You got a fast car

I want a ticket to anywhere

Maybe we make a deal

Maybe together we can get somewhere

Anyplace is better

Starting from zero got nothing to lose

Maybe we'll make something

But me myself I got nothing to prove

He didn't let himself worry about money. Kurt had a credit and a debit card, and there was enough for him to make it all the way to California if he wanted to, as long as he was careful about spending. Maybe he should stop in a couple of towns, get a part-time job, and then form a more solid plan.

Kurt was eighteen and still a teenager, and as a teenager, he'd thought about running away a few times—no, even younger, when he was six or seven and thought about running away from home. It seemed more like a phase of life seen in television than anything else and he would make lists of items he needed to take. His teacup set, Power Rangers, a stuffed cat, his favorite bow tie, twenty dollars. (Twenty dollars was a lot to his six or seven-year-old mind. Kurt thought about New York and choked back a laugh.) Of course, at eighteen, he was a little more worldly, a little smarter, and he had the sense to bring food, water, clothing, his license, and other miscellaneous items that he had bought for college (can opener, cutlery, sewing kit).

Come to think of it, his packing had been rather thorough despite the abrupt departure.

For the first time in days, Kurt laughed until he had to pull over because his sides were hurting.

He'd brought his phone with him and at the moment, he didn't know if that had been a smart move or not. Could the police trace him? It was probably for the best that he use it as sparingly as possible. He would call Aunt Laurel from a payphone to ease some of her worrying. He hadn't even left a note.

Kurt never felt so undirected, so purposeless. That was the point of having goals, otherwise you wouldn't go anywhere in life. That was what he believed, at least. For the last few years, he thought it was fairly straightforward. Survive high school, get into college (preferably somewhere out of Ohio), and then work himself to the bone until he made it on Broadway. There were backup plans, of course there were backup plans, but now everything came to a screeching halt because he hadn't expected for his father to die.

He hadn't expected to go at it alone because maybe he would have gone to college and to New York alone, but at least he would have had family.

Kurt was eighteen and too smart to ask the pointless questions, like why this had to happen to him or why it had to happen to his father of all people. Like why Rachel Berry had not only the talent but the financial support to go straight to New York. Like why he had to be a homosexual man because life would have been so much easier for him otherwise.

At eighteen, he had to learn the lesson that he was not invincible, and neither were the people around him.

He was crazed for doing this. How long could he keep this up? If he went back, Aunt Laurel would take him in. She was the only relative from Burt's side of the family that kept in contact anymore and she appeared concerned enough for him. She wouldn't push if he didn't want her to. She would support him and not even think about replacing Burt. He could still go to Ohio State and it wasn't a bad college, just not what he wanted, but he'd always known that. He could still go back and no one would realize he had left in the first place.

The thought of turning back made him sick to his stomach.

It wasn't as if he hated leaving home. He wanted to make a clean break from Ohio eventually. This just wasn't how he imagined it would happen.

Kurt wasn't going to go back. Not until he'd made something of himself.

You got a fast car

But is it fast enough so you can fly away

You gotta make a decision

You leave tonight or live and die this way

Kurt was making dinner for a change. It was nice to have the privacy of a simple meal at home, and eating out too often was expensive. He hadn't had good ravioli in a while anyway.

Blaine was out in the living room, trying to put Marigold into his lap, but she meowed in protest and kept leaping off to settle on the opposite side of the room, grooming her fur and eyeing Blaine with a reproachful air. She was an independent lady; she only sat in your lap if she wanted to, and she still preferred Kurt's company.

“She doesn't like me!” Blaine bemoaned, loud enough for Kurt to hear.

“She likes you just fine. She lets you pet her whenever you come over, isn't that enough?”

“You cats are cruel,” Blaine said to Marigold, reduced to stroking behind her ears. She blinked languidly at him, unmoved by his words. “Come on, sit here, Marigold.” He patted his lap again and she didn't move. “Kurt said that I'm like a heat generator. My lap would be awesome. You should try it.”

“Stop harassing my cat.”

Blaine sang to an unimpressed Marigold, “They give me cat scratch fever, cat scratch fever—”

“What?”

“Ted Nugent. I guess it's not your style.”

Kurt stuck his head out from the kitchen to pin a severe look on his significant other. “I'll have you know that my taste in music goes far and wide.”

“Oh yes, it's very broad. Like Broadway.”

“I take musical theatre very seriously and if you don't shut up, I'm going to burn your ravioli.”

Blaine actually did shut up for a while, contenting himself with Marigold who finally curled up in his lap after he stopped trying to pick her up. He hummed strains of songs that he knew Kurt loved, sticking to anything from Wicked.

“What is your favorite song?” he asked, breaking the silence.

“Favorite song?”

“From Wicked.”

