He knew obviously that this meant Blaine liked him, which felt-...to call it "amazing" was woefully inadequate. He was left with cheesy, overwrought metaphors about the world seeming to explode with bright possibilities and vibrant colours he'd never known existed. He found himself wanting to hop up on the curbs of sidewalks around campus, singing as he twirled around lamp-posts like Gene Kelley. To stare dreamily out the window during class instead of paying attention to the lecture on the Norman Conquests and just imagine that perfect moment, the one where Blaine had leaned over in the middle of the most wistful, sad song about the loveliness of being ordinary and kissed him so softly...

He wasn't sure what kisses were meant to feel like, not for sure, but he was pretty certain that was it. At any rate, the kiss suddenly made him understand what all the fuss was about, which wasn't something he'd ever had before. It felt like the world's most amazing love song.

How many kisses came with their own crescendos?

He smiled at the thought - he was doing that a lot, smiling seemingly out of nowhere. It took him the entire first day after Blaine kissed him (oh god, Blaine had kissed him!) to realize why it was that his face hurt before he realized it was because he'd been grinning this stupid, wide, ecstatic grin almost constantly since it happened. It took him another day to realize the reason that smiling could cause him that much pain was because his face literally wasn't used to it.

He couldn't remember the last time he'd smiled for more than a few seconds at a time, let alone this widely. With this much actual joy behind it.

He'd never felt like this. The sort of aching bloom in his chest all the time, like his heart was literally trying to burst through his ribs because he felt so much. The way he was almost breathless just thinking the name "Blaine." Everything that had felt magical in the moment he watched Blaine sing the first time, and the second time when he put a name to how he felt - it paled in comparison to this.

Because not only was he in love with Blaine, but Blaine loved him back. Or at least came close to it - and would get there in time.

Maybe. He thought so, at least. He thought it meant that he and Blaine were on the same page, felt the same way about each other, and were...

...What were they?

That was the real problem, he concluded. He had no idea how any of this was meant to...work. He understood relationships, vaguely, in theory, and he'd certainly watched his share of matches - both good and bad - as a teenager who wasn't too busy being wrapped up in his own relationship drama to observe others in living out theirs. The years he'd spent watching Rachel and Finn and Quinn alone had been an interesting educational experience in how not to pursue someone, for example. Plus he was kind of the go-to for advice about boys, even though he didn't understand them much better than any of the girls who asked him. A little bit, but not entirely. So he had enough of an idea of the basic stages and milestones that a boy and girl went through when pursuing each other, when they started dating, but this...

...This didn't always line up to that, did it?

In some ways it did - or it could, he guessed, he wasn't entirely sure. But in some ways, it didn't seem to fit at all, and Kurt wasn't sure if that meant they were doing it wrong, or if it was something that was entirely different when both people were boys. For one thing, none of the rules applied. Boys were supposed to ask the girl out - how did that work with two boys? And boys paid for dinner. Was he-...he assumed he was supposed to be the girl, since Blaine was more like a normal boy than he was, but that felt odd for some reason. Not quite right. Even though Blaine had, he supposed, made the first move so he apparently did want to take that role.

But so much of regular dating would be off-limits to them, wouldn't it?

Even if they weren't sick or wrong - and they weren't - that didn't mean other people would understand that. They couldn't walk down the street hand-in-hand like other couples could. He couldn't smile giddily as Blaine carried his books. They couldn't go to the movies like every other in town and kiss in the back like Finn and Quinn. They couldn't go out to dinner and flirt with each other because then-...then everyone would know. And if he wanted people to know, he wouldn't be fake-dating Rachel.

If he wanted people to know, it would be the sign of having a death wish.

Except he did want people to know. He wanted to shout it from the rooftops that he, Kurt Hummel, had a boyfriend.

If that was even the appropriate term.

Or lover, though that wasn't entirely accurate since they hadn't- there had been none of that yet and probably wouldn't be, though the thought of it was more confusing and intimidating than repulsive.

Or...whatever it was Man #16 called the man he was with (who Kurt thought might be referred to as Man #16.5 from now on). The report had referred to it as a homosexual marriage, and before someone got married that made them a...boyfriend, right? So boyfriend. That's what this was.

