His head feels heavy and he knows that he needs to get out of the room, out of the building. If teleporting existed he would probably be back at home in Ohio already, with Carole and his father taking care of him. He sighs and pushes his chair back. Claire, the secretary, smiles at him when he passes her walking towards the entrance.

“Hey, Claire, if someone calls…”

“I’ll tell them that you’re busy. Go and take a bit of rest, Kurt.”

Kurt flashes her a small smile and then he is out, engulfed by the people walking along the streets, by the incredible mix of sounds that only New York can offer.

Claire always talks about a coffee shop just around the corner from the small independent firm for which he works; he has never been there before but he figures that he could only give it a try.

The moment he pushes the door open the smell of coffee envelops him; it’s warm inside and the sound of cups on plates fills the air. Kurt waits in line, letting his gaze travel around the room; there are few wooden tables and a couple of sofas, people are sipping coffee and chatting- a low hum twirling around. The walls are covered in old photos of the city; one in particular captures Kurt’s eye, it’s an old picture of Penn Station. He tilts his head to the side, something warm curling at the bottom of his stomach, as though he had already seen that picture with someone who was important, in a place where he felt safe. He briefly wondered if maybe his mother had shown it to him- she used to love New York so much.

A small cough makes him realize that he has finally arrived in front of the counter. He turns and he finds himself face to face with Blaine. Kurt blinks, taken aback by how easy the man’s name has remained stuck in his head.

“How can I help you s…Kurt!”

Kurt blinks and opens his mouth but nothing comes out. He lets his gaze slide over Blaine’s features and over his shirt and the name tag.

“Oh, did I get it wrong?”

Kurt snaps out of it and shakes his head.

“N-no, you remembered right.”

Blaine’s grin burns as bright as a light bulb and like the previous time Kurt can’t help smiling back. When someone coughs behind him, Blaine quickly leans forward.

“Tell me what you want and I’ll bring it right to your table.”

Kurt quickly spots a free table near the window; he sits, his hands on his lap, trying not to look too much at Blaine moving with precision behind the counter, preparing coffees and cappuccinos and whatnot. It’s weird, but when he saw him that day on the train Blaine didn’t give him the idea of being a barista; his eyes were so focused and he seemed so eccentric that he had thought that maybe he was an artist or something like that- maybe his painted nails had misled him.

“Hey, there. Sorry it took while.”

Blaine slides in the seat right in front of him and pushes a mug of cappuccino towards him.

“Loren is covering for me so I have a few minutes free.”

Kurt tilts his head to the side; why would this guy take some time off work to talk to him when they just met by chance on a train and barely know each other’s name?

“I…why?”

Kurt has always been a direct person; it doesn’t always help, but it’s how he is and there’s not much he can do about it.

Blaine shrugs, scratching the back of his neck.

“Well, I…I don’t know; I felt like talking to you, I guess?”

Kurt knows that this shouldn’t make sense, but he can totally understand what Blaine is saying, because it’s exactly how he feels, despite how absurd it may sound or be.

“So…Blaine…you work in a really nice place.”

He takes a sip of his cappuccino, mentally kicking himself for having said such a lame thing. Blaine is smiling though, and leaning against the back of the chair.

“Well, it’s only a part time job. My main interest is music.”

Kurt smiles, because obviously his first impression had been the right one.

“The painted nails gave you away.”

Blaine looks at his fingers and laughs. It’s the first time that Kurt hears him laughing and he loves it. It’s rich and fresh and unlike any other laugh he has ever heard before, except maybe for one that he can’t seem to remember right now. Blaine wiggles his fingers.

“It’s called “Lincoln Park at midnight”; isn’t it weird?”

It is Kurt’s turn to laugh.

“Oh my, it totally is!”

Blaine grins.

“You’re quite the observer, Kurt!”

His eyes sparkle with amusement, and Kurt can’t help relaxing into his chair.

“You may say that, indeed. So…music?”

Blaine nods, dark curls framing his face.

“Yeah I came all the way up to study here. I play here and there and sometimes I write for a music magazine. Nothing big.”

Kurt tilts his head to the side, trying to take in as much of Blaine as he can. There’s something about him, some kind of quiet humility, of peaceful brightness; it makes Kurt feel at ease, when he usually finds being around new people extremely difficult.

“It sounds like a big deal to me, instead!”

The days when he dreamt to become a Broadway star are still perfectly alive at the back of his mind- when he sings in the shower, when his eyes land on some playbill. He remembers how singing made him feel, as though he could hold the world in his hands, because there was nothing that could keep him down, that could chain him. Somewhere along the way, though, that dream had retreated, leaving space for drawings and sketches and, well, Kurt really couldn’t complain. He changed over time, and so did his aspirations- it happened, and yet, now and then, he misses that old dream of his; in the end it was that dream that gave him the strength to leave Lima behind.

Something warm and dry covers his hand and Kurt snaps out of his thoughts and lowers his gaze. Blaine’s hand is slightly smaller than his, his skin tanned. When Kurt lifts his gaze, their eyes lock. Blaine quickly removes his hand and clears his throat.

“God, sorry! That was inappropriate! But, well, you seemed…upset?”

Kurt balls his hand over the wooden surface of the table; it feels embarrassingly cold now without Blaine’s.

“I was just thinking. I…I used to sing back in high school.”

He never talks about it these days; it feels so far away, almost faded, like old photographs hidden somewhere in an attic.

“Really? Me too!”

Blaine is now sitting straight in his chair- he makes Kurt think about a spring ready to snap. He wonders how the energy doesn’t ripple through his skin. And it’s weird how he isn’t taken aback in the least; somehow it makes perfect sense that someone like Blaine was in a choir. He seems to radiate his love for music all around; Kurt could easily picture him as the soloist.

“I used to be in my school’s glee club.”

Blaine’s grin grows even more- and really Kurt has never met someone who smiles like this, so open and huge.

“Let me guess, you too?”

Blaine nods like a child too enthusiastic to use words.

“Yeah! Mine was called The Warblers. Yours?”

“New Directions, we were really just a bunch of crazy teens living in the hole that Lima was.”

Kurt chews at his lower lip wondering if asking Blaine where he is from would be too much.

“You…you said you were from Lima. Ohio, right?”

Kurt nods, his hands gripping the mug of now-cold cappuccino a bit tighter.

“Well, my family is from Westerville; I grew up in Philadelphia with my grandparents, though.”

It’s weird how every single thing that Blaine says makes sense, like pieces of a jigsaw slotting in place. There’s nothing that truly rings new to Kurt’s ears, and, well that’s weird.

“You know? I think you have a weird effect on me, Blaine.”

“Really? ‘Cause you have got a totally positive one on me. I mean, I’d talk to you for hours!”

Kurt tries not to think too much about the heat blossoming on his cheeks. He is about to reply when a girl, probably Loren, calls Blaine name.

“Look, I’ve to go back to work now. It was really nice to meet you again.”

For an instant, there’s nothing that Kurt wants more than ask Blaine his phone number, simply to have a thread keeping them together, but somehow he can’t bring himself to ask.

“It was nice for me too.”

He remains there, staring at his half-full mug, before getting up and walking to the door. When he is about to open it, he turns towards the counter, though. Blaine is looking straight at him, he doesn’t lower his head when their gazes meet.

“Kurt…would you…would you please come here again?”

Kurt feels his lips stretching into a smile.

“Sure.”
As he walks back to the firm, he feels as though something has just become lighter somewhere deep inside of him.