I love you all! And for those who so kindly corrected my busted Spanish in the last chapter...it's all the fault of Google Translation. =)

"Has your boy done lost his mind?" Mercedes announced without preamble as she marched herself next Mike before first period the next day. "He's not that stupid to think one posting on Facebook is going to get us to stop worrying right? Because if he is…I'm sorry he can't be near my best friend with a criminal lack of brains like that."

Mike let out a sigh. If he could figure out where exactly Matt was, he would kill him for this. A posting on Facebook? His best friend honestly thought that would work? All that did was confirm that something had gone terribly wrong. And telling them all he was working on a "plan" wasn't exactly comforting. A plan for what? What did he need a plan for?

"I keep telling him if he talked more, he wouldn't be so bad at telling people things." Mike grumbled.

"Did you find anything out last night?" Mercedes asked, leaning against his locker. "Did his parents say anything?"

"No." Mike shook his head. "I didn't even get to talk to them. His little brothers were acting strange. I mean stranger than they normally do. I just got a lot of Matt couldn't come to the door right now. Which was kind of obvious since his car was gone. "

"He never answered anybody's texts last night."Mercedes shook her head. "I stopped when I got that stupid in box full message."

"Same here." Mike let out a sigh. "I know things aren't the greatest for him right now but I wish he would just tell us where he was and what was going on."

"You're telling me. Kurt is alternating between being out of his mind and pretending he isn't out of his mind. I couldn't even interest him in Project Runway reruns last night."

Dropping his arm over her shoulder, Mike hugged Mercedes to his side. "We're going to figure this out Cedes. Either Matt will show up and you can beat him for us or we'll figure out where he is and drag his annoying ass home so you can beat him for us. Either way, we're going to figure this out."

"Just the two I was looking for." The regrettably familiar form of Jacob Ben Israel, complete with his microcassette record sprang in front of them, the wheels in the tiny machine turning. Pushing the piece of machinery in their faces his voice took on his reporter on a mission tone. "Any comment on the story about Matt Rutherford and Kurt Hummel being caught making out?"

"What?" It was only his years of dancing that kept Mike from crashing into Jacob at that minute. Mercedes put her hand on his chest to keep him from taking another step forward. "What did you say?"

"My blog has had reports from several sources that your respective best friends were caught making out. "Jacob repeated calmly, flicking the tape recorder between them both. "I'm merely looking for an official comment out of courtesy. I'm ready to go to print with this before first period is half over. "

"You won't print a damn thing." Mercedes swore menacingly. "You don't have anything."

"What I have is the story of the year. " The blogger retorted. "This will blow the Quinn Fabray story out of the water. You know they say it's always the quiet ones. I guess Matt proved that true."

"There will be no comment from them or any member of New Directions." Rachel's authoritative voice was never more welcomed than it was right this second. Mike knew he was a split second away from punching Jacob into next week and from the look of it, his girl was right there with him. The tiny girl strode right up them and grabbed Jacob's recorder out of his hands. "If you really have the proof you claim to, then you wouldn't be trying to harass innocent people for comments. You know my dads' friends in the ACLU would love to talk to you about the rights of privacy acts in this country. "

"Rachel" Jacob purred as he attempted to grab the recorder back from her. He let out a dissatisfied sigh when Rachel handed it over to Mike. "I'm going to run this story. Even your admitted perfection can't tempt me to kill it this time. "

"Run it." Rachel said with a shrug of her shoulders. "Just know that any attempts to harass Matt or Kurt will be traced back to your story. Which means Puck and Finn will be looking for you."

Jacob seemed to consider that for a second as he backed away from the trio. "You can't stop the freedom of the press." He called out as he moved down the hallway, looking over his shoulder (most likely for Finn and Puck).

Rachel turned on her heel and looked at Mike and Mercedes for the first time. "I think all that did was buy a little time. Noah happens to be in Jacob's first period and Finn is in his second. But by third he'll probably be convinced he can run the story with nothing happening."

"And he's probably already run his mouth to God knows who." Mercedes groaned. "Kurt was already on the edge of a meltdown and this will just push him over."

Rachel nodded. "Yes and with Matthew missing in action for the moment, Kurt will get the brunt of this. If there were both here they could just come out as a couple and take the wind out of Jacob's sails."