Blaine was his boyfriend.

That grin was back, and he didn't care who saw it and gave him strange looks in the hall. Because he, the boy who had felt so alone and unacceptably eccentric for so long, had a boyfriend.

And really, who could not grin when confronted with that fact?

* * * * *

He didn't know what to do.

On one hand...mistakes happened. People slipped up sometimes, they did things they knew they shouldn't, they broke rules for no good reason, and usually all that happened was that, at worst, the person got caught and had to suffer the consequences. If they didn't get caught, then everyone just went on with their lives.

Rather, it became a moral question more than anything else. If you stole something and didn't get caught, then it was up to you to figure out if you cared that what you'd done was wrong.

And Blaine cared. He knew it was wrong and that-...saying it bothered him wasn't strong enough.

He couldn't stop thinking about it, that moment when he'd looked over at the beautiful boy beside him and had given in to every urge he'd been working for years to control. Every time he remembered it, remembered the look on Kurt's face when they separated, remembered the scent of his aftershave as he buried his face in Kurt's shoulder afterward, he felt a sharp flutter of his stomach, then nausea - disgust.

Then a kind of aching longing. He wanted to be normal so much, to not be sick, to not have ruined his chances at ever being a healthy person this way-

...but not as much as he wanted to kiss Kurt again. Not as much as he wanted to run his fingers through the boy's perfectly-coiffed hair and sing songs to him and hold him close.

* * * * *

He had taken to singing in the shower again. It was a habit he'd given up originally when Finn and Carole moved in. Unlike the old house, where he had his own bathroom far away from his dad's room, at the new house he and Finn shared a bathroom across the hall from their parents' room and it had come to his attention early on that his penchant for belting Broadway standards at an early hour was...inconvenient. Unappreciated by his housemates, at any rate.

When he started at Dalton, he had assumed that the edict against singing outside of Warbler practice still stood. Sam had a lot of studying to do, and when he got back to the room he usually wanted to just relax which didn't go well with the soaring sounds of Connie Francis. But now, with Sam off at an extra tutoring session in anticipation of their upcoming midterms - and by the way, who decided that it was a good idea to divide the semesters such that midterms fell three weeks after they returned from Christmas break? They couldn't have started a few weeks earlier, gotten out a few weeks earlier, and had exams right before the holidays rather than trying to get back into the swing of things for a week before buckling down to study like madmen in order to ace tests they didn't remember any material from? But that was its own digression entirely. With Sam at an extra tutoring session, Kurt found he couldn't help himself.

He sang when he was emotional. Usually he knew it as singing when he was brokenhearted, mournful...or so frustrated and angry he couldn't get out how he felt any other way. Now he was giddy, and it was either singing or skipping across campus and even he couldn't pull off the latter with any semblance of dignity.

I feel pretty
Oh so pretty
I feel pretty and witty and gay
And I pity
Any girl who isn't me today

He sang as he meticulously applied his Jheri Redding Creme Rinse Conditioner. He wondered if Rachel would at some point let him start recommending products for her - he did get some degree of clothing approval, he'd determined already. But even improving her garish ensembles wasn't enough if her hair was still frizzing out all over the place, and this worked wonders. He should ask the next time he talked to her.

He didn't talk to her often when he was back at school. For one thing, it was a little expensive to call Lima all the time, and he liked her but not quite that much. For another, there was always a line of boys waiting to use the phone. It wasn't the wait he minded; it was the audience. He couldn't talk to her about anything he actually wanted to talk to her about or tell her about without wondering the entire time if someone might be on to his less-than-brilliant-but-certainly-passable plan. He could act the part well enough when she was around, if he absolutely had to, and he was getting better at not laughing whenever Blaine would pointedly mention his girlfriend in front of a room full of people.

He would have to work on not staring dreamily at him now, wouldn't he? Probably. That might pose a problem.

He had written Rachel a letter to tell her about how everything had changed - a two-page long soliloquy on how beautiful Blaine was, probably, he honestly didn't remember exactly what he'd written but he knew he had talked about the kiss in there. She had probably gotten it a couple days earlier, and he was surprised she hadn't immediately called him to demand details.

