Disclaimer: I do not own Glee or any of its characters; Ryan Murphy and Co. hold that honor. I'm simply writing this for fun, not profit.
Blaine had known from the moment he decided to sever all ties with Hawthorne that bad karma would somehow come around to bite him. He had no idea that that karma would come in the form of aWarbler, but it had, and now that he was facing the consequences of his own fatalistic inevitability, it was hard to describe what he felt.
Part of him was angry. That was the same side of him that had resented having to retake his sophomore year and thus bumping up his high school sentence from four years to five.
Another part was disappointed. He had half expected greater fanfare when the announcement was made, that he would somehow catch Sebastian in the act of divulging the information to Jacob Ben Israel (because who else could have told McKinley's most notorious gossip about his confidential past?). There had been no such issue: Sebastian had evidently picked his time more wisely and done so out of sight of prying eyes.
The largest percentage of him was simply shocked. Overwhelmingly, blindingly, disbelievingly surprised that the past he had successfully kept under lock-and-key for three years was suddenly the 'latest news' at McKinley.
It was strange, seeing faces orient on him half-searching for scars, bruises even, broken bones or some other gruesome reminder of the incident. Blaine had purposefully refused to go out in public while the bruises on his face were healing, and had been wary for a time with any bruises evident. They were disgusting, especially in the later stages of healing, when blue, purple, and black gave way to sickly shades of yellow.
He had been half-convinced that they couldn't possibly exist, the surreal nature of the winding colors impossible to fully comprehend. The pain was there—he went out of his way to make sure he didn't bump into things for months—but there was nothing that made his brain accept it fully.
The people in the hallways just knew that Blaine Anderson had been beaten up on the night of the Sadie Hawkins dance badly enough that he had fled from Hawthorne high and transferred schools. Some looked at him with pity that he had avoided for a reason back at home: he didn't want to see friends' face constantly shift from that involuntary poor you look back to a more mild variation.
It was no better seeing it on strangers' faces. If anything, it was worse: these people had not known him two days ago as anything more than the person Jeremy Bletcher chose to annihilate unsuccessfully. Now they knew him as the victim of a brutal assault, and it was strange how one label changed everything.
Blaine had left Hawthorne for three very specific reasons, not least of which was his concern for his own safety.
The faculty had promised—repeatedly—that he would be in no danger despite every warning he had given about the jocks that taunted him. Sometimes they pushed things a little too close for comfort and he was forced to report them, consequently building up a long-term bad relationship that slowly morphed into hatred as he nailed all of them at one point or another. By the time freshman year was over, he had a long list of enemies and a short list of friends, but said-friends were loyal to a fault and better than most people he had encountered in the remaining four years of his high school career.
Blaine knew the others that had known and befriended the same guys that had beaten him and Luke up would be eager for some tasteful vengeance. He had been genuinely fearful for his life at Hawthorne and he had left because of it. It was as simple as that, and he knew that that reason alone was highly justifiable.
The next reason was harder to explain away. He had not simply left Hawthorne with a neat public service announcement to say he was terrified and could no longer attend. He had vanished off the face of the earth, for all that anyone at Hawthorne could judge. Faculty and students alike were left in the dark about any specifics; even the principle knew only the most basic information that he needed to take Blaine off the registers permanently.
The hitch: no one, including his friends, knew exactly what had happened to him.
Perhaps three or four weeks passed where his friends attempted to contact him. Every time Blaine would check his phone there would be dozens of texts from James and Sadie, mixed with others from various numbers. Mostly he just hit the delete all button and watched as, within two or three seconds, all of the messages were erased. It had been hard, and more than once he had hated himself for leaving them so in the dark (if he had been in either of their positions, he knew, he certainly would have pitched a fit), but he couldn't help himself.
He had to make the job thorough, complete, absolute, and the only way to do so was to be certain that no one knew about his life after the event.
And that was the third reason: he had no idea how to live his life at Hawthorne after the incident. Even though medically he had survived, he knew that the naïve fifteen-year-old he had been had died as soon as the first blow fell and his memory of the incident became mixed and uncertain. The only way to recover had been to pick up and leave, to flee from the life that he could no longer handle and the people he had no interest in seeing again (most of them, he reminded himself, since there were still those select few that he deeply regretted not seeing anymore).
Dalton had taken a cursory look over his records to ensure that there was nothing meaningful about his transfer before deciding that he would make a fine student and accepting him. No one—besides a very few, elected by Dean Jacob Barter as necessary confidants—understood the magnitude of his transfer beyond the fact that he was forced to retake sophomore year. They just thought of him as a regular sophomore at first, a short junior later on, and eventually a mixture of the two that came to be known simply as Blaine Warbler.
He had had his past destroyed, built a life anew, seen that new life fading away, and then transferred to McKinley to start another turbulent chapter.
