Chapter Twenty-One: Wasn't Supposed To Be

It's not like I'd never had a massage before; I'd tried all kinds of exotic spa treatments over the years in various attempts to include myself in new cultures. The day spa in Chicago was pretty boring after some of the crazy, half-understood things I'd let people do to my body over the years. I lay on the table and enjoyed my massage while I let my mind wander.

When Rachel, Kurt, Tina, and I returned to Tina and Mike's apartment, thunderously enthusiastic piano music was filling the air. I recognised Blaine's talent in the melody instantly.

We followed the sounds into the next room. Blaine was behind the piano, face radiant with excitement as he played and Mike danced on the floor before him.

"Yeah," Blaine said, hands still sweeping across the piano in a swelling crescendo, "Exactly. And then…"

The music thundered to a peak and then backed off, and Mike's body flew across the room in haunting and perfect motions with the sound.

Blaine's fingers left the key and he clapped, bouncing with excitement. "Ahh! It's so perfect!" he said, and leaping away from the piano to join Mike on the dance flood. "It's great. And yeah…" He hummed a few bars and Mike responded immediately with movement, which Blaine mirrored with considerably less skill.

"Yeah!" Mike's grin was as big as Blaine's. "Yeah."

I glanced at Tina, Rachel and Kurt, who looked just as confused by this interaction as all I did.

Blaine turned away from Mike with a distinct mania in his eyes, skipping a little and humming some more. We stepped further into the room to reveal our presence.

"What were you guys working on?" asked Tina, kissing Mike on the lips and taking her place by his side.

Mike glanced at Blaine, who could barely return his secretive expression for all of the energy that seemed to be bouncing through his body.

Laughing, Mike said, "It's hard to explain."

Blaine said, "Something epic. We'll have to just show you."

He practically skipped back to the piano, vibrating with excitement, and Mike raised his hands in preparation to dance. Kurt, Rachel, Tina and I quickly cleared out of his way. I raised my camera, got both of them in frame, pressed play, and waited.

Blaine started playing, and at first I was too impressed by how quickly his hands were prancing across the piano to even hear the music or notice Mike's movement.

But then I heard Rachel's gasp of awe, and I suddenly tuned in to the absolute art occurring in the room with me. I quickly looked down at my camera to make sure I was capturing it all.

It's hard to use language to describe the art of music and dance, but if you can visualize a each chord of a song as carefully strategized weapon wielded against a dancer, you might get a taste for what was happening before me. It was violent and courageous and disturbing and inspiring all at once, and I could see what had Mike and Blaine so excited.

When it ended, nobody said a word or made a movement for several moments; we all just stared into reality and considered how much it had improved now that we'd experienced the art that had just occurred.

And then Blaine leapt to his feet again in more excitement as Kurt, Tina, Rachel, and I all started raving our praise and moved together to hug each other. I had some unbelievably talented friends. It wasn't even fair how talented they were.

"I don't even know what that was supposed to be," Tina said, kissing Mike and brushing tears off of her face, "But I haven't been so moved by you dancing since… probably ever. Look. I have goosebumps."

Kurt kissed Blaine more passionately than I'd seen them kiss before, and he whispered something in his ear that made tears well up in Blaine's eyes.

I just stood next to Rachel, and we exchanged wordless glances of awe.

"It's just a random thing," said Blaine, "But so much fun. Mike, we need to collaborate more often."

Nodding, Mike said, "Absolutely. We should do a show. Maybe this winter, when I'm on vacation from Joffre."

Blaine nodded enthusiastically, but didn't seem to really register what Mike was saying. He turned to me and asked, "Finn, you got that on video, right?"

"Yeah," I said, "You should upload it to RattleBingBang."

Mike said, "Yeah, totally upload it. See if anyone else is crazy enough to love it."

"They will," Blaine said confidently, "It's awesome." He turned suddenly to Rachel and said, "We've got a hundred thousand views on that song we did by the campfire in Indiana."

Grinning, Rachel said, "I know-"

But Blaine cut her off before she could say anything else. "Finn, can I see the video? Or do you think we should shoot it again? Did you get it all in frame?"
I said, "I'll show you."

He stood beside me as I played back the video, and I could hear his halted, rapid breaths in my ear. He couldn't stand still, and it was starting to concern me.

Halfway through the video, he nodded and stepped away with a little bouncing bound. "Yeah yeah," he said, ""It's good. I think it's fine just like that. Because you
get the added reaction… of you behind the camera being like… holy shit this is good. You can practically sense that you're thinking it… just from how you're filming… Jesus fucking Christ… I can't breathe."

He swayed a little on the spot, hyperventilating.

Before I even had a chance to start panicking, Tina took him by the hand. "Okay, Blaine. Let's go for a walk."

