Eleven AM, and there is finally some silence.  There is not a soul on the empty street outside, not even one.  He almost wishes for a teenager in a private school's dapper uniform to skip in, requesting something super fancy and delicious with extra foam, but he seems not to mind the slow streak right now.  It's a nice break from his usually tauntingly busy mornings, to the point where he almost forgets that he hates his ownership of the Lima Bean.  When there's a line of money-paying customers, he almost forgets how much he hates his life, how lonely he is, how much he hates himself and his long list of failing decisions that leads him behind the counter taking coffee orders for the rest of his life.  How did I get here?  Its then that he notices he hasnt cried today. Yet.  It's not even noon.  He calls it a victory, or maybe just slow, excruciating progress.  How is one morning of dry eyes progress?  He doesn't want to put forth the effort with himself.

Sighing, Kurt dismisses his morning shift cashier, Julie, who promises she can stick around if he needs her.  Shes a petite little thing, and if he was being honest, she was only hired because she kind of reminded him of Rachel.  Annoying, yes, but exudes nothing but determination and hard work. 

Rachel Berry, a force to be reckoned with.  Rachel is Kurt's former best friend (current best friend?) and roommate. McKinley High School is to blame for the pair's meeting that led to almost seven years of being attached at the hip, breaking away only for work and school and sleep.  They grew up together, or at least matured within the worlds that mattered, and now she's gone just like everyone else and Kurt is alone.  People always leave, whether they want to or not.  Always have, always will.  Kurt knows that he'll be left alone in the end regardless, so why try his hand at interaction with others?  It's why he only reacts with his parents and his employees now.  Sure, they'll leave one day, he's positive of that much, but at least he'll also be able to remember his family who he loved, and his employees who helped him make some sort of income.  Anyone out of that circle will never be worth it.

Julie trudges to the back room to gather her purse and her keys.

His inside voice rambles nonsense not for the first time when he's left in his own personal solitude.  No one loves you.  You're a coward.  No one wants you.  Dying would be best.  Doubt.  Ugly.  Alone.  Not good enough.  Flawed.  It's true, dying would be best. 

***

Kurt had always thought of New York City as his Mecca – as the place where he would wind up and find true happiness, whether that would be another person, career, or creativity. He never felt at home in his quaint Ohioan life and had been attracted to the freedom of being himself in a city, The City, Manhattan.  He loved that New York had a mind of its own, full of influence and resistance in which he would have to figure out his own life for himself and answer to no one else.  It was a satisfying fantasy that he could be anything he dreamed of in New York, as he could with his own family, and not one person would bat an eye.  New York seemed like an adult version of the safety he sought out in Glee Club.

He found himself because of Glee Club and ultimately because of Finn.  Kurt was happy to have Finn as his stepbrother.  They mutually supported each other throughout high school and beyond, and that was enough for Kurt.  But when Rachel Berry pirouetted straight into his routine of sophomore year, all the loose puzzle pieces of a grand goal of close friends and eternal happiness seemed to fit together seamlessly.  Finn brought Rachel over to the house for a family dinner shortly after they began dating and the rest is history. Kurt and Rachel became fast friends because of her relationship with Finn, but maintained their friendship because of their identical love for the arts.  Kurt, forever grateful for Finn for being his rock throughout high school, found himself urged into Glee Club with Rachel and thus obtaining an army behind him and his interest in other boys. Kurt owed so much to Finn and Rachel for unknowingly finding exactly what Kurt needed. 

As the question of their futures started to loom over the McKinley junior class, and as graduation quickly approached, Kurt and Rachel made a pact with only one detail:  New York together.  Rachel's dreams were not necessarily New York, but the dreams were all performance-based and it was just lucky that Broadway was within city limits of Kurt's Mecca. Her incomparable voice and the light she brought to the stage were only small hints that she was going to make it someday.  They vowed a life, or at least their college years, of living together chasing their dreams in the only city Kurt would ever like to know. 

