"Where were you last night?" Finn demanded.
Kurt's eyes widened, gesturing to Quinn who he'd been talking to, and hoping Finn would understand that now wasn't the time. But it was too late, for his friend's face was already piqued with curiosity.
Kurt shook his head. "I really don't know what you're talking about."
"I saw you leaving."
"That's funny, because I was in my bed the whole night. Sleeping."
"Then why didn't I hear your alarm go off this morning?"
Well when did Finn start becoming observant? And why did he choose until after Kurt had developed a bit of a social life?
It had been a few days since Kurt first snuck out of the house, and within those few days he had snuck out a total of three more times. And no one even noticed. Or so he had thought.
Kurt supposed relying on his step brother's stupidity was never really a fool-proof plan—no pun intended. In the future he'd have to be more careful, or at least drug Finn first.
But disregarding the future, he had a more present problem in the form of his ridiculously overgrown brother blocking the path to his locker and demanding answers. He stared at him challengingly, not willing to give anything up.
Quinn sighed dramatically then, directing all of their attention to her. "Kurt was at my house last night, okay? We were getting an early start on designs for Prom committee."
Kurt stared at Quinn in equal parts shock and appreciation. He wasn't even on the prom committee, although it did sound like the type of thing he'd be interested in if he didn't hate the school. "Uh…yeah." It took him a few moments to recover. "But I figured it was none of your business." He said to Finn, feigning offense.
"Alright, alright. I get it." Finn said, holding up his hands in defeat. "I'll back off. See you guys at lunch."
And then Finn was gone and Kurt was left with a pair of green eyes cutting straight through him. A familiarity in her gaze that was more disturbing than it was comforting and all in one foul motion he knew that she knew.
"I'm gonna be late to class." Kurt mumbled distractedly, sure he was going to be sick as he hurried past Quinn and her eyes that knew too much. He sank into the comfort of a hallway crowded with people who didn't know him at all.
"Kurt, I'm sensing a lot of negative energy coming from you." Rachel said calmly to him, as usual basing her claims on nothing factual or even logical.
"…okay?" Kurt tried, rolling his eyes before he picked up a fry from his tray and examined it closely, apprehensively nibbling on it when he deemed it safe.
"I'm serious! You're very tense. It's making me uncomfortable."
You're making me very uncomfortable, Kurt thought but didn't say because that wasn't "socially acceptable" or "nice".
But she was right. He was tense. He was wound so tightly that he was sure any sudden movements would completely unravel him. Because he had slipped. He had slipped and Quinn knew and he didn't know how exactly she found out but that didn't matter. He made a mistake. He smiled at Blaine too widely or joked with him too often and now it was going to ruin everything.
Sometimes he forgot it was wrong. That they were wrong. Because that person; that boy who snuck out; that person who stole kisses in between classes and engaged in activity that was certainly illegal wasn't Kurt. Not really. It was a separate entity, the person Kurt had always frowned upon as undisciplined; the Noah Puckermans of the world. But the time he spent with Blaine constituted its own world where rules didn't apply. Kurt had never thought of it as wrong because he was leading two separate lives.
But Quinn bridged the gap and everything that had gone on in the past few weeks hit him at once. Calm ocean waters were suddenly plagued with tsunamis and hurricanes and he knew there would be causalities.
So he supposed he was, as Rachel put it, giving off a lot of negative energy.
"You're imagining things."
"No, I'm not. You can call me crazy all you like but I've never been one to hallucinate." Rachel insisted. "You're hiding something."
That seemed to pique the interest of Finn, who had accused him of the very same thing that morning.
"Would you give it a rest, Rachel?" Quinn interjected. "I know you're a sore loser, but this is getting sad. So what if you didn't win for once? Yeah, Kurt beat you. We beat you. That doesn't mean you have to resort to making up things."
The whole table was shocked into silence and Rachel looked as if she was trying to communicate but all that came out were indignant squeaks.
Quinn got up to throw out her trash as if nothing had happened, stopping by Kurt as she walked passed and leaning down to whisper a smug, "You're welcome", before heading to the garbage cans.
Kurt gave the rest of his fries to Finn, all of a sudden losing his appetite.
