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The evening had been shaping up to be perfect for Kurt Hummel.
The traveling theater company he had worked so painstakingly hard to get off the ground for the last year and a half had, at last, finalized its plans for its upcoming first tour in that afternoon’s meeting. Dinner afterward had been great; a celebration at a classy French restaurant uptown, with excellent wine, even better cheesecake, and Andrew’s playful wandering hands.
Kurt was feeling an electric high, giddy from the day’s events as he and Andrew walked home. Even the bitter wind of late January couldn’t knock him down, and he didn’t think anything could. Until Andrew stopped them on a corner, and clasped Kurt’s hands in his own, shaky and damp. When Kurt looked into Andrew’s eyes, and saw the eagerness there, when he began to talk about first meetings and forevers, he finally began to panic.
This isn’t right, the voice in Kurt’s head screamed as Andrew got down on one knee. This isn’t right at all.
——————-
Kurt almost chickens out, reaches the doors of the school and almost turns back around, and then hesitates again at the door of the auditorium. But not seeing him again weighs heavier on his mind than the fear of a long overdue conversation.
Music is playing as he enters the nearly dark auditorium, the soft sound of the piano echoing in the hall. Blaine is sitting center stage, head buried in the keyboard, completely engaged in the music, unaware as Kurt comes down the aisle. The auditorium is different, but the scene is familiar, as if his past had frozen here, waiting for him to arrive again. Kurt shivers.
He recognizes the song almost instantly. Teenage Dream, Kurt thinks as he comes close to the stage. What is he supposed to make of that? Irony? Serendipity? Coincidence?
He climbs the wooden steps slowly, careful not to disrupt Blaine or the music. Blaine doesn’t notice he’s there until one of the floorboards squeaks. The music stops abruptly, Blaine swiveling around to face him.
The shock on his face is unmistakable.
Blaine looks different, older, not quite as much gel in his hair, slight creases around the eyes and mouth. But he’s still Blaine. Still breathtakingly handsome in just jeans and a red polo.
“That was good,” Kurt says, searching for something, anything to say.
“Thank you.” Blaine shuffles off the piano bench, deliberately not making eye contact, and taking a noticeable step backwards. Kurt doesn’t close the distance.
“I’m kind of surprised to hear you play that again,” Kurt says. He folds his arms across his chest.
“Well, the kids want to sing it,” Blaine says, his eyes fixed on the floor as he picks at one of the black keys of the piano. “How’d you know I was here?”
“Rachel.”
“She still in London?”
“Loving every minute of it.”
Blaine’s face falls into a scowl. “Is there a reason you’re here?” he asks, tensely, straight to the point.
Any hope of a friendly reunion dissipates. Strictly business it is. “My boyfriend asked me to marry him.”
Blaine finally lifts his head, his eyes wide, his voice a choked whisper. “Well, congratulations. You’ve finally found someone who meets your standards.”
Kurt feels the anger rising. “Don’t do that.”
“Do what?”
He tilts his head, hurt and frustrated that Blaine doesn’t get it. “Pretend it didn’t mean anything to me.”
“Did it?” Blaine shrugs his shoulders. “Because what I remember is you dumping me. Twice.”
“And you cheated on me,” Kurt snaps back. “And things were so complicated and—god, it’s been two minutes and we’re already having the same damn argument.”
Blaine’s jaw clenches as he shakes his head. He tries to compose himself, taking a deep breath before speaking again. “You came to me, after almost five years of not talking. No warning, no hello. Just, I’m marrying someone else. What did you think was going to happen? That I would be thrilled for you? Oh, hey, I know I once promised to spend the rest of my life with you, but never mind. I found someone else to do that with. Now be happy that I did.”
“Dammit, Blaine, I didn’t come to rub it in your face.” Kurt’s voice is soft, but sharp enough to still echo in the empty auditorium.
Blaine’s hands settle on his hips, pausing a moment before he speaks again. When he does, it’s quieter, more controlled. “Then why did you come?”
“To see if there was a reason to say no. To see you. I thought maybe we…no, nevermind. I don’t know why I thought things would be any different.”
“That’s really all you see, isn’t it? Some loser of a boyfriend who was always trying to hold you back.”
Kurt stares at him, dumbfounded. “That’s what you think I thought of you?”
“Hard to think otherwise?” Blaine says, with a bitter laugh.
Kurt finally snaps. “Your heart isn’t the only one that broke. Twice. And I wanted you back. I came back, but you rejected me. And if you didn’t think that hurt, then maybe you could never look past your own bruised ego. We both made mistakes, the only difference is that I was able to forgive you when you screwed up, and you ran away. You have no idea how many sleepless nights I had, wishing, hoping you’d come back, and I—”
“No,” Blaine cuts him off, so forcefully that Kurt’s taken aback for a moment. “You do not get to play the who’s had it harder game,” he says and holds an accusing finger at him. “You are not the one who flunked out of school. You are not the one whom everyone pitied. And you are not the who’s been in therapy for the past five years. So don’t tell me how hard it was missing a few nights’ sleep.”
