A/N: Happy Thanksgiving for Thursday! :D Sorry this is late again, I tried to stay up to finish it but some lovable idiot persuaded me to go to sleep.

Need-to-know information for any non-Americans: Black Friday is the day after Thanksgiving (today!) and is the busiest shopping day of the year in America. The prices are lowered, the shops open early, chaos abounds... (PS: I’m not actually American. I just know a lot about America...) So armed with that information, you may read!

Disclaimer: If I owned Glee, Blaine would have covered Iris by now.

Chapter Seven: Keep Holding On

 “Guess who the new co-director of the Glee club is?” Kurt sat down at their table in the cafeteria, glaring moodily at the table.

Blaine frowned at him, looking around at the gloomy faces of Artie, Mercedes, and Tina as they arrived. “Uh...” He really had no clue what would cause them all to be so unhappy. Then again, despite all he knew about the Glee club, he didn’t know who they didn’t like.

“Sue Sylvester, Cheerios coach and Mr Schue’s arch-nemesis.” Kurt revealed, stabbing moodily at his food with his fork.

Blaine was pretty glad Kurt hadn’t made him guess, since, being fairly new, he was still unaware of the existence of half the teachers here.

“Oh. Is... is she the one who gets really violent when she’s mad?” Blaine questioned, recalling seeing the tracksuit-clad woman pushing students around and throwing various things at people. It was a wonder she hadn’t been fired yet. Maybe Principal Figgins was really scared of her. Not that Blaine blamed him. He was pretty scared of her, too.

“Yeah, that’s her. She’s always trying to sabotage the Glee club.” Mercedes told him, with a concerned expression. The other Glee kids nodded emphatically.

Blaine nodded, frowning a little. “So, why is she the one co-directing the club, if she hates it so much?”

“Figgins chose who the co-director was. She’s got a good track record, so she was the obvious choice.” Mercedes explained.

“Is there a chance she’ll actually be good for the club?” Blaine queried. After all, if she’d coached the Cheerios and led them to victory so many times, as he’d heard, then surely she’d do some good?

“I wouldn’t get your hopes up. I just saw her and Mr Schue yelling at each other.” Rachel announced, appearing from nowhere and pulling up a seat, clutching Blaine’s shoulder for a moment to steady her as she did so. He suppressed a yelp; she had a tight grip. “Personally, I blame the boys.” Here she shot Artie and Kurt pointed looks. “If it weren’t for them, we wouldn’t be in this predicament.”

“Rachel, it was Finn’s idea, so if you want to blame anybody, blame him.” Mercedes snapped, obviously tired of the short brunette.

“Actually, you snitched on everyone, so it’s your fault.” Kurt added, looking up at Rachel with irritation, and Blaine took a fleeting moment to think about the fact that by saying this, Kurt was probably just trying to shift the blame from his crush.

“I thought you said you would prefer for Mr Schuester to know the truth?” Blaine reminded him gently, and everyone quieted to look at him, even Rachel, who had been about to speak. And that was quite a big achievement, stopping Rachel from speaking. He was quite proud of himself. Much as he did actually like the girl, she could be incredibly irritating.

“Blaine’s right. And we’re all equally guilty. We agreed to take the vitamin.” Artie shrugged, and Blaine felt a warm sense of belonging, as someone they actually liked and listened to.

The other four all shifted uncomfortably, and Mercedes let out a sigh. “We need to stop turning on each other. We’re supposed to be a team.”

“Tell that to them,” Kurt muttered, nodding to the popular members of the Glee club, who sat at the popular kids’ table.

“We should be happy for them, not jealous, Kurt.” Rachel admonished.

The look on Kurt’s face at this admittedly very unfair statement was so fierce that Blaine interjected quickly before bodily harm could occur. “At least Finn’s looking less tired,” he offered, and all of them glanced at the football player for a moment. He looked back at them and gave them a quick, if befuddled, smile, before turning his attention back to Quinn.

Bless Finn. He did try. Well, he did as long as trying wouldn’t do any harm to his reputation.

Rachel huffed. “Well, if he spent less time focussing his attention on Quinn-”

“Shut up, Rachel.” Five wearied voices chimed, and Blaine only felt guilty for a moment before Rachel switched tactics to ask about everyone’s plans for shopping on Black Friday.

