"...want to...part of your world..."

It was a week since what had been dubbed by Wes as, "the coffee fiasco that could have been avoided if Blaine listened to Wes" but better known to the greater population of Dalton, as: "Blaine's adventure in a Lima Bean" happened. Both names brought confusion to anyone that didn't actually know what had happened and Blaine had even heard one freshman questioning the validity of coffee even being involved when a lima bean had nothing to do with coffee. He didn't even try to pretend to hide his scoff as he walked by them and ignored the gazes that followed him to class.

What was worse than the rumors that had started about him and lima beans, were the dreams. Now the boy he'd imagined to have a tinkling, clear high voice did, and instead of seeing said boy, Blaine now had his disembodied voice, sounding clear and beautiful calling out his name and worrying over him.

When he'd first come to, he expected to see him, he'd faintly heard his voice, but he was just on the ground and Ellen, the barista from earlier was leaning over him and someone to his right was on the phone.

After that things were kind of fuzzy, and the next thing he remembered was being back at Dalton with Wes and David in his dorm room, the two boys working on homework on the floor next to his bed.

Now, a week later, Blaine was rubbing at his eyes and holding a cup of coffee he'd gotten from the cafeteria, which never tasted quite right, but was his only source of caffeine for the time being. He slid into his usual seat next to Wes with a sigh, and dropped his French book on the desk in front of him.

Wes looked up from where he had been writing furiously. He pushed the piece of paper aside and out of Blaine's sight and turned to him.

"Another bad night, Blaine?"

Blaine shrugged. "I keep having this dream..." he trailed off into a yawn.

"Dream?" Thad asked, leaning over his desk towards them, "what about?"

Blaine shrugged, wondering for a moment if it was possible that Thad had some sort of book on dreams on him. "I don't even know anymore. I thought it was a memory or something at first. I just kept hearing him and it's like I felt his hands on my face. But I can't see him, just hear his voice. Sometimes he sings, other times he's just saying my name or some other nonsense. I don't know."

"Huh? Odd. What did you think the memory was from though?" Wes twirled his pen between his fingers and stared at Blaine, "not the coffee shop fiasco that could..."

Blaine cut him off, "Yes, that day. When I fell I heard him singing, but it stopped and then I thought I heard his voice again and I know someone had my head on their lap. I couldn't really see him, but he's...I can't have just made him up, you know."

Wes perked up at the possibility of Blaine being interested in a boy.

"Although," Blaine said thoughtfully, "I think sometimes, maybe he is this figment of my imagination. I had just hit my head...I don't know. I thought...I thought I saw him earlier that day here at Dalton, but he couldn't have been at both places." His shoulders dropped and he stifled another yawn.

Wes and Thad shared a look and Wes dropped his current agenda, to drape an arm around Blaine's shoulders. "You're not crazy, Blaine. Maybe...maybe you have a stalker, or there's another reasonable excuse...like, you only saw him here or at the Lima Bean and the other time you just thought you saw him."

Blaine shrugged at Wes. "The thing is I think I've been dreaming about him for as long as I can remember and never before last week have I encountered him outside my mind."

After that, Blaine concentrated on drinking his coffee and ignored Wes who was staring at him with a thoughtful expression.

Blaine went over the entire apparition in his mind again. Blaine was sure someone had been singing, it was what made him look up from his math homework right before he was thrown to the ground and then all he'd felt was pain and he remembered that same voice crooning his name. He didn't know how that boy had known, but then there was a warm, soft hand on his face and he remembered trying to see him and not making him out before his eyes closed again.

When he woke up again the boy was gone.

Blaine shook himself and gulped down the last of his drink and set the empty cup aside, trying to focus on the conjugations on the board. He wrote down the things he deemed important and then dropped his head on the desk, listening to Madame Perrault and hoping it would be enough. When the bell rang, he dragged himself out of the chair and picked up his things, walking out with Wes and Thad.

"If you want to claim you're sick I can vouch for you," Wes said, holding the door open, "you actually do look like you are sick."

Blaine didn't know if going to lounge in his dorm would help him at all, so he shook his head. "I don't think I could go to bed, and I might just drive myself insane trying."

Thad patted his shoulder. "Maybe," he said, "you could try forgetting this boy you don't even know is real and try to find someone else...or, if you really do believe he is out there, look for him. Search for him. Don't just wait for him to find you."

Blaine stared at Thad with surprise. Thad although he was a bit of a gossip and was the main reason Blaine had actually become lead singer for the Warblers, was usually not so pushy about anything with him. That was usually what Wes was there for.