She would claim it was because she was a better actress than he was an actor, that she could keep up the front and not want to 'break character' as often as he did. She could jump in a lake; she wasn't the one head over heels for the most handsome boy in school.

He rinsed his hair with a dreamy sigh and something that sounded suspiciously like a giggle as he wondered if going with someone always meant you got to negotiate their clothes and hairstyle. He knew Quinn certainly told Finn what to wear often enough - "Match my dress like this," "don't wear that," "why aren't you wearing your letter sweater?" - but she was also kind of controlling and mean and he didn't want to be like that to his boyfriend. Besides, while Blaine didn't have quite his sense of style, he did seem to know how to dress himself out of uniform.

But his hair...Kurt was going to have to insist on washing all that Bryl out of it at some point and work it into something more lifelike instead of the hard plastic-like shell it was now.

I feel charming
Oh so charming
It's alarming how charming I feel
And so pretty
That I hardly can believe I'm real

He wondered what it would be like to run his fingers through Blaine's hair. Maybe lying on a blanket somewhere in a meadow, a picnic lunch open beside them, no one around for miles, just staring up at the blue overhead and watching the clouds roll by. He couldn't imagine anything more wonderful.

Actually, he could. Perhaps unsurprisingly, it was the same fantasy he'd had for his own life for what seemed like forever - a beautiful art deco apartment in New York City, where he would have an entire room for a closet and he could throw elegant soirees and invite women who dressed in Dior and Chanel, with a pianist playing in the background for everyone to spontaneously sing along to. But the addition to Blaine into the fantasy...his own Cary Grant in an elegant suit, a drink in his hand as he greeted their friends, welcomed them to their home, mingled charmingly through the crowd...then sang all evening because he couldn't help himself?

Who could want more than that?

But there was more, he concluded as he began to rinse his hair, closing his eyes as he tilted his head back under the spray. There could be more to life than just hosting elegant cocktail parties and working for a major design house, though those were important parts of what he ultimately wanted. There could be more in life than being alone, or being surrounded by couples without ever being part of one.

He pictured quiet evenings at home in the same apartment, a soft jazz album playing on the record player because that was what people listened to when they sat around lounging on chaises and reading, wasn't it? Then Blaine would walk over to fix himself something to drink, and the music would stop. Kurt would sit up, looking away from his book to ask why Blaine had it off...only to hear whatever the new equivalent of "Unchained Melody" was at the time. And Kurt would smile, thinking about how romantic the song was, and Blaine would walk over and hold out his hand and ask him to dance...and there, in their living room, they would sway and dance and sing quietly along, holding each other close. And Blaine would reach his fingers up and run them through Kurt's hair in a way that Kurt would hate if anyone else did, but Blaine would be allowed to because he was special.

He would always be special. And with him Kurt felt special, the way Blaine looked at him? Like he wanted to hold back but he just couldn't because what they had together was so amazing, so strong?

See that pretty girl in that mirror there
Who can that attractive girl be?
Such a pretty face,
Such a pretty dress
Such a pretty smile
Such a pretty me!

As the water began to run cold, he realized just how long he had been standing there with his fingers working along his scalp and pretending they belonged to Blaine. He turned off the tap and stepped out of the blue-tiled shower, toes curling against the soft plush of the bathmat as he began to carefully dry himself from head to toe. He was getting ahead of himself, he reminded himself with a roll of his eyes and a sheepish, giddy grin. They had only been together for a few days now - maybe love songs and apartments were a little far off.

But a boy could dream, right?

He had spent most of his life expecting that most people would disappoint him, or people would die before they should, or people who appeared to like him and be nice to him would ultimately laugh at him behind his back. But Blaine...Blaine made him honestly think there might be something out there for him that could be amazing. More amazing than even what he'd pictured for himself, which was a very high bar.

And every time he thought of Blaine, that ridiculous smile came back and he felt warm all over and like his internal organs were floating and trying to burst out of him as if compelled by magnets to move closer to Blaine.