Kurt vividly remembers that the change from potential to waste materialized somewhere between his first few auditions during his junior year of college.  The unmanageable instances of rejection ripped at Kurt's soul the first few times then poisoned his veins just a bit more with each “no” making its way to the surface.   In a place that was once his definition of perfection, Kurt was experiencing a terrible case of falling sick to his stomach of New York, with no one and nothing to rip him out of his location depression.  He slowly fell into a routine of curling into a ball and crying all of the moisture out of his body and listening to slow and sappy songs about being alone and lonely.  Rachel was too busy getting noticed to notice the trapped downward spiral her best friend was now accustomed to.

Kurt carried on under the realm of rejection until he met a gorgeous boy in an advanced theory class. Eddie showed him the world of "love" he was missing all those years. Two abusive years later, Kurt Hummel officially opted out of ever having a boyfriend again if having a boyfriend was hitting and punching and rough sex and never saying “I love you.” Kurt felt like Eddie's whore for twenty-four months and decided he was no longer in love on their exact two-year anniversary after being impaled by a throbbing cock so rough and dry he would still feel it all the way from Ohio.  Shortly after, Rachel received word that she got the job on television in California and she was expected to be packed and across the country in two weeks.  There were so many variables in Kurt's life and he took all the changes in Rachel's as a sign. At Rachel's announcement over a quiet dinner party hosted at their shared apartment, there was vacant talk about moving in with Eddie.  Kurt ultimately moved home with his father instead.  It was a handed opportunity to escape a man he didn't want to be with anymore in a city that was eating him alive.

***

Julie mumbles her goodbyes and he waves her off persistently.  He knows that Austin is scheduled to come in right before the afternoon rush begins.  Damn, he is great at being a boss, even though hed rather be doing something else far away from here and a hell of a lot more creative. Kurt wishes her a great day, and continues to wipe the table that sits against the foundation pole one more time for good measure and tilts his head, humming to the constant adult contemporary soundtrack he gets to pick.  One good thing about being the owner, he supposes, is the complete control over the soundtrack.  He'll always approve of the music selection. Hes alone now, and can let go and relax until Austin comes in.

He's pretending hes on a stage now, as he twirls a tiny pirouette and grabs the mop placed strategically in the corner and dances with it for all of thirty seconds to the sound of his own take of the Broadway version of “Tale As Old As Time.” He adores the story of the Beauty and the Beast.  Belle, although physically beautiful, is sincerely fucked up and she keeps to herself buried in her books as an excuse for not being close to anyone else, and she's got a good head on her shoulders, would do anything for her dad, and works really hard to fix the one she loves.  The beast, on the other hand, is ugly inside even more than out and struggles with himself and the world around him.  They still manage to find each other and fix each other and live happily ever after.  He giggles to himself, obviously living in his own universe, and obviously analyzing a stupid fairytale way too seriously.   He just wants to find a beast to his Belle.  He yearns to love a man unconditionally, regardless of how his struggles have ruined him.  That never happens in the real world.  He, however, remains sane enough to restock the sugar, to wipe again at the chance of spilt milk.

He feels the familiar prickle of wet warmth trailing down his cheek as he retrieves the plastic funnel to easily refill the sugar from the large canister into the decorative one that sits by the rest of the condiments.  He's stuck in a rut and so painfully lonely; he only has himself.  Kurt's traded in his Vogue internship and auditions for student films and crowded subway trains and hustles and bustles to race from one corner of the best city in the world to the other for filling sugar bowls and counting five dollar bills at the end of each night, to ordering coffee beans from a corporate warehouse somewhere in Michigan.  This is his life and he can't fight it, not anymore.  He's breathless from running from the dark clouds, and from his constant fight to show anyone who would give him the time of day in passing that although it appears he's just a lifeless loser who will remain in this town until he rots away into the soil at his feet, he's not.  He has lived, and he'll live again.  Maybe he won't share a life with a man again, but he'll do it for himself.  He wants to prove it to anyone who will see, he wants to show the world just what he is capable of, even if he can't find his way back to his once-paved yellow track to super-stardom.  Kurt Hummel is not one to get stuck, but somehow it's exactly Kurt Hummel who has been sinking deep into the quicksand for more than a few years.  He hasn't quit his dreams, dammit; he's put them on hold until he's ready to try again.  He's just not ready yet.

