Of course, there was the small matter that even though they had been talking and laughing and clearly getting along for the last two subway rides, they still had no means of contacting each other besides the subway, and Kurt couldn't exactly predict seeing Blaine on the 7 on Saturday. So, he got up bright and early Saturday morning (not that that was unusual) with a plan.

That plan, the phone book, wasn't a good plan. Most people in New York didn't even have landlines, and most landlines that existed were unlisted. There was no Blaine Anderson in the phone book, and then it occurred to Kurt. Blaine was probably living with Jonathan. Jonathan was an executive at a fairly prominent insurance company. The name of which he knew from Blaine's t-shirt.

Jonathan Holloway, soon-to-be Jonathan Holloway-Anderson. It was almost too easy.

Kurt rolled his eyes at the way Jonathan was flaunting his soon-to-be married name on the company website because he's trying to get that responsible image.

Jonathan Holloway... even the name was underwhelming. Unfortunately, there was no face displayed to go with the name. The good news was that Blaine's fiancé was in the phone book, a landline in a charming brownstone on the Upper East Side. At least, that's what Kurt was picturing based on the address as he dialed the number. He didn't have a contingency plan for what he would do if Jonathan answered.

"Hello?" Blaine's voice came over the line. See? Contingency plans were unnecessary.

"Hi, Blaine," Kurt said awkwardly, because how exactly was he planning to suggest to Blaine that he scope out his fiancé without telling Blaine that he wanted to meet Jonathan to scope him out.

"Kurt! I was just thinking that I didn't know how to get in touch with you. I was thinking phone book, but Jon and I are possibly the only people in New York City that still have a landline."

"You may be entirely right."

"How did you get this number?"

"Creeping skills that I mastered under Rachel's tutelage," Kurt said, not quite willing to admit that he had found Blaine through his fiancé. That made them sound like a joint unit, and Blaine was nervous enough already.

"Jon and I were going to head downtown to Sardi's for brunch," was it ten thirty already? "You wanna join us?" That was one way to meet the fiancé.

"I would love to," Kurt said, already mentally planning his outfit. If he was going to meet the man that was going to marry his ex-boyfriend in a week, he was going to make an impression... a lasting one.

"Great. The table will be under Holloway, in case you get there before we do. Though I doubt that, Brooklyner," he said, and Kurt could tell he was grinning. "See you there." Click.

Perfect.

Kurt took the same route to Sardi's that he took to work. It really wasn't that far away from the Conde Nast building.

However, it was farther from Brooklyn than it was from the Upper East Side, and Blaine was standing in front of Sardi's in a suit and a smile when Kurt crossed the street.

"Hey!" Blaine said with a bright smile, hugging Kurt with no regard for whether or not his fiancé was there. Speaking of the fiancé, where was Jonathan?

"Where's Jonathan?" Kurt asked.

"He's inside," Blaine replied, "ordering us drinks. Since you're probably still on your life-long health kick, I told him to get you water with lemon."

"Perfect," Kurt said, because yeah, Blaine knew him better than anyone else.

Blaine headed into the restaurant with a nod at the hostess, and headed into the lower level, which was reserved for the rich, famous, and powerful. Jonathan really was an executive.

"Hey," Blaine said brightly when he reached a table with three chairs, one occupied. His fiancé was wearing dark sunglasses, and Kurt realized he was hungover. "I have returned with our guest. Kurt, this is Jonathan Holloway, my fiancé. Jon, this is Kurt Hummel, my ex." Kurt looked at Blaine in surprise when he said that, but Blaine didn't seem concerned about Jonathan knowing that.

"Pleasure," Jonathan said, standing up to shake Kurt's hand quickly and then sitting back down. He was brusque towards Kurt, but that was understandable. Kurt was willing to bet he wasn't that way with Blaine, judging by the Look Blaine was giving him.

Jonathan was pretty much exactly what he had expected, what he had been picturing. He was tall and well-built, with dark brown hair. The sunglasses prevented Kurt from seeing his eyes, but he was willing to bet his paycheck for the next ten years that they were blue. He was definitely attractive, Kurt had to give him that much, but his face was stubbly and his pores were huge. Obviously, he didn't care much about his skin.

Blaine pulled out his chair for him and Jonathan signaled to the waiter. "So..." Blaine said after a few seconds of uncomfortable silence. "Any plans for the weekend, Kurt?" he asked, and it was clear that his whole idea for a fun brunch with the fiancé and the ex probably wasn't going to work out the way he had planned. In all fairness, it wasn't the best plan in the first place.

