“One vanilla latte?” a pretty redhead asked, standing by Kurt, cup in hand.

“Where’s Blaine?” he asked, rather abruptly, causing Rachel to snigger loudly, hand covering her mouth to muffle the sound.

“He left,” the barista explained, “his shift just ended.” Kurt sighed, not even attempting to hide his disappointment. Snatching his drink from the girl, he stood up, mouth in a thin line.

“Come on Rach, let’s go.”

Rachel rolled her eyes, getting up anyway, you couldn’t, shouldn’t argue with Kurt. It never ended well. He stormed outside, having to close his eyes, taking few deep, calming breaths when he realized it was raining heavily, massive drops falling on his face, trickling down his cheeks like tears. He wanted so badly to cry. He wanted to curl up, right here in the middle of the car park and cry. He looked at the polystyrene cup in his shaking hand, suddenly wanting to throw it to the ground.

He had no valid reason to be this upset over something so small, insignificant even, he’d only known that Blaine existed for less than two days. Yet he felt physically sick at the thought of never seeing him again. He knew he was being over-dramatic and pathetic, but there was nothing he could do to control it.

He was an emotional wreck, over a cup of coffee.

A cup of coffee that Kurt discovered, on closer inspection, didn’t only have his order scrawled on it. Instead the surface was tattooed with the same word, over and over again in blue ink.

‘Sorry.’

--

Blaine loved the feeling of the ice beneath his skates. It was like flying, floating across the surface so fast, everything around him was blurred, It was dizzying and dangerous, and to him, it was what being alive really felt like.

He was training by himself today, and the silence was kind of deafening. He could hear every breath, every slice of his blades, every sigh he made as he missed a step. So, therefore, of course he heard the quiet footsteps that approached the ice. He just chose to ignore them.

“Shouldn’t you be at school?” Kurt’s easily recognizable voice rang out dryly, bitterness obvious there. Blaine’s heart plummeted, he sounded really, really upset. He continued to skate backward, swerving from left to right gracefully. Then, without warning, he jumped, as if it was as easy as on dry land, his legs splitting out to either side, at hip height. He seemed to hover there forever, and Kurt couldn’t help letting out a little gasp, before realizing that this was exactly what Blaine wanted. As he swanned over, smug look plastered on his face, Kurt fought the urge to roll his eyes.

“Show off,” he muttered underneath his breath.

“Shouldn’t you be at school?”, he replied, not icily, like the other boy, but still warm and friendly, almost as if he was oblivious to what he had done. He had, however, seemed to have lost the ability to look Kurt in the eyes, he did feel guilty, after all.

“Yes, I should be,” Kurt nodded coolly, “but if you hadn’t already noticed, I ran into some… problems.” he gestured to the painful looking, purple bruise that stained his jaw line, a happy reminder of his encounter with Karofsky yesterday.

“Hey, now we match,” Blaine chuckled uncomfortably, trying to keep things light hearted, but the black cloud around Kurt was too large to suppress, and he could feel it washing over him too. He adopted a more serious tone, trying to look deep into Kurt’s eyes, but the younger boy was having none of it.

“You left Blaine, and I know I have no right to bl-“

“I can explain!” Blaine cut in, his face pleading, “Just hear me out?”

Kurt sighed, flopping back into one of the plastic chairs. He didn’t want to listen to Blaine’s pathetic excuses, trying to cover up the fact that actually, he just saw Kurt as a desperate little boy. The worst part was that it was probably not too far from the truth.

Blaine stared awkwardly at his skates, pulling on the red jumper he had left on the side.

“Blaine Anderson.” a loud, booming voice shouted from the other side of the rink. Kurt jumped, hand clutching his heart in momentary shock. Blaine’s breath hitched, and he cringed noticeably, looking up to meet his coach’s eyes nervously.

“Good morning, Mr. Smythe.” he whispered.

“Where the hell is Evie, boy?” he snarled, and at this point Kurt’s head shot up, that voice reminded him of someone. With a chill up his spine, he realized that the man used the same intimidating tone that Karofsky did, and every last one of his childhood bullies. Mr Smythe was nothing but a bully, Kurt could tell straight off. He wasn’t a particularly attractive man, in his early forties, his hairline receding, tiny slits for eyes, gaunt, pale skin. He had the air of a man that got whatever he wanted, no matter the consequences, and Blaine’s reaction to him backed up his theory.

“I-I… I don’t know, sir.” Blaine stuttered, he was frightened of this man, Kurt realized with a start. Blaine was truly frightened of him, even though he had seemed to Kurt, on first impressions, to be someone who was strong, he didn’t let anyone push him around. He thought about how he felt, when he was scared of something, of someone, all he wanted was someone next to him, to help him be strong, to stop him feeling so small. So he got up, sliding next to his new friend and snaking his hand into the other boy’s.

Blaine’s head whipped round, he glared at Kurt, shaking his head slightly, his expression near murderous. His eyes were cold, like a light had gone out there.

“Who’s this?” Smythe growled, all his focus suddenly on Kurt, but he spat out the words as if the boy was worth nothing more than the dirt on his shoes. Blaine opened his mouth, but nothing came out. He stood, like a goldfish, eyes desperate and pleading.

“He’s just… my tutor. I’m failing… fai-“

“French. Blaine is failing French and I’m tutoring him.” Kurt cut in, instinctively, but by Blaine’s sharp sigh of relief, he figured he had said the right thing.

The burly man in front of them frowned, his dark eyebrows furrowing together. “You aren’t failing anything, Blaine. You would not be training at my rink if you were.”

Blaine nodded, playing along, “But Kurt is fluent, sir, and if-… when I get onto the Olympic team, I need to be too, right? I’m just getting ahead of the game.”

Thomas Smythe thought this over for a moment, his face screwed up in concentration. Kurt could see that thinking was obviously hard work for him. Then nodded curtly, turning on his heels and stalking away. As he reached the door, he paused, turning back to add, “Sebastian wants to see you tonight, says he’s got something to show you… I’d turn up if I were you; I don’t get on awful well with people who upset my son.” and with that, he walked away.

The door slammed and Blaine sank to his knees, burying his face and breathing deeply. “Crap, Kurt,” he cursed, “that was too close.” His face was angry as he slammed his fist into the barrier. “Do you know what that guy is like, Kurt? He is crazy, I’m being serious. He is insane, and he hates me.”

“How would I know Blaine? I don’t know the first, damn thing about you! But you, you know everything about me, my coffee order, my fluency in languages. We met two days ago, I don’t know your life story.” Kurt shouted back.

“Oh, don’t flatter yourself,” Blaine laughed, darkly, “you really think I went to any trouble to find those things out? It’s all Rachel, she told me all of it. She has some crazy, messed up plan to get us together. She’s the one who cares, not me!” he retorted, face burning bright red.

“Well, she’s going to be very disappointed then, isn’t she?”

“Yeah, ‘cause I have a boyfriend.”