Blaine rose before dawn, carefully prying himself from Kurt's grasp.

He hadn't slept a wink, but didn't move for fear that he'd wake Kurt, whose breath tickled his neck with each deep exhale. But it was time, and he needed to shower, dress and leave as discreetly as possible.

Kurt's arm wrapped under his own and wove its way around his waist, latching itself to his chest. Disentangling himself without detection would require skill and patience. Like navigating a Twister game, he loosened himself from Kurt's grip and rolled gingerly off the mattress.

He stood in the doorway for a moment and glanced back at the room. Kurt had shifted, sprawled on to his stomach and clutched a pillow like he had Blaine just minutes before. If he could, Blaine would lock them in and stay tangled in Kurt's arms for as long as possible.

He pulled some clothes from the closet and silently shut the door behind him.

****

When Kurt awoke, it was to an empty bed, and an envelope.

He looked at it for a minute, avoiding it, sensing he knew what it held.

He was alone, and he was pretty sure the envelope confirmed it. 

Their reunion may have left him breathless, but he realized that in the 16 hours since Blaine found him on his doorstep, Kurt hadn't told him that he loved him. It wasn't that he didn't -- if anything, his feelings were stronger than ever -- but something about the night before felt off, awkward, out of sync.

Their night had been boldly physical, but it didn't feel intimate, at least not in a way that longtime lovers should be. Kurt felt an unfamiliar distance between them. He couldn’t pinpoint it, but something told him that his trip may have been too little, too late. He may have been too quick to criticize Blaine's ideas, and may have shut himself off to opportunities.

All he really wanted was for Blaine to come back to New York, back to their apartment, back to Kurt's days and nights. Instead, he feared that he had driven a wedge through their nearly six-year relationship. That may not have been 'welcome home' lovemaking, he thought, but it may very well have been a goodbye fuck.

He didn’t need to pick up the envelope to know what Blaine put in it.

His heart sank.

Could he blame him?

Blaine had tried repeatedly for weeks, for months, to convince him to visit the west coast, and he had steadfastly refused, or changed the subject, or simply gone silent.

Kurt thought about the postcards and the notes that followed them: The romance of the music Blaine had shared from his first trip to the Hollywood Bowl. The goofiness of the lightsabers. The wonder he found in the living art displays in Laguna. The loneliness he'd conveyed from his canyon hikes. 

Kurt only then began to realize that Blaine had been making an effort to keep them together from the very start, and he'd ignored the signals.

He'd seen it as a brazen effort to uproot him. He wasn't entirely wrong. Blaine was talking about a permanent -- or at least longterm -- move west, and he'd suggested that Kurt move with him.

Since high school, Kurt had dreamed of New York, of Broadway and bustling sidewalks and a million people with dreams as big as his own. But he’d also dreamed of the boy in the blue blazer who sang to his soul that first day at Dalton Academy, and nearly every day since. 

But his New York fantasy had changed over the years. His original plan was based on necessity: Broadway stardom required Broadway accessibility. When his career plans shifted, dramatically, New York remained the logical choice for an education, and Blaine had always been on board with following him to the city.

But California? Kurt had as much as rejected Blaine’s question out of hand: Do you need to be in New York for your career? Could you consider a life here?

Now Kurt questioned himself.

Could I live here? If I couldn’t, could I live without love?

He didn’t have the energy, or the willpower, to answer himself.

He looked around the room for signs of Blaine's new life, but Blaine had traveled light, and never tried to make Cooper's guest room look or feel like home. The only truly personal item Blaine had allowed himself sat on the nightstand, a small framed photograph of the two of them, snuggled and smiling on a picnic day at Central Park.

Kurt got up, looking for his phone, checking for texts that didn't exist, then set it down on the kitchen counter.

He would give Blaine time, and take a shower, and hope that he could wash away the feeling that he had made an enormous mistake.

****

When he emerged from his morning ritual in search of coffee, Kurt's phone was alight with texts.

Where are you?

Kurt?

Have you read it?

The driver’s gonna kill me.

The last one got his attention.