"Wait…you ….you think he actually was telling the truth?" Mike asked stunned. One look at Mercedes and Rachel's faces and he could tell they did. In fact Mercedes looked absolutely guilty over something. He took a staggered step backwards. When Mercedes had complained about Kurt's crush on Matt, he never thought it could go both ways. "What do you know Mercedes? Rachel?"

"Nothing." Rachel swore. "Matthew did take me into his confidence about his feelings for Kurt but that's all."

Mercedes rolled her eyes at Rachel's statement before looking at both of them. "You did not hear this from me. But the reason Kurt is so freaked by Matt's disappearance is because Matt's mom and brothers caught the two of them making out."

Mike shook his head and chuckled to himself. "Well I did think he was getting ready to come out of the closet. Not the way I would have thought he'd choose."

"Clearly we'll need to formulate a plan." Rachel announced. "First we need to find Kurt and we'll meet everyone in the choir room at lunchtime."

"Wait. What do you mean find Kurt?" Mercedes held up her hand.

"Jacob prefers to go to the subject of his stories. The only reason he tries to get comments from other people is he's working some agenda for another story, he's being a disgusting pervert or…."

"Or he can't find the subjects." Mike finished for her. "And since no one knows where Matt is right now, he must not be able to find Kurt."

"Or Sam." Mercedes groaned. "Hell he'd try to talk to Sam. And he and Kurt haven't exactly talked since that day…."

She took a step away from Mike and Rachel. "I hate to say this but the Diva's right. And I need to find Kurt. We'll meet in the choir room at lunchtime."

"Sam?" Kurt called out into the locker room hesitantly. "Are you in here?"

The last place he wanted to be was a place Azimio and Karofsky considered home base. It was basically begging to be subjected to some new and highly embarrassing torture. But he had to do it. He had to stop avoiding the issue and he needed to talk to Sam. Sam deserved that much.

The slam of a locker door was his only indication that he wasn't alone in the room that always reeked of sweat and under-washed clothing. One of these days he was going to have his dad and Finn sit down and explain to him why being a jock also meant your sense of smell died. Could they not tell all kinds of fungus and lab experiments were being bred in here?

Using the echoing slam as a guide, he moved towards where he vaguely remembered Sam's locker to be. Seeing Sam standing there, he offered a shy smile. "Hey there. I've been looking for you."

"You know, I find that hard to believe." Sam responded icily.

"I know I've been avoiding you." Kurt admitted, looking at his feet. "I've been doing a lot of thinking about what you said."

"Thinking? Oh you've been thinking." Sam rolled his eyes. "I feel much better now that I know you were thinking and not making out with Matt Rutherford."

Kurt blinked, as Sam glowered at him. "What…what are you talking about?"

"Do us both a favor and don't play dumb. We both know you're too smart for that." Sam snapped. "Or at least I thought you were too smart for that. "

"I didn't…I didn't mean…."

"You didn't what? Want me to find out? Want me to leave you in case it didn't work out with Matt? What didn't you mean?"

"That's not what I was going to say. I didn't know Matt was gay until after we fought. I didn't go there to make out with him."

"But you went there." Sam's voice dropped to a hurt whispered. "And you aren't denying it. It's true. That stupid story is true."

"Story? What are you talking about? What story?"

Sam ignored his question, picking up his backpack from the floor. "You didn't even respect enough to tell me yourself. Instead you go out, make out with a new guy and I have to hear about it from that troll Jacob Ben Israel."

Jacob? Kurt leaned against the locker closest to him and closed his eyes. Oh this was a disaster. How had Jacob of all people found out? "I'm sorry. I never meant to hurt you."

"You know what Kurt? I really don't give a good God damn what you did or didn't mean to do. Just do me a favor and stay the hell away from me." Shoving past him, Sam rounded the corner at the end of the row. The empty echo of the door being flung open was the only indication Kurt had that he was once again alone.

Biting his lower lip, he slid against the lockers for once not caring if he soiled his Michael Kors pants. Resting his arms on top of his knees, he took in a shaky breath. He deserved that. He deserved every bit of anger from Sam. He probably deserved worse. He should have been honest weeks ago but he wasn't. Instead he went with some insane plan that didn't even work. And now he had hurt someone he didn't want to hurt at all. Not to mention almost the entire time Sam was yelling at him, he couldn't help but wonder where the hell Matt was. He was the worst person in the entire world.

So he did the only thing he could think to do. As the bell signifying the beginning of the school day rang, Kurt rested his head on his arms and cried.