CHAPTER 3

To say that Kurt was grumpy would be an understatement of the month. He had stayed up until six thirty last night (or this morning if someone wanted to be anal), frustrated and restless after Mitch went home, and it had taken him a while to fall asleep even then. He’d planned to sleep in, but then Seb called at eleven damn a.m., and was cheeky enough to startle him wide awake, yelling about an emergency, before laughing like it was the best joke ever and defining emergency as a lunch date. And now it was noon, or close enough – he might have gotten distracted trying to cover the dark circles under his eyes – and Kurt was grumpy and bitchy, and entering their coffee bar with an intention to kick his friend’s ass.

Of course, Sebastian knew him way too well to give him a chance. As soon as Kurt got in and made a few steps towards their usual table, he was grabbed and greeted with a wet, demanding kiss. But he knew Seb too, so he just lulled him into the sense of security, returning the kiss for a few seconds, before biting his lower lip, hard. His friend jumped away with an offended cry.

“Ow, bitch!”

Kurt shrugged. “Don’t put your mouth where it doesn't belong, hasn’t your mother taught you that?”

Sebastian snorted, turning towards the bar already, but not before he landed a sneaky slap on Kurt’s ass.

“Fair enough. Grande non-fat mocha with an extra espresso?”

“And an oatmeal muffin.”

“Mm, demanding.”

“Says the man who bullied me into getting up at the break of dawn and coming here before breakfast.”

“Honey, your break of dawn is other hardworking people’s well-earned lunchtime.” Seb passed the money to the barista and pushed Kurt towards their table.

“Not my fault if they insist on keeping such a schedule.” Kurt settled into his favorite armchair and only then he realized that they weren’t alone. Blaine was sitting in the corner, nursing a small latte, and beside him, Cooper was playing with a biscotti. Kurt raised an eyebrow.

“Wow, hi guys. Seb, how did you do this? Did you tie Coop up and bring him here? I don’t believe he’s capable of leaving his office voluntarily during work hours.”

Sebastian chuckled and passed Kurt his coffee, which he sipped immediately.

“Pretty much. There was kicking and screaming involved.”

Everyone laughed except for Cooper, who grumbled something about important papers and timetables instead. Caffeine slowly spreading through his system at last, Kurt nibbled on his muffin and asked.

“So what’s the occasion for this gathering at such an ungodly hour?”

Sebastian took care to move his chair a little further away from him before he answered.

“Well, I was bored, slow day at work…” Grinning at Kurt’s and Cooper’s surprisingly similar Glares of Death, he went on. “So I decided it was time to meet Anderson Junior. Fine lad, if I may say so.” Blaine flashed a faint smile, looking intimidated. “Plus, I needed to know everything about your date last night! So tell me, is Mick the one and only?”

Even Cooper perked up now and looked at him intently. Kurt groaned.

“First of all, his name is Mitch, not Mick. Second of all, it was just a date, guys, not an engagement. I don’t see why you are so excited about this.”

It was Cooper who answered this time.

“Kurt, it wasn’t just a date – it was a fourth date. You haven’t gone on more than two with the same guy ever since the mess with James three years ago.”

Kurt frowned and crossed his arms.

“Two and a half.” Damn. It wasn’t supposed to sound defensive.

“Nevermind. The thing is, it’s been nothing but one-night stands for you for so long that a fourth date? It’s huge.”

“Are you calling me a slut?”

He tried to zap Coop with the bitch face, but it must have been only partially loaded, with too little caffeine in his system yet, because his friend didn’t even blink. Sebastian cut in.

“Yeah, yeah, you’re a slut. Deal with it, we love you anyway. So tell us, our dearest friend, is it looooove?”

He sang the last words in that ridiculously cheery voice of his, and Kurt glared at him before shrugging.

“Love’s a myth.”

Sebastian winced. “Uh-oh. No fifth date then? No serenading in Central Park, lavish weddings and cute gay babies?”

“Nope.” He picked up his cup again. Coffee. The best friend of all.

“Damn.” Sebastian groaned, but Kurt saw Cooper grin and extend his hand, palm up. Wait, what the fuck? Had they been...

Seb cursed, but took out his wallet and handed Coop a neatly folded hundred.

“Fine. You were right. But I still maintain that he’ll fall for a guy properly by the end of the year, love and all.”

Yup. They'd been betting. On his love life. The bastards.

Cooper pocketed the money and chuckled. “And I’m still telling you that you’ll owe me another one of these then.”

