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[fic - Glee] The Distance Between Ohio and Boston, PG-13
Title: The Distance Between Ohio and Boston
Rating: PG-13
Pairings: Kurt/Blaine
Spoilers (if any): None.
Warnings (if any): None.
Word Count: ~3,700
Summary: Kurt and Blaine go back to Ohio for Christmas. Kurt does something really uncool, but so very, very Kurt.
This continues from:
Following Home
These Thousand Names for Gratitude
All the Honesty of Politics
Circles as the Dark Winds Down
The drive between Boston and Ohio is one of those things Kurt has mixed feelings about. It's certainly long enough for them not to want to do it in one day, but they do now, and Kurt figures they always will. He likes to pretend that that's because of how he and his dad did it those first times, overnight, in the dark, the radio murmuring low as Kurt half-dreamed about the completely ludicrous life he now has. But that's not the reason he and Blaine drive straight through.
They drive straight through because they really don't want to have to deal with renting a motel room in Pennsylvania, Kurt too pretty and both of them too young. They don't talk about it, and Blaine takes the first half of the drive. Getting out of Boston aggravates Kurt, who prefers night driving anyway; there's an odd freedom in it, a coffee at his hand and his boyfriend dozing in the passenger seat. Lately, it's one of the only times he feels like he has any privacy.
They get to Lima just after 12:30 in the morning. The light's on in the kitchen, and Carole comes out onto the porch to greet them, hugging Blaine, who's bleary from the ride, first. Kurt loves that. He can tell Blaine does too.
Kurt's dad greets them inside, and Kurt has to struggle not to smirk a bit as his father tries to decide whether to give Blaine one of those awkward back-slapping man hugs or a normal one. The four of them – Finn's out with some girl he met at community college and no one knows if that's going to solve his drama with Quinn and Rachel or just make it worse – sit in the kitchen and catch up.
Carole and Kurt do most of the talking.
“You two look good,” Burt says.
Blaine glances over at Kurt and smiles. “New York helped,” he says, confident, quiet.
Kurt grabs his boyfriend's hand under the table but keeps talking to Carole.
“Good,” Burt says with a nod, and Blaine wishes he knew how to say thank you.
*
Blaine's in the shower the next morning when Kurt steals his phone and copies down his mother's number. He calls Mrs. Anderson on his own phone from the porch
When she answers, he takes a deep breath before saying anything because he's slightly terrified.
“This is Kurt Hummel, your son's --” he pauses, for just a second, wondering about the presumptuousness of it, “-- partner, and I think you and I need to have a conversation. In person.”
They meet for coffee that afternoon after Kurt tells Blaine he has secret Christmas shopping to do; Kurt is only uncomfortable with how easy it is to lie to him.
*
Mrs. Anderson smiles at him indulgently, which annoys Kurt and strengthens his resolve. Whatever pity he felt for her at Thanksgiving seems unwilling to survive the tone of that smile and so he grits his teeth as he tries not to look at her scathingly. Instead, he smiles at her as expected, buys her a coffee, and then starts asking questions.
“There are very few things Blaine and I don't talk about. His situation with you and your husband is largely one of them. Obviously, we're very grateful for the use of the apartment and Blaine really loves school. But there are details of the situation that... pain him. Yet, I'm not entirely clear on what they are. So I was hoping you could explain it to me.”
“Blaine is his own man,” she says gently. “His father and I both respect that.”
“He misses you both, I think. You, in particular; what you did at Thanksgiving... that meant a great deal, so please don't underestimate my gratitude....”
“But?”
“But he misses singing too. He says it was part of the bargain. And won't tell me anything else. I was hoping you could offer some illumination,” Kurt says with false cheer. “And a solution.”
Blaine's mother lowers her eyes to her coffee.
“Blaine doesn't always see things as they are,” she says.
Kurt blinks at her several times in rapid succession. “So he takes after his father then?” It is the first time Kurt has ever had this particular thought.
*
The second time Kurt has that particular thought is that evening, when he gets back to the house and gives Blaine a jaunty hello as he reaches out to put his arms around his boyfriend's waist.
“I just got off the phone with my mother,” Blaine says quietly.
“Maybe we should take this upstairs,” Kurt suggests with his nervous, awkward, but-aren't-I-charming smile as he folds his arms across himself and fidgets with the hem of the scarf draped around his neck.
“No. Maybe you should tell me just what you were thinking.”