He vanishes to the back supply room to switch out his coffee and milk-stained rag with a fresh one in preparation for the afternoon rush, due to trickle in sooner than later.  While hes digging through his fresh supply, the ribbon of bells he designed himself to give the shop a quaint feel jingles with a push of the door.  Its an uncharacteristically harsh sound; it's a response to the door being thrown open.  He perks up in surprise, gracefully wiping his hands on his apron, and strides back in behind the counter.  He plasters on a smile for the sake of coffee expertise and impeccable customer service.

A bruised and broken boy, not all that different from himself seven or eight years ago.  A beautiful version of absolutely broken.  A limp, and a split-to-the-tooth bottom lip, and an eye threatening to snap shut in all its purplish grey glory, and… is that toilet paper attached to his cheek?  He wisps in, nervous and unstable on his feet.  He clutches the table by the pole and steadies.  He looks up in search of a menu as he approaches the counter, but finds Kurts wide eyes.  His golden irises lock with Kurts steel blue gaze.  Kurt feeds his soul with the unbearable need to control the situation.  He needs to help him; he needs to make sure the boy is okay.  Hes still gripping the newly soaking wet rag, tighter than he initially intends to, and shakes himself out of his trance as water streams down his forearm.  Pushing his hand forward and above the cash register, he offers up the dripping rag. 

"Are you okay?"  Hands brush only for a second, and his reflex is to reach up to the boys cheek, but he quickly refrains.  The boys rag-covered hand presses against his cheek with pressure and he winces at what must be an excruciating pain.  Kurt feels his eyes bulging and his brows furrowed into wrinkles, and he watches the boys own face go from wrecked and pained to defensive and scowling in a matter of three shallow breaths.  Kurt moves away from the counter to scoop some ice into a cup for the boy's black eye. 

"Can I just get a medium drip, pretty boy?"  He scrunches his eyes dramatically and pushes his palms to the counter space in front of him, and then just like nothing even happened, nods to a homemade pack of almond biscotti.  "And some of those."  He holds the rag in front of him and over his head at an angle, and unclenches his fingers around it over the nearby trashcan, watching it fall to its death. 

Kurt cant move.  He is paralyzed.  Who is this kid?  He needs to help him.  What is his story?  Why isnt he in school?  Is it even a time where one would be in school?  Would he even allow Kurt to help him?  He needs a doctor, he probably needs stitches on his cheek, and he needs Kurt.  Kurt, in turn, needs to be needed.  Kurt has found a distraction to his own depressing life, and thank goodness for that.  He starts to go through the process of nursing this boy back to health.  He fantasizes about getting to know all about his fucked up past and becoming a makeshift therapist, someone this boy can trust.  Both hands are clenching the cup of ice, and his uncontrolled shiver sends a few cubes to the tile at his feet.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?  Im your only fucking customer.  Can you fucking get me what I asked for or not?  Are you that incapable of even making a cup of coffee?  Was this your fucking dream, Lima Loser?”

Kurt decides that he needs to incorporate a black eye discount:  Free biscotti and coffee when you come here directly after getting the shit kicked out of you.

Kurt snaps out of it and slams the remaining ice down next to the register.  It's now that he notices that hes been staring at the beautiful boy for more time than is socially acceptable, lost in a trance of making him safe again.  He looks at him again before slightly nodding, at which question he's not sure, silently agreeing with him that he is in fact a Lima Loser.  He decides, for now, to push away from the jabs at his own self-esteem, because this kid has clearly had a bad day, week, year, life.  However, he does take note that this is the first person to leave him utterly speechless, without even a hint of sarcasm or snark or ounce of defense on the tip of his tongue, as he is usually prepared.  This frightens him, especially if this is the start of a regular thing.  Of course it's not a regular thing, this guy just came in for coffee after getting mauled by someone who's clearly had training.

***

Blaine is in bad shape.  He can feel his kneecap floating, as if its been filled with water and the simple bend of the joint in just the right way could a crushing pop to the balloon.  It is definitely dislocated.  Although his usual injuries are the same as they always are, there seems to be an extraordinary pain in all of them working against him together.  He remembers gliding his way to Main Street, gripping any side of any building he could find, and hoping to anything that the seconds it takes to cross the street are not the same seconds his wobble turns horizontal.  He hasnt eaten and hes tired.  He needs something to keep him awake, at least until he confirms with his dizziness that the concussion isnt coma-inducing. 