Blaine was busy apartment hunting when he should have been grading papers, his desk cluttered with half graded lab reports when he heard the sounds of someone entering the classroom. He didn't even have to look up to know who it was; the unmistakable clicking of boots on tile giving him away.
"Don't you have a home to go to?"
Kurt ignored the jab and sat down next to Blaine, leaning back in his chair and propping his feet up on the desk while peering over at the computer screen. "What's that?"
"I'm looking for apartments." He explained. "And get your feet off the desk."
Kurt moved one foot. "You should get one with a lot of storage space. You'd be surprised how many apartments don't have that."
Blaine, as politely as possible, pushed Kurt's other foot off the desk and ignored his grumbled complaint. "Right. Now you should go home and study for your test tomorrow."
"What test tomorrow?"
Blaine didn't even pretend to be surprised at that response, although he was amazed that Kurt was that absent-minded. "I'd pay money to understand what goes on in your brain all day."
"Usually a whole lot of 'ew' and 'nope' accompanied by the occasional 'I can't believe he thought it was okay to leave the house like that.' Overall, nothing exciting."
Blaine chuckled at that, somehow doubting it. "Will you call me later? When I'm less busy, I mean. And we can talk more…freely." He added, something about being on school grounds making him rationally nervous.
"Fine, fine. I can tell when I'm not wanted." Kurt joked, getting up and heading toward the door. "I'll give you a call."
"Study for your test." Blaine reminded him uselessly, already knowing Kurt would find something else he deemed more important to do. And he never thought in his life that he'd find a procrastinating student charming but he knew that in Kurt's head it wasn't the putting off of something important, but rather the delay of something trivial in the grand scheme of things.
For someone who was planning to change the world someday through words and music, chemistry sets in eleventh grade classrooms looked like the silly play things of children.
And Blaine should have found that insulting since Chemistry was a science he had dedicated more than half of his life to. Yet there was something about Kurt's alternative brilliance that blinded him to much else.
Long story short, he was absolutely infatuated. And he should have been weary of it; considering how that had turned out the first time. But where Sebastian was certain and confident Kurt was youthful and fumbling, and that assured Blaine because for once there were two people who had no idea what they were doing instead of one.
He liked that they were idiots together; even if this was just a brief stint for Kurt that ended after high school. Because he'd never been one to see the appeal of forever, anyway. Time spoiled all good things and so he wouldn't worry himself with something as benign as longevity.
It was two in the morning and Kurt's brain was feverish and occupied, which sometimes happened when it got so terribly quiet and he was left alone with his worries. Sometimes he'd write, but nothing ever coherent—just a series of vignettes that would never amount to anything Broadway worthy since the edges were too jagged to try and piece together.
Normally he would call Mercedes since she would be up marathoning reruns of the Fresh Prince of Bellaire or The Nanny, but he knew she went to sleep early on days they weren't showing. A quick check of the TV guide confirmed his suspicions that she was fast asleep.
He couldn't think of anyone else that would tolerate him calling that late. Texting, maybe. But in a world devoid of human contact Kurt sometimes longed to hear a person's voice.
That's when he remembered Blaine. And how he promised to give him a call later. But maybe "later" had a time limit. Maybe he wasn't even awake.
Kurt felt selfish for hoping that Blaine had trouble sleeping, too.
But he was, for lack of a better word, scared. And he supposed his problem— in its simplest form—was Blaine. But he was also the solution and that was enough.
He dialed on the off chance that Blaine wasn't unconscious, and he felt his heart skip a beat when the teacher answered on the first ring with a familiar, "Hey."
"Hi. How are you?" Kurt said, confused when he heard Blaine laughing on the other line. His laughter always seemed misplaced to Kurt; utilized when not warranted and scarce when needed. Regardless, it was lovely. He was lovely. "What's so funny?"
"Nothing. It's just…nothing." Blaine mumbled, smile evident in his voice. "You're just…people usually don't call this late just to talk."
"Why else would someone make a phone call?"
Blaine laughed again, a sound that quieted Kurt's anxieties.
"You still haven't answered my question." Kurt pointed out.
"I'm doing wonderfully. And you?"