“I was thinking about New York. And that I'm sick of watching you suffocate.”
“What's that supposed to mean?”
Kurt rolls his eyes. “Don't play dumb. It's unattractive. You are miserable. With school, with the apartment, with whatever this not singing thing is about. And since you won't give me the full story, I thought I'd ask the closest thing to an ally we have.”
“I, not we.”
“Pardon me?”
“This isn't your fight, Kurt.”
“The hell it is. I live in that apartment too. And seem to have been a larger point in the contract negotiations than you've deigned to tell me. So, no, you don't get to treat me like a child. Or a guest.”
“What the hell?”
“You're always protecting me from... well... life! And I'm better at it than you are. So it's not very fair. Or nice.”
“You shouldn't have called my mother. And I need some air,” Blaine mumbles, before pushing past him.
Kurt doesn't burst into tears until he hears the car door slam.
“Honey, do you want to talk about it?” Carole asks as she pads into the kitchen, her movements slow and well telegraphed as if Kurt is a frightened animal and so worth being extraordinarily wary of. He shakes his head, but then throws himself into her arms anyway.
*
Blaine drives out to Dalton and sits in the empty parking lot, blasting his car stereo until he realizes that every song is just making him angrier. Eventually, he turns it off and sits there in silence. After an hour he calls Wes, but hangs up before his friend can answer. When Wes calls back, he turns off his phone.
He finds he wants to go home and doesn't know how.
*
When Carole explains to Burt what's happened, he just shakes his head.
The whole thing is so typically Kurt it's almost funny, except that it really isn't. He'd kill anyone who hurts Kurt, ever, but the fact is he he doesn't blame Blaine for being mad one bit. Even if he thinks it was a pretty cowardly move for him to walk out in the middle of a fight that, really, had barely gotten started. Sure, sometimes a guy just needs some air, but talk about the one response Kurt can't handle.
Burt thinks Blaine should have known that.
And they all think Blaine should have been back by the time Leno comes on.
At midnight Kurt says he's having a glass of wine and then going to bed. Burt gives Carole a look and Carole gives him one right back because under the circumstances the boy is entitled to a glass of wine. Burt relents, also silently, but only because recognizes in Kurt a certain brittleness he remembers from the months before he went gone to Dalton.
Burt decides to sleep on the couch. If Blaine does come home in the middle of the night, Burt's talking to him before he goes anywhere near Kurt.
*
Blaine returns at two in the morning and Burt, who hasn't even managed to fall asleep, jerks his head for the boy to follow him into the kitchen as soon as he's in the door.
When Blaine starts to speak, he holds up his hand.
“No. I've known my kid longer than you, so I get to talk first,” he says. “Carole kinda got the story from him and I kinda got the story from her, and I'll tell you, I think you got a right to be pissed. I know I'd be, if I was you. But Kurt does stuff like this. Kurt's always gonna do stuff like this. So you guys can work this out, and he can promise not to do it again. But he will. Because that's Kurt. And that's what he does when he loves you. He obsesses, and he takes too much care, and makes choices that can seem pretty crazy. So if you can't deal with that, I think you probably need to figure that out now.”
Blaine nods, biting his lip and unwilling to look up from the spot he's staring at on the kitchen counter. “We're exactly alike in that way sir. I just wish it hadn't taken me the last six hours sitting in a parking lot to figure that out.”
“Okay. Well. Good. I guess. Second thing. My kid cried himself to sleep tonight because of you. Not really my business what with you two being half not married and whatever, but not okay. I didn't know I knew how to fight as hard as that kid has made me fight for him, not that he needs it. So you go up there and fix this. Because I like you. And I'd like to keep liking you.”
Blaine just nods.
Burt jerks his head towards the stairs. “Well? Go on then.”
*
“Blaine?” Kurt asks in the dark, twisting around to face the door when he hears it open.
“Yeah.”
“Are you....?”
“Getting ready for bed, if that works for you.”
Kurt sits up and nods frantically in the dark.
“I'm still mad,” Blaine says quietly. “I think I'm entitled to be. But I handled it badly. And I know you were just doing what you do. If the situation was reversed I might have done the same thing, so I'll get over it.”
“Okay,” Kurt says, and there's a timidity to it that makes Blaine hate himself.
“So, how about, I tell you everything, tomorrow, because I don't have the stomach for it right now. And then you tell me what happened with my mom today. And then you and I will make some agreements about when we can call each other's parents in secret, because that was sort of weird for me.”
