Kurt woke up in his soft cotton sheets the next morning and started his routine. He had cheerios practice during lunch and after school so he took out his uniform (which he had hand washed and quickly steamed last night so it was fresh) and carefully put it on. A small flicker of excitement passed through his brain - he knew Blaine would be please to see him back in uniform. He went over to his vanity to style his hair then headed upstairs to have breakfast. 

"Morning Kurt." His Dad yawned as he greeted him. 

"Hey Dad. I've got cheerios practice tonight, Coach has started choreographing our routine for competition!" Burt nodded and looked to see what Kurt was getting for breakfast. He was reaching for a pain-au-chocolat and a hand full of blueberries.

"That gonna be enough? Sound's like you got a busy day." Kurt was slim and toned, he watched what he ate carefully and never over-indulged like his father used to.

"This isn't all I'll be eating throughout the day, Dad." He replied as he pulled out a container of carrots, celery and cucumber with a side of sweet chilli dip and showed his Dad. Burt turned up his nose and went back to his turkey bacon.

"Anyway, Carole and Finn are coming over for Friday night dinner this week so you kids have a think about what you want and see if Finn wants to watch the game after." Kurt nodded and pushed away the small tinge of jealousy he felt. He loved the relationship Finn and his father were forming but it was hard not to feel a little envious sometimes. Kurt really wasn't that interested in sports, despite playing football for half a season last year. On the other hand, Kurt really enjoyed spending time with Carole as she would use their time together to consult Kurt on fashion and style choices. Kurt wasn't able to do this with his own mother since she had passed away when he was very young so he was grateful that Carole encouraged him. 

"Will do. Have a good day." He replied and headed towards the door, slipping on his sneakers.

"Love you son." Burt called.

"Love you too Dad." And with that, Kurt skipped out the door, got in his car and drove to school. 

When he arrived, the school was beginning to buzz with students arriving for the day. Kurt walked through the hallway towards his homeroom but was quickly knocked off his course as he crashed into the lockers on his left. It took him a minute to reorientate and he looked up to see what had happened. Karofsky was walking away, swinging his gorilla-like shoulder as he did and it clicked for Kurt.

"Watch it!" Kurt shouted sharply after him. Karofsky stopped dead in his tracks and turned his burly body back towards Kurt. 'Shit' he thought to himself. He should have just shut up, after his last encounter with him, Kurt would be glad to never see Karofsky's face again. 

"What did you say to me?" Karofsky boomed. Kurt's mouth was too quick for his brain sometimes and before he realised it, he was saying;

"You should really work on your impulse control, you wouldn't want a repeat of last year would you?" Kurt was, of course, eluding to when David had force-kissed him and David seemed to have cottoned on as his face twisted from cocky to panicked in a split second. 

"You shut up." He spat.

"What? Scared I'll out you right here?" Kurt spoke quietly but firmly.

"I swear Hummel," Karofsky started with a fisted forming, "you say anything...and I'll kill you." Karofsky hissed through gritted teeth and he looked Kurt dead in the eyes. And with that, he gave Kurt one last shove into the lockers before storming off. Kurt took a deep breath and blinked away the tears forming in his terrified eyes. He had no idea where he got the confidence to stand up to Karofsky like that and he wished so much that he hadn't. Pretty much everyone else had gotten over Kurt being gay and was leaving him alone but he couldn't shake this asshole. Kurt knew why, Karofsky was obviously gay and taking out his hatred for himself on Kurt but Kurt had never actually been threatened by him before. With a shaking hand, he straightened out his uniform and slowly made his way to homeroom.

...

Blaine had made it to school on time today and just has he was about to walk through the glass panel doors, he saw something that made him pause. A large guy in a letterman's jacket had pushed Kurt into the lockers and turned to talk to him. Blaine watched carefully, making sure he couldn't be seen lurking. He saw Kurt's demeanour change from confident to quietly horrified in the blink of an eye. As the larger guy shoved him again and walked away, he saw Kurt's eyes shining with tears as he trembled, turned and walked away. Blaine felt a surge of rage take over him. He'd never liked bullies, after a particularly horrific experience he had before he went to Dalton, he vowed to never let himself be victimised again but hadn't actually seen anyone else be bullied until now. There was a reason Blaine dressed the way he did, road a motorcycle and wore an attitude - he wanted to look untouchable to anyone who might try once they found out he was gay.

