Chapter 11

Blaine hated having to refrain from touching Kurt at school, but from the stories he'd heard from Kurt, the slushie he had already copped, and his own previous experience, he knew it would be better to keep the PDA to a minimum in order to avoid trouble from his narrow minded classmates.

All caution was left behind in glee club, however, as they entered the choir room together with their hands entwined. Blaine noticed Kurt's friends grinning at them and he hoped that was a sign they approved of their relationship, it would be nice if there were at least some people who supported them.

They sat in their usual seats in the back, dropping their hands but sitting so that their knees were touching, maintaining the gentle physical contact. Kurt adjusted his collar and Blaine glimpsed the red mark he'd left on his neck the night before. He smirked, wondering who else had noticed it throughout the day.

Mr Schue entered and began the lesson, trying to get them to brainstorm 'anthems' for regionals. Blaine was too busy tracing his fingers along Kurt's thigh, reminding him of the night before and seeing how long he could do it before the other boy blushed or swatted his hand away. It was too bad if Kurt wanted to think of ideas, Blaine was having far too much fun distracting his boyfriend.

It was strange for Blaine to call Kurt his boyfriend, he was so different from the guys that had previously had that title. His relationships his previous boyfriends had been mainly physical, with just enough faked emotion to keep the other guy happy. And that was why it was so different with Kurt, Blaine actually shared an emotional connection with Kurt, he actually liked Kurt for more than just physical reasons.

Unfortunately Mr Schue called them out on their inattention. "Kurt, Blaine, do you have any suggestions?" he asked.

"Um, no, I can't really think of anything," Kurt answered, blushing slightly at being called on.

"Neither," Blaine said disinterestedly.

"May I bring the idea of doing original songs up again?" Rachel butted in, then without waiting for a response she continued. "I can't think of a better anthem than something we wrote ourselves. I'm working on my song writing and to help it I'd like to remind you all of the party I'm having this weekend which I hope you can all attend."

"Thank you Rachel, but I think we'll look for more anthems for a bit longer," Mr Schuester politely declined her idea.

Blaine took advantage of the focus being drawn away from them and resumed his tender tracing of Kurt's thigh.

He enjoyed gently teasing Kurt but his fingers stilled when he felt his phone vibrate in his pocket, alerting him of a text message. He pulled it out of the pocket of his jeans to read it.

Tony: How big are your hands? I'm working on the gloves of your suit.

Blaine gritted his teeth and tensed his jaw, his father knew he would be at school. Not that he would admit it, but Blaine actually quite enjoyed working on his suit with his father. He did not, however, enjoy being reminded of it while he stuck at school in Lima.

Blaine: You know I'm at school, how am I supposed to know how big my hands are?

Tony: They don't have rulers at school?

Blaine ignored his father's sarcastic quip and tried to focus back on the glee lesson. Kurt noticed his boyfriend's tension and reached over to squeeze his hand comfortingly. Blaine squeezed back half-heartedly, making Kurt start to worry.

When the bell signalling the end of the period rang, Blaine was out of the classroom before anyone could notice, hoping Kurt would get swept up by his friends who were curious about their new relationship.

Sam caught up to him at his locker, much to Blaine's annoyance.

"What do you want, Evans?" he snapped.

"Hey man, I'm sorry about last week," Sam apologised.

Blaine was taken aback by the apology, it was the last thing he was expecting. "Uh, right…"

"I shouldn't have said those things I said and I didn't get a chance to apologise until now," Sam said regretfully. "So, I'm sorry."

Blaine nodded, not quite sure what to say. He was still a little bit mad at Sam but his apology sounded sincere enough. "I surprisingly enjoyed my suspension," he shrugged. "It's all good, man."

"Thanks." Sam nodded and smiled at Blaine before disappearing off to his own locker.

Kurt watched Sam go, eyeing him curiously as he walked over to his boyfriend.

"What did he want?"

"To apologise for last week," Blaine explained.

"Good," Kurt nodded. "Who were you texting in glee? You seemed kind of upset."

"It was my Dad," Blaine answered. "He –uh– he needed some help with something." What he and his father were working on was a secret, Blaine was used to having secrets and this was one he definitely wanted to keep.

Kurt was getting used to being able to sense when Blaine was keeping something from him and didn't want to talk about it. He understood that Blaine had many secrets that he probably may never know, but Blaine was slowly opening up to him and he would talk to him in his own time. He needed to show Blaine that he cared, and that he wouldn't forget about him once the novelty wore off.

"Do you want to come over or do something tonight?" Kurt asked.

"Not tonight," Blaine declined. "I've got homework and stuff, and I was going to do some boxing." Blaine really enjoyed spending time with his new boyfriend, but the messages from his father combined with the paranoia that someone was going to do something to him or Kurt had left him in a bad mood. All he wanted to do was go home and box out his frustration alone. "Maybe tomorrow, or this weekend?"

"Sure," Kurt forced a smile.

Blaine glanced around to see if anyone was looking before giving Kurt a farewell kiss.

OoOoOoO

Blaine didn't know why the texts from his father had upset him so much. Maybe it was his father's ignorance that he'd forgotten his son was at school, or maybe it was that the message reminded him of the life he could be living. He could be living in Stark Tower with his father, and as much as they disagreed, Blaine got on a lot better with Tony than with his mother most of the time. He could have been building his own Iron Man suit in one of the best labs in the country, and instead when he got the message he was sitting in a high school choir room in Lima.