“Okay.”
“And then you can yell at me for walking out,” Blaine adds and is so grateful when that earns a weak chuckle for Kurt. He takes a deep breath. “And then we can talk about this partner thing.”
“Are you mad about that?” Kurt asks as Blaine slides into bed in boxers and a t-shirt.
Blaine shrugs as Kurt wraps himself around him. “I don't know. Mostly confused. For one thing, I don't think either of us acted anything like partners today.”
“I just thought it sounded more grownup than boyfriend and your parents kind of freak me out so it seemed like a good idea at the time.”
“Look, use whatever word you want. But if you're going to use that word, maybe we both need to stop thinking of this whole thing as playing house.”
Kurt nods. “I haven't been playing, and I need you to stop treating this whole thing as something happened to you.”
Blaine takes a deep breath. “Yeah. Okay. That's fair.”
“Thank you,” Kurt says and it's clear that that hurt has been sitting with him for a while. Finally, into the long silence, he adds, “I'm sorry.”
“I know,” Blaine says. “I am too. I just... look, there wasn't a second when I wasn't coming home. I just didn't know how for a few hours.”
“That's... that's not how it seemed to me.”
“I know. And I'm sorry for that.”
Kurt takes a deep shuddery breath that Blaine recognizes from the few times he's seen Kurt cry. It tends to happen in the middle, when he's thought the tears were over, right before more start.
Suddenly, Blaine notices what Kurt is wearing because of how it feels under his hands.
“Hey, are these those pajamas?” he asks with a smile. The question is genuine, but he wouldn't mind if it distracts Kurt from melting down.
Kurt nods.
Blaine barks with laughter. “I really do love you, you know.”
“I know,” Kurt says, his breath steadier now, and it's quiet and coy and ridiculously powerful.
*
“Do you remember what you said to me, that night in the hotel after everything? That your dad went through with all this even though I yelled at him and stormed out because, and I quote, I was 'man enough' to stand up to him?” Kurt says as he makes breakfast for the whole house, omelets going in multiple pans and Blaine not doing much more than handing over utensils and ingredients when Kurt demands then with an almost surgical brevity.
“Sure.”
“Okay, are you still not getting it?” Kurt asks, frowning seriously at the egg-white only omelet that's for his father. “Wow, you're really still not getting it,” he says. “Your father wants you to fight. You fought for me. You didn't fight for singing. Call him up. Tell him you're going to audition. Don't back down. Nothing bad will happen.”
“Except I'll have had another stupid fight with my father that he thinks will somehow turn me straight.”
“No,” Kurt says, pointing at him with the spatula. “You'll have won another stupid fight with your father wherein he will have to recognize that his son who –” Kurt briefly lowers his voice to a blushing whisper, “loves to take it up the ass – is more of a man than him.”
Blaine gives a loud, awkward, embarrassed laugh in response.
“I'm right, and your mother says so,” Kurt says. “Now fetch me plates.”
In the living room Burt murmurs to Carole that he really, really hadn't needed that piece of information, even if there's a part of him that's proud or amused or something that's probably offensive, that Kurt's not quite all he seems.
Carole laughs. “They are really good together,” she says, less awkward because Kurt's never quite been a child to her.
“I still didn't need to hear that.”
*
On Christmas Eve they go caroling with Schuester, their friends from McKinley, and some current members of New Directions. Blaine watches Kurt look over the new kids, looking, he suspects, for someone to rescue.
As he watches Kurt link arms with Mercedes, Brittany talks to him very seriously about Santa Claus, and Blaine can't stop smiling. She is his secret favorite of all their McKinley friends. He loves that she and Kurt sort of dated once for about five minutes, and there is a brightness to her that makes him happy, no matter how much the stuff she says is weird or stupid or just plain awkward.
She and Kurt couldn't be more different, but to Blaine, for whom excellence has always been the closest he's ever really gotten to rebellion, they both seem like faerie children, and he knows the world is better for them both.
*
“So this thing with my dad,” Blaine says, three days after Christmas and six days of asiduously not discussing it, “I think I need to do it in person.”
“Okay. Good. Great,” Kurt says brightly because he's not sure what he should say.
“There's an alumni/donor brunch thing at Dalton on New Year's Day that he always goes to.”
“Is this a singing and dancing plan?” Kurt says, wary, as a tiny little voice in the back of his head is screams GAP ATTACK.