And now Sebastian had merged two of his polar opposites: the Blaine of Hawthorne and the Blaine of McKinley.
While Blaine knew that he would be missing classes if he didn't leave the auditorium soon, he could not make himself go back out in the halls and listen to Jacob Ben Israel concluding his report. The days he had dreaded ever returning to were finally here, and in less than twenty four hours one idiot had completely ripped away the wall he had built around that past.
There were only three people under the age of twenty alive that had heard of the incident from Blaine's own telling: Wes, David, and Kurt.
Now, everyone at McKinley would know, including the glee club. Blaine had that first, but he wasn't certain if he could honestly get his legs to move anymore: they seemed just as boneless as he felt, useless, deadweights. The thought of them knowing that Blaine wasn't simply the choice target of slushying but also a victim of assault made him cringe.
Kurt had hinted at it, once, while he was around Finn and Burt, judging outfits for Prom, and Blaine had involuntarily sunk back, inwardly horrified that Kurt would go around re-stating the story, before Kurt deflected with a completely different thought. Blaine had been relieved and, he hated to admit, selfishly glad that Kurt would not tell his family without Blaine's consent. Whether the thought of receiving or not receiving consent had ever passed Kurt's mind, Blaine didn't know, but he was grateful nevertheless that he had not had to deal with the Hudson-Hummels knowing about it then.
Well, he mused bitterly, they'll know now.
There was no way that the Hudson-Hummels could ignore this now that word was everywhere—even people who were completely indifferent (i.e. his parents) would notice, at least minimally.
Blaine rubbed his forehead against the throbbing headache building up.
That had nothing to do with the head injury he had received two months ago, but even that was a product of transferring to McKinley. The more he thought about it, the more he knew that, rationally, he should be disturbed by the pattern of experiences he had had at McKinley insofar. Two attempts on his life and now publicity on an incident he had spent years concealing were not encouraging signs, yet he was surprised to realize that he did not want to transfer back to Dalton. Kurt's here. Sebastian's there.
He was more than happy to leave second-guessing at that.
Distantly, Blaine heard the first bell of the day ring.
Get up, his inner drill sergeant ordered. It's not the end of the world. He just announced what people could already have known if they dug a few old papers out or watched different news would know. It's not that big of a deal.
He sighed and dropped his hand against the armrest. Easy put, in words. Difficult to actually follow through with.
Get up, the same voice repeated. You shouldn't be moping about this. It's childish and pathetic. It happened three years ago. Move on.
It had happened almost three years ago. But the impact had followed him every day since, in some small ways affecting everything that happened since.
If the assault had never taken place, for example, he and Luke might be dating now instead of him and Kurt. That possibility was a little eerie to contemplate, particularly since Blaine didn't really want to follow the alternate route his life would have taken if said-path didn't involve Kurt.
He would be a college freshman by now if the attack had never happened, and he probably would be at some distant big-name school just so his parents could brag to their friends that their son went to so-and-so.
More likely than not, he would never have met Wes, David, or any of the other Warblers.
He would never have joined a glee club in high school or won competitions or earned the title of lead soloist.
He would never have watched Finn swallow eleven pancakes in a row (an experience that was scarring to this day).
In the end, he would never have become the new Blaine, the better Blaine, the Blaine he was proud to be now. Mentoring Kurt's former bully about how to be open about his sexuality, yes, and friends with a guy who could easily become a linebacker for the NFL. But still him.
Drawing in a deep breath to steel himself, Blaine stepped out of his seat and strode towards the door, bracing himself mentally for the day beyond.
"My poll numbers are in," Kurt said breathlessly.
Most of the New Directions had congregated in their usual seats, but Schuester—as per usual—was running late, so class had yet to officially begin. Offering Kurt a smile as he took his own seat, Blaine did his best to look optimistically at the situation. Kurt doesn't know. And if he doesn't know, word couldn't have traveled that far. So you're worried about nothing.
Relaxing a little, he did his best to listen attentively to the straw poll drawn up about the class presidential campaigns. Apparently Kurt still had a sizeable lead, even though Rachel's numbers had crawled to a slightly higher percentage. Brittany remained stagnant, but looking over at her, Blaine didn't think she looked too bothered by this outlook: she was staring at Puck as he demonstrated the proper way to handle his beheaded rapier. (The blade was banned by school policy, of course, although somehow he had managed to get the handle permitted.)
"What's wrong?" Kurt asked, startling Blaine out of his reverie.
"Nothing," he said reflexively.
Kurt frowned at him and opened his mouth to say that it was most definitely not nothing—Blaine could almost see the indignation that Blaine would dismiss his issues rising—but Schuester chose that moment to burst into the room and Blaine was mercifully relieved from having to respond. "Morning, guys!" he said, ever cheerful, dropping a two-foot tall stack of dictionaries on the piano bench. "Happy Halloween! I brought you some presents."
