where the boys could go Blaine highly doubted that he had to pretend to be home then sneak out.

So Kurt was actively ignoring and avoiding him. It stung. It also made the fact that he didn't really know his 'new best friend' that well very clear. Which double-y reinforced Blaine's decision to not date this one. Even though Kurt was oh so beautiful. If he had capitalized on all those evenings they had had over the last month and asked for a 'real date' or tried to kiss Kurt, then this right now would probably have broken them up. Maybe. Blaine didn't like being ignored. Especially when he thought that he and Kurt had something special. As friends. They were definitely just friends. Nothing more.

It hurt so bad because they were on the verge of a real true deep life-long kind of friendship. That was all.

He was supposed to be Kurt's confidant and protector. He was supposed to matter. Kurt had been coming to him for help for the last month. That was their entire relationship! Kurt came to him. He got Kurt to smile that beautiful smile again, they had some fun, gossiped a lot about everything, and then they started it all over the next day. And it wasn't that Kurt didn't have problems at Dalton. He definitely did. But they weren't bullying problems.

Was that the problem? Was that all their friendship was? Was he...being used?

No. No no. Kurt was not like that. Not from what everyone else had said. Then again everyone else hadn't been helping him with Karofsky.

Thursday found Blaine spending his study hall by himself trying to stay calm. He was quite a dramatic person all in all, and he knew it. He was overthinking things. Kurt was just adjusting. It was odd, sure, that he didn't turn to his friend and confidant and person who knew him best within these walls and could probably help him the best. But maybe this was how Kurt just dealt with things. After all he had turned to someone who wasn't in his school to deal with Karofsky. Yeah.

Psyched up, he hurried out of study hall as their shared lunch period began. "Ok Kurt," he announced, linking their arms and not leaving his friend any room to get out of it. "We are going to the Lima Bean. It is high time you were introduced to the most traditional of Warbler traditions. Midday coffee."

"Oh so that's how you always manage to have a constant pep in your step."

"Precisely. And seeing as you haven't been partaking I'm actually shocked that you manage it too. Do you hide pixie dust in that hair of yours?"

"They don't let us have coffee at McKinley. We have to energize ourselves in other ways. Like singing."

"Speaking of singing-"

"I have been practicing, every lunch and every study hall."

"Is it supposed to be a surprise even for me?" His friend's shoulder just lifted up in a shrug. "Is that what you've been doing after school too?"

"...No. I've been, uhm, studying. I have to catch up in all these new classes and forget half of what I was learning at McKinley because apparently its not even going to be discussed here. Catcher in the Rye? Nope - we're reading Frankenstein. Which I actually do like a whole lot more." Good. Casual conversation, no shrugging off. This was good. "Which I still need to read five more chapters in to be caught up."

"Can't you use sparknotes or something like that?"

"Are you really suggesting I cheat!" He held his hand up to his chest and winked at Blaine, feigning insult.

"I'm just saying no one will blame you if you cut a few innocent corners just so long as the results are the same, at least until you start a new chapter or section in each class. Do you have your keys?"

"Always. This not having a locker thing is really weird."

"You get used to it." They had copies of all their books available in each classroom, and the library, and there were sets to take home as needed. The school was essentially an old estate so it wasn't exactly built to have lockers, and no one had ever wanted to mar the beautiful design by adding them in. So they'd compensated at no cost to the students.

"I do like it."

Everything was just fine. Kurt was just fine. It made sense too, his excuses. Of course he had to study. Of course he was practicing for his audition.

So why was he so tense? He pulled away as soon as Blaine let go of him. His back stayed straighter than ever before whenever Blaine was around. And it was just Blaine. The shorter teen watched as Kurt drove them there, nibbling on that soft lip the entire time. It was a nervous thing. He was going to put a hole in it if he didn't stop and the whole lip piercing thing just didn't seem like it would suit his face. The worst part was that Blaine couldn't figure out how he was going to bring it up.

"Kurt."

"Hm?"

"You don't really like Dalton, do you?"

"What? Why would you say that of course I like Dalton. It's beautiful. It's a dream. And there's no Karofsky. And...you're here. We can hang out whenever we want now."

"Yeah, and we haven't hung out since your transfer. Not once."