I feel stunning
And entrancing
Feel like running and dancing for joy
For I'm loved
By a pretty wonder-

He was cut off by the sound of someone clearing their throat behind him, and he jumped and attempted to cover himself with the towel all in one uncoordinated motion. Sam stood in the doorway of their bathroom, glasses still on, looking amused and a little perplexed. "Sam," he said breathlessly, trying not to look nearly as embarrassed and flustered as he felt. "You're back early."

"Yeah," Sam replied, looking at the tile at the top of the wall. "Tutor had something tonight, I think his son plays basketball or something, so I came back here to work on stuff. Everyone's taking over the library because of midterms so it's kind of impossible to concentrate."

"Makes sense," Kurt stated, feeling the blush pinking his cheeks even as he stood a little straighter. "I'll just...be quiet then."

Sam gave a faint smile. "Yeah, that'd be good." He closed the door behind him as he went back to the room, and Kurt finished drying himself quickly before slipping into his silk robe and back into his fantasy world.

* * * * *

Blaine was convinced that it was a fundamental principle of life that, no matter who you were trying to avoid thinking about, they would be all you could think of. It was certainly shaping up to be the case for him about now.

He couldn't stop picturing Kurt. The way his eyes got really bright in certain light, at certain times of day. The way he flicked his hair back from his face. The way his voice sounded when he was trying to hide that he was nervous. The way he smelled, oh god, why couldn't he stop thinking about the smell of Kurt's neck when his face had been buried there after he gave in to an urge he'd been successfully resisting for years? Why couldn't he just stop thinking about him and go back to...whatever it was he'd been before? Why couldn't he just ignore the boy? Why was no amount of thinking about agonizing pain and feeling this anguish making any of it go away?

He'd always been able to push it aside before. What was wrong with him now that he couldn't stop wanting?

There was a knock at the door, and he dragged himself slowly out of bed, straightening his pajamas to make himself at least a little presentable. It wasn't that late, not nearly time to fall asleep - not even near curfew yet - but he didn't feel like being social. He didn't feel like going out and trying to force himself to pretend everything was fine, not right now. Not until he could get the way Kurt's neck smelled out of his head.

Which, of course, meant the person knocking on his door...

Kurt looked freshly-showered, his hair still damp and slicked neatly to the side, but he was dressed as elegantly as ever. He looked like a 1940s movie star like that, with the way he held himself so tall and upright and confident, but a split-second later Kurt broke into a grin. He leaned forward as if to kiss him, and Blaine panicked, practically pulling him into the room and shutting the door quickly behind him.

Why didn't Kurt understand? Why didn't he get that this was something they weren't supposed to be doing? That just like he didn't want anyone to know if he screwed up an assignment or did poorly on an audition or something, he didn't want to broadcast this particular failure - to say nothing of the ramifications. Why didn't he get that this was something that they needed to be vigilant about, that if anyone found out their reputations would be ruined?

But when Kurt grinned apologetically and said, "Sorry, I just...missed you..." his heart ached. And he found himself murmuring "Me too" even though he wished he hadn't.

Kurt leaned in again to kiss him, and behind the safety of the door Blaine found himself unable to pull away, unable to find any reason beyond the obvious to push Kurt away. Anything to hide behind, because apparently the obvious was no longer enough of a good reason to do what was right.

He felt Kurt's soft palm cup his cheek, the minty lips cover his, and his own hand moved up to Kurt's shoulder - not to push him away, just resting there. Pausing. He drew in a deep breath through his nose, and the scent of Kurt was just-...everywhere. Clean and fresh and innocent and Kurt and he couldn't move away.

He didn't step forward though. Didn't move to meet him, didn't pull him closer.

It...it wasn't wrong if he let Kurt kiss him as long as he wasn't kissing back. As long as he wasn't initiating things. If he wanted but didn't advance, that still counted, right? It was still showing enough restraint that he wasn't entirely a lost cause, flinging himself with hedonistic abandon into something he knew was wrong. If he wasn't doing anything to- to bring this about, or to encourage him, or to start the kissing, then it wasn't his fault and didn't mean he was quite as sick.

...Did it?

Did it mean he was more sick if he'd been halfway wishing for this moment for days?