"Is it candy?" Brittany asked at once.
"No," Schuester said, still beaming, as he grabbed a book off the top of the list. "Rhyming dictionaries! Remember these?"
"Oh, damn, I thought we burned all those," Mercedes whispered.
"He must have bought a new set," Kurt murmured back.
The copies did look new, Blaine mused, as Schuester distributed the books around. He turned his copy over absently in his hands while Mercedes and Kurt continued to whisper urgently.
"I thought he over-budgeted and couldn't get more books?" Mercedes was saying.
"He probably blackmailed Figgins or something," Kurt pointed out.
Mercedes gave him a dubious look. "Blackmailed Figgins? With what?"
"Hey, if Coach Sylvester could do it, I'm sure Mr. Schue could figure out something."
"Coach Sylvester could dismantle a satellite," Mercedes reminded flatly.
Kurt tilted his head in concession. "True."
"We need to start seriously preparing for sectionals," Schuester continued in his Serious Voice TM. "Competitions come up faster than you think, and we need to keep on top of things this year. It's the last chance for many of you and we want to make it spectacular, so we've got to work hard."
"Come on, Schuester," Puck complained. "It's Halloween. Are you really going to make us sit down with rhyming dictionaries and come up with some bull crap for competitions right now? We should be outside chilling on our asses and instead they drop us off here." He shook his head as though to demonstrate the travesty of the situation.
"Well," Schuester said, somehow not offended by comment, "I recognize that today is a holiday—"
"So we don't have to work?" Mercedes put in quickly.
"Oh, you have to work," Schuester assured, "but not on the rhyming dictionaries. Not today," he added, very firmly, as relieved sighs sounded from other seats around the room. Kurt rolled his eyes and Mercedes followed suit as she stuffed her rhyming dictionary into her bag. It shouldn't be too hard to lose this, was clear in her expression.
Blaine carefully slid his book inside his satchel. He might actually use it, if he couldn't perform and did end up songwriting. Who knows, he mused, it might even be helpful.
"Last year we were able to meet with several other teams that we were competing against," Schuester went on, "and we built positive relationships with them."
Blaine could see the sour tinge to Kurt's expression, mirrored by Mercedes', and silently concluded that 'positive' was a euphemism for 'nonexistent.'
"This year," he added, clasping his hands, "one of those teams asked if they could visit and I accepted. Without further adieu, let's give a warm welcome to—"
He's kidding. It's not—
"—the Warblers!"
It was.
"Hello, everyone," Sebastian said, stepping into the room.
Blaine savagely bit back the urge to scream.
Later, he warned, as the angry side of him flared. Later. Kurt doesn't know. No one else knows. The news hasn't spread.
Yet.
Kurt's expression was dark. If Blaine hadn't known by his bubbly report, he would have sworn that Kurt had already figured it out.
Schuester stepped back to let the rest of the Warblers inside, and it reminded Blaine of two rival gangs coming into contact after a long period of warring. No threats were openly exchanged, but it was clear from everyone's expression and stance that a single wrong move would spark. Sebastian leaned against the piano and surveyed them with neutral eyes, for all the world like he was simply a student visiting a boring museum. Several of the older Warblers threw Blaine cautious looks, a strange knowing in their gazes that made Blaine's heart sink. He clenched a fist over his knee against temptation.
Not now, he told himself sternly. Not here.
Kurt noticed and his expression darkened another shade, if possible, before he reached over and gripped the back of Blaine's fist, silently staking a claim. Blaine didn't release his fist. If he wanted to keep his head, he couldn't.
Jeff and Nick looked almost sheepish as they trailed in after the rest, shuffling around so they were standing near the front. Schuester lingered on the Warbler's side, oblivious to the unspoken threat between the two groups. The tension on the New Directions' end was purely competitive; the Warblers had more reasons to dislike the New Directions, the rival glee club that had stolen their lead soloist.
You replaced me with him, Blaine reminded them all silently, staring Sebastian down.
The latter's lips twitched in the faintest of grins before he repressed it. Kurt's fingers actually dug into Blaine's fist a little; Blaine didn't flinch.
"So you're the New Directions," Sebastian said, voice soft. It was obvious why: the contempt in his voice was clear enough that he could have been mouthing the words and they would have still heard it. Puck reared up like a bull dog on a leash, a snarl visible on his lips. You don't even need to fight him here, Blaine thought, they'll fight him for you, for no other reason than he annoys them. "Nice to meet you," he added tonelessly. It was actually an improvement, as far as being nicer went.
Puck stood up, looking fully prepared to stab his headless rapier through Sebastian. "Why are you here?" he demanded.
