THIRTY-EIGHT
Blaine strummed the guitar resting in his lap and tried two different chords in quick succession. A sharp throb raced from his shoulder down to his fingers. He'd been playing for over twenty minutes now, and his healing tendons couldn't stand much more exertion. Reluctantly, Blaine laid the guitar down flat on top of the bed.
He contemplated the black fretboard and followed the strings down to the rose design around the sound hole. A week had passed and he still hadn't figured out what was wrong with Here Comes the Sun. He'd spent whole days listening to the song on repeat on the iPod Kurt had left behind. The unusual rhythm he'd picked up on after a few close listens, but there was still something off about his playing that Blaine couldn't put his finger on. Here Comes the Sun was starting to make him feel incredibly discouraged.
Blaine spun the desk chair around. Sheaves of paper covered the surface and pushed up against framed photographs. A notebook full of scribbles lay open in the center, and a mountain of crumbled up staff paper and ruled notebook paper overflowed the trash can. While his left shoulder rested, Blaine clicked his pen and considered the next stanza.
Blaine had hardly left Kurt's bedroom in a week. He knew today was his last day of uninterrupted songwriting, if what he was doing could even be called songwriting. At this point, he was writing bad poetry and a few melodic bars between failed attempts at playing Here Comes the Sun. Starting on Wednesday, he had summer classes at school, and he would be inundated with Economics and Chemistry homework in addition to dance, voice, and acting classes in the evening.
So far, Hana had been patient about the original songs Blaine was meant to be writing for Grey's Anatomy, The Musical (something which Blaine found more ridiculous every time he thought about it), but at lunch she'd announced that she and Dagny had finally cast the other roles, so they were ready to begin filming as soon as she finished adapting the script and Blaine had some songs. She hoped to start next week.
But Blaine had no original songs yet: only a few couplets and some simple melodies to go with them.
Blaine didn't think his partial songs really had anything to do with Grey's Anatomy, The Musical either. The longer he spent writing lines and crossing them out in his notebook, the more he hated the idea of writing songs about surgeons who made life miserable for each other. For so long, he'd repressed his emotions and just accepted what life had handed him, but now that he'd started to let those feelings out in song lyrics and melodies, he never wanted to stop expressing himself.
Songwriting was a drug, and maybe Blaine wasn't good at it yet – might never be good at it – but he couldn't stop now when he felt he had so many more songs in him just waiting for their chance to become music and lyrics.
A rap on the door drew his attention away from the ghastly rhyming couplet he'd jotted down on the paper. He crossed it out hurriedly and closed the notebook over his pen.
"Come in."
Nick poked his head through the door. His eyes widened at the sight of balls of paper littered around the trashcan and the sea of paper on the desk. He whistled lowly.
"I thought this only happened in comedy movies about writers."
"Apparently not. You wouldn't happen to have a spare notebook around would you? I've almost gone through this one."
"Who do you think you're talking to?" Nick laughed. "I'm the guy who fills whole composition books with math proofs. I have a couple spiral bounds that I'm not using, though. Help yourself to those, but if you touch the composition books …."
"It's the lightsaber for me?"
They both laughed, but Nick cut off their friendly, idle conversation by tapping his watch.
"You told me to get you at two o'clock."
Blaine started. He'd spent seven hours songwriting today, and although he had precious little to show for his efforts, he felt a great sense of accomplishment.
"Thanks. I'll be back in time for jazz."
Blaine headed out of the apartment with his duffel bag over his right shoulder. Physical therapy was a real pain in his … shoulder, actually. The broken fingers in his right hand had regained their strength quickly, partly thanks to Blaine's determination to play guitar. His hand cramped up every time he played, but he shook it out and kept going. His shoulder, however, was another story.
He entered the physical and occupational therapy unit ten minutes before his appointment with Miles and checked in at the front desk. While he waited for Miles, Blaine flipped through old copies of Sports Illustrated. He was halfway through an article on David Beckham when Miles came to get him.
"Devastatingly handsome, isn't he?"
For a minute, Blaine thought he was the subject of an offensive joke, but Miles looked genuinely smitten by the large, glossy photo of Becks in his football kit.
"I, uh, suppose. I prefer a different type, though."
Miles jerked his head backwards to indicate Blaine should follow him over to their first station. He held out a three pound dumbbell that never ceased to offend Blaine, even though he now realized his shoulder was too weak to lift anything else.
"What type is that?" Miles straightened his arm out. "Twenty."
Blaine made a choking sound, but rotated the dumbbell in tiny circles nonetheless. This was the problem with acquaintances thinking they were friends, Blaine thought.
"All right. We don't have to have a lady chat, but I'm going to assume that mean you're into queens."
Blaine cheeks went bright red, and Miles laughed heartily.
"He's not a queen," Blaine said defensively.
"So where is your boyfriend? I never see him coming in here with you."
Blaine didn't answer until he finished the exercises and handed the dumbbell back to Miles. Over the weeks, he'd grown accustomed to the curiosity directed at him because he was with Kurt when he went home. Talking to someone who didn't realize his connection to the infamous boy-who-went-home was brand new.
"Kurt Hummel is my boyfriend."
Miles' eyebrows disappeared into his fringe. "Oh. I didn't realize. I'm sorry, Blaine. That was a really insensitive question."
"It's fine," he mumbled.
"So are you wanting to go back like half the town? Or are you content to stay here?"
A smile made its way into the corner of Blaine's mouth. "If you'd known Kurt the way I know him, you'd follow him anywhere. I'll be going home someday."
Blaine held up his palms to Miles. Like a gushing river, a torrent of melody and words all mixed together rushed through Blaine in an instant. He sucked in a breath and let the feeling of the song take him over.