“That's easy, it's 'Defying Gravity.' There's something very powerful about it, something very free...”

“I bet you could sing it. You could make a show-stopping Elphaba.”

There was a deliberate clashing of pans and running water. Deep sigh. “Blaine.”

Blaine wasn't the smartest man in the world, not when it came to human beings. But he was starting to know Kurt with a certain intimacy that lent a bold and assuming force to his words, intimacy that brought tentative knowledge. “Kurt, I saw you at Ground Zero. I think you want to perform, or you wanted it once.”

“What about you? You're an amazing singer too.”

“Don't make this about me, Kurt, don't do that.”

“Maybe I don't appreciate you springing an irrelevant topic on me when all I want is a nice dinner with my boyfriend.”

“There's something else you're not telling me.”

“Are you really going to push, Blaine?”

“I think it's important.” Finally, Blaine set Marigold aside and walked over to the kitchen. He saw Kurt, slumped over the counter and his shoulders hunched all the way up to his ears, and he softened. He ran a hand down Kurt's back, silently asking permission, and wrapped an arm around Kurt's waist when the shop owner nodded. “I was talking to Quinn. She mentioned that one of her former classmates was part of a Broadway revival cast. Her name is Rachel Berry.”

What Kurt heard was the name “Rachel Berry,” but what he actually heard roaring in his ears was the sound of his two worlds, kept so carefully apart, suddenly crashing into each other until they were one and the same, leaving only remnants behind. What he heard were the sounds of Rachel Berry's voice, and how his was only ever really heard by his father and Mercedes. What he heard were the endless put-downs extracted from his peers and amplified in his head (not good enough, not talented enough, not conventional enough) until they were all he could hear.

What he heard was Blaine saying his name over and over again, “Kurt. Kurt. Kurt!”

He was clutching his head, bent over the sink as if he were about to puke. Blaine had one hand on his arm and the other on his cheek, meeting Kurt's blank gaze. “Hey, hey, Kurt, it's okay. I'm sorry I pushed. Take deep breaths for me. I'm sorry.”

Kurt sucked in air like a suffocating man before letting Blaine steer him over to the dining table where they could both sit. Blaine bent to look at him, but Kurt turned his head away, ashamed.

“Kurt?” Blaine murmured, sounding apologetic and guilty.

“What does Rachel Berry have to do with anything?” Kurt threw out, voice strangled.

“Nothing, forget I said anything. I won't push again.”

“No. You've gone too far. You might as well finish what you were saying before. What do you know about Rachel Berry?”

Blaine stalled momentarily, glancing furtively at Kurt, but when there were no further questions, he let out a breath and respectfully put a few inches of space between the two of them. “I know she made her Broadway debut two years ago in a revival of Annie Get Your Gun. She's had a few minor roles in TV shows and movies. I know she went to McKinley with you and went on to Tisch. She was in glee club and you weren't because McKinley was a horrible place for people like us. I know that she has two gay dads and one of her favorite Broadway musical songs is 'Defying Gravity.' I know that you wanted to go to New York and perform, just like she did. And I'm sorry, Kurt, that you never got the chance to.”

“I did have a chance,” Kurt argued at this point, and he glared at Blaine. “I did, and I threw it away because my dad died and I wasn't confident enough and now it's too late.”

“Kurt, it's never—”

“Yes, it is! You know what, Blaine? I didn't go to college. I've taken classes when I could afford to, but after my dad died, I decided I had to be alone. I wasn't going to burden my aunt or my homophobic relatives with my presence or my expenses. But if he hadn't died...” He broke off and stared blankly across the table. “If he hadn't died, I would have gone to Ohio State. And then I would have gone to New York somehow. Maybe I would transfer or move after graduation, but I would have found a way. But he died and I was alone. And he was the most important person in my life. Gone, just like that.”

“I'm sorry, Kurt.”

“They all seemed so silly after that. My—dreams. What was the point of going to college and New York if he was gone? But I was a childish teenager who didn't know how to deal with grief, and I regret running away. I regret it so much. I wish I had gone to college. I wish I tried harder because that's what my dad would have wanted. It's not his fault that he died.”

He finished recounting and kept his gaze firmly on the tabletop. He had more or less babbled to Blaine, and half of him relieved that he emptied his thoughts at all, the ones he had held onto for so long that they were forever imprinted in his mind.

Because it was all mixed up, all of it. How much had grief played a part in his reckless move to leave Ohio the way he did? Or the cowardice that he never knew he had—fear of having Aunt Laurel as a parent figure instead of his father, fear of going to New York and calling home only to remember that Burt wasn't going to pick up. Perhaps even the confusion that plagued every person his age had a hand; of growing up, of leaving all that was familiar, of losing all that was familiar. (Of being at an even greater disadvantage compared to Rachel Berry.) Eventually, the emotions passed and he was able to maintain a semblance of a balanced life.