WHAT?

He turned to the bed, opened the envelope and braced himself for the worst.

I've never felt that I needed a map to your heart, but LA freeways are another matter entirely.

A car service will pick you up at 10. 

B

Kurt looked  at the top of the screen: 10:38 AM.

"Shit."

Kurt tapped out a reply with reckless speed.

Hadn’t read your note til now. If he’s still outside, let him know I’ll be right down.

I’m so sorry.

****

Inside the car, Kurt found another envelope. This one contained a photograph of a seaside cliff, and no explanation.

“Where exactly are we headed?” Kurt asked the driver.

“I’m sorry, but I’m not at liberty to discuss that.”

“So I’ve been kidnapped?”

“I believe you stepped into the car of your own free will, Mr. Hummel. However, if you do not care to continue, I have been instructed to deliver you to the location of your choosing.”

Kurt could see the slightest smirk of a smile in the rear view mirror. The driver -- smarmy bastard -- was enjoying this. He sat in silence, confused and anxious.

He called Blaine and was sent straight to voicemail.

“Keep driving.”

Not expecting a response, he turned to text.

Would you tell me what’s going on?

Are you in the car?

Yes. Would you tell me what’s going on?

Afraid I can’t. You’ll have more info soon. 

Blaine ...

Kurt?

I’m not in the mood for a treasure hunt.

Do you trust me?

Sometimes.

C’mon. Do you TRUST me?

Yes.

Good. Sit back and relax.

“Do you mind if I put on some music? It was requested," the driver said.

“Fine,” Kurt replied.

The Town Car filled with the sounds of a piano, then an orchestra. Kurt knew the piece. Blaine had shared it with him via email and YouTube link after his first trip to the Hollywood Bowl. 

The Chopin Nocturne.

One of the most romantic things ever written. ... It's us, Kurt. 

It's music to love to.

He’d only read the words, but he could hear them in Blaine’s voice.

He could feel the moisture building in his eyes.

The driver swiftly navigated the incessant congestion of the 101 south, past Capitol Records, toward the skyscrapers of downtown Los Angeles.

Kurt marveled how the nation’s two largest cities could be so very different from a distance. New York, condensed and compact, bristling with bodies and energy and steel and concrete. Los Angeles, a sprawl of sun-kissed hillside homes clasping a valley center of low-slung stucco punctured by clusters of glass towers.

Yet at their core, were they all that different? Both cities were the very definition of melting pots. Both cities served as launching points to other continents. And both cities were largely driven by the arts: New York with theater, fashion and museums; Los Angeles with Hollywood, and the music industry.

And fashion, he reminded himself. 

They turned on the 110 south, the freeway that cuts a swath through the heart of L.A., a concrete line of cultural demarcation. To the right of the double-decker freeway: USC, West Hollywood, Beverly Hills and eventually UCLA. To the left: Watts, Compton, Hollywood Park racetrack and the noisy approach pattern for LAX.

They drove the entire length of the crosstown freeway, nearing the Port of Long Beach before turning north. Kurt gave up guessing miles ago, when at a stop light, the driver turned and handed him a card.

Another postcard.

“For you, Mr. Hummel.”

It was the image of a glass seaside structure, a stone tower beside it -- a church? -- along a seaside cliff. Unlike previous postcards, it contained no identification and little information, save the unconventional signature line.

With hope,

B

The car arrived in the seaside parking, a garden path leading to the glass-walled structure from the postcard. 

“We’re here. I believe you’ll find what you’re looking for at the end of the walkway, Mr. Hummel, and best wishes.”

Best wishes? And what was he looking for? Wasn’t that the root of his problems?

He walked the tree lined path, toward the building. Along a stone wall, a sign designating a historic site: “Wayfarer’s Chapel.”

He stopped to look for a moment, puzzled by the thought of Blaine sending him to a church. When he looked toward the structure -- a sleek, oversized greenhouse, he thought -- a dark-haired man stood alone by the open doors, fidgeting.