Hes a smart kid.  He knows what hes doing and he always takes care of himself.  No matter how much others dont give a damn. 

The older man scrambles to prepare the injured boy's order. "Why dont you go sit down?  Ill bring your order over in a second." 

Turquoise eyes full of pity stare down on Blaine, snapping him back to reality.  He wants to bark that he doesnt need any help, that he doesnt need anyone to feel bad for him.  He wants to growl and curl his lip and intimidate.  Instead, he sets his jaw and shuffles to the table by the pole, extending his arms across the length of the surface and curling his fingers around the opposite end.  He puts his head down, forehead kissing the still-damp area in front of him.  He closes his eyes to block out the last three hours of his life and drifts away.

The next thing he knows, there is a mop dropped at his feet and hes jolting awake to bright eyes and an elbow on the spot across from him.  Theres a cold cup of coffee and an untouched bag of cookies. 

"Oops.”  This guy's tone is mocking, as if he dropped the damn mop on purpose.  The man follows his line of vision down to the fallen mop and shrugs.  “Youre drooling, you know."  He smirks for just a second then turns his lips upward into a small, shy smile.  There is silence in the flirt, but a flirt nonetheless.  "Im Kurt."  Blaine blinks and swallows a gulp of cold coffee, making only the slightest reaction to let in how unpleasant the taste is on his tongue.  Theres a beat and Kurt turns to break the awkward silence.  He strolls, like a fucking graceful ass vampire, back beyond the counter and pours another cup of coffee.  He palms a few sugars and balances a small jug of liquid carefully, returning to the table with a determined look in his brow so theres no more spilt milk.  "Are you okay?  Do you want me to call your parents?  A friend?  What happened?"  Blaine flips the top, arranges the mixture to his liking, and gulps again.  So light, so sweet.  His hands follow the paper cup back to the table and he stares into the brown, slightly too light mixture.  Kurt gets up again and flips the sign in the window to “closed.”  They dont speak.  They dont meet each others eyes. Blaine is scared.  He is shaking. He's not sure if it's his body's reaction to this seriously good looking man who clearly thrives in helping fucked up teenagers like himself, or his body's reaction to the pain.

Blaine pushes up in an effort to appear as normal and unhurt and as unaffected toward Kurt as possible, empties his coffee cup into his stomach, and slams it back down to the table, burning his throat in the process.  He brushes past Kurt a little too aggressively, then again past a newly arrived Austin, and disappears into the emptiness of Main Street.

***

Kurt sighs and changes the sign on the door from "closed" back to "open."  So much for stopping everything to help the boy in need.  Not even strangers want to waste their time with me.

Kurt greets Austin politely, gives him a few instructions for the rest of the afternoon, and locks himself away in the back room's restroom to cry.   

***

Blaine sneaks into the foyer and dives into the family room down the long hallway beyond the stairs and closes the elaborately detailed doors and locks them together.  He follows his familiarity and collapses onto the plush couch.  Grabbing for the remote on the coffee table and powering up the DVD player, Blaine is destined to watch whatever was in there from last time.  He daydreams of blue sparkles glistening back at him, the voice too high an octave, and he has hope that things will work out in the end, whenever that will be. 

Blaine wishes beyond anything else that he could go back to how things were before he came out.  He wants so badly to go back to the time even after he came out, and his father wasn't so angry about it all.  Its definitely built up slowly, and now his dad is in the worst condition hes ever seen.  He needs his confidence back; he needs himself back.  He's always angry, now.  He throws his phone against the wall.  It shatters.  He knocks the framed family photo off the wall, and he overturns the oversized chair in rage after unzipping the cushion and throwing the fluff across the room.  Sneaking down the hall again, leaving the trashed family room for someone else to straighten up, he thankfully makes it to the kitchen where he proceeds to gather a survival kit of boxed crackers and a few cans of soda before sneaking up to his bedroom and locking up as quickly as possible.  He drifts into a nap that turns into the entirety of the night, dreaming of graduation and college and the beautiful man from the coffee shop that couldn't seem to take his eyes off of Blaine's face.  He would share these dreams and the story of his newest infatuation if he had a friend in this lonely, lonely world.  