Kurt pulled back slowly, smiling and looking almost giddy as he slipped his had into Blaine's easily. The fluid movement felt like something that had happened a hundred times despite being new, and he wished it didn't all feel so damned easy. It would be so easy to just go with this, to let go, to let himself-

It would be wrong. It was wrong, no conditional tense. What they had already done was wrong enough, what he wanted to do was even more wrong, and this-

...This was unrepentant. This made him a difficult case. Wanting counted. Wanting mattered. Intent mattered. No amount of mental gymnastics could get him to honestly believe otherwise, no matter how hard he tried: wanting Kurt, and not pushing Kurt away, and not resisting anymore - that was just as bad as actively engaging.

Kurt was talking, but he couldn't focus on the words - just the feeling of the soft palm in his, the sparkling of his blue-green eyes, the excited melodic movement of Kurt's voice. Had Kurt always sounded like that? He seemed to recall something much colder before, something so much less excitable. More reserved. More appropriate than the near-giddiness he heard.

It was because of him, Blaine concluded grimly. Because of this. Not only was he getting worse, but so was Kurt - they were getting sicker the longer they were around each other, making each other so much more difficult, making all of this so much harder.

"...on Friday. If you're not doing anything."

He felt Kurt staring at him and realized he hadn't been paying attention. "What?"

"I thought we could get dinner. Don't worry - nothing overt," he added with a roll of his eyes, as if it was the funniest thing in the world to be worried about. "Two boys can get dinner together without anyone thinking anything, if that's what you're worried about."

"It's not," he replied quickly - too quickly. That wasn't what worried him. Everyone else knowing would be devastating, but it would only be the tip of the iceberg compared to everything else - the symptom compared to the cause. Everyone else knowing he was a pervert would mean the end of most of what he needed out of life, but it wouldn't hurt half as much as knowing it hurt him. There were no words a person could use that were half as harsh as what he thought of himself.

"Great," Kurt replied with a broad smile. "So we'll go. I thought somewhere nice, not the usual Dalton fare-"

He could imagine Kurt across the table from him, eyes shining in the soft light, in a ridiculous jacket that he wore with pride, elegantly picking at a fancy dish of some kind in one of the nicer restaurants around town- "I can't." His tone was firm, adamant, and he wasn't sure who he was trying to tell.

Kurt's smile fell, and his eyes hardened into a near-glare. "Why not?"

Maybe Kurt really didn't know it was wrong. He still didn't know. Because the way Kurt acted about all of this, the way he didn't even try to fight it- But the idea of being the one to break that to him, to being the one to tell him how sick he was, how sick they both were, for even wanting this let alone how much worse off they were now by acting on it...

Crushing Kurt like that might be the right thing to do, but it wasn't something he was capable of. And it wouldn't stop his own problem. The other solution, while less honourable and far less courageous, helped save them both: backing away. Putting distance between the two of them, putting people between the two of them. Falling for someone else instead. That way Kurt wouldn't do these things because there was no one else to do them with, and he wouldn't do them because he would have someone else. It was the best of all worlds.

Well. Not the best, but the less-horrible of all options.

"I have a date with Jean," he said, which wasn't entirely a lie. Rather, he didn't have a date with her yet, but he would once he called her first thing tomorrow after class. She had called him earlier in the week to ask how his break had gone, to let him know she was back at school and to not-so-casually hint that, should he want to take her out, she would still be interested. It was time for him to step up, to be the man in all of this, to do what was necessary. To be an adult instead of a frivolous child who pursued only his own desires. It was-...it was time to finally settle down and seriously date instead of waiting around and hoping this sickness would go away. It was time to be proactive.

"Really," Kurt said slowly, his eyebrows lowered. He was skeptical. Rather - he was skeptical of Blaine's motives, not of whether the date existed at all. Because he was fairly certain that Jean was not in on any of this - unlike Rachel, whom he was occasionally obligated to take out around Lima, showing her off for all the morons they used to go to school with to see that she was capable of getting a boyfriend and he was capable of wanting a girl on his arm. From the way Blaine said it, made it sound legitimate, it didn't seem like they had the same arrangement. And while they were nowhere near the point yet of going steady - did homosexuals even do that? Could boyfriends be 'steady'? Could they be anything other than steadies if there were only two of them in the entire world of a similar age and geographic location? It was hard to play the field when there was only one boy who might not reject his advances outright, he thought with twisted amusement - it felt like this was...different. More than merely having plans with someone else.

