Kurt groaned softly to himself as he stared at the foggy doors of the Lima Bean, willing the tumultuous whirl of snowflakes to just disappear. Coffee in hand, he stared around the multiple tables, resigning himself to waiting the storm out. With a sinking heart, he noticed that the longer he stood, the more people hurried into the Lima Bean, huffing warm air into their hands and snuggling deeper into their thick woolen scarves as they escaped the cold outside.

Well, that was that. He had to find a table, and fast.

It was only a moment later that he noticed the boy. He didn't know quite what it was that drew him; maybe it was the odd lack of coffee or the lonely look in the boy's eyes as he watched the other customers with a sad, wistful air. After all, Kurt knew that look all too well.

He saw the same expression every time he looked in his vanity mirror.

Regardless, the boy had a free seat in front of him, and Kurt was not going to be able to stand in these boots for a half hour or however long this godforsaken storm was going to last.

"Excuse me, can I sit here?" Kurt asked, gesturing to the chair directly opposite the boy, one that faced the window with its back to the rest of the customers.

The boy blinked. "A-are you talking to me?" he asked in a faint voice.

"Um, yes?" he asked, shifting his weight from foot to foot, half from nerves, half from pain. "I'd hate to int-"

He didn't even let Kurt finish his sentence. "By all means, go ahead," he said swiftly, gesturing to the chair. "You're not intruding." The corners of his mouth pulled up into an eager smile.

"Thanks," Kurt said in relief as he lowered himself down, surreptitiously wiggling his toes in his boots. "These boots were not made for walking," he murmured.

The other boy shot him a sympathetic look. "They, um, look great through," he said, his smile dimming slightly as his eyes fell to study the plain wood tabletop.

Kurt brightened. "Thanks," he said shyly, "They should, for how much they cost."

"I'm Blaine," the other boy said, his hazel eyes lifting to meet Kurt's as his smile returned.

"Kurt," Kurt responded, reaching across table with a proffered hand.

Blaine hesitated slightly before slipping his hand into Kurt's.

Kurt repressed a shudder as he felt the temperature of the other hand. "It's nice to meet you, Blaine," Kurt said, nodding his head politely. "My god, your hands are just like ice. Did you just get here?"

Blaine ducked his head as he let out a small laugh. "Um, no, not really," he said, his eyes crinkling in the corners. "God, it feels like I've been here for ages."

Kurt shrugged. "I know how that can be," he said, taking a sip of his coffee before continuing, "Time just seems to slip away here, doesn't it? Are you waiting out the storm?"

Blaine's eyes twinkled. "You could say that."

"Me too," Kurt sighed. "I meant to get my snow tires yesterday, but there was this last minute sale at the mall..." He huffed out an annoyed breath, making the smallest wisps of hair that weren't coiffed flutter.

Blaine nodded slowly. "Do you come here often?" The words were barely out of his mouth before he cringed, letting out a sharp breath of air at the same time. "I'm sorry – that sounded less lame in my head." He bit his lip, and Kurt could only tear his eyes away from Blaine's mouth with great difficulty.

Kurt let out a breathy laugh. "No, it's no problem," he said, cupping his coffee with both hands as he studied Blaine thoughtfully. "I come here once or twice a week, whenever I have to work afterschool. I don't usually stick around, though. It's a nice in between pick me up before I have to get to the garage at four-thirty... which will not happen today, obviously." He frowned as he pulled out his phone, grimacing as 4:07 lit up in big, bright letters.

"Obviously," Blaine echoed. "But, now I get to enjoy your company, so I'm not complaining." He tossed Kurt an uncertain, quirky smile.

"Well," Kurt drawled, suddenly feeling a surge of confidence, "I wouldn't either. I'm fabulous company."

Blaine laughed, and Kurt felt like he could listen to that wonderful sound all day. "I'm sure you are." He grinned.

Kurt grinned right back. They sat in silence for a moment, a comfortable, companionable, silence though, as Kurt steadily diminished his coffee and Blaine's eyes wandered to the customers behind Kurt.