"Funny you ask," Sebastian said, voice bright and poisonous. "We felt it would be more appropriate to do this in person." His gaze never strayed from Blaine as he smirked. Blaine could feel the anger freezing as fear overtook—he won't, there's no way, not in front of everyone—and he actually jerked his hand away from Kurt's as he leaned forward, anticipation making him restless.
"I don't think we should continue this conversation," Finn said, staring at Sebastian. Blaine couldn't see his expression well from this angle, but he was certain he wasn't smiling.
"It's nothing you shouldn't already know," Sebastian assured. "Besides, he's your member."
All eyes flickered to Blaine.
"If you're just here to insult us," Rachel began heatedly.
"Get out," Finn finished.
Marcus said nothing, but the impressive growl that reverberated across the room could have come from no one else and seemed to momentarily silence everyone.
"Haven't you heard the morning report?" Sebastian asked in a mock-innocent tone.
Mercedes' brow furrowed. Blaine's heart felt like it was either going to burst out of his chest or stop cold. He didn't know which would be more unpleasant; both sounded equally likely and painful. There was no mistaking the vague recognition in Mercedes' expression. She had heard. Probably dismissed it as a falsehood, at first; Jacob Ben Israel would not exactly make the top ten lists of 'credible sources.'
But she had heard.
And now Sebastian was—
"Stop," Schuester said suddenly.
Blaine stared at him. He was certain that the rest of the room was staring, too, but Schuester looked surprisingly unalarmed despite being outnumbered. "I agreed to have you visit because you would be civil," he said. "If you have something to say to one of us, you have something to say to all of us. And I don't appreciate my glee club being insulted." He seemed to swell a little at the mention of the last, bolstered by the fact that it was his glee club.
Sebastian stood his ground. "Of course," he said, his voice almost neutral enough to pass for apologetic. "We simply came to clear up some of the facts. We have no intention of offending anyone." He shrugged as though this should have been obvious. Just keep smiling, Blaine warned silently.
"What kind of facts?" Mercedes demanded flatly. She sounded as close to punching Sebastian as Blaine was, if possible.
Sebastian smiled, and the cold pit of fear in Blaine's stomach turned to ice.
He didn't, he deadpanned.
But Sebastian had.
To everyone else, it was an anticlimax. A tall, brown-haired boy entered the choir room sporting a visitor's pass and a passive expression.
His gaze found Blaine immediately and he actually staggered back a step.
"Blaine," Sebastian said softly, "James. James—Blaine."
Blaine's heart stopped cold.
Kurt could tell that something was wrong, even if he didn't know what that something was. It was the exact same pre-nausea feeling he had had the day Jeremy Bletcher had set the first fire to the chemistry lab: a sense of forbidding that began as a subtle ache and quickly escalated to full-blown panic. When he had found out that the fire alarm had been real, he had been somewhat concerned; when he had realized that Blaine, Brittany, and Mercedes were somehow trapped underneath the burning chemistry lab, 'mild concern' had shot straight past 'horrified' and 'terrified' to shock. In retrospect, he was amazed that he had been texting Blaine during the incident; shouldn't he have been calling, demanding a farewell or at least a promise of survival? The former seemed practical, the latter optimistic and largely preferable. Either way, he knew that he had not, and somehow he wasn't overly bothered by that. Talking to Blaine might have made it too real, too clear that he was really trapped underneath the chemistry lab about to be suffocated unless he took evasive action.
So when Blaine walked into the choir room seven minutes late, Kurt knew immediately that something had happened. His first instinct was to ask him, but Blaine's expression was closed and his body language uncompromising, so Kurt tried a different tactic: cheerfulness. It worked for a time, Blaine even quirking a smile and managing to nod along, but it was clear he was distracted. They had entered the school at different times (Kurt had been delayed when Rachel had an 'emergency' with her plans for the night and demanded his practical advice while Finn and Blaine walked), so something must have occurred between the time Blaine entered and Kurt stepped into the choir room.
What's wrong? he wondered.
He only realized he had said it aloud when Blaine shrugged it off. Opening his mouth to say that he wasn't Finn, he did have a few perceptive brain cells, he was cut off as Mr. Schue entered the choir room and began, in his usual jocular tone, to describe their latest scheme to win sectionals.
With many looks at Mercedes and much inward sighing, Kurt listened as best he could while still fully aware of the tension around Blaine, an unspoken pressure that seemed on the verge of snapping at any moment. Determined not to be outwardly forceful, Kurt laid low, waiting for Blaine to organize his thoughts on his own, before suddenly Mr. Schue started backing away from the door, a grin plastered on his face.
Kurt tuned back in just in time to hear him say, ". . . a warm welcome to the Warblers!"