"Thank you," Blaine said and tried to smile, "I think I needed to hear that."

- - -

From the journal of Blaine Anderson

- - -

Kurt could still feel the warmth of Blaine's forehead and his half un-gelled hair under his fingers, even a week later. Yet, the memory of having Blaine so close to him, of trying to help him when he'd fallen and not gotten up, was tainted by Rachel Berry's thoughts on the entire matter.

She'd pulled him away from Blaine just as the other boy's eyes were fluttering open, and she hadn't let go of his arm until they were back in his car.

Kurt could still hear her accusatory words in his mind, reverberating like an echo in his mind, "You like him! It's why you went back to Dalton. I should have seen it from the start. God, Kurt! You jumped right off the stage straight towards him without a moment's pause. I can't believe you! You saw what Jesse did to me, no, you can't do this. Just look at his hair!"

Since then, Rachel had been nagging him nonstop and watching him like a hawk. He suspected she'd even gotten some of the other New Directions members to make sure he stayed in school and didn't run off back to Dalton, not that Kurt was planning to. She'd taken back the uniform anyhow, and Kurt had already decided he couldn't keep dreaming about going to Dalton and meeting Blaine properly and having the epic romance that he knew he wouldn't get to experience until he got out of Ohio.

But the thing was, thinking about that fantasy, the dream world where he got to switch schools and join the Warblers and say even a word to Blaine, it was the only thing that kept him from going insane. It kept him from freezing up when he saw Karofsky in the halls, and it was the only thing that made him continue on and not crumble when he was pushed aside in the middle of a hallway, or when yet another slushy dripped down his front.

Kurt closed his eyes tightly. He'd seen them coming. And of course, soon enough the cold, wet, sticky substance was thrown in his face and he heard their laughter followed by high fives. Kurt reached up to remove as much of the slushy as he could from his clothes and face.

Rachel, who had taken to following Kurt when she could, appeared, then, and reached for his hand.

"Don't open your eyes," she advised and led him towards the closest girls' bathroom.

Kurt gratefully followed her and when they got there splashed water on his face first thing and slowly opened his eyes enough to access the damage on his clothes. He groaned. They would definitely need dry cleaning for sure even after he went through them.

"Karofsky really has it out for you, huh?" She asked. "I've...I mean, the jocks have always picked on us...but it's like lately he's just focusing on you."

Kurt shrugged, not looking at her. It was the first time someone was bringing it up in a way that told him they cared, and yet he wasn't particularly appreciative that it was Rachel who'd noticed.

"Kurt, has something else happened?" She asked and then when Kurt didn't answer, went on in a very Rachel manner, into, "this isn't about that Blaine guy again, is it? Because it's really just a bad idea for you to even entertain that you could be together. He probably cares for his glee club even a modicum more than a possible relationship. Give it up, Kurt."

He didn't say anything.

Rachel went on, "you've finally got a solo, Kurt. For Sectionals! You can't blow that all away for some boy...and you know, when you were up on that stage that day, I thought you were going to be so much better than me." She sighed, "we need you here, Kurt, and it's not like you actually know him anyway..."

It was too much. Kurt didn't know how he was supposed to just let Rachel talk to him like some little kid that needed to understand the facts of life. He knew already he had no chance with Blaine and that transferring to Dalton would only happen in his dreams.

Kurt knew better than anyone, his reality, but he wanted to keep the fantasy for as long as possible. He wanted to believe that maybe almost running into him twice meant they had to meet and that even if he didn't look for it, the opportunity would present itself.

"I know, Rachel," Kurt said and rubbed at a red spot on his shirt. He sighed and let it go. "Is it just too much to be able to think that maybe I'd be happier there? You've said it enough times, Rachel, we're alike. Well, right now, I know what is real and what isn't, but just because I do doesn't mean I don't wish my dad had the money to send me to Dalton, or that Blaine and I could just somehow connect without it affecting our perspective glee clubs."

She stared at him, bemused for a moment, before she calmed herself down and said, "I didn't know you were so unhappy here."

"Yeah, well..."

Rachel watched him for a while longer and then pushed off the wall she'd leaned against, "I know it's hard to be so different, specially with Karofsky, but you still have friends here and I'm not just saying that because I'm afraid we'll be sabotaged again. I do mean it, Kurt. You're just...you've been acting differently lately, ever since you went to Dalton."

"And it has nothing to do with New Directions," Kurt said, beginning the same rant he'd given her a few times when she brought up the subject.

She raised a hand. "It's not about that," she said, "you've said it enough...Kurt, what is it about? Something happened..."