Blaine pauses as he considers the idea. “No. But the Warblers are as good an intro to the discussion as any.”
“Do you want me to go with you?” Kurt asks, nervous and eager.
“Of course.”
“Okay, so fashion? I'm thinking political wife. Jackie O. Simple, understated, high contrast, demure.”
Blaine laughs and shakes his head. Of course this is going to be a performance, how could he have ever doubted it with Kurt as his partner. Yeah, that's entirely weird, even as he can't seem to stop himself from playing with the word in his head.
*
When Blaine corners his father during a break in the entertainment, Kurt excuses himself to talk to Wes. No matter how much he wants to stand beside Blaine looking fierce and proud and gripping his hand as if to say mine and not yours, he knows that Blaine has to do this alone, both for it to work and for Blaine to feel good about it.
“So why do I get the sense that you guys aren't here because I've been begging you to be more involved?”
“Because we're not,” Kurt says blandly.
“Blaine's father still being... well, not to speak ill of someone who writes the checks, but...?”
“Yeah,” Kurt says, a little surprised. He's never mentioned any of their difficulties with Mr. Anderson to him, and had assumed, clearly erroneously, that Blaine hadn't either. “I didn't know Blaine had said anything to you about it.”
“Not in years. I just assumed.”
“Tell me what you're not telling me.”
“I think Blaine would have been fine at his original school if his dad had been on his side. The problem wasn't the bullying. The problem was that he didn't have a refuge. Then you showed up and he did.”
“So you, the Warblers and Mr. Anderson resent me?”
“No,” Wes said. “I think we're all grateful.”
Kurt narrows his eyes at Wes because he knows there's more to the story.
“I'll tell you another time,” Wes says, clapping him on the shoulder and wandering away.
*
Kurt drives them back to Lima after the brunch. Blaine's wired but silent, and it's not a mood of his that Kurt feels particularly adept at dealing with, so the distraction of the road is welcome.
“I thought that would feel better than it did,” Blaine says after a while.
“I want to be clear that I never said it would feel good.”
“No, I know. And it's a … relief. But, wow. I don't want to have to be that person.”
For a long time, Kurt says nothing, but eventually fills the silence. Driving makes it easier; the road means he won't have to look at Blaine and see all his pity or concern or self-absorption right now, which means Kurt can just talk, even if, since the fight, his skin has felt too thin, like it might break open from acts simple or severe.
“The year before my mom died, I lost my best friend. She had an older brother, and he and his friends told her that she wouldn't be cool when she got to junior high if she had a friend like me --”
“A boy?”
“No, Blaine.”
“Oh.”
“So she sort of broke up with me. She explained, even though we were nowhere near junior high, that it would just hurt more later, so we should stop having tea now. To get used to it. Not being friends. I didn't really understand, and I went home and cried to my mother about it. I remember my dad looking really uncomfortable, and thinking that maybe things would be the same way with him that they'd been with my friend --”
“What was her name?”
“Emmie. Anyway, I didn't say that, but I remember thinking it. And my mom told me that people were just really disappointing sometimes, and there wasn't anything you could really do about it other than not being too mad at yourself for doing the best that you can with them. So your dad's your dad. And it sucks. But you know what to do, and you're able to do it, and you can't make it about you or else you're going to become all the ways in which he's disappointed in himself.”
“What happened with Emmie?”
“She and her parents came to the funeral. I shook her hand. I never talked to her again. She moved away when I was twelve.”
*
That night they stay up far too late going through the entirety of Kurt's iTunes library, looking for Blaine's perfect audition song.
“You know I'm just going to choose something you sort of hate.”
“Probably. Did you want to sing “Popular” again?”
Blaine laughs. “Yes, please.”
Kurt gets out of bed and paces around as they do, conservatory having rid him of a certain laziness around his voice, even when they're just being silly.
Finn eventually bangs on the wall; it's three in the morning, and they're probably keeping him up.
“I bet he thinks we sing musical theater when we screw,” Kurt says, making a vicious and somewhat disgusted face at the shared wall.
“I bet he actually just thinks we're being annoying.”
“Yes to everything!” Finn shouts through the wall. “NOW JUST PLEASE SHUT UP.”
Kurt doubles over with laughter and crawls back onto the bed as Blaine keeps trying to make shushing sounds at his giggles, which only makes the both of them laugh harder.
Eventually Kurt kisses him, and while that doesn't entirely work to silence him either, it's good enough.