"You go to Dalton?" Kurt asked suddenly, his eyes narrowing in on the ornate D on Blaine's navy-and-crimson blazer.

Blaine gave him a sheepish smile as he reached over to finger the insignia with his index finger. "What gave me away?" he asked.

Kurt rolled his eyes and gestured to the blazer. "At least you have the sense to at least attempt to keep up with current fashion. Even if you are stuck in a blazer and dress pants like the rest of the student body," he added with a frown.

Blaine's eyes narrowed slightly in confusion. "Excuse me?"

"Well," Kurt continued, waving a hand in Blaine's general direction while he used the other to finish his coffee. "Jackets with red ties and blue piping almost go with what I saw in Vogue last week," he explained.

Blaine tilted his head as he regarded Kurt, a small smile lurking at the corners of his mouth.

"And I saw your Warblers at sectionals," Kurt continued, "And what you've got there is so much better than what they were wearing. Accents are everything this season."

"The Warblers?" Blaine repeated, his voice cracking slightly on the second syllable.

Kurt's blue eyes up from Blaine's blazer to his face curiously. "Um, the show choir at Dalton? Named after their penchant for canaries?"

Blaine shook his head. "No, no, I know who the Warblers are, of course," he reassured quickly. Blaine sighed. "I..." he drifted off, shifting slightly in his seat. "I used to be their lead soloist," he confessed.

"You sing?" Kurt demanded, his eyes widening as he looked at Blaine with new eyes.

Blaine nodded. "I love singing."

"Me too," Kurt sighed, still riveted by this new piece of information. "But you said, used to," he added, frowning. "Why'd you stop?"

Blaine's eyes momentarily flashed with pain before he blinked, and he was perfectly as composed as before. He gave himself a little twitch, as if he was trying to physically shake off bad memories. "I, um, had an accident," he stated coolly, "and I couldn't compete." He looked up and gave Kurt a brave smile. "But I'm fine now," he reassured before finishing in a wry lower voice, "more or less."

"That's terrible," Kurt breathed. "I don't know what I'd do without glee."

Blaine shrugged. "It happened a long time ago. Now, I spend my time here," he said, his face lifting so his hazel eyes could survey the people behind Kurt, "Instead of Warblers practice."

"Well," Kurt said, reaching one hand to fix a hair that fallen into his eyes, "now I get to enjoy your company," he said with a smile, echoing Blaine's comment from earlier.

"I guess so," he said, chuckling.

"Well, I for one am grateful," Kurt announced, "Because then you would be competition, and we were given strict instructions not to fraternize with the enemy."

"Enemy?" Blaine questioned.

"I'm in the New Directions," Kurt admitted.

At Blaine's blank stare, Kurt's mouth nearly fell open in astonishment. "From McKinley High? We competed last year, but I heard the Warblers couldn't make it because their lead singer... died." Kurt clenched his jaw as the realization sunk in.

Cold hands.

Been here ages.

Accident.

"You're him," Kurt said, slumping in his seat.

"Who?" Blaine asked, and now Kurt could understand the fear and reticence behind his eyes.

"The lead singer of the Warblers," Kurt explained in a tired voice, "The one who died two years ago."

Blaine stiffened. "No, no I'm not. I'm not him. He's dead. I'm right here, Kurt. You're looking and me and talking to me, right?" His eyes burned with fire, and his voice lost some of its composure as he continued to speak. "I'm not him. I'm sitting here, talking to you-"

Kurt gave him a sad smile. "And we have another one in denial," he said to no one in particular. His eyes narrowed in on Blaine, who slumped in his seat.

"I'm not in denial," Blaine interrupted indignantly.

Kurt snorted. "Of course you're not, Mr. I'm-Not-Dead."

"I never said that."

"So you know you're dead?" Kurt demanded, his eyebrows raising in surprise.

Blaine nodded jerkily. "I'm just saying I'm not that lead singer of the Warblers."

"Alright then," Kurt said, his voice positively dripping with skepticism, "Who are you, Blaine?"

"Anderson," Blaine supplied, laughing slightly as he continued, "Blaine Anderson."

