Dave and Quinn had shown up at Breadstix, separately, of course, where they had been seated in a booth near the back of the restaurant away from the front entrance. It was Wednesday night, meaning there really weren't that many people that had decided to go eat dinner there. They ordered their drinks and food, and then engaged in awkward small talk while waiting for it to arrive. How is school going? How are things on the football team? How do you like glee club?

Dave was just as confused as ever, and he was beginning to wonder if Quinn actually did think that this was a date. I have no idea of what I'm doing here, Dave thought. Their food eventually came and he was glad to have something else to keep him occupied rather than flicking the paper that his straw came in back and forth between his fingers. He occasionally glanced up at Quinn, who had stopped with the random questions to eat her dinner. Paranoia soon set in, causing Dave to begin to feel nauseous. He twirled his spaghetti around his fork, letting it slide off so that he could just do it again.

Does she know? He was feeling really nervous, which just caused him to become irritated for agreeing to come in the first place.

"Look, I don't mean to be rude, but... I'm not exactly sure why you asked me to come here with you," he said, letting his fork fall loose between his fingers so that it clanked against the plate.

Quinn looked up at him, and then glanced down at her plate momentarily before nodding. "I just... I remember how it feels." She looked back up.

Dave's eyebrows came together, showing his confused expression. He didn't understand what she meant by that statement. "How what feels?"

"To have it seem as if everyone is looking down at you," she said softly. Her voice was more sympathetic than Dave had ever heard from her before. "To feel like you lost most of the people that you thought were your friends. I mean, yeah, it's a little different since I was pregnant and got kicked off the Cheerios, of course, but... I remember how lonely I felt."

Dave was glancing to his left and his right, taking in everything that she was saying. She was right, and he hated to admit that to himself. It wasn't even about his sexuality that he was keeping from everyone. It was that he had decided to make major changes in his life that he knew were for the best. He just didn't understand why he had to feel like no one really cared about him after he had made those changes. Besides Kurt and possibly Santana, at least.

Quinn could see that Dave was thinking and that he wasn't going to say anything soon, so she continued. "I hated that feeling so much. I felt so lost and confused and... those feelings never really went away until people actually reached out to me because I was too stubborn to do it on my own. People that actually cared about me."

He remembered when word had gotten around the school that she was pregnant. It was shocking, to say the least. The captain of the Cheerios and the head of the celibacy club pregnant at 16 years old. Honestly, he felt bad for her around that time, but still treated her like crap because of everything the people he hung out with had been saying about her.

"I just don't think that you should have to feel that way too," Quinn finished, smiling softly at him.

Dave shook his head at her. "I don't understand why you want to be nice to me... I was horrible to you when I found out."

Quinn nodded. "I know. But I see the different looks on your face now. I see you standing there with all of us in glee club, but," she paused for a moment. "It's like you're not really there. It reminds me of how I felt back then."

Dave looked down at his plate, picking up his fork and twirling the spaghetti around it once more. He wanted to look back up at her, but felt his eyes tearing up just a little bit. "I pretty much feel invisible sometimes, yeah," he stated. He was finally able to look back up to meet her gaze. "But it's nobody's fault but my own." He shrugged slightly as if saying it was no big deal.

"You shouldn't have to feel that way. Nobody should," she said, shaking her head. "I know it's hard right now, just like it was for me, but... when they all reached out to me, I was finally able to open up." She smiled again. "Just try opening up to all of us, you know? I had this assumption of who you were because of the way you used to treat all of us. But you're not that guy. I feel like I don't even know who you are, and I'm sure everybody else feels that way too."

He was speechless at that moment. He knew that Kurt had given him a chance and had actually given him time to open up and listen to him. And now, here was Quinn Fabray doing something similar. She was a girl that he had been rude to on many occasions, yet she had taken the time to notice that he was lonely and in pain. He had never really thought that there'd be more people like that at McKinley.

He found it to be so unbelievable that he laughed a little bit to himself, feeling like a failure for not having more trust in people. "I'm still trying to figure that out for myself, to be honest."

Her smile grew a little bit. "I think there's a good guy in there somewhere."

Okay, maybe Kurt was right, he thought. "Thanks," Dave said, smiling back.

"And honestly- being on top at McKinley, being popular... it's really not all it's cracked up to be," Quinn said, raising her right hand to push her hair behind one of her ears. "Trust me. I learned the hard way."