Kurt didn't want to tell her. He didn't want to admit out loud what he'd let happen to him.

Rachel, seeming to sense that Kurt wouldn't be talking about it sighed and fixed her shirt. "You have to tell someone," she informed him, "you can't just go through life hiding big things like this probably is. You know that and I know that...and even if you don't tell me, Kurt, I want to help."

Kurt sighed. "There's nothing you can do really. Unless you rid McKinley of Karofsky or find a way for me to go to Dalton, there is nothing you can do."

Kurt didn't like the look that Rachel got, after his last statement. He didn't like it at all. She grinned at him, and not saying a word walked to the door.

"Meet me after school? I want to show you something. It could help. And, Kurt, I'm doing this against every bone in my body..."

She left, then, and Kurt fixed himself up and couldn't help but wonder what she was going to drive him into now. Whatever it was, was not going to end well.

- - -

From the diary of Rachel Berry

- - -

"You weren't up there long enough," Rachel said later that day. She walking hurriedly through some hallways to the choir room.

"Up where long enough?" Kurt followed, trying to match her pace and actually understand whatever it was she was explaining.

Rachel ignored him, "I felt like I was floating, Kurt. There was this energy around me and just a deep understanding." She paused suddenly and turned to face him, her shoulder's drooping a bit.

Kurt almost ran straight into her, but managed to stop himself. He rocked back on his heels. "What?"

"It scared me, Kurt. That power. It was wonderful, and overwhelming and just like nothing I'd ever felt before, but it was the scariest thing I have ever felt. I can't tell you what it told me...and I can't stop you if it's what you want, but I just want you to understand that for all its beauty, it is also, at its core, dangerous."

Kurt still wasn't following. Rachel really had a way of just assuming that he could understand what he was talking about without her mentioning it first. Suddenly, he wondered if this is how Finn felt all the time with Rachel.

"Rachel, what are you talking about?" He asked at long last.

Rachel turned on her heel. "The Lima Bean, Kurt," she called back and continued on in her previous pace.

Kurt followed at more luxurious pace, now that she wasn't talking to him and he had to focus on the possibility of The Lima Bean of all places being dangerous and powerful. Kurt frowned at Rachel's back. Kurt could only rationalize her rant to be about the coffee, but even that made him wonder at her sanity.

"What about The Lima Bean?" Kurt asked, when he'd sat down next to Rachel.

"I just told you. Kurt, did you listen to me at all?"

Kurt opened his mouth to say he had listened to her and she just made absolutely no sense, but instead he shook his head and went to his usual seat next to Mercedes.

"After practice, Kurt," Rachel told him.

He nodded.

Mercedes nudged him. "What was that about?"

"I actually don't have any idea...she was babbling on about something earlier, but, it didn't make a whole lot of sense."

After the Glee meeting, which ended earlier than usual because Mr. Shuester looked like he was going to pass out at any moment, Kurt hugged Mercedes and waited for Rachel.

"I am not going to even hide that I'm curious, Rachel Berry," he told her and eyed Finn who was standing behind her.

"Curious about what?" he asked as he grabbed a folder he'd put under his chair earlier.

Rachel shushed him. "Nothing, Finn. Kurt and I are going to grab some coffee. I'll be over later tonight? Alright?"

He nodded. "Yeah, sounds good. See you later, Dude."

"Do not call me 'dude', Finn!" Kurt glared at the other boy.

Finn shrugged at him. "Sorry."

"Right," Rachel said after he was gone, "I have to explain what I know about it. I guess I wasn't being very clear. I've been very worried about Glee, you know, because once you're not around I'm not going to have any real competition."

Kurt blinked down at her, confused. "Once I'm not around?" he asked.

She smiled at him. "I know I'm not usually so selfless. One could say this is the only thing I have ever done that is not for myself...but, Kurt, you don't think we notice, but we do...and I had half a mind to demand Finn do something about it with the other glee guys, but it's not what you want is it?"

Kurt didn't know when Rachel had started to understand him. Maybe it had to do with how much time she spent watching him to make sure he wasn't running off to Dalton again, Kurt wasn't sure.

"It's not the way to go about it," Kurt said, "violence. That's not going to help the situation in any way but anger them more."

"And it won't rid McKinley of Karofsky either," Rachel added, "I know there's really nothing we can do. I know how these things end up...and I don't want to get a call in the middle of the night from Finn telling me you took the coward's way out."

There were tears in her eyes, Kurt realized, then. And, he'd known they cared, that Rachel cared. He knew that, but seeing such an emotional display from her made it all the more real.