Halfway through her chiding Artie for not knowing what Black Friday was, he caught Kurt’s eye as Mercedes leant in to ask Kurt something about their shopping plans for that day, and quickly glanced away to focus on eating. He was pretty sure Kurt had been about to ask him what his plans were, and if he admitted that he didn’t actually have any plans, Kurt would probably ask him to join them.

Though he liked shopping, he was pretty sure getting seen shopping in Lima with an out-and-proud gay boy and said boy’s female friend on Black Friday of all days would be like waving around a huge neon sign saying ‘I’m gay!’

And he really wasn’t ready for that yet.

---

“Hey, Kurt!” Blaine’s voice sounded chipper when he picked up the phone, which Kurt found a little hard to handle after the afternoon he’d had.

“Hey, Blaine.” He responded tiredly, reaching up to rub the back of his head, where he could feel a headache developing.

“How was Glee club?” Blaine’s voice softened a little, obviously realising something had happened.

Kurt let out a groan. “Coach Sylvester and Mr Schue split us up into two groups.” He paused to let this sink in. “And she chose all the minority members.”

“I’m guessing that includes you?” Blaine asked carefully.

“You got it. Santana, Mike, Mercedes, Artie, Tina, Matt, and I, have all been selected for ‘Sue’s Kids’, which seems to be a bizarre stand against Mr Schue for not paying enough attention to us, or something. We’re all pretty confused.” Kurt admitted, shaking his head a little. Though it was nice to have attention paid to him for once, this wasn’t the type of nicety Sue Sylvester was famous for. Actually, she wasn’t known for any niceties. It was presumed she didn’t have any.

“Well, that’s... odd.” He could almost hear Blaine’s frown. “So are you still in the New Directions, or...?”

“Each group is doing one number. I really don’t know what she and Mr Schue think they’re playing at. We work better as a team, and surely it’s going to seem more bigoted to the judges if there’s one number with just minority students and another with white kids?” Kurt bit his lip.

“You’d think so.” Blaine agreed. “Give it time, though. You never know, maybe it’ll actually turn out really well.”

“I hope so, because she’s already banned us from talking to the others on pain of death.” Kurt responded. “And I wish I was joking.”

Blaine made a shocked noise. “Surely that’s illegal?” He questioned, sounding vaguely horrified. Well, it wasn’t a surprise. People were often horrified by Sue. And the poor boy hadn’t even met her yet. Kurt was kind of interested to see what nickname she gave him.

“Probably, but it doesn’t bother her.” Kurt exhaled deeply. “I guess we’ll see how it goes. I’m just worried she’s doing this to get at Mr Schue, and not for us. I mean, she’s never shown an interest in helping minorities before.”

“Maybe she had a life-altering experience.” Blaine guessed.

Kurt snorted. “Right. Like, she’s high off of something?”

Blaine laughed. “What, like vitamin D?” He teased.

Kurt went red, and was glad that Blaine couldn’t see him. “I told you, if you bring that up again, I am not afraid to burn all your hair gel products.”

“And I told you, if you do that, I’ll burn your wardrobe.” Blaine fired back.

“Okay, that’s crossing a line. I’m hanging up on you now.” Kurt told him sternly, and pressed ‘end call’.

He waited one minute before sending a text: Goodnight, I’ll see you tomorrow.

The response Goodnight! Dream of hair gel! :) made him smile as he started his moisturising routine.

He didn’t dream of hair gel.

---

It was Black Friday, the shops were packed, and Kurt and Mercedes were shopping. As experienced shoppers, they’d done this for the last two years without any (lasting) damage, although Kurt had spent the weekend sulking last year because he’d had a pair of pants he absolutely loved stolen from underneath his nose.

Kurt flipped through a clothing rack, shaking his head at everything before moving on, totally unbothered by the crowded shop. This was Lima, Ohio, where there was only one shopping mall worth going to. It was always fairly crowded. And since the prices were actually affordable today... well.

Mercedes’ eyes lingered on a lurid green top. Kurt noticed and snapped his fingers in her face. “No.” He pulled a chequered red hoodie from a clothes hanger and handed it to her, before resuming his quest for actual clothing, something that was hard to find, since it was Ohio. God, he couldn’t wait to be out of this place.

Mercedes watched him for a moment, before moving closer to him to ask casually, “Do you like Blaine?” as she flicked idly through the rack.

“Of course I do, he’s one of my closest friends.” Kurt responded, giving her a frown before returning to his mission. Was she asking because she was jealous? He had been paying a lot of attention to Blaine recently, and Mercedes was supposed to be his best friend... maybe he should work on that.