His good mood evaporated on the spot. He suddenly understood why Blaine's expression was so abysmal—clearly, he had had a warning that this would happen and knew that Sebastian (who, sure enough, walked through the door a moment later, looking just as condescending and confident as before) would be coming. It definitely explained his dark expression, and the way he leaned forward a little, the tension in his shoulders winding up a few notches.
Why he hadn't told Kurt, Kurt didn't know, but he reached out and gripped the back of Blaine's hand to let him know he was there. Blaine didn't even look at him, gaze fixed on Sebastian, face darker and somehow paler than before.
There's more, a tiny voice in Kurt whispered.
The entire conversation started as badly as Kurt had predicted it would and descended quickly. Puck was already on his feet, his beheaded rapier wielded like a staff, and Finn was working his way towards challenging Sebastian. The latter stared unconcernedly back at them all and flicked his gaze to Blaine after several moments.
Blaine stiffened and jerked his hand away from Kurt's. Although now curious and worried, Kurt let him retreat. There was something about his demeanor that said interference would not be appreciated.
"What kind of facts?" Mercedes asked sharply.
Kurt did his best to focus on the present conversation, but it was hard, given all the different signals he was receiving. The rest of the Warblers were mostly stoic, but there were a few familiar faces—Jeff and Nick most notable among them—that were watching with almost miserable expressions. Several of the older Warblers looked somewhat uncomfortable, as well, but the middle group of underclassmen simply stood like machines, unbothered, unmoved. They're a team, Kurt mused, they'll support each other, regardless of the morality of it.
A Finn doppelganger stepped into the choir room.
Well, Kurt noticed, upon closer reflection, he wasn't actually a Finn look-alike: the features were different, sharper, narrower, a little less innocent-browed and more stern. This was an intelligent, experienced, older version of Kurt's stepbrother. He had the same general build; a little bulkier, a little more muscular, but otherwise the same. Brown hair, brown eyes. Unremarkable.
Wondering who this newcomer was, Kurt almost missed the way Blaine skittered out of his chair so fast it tipped over. He was out of the choir room's only other door before Sebastian could finish clasping his hands together in a satisfied manner, his smirk broad and visible. Mr. Schue looked puzzled, but Kurt only wasted three seconds wondering before deciding, This is bad.
And there was only one person responsible.
The rest of the Warblers were still watching the newcomer with visible confusion; Nick and Jeff were pointedly averting their gazes. The tall almost Finn-double was staring after Blaine as though he was a ghost.
One minute passed in silence. Then Sebastian said softly, "So he always runs away."
And then Kurt didn't remember exactly how many steps it took to get from the top row to the bottom tier or whether the newcomer stepped aside or simply shifted his weight.
All he knew was that in the next moment he had grabbed Sebastian by the collar and shoved him out into the hall so hard even Finn would have been impressed. With reflexes born from his days under Coach Sylvester's regime, he kicked the door shut behind him, leaving the Warblers and New Directions to resolve their own problems. They could handle themselves—they were all high school students. Kurt could hear someone running down the hall—they're not supposed to run in the halls—before Sebastian twisted his arm partially around.
It was very satisfying driving a knee in his groin.
By sheer instinct or dumb luck, Sebastian managed to wrestle them both to the floor, and any politeness was quickly forgotten as Kurt's sole objective became beat the bastard's pretty face in. Sebastian seemed just as interested in returning the favor, a fact that Kurt couldn't help noticing even as his limbs operated on auto-pilot to deflect and return blows. He remembered that they were on school property and this was about as non-school appropriate as it came but, well, Sebastian had gone too far.
He had come to McKinley. That was Kurt's turf. No one hurt Kurt Hummel's boyfriend on the home front.
So, like any good Hummel would, Kurt stood up for his own honor and damned school rules.
"Blaine, talk to me!" James shouted as he rounded a corner. Blaine ignored him, scrambling up a stairwell. He was suddenly glad that McKinley was so disorganized: whereas any stranger could navigate his way around Dalton with a good enough sense of direction and a little deduction, McKinley had virtually no organizational system whatsoever. Evasion was simple when there were at least four alternate routes to every decision he made, yet somehow James managed to keep pace with him, always one hallway behind, just paces away.
The knowledge that Jacob Ben Israel had published his past to the entirety of McKinley (and whoever else tapped into his glog) had been a plethora of emotions: worrying and angering foremost among them.
There were no words for how he felt about James Peterson, once-upon-a-time one of his closest friends, returning after an almost three-year absence.
What next? he wondered, scanning the halls for a potential quick escape. At this point, he was almost willing to take an emergency exit and trigger the alarms if it meant he could get away faster. The only problems were that he didn't want to put Kurt through another panic attack and that the alarms would immediately let James know where he was, only given him the lead he would have by descending stairs. Not the most practical maneuver, and so he just continued to hastily duck out of sight, doing his best not to arouse attention of teachers wherever possible.