"I have to go."
"We've just gotten started," Miles protested.
Blaine was already gone, however. He sprinted out the door and made it back to Kurt's room in record time. Jazz class, dinner, and the classes starting bright and early tomorrow morning faded into the background as unimportant details. It was all Blaine could do to sort out the jumble of feeling into words and notes.
o o o
"Mr. Duval, do you know where Mr. Anderson is?"
Nick looked up sharply from his Economics textbook. The professor nodded pointedly at the empty seat at the table Nick had chosen. Everyone knew they were roommates, and if one was missing from school, the other had an explanation for it. But Nick didn't have one this time. At least, not one a teacher would accept.
Blaine had blown off the first day of summer session to keep writing songs. He'd been up all night fiddling around with his guitar, playing snatches of melodies and variations on those same notes, and sometimes singing along with the music. Nick didn't mind, and it hadn't kept him awake too long. Blaine's natural affinity for music meant he'd picked up guitar quickly. His renditions of other people's songs weren't exactly enjoyable yet, but his own music was pleasant enough to listen to.
They had all skipped school on at least one occasion for professional reasons, but doing so on the first day was a bad sign.
"He's home sick. His shoulder," Nick lied.
All of their teachers knew about the attack and had been informed that one of their pupils was still not fully recovered almost nine weeks later. The professor accepted the excuse and went on with the lesson.
Summer sessions lasted only half a day, so Nick headed back to the apartment in time to have lunch with Dagny and Jeff. Hana was putting the finishing touches on their Grey's Anatomy, The Musical libretto.
"I still can't believe you agreed to do this," Dagny laughed. "I mean … Grey's Anatomy. Really?"
"Shut up," Nick grumbled playfully. "You know it's Blaine's favorite show."
"Speaking of … where is our dapper friend?" Jeff inquired. "Didn't he come home from school with you?"
"He skipped to write songs."
"Okay. I have to know what these songs are," Dagny cried. "For two weeks, we've talked about nothing but Blaine and his songwriting. We all get that you have to create whenever inspiration strikes, but I seriously need to see these amazing songs that have abducted our friend."
"He's not going to show anybody. He won't even ask Eliso why he can't play Here Comes the Sun right. Frankly, it's getting annoying. I want to know why he can't play it right."
"Well, he's going to have to if we're singing them next week," Dangy protested. "You could … take a sneak peak."
Jeff cocked an eyebrow. "You want to sneak into Kurt's room and look at the songs Blaine has written?"
"No! I want Nick to do that."
"Okay."
"Really?"
"No! I am not snooping on Blaine's songwriting."
An hour later, Nick and Jeff pressed their ear to Kurt's door and listened for any movement beyond the solid wood. The screeching of the old pipes from the direction of the bathroom sent them flying onto the couch and trying to look casual. Next moment, the screeching faded away and the high pressure showerhead pounding against the porcelain tub replaced it.
"Blaine's in the shower," Nick and Jeff informed each other.
They crept across the common room and stole into Kurt's room. Blaine had left the guitar on the bed again, but he'd cleaned up the desktop somewhat. Instead of a mess of papers, the staff paper had been arranged in several piles, some overlapping, but distinctly arranged nonetheless. The blue notebook with a pen in the spine rested on the corner of the desk. Nick picked it up and flipped through the pages while Jeff ran his index finger along the staff paper and hummed the melody. He moved on to the next stack of staff paper.
"Wow. Blaine's not a bad composer. Do you hear the theme reworked in this song?"
Nick didn't answer. Jeff looked up at his friend, who stared wide-eyed at the notebook. Nick slammed the lyric book closed with a snap.
"These aren't songs for us," Nick said.
"No, they're not."
Nick and Jeff whipped around. Blaine stood in the doorway with a frown on his lips and his brows furrowed. Nick wanted to point out that he'd just taken the shortest shower ever, and also he appeared to have forgotten to wash his hair, but that seemed too obvious a deflection.
"If you wanted to know about songs for the Grey's Anatomy musical, you could have just asked," Blaine went on. "But instead you're snooping through my personal things? I thought we left our doors unlocked because we trust each other."
"It's not like that, Blaine," Jeff said.
"We were just curious about the songs we'd be singing next week, and we didn't want to disturb you," Nick said. It was a half-truth, at least. "We didn't realize they were about Kurt or we wouldn't have looked at them."
Jeff's eyes went round, and he gawked at Nick. Blaine's jaw set, and he snatched back the journal full of song lyrics from Nick. A tense silence passed while Blaine fixed his eyes on the notebook cover and breathed heavily.
"They go with a libretto," Blaine said at last.
"Which book?" Jeff ventured.
Blaine shook his head. "I have no idea. I just know that these songs belong in a musical that someone is going to write some day."
Nick and Jeff exchanged uncertain glances. Blaine didn't notice their concern. He opened the notebook to the page marked by his pen and gazed pensively at the last stanza that he'd written. He closed the notebook again and laid it down on the desk.
"Can I trust you not to read this while I take a shower?"
Nick and Jeff nodded quickly and sidled towards the door. Blaine shook his head at their antics and took a bottle of shampoo from Kurt's shower caddy.
The shower, Blaine had discovered, was a good place to write. He was working on his fifth shower so far today, and the water pounding on his shoulders and relaxing his muscles had produced some of his best work. As he stood under the high pressure cascade with his eyes closed, he went over the last stanza he'd written and pondered where to go from there.
They've said you can never go home again,
Any maybe that's true.
But I can smile again, laugh again
When I'm with you.
