“So, school is starting tomorrow, isn’t that exciting Blaine?” Blaine’s mother asked suddenly, after there was a lull in their dinner conversation. Blaine glanced up from his plate, barely hiding his eyebrow raise at the fact that they were attempting communication with him, and not directing the conversation about his older, more successful brother Cooper as usual. Blaine shrugged non-committedly, pushing around his mashed potatoes on his plate.

“Sure, I guess.”

“Hopefully you’ll make some new friends this year.” She continued, non-pulsed by his somber mood. Blaine made what he that was a well-rehearsed exaggerated smile and nodded, muttering the word ‘doubtful.’ Under his breath.

It wasn’t likely that anyone would pay any attention to him- they ever had. He had always been considered weird to his peers. How he dressed. Usually a colorful buttoned up shirt with a bowtie, and occasionally suspenders. He dressed sort of like what they would call a nerd, but he was in no way a genius.

He had gotten along fine, or as the teachers had said. He had always felt he was being pushed through school, rather than learning and soaking everything up. He still sometimes had trouble with even the simplest of math problems. His parents had paid no mind, to busy cooing over how great it was that Cooper had gotten a job or a commercial or whatever. And besides, he had been getting decent grades in all the other subjects, why should they worry? Math was his weakest point. And science and history were, eh. He was passing, barely.

What he really excelled in though, was Language Arts. Or anything to do with that, like reading and writing. Blaine was prideful in the fact that he was above his classes reading level at the time. He had found it tremendously easy to fall into the pages of a book, reading and taking in every word for hours on end.

The same pattern had happened from elementary to middle school. And then high school happened. Followed by the….

Blaine thankfully snapped out of his train of thought when he registered Cooper was talking to him.

“Too bad I wasn’t there when you and mom when clothes shopping, I could ‘a taught you a thing or two about being fashionable. It might help you out later on!” Cooper grinned and lightly pushed his shoulder. Blaine didn’t even bother to suppress an eye roll as his mother chimed in with light laughter as well.

“Whatever. May I be excused?” He asked, turning his blank stare back to his mother. With a sigh she nodded and Blaine headed for the stairs, depositing his dishes in the sink on the way. After closing the door behind him with a little more force than necessary he flopped onto his bed with a deep sigh, glancing at the calendar on his wall. Yeah; tomorrow would be his third year at McKinley High.

He had gone to another public high school before McKinley, but after certain…incident, he was transferred to McKinley and had to repeat his freshmen year over, as if being stupid wasn’t humiliating enough. He swallowed a bit and dragged himself off of his bed, forcing his body to his bathroom to get ready for bed. Once he was done he made his way back to bed, sighing again after he had slipped under his soft sheets, turning onto his side.

Hopefully, this year would be different.

At the time, he didn’t know how right he had been.

Kurt strode down McKinley’s hallways proudly, happy to be a senior and unable to keep the smirk off his face at the fact that all eyes were on him. And not in the leering, annoyed way they used to. It was funny how much a simple outfit could change all that. Ever since he had joined the Cheerios team last year it was like they had changed their tune.

Even the jocks, which used to terrorize him all the time, left him alone for the most part. It was either because he had apparently moved up in the school food chain or the fact that Coach Sylvester literally would rip their hearts out of their chests if they hurt him.

With a slight squeal he waved to Quinn, who was also decked out in her Cheerio uniform and pushed through the small crowd of people to say hi to her, not even so much as sparing a glance to anyone else.

Certainly not glancing to one Blaine Anderson, who had been admiring him from afar.

Blaine openly stared at Kurt, one of the Co-captains for the Cheerio squad, with an almost dreamy expression. But of course Kurt would never even notice him, there was no way. He bit his lip, locking and un-locking his locker several times to make sure he had the combination down while his best friend Tina chatted his ear off about how her summer had went.

“Speaking of Asian Camp and singing, are you going to join Glee club this year?” She asked, pausing to stare pleadingly at him. Blaine hesitated.

“I don’t know Tina, I mean-“

“Oh, c’mon Blaine, you’re like the best singer I know! Even better than Finn! And you can dance. You have to join, we need the members.” Blaine simply shrugged. In all reality he thought Glee Club sounded pretty awesome, but he didn’t have the confidence to join, and Finn kind of frightened him with his height. Not to mention that most of the members had been there since the beginning, he felt like he would be an outsider that randomly decided to join.

It had nothing to do with the fact that a certain boy happened to be in glee club, nope. Not at all. Suppose this certain boy did- he would just constantly be making a fool of himself in front of him and would probably end up costing them a competition with his awkwardness.

“Maybe.” He finally said, pretending to consider it. Tina grinned and gave him a peck on the cheek, dashing off to her own locker. Blaine smiled as he watched her go, grabbing his first period book and schedule. Tina was, quite literally, his only friend. They had had most of their classes together their freshmen year, and were often paired up for assignments. He had had a few friends at his old school, but due to their different schedules it wasn’t the easiest in the world to stay connected.

“Hey, hobbit.” Someone called from behind him. He froze, knowing that voice very well. He picked up his speed, hoping that he would make it to his first period in time, when a hand snatched at the back of his collar. He yelped slightly when he was tugged back and forced to come face to face with Dave Karofsky.

“Oh, hey, Dave. How was your summer?” Blaine asked, attempting to speak in a calm manor.

“Just cut the crap, lady boy. I’ve been waiting all summer for this.” Dave interrupted with a malicious smile. Blaine swallowed, panic rising up as he was shoved backwards into a janitor’s closet- because apparently at some point Dave had opened the door behind him. He fell to his knees, luckily still clutching his school book (he didn’t need those Neanderthals ruining his school books again) before he could get up and try and get out Dave locked the door with a laugh.