Blaine’s words cut through his heart deeper than he would have thought possible. This was a bad idea, Kurt thinks. He should have known better than to even try.
“You know what, Blaine?” Kurt says, staring darkly at him. “Fuck you.” Kurt doesn’t even wait for a response. He’s down the steps and out of the auditorium without a single glance back.
Just outside, in the cold, he breaks down crying, uncontrollably, wondering just when and how his life had become such a mess. Trying to trace back the thought only makes things worse. At least it’s cathartic to cry, to feel it all again. He can deal with it and move forward, right?
When he’s finally able to stop, he wipes the hot tears from his cheeks and collects his composure, and after a few deep breaths he begins to head back to his car.
“Kurt!” a voice calls out to him. It’s Blaine, who must have followed him outside.
“Go away,” Kurt calls over his shoulder as he reaches his car.
“Kurt, wait,” Blaine says, catching up to him quickly. “Please, just hear me out.”
“What is it?” Kurt spins to face him. “What more could you possibly have to say?”
Blaine blinks, taking a second too long to answer. Kurt’s rarely seen him unprepared. “Just—I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. There were a lot of ways I imagined seeing you again and that—I’m sorry.”
Kurt breathes, in the empty space Blaine’s cleared for him, and his mind slows down enough again that he’s able to try to think. “What’s wrong with us? What’s wrong with me?”
“Are you really asking me?” Blaine says, resigned as he backs against the car and slides down to the ground. “God, we’re both a couple of fuck-ups.”
Kurt joins him on the ground. The pavement is a stinging cold, but at least it’s dry, and he’s too exhausted to care.
“Elliot used to come over. Everyday,” he says. There’s a stone on the ground next to him. He picks it up and turns it over and over, pretending not to notice how Blaine watches him. “Make sure I would eat because I wouldn’t feed myself. He worried that I might harm myself, but I don’t know. I was too numb to try anything. I just…existed. For a very long time, all I did was exist. So, no, I’m not sorry for where I’m at now.”
“And you shouldn’t be,” Blaine supplies. “But, Kurt? Let me ask you this. Would you be here right now if you didn’t have any reservations about marrying him? Regardless of me. Of us. Would you?”
It’s a fair question, though ‘regardless of me’ strikes something in Kurt that he’s not ready to look at just yet. “He’s not a bad guy, you know. Andrew. Does the dishes without complaining. Remembers to get the mail. He even adheres to my laundry regimen.”
“Of course you still have a laundry regimen,” Blaine says fondly.
He still can’t look Blaine in the eye, but he can hear Blaine’s smile.
“When he proposed, he took me to the place we met,” Kurt continues. “This spot on 4th, just around the corner from this little bar Rachel liked to take me to when she was still in New York. He took me to underneath the lamplight where we literally ran into each other. And he got on one knee, and told me that from the moment we met, he knew we were supposed to be together.”
“What a naive idiot,” Blaine says. The smile in his voice isn’t quite gone, but now there’s also an ache.
“It made me miss you.”
“Kurt…”
For the first time, Kurt lets himself look up into Blaine’s eyes, still a glowing hazel. The familiarity of Blaine’s gentle gaze is both comforting and frightening, and the intensity of it causes Kurt to break away first.
He looks down to the stone clutched in his hand. “It doesn’t help that I keep hearing that damn song being played everywhere. Is Katy Perry paying people to revive her career?”
Blaine leans back against the car with a laugh. “Some indie punk band named Black Metal Daisy did a remix. Only their rendition is supposed to be ironic, I think? I don’t know. But the kids love it.”
“Oh, my god.”
“Right?” There’s a brief pause, and a thick heaviness in the air. Blaine turns his head towards him. “Kurt—what does this mean?”
“It means I don’t want to marry my boyfriend.”
“And?”
“And, I don’t know,” Kurt throws the stone across the parking lot. “Blaine, I can’t.”
“I wasn’t asking.”
Kurt tilts his head. “You’re always asking.”
“We should go in,” Blaine says as he pushes off the car to stand. “My ass is freezing.”
Blaine holds out his hand to help Kurt up, a smile settling onto his face as he waits, faded but still sincere. For a moment, Kurt’s transported back in time. He’s seventeen again, and it’s prom, and everyone’s eyes are waiting on him to see if he’ll accept his fairy tale.
The moment passes as nearly a decade’s worth of reality settles in. He doesn’t need saving, not anymore, not for a long time. And Blaine was never a prince, not really. Only in his head.
He lets go of the fantasy and grasps onto Blaine’s hand, warm and familiar. As he rises to meet Blaine eye to eye, something shifts. Blaine is just Blaine, real and worn and weathered as he is.
“I…have to go,” Kurt says, quickly pulling his hand out of Blaine’s grasp.
“Okay,” Blaine says easily. Kurt lifts his eyes to meet Blaine’s. There’s no anger in them, no resentment, no expectations. Maybe a little sadness, but Kurt can’t really tell what he’s thinking.
“Hey, Blaine?”
“Yeah?”
“Could I call you sometime?”
“Always.”