"Not at the moment," Kurt answered, a way to say no without seeming pathetic (hopefully). "What about you?" He didn't ask Jonathan. He didn't care. Nothing about Blaine's fiancé was endearing the man to Kurt, especially because he was hungover.

"Nothing wild and crazy," Blaine responded with a smile. "We might go see a show or two, and maybe have some fancy dinners out with Jonathan's parents. They're in town for the wedding, and we can hardly get rid of them." Blaine threw his fiancé a smile (it was clearly in inside joke), but Jonathan wasn't looking at Blaine. Jonathan's eyes were scanning the restaurant. "There's wedding set-up to do, but thankfully the 404 is very accommodating, and we don't actually have to be involved in most things. I have to locate most of our wedding party, whom we have yet to get in touch with. Jonathan's sister, our maid of honor, is harping at the rest of the bridesmaids, trying to get them all prepared, and she's kind of bummed she doesn't get to throw anyone a bachelorette party, but Jon and I agreed we would have separate bachelor parties, and even though the best man is my brother, he's throwing a party for Jon, and Elizabeth, Jon's sister, is throwing a party for me. We figured it was the perfect way to really promote harmony in the families." These were all the words coming out of Blaine's mouth, but his eyes were telling a different story. One where Jonathan hadn't wanted to go to a bachelor party thrown by his own sister, and instead had stolen the awesome party Cooper had probably been planning for most of Blaine's life out from under his fiancé, but the tenor couldn't complain because they were getting married in a week, and he didn't really think there was any going back now.

Jonathan definitely wasn't doing anything to endear himself to Kurt.

"Well, I'm sure the party Jonathan's sister throws will be fun. She'll probably drag you to a strip club and embarrass the crap out of you, because she's not shy about watching male strippers, and Cooper probably is."

"You do remember that my brother was in a movie about male strippers, right? If there are any straight men on the planet completely comfortable with that, they are the guys in that movie. Especially Cooper." Blaine wasn't helping Kurt turn this little situation in Blaine's favor. It was terribly saddening. "Knowing him, he's probably convinced Channing Tatum to do an actual strip show." Kurt snorted. Yeah, he had met Cooper on numerous occasions, and that definitely sounded like him.

"Well, I'm sure... you said her name was Elizabeth, right?" Elizabeth Holloway was not longer in charge of Blaine's bachelor party. She just didn't know it yet.

"Elizabeth McCulloch," Blaine corrected Kurt's mental note with a nod, but Kurt had a feeling the tenor didn't know what he was up to.

"I'm sure Elizabeth will throw you a great party." Well, he would be sure as soon as he got a hold of her. "Who else is in your wedding party?" Kurt was hesitant to ask. He wouldn't put it past his too-nice-for-words ex-boyfriend to suddenly add him to the wedding party as well as the guest list.

"Santana's one of my bridesmaids, so are Rachel and Tina. As well as a few female friends of Jon's." Blaine smiled over at his fiancé again. This time Jonathan was looking at the table.

"I thought you said you hadn't talked to Rachel in a long time," Kurt questioned, but Blaine just smiled.

"I haven't seen her since I asked her to be a bridesmaid, and that was within hours of Jon asking me." This time Blaine squeezed his fiancé's hand (the squeeze looked rather forceful, and a little bit painful), but Jonathan still wasn't paying attention to him, or the conversation. "About a year ago," Blaine added helpfully, in case Kurt had forgotten.

"And what about the groomsmen? Besides Cooper, I mean," Kurt said, just to distract Blaine from how Jonathan was acting. Maybe he just wasn't quite as pleased as Blaine was to have one of the tenor's exes coming to their wedding. Kurt couldn't exactly blame him, but that didn't mean he had to be an asshole about it.

"Sam fought Cooper for the best man position," Blaine said with a laugh, "but he didn't know my brother is actually pretty strong. Wes absolutely insisted on being included, in that council voice he used to use that logically shouldn't still work, yet somehow still does. That's about it in the way of my groomsmen, the ones you would know." Blaine didn't mention Jonathan's groomsmen or the number of them. Odd.

The rest of brunch was much the same, Blaine giving Kurt details about the wedding or asking him questions about his job (thankfully, his ex did not bring up his empty love life), and occasionally smiling at his fiancé, who was steadfastly ignoring both him and Kurt.

"I think it's about time we go out and enjoy the day," Kurt said finally after about an hour and a half of watching Blaine be ignored by the man he was in love with. Supposedly. Though Kurt was finding it hard to believe that anyone could love Jonathan. He didn't seem to have any sort of visible personality.