Next: All the Pretty Little Horses
Rating: PG-13
Pairings: Kurt/Blaine
Spoilers (if any): None.
Warnings (if any): None.
Word Count: ~3,700
Summary: Kurt and Blaine go back to Ohio for Christmas. Kurt does something really uncool, but so very, very Kurt.
This continues from:
Following Home
These Thousand Names for Gratitude
All the Honesty of Politics
Circles as the Dark Winds Down
The drive between Boston and Ohio is one of those things Kurt has mixed feelings about. It's certainly long enough for them not to want to do it in one day, but they do now, and Kurt figures they always will. He likes to pretend that that's because of how he and his dad did it those first times, overnight, in the dark, the radio murmuring low as Kurt half-dreamed about the completely ludicrous life he now has. But that's not the reason he and Blaine drive straight through.
They drive straight through because they really don't want to have to deal with renting a motel room in Pennsylvania, Kurt too pretty and both of them too young. They don't talk about it, and Blaine takes the first half of the drive. Getting out of Boston aggravates Kurt, who prefers night driving anyway; there's an odd freedom in it, a coffee at his hand and his boyfriend dozing in the passenger seat. Lately, it's one of the only times he feels like he has any privacy.
They get to Lima just after 12:30 in the morning. The light's on in the kitchen, and Carole comes out onto the porch to greet them, hugging Blaine, who's bleary from the ride, first. Kurt loves that. He can tell Blaine does too.
Kurt's dad greets them inside, and Kurt has to struggle not to smirk a bit as his father tries to decide whether to give Blaine one of those awkward back-slapping man hugs or a normal one. The four of them – Finn's out with some girl he met at community college and no one knows if that's going to solve his drama with Quinn and Rachel or just make it worse – sit in the kitchen and catch up.
Carole and Kurt do most of the talking.
“You two look good,” Burt says.
Blaine glances over at Kurt and smiles. “New York helped,” he says, confident, quiet.
Kurt grabs his boyfriend's hand under the table but keeps talking to Carole.
“Good,” Burt says with a nod, and Blaine wishes he knew how to say thank you.
*
Blaine's in the shower the next morning when Kurt steals his phone and copies down his mother's number. He calls Mrs. Anderson on his own phone from the porch
When she answers, he takes a deep breath before saying anything because he's slightly terrified.
“This is Kurt Hummel, your son's --” he pauses, for just a second, wondering about the presumptuousness of it, “-- partner, and I think you and I need to have a conversation. In person.”
They meet for coffee that afternoon after Kurt tells Blaine he has secret Christmas shopping to do; Kurt is only uncomfortable with how easy it is to lie to him.
*
Mrs. Anderson smiles at him indulgently, which annoys Kurt and strengthens his resolve. Whatever pity he felt for her at Thanksgiving seems unwilling to survive the tone of that smile and so he grits his teeth as he tries not to look at her scathingly. Instead, he smiles at her as expected, buys her a coffee, and then starts asking questions.
“There are very few things Blaine and I don't talk about. His situation with you and your husband is largely one of them. Obviously, we're very grateful for the use of the apartment and Blaine really loves school. But there are details of the situation that... pain him. Yet, I'm not entirely clear on what they are. So I was hoping you could explain it to me.”
“Blaine is his own man,” she says gently. “His father and I both respect that.”
“He misses you both, I think. You, in particular; what you did at Thanksgiving... that meant a great deal, so please don't underestimate my gratitude....”
“But?”
“But he misses singing too. He says it was part of the bargain. And won't tell me anything else. I was hoping you could offer some illumination,” Kurt says with false cheer. “And a solution.”
Blaine's mother lowers her eyes to her coffee.
“Blaine doesn't always see things as they are,” she says.
Kurt blinks at her several times in rapid succession. “So he takes after his father then?” It is the first time Kurt has ever had this particular thought.
*
The second time Kurt has that particular thought is that evening, when he gets back to the house and gives Blaine a jaunty hello as he reaches out to put his arms around his boyfriend's waist.
“I just got off the phone with my mother,” Blaine says quietly.
“Maybe we should take this upstairs,” Kurt suggests with his nervous, awkward, but-aren't-I-charming smile as he folds his arms across himself and fidgets with the hem of the scarf draped around his neck.
“No. Maybe you should tell me just what you were thinking.”
“I was thinking about New York. And that I'm sick of watching you suffocate.”