It wasn't easy; half of the teachers on this floor were close enough to their doors that they could easily see a student running by, so he was forced to slow if he wanted to remain unnoticed. The last thing he needed was a helpful Samaritan letting James know a shortcut so he could head him off.
He just had to get away. Somehow.
But even as he ran down a mostly empty hallway, Blaine knew that there was no more running away from this. He couldn't just drop everything at McKinley and leave. There would be no simple way to deter James from an explanation owed years ago. He would find out, and he would tell Sadie, and—
Worried that he might panic if he started thinking too deeply about it (he already was panicking), Blaine leapt down a stairwell, taking the steps three at a time. It put him considerably farther ahead of James, and he took advantage of the momentary lapse, bolting up the nearest hall before taking a sharp left.
He almost skidded to a halt. He could go through the chemistry labs (impossible: classes were taking place, and unless he really wanted to raise hell, he had to avoid that) or down to the basement and wait there. James wouldn't know the way around: Blaine could actually lose him. If no one saw Blaine descend, he could avoid James entirely.
But he would have to go back beneath the chemistry lab. He recoiled from the thought.
Seconds. That was all he had before James would be close enough that he would know anyway and that escape would be pointless. Blaine closed his eyes, trying to think past the torrent of emotions sweeping through him.
It was over. He had to give in and face reality. For months he had helped Kurt face up to his tormentors. For days he had helped Karofsky along his own pathway to accepting his sexuality openly.
Now he had to face up to his own advice: he had to stand his ground. There was no where else to run.
So he took a breath, clenched his fists and turned around in time to see James jogging around the corner.
It was not nearly as frightening as a fire, Blaine thought. If he could survive that, he should be okay with James, his friend.
Former friend, he supposed, as James slowed to a walk, surveying him with the same amount of cautious speculation.
"Damn," he breathed at last, running a hand messily through his hair and coming to a stop ten feet away. Blaine appreciated the distance.
"Damn, Blaine," he repeated. "When'd you grow up?"
Blaine blinked. He wasn't expecting that out of James, although perhaps he should have—James never seemed to fully grasp the seriousness of certain situations unless he was viewing them through the helpful lens of hindsight. "It's been a while," he said tentatively, glad his voice was steady and strong.
James made a vague humming sound, taking a step closer. Blaine reflexively stepped back. With a sheepish grin, James said, "Overstepping?"
"Little bit," Blaine admitted. "How'd you even get here?"
"I was in town," James said with a shrug. "Cousin got married."
"Congratulations." It sounded hollow even to Blaine. He just couldn't think: James was here. Here.
All those days, all those nights—pointless.
It was a little frustrating; he could have saved himself so much mental anguish if he had just had this conversation years ago. Somehow, his younger self had been convinced he could just avoid it forever.
No, he told that foolish side of him. You can't.
"So where do we go from here?" James asked, his voice finally matching the uncertainty Blaine felt.
Blaine shook his head. "I don't know," he said simply.
James took another step forward. Blaine closed his eyes and didn't step back.
You can't run from this.
Step.
You can't hide forever.
Step.
This is all Sebastian's fault.
Step.
He opened his eyes, and James was right there, barely three feet away, and Blaine could no longer deny it.
James was real, James was here, and he could no longer ignore his existence.
It was strange, how uplifting and burdening the knowledge felt. The guilt of not telling him and spending months anxiously wondering if he had made the right decision virtually evaporated. He had no more reason to worry about those: James was here now, and that mattered more.
The fact that he could no longer run away from that past was still making his heart race.
Blaine didn't know what compelled him to do it, but he stepped forward and hugged James hard enough he could feel his own spine creaking.
I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry.
James just gripped the back of his shirt in his usual one-handed hug, seeming just as shell-shocked. I know. I don't forgive you, but I know.
And for the first time since he learned that Ben Israel had spread the word, Blaine was actually tentatively hopeful things might still be reparable.
Kurt had never felt so alive.
Maybe this was why guys constantly pounded each other and spent their free time tackling their opponents into the dirt. It was exhilarating. He didn't even care if he was wrinkling his outfit or messing up his hair, because he was certain that he had given Sebastian at least a few memorable bruises and that he would be sore tomorrow. It wasn't enough, and it didn't erase the fact that Sebastian had upset Blaine badly enough he had literally fled, but at least it satiated some of the ferocious desire Kurt felt to just smash his teeth in.
Kurt could have strangled Finn for prying him off. They were both smashed up against a pair of lockers, which made the feat impressive in itself: he had to untangle limbs and pull back at the same time. Of course, when you were Finn Hudson, this was fairly simple, since he could probably have pried two mountain gorillas off each other without breaking a sweat. As it was, he almost bodily lifted Kurt in the air, who refused to give in so easily and spent a good minute fighting him. In the end, Finn won, but Kurt was still proud of himself for putting up a decent fight anyway.