Blaine dealt with these feelings the way he always did, by taking it out on his punching bag. The steady pounding of his fists against the bag helped to clear his head, and imagining whoever was annoying him the most at the moment's face on the bag stopped him from hitting their real face. He knew he had self-control issues but he hoped the boxing helped.

His other outlet was music, sometimes finding the right song helped in huge ways. Blaine's iPod was playing on shuffle from a speaker as he hit the punching bag and he was singing along as usual. He paused when one particular song came on that had both the epic feel for regionals and the right words to sum up his feelings.

"Life's too short to even care at all, whoa…"

Blaine performed it for the glee club the next day, his first solo since he auditioned.

"I'm losing my mind, losing my mind, losing control. These fishes in the sea they're staring at me, whoa. Wet world aches for a beat of a drum, whoa."

Kurt watched his boyfriend perform, seeing the emotion in his eyes that only came when he was singing.

"If I could find a way, to see this straight I'd run away, to some fortune that I should have found by now. I'm waiting for this cough syrup, to come down, come down."

Blaine had never been very good at dancing so he just held the microphone stand and moved his body to the beat as he listened to the guitar riff before the second verse.

"Life's too short to even care at all, whoa. I'm coming up now, coming up now, out of the blue, oh. These zombies in the park they're looking for my heart, whoa. And dark world aches for a splash of the sun, whoa."

Kurt didn't know what anyone else would think about the song but there was no denying that Blaine was amazing. The intensity and emotion in his voice was captivating.

"If I could find a way to see this straight I'd run away, to some fortune that I should have found by now, and so I run now to the things they say could restore me, restore life the way it should be, waiting for this cough syrup, to come down."

Blaine visibly relaxed his tensed body as he sung the last line with a hauntingly beautiful quality to his voice.

"One more spoon of cough syrup now, whoa…"

The glee club applauded him and Blaine returned to his seat beside Kurt, who placed an arm around him and squeezed comfortingly.

"That was great, Blaine," Mr Schue commended. "It's definitely a contender, but let's keep looking."

OoOoOoO

Finn approached Blaine in the locker rooms after their shared gym period.

"So you and Kurt are officially dating now?" he asked.

"Yeah," Blaine nodded warily. Finn gave off a weird, almost hostile vibe to Blaine.

"As both Kurt's brother and a member of the glee club, I need to warn you that if you do anything to hurt him, you'll have me to answer to, as well as most of the rest of the glee club."

"I don't plan on hurting Kurt," Blaine said, his jaw tensed.

"Good," Finn replied curtly.

Blaine turned back to his locker and continued changing, stripping his shirt off and shoving it into his bag. He had his clean shirt in hands when he turned around at Finn's gasp.

"What?" he snapped.

"The scar on your back," Finn tried to regather his composure.

"What about it?" Blaine asked defensively, pulling his shirt on and folding his arms across his chest.

"It's really big." Blaine rolled his eyes. "What's it from?"

"Something," Blaine said vaguely, shutting his locker door.

"I just don't want any trouble for Kurt," Finn eyed Blaine suspiciously.

"And I look like trouble?" It wasn't the first time someone had said something like that to Blaine.

"Your history doesn't help," Finn persuaded.

"You have no idea," Blaine chuckled dryly before his expression became more serious. "I don't want to hurt Kurt, and you've gotten your threat across."

"Good," Finn nodded, considered Blaine once more, then returned to his own locker.

OoOoOoO

"Finn gave me the 'if you hurt Kurt you'll have me and the glee club to answer to' speech this morning," Blaine dropped down beside Kurt at his table at lunch.

"I'm sorry about him, he can be kind of overprotective of me sometimes," Kurt apologised for his step-brother.

"I think I can handle him," Blaine smirked. "I've had worse."

"Good," Kurt smiled slightly, "But my Dad'll be way worse once you meet him."

Blaine chewed on his bottom lip, "I don't tend to make good first impressions, but I don't know if I could beat the first time my Mom met you."

Kurt blushed at the memory, "My Dad's more protective than Finn, but he's easier to sway."

"I have enough trouble with my own father, I don't really want to have to worry about yours as well," Blaine said gruffly.

"Then we won't worry about that for a while," Kurt compromised.

Blaine sighed and looked down at his food. "So what'd you think of my number for glee club today?"

"You were amazing, as usual," Kurt grinned, glad of the change in subject.

"It came on when I was boxing last night and it just felt so perfect," Blaine explained. "Mr Shue seemed to like it too."

"Of course he liked it, you were fantastic," he agreed. "When you're singing something like that, the way you lose yourself in the music is so intense and just incredible."

"I'll have to sing more often if you're going to be this nice to me," Blaine laughed.

"I'll be even nicer to you if you come to Rachel's party this weekend," Kurt smirked. "It's going to be so boring without you."

"Then why don't we both blow it off and spend the night at my place? Mom won't take much convincing to get out of the house for the night," Blaine said suggestively.

"But the whole glee club's going," Kurt argued, ignoring how good Blaine's invitation sounded. "There'll be alcohol and it'll be a really good bonding experience for the club." Blaine didn't look convinced. "Come on, please, for me," Kurt gave Blaine his best puppy-dog eyes.

"I'll think about it," he shrugged, avoiding his boyfriend's eyes. "You're not going to win me over by mentioning the people in glee, though the alcohol does sound quite inviting…"

Kurt beamed at his small victory.