If anyone could love him, it would be Blaine.

"It was nice to see you, Kurt," Blaine said, standing up and giving Kurt a hug as he was about to leave. "Here," Blaine grabbed his phone as quick as the best pickpocket in the city, unlocking it easily despite the fact that he shouldn't know the password (MDNA, at the moment), "is my new cell number. Call me anytime."

"Will do," Kurt said, ignoring the slight déjà vu from the day they met. That had been so many years ago.

As soon as he was out of Sardi's, he called Rachel for the first time in six months.

He had a bachelor party to save.

"Have you actually met him?" Rachel asked as she made them tea.

"Jonathan? Yes, we had brunch today. And by 'we had brunch today,' I mean Blaine and I had brunch and he did an incredibly dedicated Bernie impression." Rachel snorted at that.

"No one else has met him. Not me, Wes, Santana, Sam, Tina, not even Cooper, I don't think. It's like he's keeping Jon under wraps and the wedding's going to be the big reveal."

"I'm not exactly sure how spectacular that reveal is going to be," Kurt said dryly, and before Rachel could ask what he meant, he cut her off. "So, you've met the elusive sister?"

"She's not exactly elusive. She lives in Queens."

"Blaine told me all of Jonathan's family had settled on the West Coast."

"I don't know about that, but I do know that Elizabeth hasn't met Blaine yet. It's like Jonathan's keeping Blaine away from his family, too." Rachel sounded concerned. Kurt couldn't blame her.

"Can you give me Elizabeth's number?"

"Why?"

"Because I think I have some damage control to do." More than he had originally thought.

"Kurt..." Rachel started, but she trailed off. "Just, uh, d-don't do anything stupid, all right? They're getting married." That implied a whole lot of things that Kurt hadn't been thinking about.

"I know that," Kurt said as Rachel scribbled down the number. "I just wanted to right some wrongs."

"Some assumed wrongs," Rachel corrected, but she didn't push the issue. "So, have you talked about it?"

"Have who talked about what?" Kurt asked as he put Elizabeth McCulloch's number in his phone and began planning exactly what he was going to say to her. He was going to sound like a crazed stalker at first, but a few harmless fibs could turn everything around.

His plan was starting to seem a lot like a plot.

"Have you and Blaine talked about it?"

"Okay, you answered half my question. That's definitely progress from high school." Rachel ignored the slight.

"Have you and Blaine talked about the way you ended? The fact that he asked you to marry him and you said no?" Rachel asked, sounding rather exasperated.

"No," Kurt answered honestly, though lying to her was incredibly tempting. "We made a tacit agreement to let bygones be bygones. Water under the bridge," Kurt said, painting Rachel a little picture with his hands.

"Which is the exact definition of not talking about it," Rachel commented, but Kurt chose not to rise to the bait. "I'm surprised that he let you of all people meet Jonathan."

"What do you mean, 'me of all people?'" Kurt asked, because yes, the situation was awkward, but he and Blaine had never been normal.

"You're his ex-boyfriend. I'm wondering if he's looking for your approval, or trying to find an excuse not to marry Jonathan." Kurt spit out his tea all over Rachel's carpet.

"What do you mean looking for an excuse not to marry him?" Kurt asked quickly over Rachel's protests of her ruined rug.

"I mean," Rachel said as she dragged out the carpet cleaner, "I haven't talked to Blaine lately, but Tina told Santana that he's pretty nervous about the wedding."

"I already knew that."

"Some people's automatic reaction to cold feet is trying to remove themselves from the situation. Maybe Blaine's manifesting his cold feet in your approval," Rachel suggested, and clearly she had gotten a degree in psychology when Kurt wasn't looking. "Did you tell him what you think of Jonathan?"

"No."

"What do you think of Jonathan?"

"I haven't decided yet," Kurt said, and he was being honest, if playing his cards a little bit close. He wasn't sure if he hated him or loathed him. There was a big difference between the two. One he had a song to sing about. "What did the sister have to say?"

"Elizabeth?"

"Yeah."

"Well, she seemed excited about the wedding. Maybe a little surprised, but excited for her brother." Which probably meant she hadn't expected him to get married. Curiouser and curiouser.

"I think I might call her. Get to know Blaine's future family."

"I know you're going to call her," Rachel said with a sigh, "but try not to alienate her."

"Why would I do that?" Kurt was willing to bet Elizabeth McCulloch was on his side. Whichever side that may be.