Blaine kicked open the door and thundered towards the tall jock until he had caught up with him. 

"HEY!" Blaine called abruptly. He didn't have a plan, he was honestly just acting on impulse. The big kid turned around, looking a little confused. Blaine was shorter than him and clearly he didn't feel in the least bit threatened.

"What? You couldn't find someone your own, giant size to pick on so you go for Kurt?" Karofsky looked amused at this and his face twisted into a grin.

"I see Hummel finally found another fag to-" That word. That word was enough for Blaine to explode with anger and he launched his fist straight into the larger kids face, causing him to stumble backwards. Blaine may have been a shorter but he was a lot stronger than he looked. He took up boxing once he transferred to Dalton and even helped found the fight club to take back some of the power he felt he had previously lost. 

"What the hell?!" Karofsky barked through a mouthful of blood. His tooth had gone through his lip from the impact of Blaine's fist and this clearly pissed him off enough to send him flying at Blaine and whilst Blaine was strong, Karofsky threw his entire body weight into a punch of his down, colliding with the side of Blaine's face, connecting with his eye socket. 

"HEY, STOP IT." Both boys stopped dead in their tracks to see where the roaring voice had come from. Sheldon Beiste was stomping towards both of them, positioning himself between them to prevent anything else from happening. 

"Principle's office, NOW." He demanded with a rasp of anger. 

Blaine and Karofksy were both dragged by the scruffs of their necks to Figgins' office where they were forced down into seats in front of his desk. Figgins looked entirely shocked at the sight of the bloody and bruised boys in front of him. He looked helplessly at Coach Beiste who began the interrogation.

"What the hell are you two playin' at?" He asked with his sightly southern accent. 

"I didn't do anything, this kid just jumped me for no reason." Karofsky started, trying to play innocent which made Blaine's blood boil. 

"No reason? You slammed Kurt Hummel into the lockers and cornered him until he was shaking. Don't dish it out if you can't take it, asshole." Blaine retorted with fury in his voice.

"I will not have these shenanigans at this school. Mysterious new bad boy Blaine Anderson." Figgins' began,  "You have been given a fresh start here at William McKinley and it does not please me to see that you are not taking advantage of that." Blaine huffed and leaned back in his chair. 

"I am taking advantage of it. I'm using it to stop a homophobic bastard." Blaine mumbled. This had clearly caught Coach Beiste's attention.

"What're you talkin' about Anderson?" He asked seriously, looking at Blaine as if he was trying to convey that he could tell him the truth.

"He's lying, I didn't do anything Coach." Karofsky tried his best to sound earnest. 

"You called me a fag." Blaine spat. He hated even saying the word, it had been burned into his brain and hurt almost as much as his eye socket, which he could feel was throbbing with a growing bruise. Blaine caught Coach Beiste's eye which was now burning a hole in David Karofsky.

"That true Karofsky?" Beiste asked calmly with a hint of hurt in his voice. Karofsky said nothing back, he just wiped his bleeding mouth on his sleeve and looked down at his hands. Coach Beiste nodded and looked at Figgins. Blaine couldn't quite figure out what was going on, it was like something had happened that he wasn't aware of. Using the F slur was of course bad but teachers would mostly just give students at his old schools a slap on the wrist for using that kind of language and he couldn't see a public high school in Lima being above them in terms of zero tolerance. 

"Mr Anderson, please go to your first class. Mr Karofsky, I cannot accept this behaviour. You are off the football team and you will be suspended until further notice." Blaine's eyes widened (painfully considering he had a forming black eye) and Karofsky threw his hands up but was met with a disgusted look from Coach Beiste. Blaine still had no idea what had happened that had caused this situation to escalate so quickly but he didn't argue with the instruction he had been given. He simply picked up his bag as the bell rang and walked off towards first period.

...