I was surprised by how willingly Blaine followed her. I waited Kurt to go after them, but he watched them wordlessly, offering no support.

"Is he okay?" I asked, "I've never seen him so… frenzied."

Rachel said, "It's an anxiety attack."

Kurt added. "He always gets like that when he's trying not to be sad. Tina knows how to calm him down."

Mike said, "I guess I should have noticed how wound up he was getting."

Shrugging, Kurt said, "He's an adult. You don't have to look out for him."

Rachel said, "Your dance was seriously inspiring, though."

Mike nodded. "That's all on Blaine. The way his mind processes music… I mean, he's insane. That's the only explanation. It's incredible to watch him compose."

Grinning proudly, Kurt said, "He's not insane. He's just unique. Have you ever heard of synesthesia?"

Shaking his head, Mike said, "Synesthesia? No."

Kurt explained, "Blaine's therapist thinks that synesthesia is a big part of what makes Blaine such a great composer. His brain connects sound to meanings much deeper than anyone else. Each note has a personality and a color and a spatial position. His songs are more than songs; they're conversations—love affairs—arguments—between the notes that make them up."

None of us responded to this for a moment. "Wow," I said finally, "That's a cool way of looking at it."

"It's not a way of looking at it," Kurt said, "It's Blaine's reality. You or I could arbitrarily assign traits to notes and try to keep track of them as we made music, but it would be so much work we'd get overwhelmed trying to tell a story and make good music at the same time. For Blaine it's just instinct. The notes are his friends; he cannot separate the characters from the music. It's a documented brain phenomenon: synesthesia."

Rachel nodded, "And he thought he was crazy because of it for a long time."

Mike said, "As I watched him compose that song, I thought he was insane. He just…"

"I know," Kurt said, "He loses himself in it. He becomes it."

"Exactly," said Mike.

"And of course, when he's already in that manic headspace he gets in when he's avoiding emotions… let's just say I'm not surprised he created something epic today."

"But why is he so manic today?" I asked.

Kurt sighed. "Because of Tina."

Nodding, Mike said, "It's the same reason that Tina's been on the verge of tears all day."

I didn't really know how to respond to this.

"If you try to understand the relationship that those two have, you'll lose your mind," said Kurt. "They get all fucked up every time they're around each other. If you're in a room with the two of them, you'll never hear then talk to each other or see them even make eye contact. But then they go off alone together and you don't see them for hours. Sometimes Blaine locks himself in the bathroom all night just so that he can whisper to her on the phone. And sometimes they jump on planes and disappear together for days anyway. And they can never explain why."

Mike nodded. "At some point, Kurt and I just realized that we could never provide them what they can provide each other. There's no way to understand the hell those two went through together. You just have to let them do their thing."

Rachel added, "Here's hoping they come back before our show tomorrow."

Here was the real evidence of the real damage that had been done. I'd expected Tina and Blaine to be so much more fucked up than they'd been acting. Learning about their bizarre relationship was comforting. I wasn't the only one who had broken pieces I couldn't repair. Tina and Blaine had more right than any of us to be a little bit insane, and I was glad that they took advantage of it.

I said, "I still get sick to my stomach whenever I let myself wonder what it must have been like to be in that choir room that day."

Rachel shuddered, but all three of them looked grateful that I'd gone ahead and opened up the topic.

I think that most of the time, people were to afraid to talk about the stuff they wanted to talk about the most. But at that moment, it felt to me that there was no point in all of us being together if we weren't going to acknowledge and talk about the event that kept us all bound together.

"Tina's written about it," said Mike, "She's writing a book about the whole thing-about glee and community and tragedy and moving on. It's very moving. But anyway, I've never heard her talk about what really happened, but in her manuscript she describes it. I cried like a baby when I read it."

Nodding, Kurt said, "I've read it too. She remembers a lot more than Blaine. Blaine doesn't remember much. It was the second glee rehearsal of the year, and they were fighting about what songs to sing first. Kent Irving walked into the room and they all looked up. Mr. Schue asked if he could help him with anything, and Irving took out his gun and shot Mr. Schue in the face. And after that it's just a blur."

I'd never heard any of that before, and it made my stomach turn, but I wanted more. I asked, "But Tina remembers? What did she say?"

Mike said, "Apparently everyone started screaming and getting down behind their chairs. And Irving shouted something about faggots and the devil and his son, and then he started shooting at everyone. Artie couldn't hide, because of his wheelchair, so Irving killed him next. And then he just kept shooting."

Rachel grabbed my hand as we listen, seeing how white my face had gone. Mike asked, "Do you want me to go on?"

I nodded.

He said, "Sam and Blaine tried to tackle Irving, but they both got shot in the process. Then Blaine crawled to the door and opened it and screamed at people to run, but Brittany and Tina were the only ones who weren't already down. Brittany ran, but Tina was hiding under the piano and too scared to move. Irving chased Brittany down the hall and Tina just sat there, listening to people die around her."