It felt wrong. It felt like lying. It felt like sneaking around and there was no sneaking in his fantasy. None. There was no- no skulking around in shadows and pulling each other frantically into rooms like Blaine had when he'd shown up at the door. There was only joy. No fear. No hesitation. No shame.

"Yeah," Blaine replied. "We're going out Friday. And maybe another time over the weekend. Sorry."

Now he was just making things up. No girl, even one as forward as Jean - perhaps especially as forward as Jean - had a date with the same boy two nights in one weekend. Ever. Not unless they were definitely steadies and even then. And Blaine and Jean had known each other less than six weeks.

This wasn't just deliberate, this was avoidance.

He was too proud to plead for Blaine to make room in his schedule, so testing the waters he said, "Then I should probably leave you to get work done - since you'll be busy all weekend."

And Blaine looked relieved.

He wanted to cry, to belt out the most mournful song he could as it felt like this boy he had adored from arms' length, then kissed and envisioned everything good in life with, took out his heart and crushed it under Jean's ugly high-heeled shoe. But he was too proud for that, too. His jaw, neck, posture all tightened as he slid his hand out from Blaine's gracefully. He managed a cold "Goodnight" before slipping into the hallway.

Blaine wanted to get rid of him. Wanted to shove him away and pretend none of it ever happened, that none of their kisses ever occurred, that they were something else - that he was something else.

Maybe Blaine really had been pretending he was a girl during "Baby It's Cold Outside". Maybe Blaine really didn't feel like this all the time and liked girls just as much, or more, or could like girls just as much or more. Maybe this boy he had worshiped and wanted so desperately to be with, to be like, was just an unrepentant jerk who didn't care about people, didn't care if he broke their hearts or their spirits or single-handedly wiped out every glimmering future dinner party they'd planned. Maybe he was a mean-hearted person under all that hair gel and that uniform and those eyes and that charming smile-

...maybe Blaine was scared.

His breath caught as he thought it, hurrying down the hallway back toward his own dorm. He remembered how terrified he'd been when he'd first found out what was wrong with him, remembered how scared Blaine had been in the car when they were even talking about it, how hesitant he'd been before the first kiss, how he'd run away before that, maybe-...maybe that was the problem. Maybe Blaine was just afraid.

But he didn't know how to help. Because if Blaine wanted to get away from him, wanted him to go away, how was he supposed to reach him? How was he supposed to explain to him that all of this was okay - more than okay, it was...it was amazing, it was beautiful...how was he supposed to show Blaine the future he could envision absent a crystal ball, if Blaine wasn't ready to see it?

How was he supposed to show Blaine what things could be or how this could go if he didn't really know it for himself, not for sure?

He needed to talk to someone, but his list of potential options was pretty limited. Exactly three people in the world knew his secret: one was currently either scared of him or hated him and was planning a date with a girl in a tacky uniform; one was still not entirely comfortable with the idea and thought he should just stay away from Blaine in the first place; and one...

...one may have been the worst giver of advice ever and the single least successful person in relationships he'd ever seen, but at least...at least she knew. At least she might be able to tell him something. Or just...listen. Or something.

When did he start needing to talk to people? He'd been the silent, solitary kid his entire life, why did he suddenly now, when things had to be such a carefully-kept secret, start feeling like if he didn't talk to someone he might crack?

He reached the hall phone and dug into his pocket, hoping there might be some kind of change in there. He retrieved a quarter and slipped it in, dialing Rachel's number. It was late, but probably not so late that she wouldn't be able to talk.

"Hello?" She sounded crisp on the phone, well-practiced, as though she thought at any moment an agent might be calling her and she wanted to make the best possible first impression. But the peculiarity was familiar and oddly comforting, even as much as he would have mocked her for it a year ago. Or might mock her for it again in a few days, when he didn't feel so confused and hurt.

"Hi, Rachel," he said quietly, but at least he managed to keep his voice tight so he didn't sound pathetic - just cold and tired, which he was.

"How are you? How's the new boyfriend?" she drew out the word teasingly, and he could hear the grin in her voice and it made him cringe.