But even then, his best years had been behind him. He'd lost them slowly, leaving them with his mother, his father.

What was the point?

I learned that I could be special in a different way. I had experiences. I had people I loved. Making it didn't matter as much because even if I lost my voice, I would still have something.

“I have an older brother.”

Blaine spoke the words calmly, as if he were passing the time by chatting about anything and everything.

Kurt didn't say anything. He didn't have to. He merely listened.

“There's an eight-year difference between us, so we weren't really close at all. He was aspiring to be an actor when I was still in high school and he was in a couple of ads and films, nothing big. My parents didn't approve especially since he was hopping all over the place, but Cooper's mistakes were nothing compared to mine.”

“Your parents are officially idiots.”

“They were a bit narrow-minded. It didn't help after I came out to them. They used to be critical, but then they started to be deliberately...”

“Obtuse?”

“Distant. They didn't like me singing or performing before, and now they saw it as a sign or effect of my sexuality. Obviously that meant they wouldn't support me at all. It also didn't help that I got beat up my freshman year.”

“Beat up?”

“Hey, hey, hey.” Blaine squished into Kurt's seat to hold him, making soothing noises. “It was a long time ago. I stupidly went to a Sadie Hawkins dance with the only other openly gay kid at school and we got beat up when we were waiting for his dad. Our injuries could have been more severe, but I transferred to Dalton anyway. Dalton with its zero-tolerance bullying policy was everything I'd dreamed of and it wasn't perfect, but it helped me figure out who I was without danger. I'm sorry that you never got to do that in high school.”

Kurt traced the veins on Blaine's arm, lost in his thoughts. “What happened to the guys who beat you up?”

“They were suspended for a week and had detention for the rest of the school year.”

Making a noise of distress, Kurt squirmed around until he could see Blaine properly. “You could have died.”

“I told you our injuries could have been more severe. It doesn't matter, they were never going to accept me at school. What hurt me most was that my parents couldn't do the same. I tried to get back some of their approval by majoring in business and never talking about my boyfriends, not like I had many, but it was easier to be myself when I was farther away.”

“So after college...”

“So I went and graduated college only to become a street artist. Sometimes I don't know if I made the right decision in losing contact with my parents because I won't have to see or hear their disappointment, but I can't stop imagining it. I don't know what's worse.”

“You,” Kurt grasped Blaine's face, “have done nothing wrong. Take pride in yourself because I do.”

Blaine lifted his head, shocked speechless as if he'd never heard those words before.

“It's not your fault that they can't accept or support who you are. All you can do is find a way to be happy. And if you can't be happy, then be interested.”

“I am happy.” Blaine tilted his head. “And I know now that I can't control my parents. Neither can you.”

“Blaine—”

“What I was trying to say from the beginning is that you may regret parts of your past, but you didn't control the circumstances. You didn't wish it on yourself and though it was your choice to leave Ohio, that doesn't mean you've lost everything.”

“If I had been stronger—if I had held onto what was important to me—”

“Do you really regret everything about your life here?”

There was a note of sadness underneath Blaine's placid exterior, and Kurt scrambled to say, “No, Blaine, I don't regret meeting you or owning Timeless or anything else, really. But I feel like I wasted what potential I had. I know it's hard being a performer in New York, but I wanted to give it a shot.”

“Like Rachel Berry.”

“And she succeeded.”

“Do you hate her?”

“No!” Kurt shook his head, hair flying around his face. He really needed to get it cut. “I don't hate her. I was just...sad.”

Because I think that we could have been friends. And being friends with her would have been so much easier than resenting her for factors she couldn't control. Maybe life in Ohio would have been different if I joined glee club or tried talking to her nicely. At the time, I didn't want my life to be more complicated. Now I don't know anymore because maybe I would have been happier, but I'm happy now. Does that negate everything bad that's happened to me? Of course it doesn't. But would I trade one for the other?

“And now?” Blaine prompted, and Kurt understood the question for what it was.

“Now I'm happy too,” he admitted, but it felt less like a concession and more like a promise. Blaine's eyes were tender and they were kissing, unaware that the ravioli was burning in the kitchen or that Quinn had just run into her old flame Puck at the hardware store or that Sebastian was printing fake money with a particularly smug smirk on his face. They were unaware that in New York, Rachel Berry was drinking hot water with lemon and honey as she always did nowadays before going to bed, and as she did so, she thought about the new Broadway musical she was going to star in.

But that was life because you would always miss moments, some that were important and some that were not, some that were related to you and some that were not. The good news was that you wouldn't miss all of the pivotal moments; in fact, the ones that you didn't miss were usually the only ones that mattered in the end.