***

The next morning, he wakes on his own at 8:30.  He slept off most of his injuries, he hopes, so he showers and leaves.  He nearly trips over a box of textbooks at his front door with a note attached. “Studying material for your senior year.  This is what the others were up to while you were stealing the latest copy of a thesaurus.  Theres something ironic in that, dont you think?  Call me! – Santana”

Hes on autopilot, now.  Hugging an astronomy textbook and others he's not quite interested in, he walks with less of a limp than yesterday.  Only staying still for a few hours in his slumber helped his ribs to heal on their own a bit, although definitely not 100%.  His headache has gone away; licking his bottom lip proves an effort to normalcy as well.  He knows, without looking, that his swollen purple eye will be just that for quite some time, but thats perfectly fine because it keeps the people away from him, as he prefers.  He doesnt realize that he ends up at the Lima Bean, naturally scanning behind the counter for this Kurt character.

The man is a fucking angel, and probably a freak in the sheets, too.  The way he walks, the swivel of those hips!  Bright and interested blue-as-the-ocean eyes that gaze into his soul every time they meet.  He has perfectly coiffed strawberry-blonde hair, straight and a little too long across his forehead, and a button nose that resembles a freckled ski slope.   His skin is pale, blemish-free, and completely flawless.  His mouth is full, lips are plump and red, and his cheeks have a natural rosy glow.  His body is lean, lanky, but formed and muscular.  His biceps bulge, and assuming by the tightness of his visible body parts, his calves must reform with every step.  His thighs must be devastatingly toned and perfect, even his ankles are probably beautiful.  Hes a ten in a town of twos, and Blaine cant stop staring.  Won't.

Blaine finds himself sprawling at the same table by the pole for hours, reading everything he can about stars and constellations and other galaxies.  He escapes his four-mile world in something that is so much bigger than this stupid little town.  He is seemingly thirsty and laughs at the irony that hes in the middle of a place that could probably make any beverage he wanted sans alcohol, so he approaches the counter as naturally as he can, but not before staring at his books in an effort to glue them to the table so no one walks off with them.  Theres no one super threatening in the vicinity, anyway; itll be fine. The queue moves efficiently, and soon he is ordering into the subtle waves of blue and porcelain.  Kurt shines at him, and Blaine forks over his credit card. 

"Shit!  No, I want to pay cash."  Blaine grabs for the card, but Kurt pulls it away and up over his head.  He turns his back to Blaine and reads the card.  Kurt is smiling brightly when he faces him again. 

"Can I get you anything else, Christian?" He allows every letter to drawl out of his mouth, overexaggerated and… steamy hot.  Kurts eyes darken before him, squinting into a rather serious look.  The bell of the door rings, and Kurt is somewhat aware of his newly arrived employee joining him behind the counter, signing into his register, and forming words with the following customer in line.

Kurt and Blaine exist in this world together, the only two who are one in the same.

“No!  I mean.  Shit.  My name is Blaine.  This is my father's credit card.  Christian is my father.”

Kurt stores this information and comes out of it appearing seemingly unfazed.  “Can I get you anything else, Blaine?”

Blaine curls his lip downward, clearly disappointed hes let someone in so quickly, and shoves a five dollar bill at him.  "Your pretty little mouth all over my cock, Kurt, and I didn't want you knowing my name until you scream it later."  It was too loud.  A stupid, slutty housewife turns to him, flabbergasted, as does the employee standing at the next register with the housewife.  He raises an eyebrow and moves back to his table, leaving Kurt behind to squirm and become acquainted with the blush rising all the way to the tips of his ears. 

"Medium drip for Blaine, on the bar." Kurt says, shyly but loud enough for Blaine to hear.  Hes surveying his soul, peeling each layer one by one.  Blaine raises an eyebrow and doesnt budge.

A few seconds go by and Blaine continues to stare at the man.  Kurt scoffs and angrily grabs the cup, a few packets of sugar, and a jug of milk, and hand delivers the coffee to the table by the pole.  He throws it all on the table and turns on his heel, swinging his hips a little too freely on the way back behind the bar and into the back room. 

He feels the moisture welling up quickly, and he couldn't do anything to stop it if he tried.  He throws himself into his chair and folds himself to jolt his head in his hands.  Kurt sobs.