"...Well, I have been busy. Studying. Practicing. And practice with everyone else too. And I still have a job. It's rough."

"We can study together, if you'd like. I might be a year behind you but I know what the teachers are looking for. Maybe I can help. And I'm really good at math. Like, really good. We're both in Geometry right?"

"We are."

"Yeah. So maybe we can help each other out at least in that."

"I'm not really having trouble with keeping up in Geometry. That's the same no matter where you go, more or less."

He was so calm about it. So cool, in fact. As he leaned back, crossed his leg nonchalantly over his knee, and sipped at his coffee. It was so effortless for him. He was effortless. Blaine felt small next to his friend. It must have been so nice to be so confident. This was the real Kurt when he was free of terror. Or maybe Blaine was just being too dramatic. As usual. That was probably more accurate.

"Kurt, I'm trying to find ways for us to hang out! It's like you don't even want to spend time with me anymore."

"Of course I want to spend time with you!"

"I haven't seen you in days. You don't even text me anymore."

"...We see each other all the time. We go to the same school now. We can just...talk. Like this." Kurt lifted his coffee up in a mock toast.

"But we don't."

"...sure we do." Blaine pressed his palms down against the cool table.

"We talked more often when I only got to see you after school." He watched as his friend put the coffee down and folded his hands down in front of him. It was hard to tell whether Kurt was mad or about to confess something. Judging by how his eyes weren't narrowed but in fact turned away, affixed to the floor, Blaine guessed the latter. "I miss you, ok? I've had a lot of friends but...you feel like the first friend who actually honestly just gets me, without much effort at all. I really like that."

"We...we're still friends Blaine. I just. I…" The younger teen edged his chair slightly around the table to be just a little bit closer.

"Talk to me, Kurt. Please. I'm still here for you. If anything is wrong, I am here to help you. That's what friends are for."

"It's so hard to face you knowing that I failed, ok?"

"What?"

"I failed, Blaine. I completely failed. I tried so hard to win so I wouldn't have to run away. You said how you always regretted running away so I was trying not to and I didn't make it. I had to run too."

"Oh." This was about their friendship. Just not in the way he'd expected it to be. "There's no shame in having to leave, you know that right? What I regretted was never the running part so much as the not trying at all part. When...when things got rough at my school, the only thing I did was talk to the teachers. When they didn't do anything, I begged my mom to let me transfer, and she did. You did so much more than that. You stood your ground, you dug in and tried to keep ahold of what you wanted in life. I let my old life go so easily. But...then again my old school wasn't exactly something worth fighting for. You have so much more to lose that doing this, being here right now in our uniform, that makes you a hero. You're fighting to stay alive because you deserve a life free of the fear of being killed just for going to class every day."

The edges of their hands pressed up against each other. There was definitely some electricity there but Blaine didn't dare make a move on it. This was his best friend. He couldn't lose this. "I just feel like I've let you down," his friend whispered.

"No. I'm proud of you. I am so glad that I know you and that you're sitting here right now. You know I wanted you to transfer two months ago-"

"You didn't even know me two months ago."

"That doesn't matter. What does matter is that beyond all these regrets, something out there in the great wide universe decided that I needed to transfer to Dalton last year so that I could have the luck of being the boy you asked for help from on those stairs."

"Yeah, they're called bullies."

"Bullies, or fate?"

"Fate hm?" Blaine laughed at the adorable red tint that took over his friend's cheeks.

"Yes, fate. And maybe that fate brought you to the Warblers so we could kill at sectionals, regionals, and nationals for the first time in, oh, hm, decades."

"Yeah the age really shows on you guys. You're really going to have to step up your games if you want to beat this new breed of competition."

"I'm sure we'll be just fine. Tradition is a big deal here."

"Tradition is nice, but if there's one thing we all learned from Tevya it's that times will change whether we do or not. We all have to adapt to the world around us. Or was everything that happened to him just fate too?"

"...Ok, ok, you have a point. But I still say that this, this right here?" He motioned casually between their two coffee cups. "This was destiny."

"Some great sky monster just knew you needed someone to have coffee with. Got it. Shouldn't we be getting back before we're late for class? Maybe if I'm all caught up today we can go catch a movie. Or kidnap the TV at my house to watch Moulin Rouge again."

"Now that sounds like a plan."