"So, what are you saying, Rachel? Because, the way I see it, there's no solution but waiting it out."

Rachel began to smile at him. "I can give you another option."

"Is that what you've been ranting about, then? But what does the Lima Bean have to do with anything?"

Rachel's smiled widened, "come on, I'll show you."

- - -

From the diary of Kurt Hummel

- - -

Blaine was on all fours, his lower half sticking out of his closet, when he heard his door open.

"You know, it's customary to knock," he called, his voice muffled.

Wes sighed, "right, but you wouldn't have been able to open the door, all things considered." He leaned to peer into the closet over Blaine, "what are you looking for anyway?"

"Kind of chilly out. I thought I'd get a scarf before going to get coffee. The shelf was too high and David borrowed my chair the other day and, well, there was an incident."

"Oh. Well, you don't have to go anywhere. I got you coffee."

Wes pulled back and walked to set down the cup of coffee he'd gotten Blaine, before he took a seat on Blaine's bed. Blaine emerged from his closet some moments later, holding a few socks in one hand and a wet tie in another.

"Do you just throw your things in your closet and expect them to fly into their hangers or shelves. And how did you get that tie wet?"

Blaine dropped the socks and wet tie into a hamper. "Old water bottle."

Wes rolled his eyes. "I look at your notebooks, and your music sheets and, I don't know, everything else outside of your room and you're the neatest person I know, but the moment you go near clothes, they're just all over the place."

Blaine laughed. "I don't see a point to folding them. They don't need to be put away neat and tidy. My notes, on the other hand do need to be readable."

Wes pointed to the coffee cup.

"You know it's more than just about coffee. I wanted to see if I could find him, see if anyone else had seen him. One of the baristas, maybe. I need to find that boy, Wes."

"I know you want to believe he's real and I'm not trying to take that from you, I just want you to be prepared for the possibility that you're just projecting him because you're lonely. You denied being lonely, Blaine. You said you were happy. You're not and I know you want him, whoever he is, to make you happy, but what if he isn't real?" Wes played with a loose thread from the doublet on the bed.

Blaine sat down next to Wes. "I know what you mean. I've thought about that so much. But Thad's right. I can't just wait for him to find me, when I haven't looked for him. I don't know if he's real. He might not be the boy I picture in my head, but he could be someone like him."

Wes began to smile and Blaine didn't know if he wanted to know what the smile was for or not.

"So," Wes said, the smile still on his lips, "does that mean you're open to dating, then?"

Blaine should have know that was where Wes was headed with the conversation. He sighed.

"You can't have ruled out everyone at Dalton. You don't know everyone. And you are lonely, just admit it."

Blaine heaved another sigh and sipped at his coffee instead of answering Wes. He didn't know how to answer Wes. On the one hand, he knew it was very improbable to find a boy that was exactly like the boy in his dreams, if he even existed, but on the other, he knew the kind of boys that went to Dalton. And, yes, it was him stereotyping, but he really wouldn't be too far off the mark with a lot of them.

"I'll get David and Thad to screen them with me," Wes said, "we'll find you the perfect guy and when the two of you end up married and adopting adorable Chinese babies, you'll thank me."

"Why do they have to be Chinese?" Blaine asked.

Wes frowned at him, "One child rule, Blaine. Plus, don't you want a fully Asian baby?"

It was at this point that David pushed Blaine's already half open door, open further and entered the room, looking excited about something.

"I found the one," he said.

Blaine groaned. "You've already started looking?"

Wes smiled at him in what was supposed to described as innocent but Blaine could only describe as malicious and cunning.

"Who?" he asked, instead of going with his other impulse which included smothering Wes with his pillow. He drank his coffee slowly, letting the liquid warm him.

David grinned at Wes. "You were right," he said, "Pierce is definitely gay. He was really excited when he heard Blaine might be lookin' "

"You mean that you and Wes are looking," Blaine amended with a pointed look in David's direction.

"Lookin'," David repeated.

Blaine and Wes shared a look.

"What?" Wes asked.

David sighed. "And I call you my best friend? Looking, without the 'n'. Sounds better, you know. If you're looking with an 'n' then,"

"They'd know I was a good speller?" Blaine asked and downed the last of the coffee, wishing once again after another of Wes' passable coffee cups, that it had come from the Lima bean.

Wes grinned and shared a look with David. If Blaine was joking then things didn't have to be so bad.

"So, Pierce? I don't know a Pierce."

"Well, then, you'll meet him tomorrow night," David told him as if that settled the matter. "He'll pick you up an hour after practice."