Despite himself, Kurt smiled. "Okay then, Mr. Anderson, Blaine Anderson, who exactly are you? Because, I'm telling you now, you're name doesn't tell me much."

Blaine sighed. "I was the lead soloist of the Warblers, that's true." He ducked his head and rubbed the back of his neck self-consciously. "I actually won Nationals with them."

Kurt threw his mind back, trying to remember Rachel Berry's obsessive chart of Nationals winners she insisted on explaining to the glee club. Well, as you can see, the pattern of Midwestern winners has continued long before I was born-

"But," Kurt said, frowning slightly, "The Warblers haven't won Nationals since..."

"1959," Blaine finished with a sigh. "I was there."

"That was you?"

Blaine nodded, a hint of pride lurking behind his eyes even as his mouth was set in a grim line. "Best year ever. Well," he amended with a wry chuckle, "Until I died."

Kurt snorted. "I didn't think I'd ever hear that sentence ever in my life," he murmured, raising a hand to rub his temple. "And so now you, what, haunt the Lima Bean for eternity?"

"Well, hopefully not eternity," Blaine faltered, his hazel eyes darkening.

"If you haven't moved on in fifty years, Blaine..." Kurt drifted off, his lips drawing together in an expression of sympathy.

"I know," Blaine croaked, leaning over the table even as he crossed his arms defensively over his chest. "Do you think I've wanted to sit around here for fifty years?"

"I don't know," Kurt said slowly, "Do you?"

"No!" Blaine exclaimed so loudly that Kurt swiveled around in his seat to see if anybody noticed. Of course they didn't, Kurt realized a second later. Because Blaine was dead.

"Right, well," Kurt stuttered, trying to calm his hear which had nearly jumped out of his chest at Blaine's unexpected outburst. "Why do you think you haven't moved on?"

"I don't know," Blaine groaned miserably. "I've just been... here... for so long. I've done everything, you know? I visited my parents, saw my funeral – which was more weird than anything else – haunted Dalton for a year in case I left anything behind..." He shook his head. "I don't know what's keeping me here."

"So you can leave the Lima Bean?" Kurt sat straighter in his chair.

"Of course," Blaine scoffed. "I really would have gone insane if I was suck in the Lima Bean for fifty years. I didn't even die here."

Kurt hesitated, his hands curling around his empty coffee cup as his licked his lips nervously. "If you don't mind me asking," he started, "Where did you die?"

Blaine sighed. "Back at Dalton, actually," he divulged quietly.

"So..." Kurt asked slowly, not wanting to sound insensitive, "Why aren't you there now?"

Blaine's jaw clenched almost imperceptibly. "You know that other Warbler who died?"

Kurt nodded mutely.

"He's still there," Blaine said heavily. "And Sebastian – that's him – he's not the most... pleasant person to be around. So I came here," he said, his eyes lifting to the Lima Bean ceiling. "I used to come here, you know," he said quietly, "back when I was alive and back when it was still a burger and shake shop."

Kurt chuckled quietly. "That must've been something." He paused, tilting his head as he watched Blaine.

"Yeah," Blaine murmured, a nostalgic air to his expression, "It was. There were black and white checkered tiles on the floor," Blaine said, before pointing to an empty corner right behind him, "And there was a jukebox in the corner, right here."

"Was this your table?" Kurt asked, enjoying the glimmers of excitement behind Blaine's eyes as he described his favorite diner.

Blaine grinned as he nodded. "Yes, yes it was. It was a big bigger than this one," he said, frowning slightly, "Because Jeffrey, Wes, Nicolas and David could all fit, but this was essentially our spot."

Kurt swallowed. "So what's it like being here now?"

Blaine shrugged. "It was weird, at first. People can feel ghosts, right? I mean, clearly not in the way you can."

Kurt grimaced and shook his head. "No, but they do get a sense of something and it's enough for them to normally stay away."

Blaine nodded. "That's what I thought because no one ever sits here. Even if the Lima Bean is packed, people always choose this table last. I hope they say it's haunted or something, that'd be cool." He smiled, looking absolutely adorable.

It wasn't fair.

He was dead.

"Do you usually come here?" Kurt asked.