“What's that supposed to mean?”
Kurt rolls his eyes. “Don't play dumb. It's unattractive. You are miserable. With school, with the apartment, with whatever this not singing thing is about. And since you won't give me the full story, I thought I'd ask the closest thing to an ally we have.”
“I, not we.”
“Pardon me?”
“This isn't your fight, Kurt.”
“The hell it is. I live in that apartment too. And seem to have been a larger point in the contract negotiations than you've deigned to tell me. So, no, you don't get to treat me like a child. Or a guest.”
“What the hell?”
“You're always protecting me from... well... life! And I'm better at it than you are. So it's not very fair. Or nice.”
“You shouldn't have called my mother. And I need some air,” Blaine mumbles, before pushing past him.
Kurt doesn't burst into tears until he hears the car door slam.
“Honey, do you want to talk about it?” Carole asks as she pads into the kitchen, her movements slow and well telegraphed as if Kurt is a frightened animal and so worth being extraordinarily wary of. He shakes his head, but then throws himself into her arms anyway.
*
Blaine drives out to Dalton and sits in the empty parking lot, blasting his car stereo until he realizes that every song is just making him angrier. Eventually, he turns it off and sits there in silence. After an hour he calls Wes, but hangs up before his friend can answer. When Wes calls back, he turns off his phone.
He finds he wants to go home and doesn't know how.
*
When Carole explains to Burt what's happened, he just shakes his head.
The whole thing is so typically Kurt it's almost funny, except that it really isn't. He'd kill anyone who hurts Kurt, ever, but the fact is he he doesn't blame Blaine for being mad one bit. Even if he thinks it was a pretty cowardly move for him to walk out in the middle of a fight that, really, had barely gotten started. Sure, sometimes a guy just needs some air, but talk about the one response Kurt can't handle.
Burt thinks Blaine should have known that.
And they all think Blaine should have been back by the time Leno comes on.
At midnight Kurt says he's having a glass of wine and then going to bed. Burt gives Carole a look and Carole gives him one right back because under the circumstances the boy is entitled to a glass of wine. Burt relents, also silently, but only because recognizes in Kurt a certain brittleness he remembers from the months before he went gone to Dalton.
Burt decides to sleep on the couch. If Blaine does come home in the middle of the night, Burt's talking to him before he goes anywhere near Kurt.
*
Blaine returns at two in the morning and Burt, who hasn't even managed to fall asleep, jerks his head for the boy to follow him into the kitchen as soon as he's in the door.
When Blaine starts to speak, he holds up his hand.
“No. I've known my kid longer than you, so I get to talk first,” he says. “Carole kinda got the story from him and I kinda got the story from her, and I'll tell you, I think you got a right to be pissed. I know I'd be, if I was you. But Kurt does stuff like this. Kurt's always gonna do stuff like this. So you guys can work this out, and he can promise not to do it again. But he will. Because that's Kurt. And that's what he does when he loves you. He obsesses, and he takes too much care, and makes choices that can seem pretty crazy. So if you can't deal with that, I think you probably need to figure that out now.”
Blaine nods, biting his lip and unwilling to look up from the spot he's staring at on the kitchen counter. “We're exactly alike in that way sir. I just wish it hadn't taken me the last six hours sitting in a parking lot to figure that out.”
“Okay. Well. Good. I guess. Second thing. My kid cried himself to sleep tonight because of you. Not really my business what with you two being half not married and whatever, but not okay. I didn't know I knew how to fight as hard as that kid has made me fight for him, not that he needs it. So you go up there and fix this. Because I like you. And I'd like to keep liking you.”
Blaine just nods.
Burt jerks his head towards the stairs. “Well? Go on then.”
*
“Blaine?” Kurt asks in the dark, twisting around to face the door when he hears it open.
“Yeah.”
“Are you....?”
“Getting ready for bed, if that works for you.”
Kurt sits up and nods frantically in the dark.
“I'm still mad,” Blaine says quietly. “I think I'm entitled to be. But I handled it badly. And I know you were just doing what you do. If the situation was reversed I might have done the same thing, so I'll get over it.”
“Okay,” Kurt says, and there's a timidity to it that makes Blaine hate himself.
“So, how about, I tell you everything, tomorrow, because I don't have the stomach for it right now. And then you tell me what happened with my mom today. And then you and I will make some agreements about when we can call each other's parents in secret, because that was sort of weird for me.”
“Okay.”