“Like you know anything about relationships. Being married to your job doesn’t count, just so you know.” Sebastian smirked and stole the last bit of biscotti from Cooper’s plate, earning a slap on the hand in the process.

“Oh yeah? You, on the other hand –“

Oh god, they were doing it again. They’d poke fun at each other, then argue, and then Kurt would have to be a goddamn mediator for the next week. No fucking way.

“Guys. Guys?” It was loud enough to get their attention. Finally. “I hate you both.”

Sebastian slapped his forehead and moved his chair closer to Kurt. “You’re right. We’re so sorry. You need comforting and we’re –“

“I don’t need comforting.”

Cooper leaned towards him over the table, too.

“Just tell us what you need. A guy’s night out? Drinking until you forget?”

“A friendly fuck?” Sebastian put on his serious, concerned face. Bastard.

“No, seriously, we’ll help any way we can.” Cooper reached to pat Kurt’s hand.

“What was wrong with Mick –“ Seb started.

“Mitch.”

“ – Mitch, anyway? Was the sex bad?” Now it was the counselor look, and Kurt was really having enough of this conversation. He snapped.

“The sex was fine, thank you very much. It was the rest that wasn’t. It would be nice to have a conversation sometimes, maybe. Some mutual interests? You can only fuck a guy into the mattress so many times until you realize that.”

A choked sound came from the side and suddenly, they all remembered about Blaine, who was sitting quietly in the corner, red-faced and very wide-eyed. Kurt quickly replayed the highlights of their conversation in his head and groaned.

“Oh fuck. I mean. Great. See? Now you two have terrified Blaine with your crazy ways. I’m sorry, Blaine, we’re not always this –“

Sebastian raised his hand to silence him and looked at Blaine intently.

“ – Insane? Intense? Yeah, we are. But don’t try that at home. Remember, you don’t want to be like Kurt when you grow up, young Jedi. There is a whole world of beautiful gay love out there, don’t believe those that say otherwise. Kurt’s just… compensating. James hurt him and – “

Kurt stood up quickly and grabbed the remaining half of his muffin. “Oh my god, okay, enough. I’m going home and back to bed, and I don’t want to hear from either of you until you start behaving like normal people. Or at least as close as possible with you. Thanks for coffee. Bye.”

He would have slammed the door on his way out, but it was unslammable. Dammit. Even doors hated him today. Fuming, he marched towards his apartment.

***

An hour later Blaine was back in his room in Cooper’s apartment, his head still reeling from all that he saw and heard. He’d planned to go and explore the city on his own after lunch, but right now there was no chance for him to focus on anything outside of his own head, so he gave up and came home instead. Lying down on the mattress, he let his thoughts go back to the events in the coffee bar.

After Kurt had stormed out, there was a moment of uncomfortable silence at the table. Both of the men looked like they were wondering if they’d gone too far, but soon Sebastian shrugged and went on telling Blaine the story of how James, Kurt’s ex-fiancé, had left him less than a month before the wedding, and how Kurt had never been the same since. This was all Blaine heard before Cooper interrupted to say that he needed to get back to work.

They walked together for a bit, and all along Coop was trying to convince Blaine that Kurt was really a great guy, no matter how many different men he wanted to date, while Blaine was wondering if he really seemed like such a kid to them. Because how could all of them have read him so wrong?

On the other hand, maybe it was better they did. The truth might have been a lot more awkward for everyone present.

They all seemed to believe that Blaine felt uncomfortable about their conversation. Disturbed, even, or maybe disgusted. They couldn’t be further from the truth if they tried. His feelings were of a different kind altogether.

There was jealousy, for sure. He knew he had absolutely no right to be jealous about all the other men that got to kiss and touch Kurt, Sebastian included. But right or wrong, the green-eyed monster was there, gnawing at his insides. It was grinding its teeth hearing that Kurt had went on a date (and, most likely, had sex) last night; it became more restless when they were talking about one night stands, and once Kurt got to fucking a guy into the mattress… Guhhhh. Blaine had almost choked on the picture his brain managed to produce before losing all blood as it migrated south in a hurry.

There was astonishment among his feelings, too – a stunned kind of disbelief that made him sit quietly in his corner, sip on his latte (an experiment, just like Kurt had suggested, and delicious) and listen intently. Here he was, fresh from Ohio where he’d been teased, bullied, taught that there was no place for people like him there, told to keep his sexuality to himself, if only for his own safety – and then there was that. Three adult men, including his own straight brother, sitting in a public place, talking and bantering openly about gay relationships, gay sex even. Without a shadow of fear, without looking around to check if anyone disapproved, like it was something completely normal.