Dave glanced over at the napkin holder sitting on the side of the table. He recalled his summer break and how he had spent so much time thinking over all of the mistakes he had made in the past. He remembered all the times he had mentioned that being popular, liked, or intimidating had been the most important thing to him... but now... he just wanted to be happy. He didn't want to be scared anymore. He didn't want to have to lie to anyone.

He just wanted to be able to let people in without being ashamed of who he really was.

"That's actually the least of my worries," Dave eventually said, regarding Quinn's statement on being on top at school.

She lowered her eyebrows, giving him a look that showed that she didn't quite understand. "What do you mean?"

Just say it, Dave repeated over and over again to himself. Quinn had been kind enough to reach out to him. She had done exactly what he needed for him to feel like he trusted her. Say it, Dave said to himself again. He was glancing to his left and his right once more, looking to see if other people were sitting close by. He was attempting to say the words that he had finally admitted and said to himself over the summer.

"I'm," he started. He said this at least one or two more times, yet couldn't bring himself to finish the statement.

Quinn gave him a sympathetic look. "What? You can tell me."

Dave wanted to just be able to tell her that he was gay, but the words seemed to be stuck and wouldn't come out. He figured he could try and explain it in a different way... a way in which she'd hopefully be able to take all of the pieces from him and put together by herself.

"I've um," he started. He knew his voice was shaky, and he could feel his eyes getting watery again. He forced himself to look at her. "I've been keeping something from everybody... for a long time now."

Quinn nodded, showing that she wanted him to continue. "And I didn't know how to deal with it." He broke away from her gaze for a moment and then looked back. "I still don't, really. It pretty much made me angry all the time. Clearly." He knew that the last statement was obvious. "And I made a lot of mistakes because of it."

She looked at the table briefly before looking back up. He could tell that she understood what he was saying, but she was hesitating asking him if what she thought was true, as she may have been doubting herself slightly. "I'm not..." she began.

Dave finally had to look away, turning to stare at the wall. He was blinking a few times, attempting to make the few tears in his eyes go away.

"I really don't deserve you being nice to me. After everything I did to all of you... especially after everything I did to Kurt." He still couldn't look at her.

She was a smart girl, he knew that. He knew that she'd figure it out without him having to flat out say that he was gay.

He sat there looking at the wall for a few moments, but when she still wasn't saying anything, he felt the urge to look at her. Dave turned his head to see Quinn staring down at the saltshaker, her mouth slightly opened as if she finally understood what he had been trying to tell her. She looked over to him.

"You're g..." She trailed off, noticing Dave look around the general vicinity of their booth when she had begun speaking. Everything made sense to her now. The anger. The bullying. The death threat. The protection he helped set up for Kurt when he had transferred back. "I get it now," she said softly. "That's why you had threatened Kurt last year... he knew."

Dave turned his head back towards the wall, shaking his head. He knew it wasn't going to be easy letting people in, but he didn't think it would be this hard either. He was telling himself to pull it together because he didn't want to cry in front of Quinn. He especially didn't want to cry in a booth at Breadstix.

He brought his hand up from underneath the table and rubbed the tip of his nose once, sniffing a few times as he let it drop to the table. He was taking deep breaths, telling himself to calm down. After a few moments of silence from the both of them, he felt as if he was almost ready to look back at her. A tear fell from one of his eyes and he brought his hand up to wipe it away, setting it back down on the table again.

She probably regrets reaching out to me now, Dave thought. This was, in fact, the complete opposite to how Quinn felt.

She felt sorry for Dave more than anything. She reached her arm out over the table, setting her hand on top of his. It was a sign of comfort, and she knew Dave would know that. He turned to look back at her, sniffing again before nodding ever so slightly.

A thought instantly crossed Quinn's mind, and she was asking Dave about it before she was able stop herself.

"You like him, don't you?"

Dave just stared at her for a few moments, and it seemed like he wasn't going to say anything. As soon as he opened his mouth to respond, their waitress had walked over to stand next to their booth.

"I hope everything was alright," she said cheerfully, setting the check down on the table and looking back and forth between the two teenagers sitting down.

"It was fine, thank you," Quinn said.

As soon as she walked away, Dave pulled his hand from Quinn's and rubbed the tip of his nose again. "I'm sorry," he mumbled.

She shook her head. "Don't be." Dave looked down at his hands.

