CHAPTER 12 : Tabula Rasa - Part 1

Lima, OH, October 2, 2010

When Carole arrived at the Hummel home late Saturday morning, she found Kurt and Blaine snuggled together on the living room couch while a movie Carole didn't know played in the background. Both boys looked up when she entered the living room and Blaine immediately tried to put some distance between him and Kurt.

"I just wanted to drop off my suitcases real quick. No need to get up," she tried to assure them. "Did you get here alright? I could have picked you up from the airport." Blaine, who at that point had already gotten up and was holding one of her suitcases, asked. "The two of you deserved some time alone after everything…", she trailed of guiltily.

"Kurt, where do you want me to put my suitcases? I know your dad slept in your mom's bedroom, but I wanted to ask you first if that was okay." Carole asked instead.

"Blaine could just share my room and then you could have his." Kurt gave her his best puppy dog eyes, but this wasn't her first day as a mother. "Did your mother allow you two to share a room?" she countered, hoping the answer wasn't actually yes.

"Yes," Kurt said the same time as Blaine said "No." She raised an eyebrow at both of them. "Fine," her stepson relented. "She would have let us share during summer break." "Okay, than that's settled. Everyone sleeps in his own room until further notice, and I can stay on the couch down here, if that would make you more comfortable." Carole told Kurt who looked conflicted and seemed to struggle with the answer.

That was answer enough for her. "The living room it is," she said cheerfully. "You two get back to your movie," she said as she took back her suitcase and moved them into a corner.

"I'm going to drive around for bit, to get a feeling for the neighborhood and check if there are any houses for sale." Carole ushered Blaine back to the couch and made him sit down. "I'd really like to have dinner with the two of you tonight, so we can all get to know each other a little better. Unless you already have plans, of course."

"Our friends Rachel and Mercedes wanted to come over tonight." Kurt told her as he tried to snuggle up to Blaine again without upsetting his injuries. "Then invite them too. If we're all going to live together, it's only right to meet your friends." She smiled at both of them before grabbing the keys to her rental car.

"I'll be back around six. I don't really know what you have, so maybe we can just order take out when your friends get here." The boys nodded in her direction before turning back to the television. She checked again that she had her keys, phone and a map and left the house.

As soon as Carole had closed the front door, Blaine had put his arm around Kurt and kissed him deeply. "I can't wait to go to school with you again," Blaine whispered against his lips. "You know we can't do that at school. Even if McKinley has really changed. But maybe it was me who'd been the problem."

Why else did no one at school push Blaine around or call him ugly names. At least Blaine had told him that it hadn't happened anymore since the first day of school.

"Hush you. Coach Beiste really cleaned up the football team. If your GPA isn't good enough you're off the team. At lot of the Neanderthals have lost their pull at school because they're not wearing their precious letterman jackets anymore."

That was a welcoming change, because that meant Finn wouldn't be allowed to join the football team unless he miraculously suddenly got better grades. Because he had taken mostly AP classes in addition to the two senior classes he didn't really know how hard normal classes were at McCallum, but he assumed they hadn't been much more difficult that the ones at McKinley.

Before he could say much more about the topic the phone rang. "You want me to get that?" Blaine asked. "Could you just get me the phone? It might be my father, since my cell is still off." There was no reason for him to turn on his mobile phone because he could only call people he didn't want to talk to apart from Carole.

He felt Blaine get up from the couch and a moment later the phone was held out for him. "Kurt Hummel speaking," Kurt answered. He had stopped saying just hello because people more often than not thought he was his mother and it had been especially hard after the funeral when people had called the house who didn't know his mom had passed.

"This is Mark Allan from the auto repair shop on W Elm. Can I talk to your dad?" "I'm sorry, my father went back to Texas this morning. You should try his cell if you have his number." "Thanks, kid. Will do." Blaine shot him a questioning look as he hung up the phone. "The guy from the garage Burt wants to buy," Kurt explained. Blaine raised one of his eyebrows. "What?"

"You still call your father Burt?" "Until he can learn how to act like a father, I'm not going to treat him like one. And besides, you spent two days alone with him and still call him Mr. Hummel even though he seems to like you much more than he likes me."

Definitely wouldn't be a first. People always liked Blaine better, because he was charming and generally nice to everyone, even people who didn't deserve it. "You know that's not true. He was probably just being polite because he needed me while we were looking for you." "I don't want to talk about it anymore." Blaine gave him a sympathetic smile and took his good hand to help him up from the couch.