Blaine bit his lip. "For the past year or so, yeah. Ever since Sebastian died, Dalton's become kind of unbearable, so I've been biding my time here."

"How come he's not moving on?" Kurt asked, his fingers tapping along the rim of his empty coffee cup.

Blaine rolled his eyes. "Beats me. He says he needs revenge for his death – he's convinced he was murdered. I told him he was being a drama queen. And then he made some inappropriate jokes about queens and made a pass at me. I'm not too concerned about the whole murder thing."

The corners of Kurt's mouth turned down into a slight frown even as he filed that 'queen' comment away for future analysis. "Are you sure? Because murdered ghosts tend to stick around more than the average dead person. God knows I've met enough of them."

"He wasn't murdered," Blaine said flatly.

Kurt was taken aback at his decisive tone. "You're sure?"

"He'd be a hell of a lot more," Blaine paused, and then continued in a hard voice, "pissed off about the whole thing."

Kurt raised a cool eyebrow. "Speaking from experience?"

Blaine nodded sharply. "Yes."

"That... sucks."

Blaine let out a harsh laugh. "Yes, yes it does."

"Don't want to talk about it?" Kurt asked in a forced casual voice as he fiddled with the ends of his scarf.

"Not especially," Blaine sighed. He rubbed his eyes with the heel of his hand and straightened in his chair. "It was a long time ago, and the guys who did it were found. But," he said, a slow, friendly smile raising the corners of his mouth, "Enough about me. What about you, Kurt?"

Kurt shot him a bemused look. "What about me?" he asked.

Blaine stared at him for a moment. "Really?" he asked, laughter bubbling behind his words. "You do know you're the first real, live person I've talked to in fifty years?"

Kurt snorted. "I can tell you now," he said fervently, leaning closer over the table as if he was letting Blaine in on a secret, "Most real, live people are not worth knowing." He settled back in his seat and fixed the folds of his scarf as he continued coolly, "Well, at least, those in Ohio, at any rate-"

But, Kurt's rant on homophobic Neanderthals was cut short by the chirp of his ringtone. "Sorry," he murmured as he bent down to fish his cell phone out of his bag. He glanced at the screen, wincing as he caught sight of the time and the big white letters spelling out "DAD" on the home screen. "Crap...hi Dad... yeah, I know what time it is, and I'm sorry I didn't call... I'm at the Lima Bean... no, Dad, I know I should've put them on last weekend... yes, you did tell me so, thank you very much... I'll stop by the garage on the way home, okay? I'll be there in twenty... right... love you, Bye." Kurt slipped the phone from his ear and turned back to Blaine, who was watching him with a bemused expression. "I should have been home an hour ago," he explained, rolling his eyes. "Turns out the storm stopped."

"Oh," Blaine said, turning to look out the doors of the Lima Bean, where the sky was clear. "I'm sorry I kept you late, Kurt," he apologized, clearly contrite.

Kurt smiled as he began to gather his things. "It's really no problem."

Blaine hesitated, watching as Kurt slipped into his jacket before saying in a quiet voice, "Thank you so much for talking to me. It really means a lot, you know?"

"What?" Kurt whirled around, halfway finished rewinding his scarf about his neck. "Blaine," he said, pausing to lean over the table, "You were great company."

Blaine looked up, his eyes shining with just a hint of wonder. Kurt couldn't help noticing how dark and gorgeous his lashes were and – Kurt Hummel, now is not the time for this.

"I-thanks," Blaine fumbled. "And hey," he said, visibly straightening in his seat and swallowing before continuing, "If you ever stop by the Lima Bean, don't be a stranger, okay?" He tossed Kurt a charming smile.

Kurt rolled his eyes. "I'll be here tomorrow, Blaine. Same time same place?"

Blaine started in his chair. "What? Oh, okay," he said, blinking dazedly up at Kurt.

"See you later," he waved firmly as he pushed in his chair.

"Righto." Blaine's face broke out into a grin. "Later, Kurt."

Kurt raised his empty coffee cup in a salute before departing, his face burning and his mind filled with the most beautiful hazel eyes he had ever seen.