"Hey, hey, calm down," Finn was saying. "You're gonna get caught."
Kurt said something unprintable about how he didn't care about getting caught, he just really, really wanted to rearrange Sebastian's face, but Finn wasn't having it and forcefully hauled him back.
"Listen, unless you want to get suspended, you need to calm down," Finn said. "Figgins'll be here any second. Luckily the mess inside's worse, but seriously, dude, calm down."
Kurt snarled at him but grudgingly backed off. Sebastian didn't bother coming after them—whatever brain cells he had could apparently deduce the simple math that two against one never ended well—but he glowered at them both, vanishing inside the choir room in seconds.
"What mess?" Kurt asked at last, shaking free of Finn's grasp and moving towards the choir room door. It looked like at least a few Warblers were down and Puck was waving his rapier around impressively.
"What's going on here?" Figgins asked, sounding baffled as he walked brusquely down the hall.
"We just had a friendly debate," Kurt assured.
There was no blood visible, which somewhat assisted his argument, and the Warblers had picked themselves back up at the sight of the principle. Everyone looked ruffled but otherwise normal.
Figgins blinked. "I thought I heard fighting," he said suspiciously.
"Ventilation," Kurt said at once.
Figgins frowned, then shook his head. "I'll have to have that checked out."
"Good idea," Kurt agreed, watching him walk off as the Warblers quickly made their own exit. Kurt stared at them, letting it be known that he was not happy with any of them, especially Nick and Jeff, before turning back to Finn. "Where'd Blaine go?"
Finn shrugged. "I don't know. The new guy went after him, though, so—oh, crap."
It was funny, how often Kurt ended up running down the halls with Finn. Maybe he should be worried by the pattern—it always seemed to signal Blaine was in trouble—but right then, he had a different priority.
Three hours later, Kurt had heard the whole story, and he really wished Finn hadn't pulled him off Sebastian. He definitely hadn't knocked any of his pretty teeth out, although he might have blackened one of his eyes, and overall he hadn't done nearly enough damage for the magnitude of trouble Sebastian had caused.
He, Blaine, and James were sitting at a table in the school cafeteria, Blaine sitting pointedly close to Kurt, almost touching but not quite. James kept his distance, sitting across from them and looking them both over pensively.
"I can't believe he did that," Kurt said, shaking his head, while Blaine picked at an apple disinterestedly. He was avoiding everyone's gazes, though thankfully most of the other McKinley students had their own drama to capture their interest and were thus generally ignoring Blaine.
This is turning out to be a fabulous Halloween, Kurt thought dryly, watching as James shook his head at something Blaine had asked. They were talking normally, which Kurt thought was a good sign, even if there was still a definite tension between them. He couldn't imagine what it would be like. How Blaine was coping with this all now, he didn't know, but he had silently decided that as soon as they were free from school obligations he was going to give Blaine some well-needed comfort. He had asked him if he wanted to take a half-day—he was fairly sore himself from his fight with Sebastian, even if he refused to admit it—but Blaine had stubbornly insisted that he would make it through the whole day.
Looking at Blaine's almost listless expression now, Kurt made an executive decision and overrode Blaine's earlier decision. "Come on," he said. "We don't even have any interesting classes next."
Blaine shrugged a little. "That's no reason to skip," he pointed out.
"We're not skipping," Kurt said seriously. "We're celebrating. It's Halloween."
"Wow," James said, shaking his head. "I can't believe it's Halloween already."
"Come on," Kurt repeated softly to Blaine, who had yet to stop picking at his apple mindlessly. "We are not hanging out at this dull institution any longer."
Blaine set down his apple at last, which Kurt supposed was an improvement, even if his expression remained the same. "Anything in mind?" he asked, not sounding terribly invested either way.
"I'm not telling," Kurt said, dragging him upward. "See you later, James," he added perfunctorily.
James lifted a hand but remained seated, looking around the cafeteria.
Kurt ushered Blaine out before he could change his mind and decide he wanted to stay for the rest of the day, linking their arms as soon as they were in the hallway.
Blaine gave his own a weak tug to try and free it. "Kurt," he warned. "We're in school."
"And it's Halloween, and you're my boyfriend," Kurt added, nodding. Blaine was never the one to shy away from simple things like hand-holding and arm-linking, even if Kurt did more times than he could count. It was strange, having the positions reversed, and a little worrying. Is he really going to be okay? he wondered. Emotionally?
Well, he would just have to find out, and staying at school was definitely not helping anything.
Sebastian is a dead man as soon as we fix this, Kurt vowed silently.