"Oh my god," I whispered, "Poor Tina."

Mike added, "And then Blaine started screaming at her to help him, and she saw him kneeling over Sam, covered in blood and trying to stop Sam's bleeding. Tina went to the first person she saw and tried to do the same. And then things get hazy for her."

I shuddered. I said, "Well, after that we know that Coach Sylvester took Irving down in the hallway after he killed Brittany and those freshman girls. And then the police and the paramedics and the fire department were called."

Rachel squeezed my hand. Kurt said quietly, "And they called you to the scene."

I nodded. "It was the first and only time I ever got paged as a volunteer firefighter. I'd just finished my training. I was at Burt's tire shop when it happened. When I got to the school, I was assigned to help control the crowds of freaking out parents and passersby while the bodies were removed and the rest of the students were evacuated. But I wasn't very useful. The moment I saw Blaine being dragged out of the school, covered in blood, I completely forgot what I was supposed to be doing. And everyone was in body bags so I couldn't figure out who was dead, but then I saw them dragging Tina out too, and she was just as hysterical as Blaine, and I just knew…"

I swallowed, unsure if I should say more. I'd never told that story before. Rachel, Kurt, and Mike were all looking at me hungrily, silently begging me to tell them more.

"So I went over to where Blaine and Tina were, and since I was wearing my firefighter coat, nobody tried to stop me. I tried to get them to tell me what had happened, but then Blaine collapsed from blood loss, and Tina got so hysterical that they had to sedate her. I guess you all know the rest of the story."

Kurt said quietly, "Jesus. What a nightmare. They should never have called you to that scene."

I asked, "How could they have known? Anyway, I'm kind of glad I was there. It must have been so hard to only see it all on the news."

The other three nodded sadly. I said, "You know, I've never talked about that before. Sometimes I'm not sure if it really happened."

Kurt said, "It happened. And you should talk about it. Talking helps."

Nodding, Mike said, "We've got to talk about it. It affected all of us. And I think that secretly, we all love to talk about it. It's cathartic. Every time Tina and I get together with New Directions alumni, we have good long, emotional talks about that day."

Rachel said, "I think I've heard everyone's story about where they were and how they reacted three or four times at this point."

I asked, "So why hadn't we talked about it yet?"

Shrugging, Kurt said, "It's a tough subject to broach. The moment has to be right. And Finn, you're extrememly focused on the present. You're always sparking these great conversations about our current thoughts and plans and feelings. It doesn't leave much room to talk about the past."

I frowned, swallowing. "Yeah. Yeah I know I do that. That's the way I live. Forward motion. I guess I should work on making time for memories too."

Rachel smiled wonderingly at me and didn't say anything.

I asked, "So how did you guys find out? Where were you?"

Kurt said, "I was at work, sewing costumes for Etude. We had the radio on, and the news came through. A school shooting had occurred in Ohio. At least ten people were dead. My heart stopped beating, but I thought it couldn't possibly be in Lima. It couldn't be McKinley. And then my dad called. I can't describe the feelings that went through my body when he told me."

Nodding, Rachel said, "I remember the feeling. Like you're falling and being compressed and nothing is real. I was sitting in a room full of other girls waiting for an audition when one of them asked me 'Hey, aren't you from Lima?' and I said 'yes,' and she told me about the shooting. I started freaking out, asking what school it had happened at, but nobody knew. And then Finn called from the hospital and told me everything. Most of those girls skipped the audition so that they could bring me home and make sure I was okay."

I had this hollow, dazed feeling as I heard these stories.

Mike said, "Well, I found out on Facebook. I was sitting in my dorm room, watching Grey's Anatomy on my laptop. It was a sad episode, so I was crying a little when it ended," he admitted. "And then I logged into Facebook, and a bunch of people had posted about the shooting and were giving RIPs to everyone. I freaked the fuck out. I called Tina, and she didn't answer. I called my parents, and they didn't answer. I called Mr. Schue, and he didn't answer. I called Artie and he didn't answer. Finally I got ahold of Finn. I was on a plane to Lima within two hours."

We were all quiet for a while. Then Kurt said, "All of it was so unbelievably unfair. I miss them all so much."

"Every day," nodded Rachel, "We lost so many people that day. There were so many people to grieve for all at once that I don't think I ever really grasped the separate pain of losing each of them until the last year or so. As soon as something reminds me of one of them, I start missing all of them and start getting so angry about the shooting. Lately I'm trying to let myself give each of their memories the attention they deserve."

My mind felt like it was buckling under the insane weight of this conversation. Rachel Berry was not supposed to be a girl who thought about things like that. I wasn't supposed to be the guy who understood exactly what she meant.