"I'm alright, I guess."
"Alright. Just alright?"
"Yeah."
"If I were more cliché this would be the part where I'd ask you what you were wearing."
Kurt laughed nervously. "Um…pajamas?"
"God, you're so boring." Blaine drawled.
"Well what did you expect?"
"You're probably wearing pajamas stitched together by the tears of children dwelling in third world countries."
Kurt snorted. "I don't own designer pajamas. You make me sound like some snob."
"If the shoe fits…"
"Be nice."
They talked for a while and speaking to Blaine somehow made all of Kurt's worries about Quinn seem juvenile and silly. He was being silly.
"You should go to sleep now." Blaine proposed suddenly.
"No."
"Yes."
"M'not even tired." Kurt mumbled.
"Yes, you are. And you have school tomorrow."
"Good to know, Mom." Kurt said mockingly.
And it totally caught Blaine off-guard. It was just a part of culture; the fact that we all associate mothers with nagging. But if the mother in question no longer existed could the expression still be used? It was a tree-falling-down-in-the-woods kind of question; the kind Blaine spent his time pondering when he should be doing something important.
If a mourning child's heart breaks in two but no one sees it happen did it really break at all?
"Blaine? Are you there?" Kurt's voice cut deep into his thoughts, sounding vulnerable as well as something else he couldn't place. "I'm sorry for calling so late. I just really wanted to talk to you."
"It's fine. I wasn't even sleeping." Blaine assured him. "But I still think you should go to sleep."
"I can't." Kurt put it very simply. He was not being defiant for the sake of it but because there was no other option. And all of a sudden Blaine connected the dots.
"Did you want my help? To sleep, I mean."
"That would be nice. Maybe you could start lecturing like you do in class? That always puts me to sleep."
Blaine laughed shamelessly, feeling no offense. "I can tell you a story?"
"You don't seem like the creative type."
"I don't need to be. This story is completely true." Blaine lied.
Now he had to think of something. Something amazing. Something that would make Kurt smile even if he wasn't able to see it.
"There was once a boy and a girl…"
"Typical hetero-normative start to any story." Kurt mumbled.
"Shush. Do you want a story or not?"
"Sorry."
And although he had never been a good story-teller he managed to tell him a story of love and loss and second chances; his words and Kurt's soft breathing harmonizing to create something wondrous.
He spun a tale of a princess and a stable-boy who fell in love—"How original." Kurt drawled—but they were not allowed to be together, not because of social class but because they grew up in a village where everyone was born with a shape on their hand. Circles could only be with other circles, stars with other stars, and so on.
So the two decided to run to a land where people were born naked of any markings; where palms were as blank as a freshly made canvas.
He was in the middle of the story— "And while on the run they encountered a field full of lilacs and carnations." –when Kurt interrupted.
"Did you know that lilacs mean the joy of youth? And carnations….carnations mean 'alas, my poor heart.'." Kurt recited, still so brilliant although barely awake. "So I'm confused."
"Why?"
"Because, how can those two flowers be in the same meadow? Joy and heartache don't coexist."
"Of course they do." Blaine insisted, knowing that was the very foundation human life was built on.
"Not in fairytales." Kurt corrected. "Fairytales are very one dimensional."
"I already told you this was a true story."
"Okay, okay. Continue." But as soon as Blaine started speaking again he interrupted him. "Wait, wait. Are the flowers a metaphor? Are they running toward youth? Or away from it?"
"I don't know, Kurt. I just picked random names because they sounded nice."
"Kay. Done interrupting. Honest."
He continued telling the story, and it was about fifteen minutes later when he realized he hadn't been interrupted in a while. Growing silent, he picked up the sound of Kurt's quiet, even breathing. He had succeeded in getting the student's restless mind to collapse on itself; to allow him some quiet.
It was only that morning that Kurt woke again, sending him the message: What happened to them in the end?
Blaine: They cut off their hands to avoid persecution
Kurt: How morbid. I love it.
And Blaine simply laughed because Kurt had such blind faith in everything he did that if he were to draw stick figures he knew Kurt would call it a mosaic.
And for some reason that terrified the hell out of him.