Kurt half-wished he could drive out to Westerville and pay Sebastian a special visit, but he had more important matters on his hands with Blaine, so he focused on that first. It bothered him just how much of Blaine's past Sebastian had dug up in his endeavor to do—something. Whatever it was, Kurt didn't know, although the primary motivation no longer seemed purely to make him drop his current boyfriend and become Sebastian's . . . whatever.
Languishing in the opportunity of the rest of the day without school, Kurt made a fresh batch of Halloween cookies to celebrate. Blaine sat down on the couch while he worked, silent, seemingly neither bothered nor affected by Kurt's activity. At last when the batch was in the oven and Kurt was free until the timer went off, he stepped over to where Blaine was and sat down beside him.
Blaine sagged almost visibly, leaning against him more heavily than he usually would.
Rubbing between his shoulders, Kurt asked, "Do you want to talk about it?"
Blaine shrugged and looked at him liquid brown eyes. It was hard to read that expression moreso than most of those in Blaine's repertoire, but Kurt could see the pleading in them fairly plainly. Please distract me.
"Well," Kurt began, "any plans for Halloween?"
Kurt didn't know how they got from talking absently to carving pumpkins, but they did, with Kurt studiously working on the face of one while Blaine focused on the nit-and-grit aspect of it by pulling out all the pumpkin seeds. Kurt also had no idea how he could stand to stick his hand inside a freezing pumpkin and scoop out its guts without at least a little shudder, but Blaine didn't seem bothered. He even looked grateful to have something to do that had nothing in relation to the Sebastian incident earlier. James had thankfully not bothered either of them, although he had mildly insisted on at least Blaine's phone number before they left, a concession that was reluctantly acceded to.
"I don't know how you can do that," he told Blaine aloud, shaking his head as the latter scooping out more pumpkin innards and dumped them on the old newspapers they'd set up around the driveway.
Blaine grinned. "Practice." He rubbed his hands off briskly on a towel before stuffing them into a pair of Finn's gloves (Kurt point-blank refused to let him ruin a pair of his own with pumpkin extras). "It's freezing, though," he added.
"Welcome to Ohio," Kurt reminded dryly. "Warm less than half the year and absolutely miserable the rest."
"Charming." Blaine smiled as he turned back to the untouched pumpkin.
Kurt shook his head, digging the thin carving knife into his pumpkin's rounded surface. "I don't know how you're so optimistic about it. Whenever I tell Rachel she cries."
"Would you prefer it if I burst into tears?" Blaine asked.
Kurt tapped his chin thoughtfully with his glove-covered hand. "I don't think I've ever seen you burst dramatically into tears," he mused.
"I don't think I've ever done it," Blaine admitted. "Although I cried so hard when Marley died." Kurt tilted his head. "You know. Marley and Me. It was terrible. Wes wouldn't let me live it down for weeks."
"So you're a sucker for tragedies," Kurt mused.
"No," Blaine corrected, "I just can't help it when directors mess with my emotions like that. They killed Marley." He shook his head in deep disgust, casually pulling out a handful of pumpkin guts without the slightest indication that he was bothered.
"So? What gets you?" Blaine prompted.
Kurt frowned, confused. "What gets me what?"
Blaine rolled his eyes as though he was being deliberately slow and stuffed his hands back into Finn's gloves after briskly rubbing them off on the towel. "You know," he said, scooting over so he was sitting directly beside Kurt, their thighs pressed together. "What movie gets to you?"
Kurt thought about it, mulling over various titles, before shrugging and concluding simply, "Bambi."
Blaine laughed, which was both insulting and amusing to watch, since Kurt felt he should be a little more sympathetic to his plight. "What?"
"Bambi. Really, Kurt?"
"They shot his mom," Kurt said stiffly.
"Bambi?"
Kurt rolled his eyes and nudged his shoulder. "You have your tastes, I have mine. If I have classier tastes—"
Blaine just had this grin on his face that Kurt knew meant he wasn't really listening, so he stopped talking. Blaine promptly kissed him—oh, hello, wasn't expecting that—but it was over before Kurt could do more than gape blankly at him afterwards. "I love you," he said simply.
Kurt continued to gape stupidly for a couple more seconds before shaking his head. "You smell like pumpkin," he accused.
Blaine blinked, then looked around and almost beamed. "Shall we clean up and head back inside, then?"
The possibility of continuing was too tempting to resist, even though Kurt had only finished one of the pumpkins. It had a jack-o-lantern face on it, neither terribly original or boring, so he set it out on the front porch and the other two on the grass beside it.
As far as Blaine, well—it was only fair to return the favor once he had dropped off the pumpkin seeds in the trash and was about to step inside, frazzle-haired from the slight breeze and grinning.
And after that, well . . . Kurt had to admit that for a lonely afternoon at home, it was pretty well spent.