“And then you can yell at me for walking out,” Blaine adds and is so grateful when that earns a weak chuckle for Kurt. He takes a deep breath. “And then we can talk about this partner thing.”
“Are you mad about that?” Kurt asks as Blaine slides into bed in boxers and a t-shirt.
Blaine shrugs as Kurt wraps himself around him. “I don't know. Mostly confused. For one thing, I don't think either of us acted anything like partners today.”
“I just thought it sounded more grownup than boyfriend and your parents kind of freak me out so it seemed like a good idea at the time.”
“Look, use whatever word you want. But if you're going to use that word, maybe we both need to stop thinking of this whole thing as playing house.”
Kurt nods. “I haven't been playing, and I need you to stop treating this whole thing as something happened to you.”
Blaine takes a deep breath. “Yeah. Okay. That's fair.”
“Thank you,” Kurt says and it's clear that that hurt has been sitting with him for a while. Finally, into the long silence, he adds, “I'm sorry.”
“I know,” Blaine says. “I am too. I just... look, there wasn't a second when I wasn't coming home. I just didn't know how for a few hours.”
“That's... that's not how it seemed to me.”
“I know. And I'm sorry for that.”
Kurt takes a deep shuddery breath that Blaine recognizes from the few times he's seen Kurt cry. It tends to happen in the middle, when he's thought the tears were over, right before more start.
Suddenly, Blaine notices what Kurt is wearing because of how it feels under his hands.
“Hey, are these those pajamas?” he asks with a smile. The question is genuine, but he wouldn't mind if it distracts Kurt from melting down.
Kurt nods.
Blaine barks with laughter. “I really do love you, you know.”
“I know,” Kurt says, his breath steadier now, and it's quiet and coy and ridiculously powerful.
*
“Do you remember what you said to me, that night in the hotel after everything? That your dad went through with all this even though I yelled at him and stormed out because, and I quote, I was 'man enough' to stand up to him?” Kurt says as he makes breakfast for the whole house, omelets going in multiple pans and Blaine not doing much more than handing over utensils and ingredients when Kurt demands then with an almost surgical brevity.
“Sure.”
“Okay, are you still not getting it?” Kurt asks, frowning seriously at the egg-white only omelet that's for his father. “Wow, you're really still not getting it,” he says. “Your father wants you to fight. You fought for me. You didn't fight for singing. Call him up. Tell him you're going to audition. Don't back down. Nothing bad will happen.”
“Except I'll have had another stupid fight with my father that he thinks will somehow turn me straight.”
“No,” Kurt says, pointing at him with the spatula. “You'll have won another stupid fight with your father wherein he will have to recognize that his son who –” Kurt briefly lowers his voice to a blushing whisper, “loves to take it up the ass – is more of a man than him.”
Blaine gives a loud, awkward, embarrassed laugh in response.
“I'm right, and your mother says so,” Kurt says. “Now fetch me plates.”
In the living room Burt murmurs to Carole that he really, really hadn't needed that piece of information, even if there's a part of him that's proud or amused or something that's probably offensive, that Kurt's not quite all he seems.
Carole laughs. “They are really good together,” she says, less awkward because Kurt's never quite been a child to her.
“I still didn't need to hear that.”
*
On Christmas Eve they go caroling with Schuester, their friends from McKinley, and some current members of New Directions. Blaine watches Kurt look over the new kids, looking, he suspects, for someone to rescue.
As he watches Kurt link arms with Mercedes, Brittany talks to him very seriously about Santa Claus, and Blaine can't stop smiling. She is his secret favorite of all their McKinley friends. He loves that she and Kurt sort of dated once for about five minutes, and there is a brightness to her that makes him happy, no matter how much the stuff she says is weird or stupid or just plain awkward.
She and Kurt couldn't be more different, but to Blaine, for whom excellence has always been the closest he's ever really gotten to rebellion, they both seem like faerie children, and he knows the world is better for them both.
*
“So this thing with my dad,” Blaine says, three days after Christmas and six days of asiduously not discussing it, “I think I need to do it in person.”
“Okay. Good. Great,” Kurt says brightly because he's not sure what he should say.
“There's an alumni/donor brunch thing at Dalton on New Year's Day that he always goes to.”
“Is this a singing and dancing plan?” Kurt says, wary, as a tiny little voice in the back of his head is screams GAP ATTACK.
Blaine pauses as he considers the idea. “No. But the Warblers are as good an intro to the discussion as any.”