"Because you were almost Blaine's future family," Rachel said simply.

Kurt wasn't jealous. He was just concerned. Protective.

And he was really interested to know what Elizabeth McCulloch would have to say about her brother.

Kurt had a glass (or two) of wine for liquid courage before calling Elizabeth that night. Blaine was getting married in seven days. He couldn't procrastinate on this the way he did on assignments at work.

This was serious.

When a voice answered in a very Scottish accent (probably Elizabeth's husband), Kurt flat-out lied. "Yes, my name is Kurt Hummel and I'm looking for Elizabeth McCulloch. I'm part of her brother's wedding party." There was the lie, and it came out perfectly. Mr. McCulloch called out for his wife, and soon a female voice came to the phone.

"Hello?"

"Hi. My name is Kurt Hummel and-"

"And you're not part of my brother's wedding party, so what do you want?" she asked coolly, as if she had stalker-ish exes of her brother's fiancé calling her everyday.

"Well, I am a friend of the man your brother is marrying."

"The fact that you know my brother's marrying a man would be conclusive proof of that, yes," she said, and she sounded amused.

"Plus he hyphenated his name on the website already." Okay, maybe the wine hadn't been such a good idea.

"Yes, but some headstrong women make their men do that. What do you want?"

"Well, I've known Blaine for a long time, and I want to send him off in style."

"You want to talk bachelor party?"

"Yes."

"Okay. We can talk bachelor party. Meet me tomorrow at... oh, I don't know. The Pancake Faktory on Park? Tomorrow at 8?"

"Do you mind if I bring the rest of the bridal party? The ones I know, at least."

"I'll bring the other half." There was silence on the other line for a second. "Have you met Jonny?"

"Yes."

"And you've seen them together?"

"Briefly. Though at the time, your brother was rather hungover."

"That is his default state," she said dryly, and Kurt was starting to like her much more than her brother. "Either that or drunk... Do think they're good together?"

"I don't know."

"I haven't met him. Blaine."

"He's a great guy."

"That's what I'm worried about."

"You were surprised to hear your brother is getting married?"

"For someone not part of the wedding party, you seem much more informed than anyone else."

"I have my sources."

"Yes, I was surprised. Not that my brother doesn't believe in marriage or anything, he does, but I was surprised anyone wanted to marry him. If he ever had good qualities, he drowned them in Scotch."

"I'm worried about Blaine."

"He's marrying my brother. You should be."

"He tends to see the best in everyone and ignore the bad. It's gotten him hurt before."

"Well, he'd have to be pretty oblivious to ignore all the bad in my brother."

"He's oblivious enough. Trust me."

"We'll talk about this more tomorrow, after the bridesmaids leave. My husband's starting to look at me funny."

"Tomorrow at 8. Pancake Faktory on Park."

"You got it."

"See you then."

"See you."

Rachel, Tina, and Santana weren't exactly happy to be dragged out of bed for an 8 o'clock meeting on Sunday morning, but Rachel lived in Manhattan, and Tina and Santana were both staying in the hotel that was almost entirely guests to Blaine and Jonathan's wedding, which was in Midtown, so they really didn't get to complain. Kurt definitely had to travel the farthest.

"You must be Kurt." Jonathan's sister was beautiful. Long, flowing black hair, sharp hazel eyes set in a heart-shaped face, she could have been on the cover Kurt was supposed to be designing Monday.

"Elizabeth."

"This is Michelle, Cathy, and Kate," she pointed to the girls behind her.

"This is Rachel, Tina, and Santana," Kurt said, pointing to the girls behind him. "They're Blaine's half of the wedding party."

"A little less than half, unless you're a bridesmaid," she said with a grin. "Come on, let's grab a table."

A table for eight wasn't the easiest thing to get in Manhattan, but Elizabeth managed. Possibly because the waiter she asked was almost drooling, but that was beside the point.

"Strip club," were the first two words out of Elizabeth's mouth as they sat down, and the waiter looked about ready to faint. "It's the most traditional bachelor party setting, and I don't think Blaine is expecting it at all."

"I don't think Blaine knows what to expect," Kurt added.

"It's not my fault I've never met him," Elizabeth hissed at him, but thankfully no one seemed to notice.

"How about something a little classier than that?" Tina suggested. "I mean, I know Blaine's a guy and he probably wouldn't mind going to a strip club, but he's not a rampant horndog."

"As far as you know," Kurt muttered, and Elizabeth laughed.