"I don't know," he replied simply.

"I can't believe you didn't call and tell me - I had to read it in a letter days later. I need faster updates than that."

"There are people around," he pointed out.

There was a long pause, then a kind of forced brightness as she said, "Well then? I need updates now. We can speak in code. Or in famous movie quotes - people will just think you're a film buff. Or song lyrics, since you keep talking about how the Warblers are the hit of the school so obviously Dalton must appreciate musical talent, and you can't be truly talented unless you also have an extensive and in-depth knowledge of a wide variety of musical styles and genres-"

He wasn't sure why the upbeat tone in Rachel's voice made him feel so much more exhausted than he had only a few minutes earlier. Maybe she was going so fast he was getting tired just listening to her and trying to keep up. Maybe it was because everything seeming okay and holding it all together felt so dim in comparison to the brightness, the excitement with which she wanted to know every detail.

Maybe it was because he was starting to feel like there were no details worth revealing. He'd made up everything in his head again, hadn't he? Made up an entire relationship, an entire future, based solely on one kiss - one amazing kiss, but still just...just one kiss. He did this - every single time, he did this. And just once he wanted-

"I'm always chasing rainbows," he quoted, glancing up and down the halls to see if anyone was going to think it was strange to be speaking in lyrics, anyone who could put any of it together. That the quote came from a song done by Judy Garland was more painful than comforting - he could imagine Blaine watching him with rapt fascination while he sang it, seated on Blaine's bed and pouring his heart out because he didn't know how else to explain this feeling of everything he wanted being torn away like this. He skipped a line, then added, "My schemes are just like all my dreams - ending in the sky."

"What happened?" she asked before remembering there might not be a lyric that would tell precisely the story. "Did something not work with Blaine, is it-"

"I don't know," he stated. Because he didn't. He didn't know how this was supposed to go, or what he'd done wrong, or how exactly he was supposed to fix things now. He knew he needed to, he knew that clearly Blaine was afraid and confused and conflicted...but so was he. And he was doing an okay job of helping himself, but anything beyond that he wasn't sure how to approach. "I don't know how it's meant to work, but clearly this isn't it."

There was a long pause, then an almost tentative, "Do you want to...I don't know if it would help, but when I saw my dad over break, I mentioned you. If you wanted to meet him..."

The prospect of meeting someone else - someone like him, someone who knew how this went, someone who had a homosexual husband - or lover or whatever word it was they actually preferred because he somehow doubted that Rachel was trustworthy on this question - and therefore obviously had figured out how to breach all of this at some point...someone he could ask all of the several thousand questions that had started swirling around him so quickly he could barely think of anything else- a sigh of relief escaped at even the thought of it. "Yes."

"Yes?"

"Yes, Rachel. For someone who tends to be invested primarily in herself, that's a surprisingly good idea." But even through the backhanded compliment, he couldn't help but smile and stand a little straighter.

"Thank you," she replied; she didn't protest the first half of the sentence, probably because she didn't see it as a bad thing Kurt realized with a fond roll of his eyes. "I'll call him. Would Friday work? They usually-"

"Friday's perfect," he replied. No way was he going to sit around his dorm on Friday and think obsessively about Blaine and his ridiculous non-fake fake date. With a girl.

"You can pick me up after classes," she stated. "Besides - it's about time you met your girlfriend's father, isn't it?" She added dramatically, "You should tell the boys at that school that, too. They'll appreciate it and it will seem more realistic. Pretend to be afraid of him, though, even though he's bookish and entirely unintimindating. Most guys would be nervous before meeting the parents, especially of a girl as exceptionally talented as I am who would obviously be her parents' pride and joy. Assuming her father hadn't left almost a decade ago to live with his secret male lover."

The ridiculousness of it, and how over the top Rachel was when she made speeches like that, still couldn't take away his excitement and defiance. Blaine could have his pathetic attempt at normalcy on Friday. He would be having dinner with two men who had found each other and found happiness together as proud homosexuals, and then he would drop his knowingly-fake girlfriend off at home and come back to school...where he would teach Blaine everything he was missing.

And then he would get his future back, with all of its dinner parties and happy evenings at home. So help him, he would.