Oh my goodness! I'm so sorry that this took forever to get out. I haven't actually had a full dya off in about a week and a half, so I'm running on empty, and haven't had any time to write. I'm hoping that this will be a double weekend though, because I'm posting a chapter today, and then I have another day off tomorrow.
This chapter did not come easy, but I'm finally comfortable with where this story is going and how everything will play out. We have a few new people to add to our cast of characters here. Namely, Miss Rachel Berry. I will be writing her as her old self, not this new sassy non-sense. Hope you all enjoy!
Come say hi on tumblr, practical-amanda
I realize that this little development is now a little known fact of pop culture, relegated to the I Love the 90s version of Trivial Pursuit, and a running joke in my household. Rachel Berry is one of my closest friends, and a sister to me. I love her dearly, but even back then, before we met, she was an unmitigated pain in the ass. Ironically, however, of all the publicity disasters that could have come out of that night, the one Blaine's manager picked up on was the one I was least expecting.
"Blaine, have you lost your mind?" Joe, his manager said, staring pointedly across the desk at his client. "We have spend three years carefully crafting an image as a lady's man, and you go a ruin the whole thing with Rachel Berry?"
The term 'industry joke' is almost certainly too harsh of a word to describe what Rachel's image was like at the time, but it should be noted that her reputation was almost nothing like the Broadway Baby she is now. She got her start as a Disney Channel star, and a loud mouthed one at that. I should remind you all that the Disney Channel was not the star maker it is today, and that's really saying something.
Blaine looked a little dumb struck. All he had been trying to do, was suggest that he and Rachel might be dating. He had slipped some pictures of the one time they had hung out under the door of a well known paparazzi, and idiotically allowed him to do with them what he wished. He had intended to keep people off the scent of his homosexuality. He had definitely not intended to be one half of a celebrity odd couple.
"Please, please tell me that this is a misunderstanding, that you're not actually dating Rachel Berry?" Joe asked, sighing and taking off his glasses so he could rub his eyes.
"Of course not!" Blaine said, maybe too loudly. "I...I have no idea how they got those photos," Blaine said. He gulped. When had lying become so easy for him?
"Yeah well, we're going to have a hard time convincing anyone else of that. Especially since her people are already pushing the story," he said. "As far as they're concerned. This is career gold for her."
"Well, I mean if the tooth paste is out of the tube...," Blaine said, picking up his bag to make a hasty escape from the office.
"This isn't over, Blaine," Joe said pointedly. Blaine felt a bit like a scolded child. "You have to get to set now, but we will be talking about this later."
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"Will you guys believe anything you read in those stupid gossip rags? Do you know how many times they've reported Leonardo DiCaprio's tragic death, just in the past month?" Kurt huffed, finally getting fed up listening to the girls yammer on about Blaine and Rachel. "Don't you think we would have seen her around set or something, if they were actually dating."
"I think it's sweet that he goes to such lengths to keep their relationship out of the public eye," Sugar said, dreamily. "He's so romantic."
Kurt rolled his eyes, "the man is a walking flirt machine. Romantic is definitely not a word I would use to describe him. The guy's a player."
Tina gave him a look that Kurt wasn't quite able to read, "I think his personal life is none of our damn business. You guys don't know anything about him besides what they print in those rags," she said, primly returning to the pants she was hemming.
"What do you know what we don't know Cohen-Chang?" she asked. "You're awfully quiet over there."
"I don't know anything," Tina snapped back. "I'm just saying that I'm sure he's getting enough shit today. We don't need to add to it by squawking like a bunch of french hens."
"I'm inclined to agree," Kurt said, passing out some sewing patterns to his assistants. "Less talking, more working."
It's an interesting question to examine for sure. What did Tina know that we didn't. I knew at that point that she had started on the set at Dalton that same time that Blaine did, but that wasn't unusual. Tons of people had been there from the beginning. It turned out, however, that Wes wasn't the only childhood friend working on the set.
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"Anderson, what have you done?" Tina said, slipping into Blaine's dressing room and dropping a stack of clothes onto the table. "You should hear the sewing room right now. The girls won't stop yammering on about how romantic it is, and Kurt looks like he's about to burn a hole in the sewing machine with the strength of his glare alone."
Blaine looked up from the magazine he was reading and shrugged, "I can't be held responsible for the gossip in the wardrobe room, Tina. I'm sorry they're annoying you."
"Don't play dumb with me, Blaine. I know we agreed to keep things professional, but this is too crazy to ignore," Tina replied. Not wanting to risk other people thinking that Tina had only gotten the job through Blaine, she had asked him to keep their connection a secret while at work.
"I'm not playing dumb. This just isn't really a good time..."
