They had ordered already and fell into easy conversation while waiting for their food, and Blaine was doing his best to be funny so that Kurt would laugh. He was in love with Kurt's laugh, the way his eyes lit up and how his whole face looked happy. He had known Kurt long enough to know what amused him, but not quite long enough to have him figured out completely. It was exciting, discovering Kurt, getting to know every side of him. Blaine knew he wouldn't be done with that for a long time.

Kurt had just been wiping his eyes after laughing at one of Blaine's bad jokes, his hands falling back onto the table between them as he hiccuped and let out a long breath.

“God, you're ridiculous,” he said, a fondness in his voice that made Blaine's face heat up.

He only thought about it for a second before reaching forward to cover Kurt's hand with his own. He liked Kurt's hands as much as he liked his laugh. He’d never known he had a thing for hands before, but Kurt’s were strong yet soft, and they fit into his in a way that was almost too much.

Kurt cast down his eyes for a second and bit his lip as he blushed a little before turning his hand and intertwining their fingers.

Blaine liked that about him too—Kurt could be the one to initiate their kiss outside the restaurant, he could be brave and spontaneous and daring, judging from everything they had done back at the lake each night after Rachel had gone to bed, yet the simple act of hand-holding was enough to make him blush sometimes.

“This is really nice,” he said in a small voice.

Blaine only nodded in agreement, debating whether or not it was a good idea to kiss him right now. He would be perfectly fine with forgetting about the food and the entire date thing and just find a quiet corner somewhere and keep kissing Kurt all night long.

“I don't know if I have said it yet,” Blaine started, “but that morning after we both left—I was so glad when I found your little note in my pocket,” he confessed. “I was—I really wanted to see you again.”

“You have no idea how happy I was when I found yours,” Kurt replied. “And how obnoxious Rachel was about it with all of her I-told-you-so.” He rolled his eyes.

“I was afraid I was being totally creepy.” Blaine laughed, squeezing Kurt's hand for a second. “But then I thought to myself, hey, if I don't do it I'm never gonna see him again, and if I do, there's at least a small chance, so go for it.”

“Same. I was debating destroying the damn thing, but then you came out of the bathroom and I had no choice but to leave it.” Kurt squeezed his hand back, grinning, his expression going soft as he met Blaine's eyes. “Although, I have to add, your chances were never small to begin with.”

Blaine just sat there for a moment, opening and closing his mouth, but he was buzzing with so much happiness the words just wouldn't come out. “Who's being cheesy now?” he finally managed, the best he could come up with.

“Oh, shut up.” Kurt sank back into his chair. “Just letting you know how you sound sometimes. It's ridiculous, really.”

“I agree.” Blaine nodded. “Clearly, we're a bad influence on each other.”

The food arrived and Kurt let go of his hand. Blaine missed the feel of it instantly. But he guessed they would indeed need both of their hands if they didn't want to spill steak sauce all over themselves.

Kurt did most of the talking during dinner—because he was graceful as fuck and could eat and talk at the same time without looking ridiculous while Blaine was sure he'd just spew his dinner all over the table cloth or reveal bits of food that were stuck in his teeth if he even attempted it. And he liked listening to Kurt. That was another thing about Kurt he liked a whole lot—his voice. It was soothing and melodic and he couldn't get enough of it. God, he thought, looking at Kurt who was cutting his meat while telling him about the extra voice lessons he wanted to sign up for next semester, he just liked everything about Kurt. He had known him for a few weeks and he was already crazy about this man. He knew Laura had only been teasing him when she'd said it, but she'd hit amazingly close to the truth: this was what falling in love felt like, wasn't it?

Blaine quickly looked down on his plate, hiding his face in case his eyes gave him away. It was too soon for declarations. He didn't even know if he was quite there yet himself. All he knew was that he'd be a fucking idiot to ever let Kurt get away. He had gone to the lake to recover from a hell of a semester during which he had worked two jobs while taking on a shitload of classes, he had gone there to get away from everything. Instead, he had found something. Something to make everything in his life just that much brighter and better. It was crazy. Maybe it was true that the things you needed had a way of showing up when you least expected them.

He hadn't expected Kurt. He could never have expected someone like Kurt.

“Blaine?” Kurt sounded concerned. “You still with me?”

“What? Yes! Sorry.” Blaine laughed, looking up into the eyes of this wonderful person sitting across from him. “I'm... fine. I'm great, actually.”

“Good.” Kurt hooked an ankle around Blaine's under the table, smiling. “You looked a little far away for a moment there.”

“Sorry about that.” Blaine saw that Kurt's plate was as good as empty and most of his own food was gone as well. “Do you want to get out of here? There's this beautiful little park just a few blocks from here and it's still warm out, I thought we could—”

“Sounds perfect,” Kurt agreed, and Blaine waved for the waitress.

They ended up having a small argument over who should pay (“I invited you, so I'm paying, end of discussion.” “Just let me pay my share, Blaine, and we can be out of here, god, you can be so stubborn!”) but Blaine won in the end, after Kurt had made him promise to let him pay next time, at least. (Next time! Blaine had to suppress a squeal at the thought.)

Blaine was amazed to find that as he walked next to Kurt, joined hands swinging in between them, it felt like they had parted only yesterday. It was all so easy. So comfortable.