"Come on, we have a couple more hours before Carole gets back. How about I make us some sandwiches and we eat them out back. I can build us a fort out of sheets so you can lie down comfortably." Kurt couldn't help but smile at his goofy boyfriend. Blaine wouldn't be Blaine if he didn't cite a Katy Perry lyric at least once a day.

Carole had had a productive afternoon. She had applied for a job a local coffee shop and talked to the realtor she'd spoken with after Kurt's mother's funeral. The woman had agreed to show Carole a couple of houses first thing Monday morning. Afterward she had gone grocery shopping and taken a walk in a park close to the house to give Kurt and Blaine a little more time alone.

She liked being back in the Midwest especially because she had grown up in Decatur, Illinois and had only moved Texas after her high school graduation because she had gotten pregnant with Finn, and Finn's father had decided to join the army to support her and the baby.

Her mother hadn't been too happy, but supported her nevertheless and when her mom had moved to Arizona shortly after Finn's dad's death she hadn't had any reason to return to Illinois and had stayed in Texas where she had met Burt after her car had broken down. Once she was done with her trip down memory lane she headed back to the house to spend the evening with the boys and their friends.

When she returned to the house she couldn't find anyone at first until she heard laughter coming from the backyard. The boys and two girls she recognized from the cemetery were sitting on pillows and what looked like Kurt's comforter, listening to music coming from one of those apple things and occasionally singing along.

They all sounded great together and she now understood why Kurt had been so down when he had found out his school didn't have a music program. She wondered for a second if Burt knew how talented his son was. She watched them for a while before one of the girls, she thought her name was Rachel, spotted her.

"You can come closer if you want to here me sing," the girl said, earning her an eye roll from her friends. "That's Carole, Rachel," Kurt interrupted her. "She's my father's wife." Carole just smiled, but she had hoped that by now she was more than just the wife. She never wanted to replace Kurt's mother because she knew that wasn't even possible, but she had hoped she was considered a friend, someone Kurt could rely on.

Kurt must have noticed her expression and the look on his friends' faces because he quickly added. "Carole's okay. She's an ally." He made it sounded as if they were in a war, with him and her at one side and Burt and Finn on the other. She just hoped they could find a way to bury the hatch somehow.

Dinner was nothing like it had been the day before. Rachel and Mercedes were telling stories about a younger Kurt that Blaine loved while Kurt glared at his friends. They asked Carole about herself to make her feel included and even Blaine shared some of his better childhood memories. If it would be just the three of them living together it would be great, but Blaine knew it wasn't realistic.

Carole might not like her son that much right now, but she would never leave him behind. Even Kurt's father was better than his own, because he at least tried to do what was best for his son instead of just abandoning him. His own father would never have uprooted his family just to make his life easier. After Blaine had been attacked they could have moved somewhere else, but Dalton had worked out great for them because they could send their son away.

Kurt seemed to have realized that he had stopped smiling somewhere along the way because suddenly there was a hand on his knee squeezing it gently.

Blaine knew things wouldn't stay like that, considering Mr. Hummel and Finn's impending arrival, but maybe they could all find a way to make it work. At least he wasn't alone anymore.

In the end, the girls had decided to stay the night and after Blaine had promised that he wouldn't sleep in Kurt's bed he was allowed to join the sleepover in the basement. Kurt couldn't remember the last time he had that much fun, staying up all night talking to his friends. It made him realize how lonely that last couple of months had been.

Kurt relished that he had at least part of his wardrobe back and even though it was hard to get into some of his pieces because of his injuries, he spent most of Sunday trying to find the perfect outfit for his first day back at McKinley. Burt would probably not be back for at least another week and Kurt intended to make the most of it clothes wise just in case his father tried to get him into "boy clothes" again.

Carole had kept out of their way after the girls had left with the excuse that she wanted to explore Lima some more and therefore Kurt had spent a lazy Sunday afternoon with his boyfriend interrupted only by the occasional fashion show that usually ended with them kissing on Kurt's bed because Blaine found one of his outfits particularly hot.

For the first time in forever Kurt was actually looking forward to getting up in the morning and even though Carole had told him he could stay home from school a little longer, he didn't want to wait any more. He wanted to show the world that Kurt Hummel was back. Maybe he should wear the top hat after all.