"It's one thing the lie to the press. People do it it all the time, but Rachel Berry?" Tina questioned. "Blaine, you'll be a laughing stock. What could have possibly made you that desperate."
"I have a feeling I know," came a voice from behind them. Someone had unceremoniously opened the door to Blaine's dressing room. Tina was shocked, and a bit embarrassed to see that it was Rachel Berry herself, decked out in all her school girl glory. Publicist's advice be-damned, Blaine decided that it was probably best to try and clean this mess up himself, and he had called Rachel to see if she would be willing to meet.
Blaine, on the other hand, looked resigned, but non-plussed at the woman's presence, "I told you it wasn't a good time," Blaine said to Tina, sighing and setting his magazine aside. "Nice of you to come on such short notice, Rachel, but I would appreciate you knocking next time. Tina, if you could tell Kurt that I have to postpone my one o'clock fitting. I'd ask you not to tell him why, but I have a feeling you're just going to tell him anyway."
Tina raised her eye brows, but complied anyway, "this conversation isn't over, Blaine," she said as she closed the door behind her. That sentence seemed to be a theme for him today.
"Alone at last," Rachel said, dramatically, un-winding the scarf from around her neck and plopping down next to Blaine on the couch.
"You do know we're not actually dating, right?" Blaine asked bitterly. He was so not in the mood for this, even though he knew it was entirely his own fault. If anything he should really be grateful that Rachel was being so nice about it.
Rachel rolled her eyes, "Look, let's me make one thing clear. I'm a lot of things, Anderson, but stupid is not one of them. Mark my words, I will be a big star on Broadway one day, and my Disney Channel days will be long behind me. But, I will do so without any help from the likes of you," she said harshly, surprising Blaine with her shrewd tone. "I know that you're going to try to spin this whole thing as a boon to my career and a minor blip on yours, but if I'm not much mistaken. I'm the one doing you a favor in this situation."
Blaine stared blankly back at her, "and how do you figure that?"
Rachel narrowed her eyes, "despite my reputation, I'm very popular with the Wigfest crowd. They think I'll be the new Cher. You can imagine my surprise when I went to see some of my friends perform at a popular drag show last night, only to see a moderately well disguised teen idol hanging at the bar."
Blaine paled, but narrowed his eyes back, "so, you're going to black mail me? What else could you possibly want? The whole world already thinks we're dating."
Rachel cowed at the suggestion, "what do you take me for? Didn't you hear what I said two seconds ago. I'm going to get the glory I obviously deserve without riding on your sequined coat tails..."
"I'm not gay it that's what you're trying to imply, Rachel," Blaine said, cutting her off.
Rachel's whole face softened, "Oh, honey, you don't really expect me to believe that do you? I have excellent gay-dar. My Dads taught me well,"
Blaine sighed, but crossed his arms petulantly. Of course he would pick the gayest straight woman of all time to be his beard. He might as well be fake dating Liza Minnelli, "look, I called you in hear to find out how to deal with this mess. If you're not black mailing me, then can we get back to the point."
"Blaine, I'm not here to make trouble for you," Rachel said, taking his hand in what was supposed to be a comforting gesture, but Blaine had to fight every instinct to recoil. "I'm here to help you. I know I might seem like a diva, but I know what it's like for people like you, especially in this industry. It would be perfect. I'm too ambitious to be held down by a man, so we can fake date for as long as you want. And, I won't mind if you want to sleep with the pool boy!" she said, almost giddily, dropping Blaine's hands to throw her own in the air excitedly. "And if it happens to give my career the boost it needs to..."
"Rachel, don't say anymore. You're going to spoil the fact that you're actually doing a nice thing," Blaine said, holding his hand out to silence her. Despite what his manager said about his ladies man image he was tempted, sorely, sorely tempted.
Didn't I warn you this was going to be a long story? Blaine's never relayed the details of exactly what else happened that day, at least not to me. My theory is that he blocked it out. More likely, is that he really wants me to believe he blocked it out. Either way, the fact was, that this was the reality for so many gay men during the 90s. Things were getting better back then, and more and more people were becoming comfortable being themselves, but the fact remained that many gay people, especially in the public eye were resigning themselves to a life of solitude, or a marriage of convenience. We had evolved enough to be aware of our urges, but the world hadn't changed in their opinions dramatically enough for us to do much about it.
Sometimes I feel guilty about how I treated Blaine in those early days. I was thinking a lot about how I was feeling, but was completely ignoring how all of these things might have been affecting him. There was something about him that made me feel like we had known each other for ages, but really I barely knew him at all. He didn't owe me anything, let alone his deepest, most closely hidden secret.