Because it was normal. This was how it was supposed to be – how it should be everywhere. It wasn’t that New York was strange – it was the rest of the world that was weird and wrong, all those places where two boys holding hands were looked at with disgust and showered with hateful words, or worse.

And Blaine had known that there were such places as here – but it was theory, a gay utopia of sorts. Now that he’d gotten to see it for himself, he knew without a shadow of doubt that he wanted to live here too. That he would do anything in his power to come back to New York after graduation, and that he would stay here, where his sexuality didn’t determine who he was and what he could do. He wanted to just be normal, to have normal relationships, normal heartbreaks, normal sex, things that everyone else took for granted. To be able to date openly, hold hands wherever he wanted, kiss in public, live with a boyfriend, get married one day. He wanted it all so much it hurt.

It was not the only thing he wanted, though, and this could be a problem.

Because how wrong was it to desperately want to be held down and fucked into the mattress by your older brother’s best friend?

“Have Kurt and Sebastian ever been… you know, an item?” Blaine asked Cooper over a late dinner of take-out Chinese that evening. He hoped he wasn’t too obvious, but ever since he saw them kiss earlier, the question wouldn’t leave him alone.

Cooper just laughed. “God no. I know, they act like an old married couple sometimes, but they’ve never actually dated. Or slept together, for that matter. This is just their thing; the teasing, the groping – but I doubt they’d ever actually follow through with it. Too much potential to screw things up, I think, and they need each other. We all do.”

“It seems like you three are really good friends.”

Coop nodded, his face serious now.

“The best. I don’t know what I would do without them. Well, probably work even more and be less sane.” He flashed Blaine a smile before going back to playing with his chopsticks. “It’s funny, you know? We’re all completely different, and yet we click somehow. We talk, we meet, we do silly stuff, and at the same time we know that we can trust one another with our lives. There have been situations where we all learned we can depend on one another.”

“Like what?” Blaine asked before he thought it might be too private. But Cooper didn’t mind, apparently.

“Like when Kurt’s dad had his second heart attack. They decided to do a bypass surgery that same night, and in his state it was pretty risky, but so was waiting. Kurt had like eight hours to get there before the surgery, I think, and it was right before Christmas, so he couldn’t get an earlier flight, everything was booked. He called us, almost hysterical, and by the time Sebastian got to Kurt’s apartment half an hour later, he had a small private plane ready for Kurt and a cab waiting outside to take him to the airport."

Blaine’s jaw might have hit the floor before he noticed and gathered it back.

“Sebastian has a private plane?”

Cooper laughed. “No, not yet at least. But he’s from a really wealthy family and works with people who have more money than they know what to do with. He has his ways. He pretends not to care too much, but then he goes and uses his money and connections to go above and beyond.”

“What about Kurt’s father? Was he okay?” Blaine had to ask – he remembered Kurt telling him how important his family was to him.

Cooper nodded and put his carton on the table.

“Yeah, the surgery went great and he’s good as new now, thank god. I don’t know how Kurt would have survived if he’d lost his dad then, right on top of James leaving. That was a bad month for him. And Kurt will drop everything to take care of those close to him, but when it comes to asking for help, he’s worse than a mule. He shuts himself in his little world and it’s hard to get to him and convince him to let you take care of him, for a change. He’s kind of like you in that regard.”

Blaine said nothing. He’d learned long ago that dumping your problems on others wouldn’t solve them, and often would make matters worse. That’s why the phone call to Cooper was such a clear act of desperation – he just didn’t do such things. Didn’t ask for help. He managed, alone. That’s why he knew he understood Kurt – his heart clenched at the thought of how hard it must have been for him, back then.

“Anyway,” Cooper yawned and stretched. “Any plans for tomorrow?”

“Yeah. I think I’ll walk around, do some touristy stuff, you know.”

“Okay. Just be careful. Oh, and before I forget again.” Cooper reached for his wallet and took out a debit card. “The code is 0823, like your birthday. You need to eat and buy stuff sometimes, right? Don’t go overboard, but you don’t have to count every penny, either.”

Blaine took the card, surprised with the trust his brother put in him. “Thanks!”

“Don’t mention it. And I’ll be late tomorrow, so maybe meet Kurt for dinner if you want company?”

“But he said –“

Cooper laughed. “He meant Seb and me, not you, silly. Don’t worry about it, it’s not the first time.”