“That’s not the kind of ‘liking’ I mean.” She told him quietly.

He just about managed to stop himself from asking if she’d taken any drugs he should be aware of, but it was close. “Mercedes,” he began, with absolute and exaggerated calm, “No.”

“I’d be fine if you did, you know.” Her eyes were beseeching.

“I believe you!” And he did, because even though she may have been angry at him for a while, she wasn’t homophobic and he knew she was totally fine with it. “But I honestly don’t think of Blaine in that way. He’s my friend.” Honestly, the idea was laughable. Sure, he’d noticed that Blaine was cute (oh, so very cute) but he liked Finn, and besides, just because Blaine was gay didn’t mean he should automatically start crushing on him.

“Okay, if you say so.” She chose a pink top which Kurt didn’t approve of, but he let her win this one. Sometimes, you had to pick your battles. “So, is there anyone you like?” The genuine interest was a relief; he’d been worrying that she was never going to forgive him for the ‘you busted my heart!’ incident. But... his face heated up, and she breathed “There is! C’mon, who’s the lucky boy?” She asked with a coy smile, bumping his hip with hers.

He bumped her hip in return and sighed. “If you must know, it’s Finn.” He admitted quietly, glancing around to check that nobody they knew was in earshot.

“Finn?” She repeated, loudly. He shushed her, looking nervously around. “Sorry, boo. I’m just... a little surprised. I mean... Finn? Kurt, you know he’s not...”

“I know. But the heart wants what the heart wants.” He shrugged. “And you never know, it could happen.” He ignored her doubtful look and muttered statement that ‘there’s a reason Quinn’s knocked up’, and turned back to the clothing racks.

A boy could dream. Even if his dreams were ridiculous.

---

“So, how was your Thanksgiving?” Mercedes asked Kurt in their final lesson on the first Monday back after said holiday.

“Well, Thanksgiving dinner was actually pretty similar to our Friday dinners, except for the addition of a turkey.” A smile graced his face. “It was great, though. I mean, I always love spending time with my dad, hence the dinners. It was a tradition my mom started.” Mercedes nodded sympathetically. “How about yours?” He asked her.

“It was awesome! I missed my cousins, so seeing them again was cool. The whole family came down.” Mercedes was practically beaming, and Kurt smiled a little at her enthusiasm. He knew she had quite a large family, which he’d met only once. Their kindness was seemingly boundless, and he was glad she had such a lovely family. “Hey, how was yours, Blaine?” She added, with a bright smile.

Blaine was half-turned in his chair to listen to their conversation, and now frowned a little, shrugging. “Uh, it was fine, I suppose.”

Her smile faded a little. “You suppose?” She echoed, and Kurt could hear the vague concern he felt mirrored in her voice, behind the slightly jokey tone. Thanksgiving was supposed to be a good time, a family time. But if Blaine’s relationship with his parents wasn’t too great, as he’d told Kurt before...

Blaine gave her a half-smile. “Yeah. I mean, my brother called at the last minute to say he couldn’t make it, so obviously everyone was really disappointed.” There was some underlying bitterness in his voice, and Kurt frowned a little. “But we didn’t end up calling the police this year, so that was a plus.” He added, in an attempt at a casual voice.

Mercedes and Kurt both gaped at him in shock. “You had to call the police one year? Why?” Kurt asked, horrified.

“It’s... a long story.” Blaine hedged, glancing uncertainly to the front, where their teacher still wasn’t. It was normal for their teacher to be late, and so nobody was concerned.

Kurt opened his mouth to speak, to tell Blaine that they had time to hear a story that involved the police being called, but was interrupted.

“Excuse me, I couldn’t help but overhear your conversation-” Rachel began as she turned to face them.

“Yes you could, Berry.” Kurt and Mercedes said simultaneously, Mercedes fed up, Kurt irritated.

“-And frankly, I’m offended that you didn’t ask me about my Thanksgiving,” she went on, ignoring them.

“How was your Thanksgiving, Rachel?” Blaine asked, turning to face her with a charming smile.

Did she just blush? Kurt wondered. Probably. It wasn’t as if she was used to attractive boys paying attention to her. Or to any boys paying attention to her, really.

“It was exceptionally brilliant, thank you, Blaine.” She beamed. “For Thanksgiving dinner, my dads invited some friends over and we gave them an impromptu concert afterwards.”

