CHAPTER 1

Lips slide easily against lips, soft and plump, breath intermingling sweet and minty between them. It’s a road travelled a thousand times over; tongues meeting in a gentle dance, fingers caressing smooth skin of cheeks and necks, bodies close enough to share heat.

Until the door swings open.

“Q! Porcelain! In my office, now. And for god’s sake, stop playing tonsil tennis in the locker room. One would think you’d get bored with it after all this time.”

Minutes later, the co-captains of the McKinley cheerleading squad are seated in front of their coach’s desk, along with two girls also in uniforms, Santana and Brittany. They don’t have to wait long for explanation of their presence there. Coach Sylvester pierces them with one of her determined-bordering-on-insane glares before snapping.

“Okay, the four of you are about to become my secret weapon: the singing squad.” She snorts, seeing them exchange incredulous glances. “Don’t look so surprised, I know you all can sing. The impromptu Christmas caroling last year? Dreadful idea, but it gave me some useful info.” The girls look at one another uncomfortably – the fit  Coach Sylvester had thrown when she found them singing in the girls’ locker room was unprecedented. “And you, Porcelain – oh well, I heard you in the showers last week, when I went there to spy.”

Kurt raises his eyebrow, his tone snarky. “And that’s not creepy at all.”

“Oh relax, it’s not like I wanted to ogle your boy parts,” she shrugs, nonplussed.

“Thank god for the small mercies,” Kurt mutters under his breath, but gets ignored as Coach continues.

“So, starting next week, the four of you are joining the Glee club.”

“What?” It’s Santana who explodes with what they’re all thinking. “Coach, we can’t, they are a bunch of losers!”

Coach Sylvester nods with a wry smile. “I agree. But they are a bunch of losers who will prepare you to sing at our next competition. We’re good, but with this, we’re going to be invincible. We’ll take winning to a whole new level. I’m going to call it winning Sue Sylvester style. Okay, you know what to do. Now get out of here, there’s too much estrogen in this room.”

Kurt strides through the crowded corridors, head held high. People move out of his way; some heads turn. Kurt isn’t naïve enough to believe it’s a sign of respect – after all, this is high school; they may feel respect towards his status and popularity, but him, as a person? No one really cares.

Not that it matters.

Right around the corner, Azimio is pressing some scrawny freshman into the wall of lockers with one meaty hand, his other balled into a fist and hovering threateningly in front of the kid’s acne-ridden face. He grins, noticing Kurt.

“’Sup, Hummel?”

Kurt smirks, the familiar expression of disdain firmly in place. “Dude, don’t overexert yourself. The guy looks like a fucking wrestler.”

He passes them without stopping, knowing that the jock is probably looking back at his victim in confusion. Dumb like most of them. Well, at least Kurt’s place in the high school food chain wasn’t earned with fear and a letterman jacket. Sure, the red and white polyblend excuse of an outfit he wears is a big part of it, but he wouldn’t be where he was if it wasn’t for his insanely hard work and his brains. Many of the cheerios might be dumb as doornails; not Kurt Hummel. He’s earned his place on the social ladder fair and square, with effort and time and sacrifices.

The cafeteria is crowded and loud, but Kurt doesn’t stop or slow down before striding right to the beginning of the line to grab a salad and a yogurt. No one says a word, though some faces flash with annoyance. That’s okay, they don’t have to like him. A year and a half and he’ll be free from this damn school and this whole hate-filled town, on his way to bigger, better things. In the meantime, fuck them all.

His usual place by the cheerios table is waiting for him, of course, so he slips in the chair smoothly, kisses Quinn and starts to eat, listening to the girls’ chatter with a bored expression. There’s never too much knowledge and gossip, after all – you never know when you can use some tidbit of information. It’s boy drama again, so he suppresses the urge to roll his eyes and tunes out most of the details. Until a particular word grabs his attention.

“… I’m telling you, Kendra – he’s gay, there’s no way he’d leave you like this otherwise.”

A roll of anger vibrates through Kurt’s veins and he chastises himself, quickly covering his reaction with snark, in case any of them noticed the slip. “No way. Have you seen the way Douchebag McDick dresses? I don’t think any gay guy would be able to pull off those monstrosities without immediate implosion.”

They giggle in return, but Sandy smirks, shaking her bleached blond head. “Well I don’t know. Our resident fag’s outfits make me want to scratch my eyes out sometimes, and he seems fine.”

Like a pack of sheep, the girls all laugh and look towards the table where the current object of their mockery sits alone with his physics book open in front of him, immersed in reading. Blaine Anderson – a transfer from some private all-boys school. A junior like Kurt, he’s a short, nerdy, openly gay boy with gel-slicked dark hair and big, thick-framed glasses; currently sporting a confusing outfit of red pants, green checkered shirt, yellow suspenders and a grey bowtie. Okay, that’s definitely too much.

What Kurt doesn’t point out as he shrugs and returns to his salad with a bored expression, is that no matter how confusing Anderson’s outfits are sometimes, they’re always perfectly fitting – a feat Kendra’s ex seems to be completely unable to achieve. And while they’re no high-end designer stuff, Kurt knows quality clothes when he sees them.

Not that he’d ever admit to any of it out loud. He’s just observant, okay?