"I'll tell you what," Quinn continued, reaching for the check. "I'll take care of this today. But you're buying next time."

Dave looked back up to Quinn, seeing her soft smile again. He didn't understand why she wasn't upset with him. "Next time?"

"Yeah," she nodded. "And if you need someone to talk to before then... you can talk to me."

He stared at her for a moment. "You're not... you're not mad at me for everything I did?"

She sighed lightly, looking over his face as if analyzing it. "I was," she stated. "But I know how hard you're working at changing." She smiled again, nodding towards him. She thought about how much he had been there for Kurt, and how Kurt had obviously forgiven him a long time ago. It wasn't her place to hold all of his past mistakes against him.

"Everyone deserves a second chance," she finished. Dave finally smiled again.

The next day, Kurt was waiting for Dave in the choir room after school so that they could begin discussing plans to start up the chapter of PFLAG at McKinley. Mr. Schuester was nice enough to let them use the room since there was no glee club meeting happening because he had an appointment to go to. He was sitting down in one of the many chairs available, glancing over all of the notes he had taken when researching from the night before.

Dave silently made his way towards Kurt, stopping a few feet away from him before saying something. He was still a little shaken up about what had happened the night before with Quinn, but he trusted her. After everything that had been said between the two of them, he knew that she wouldn't out him. "Hey."

Kurt looked up and smiled. "Hey, you." Dave sat down next to him, grunting a little louder than he anticipated. "So... was the rest of your Thursday exciting here at McKinley High?"

Dave huffed out a laugh. "Oh yeah. It's always exciting when I'm here."

"Very true," Kurt nodded before laughing a bit too. "Alright, well, you want to get started?"

"Sure." Dave sighed, but Kurt decided to ignore it for now because he felt as if he had no right to ask Dave about what had happened with Quinn.

"I did some research on how to start a PFLAG chapter last night, and we have a little bit of work ahead of us, but... it'll be worth it in the end." He turned to look at Dave, who was now slouching down in his chair, looking like a small child sitting at the dinner table who didn't want to finish their vegetables. Again, he decided to ignore it.

"Sounds good," Dave replied. "What do we gotta do exactly?"

"Well, first things first. We need a third member to start it up, according to their website."

"Who'd you have in mind?"

"Well, we have a lot of options for that, but I was thinking about asking Mr. Schue or Ms. Pillsbury... it'd probably be good to have someone that works here on board too."

Dave nodded. "Think either one will mind?"

"I'm not sure, but it wouldn't hurt to ask," Kurt responded. "If not, I'm sure I can just talk to Mercedes or somebody else." Dave nodded again, not taking his eyes off of the floor in front of him. Kurt continued anyways. "There's already a PFLAG chapter at Rhodes State College here in town, so I figured we could head over to one of their meetings sometime soon to see how they do it. We could probably get a lot more information from them too. And before you ask, no, April Rhodes has nothing to do with that college."

Dave finally looked over at Kurt, raising his left eyebrow. "Who is that again?"

Kurt shook his head and smiled. "Nevermind. So what do you think?"

"Yeah, that sounds good."

He noticed Dave turn his head and look down again, staring at the floor as if it was about to open up and swallow him whole at any minute. He really didn't want to pry into Dave's business, but he wasn't sure if anyone else would see if he was okay.

"Are you alright? You're not really saying too much here."

"Yeah, I'm fine," Dave nodded.

Kurt couldn't take it. He knew it really wasn't any of his business, but he didn't care at that moment anymore. "I know it's not really my place to ask, but did something happen when you went to Breadstix with Quinn last night?"

Dave smirked, sitting up straighter in his chair only to put his elbows on his knees and put his hands on both sides of his face. "I was waiting for you to ask about that."

Kurt's eyebrows shot up and then back down quickly. "It's your business, Dave," he said. "I probably shouldn't have told you how to handle that situation the other day either, by the way." He turned in his chair slightly, moving his head to the side to try and see more of Dave's face. "I'm sorry about that."

Dave sighed again and moved his hands from his face to turn his head towards Kurt. "Oh, hey, it's fine. She didn't try to make it a date or anything anyways."

"Did you want to talk about it?"

Dave glanced down at the floor momentarily, only to sit back in the chair and stare straight ahead towards the piano. "Can I ask you something?"

Kurt wasn't exactly expecting a question from the jock, but he certainly wasn't going to tell him no. "Yeah, of course."