What he saw behind his eyes were bursts of color; dotted violet lines crossing his body, green vines climbing up his arms, blue scales lining his thighs, and red streaks painting his face. He felt like he belonged in a Froot Loops commercial, except his surroundings were dark and the colors on his skin lit up so that he was the brightest firework in the night sky. Distantly, he could hear the sound of applause from somewhere below, a small thundering noise that seemed to come from no apparent source.

He opened his eyes just in time to see Blaine lean back, a satisfied curl to his lovely mouth, and paintbrush in hand.

“What did you do to me?”

“Had a nice nap, Sleeping Beauty?”

“I was mentally preparing myself,” Kurt explained loftily, stretching his arms up above him. He casually looked over the walls of the living room, taking in the cream-colored surface. Quietly, he made a decision.

Blaine didn't notice Kurt's thoughtful expression as he brought over a hand mirror. “Were you mentally preparing yourself to see your face?” he teased. With a flourish, he held up the mirror so Kurt could see the distinctly plum and smokey gray swirls shadowing his cheeks and eyes.

“Like out of a Mardi Gras parade,” Blaine enthused.

Seeing his face only strengthened Kurt's resolve as he moved the mirror out of the way, getting Blaine's attention as he did so. “Blaine,” he began, “would you like to help me redecorate my house?”

“You want to redecorate?” Blaine squinted, surprise written all over his face.

“More like I've been thinking about painting the walls. I wouldn't mind giving this place a more cheerful color scheme. And it would be nice to have something artsy to remind me of you...” Kurt snapped his mouth shut at Blaine's stunned countenance. “But if you don't want to, I completely understand. It's a lot of work and I can do it on my own.”

“Kurt,” Blaine said, stroking one of the painted swirls affectionately, “of course I want to.”

Kurt was sitting up now, straightening his back and fussing over his hair self-consciously. “I just don't want you to think that I'm forcing you or abusing my significant other privileges, even though that's more or less what I'm doing.”

Blaine silenced him with a touch of his hand. “I'm going to do this because I love you and I never mind having more blank space for me to unleash my artistic creativity upon. So if anything, I'm the one who will be abusing my significant other privileges, which you were not doing in the first place.” He caressed Kurt's neck and cocked his head to the side, grinning like the mischievous young boy he must have been. “Okay?”

“Okay,” Kurt whispered, awed by Blaine's glowing silhouette. He loves me.

“I'll take care of it, okay?”

“Okay.”

“I'm going to kiss you now.”

“Okay.”

“And then,” Blaine deepened à la James Earl Jones, “I am going to put my penis against your penis—”

“You most certainly will not if that's how you talk dirty!” Kurt cried, mock-indignant. The spell Blaine had put him under was broken and he slapped Blaine lightly on the forearm.

Blaine was laughing his head off, wheezing from the force of his gasping, and he rolled onto the carpet where Kurt pounced on him, the two of them pinching and squealing as if they were teenagers again. When they cooled down, panting in the other's mouth (and hello, when did they start kissing and touching like that?), Kurt braced himself on his arms to get a better view of Blaine spread out underneath him, a loose curl adorning his forehead and beads of sweat shining on his darker skin.

“I love you too, you know. And thank you,” Kurt said.

“Hey, don't thank me until after you see what I'm going to do to your walls.”

“Not for that. Okay, not only for that. But thank you.”

“For what?”

“For being you.”

Blaine pulled Kurt back down so that they were nose-to-nose, chest-to-chest. Kurt could feel how hard Blaine was against his stomach, but it was secondary in the face of Blaine's softly glowing eyes. “Trust me,” Blaine asserted, “you never have to thank me for that.” And he sealed it with a kiss and then some.

He was on a stage of some sorts, the biggest and flashiest stage he'd ever seen. He could hear the chorus members singing as they flounced about in a myriad of costumes, everything from a football uniform to a ballerina tutu. There were so many of them that they piled on top of each other, steady notes still pouring out of their cherry-red mouths, arms waving and gesturing.

Then a podium rose from the pile of singing human bodies and there was Rachel Berry, wearing a long red coat and carrying two suitcases, her expression rapturous.

“NYC,” she sang, “just got here this morning. Three bucks, two bags, one me.”

And then another voice continued, “NYC, I give you fairing warning. Up there, in lights, I'll be.”

It was his voice, and now Kurt was walking up stairs (where did the stairs come from?) as the spotlight fell on him. He was wearing something, no, he was wearing a suit, a dark gray number, and he ascended the podium to offer Rachel his arm. She took it, smiling widely at him with sparkling eyes, and he looked out at their adoring fans.

Gradually, the music slowed and...

“Forget your troubles...”

“Happy days...”

“And just get happy...”

“Are here again...”

“You better chase all your cares away / The skies above are clear again.”

They sang on in the light and Rachel squeezed his arm once as if to say, This is how it should have been. Then: darkness.

Kurt woke up in tears.