Blaine groaned. "You're not going to tell me anything else. No last name, no description. Nothing? This is possibly the worst idea you've ever concocted. Is there even a Pierce at Dalton?"

Wes got up from Blaine's bed then. "I'd pick and outfit tonight, just in case your closet eats you tomorrow or something, and really, you're making this out to be something terrible. We're not giving you to cannibals or something."

David nodded along. "Could be much, much worse, if we didn't like you. Don't freak out too much, okay."

Both of them walked out of his room, then, and David closed the door behind him. Blaine sighed and sank into his bed, before flopping back onto his back, hands behind his head.

Pierce, he decided, was not the kind of name that the guy he dreamed of would have.

- - -

From the journal of Blaine Anderson

- - -

"So I just -" Kurt motioned towards the stage.

Rachel nodded. "Just...wait, Kurt, are you sure you want to do this? I told you how it works...I, just, you have to be sure."

Kurt looked from the stage back to Rachel. Rachel had explained it well enough and he knew it was risky thing to do, but it was a risk he was willing to take.

"You have to be really sure," Rachel pressed, "you don't know that you'll get just what you want and I don't exactly trust this thing, but, if it's what you want...you don't know what Dalton is like. You don't really know that Warbler of your either."

Kurt bit down on his lip and he looked back to the stage. It looked like any normal stage. In fact, Kurt was half convinced, Rachel was playing some sort of prank on him, a cruel prank, but a prank nonetheless. The only thing that made him question the possibility that she was right and this would work, was how scared she seemed to be of the stage and of Kurt getting near it.

"You weren't acting like this last time you wanted me to go on this stage," he said, to try and break the awkward tension that surrounded them.

The Lima Bean was mostly empty. Just the baristas and two older women sitting at a corner table and a young man with hair down to his back, facing away from the stage.

"You don't have to do this, Kurt," Rachel said again, "things can be okay at McKinley. You don't know what it will ask for. Are you really willing to give up something important to you for this?"

Kurt nodded slowly. He was willing. He had nothing to lose.

Rachel frowned, "okay, then, if you're sure." She walked around him and Kurt took a deep breath before he stepped up on the stage.

It felt like any other stage, until the backing track came on. To Kurt it felt like just standing in a cafe, ready to sing something that everyone ignored, but the moment the music came on, everything changed. The stage thrummed under him. The air around him filled with warmth and some sort of electric current that ran a shock through his body.

Somehow he managed to start singing, his voice clear and light, carrying over the cafe, echoing perfectly and smoother than he'd ever heard it.

An indescribable smell surrounded him, something flowery or fruity that he couldn't put a name to mixed in with the smell of coffee and something tangy and the faintness of spearmint. Suddenly the air was heavier, powerful. It was a force that shouldn't be reckoned with. Kurt continued to sing. It demanded that Kurt sing.

"I know what your heart desires. The girl desires many things, but she would not lose a part of herself to gain them. Instead she will work hard and get some of those things, but not what I could give her. She'll still have to make a sacrifice, as do us all, if we want to be happy."

The voice was neutral, belonging to neither a boy or a girl. There was power behind it, and it echoed around him even though Kurt knew no one else could hear it but him.

"I do not play God, Kurt Hummel, I am merely a tool. For this to work, you must understand that. I also respect free will, and I will give you, your wish if you so desire, for a price. A small token. But, I am not God, so you must choose your own fate. You believe truly that what you want will make you happy, and so you must prove that to me."

Kurt kept singing.

"You want your chance at Dalton Academy, and you shall get it. You want to be close to your beloved Blaine, and so it must be, and only when you've proven that what you wanted was for the better...only then will I return what I shall take."

Kurt's voice carried throughout the Lima Bean, better than ever, louder than when he'd started. He hit the notes perfectly; flawlessly. He couldn't concentrate on the singing, it was like it was someone else singing for him. Instead he listened to the voice, wanting to ask questions, but knowing already that it wouldn't answer anything.

"And what is your choice, then, Kurt Hummel? I see your future clearly, your two futures. One is harder than the other. You, as master of yourself, must choose. This is your cross roads."

Kurt knew what he had to do, so as he hit the last note in the song he nodded. "I choose to get my heart's desire," he said, clearly, hearing himself in his head just like the voice.

"So, it shall be."

The voice didn't speak again and Kurt almost waited for Rachel to come out and say something about how gullible he was. But that never came. Instead he felt the energy around him shifting. It was like colors swirling around him. A mist formed and he saw Rachel one last time, before he felt his eyes dropping and everything was going black.

The last thing he heard was, "He must love you for more than what he already sees."