“That sounds delightful. Did they enjoy it?” Blaine asked, appearing totally interested. Maybe he was totally interested. He was too nice for his own good, in Kurt’s opinion.

“Of course they did. Where do you think I inherited my talent from? We’re a very talented family.” Rachel smiled.

Kurt wondered if ‘she’s Rachel freaking Berry!’ was an acceptable reason for murder.

“Oh, so one of them is your biological father?” Blaine questioned.

Kurt fought the urge to slap his hand over Blaine’s mouth to stop him talking. Once you started Rachel Berry off talking about her family, she rarely stopped.

“Yes, but we don’t know which one, and we prefer it that way.” Rachel beamed.

She was so proud of having two dads. Much as Kurt detested her, he really hoped his kids were like her in that respect. If he ever had children, of course, which would first involve finding a male to have children with. And considering he was living in Lima, Ohio, his choices were limited. Of course, he had his eyes on someone, but that someone probably wasn’t going to return his feelings any time soon.

Well, he could dream.

And as the teacher arrived and thrust them all into Emily Bronte’s wonderful world, he completely forgot about Blaine’s ‘long story’ about Thanksgiving.

---

“Hey, Blaine.” Kurt caught up to his friend as they left English. “So, I can’t stay long, Mr Schue wants us for rehearsal.” He let out a sigh. “I can’t tell you how good it feels to be able to say that, after being one of Sue’s Kids for so long.” He admitted. Sure, Mr Schue wasn’t always good with treating them equally, but at least he cared about them in a way that Coach Sylvester certainly wouldn’t.

Blaine laughed. “Go on, then, what did you want to say?”

“Well, it’s more of a question. If your Thanksgiving wasn’t so good – and trust me, I know how that goes – Mercedes and I went shopping last Friday, and we’re planning to go again this Saturday, for some well-deserved therapy after the torture of being under Coach Sylvester’s regime. So I was wondering if you’d want to come with us.” Kurt beamed, convinced that Blaine would like this idea. He knew Blaine liked shopping. What gay boy wouldn’t?

The laugh that came from Blaine was so derisive that Kurt doubted for an instant that it had came from Blaine.

“Something amusing?” He asked, hurt and already going on the defensive.

“Kurt, come on. Going shopping with you and Mercedes would be like holding up a neon sign saying “Look at me, I’m a massive fag!” No thanks.” Blaine responded, before looking immediately shocked at his own words.

Kurt’s jaw clenched, ignoring the guilt flashing across Blaine’s face. “Right. Well, we wouldn’t want that, would we?” He spun on his heel to go.

Blaine caught his arm, and hurriedly let go on receiving the death glare Kurt sent him. “Kurt, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean that-”

“Yes, you did. You don’t want to be treated like me, which, fair enough-” After all, who would want to be thrown into Dumpsters, slushied, pushed into lockers, and verbally abused every single day?

“Kurt, no-”

“-and you’re definitely doing a good job of fitting in so far, so if Mercedes and are so damaging to your reputation, feel free to pretend we don’t exist. Everyone else does. Why don’t you join the football team? I’m sure you’d fit in perfectly there.” By the time he finished this, he was breathing heavily, and Blaine was staring at the floor. “Now, if you don’t mind, I have to go and sing to my crush’s pregnant girlfriend about how we’re all here for her now everyone knows she’s knocked up.” With these words, he turned and stalked off, desperately trying to ignore the twisting feeling in his stomach.

Blaine hadn’t deserved that tirade. He’d spoken without thinking and had been sorry at once, a feeling Kurt knew well.

Pushing his conscience away, he headed for the auditorium.

Like he’d told Blaine, he had a song to help perform.

---

Blaine took a deep breath to stop the tears he could feel prickling his eyes.

That was stupid of him. He hadn’t meant to say that. He’d just had a crappy week and the very idea of anyone finding out that he was gay had filled him with panic, fuelling words he didn’t mean.

How did he manage to screw that up? It would have been simple enough to turn Kurt down, and Kurt would’ve understood, if he hadn’t phrased it in that way, and especially if he had managed to avoid using such a hurtful word that he knew Kurt heard every day from people who certainly weren’t his friends.

It was just...

The very idea of the rest of the school knowing he was gay was terrifying. He couldn’t handle going through what had happened at Westerville again.