Kurt sat with Mercedes and Tina in the seats they had adopted for the year. Kurt had opted against filling them in on his scandalous encounter with Blaine yesterday. Until he figured out what he was feeling and where he wanted it to go, he would just keep it to himself. Kurt had, however, noticed that Blaine was absent from homeroom and given his very limited but already apparent track record, Kurt wasn't overly surprised. He also didn't bother mentioning the threat that Karofsky had made. It would only lead to further questions about why he made the threat in the first place and Kurt couldn't handle the thought of Karofsky finding out that he had told people, he was honestly terrified of what would happen. Kurt's thoughts were disrupted by the chatter of the girls;

"Did you hear Coach Sue is campaigning to get rid of tots from the lunch menu?" Tina asked Mercedes with a hint of concern in her voice.

"What?! Oh hell to the no! She can't do that, what else am I supposed to eat?" Mercedes was clearly very passionate about this topic and whilst Kurt always opted for healthier lunches, he knew that Mercedes loved her tots. 

"Relax, I'm sure it's just another one of her boredom rampages. Remember when she campaigned for Artie to try harder at walking?" Tina nodded with Kurt's attempts at calming Mercedes.

"Besides," He continued, "She can't make that kind of decision without the school board agreeing and that would take ages anyway." Mercedes seemed to agree with this but still had a slight frown showing between her brows but before she could respond, the bell rang for first period. Kurt parted ways with Mercedes and Tina and started walking towards geometry (a class Kurt was not fond of and wasn't that good at) but stopped when he saw Blaine coming out of the principles office looking perplexed. Kurt peered behind Blaine and saw Figgins and Coach Beiste in what looked like a serious conversation with...was that Karofsky?

"Blaine?" Kurt asked cautiously as he walked towards him. Blaine was broken out of the deep thought he was clearly in and looked up at Kurt. Kurt gasped and brought his hand up to his mouth as he saw the swollen purple bruise on Blaine's eye. 

"What happened? A-are you alright?" Kurt was so stunned and honestly couldn't think of anything better to ask other than that.

"I'm fine." He said as he looked back down and let his long curls fall into his face, hoping it would cover his eye. 

"Why were you in there with Karofsky? Did something happ-"

"Leave it, Kurt. I said it's fine." Blaine cut Kurt off with a snap, making Kurt jump. Blaine instantly felt bad, he knew Kurt had already had a tough morning and snapping at him wasn't going to improve his chances of hooking up with Kurt. He thought of what to say quickly to fix it.

"Nothing that could ruin my day at least, not with you back in that sexy little uniform." He looked back at Kurt through his dark lashes to see that his attempt at a compliment hadn't affected Kurt in the least. In fact, Kurt looked a little irritated. 

"Fine, don't tell me then." Kurt said as continued walking to geometry. Blaine also had geometry first so he took a deep breath at his own feeble attempt at flirting and followed on behind Kurt, deciding not to say anything else for now. 

Blaine took the seat directly behind Kurt, right at the back of the classroom. He was already very good at geometry and considering Dalton Academy held a more difficult curriculum, Blaine found that he already knew everything the teacher had set out for them to learn today. During the class, he noticed that Kurt was looking at the wrong page of his text book as he peered over his shoulder. He caught a glimpse of Kurt's profile and it looks frustrated and confused. Blaine lightly kicked the back of Kurt's chair and Kurt turned around sharply. 

"What?" He asked, sounding annoyed. 

"Page 42." Blaine gestured to his own book and then to Kurt's. Kurt looked down at Blaine's textbook and then at his notes and he raised his eyebrow.

"You actually understand this?" He seemed a little less angry now and more curious.

"I'm full of surprises, babe." Blaine replied with a dark wink. Kurt titled his head and had a twinkle in his eye. Blaine smirked and he knew he was edging his way back into Kurt's good graces. Kurt turned back around and flicked through his book until he was on the correct page. To Kurt's dismay, he still didn't understand what was going on so the lesson dragged, the only thing keeping him awake was Blaine's foot occasionally brushing against the back of his leg from behind him. The bell finally rang and Kurt gladly put his book and notes away, ready to go to US history. 

"You know, I'm a pretty good tutor." Blaine's velvet voice sang cockily. 

"And what makes you think I need tutoring?" Kurt asked confidently. Blaine chuckled and shook his head.

"You were reading a page about vectors for a good 10 minutes before I told you to turn to trigonometry and they're kind of completely different." He finished a a smug smile. Kurt opened his mouth to reply but couldn't argue with the fact that he had no idea what was going on. 