“Do you want me to go with you?” Kurt asks, nervous and eager.
“Of course.”
“Okay, so fashion? I'm thinking political wife. Jackie O. Simple, understated, high contrast, demure.”
Blaine laughs and shakes his head. Of course this is going to be a performance, how could he have ever doubted it with Kurt as his partner. Yeah, that's entirely weird, even as he can't seem to stop himself from playing with the word in his head.
*
When Blaine corners his father during a break in the entertainment, Kurt excuses himself to talk to Wes. No matter how much he wants to stand beside Blaine looking fierce and proud and gripping his hand as if to say mine and not yours, he knows that Blaine has to do this alone, both for it to work and for Blaine to feel good about it.
“So why do I get the sense that you guys aren't here because I've been begging you to be more involved?”
“Because we're not,” Kurt says blandly.
“Blaine's father still being... well, not to speak ill of someone who writes the checks, but...?”
“Yeah,” Kurt says, a little surprised. He's never mentioned any of their difficulties with Mr. Anderson to him, and had assumed, clearly erroneously, that Blaine hadn't either. “I didn't know Blaine had said anything to you about it.”
“Not in years. I just assumed.”
“Tell me what you're not telling me.”
“I think Blaine would have been fine at his original school if his dad had been on his side. The problem wasn't the bullying. The problem was that he didn't have a refuge. Then you showed up and he did.”
“So you, the Warblers and Mr. Anderson resent me?”
“No,” Wes said. “I think we're all grateful.”
Kurt narrows his eyes at Wes because he knows there's more to the story.
“I'll tell you another time,” Wes says, clapping him on the shoulder and wandering away.
*
Kurt drives them back to Lima after the brunch. Blaine's wired but silent, and it's not a mood of his that Kurt feels particularly adept at dealing with, so the distraction of the road is welcome.
“I thought that would feel better than it did,” Blaine says after a while.
“I want to be clear that I never said it would feel good.”
“No, I know. And it's a … relief. But, wow. I don't want to have to be that person.”
For a long time, Kurt says nothing, but eventually fills the silence. Driving makes it easier; the road means he won't have to look at Blaine and see all his pity or concern or self-absorption right now, which means Kurt can just talk, even if, since the fight, his skin has felt too thin, like it might break open from acts simple or severe.
“The year before my mom died, I lost my best friend. She had an older brother, and he and his friends told her that she wouldn't be cool when she got to junior high if she had a friend like me --”
“A boy?”
“No, Blaine.”
“Oh.”
“So she sort of broke up with me. She explained, even though we were nowhere near junior high, that it would just hurt more later, so we should stop having tea now. To get used to it. Not being friends. I didn't really understand, and I went home and cried to my mother about it. I remember my dad looking really uncomfortable, and thinking that maybe things would be the same way with him that they'd been with my friend --”
“What was her name?”
“Emmie. Anyway, I didn't say that, but I remember thinking it. And my mom told me that people were just really disappointing sometimes, and there wasn't anything you could really do about it other than not being too mad at yourself for doing the best that you can with them. So your dad's your dad. And it sucks. But you know what to do, and you're able to do it, and you can't make it about you or else you're going to become all the ways in which he's disappointed in himself.”
“What happened with Emmie?”
“She and her parents came to the funeral. I shook her hand. I never talked to her again. She moved away when I was twelve.”
*
That night they stay up far too late going through the entirety of Kurt's iTunes library, looking for Blaine's perfect audition song.
“You know I'm just going to choose something you sort of hate.”
“Probably. Did you want to sing “Popular” again?”
Blaine laughs. “Yes, please.”
Kurt gets out of bed and paces around as they do, conservatory having rid him of a certain laziness around his voice, even when they're just being silly.
Finn eventually bangs on the wall; it's three in the morning, and they're probably keeping him up.
“I bet he thinks we sing musical theater when we screw,” Kurt says, making a vicious and somewhat disgusted face at the shared wall.
“I bet he actually just thinks we're being annoying.”
“Yes to everything!” Finn shouts through the wall. “NOW JUST PLEASE SHUT UP.”
Kurt doubles over with laughter and crawls back onto the bed as Blaine keeps trying to make shushing sounds at his giggles, which only makes the both of them laugh harder.
Eventually Kurt kisses him, and while that doesn't entirely work to silence him either, it's good enough.
Next: All the Pretty Little Horses
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