Dave turned his head to look at Kurt.

Kurt stared back, noticing how sad Dave's eyes looked all of a sudden.

"How do you deal with all of the things people throw at you? The looks? The comments? I mean," he paused. He was picking at his thumbnail, Kurt saw. When Dave looked back, Kurt met his gaze again.

"Last year at prom," Dave continued, "you came back in and brushed off that joke someone pulled on you like it was nothing..."

Kurt nodded. He understood everything David was asking him. Like so many times before, it made him think about the one piece of advice Blaine had given him almost a year ago. Courage.

Kurt could feel his voice was shaky when he began speaking, yet he wasn't sure why. He kept on talking anyways. "Honestly... I don't know how I do it sometimes. I think I just started focusing on how many people actually care about me and support me, you know? Everybody in glee club accepted me when I officially came out... even though it took a few of them longer than others."

Kurt laughed softly to himself, thinking of the crush he used to have on his, now, stepbrother. "My dad really helped me too," he said. "He always told me that I shouldn't care about what other people think of me." Dave was still staring at him with a look of sadness on his face.

"The only person who can really bring you down is yourself, you know? If you ignore those looks and those comments, and focus on everything else... then it feels like everything's okay," Kurt smiled and then sighed. "And even though the past few times you've met him have been a little tense," he elbowed Dave in the ribs slightly, smiling again. "Blaine's helped me a lot too."

Dave left Kurt's gaze to look down at floor again. He took a few moments before looking back over. "Does he love you?"

He didn't know why, but that question made Kurt really uncomfortable coming from Dave for some reason. He opened his mouth to respond, but nothing seemed to come out.

"I'm sorry," Dave said, looking away and shaking his head. "I shouldn't have asked that."

"No, it's okay," Kurt finally responded. Dave looked back before Kurt started to nod. "He does."

Dave smiled, but Kurt thought he still looked sad. "I'm glad," Dave said, nodding too. "You deserve it more than anybody else."

He looked away, and Kurt wanted to say something else but had no idea of what. He chose to just sit there quietly, staring at the wall to his right. He felt Dave stand up next to him, turning his head to look up at him.

"Hey, uh," Dave started. "I think I'm gonna head home early. Send me some more info on this, alright?"

"Okay," Kurt nodded.

Dave attempted to smile more warmly at Kurt, though it still looked a little sad. "Okay, I'll see you later, Kurt."

He made his way out of one of the doors. Kurt sat there silently for a few minutes, thinking over their conversation.

"Bye, Dave," he said to the empty choir room.

Dave didn't show up to school on Friday. Kurt was worried about him, but didn't want to try to contact him right away because he thought it'd just make things weird.

It was Saturday afternoon, and Kurt was in his room going through all of his clothes in his closet when he heard the doorbell ring. He knew Finn was out, and his dad and Carole were both in the back doing yard work. He rushed down the steps to the front door, opening it without looking to see who it was first.

Standing there was Dave- hands deep in his pockets and looking like he hadn't gotten much sleep the night before.

"David," Kurt said.

"Hey."

"You weren't at school yesterday." Wow, way to state the obvious, Kurt thought.

Dave just smirked, "yeah, I know. I just... needed a day."

Kurt nodded, realizing that they had both been standing in the doorway for a few moments silently. "Is everything okay?"

Dave's face went blank as he looked down at the welcome mat, sighing to himself. He finally looked back up saying, "is your dad home?"

"My dad?" Kurt wasn't sure why Dave had shown up at his house asking for his father. It made him really nervous, to be honest. He wasn't sure if it was more for himself or for Dave. He suddenly heard footsteps coming from behind him, turning to see Burt and Carole laughing about something.

They both glanced at the doorway, stopping where they were standing to stare at Dave.

"Mr. Hummel," Dave nodded.

Kurt glanced back and forth between Dave and his dad, noticing Burt put on his stern face. "What are you doing here?" His tone hadn't sounded mean, though it hadn't sounded pleasant either.

"I was wondering if I could talk to you for a few minutes."

Kurt could tell that his mouth was open slightly. He wasn't sure what this was all about, and was hoping his dad wouldn't get too worked up because of his heart condition. He glanced back at Burt, wondering when and if he was even going to respond.

Burt took a few steps closer to the door, looking the jock over. "Sure," he said. "Come on in."