"It's only the first class of the year, I'm sure I'll catch on soon enough but thanks." Kurt said and spun around of his heel to walk away. He knew exactly what Blaine would have in mind if he agreed to 'tutoring' and it certainly wouldn't involve any math. Kurt really wanted to keep his vow to himself and try to get to know Blaine as a person and not just the inside of his mouth. He felt proud of himself for not letting his attraction to Blaine get the better of him.

Second and third period went just as slow as first period and by lunch, Kurt was so tired but he couldn't rest for long as he had cheerios practice. He quickly ate his veggies and sweet chilli before heading out to the field where the rest of the cheerios where arriving and beginning to warm up. He put his bag down on the first row of benches on the bleachers and jogged over to Brittany and Santana. 

"Where's Mercedes?" He asked, looking around for his best friend. 

"She totally had a hissy fit over Coach Sue's genius plan to scrap tots from the lunch menu. She threatened to quit." Santana said matter of factly. 

"I didn't know Mercedes had a pet snake? Wait, do snakes get epilepsy?" Brittany asked with a wave of concern flooding her soft voice. Santana cocked her head at her but decided not to answer.  

"She only threatened to quit, right? So why isn't she here?" Kurt asked.

"Oh, well Coach Sue said that if she wasn't going to eat right then she had no business being on the cheerios. She kicked her off." Kurt was horrified and wished that Mercedes wasn't so stubborn sometimes. This was supposed to be their year, they were meant to be top of the food chain together. 

"Porcelain, get over here." Sue yelled through her megaphone. Kurt ran over to Sue. He wave of fear ran over him, he wondered if he had been implicated by Mercedes after what he said about Sue's boredom rampages. But he also knew that Sue liked him and as much as she was a bully herself, she certainly didn't allow students to bully other students. She was the one who had previously gone to the school bored and threatened to quit her role as champion cheerleading coach if the school did not implement a zero tolerance bullying policy after Kurt was called a homophobic slur during cheerios practice last year by a football player. 

"I assume you've heard about David Karofsky." She asked cooly.

"Heard what?" Kurt asked. His mind wondered back to that morning when he had seen Karofsky sitting in the principle's office after Blaine had walked out. 

"He was suspended this morning. The new kid said he saw David assaulting you this morning and, to top it all off, The Beiste caught the two of them clocking each other. Congratulations kid, you are now free of torment from everyone, other than one Sue Sylvester." She finished with a slightly twisted grin. 

Kurt could feel his eyes growing wider and he stared in disbelief at Sue. A huge flood of emotion took over him. He was happy that Karofsky had finally been punished for what he had done but also mortified that Blaine had seen the encounter earlier. He knew he shouldn't be, but Kurt was humiliated. He was sassy and confident and hated feeling like a victim. And oh my god, would Karofsky think that Kurt had told Blaine what happened? He might stay true to his threat...

"Porcelain? Stop daydreaming and get your ass back on the field, we're doing a kick-line." Kurt was brought back to reality by Sue shouting at him but there was a horrible pit in his stomach about the information he had been told. His head was spinning and he dragged himself over to the rest of the squad and Santana walked up to him.

"Oh come on Lady Hummel, it's not like you'll never see her again." She commented snidely.

"See who?" Kurt had forgotten all about the Mercedes-Sue-Tots drama.

"Mercedes...What's wrong with you?" She furrowed her brow and asked. 

"Nothing, just tired." He lied and got to the floor to start stretching his splits for the kick-line.  He spent the rest of the lunch practice mindlessly listening to Sue talk about how she was the one who invented the kick-line and the Dallas Cowboy's Cheerleaders stole it from her as she made them do it over and over again. By the end of lunch, Kurt was physically and mentally exhausted. He wanted nothing more than to go home but he still had 2 periods left and practice after school. He picked up his stuff from the bleachers and noticed the smell of smoke coming from under them. Blaine had been watching the practice. Kurt wanted to ask Blaine what the hell happened but he didn't feel like he had the energy or even the courage to talk to Blaine after everything he had learned just 30 minutes ago. Kurt walked the long way round back to the locker rooms, avoiding the underside of the bleachers today. He threw his bag down and stripped off, leaving just his towel on to get in the hot shower. After a good 10 minutes soak and wash, he stepped out and wrapped his red McKinley Athletics towel round himself and walked out to the main part of the locker rooms. 