It was a familiar look. A mass of controlled curls atop his head, a classic wardrobe that defined easy grace and showed off the well-toned body beneath it to its best advantage. A slim cardigan in heather gray. A Cabernet red athletic-cut polo beneath it. Trim gray slacks, hugging the hips and all the right places, rolled to show off trim ankles (and save money on shortening, Kurt knew).

Blaine, dreamy as ever, fidgeting with something small. His phone? No. 

Something else entirely.

He looked up to Kurt, his face a maze of wonder and tension.

“Kurt.”

“You kidnapped me.”

“I'm sorry for all the secrecy. And about abandoning you this morning. I had ... things ... to do. Most of it was already arranged, but ..."

“Hmm,” Kurt said, his head low, eyes up, walking slowly toward Blaine with his hands behind his back. “So now can you tell me why I’m here? Is this a church?”

Blaine explained how he had attended the Christian's wedding to his longtime boyfriend  in the chapel, and marveled at both its beauty and its relaxed, embracing atmosphere. The historic church had a long history of welcoming same sex unions, he'd found, and had backed marriage equality during the state's battle over Prop. 8.

“It was ... I know ... it’s a church, Kurt, but it was so beautiful, so right. The whole time I was here, I thought of you.”

Kurt tried to blink away the welling tears, and took a deep breath.

“When I woke up to an envelope, I thought you were gone,” Kurt said. "You were gone, but I thought you had left me, so I didn’t open it. I didn’t want it to be true. Last night, it felt like the last time. Like we couldn’t recover. Like we were pouring everything into it because we might not be together again.

“I thought we were over, Blaine.”

Already on the brink of tears, Kurt finally set his tightly-wound emotions free. It was just enough to tip Blaine over the edge.

He let it all spill out, everything he was feeling. Everything he was hoping for. The ulterior motive behind the postcards and emails, a phone call to a father, a shopping trip to the jewelry district, a borrowed company car that brought them to the steps of a gazebo-like glass building overlooking the Pacific.

“I’m sorry, Kurt. I didn’t mean to scare you, or mislead you. I just missed you. So much. And that postcard you sent. It seemed pretty clear that there was no way you would come here, that you wouldn't even consider leaving New York, even to visit.

"I'm a better person when I'm with you, Kurt. When I'm by myself, I just kind of ... drift. I just wanted you with me, and I knew it was time," Blaine said, searching for the words he'd been practicing for days.

"Time?" Kurt whispered.

“Last night, I was nervous, Kurt. I was plotting. I was going over all the details and arrangements.

"I was afraid you would say ‘no’.” Blaine said, adding softly, “Don’t say no, Kurt.”

He took a centering breath, and continued.

“I promised you once to always love you. To defend you even if I knew you were wrong. To surprise you. To always pick up your call no matter what I was doing. To kiss you whenever and wherever you want. And to make sure that you always remember how perfectly imperfect you are.”

Kurt looked at Blaine's stressed features and thought back to a quiet hallway in an Ohio high school, and the first moment he was promised unconditional, eternal love from the boy he knew would always own his heart.

“You forgot the cookies,” Kurt said, hushed.

Blaine blushed, and smiled. “And cookies, fresh from the oven at least twice a year.

“None of that has ever changed for me, no matter where we are, no matter where life has led us. My life is with you, Kurt.

"You're my glue. You hold me together, and I'll never be complete without you.

“I fell in love with this place, but I could never love it more than I love you. I had hoped with the letters and the cards and eventually with a visit, you might see what I saw: Possibilities, a blank slate, a future. I saw opportunities for us, as individuals, as professionals, as a couple.

“If you don’t see that, my promise to you is that I’ll drop it. But I won’t drop you, Kurt. Wherever you are is my home, and I want it to be that way for the rest of our lives.”

He knelt on the pathway, reaching for Kurt’s hand.  When he looked up to meet Kurt’s gaze, tears had filled both their eyes.

“Please tell me you feel the same way. Tell me you haven’t given up on me.”

Blaine reached into his pocket to retrieve the item he had been fidgeting with: A red ring box which he opened to reveal a simple band of brushed platinum.