"What are you expecting to find, male burlesque? This isn't an Aguilera movie. This is Magic Mike!" Santana exclaimed.

"Blaine's brother was in that movie. I think he finds the whole concept rather traumatic," Rachel pipped up, making everyone laugh. The waiter came over and took their orders, which added up to the amount of food required to feed a reasonably-sized army.

"What about that place on the corner of 8th and 39th?" one of the bridesmaids sycophants pipped up (Kurt hadn't bothered to remember which one was which) once the waiter was gone.

"Hunk Mania?" Tina asked, and then everyone turned to look at her as she blushed. "I mean..."

"What do you think, Kurt?" Elizabeth asked.

"I've never been to... Hunk Mania." Even the name made it sound kind of... cheap.

"About dragging Blaine to a strip club for his bachelor party."

"Dragging has quite a different connotation than bringing."

"That was the idea."

"I see your feelings are clear."

"As are yours. Right there on your face."

"So we're in agreement."

"Perfectly."

"Are you sure you're not the two getting married?" Santana asked dryly.

"Oh, please, Santana, I've been down that road before. With your wife, as I recall." Rachel and Tina snickered as Santana glared.

"I forgot about that. You'll pay for that, Hummel." The waiter brought over the food, and the arguing stopped for a few minutes as everyone inhaled their breakfasts. It wasn't the classiest consumption Kurt had seen from girls, but it definitely streamlined the process.

"As charming as this reunion is," Elizabeth dry-panned, "if we're not going to a strip club, we need somewhere to bring Blaine for his bachelor party."

"How about just a club?" Tina suggested, but Elizabeth shook her head.

"Not special enough. If there is a woman planning a bachelor party, it has to be fantastic."

"She has a point."

"Any idea what Blaine wants?"

"Not a clue. I think Cooper had some ideas, but he's probably using those for Jonathan."

"What about..." Santana started as she browsed on her phone, "the Manhattan Men VIP booth? Pictures, champagne, seems like a pretty good idea to me."

"I can't believe you're still talking about strip clubs," Elizabeth said with much sass.

"I can," Kurt said with equal sass.

"I can't believe Anderson actually invited his ex-boyfriend to his wedding," Santana shot back, and Elizabeth raised her eyebrows at Kurt.

"Ex-boyfriend?"

"Did I forget to mention that?" he asked innocently, making her laugh.

"I guess that would explain why you care, and why you called me to scope out my brother after the lousy first impression he made." Elizabeth sounded like she was putting together the pieces, and the image the puzzle made amused her. "And maybe even why you don't want to take him to a strip club."

"You mean, because I know Blaine so well and that's not what he would want?" Kurt asked, and Elizabeth grinned.

"Something like that. Still, if I, head of Jonathan's wedding party by default, and you, head of Blaine's wedding party by force, agree that Blaine shouldn't be taken to a strip club, I think that's the final decision."

"It's interesting that you divide their wedding parties," Kurt said with a little smile. He liked the sister much more than he liked Jonathan.

"Wouldn't you? Bottom line: no strip clubs."

"Loser," Santana huffed under her breath, but no one else had anything to say on the matter.

"Why don't you two just decide on a place rather than dragging us all out of bed at ungodly hours of the morning to neglect our opinions?" Tina demanded, and she sounded pissed, but Kurt really didn't care. Tina had mostly been Blaine's creepy stalker during high school; Kurt was surprised she was even a bridesmaid. Another example of Blaine failing to see anything but the good.

"Sounds good to me," Elizabeth said, standing up from the table. "Shall we?"

"Actually, we have another appointment," Kurt admitted. He hadn't clued her in on his entire plan, mostly because it didn't seem entirely necessary to give her the full picture. He had started to see exactly what was going on behind the scenes of this wedding, and he didn't like it at all. She didn't like it to begin with, and she clearly had enough to worry about.

"Where?"

"Bryant Park."

A/N: I know that it's almost Saturday at this point, but I didn't forget you guys. Meet the Holloway family! They're very involved in the story, and I find them very amusing. This chapter is a little short, but there's a lot of Klaine goodness in the next one, so be patient :)

Also, the italics thing is just something I do with phone calls. Anyone who is not in the room is in italics. For some reason, it makes it easier for me to keep track of my characters during more complicated scenes.

Oh, and in my head canon, Matt Bomer is Cooper's stage name in the future, so everything Matt Bomer has done I claim as Cooper's accomplishments. Hence all the Magic Mike jokes.

Reviews are Love.