It was getting late by now and while the small park was by no means empty, it was easy enough to find an empty bench underneath a large maple tree where they sat down, close enough to one another that their shoulders were pressed together.

“So how do you know this place?” Kurt asked, playing with Blaine's fingers in his lap.

“I actually don't live too far from here,” Blaine explained. “I like it here—I come here sometimes to read, or to run, or... just because I like it here.”

“Brought a lot of dates here, then?” Kurt's tone was teasing, but Blaine didn't miss the underlying curiosity, the carefulness.

“I... no, actually.” Blaine sat up straighter, thinking about his answer for a second. “I haven't... I haven't dated much since I came here, actually.”

“Oh?” Kurt tightened his grip on Blaine's hand as if he was afraid he'd withdraw it and turned his upper body so he could look at him.

“No. It's not that...” Blaine sighed. “It's... my last real boyfriend... We knew each other from Ohio. We went to the same school. Well... he transferred to my school when I was a senior. And I went to New York for him, actually, we had been together for a year by then. It didn't last long after that.” He shook his head, memories of his first months in New York flooding back.

“What happened?” Kurt's thumb had started drawing soothing patterns onto the back of his hand and Blaine relaxed his shoulders. He hadn't even realized how tense he was. He didn't like thinking about Sebastian and how na�ve he had been back then. “I mean, you don't have to tell me, obviously, if you don't want to, but...”

“It's okay.” Blaine rested his head on Kurt's shoulder. He didn't feel bitter about it anymore. He had something much better now. Or so he hoped. “He was... well, he was my first boyfriend. At the time, I thought I was in love with him.”

“But you weren't?”

Blaine shook his head, sighing. “He was... the first to really see me, you know? He complimented me, told me I was sexy and talented and he was... adventurous. You know I went to Dalton?”

He waited for Kurt to nod before he continued. “I loved that school, but it was very strict. Uniforms, rules... Sebastian was like a counterpart to that safe little world. We would sneak out to gay bars and drink, he even got me a fake ID.” Blaine laughed. “I felt... it was like a side of me I hadn't even known existed up until then. It was exciting. Dangerous.”

“And when you came to New York?” Kurt asked.

“At first, nothing changed,” Blaine explained. “We lived in separate dorms and I had to find a job to help me through college—a lot of what my parents had saved up for me went into Dalton—and Sebastian didn't like the fact that I had less time for him. I think I was starting to be too boring for him even before we left Ohio. I knew he was going to dump me sooner or later, and I knew he was already sleeping around before he dumped me. I couldn't bring myself to do it, though, I knew he was shallow and not good for me, but I...” Rubbing his free hand across his face, he sighed again. “I didn't want to hurt him.”

“Oh, Blaine.” Kurt let go of his hand to put his arm around his shoulder, drawing him closer. “Only you could stay with someone who was cheating on you because you didn't want to hurt his feelings.”

Blaine shrugged, slipping an arm around Kurt's waist and pressed even closer to him. “After that... I just set a higher bar for myself, you know? I went on dates, I went out with this guy, Michael, for about three months, but I never met anyone I wanted to stay with.” Until now, he added in his head. Until you sat on that dock on a sunny afternoon in the middle of nowhere and changed everything. He couldn't say it, not yet, but he thought Kurt understood, the way he cupped Blaine’s face and tilted up his head to kiss him softly.

“Let's talk about nicer things,” Blaine suggested. “Tell me more about your visit home. Tell me about your family. You've only hinted at what you're stepbrother is like in your texts... what was his name again?”

“Finn,” Kurt supplied, grinning.

“Finn. Right. But it sounded hilarious. Tell me more about him. And your dad. He must be an awesome guy.”

“He is,” Kurt confirmed, and went on to tell him about his father, his stepmother who already sounded like someone Blaine wanted to know (don't get ahead of yourself!) and his stepbrother, who, apparently, also knew Rachel quite well.

They stayed in the park until it became too chilly to stay any longer, and Blaine felt a sudden surge of sadness at having to say goodbye to Kurt again so soon. At the lake, they had spent every minute of every day together, and this just felt... inadequate, after what they were used to.

Aware of the fact that he might be pushing his luck, he stopped Kurt as they were about to exit the park and tried not to blush as he prepared himself for rejection.

“I actually really just live a few blocks from here and my roommate is out on a date with her boyfriend tonight. You can say no, of course, but I'd like to talk with you more and I have, like, an unopened bottle of wine somewhere and... would you maybe like to...”

“Yes,” Kurt cut him off. “Okay.”

“Okay?” Blaine felt like bouncing up and down in his excitement, but decided against it quickly. Kurt had agreed to come home with him. Now was not the time to start behaving like a five-year-old at Disney World.

“I'd love to,” Kurt said, and he smiled warmly as Blaine took his hand again, leading them down the street in the direction of his tiny apartment. He just hoped that Laura had cleared away the remains of her microwaved dinner and the dirty clothes on the bathroom floor before she had headed out for the night.

Kurt had agreed to a date and now he was coming home with him. Not that Blaine really expected them to... do anything. But there was definitely a chance of it and probably more of one if the apartment wasn't going to look like it had recently been raided.

He didn't care whether they were going to end up in bed together or play chess all night long, he was getting more time with Kurt. That was all he had hoped for.