He knew that at some point, he’d find the courage to be true to himself, and the ability to stop caring about any bullying that would occur. He could be confident and proud, like Kurt. But at the moment, the memories and pain from the Sadie Hawkins dance were still fresh in his mind. The thought of coming out was terrifying.

It wasn’t as if he was currently popular and liked by all; he was sort of floating, mainly, and the rest of the school hadn’t yet figured out where he fitted in. So he wasn’t safe, or at least he wouldn’t be safe for long.

At this point, he was really just putting off the inevitable, but was there really so much wrong with that? Was there so much wrong with wanting to stay invisible for as large a percentage of the school year as possible?

Realising that pretty much everyone had left school by now, on their way home to families who hadn’t spent their Thanksgiving slyly reminding them that they were never going to be as good as their brother, he glanced up from staring at the floor and began slowly walking, not really thinking about his destination until he found himself outside the auditorium.

He smiled a little, hearing the notes of ‘Keep Holding On’ from inside, and walked in, standing just inside the entrance where he could escape their notice, watching the Glee club singing.

Well, watching Kurt, really.

Who he’d have to apologise to again tomorrow. And try to explain. He wasn’t ready to talk about Westerville yet, but he’d tell him some of it.

“Whatever’s meant to be, we’ll work it out perfectly,” Blaine sang quietly along with them, eyes fixed on Kurt, and meaning the lyrics completely.

Singing gave him a pang of regret as he watched them. Really, his biggest regret from Westerville was not joining the Glee club.

His coming out had brought him here, in the end, and he couldn’t regret that. And the bullying had been out of his control, so he couldn’t really list that as a regret anyway.

But not joining the Glee club... Music was something he really enjoyed, really loved, and he was talented at it, as his mom was always telling him. Had he joined, maybe he’d have had real friends, and an escape from the bullying.

Yet he hadn’t.

And even here, with real friends, one of whom knew he was gay and didn’t care, he still wasn’t brave enough to join the Glee club.

With a sigh, he turned to walk away, knowing he was late for meeting his mom. “Keep holding on, ‘cause you know we’ll make it through, we’ll make it through...”

---

“Hi.” Came the hesitant voice next to Kurt’s shoulder, the next day before the first bell.

Kurt shut his locker and turned, leaning his shoulder against his locker and raising an eyebrow at Blaine, who looked nervous but determined. A sense of déjà vu hit him, and he sighed, overwhelmed with guilt for snapping at Blaine yesterday. “Hi, Blaine.”

“I’m sorry.” Blaine told him, somehow managing to look as guilty and sorry as if he’d set fire to Kurt’s wardrobe. He could only imagine how sorry Blaine would look if he actually had set fire to Kurt’s wardrobe. He had a feeling apology gift baskets would be involved.

Kurt breathed out deeply. “You shouldn’t have to apologise. I overreacted.” He admitted.

“I deserved it.” Blaine shrugged.

“No, you didn’t.” Kurt responded, fiercely. Leaning in closer, he spoke quietly. “I shouldn’t have said that. I know you’re scared of coming out. So, I’m sorry.”

Blaine nodded slightly. “Thank you. I just... Kurt, I overreacted too. But, uh, it was for a reason.” He took a deep breath. “The reason I’m here is because of what happened at my last school. I... I came out. And... the bullying got so bad, I had no other choice but to transfer.”

Holy crap. No wonder Blaine had seemed so freaked out at the idea of the rest of the school knowing. He hadn’t been exaggerating when he’d said coming out hadn’t gone so well for him before.

Sure, Kurt was bullied, but it had never gotten so bad that he’d considered transferring. And the way Blaine said he had no other choice...

It must have been really, really bad.

“Then I’m really sorry.” Kurt told him.

 “I’m not trying to make you feel guilty.” Blaine clarified, with a half-smile.

“Then I won’t feel guilty.” Kurt smiled at him. “And for the record, you don’t have to feel like you have to come out any time soon, or do anything gay or whatever. Take your time. And I’m always here for you. Remember that.”

Blaine nodded, a grateful smile spreading across his face.

Kurt pulled him into a quick hug, before releasing him as the bell went. “I’ll see you at lunch, okay?”

Blaine nodded, shooting him a smile before walking away with a definite spring in his step.

Kurt smiled, glad they’d made up, and glad that Blaine had revealed a little bit more about himself.

Slowly, he was putting the pieces together to get the full picture.

A/N: Yay for clichés! (But seriously, sorry. It was necessary).