"Avoiding me?" Kurt gasped as he heard the voice coming from the far end of the room. He look in the direction of the voice and saw Blaine leaning against the lockers. Suddenly very self conscious and wearing only a towel, Kurt tightened his grip on it.

"I'm just tired and busy." He replied shortly, making sure not to take his eyes off Blaine in case he tried to make another move and catch Kurt off guard. Blaine nodded but didn't move or say anything else. He was simply watching Kurt with a rather inquisitive expression, as he if he knew something was wrong.

"I need to change." Kurt said, finally breaking eye contact with Blaine as he started picking out his spare outfit from his bag. 

"Go ahead." Blaine replied as he inched closer to where Kurt was standing. Kurt glared at Blaine and once again, his eyes landed on that painful looking shiner. This might be a good chance to find out exactly what happened, despite how embarrassed Kurt felt about the whole situation.

"You can stay if you tell me what happened with you and Karofsky?" Kurt offered as he walked round the corner behind the lockers and slipped on his boxers under the towel, ensuring Blaine saw absolutely nothing.

"Felt like picking a fight and he's an ass so, 2 birds, you know?" Blaine shrugged and tried to play it cool. Kurt came back into view, towel still wrapped firmly around his body and he grabbed his pants and shirt.

"Now the real story?" Kurt asked impatiently as he went to go back round the corner to change and started pulling his pants on.

"I'll tell you if you let me watch you change." Blaine replied in his usual cocky voice. Kurt finished zipping up his tight grey jeans and paused to think. He wanted to know what happened but really didn't want to fuel Blaine's fire. Then again, he was already mostly dressed, all he had to do what put his shirt on. He huffed and walked back out into Blaine's view. Blaine's dark eyes immediately fixated on Kurt's toned, fair torso. Blaine bit his bottom lip and walked forward towards Kurt but Kurt put his hand up to stop his from getting too close. He raised an eyebrow at Blaine, causing Blaine to roll his eyes.

"Fine, I saw him talking to you earlier and you looked freaked out. I confronted him and he ...well he was a dick so I clocked him. Clearly pissed him off cause he returned the favour but whatever. Then I dunno, I guess Figgins and Beiste just kicked him out." Blaine told a slightly altered version of the story as he really hated getting all emotional over a stupid word and he didn't want Kurt to think he was soft. But Kurt clearly wasn't buying it. He looked skeptically at Blaine and then sat down and looked at his shirt in his hands as though it would give him the answers to his questions. Blaine didn't really know what to do, he was a little annoyed that this golden alone time with a shirtless Kurt was being spent talking about some freak kid but also felt that the mood wasn't really right to start feeling Kurt up and down so, in an attempt to change the subject Blaine said;

"You cheated on the deal though." Kurt was brought out of his thoughts and he looked up at Blaine, confused as ever.

"You have pants on. I wanted them off." He continued with his smirk appearing back on his face.

"Keep dreaming Blaine." Kurt said sarcastically as he stood back up to put on his shirt. Finally, the mood had shifted. Blaine stepped in front of Kurt and put his hands on either side on him, against the lockers. 

"Oh, I intend to, and now I have a little more to work with." He said in a low voice as he gave a quick look down at Kurt's toned body. Fire fought ice as their eyes met and for a second, Kurt thought he was going to give in but thankfully, the bell rang and broke the spell. Blaine dropped his head and head it hang on his chest for a moment as he chuckled.

"Saved by the bell. Until next time babe." He said as he pushed himself off and headed out the door, leaving Kurt speechless and with more questions that he had started with. Did Blaine go after Karofsky for him? Also how come the school had now decided to do something about the bullying? This was nothing new, Kurt had faced relentless bullying almost every other year but for some reason, this morning had been different. He obviously wasn't getting the full story from Blaine and he wondered if he ever would. Blaine seemed to be pretty set on his ambition with Kurt, making it difficult for Kurt to have a conversation longer than a few seconds without Blaine saying something inappropriate. Kurt sighed to himself as he finished getting dressed. This was gonna be a lot of effort, he only hoped Blaine would be worth it in the end.