“See you at the end of the day, fairy.” He called hauntingly, laughing to himself as he began walking away. The bell sounded and Blaine groaned, his head hitting the door with a soft thump.

It took nearly all of first period for someone to finally find him. When he had finally gotten to geography he had missed nearly everything and they had checked him off as absent.

There goes my perfect attendance record. He thought dryly with a scowl.

Three periods later and he was in Geometry, sitting in the front row so he could try and soak up everything he could. When the teacher sprang a ‘surprise pop quiz’ nearly everyone groaned and looked panicked. While Blaine, expecting that the teacher would do that to see how much they remembered from last year, had studied.

He felt pretty confident, handing the stack of papers to the person behind him with a polite smile, writing his name and the date at the top. He had been doing pretty good, and had gotten to the fifth question before he stopped, pencil poised on the line but unmoving. He stared down at the paper, frowning as he tried desperately to remember what the answer was. It was probably something really obvious, too. He shook his head, attempting to keep his thoughts from getting to him and he moved on, figuring he’d come back to the question later. All too soon the teacher asked them to pass their papers up and he felt shame and disappointment wash over him, glancing at the eight out of twenty questions he had actually finished. He was glad his paper was on the bottom of the stack.

--

Once the bell had rung he quickly gathered his stuff, happy to be heading to lunch. As he got into the hallway he saw Quinn walking smoothly towards him, the students parting for her.

“Coach Sylvester wants to see you in her office.” She said, keeping eye contact with him for a mere second before floating past, heading off to where ever she needed to go. Blaine’s eyes widened as he attempted to recount everything he did since he had gotten to school. Surely he hadn’t done anything to receive punishment from Sue Sylvester of all teachers. Warily he slung his bag over his shoulder, walking as quickly as he could, because Sue never liked to be kept waiting.

He knocked on her door tentatively and edged his way in, clearing his throat.

“You wanted to see me, Coach Sylvester?”

“Ah, Caterpillar face, glad you could join us.” She gestured to a seat that stood on the other side of her desk. “I was just telling Porcelain here about my time as a Special Ops solider.” Blaine face scrunched with confusion, as it usually did when Sue said anything.

It was then that Blaine noticed that the other chair in front of Sue was occupied by Kurt, who looked mildly bored. He had one leg crossed over the other, his pants stretching to give a picture on how strong his legs and thighs actually looked. Not knowing whether or not to take offense of the comment Blaine shook his head and sat down slowly, not daring himself to speak and stutter and make a fool of himself.

“Not that I don’t absolutely love your stories, Coach, but why am I here?” Kurt asked, while Blaine tried to look everywhere except at the finest specimen that was sitting next to him.

“Well you’re here, Porcelain, because until further notice you will be tutoring Helmet Hair here.” She announced in a matter-of-factly way.

“WHAT?” Kurt and Blaine both yelled out simultaneously. Blaine, getting tutored by Kurt. He flushed a bit, thinking about those cliche movies where the tutor and the studen fell in love. But…how did she know that he-

“Wha-wha- Why do I have to tutor him?” Kurt asked, not even caring that said him was sitting right next to him.

“Forgive me, Porcelain. I had been under the impression that the two of you were dating, given that fact that you’re both as gay as a rainbow flag in the month of June.” She said calmly, while rubbing off one of her trophies. Blaine flushed an slightly darker shade of red and Kurt sputtered.

“We’ve never even talked before!” Kurt paused and crossed his arms over his chest. “What do I get out of it? And how is it benefiting you exactly?” Sue let out a hum and grinned, gently sitting the trophy down and sitting up once more.

“Well, Young Burt Reynolds’ dad here paid quite the hefty sum to ensure that his son was succeeding in his classes. We talked and I offered to let my greatest protégé- how achieves straight A’s- tutor him. In turn he would give the money to the Cheerio fund.” She explained, gesturing out her arms at the end in a sort of ‘ta-da’ way. Blaine felt his mouth fall open. His dad, the guy who never seemed to care about him, offered God knows how much money for his education? Blaine sat back, unsure how to feel about this.

"My dad did that?" He muttered, mostly to himself. Kurt finally glanced towards him, looking almost a tad confused.

“I’ve decided to bestow you with ten percent for your efforts.” Sue continued. Kurt paused, considering this for a while.

“…Make it twenty and you’ve got a deal.” Sue chuckled a bit, obvious pride shinning in her eyes for a split second.

“You drive a hard bargain.” They shook on it and Kurt stood up, gathering his stuff.

“Better get your can moving or you’re gonna be late for cheer practice.” She noted. Kurt nodded with a small wave and in a flourish he was gone. Blaine snapped out of his conflicted thoughts, standing up as well. He fumbled with the strap on his bag for a second, unable to look Sue in the eye.

“Thank you.” He said quietly. Sue eyed him for a second, face unreadable.

“I think you should be thanking your dad.” A pause. “Now get out of my office, the smell of all your hair gel is making me nauseous. “ With a slight smile Blaine nodded, jogging out of the room in hopes to catch up with Kurt. Luckily Kurt was at his locker, hurriedly digging around for something, his gym bag slung on one shoulder.

“Uh- hi, Kurt. So I uh- I’m usually free on Friday, if that’s a good d-“

“I can’t do Fridays.” Kurt said simply.

“Oh, well. Uh whatever works for you the-“

“Yeah, yeah fine, I’ll get back to you later. I have to go.” Apparently finding what he was looking for Kurt began walking down the hall towards the football field without so much of a glance in his direction. He sighed.

It was going to be a loooooong couple of weeks.