Unfortunately the next day came too soon and everyone met for breakfast.
David and Wes had an early start and were under the first to arrive of their little group of friends and Warblers.
After they found their seats and were slowly waking up with the help of their first cups of coffee they spotted a very disgruntled Kurt stomping into the room, almost dragging an equally disturbed looking Jacques behind him.
The other boys tried, only semi successful, to hide their smiles as Kurt shot them very seriously pissed of glares.
"My rude-new-boy shift is over and I hereby retire. At least for today. Two shifts of him would be inhumane and I truly hope Blaine knows what we're putting up with for his sake."
"Oh, I'm sure he does. He sounded like that last night when we texted at least. But why don't you sit down for now, Kurt? Jacques looks occupied for now…at least I think so….kinda seems he's dissecting the fruit bowl over there."
"Oh he told me all about his weird fruit fetish. Seriously what can be wrong with one regular apple? He seems to be convinced that Dalton could not, in any case, satisfy his regular fruit standards. Gosh – he's ridiculous! And I'm not even starting on his wardrobe. He texted me 15 times last night. 15 times, David! I don't even text Mercedes that often in one day and he just needed two hours for that….. I think I need to change my number."
Wes started to laugh now, interrupting Kurt's rant and lightening up the mood instantly.
"Don't you worry, Kurt. Wes is taking over this morning and we have about 5 other Warblers who agreed to hang out with him too."
"Wait… what did you say? I'm next? You know how incredibly busy..." Wes looked seriously alarmed at the news and desperately tried to remember when and if he ever agreed to this. Now it was Kurt's turn to snicker and David stopped Wes with a swift smack to the back of Wes' head.
"Don't even start. It was your idea, you know."
Wes turned his attention back to his coffee, deciding for now that he had lost the battle and silently looked for ways to get rid of Jacques.
That boy was rude and he was sure he wouldn't even laugh at any of his jokes. Hmph… the things you do for friends…speaking of which:
Blaine easily made his way over to their table with a relaxed smile and slid into his usual seat next to Kurt and David.
"Well good morning to you! You look happy."
"Good morning, Kurt. Yeah, I actually am happy. I wanted to thank you guys again. Last night really helped a lot. So…thanks." Blaine ended with a little cough and sniff.
"No problem dude. It was a pleasure. And Kurt actually made friends with Jacques right away. A match made in heaven." Wes answered with a snort and wink in Kurt's direction.
"Funny, oh so funny."
Blaine gave Kurt a sympathetic smile and patted his knee under the table.
"Yeah he isn't the greatest company. But don't worry, I'm back and in good shape, so I can handle him again."
"Nu uh…don't even think about it. At least not until Wesley over here, has a chance to embrace the new kid from hell, until lunch."
Kurt now smirked towards Wes, who nonchalantly shrugged his shoulder.
"I'm not worried at all, I have you know. I'm awesome and he will notice soon enough."
"Keep telling yourself." David said and when Blaine once again started to cough he turned his attention to him and asked:
"You feeling ok? Did you get some sleep?"
"Yeah I did - a lot of it too. It's just a cold... You know how sometimes you're just so busy that, when you do finally relax for a bit your body kinda catches up with you? I feel good though, so stop with that worried frown. Some day it'll stay like that, David. And then I will be the first to say: I told you so."
"Yeah, yeah mother. Just take it easy, will you? You don't have to worry about Jacques today either, so use the time wisely and chill."
The banter went on for the remainder of breakfast and Kurt noticed for the first time, how important Blaine was not only to himself and his life, but to the dynamics of the group he was a part of. Even when he wasn't the most talkative person in the group (that spot had been proudly taken by Wes) he was always part of conversations, sometimes adding intelligent comments, funny joke or just giving his whole attention to someone or something.
It amazed Kurt to see Blaine in these situations, when the other boy was so wrapped up in a story that he forgot the world around him. It was moments like that, when Kurt felt the love for the shorter boy grow.
They excitedly chatted on and turned the conversation to Kurt and his play and Blaine's beautiful smile was directed to him and Kurt couldn't help but blush briefly. He hadn't had the chance to talk about their first rehearsal yet and he had to restrain himself quite a bit last night, not to call Blaine but just send him a few very excited text messages. While Kurt gushed about the director, his cast mates and most importantly his awesome part and songs, time flew by and the day of classes had to start.
Blaine had to get back into the swing of things quickly and by the time he got out of his last class for the day he was happy to have gotten so much sleep the night before.
But he also had to think about his workload again and felt that slightly growing panicky feeling in his gut. He met with the younger warblers before dinner, to see what they had gotten together so far and was just a little disheartened to see that, while they definitely had tried, most of the work would be left to him. He crammed all the different notes the boys had given to him together and buried it in his bag, before the regular practice would start.
Blaine's day hadn't been extraordinarily busy, it was really just a usual Dalton day, but he could already feel the exhaustion creeping up on him and he noticed that the sore throat was coming back.
He hated colds.
They were annoying more than anything, hindering him in his usual lifestyle, made it tough to sing and really just to function. At the same time a cold never really qualified as being truly sick, no matter how bad you felt – it was always just the simple cold.
Once again he thanked his friends for making him taking a break, cause he couldn't even imagine how he would have felt if he hadn't when he was already feeling pretty crappy now.
Fortunately he made it through practice and the evening, before being able to retreat to his room and work on various tasks until he finally crashed onto his bed.
The week was filled with sheet music, Warbler meetings, finishing papers and crossing off to-do-lists.
Blaine had spend plenty of time listening to Kurt's very entertaining stories about the drama club, which apparently stayed true to its name and had plenty of divas to share just one stage. He also read lines with him so often that he was sure he could fill in for several actors if he would need to.
But now he was just looking forward to the weekend.
Kurt was planning to go home, as was Wes and he didn't mind that David was going to stay at Dalton, since they weren't going to do much more than watching movies and ordering in. Going home wasn't really an option for Blaine this time, because his family was out of town and he didn't feel like making the drive by himself to not even be able to see his dad.
Before Wes left he had made sure that Blaine had some fresh orange juice in his room as well as every piece of fruit he was able to steal from the dining hall, plus a weird assortment of drugs he had collected from the Warblers for his use. Kurt had said good bye and promised to text him at least a hundred times each day and Blaine had to draw in a deep breath when Kurt had given him a hug and whispered to him, that he would miss him; before prancing towards his car and racing away.