~*~ Chapter Eleven ~*~

Run Boy Run! This world is not made for you
(Run boy run; Woodkid)

Blaine sat at a small wooden table in a corner of 'The Lucky'. It was late wednesday afternoon and therefore the small café was fairly busy, filled with exhausted students looking for a quick caffeine fix, or simply a break before heading home. So far Blaine's week had gone by agonizingly slow. It had seemed like every lesson, every conversation, every minute spend on doing homework had stretched out into endless length, making the minutes drag like molasses on a cold winter day.

But now finally – finally, after his teacher had purposefully ignored the final bell for a good ten minutes and traffic had chosen this day to stop all together – school was over and Blaine sat half-excited, half-dreading next to an elderly couple, picking his nails. Two cups of coffee were standing in front of him, both untouched and lukewarm until now, since Blaine had not only been embarrassingly early, but also fought with a nervous stomach. He looked at his watch for what felt like the hundredth time and then back at the table without even remembering the hour. He carefully traced the lid of the cup closest to him. He folded his hands, parted them again and put them in his lap. The bell over the door jingled and his head snapped up, but it was only an asian looking girl who entered and trotted towards the counter. Blaine sighed and crossed his hands, one of his finger tracing the pattern of the wood.

"Blaine?" In front of him stood Seth. He must have entered directly after the asian girl, avoiding a second ring of the bell and identifying Blaine with a single glance around the room. Shuffling nervously, he stepped closer to Blaine's table, looking him up and down curiously.

He was still short, even shorter than Blaine himself, but where originally a pair of thick rimmed glasses had sat on top of his perky nose, now two dark brown eyes were blinking rapidly back at him. Blaine highly suspected contacts - something the other boy had detested when they had met – and he had to admit that it suited him.

"Seth," he smiled back, "How are you?"

What was admittedly not the most perspective question to ask after more than one year of no contact. Seth though did not seem bothered and shrugged. "Fine, I guess." His hand snipped back a few straws of hair that were threatening to fall into his unshielded eyes and Blaine squinted fondly at the familiar gesture. "Uhm, can I maybe sit?"

"Of course! I'm sorry, forgot my manners for a second." Blaine quickly scooted to the side with his chair, making room for Seth to pull his seat closer to the table.

"I bought our coffee," Blaine said after a moment of silence, touching one of the drinks testing the temperature, "But I'm afraid it's cold now."

"Ah, I'm sure it's fine," Seth said conciliatory, reaching for the other cup and taking an experimental sip. His face screwed up. "Che schifo! Ugh, I was wrong." He rose, picking up both cups. "I'm going to get us new ones," he announced and before Blaine could protest he was walking towards the counter.

A bit perplexed Blaine shook his head. As much as Seth outwardly resembled the boy he had known, his self-esteem and confidence had surely sky-rocketed since then, leaving Blaine helpless of what to make of this change of character.

When he and Seth had slowly become friends in the middle of their freshman-year the other boy had been reserved, silent and downright shy, even though, once Blaine got to know him he turned out to be a real chatterbox. Being small and shy, two characteristics that did not ensure great popularity in high-school and on top of that painfully intelligent, filled up under the hairdo with scientific numbers and facts, Seth had not had it easy in the past. At the beginning of their freshman-year he had been outed, unforeseeable and cruel, by one of the hockey-players and from that moment on he distinguished the perfect target. Their friendship had been difficult at first, the only thing connecting them their shared liking of boys, but Blaine had been persistent and after a while the other boy had started to open up to him. Well, at least until -

"Still drinking Medium Drip?" Seth was back, all smiles and leaning half over the table, setting two drinks in front of them.

"Yeah," Blaine answered after a moment, taking his cup. "You know I'm a creature of habit." Seth chuckled quietly, lowering himself on his chair again and meeting Blaine's curious gaze.

"I guess you have a lot of questions," he stated, annoyingly calm. For a moment Blaine seriously contemplated making this difficult, because after one year of no messages at all? Yes, he had tons of questions, but in the end the loss of contact had been as much his fault as it had been Seth's and why complicate something that was already this difficult. So instead he kept silent, only nodding and after a pregnant pause, Seth felt the need to continue, "Uhm, thanks for coming, by the way. I know, tearing open old wounds is not exactly pleasant, but ... well my therapist strongly suggested for us to finally talk and I guess he had a point."

"You're still seeing a therapist?" Blaine asked, voice more surprised than concerned, but it had been over a year and he had not known that Seth had been that affected. Because if he had known – If he had guessed – he could have – he would -

"Yes. Not only because of ... that, but also concerning the earlier bullying and the relations to my parents. He has been an amazing help for me so far. Why? Weren't you in treatment?"

"Of course, for a while, but I haven't seen her for months now," Blaine trailed of, unsure how to continue this conversation without being to intimate. "Are you ... alright? I mean, if you're still treated ..."

"Che cosa? Don't worry! As I said, I'm fine. I've actually stopped meeting my therapist regularly a few months ago, but from time to time we still talk and he has been highly suggesting a meeting with you and an email from him two weeks ago was finally able to push me into the right direction."

He smiled reassuring at Blaine and Blaine could not help but smile back. "I'm glad," he said honestly, "I was worried about you, after we drifted apart. I know the whole thing was a lot worse for you then for me."

Seth was silent for a moment. "Maybe, but I don't doubt that it has been hard for you, too."

"To which school do you go now? I never got to ask after my parents pulled me out of the hospital."

"Carmel High," Seth answered, slowly sipping his coffee, "Did you at least got treated well in the fancy private clinic they brought you to? What was it's name again? Ketchup, or something?"

"Mayo," Blaine laughed, "The staff was great, incredibly friendly and motivated, but the lack of information about you drove me crazy."

Seth cocked his head, considering him for a moment. "This isn't supposed to sound like I blame you, but ... if you were that worried, why didn't you contact me?"

"I- Hm, I don't really know, to be honest. At first I was to busy being angry at my parents for controlling my life without my consent and then it seemed as if too much time had already passed, so I postponed it further and further, until ... well, until a week ago."

"You are a worry head, Blaine," Seth informed him, "I always thought you were angry at me, for getting us into that situation."

"Seth! It wasn't your fault!" Blaine exclaimed, but the other boy only rolled his eyes.

"I know that now," he said, "But at that time I was convinced nothing would have happened without me. It was me after all they were after."

"Uh, yes, but I convinced you to go as my date."

"A date that was seen by nobody as a date? I think it was worse enough that two guys decided to go together. Remember who we went to school with."

"Ugh." Blaine laughed again. "Maybe you're right."

"I'm always right." Seth grinned triumphant, flicking back his hair.

"Well, therapy surely shot your ego up in the sky," Blaine remarked, only half-serious, but honestly curious.

Seth shrugged, contemplating him for a moment. "Nah, not only therapy, but I'm proud to announce that I've won several national science competitions until now."

"Oh, well congratulation, Mr. Smarty-pants! All I can brag about is a lousy second place at Regionals last year."

"Oh, so you started show choir?"

"Yeah and I love it. I'm actually the lead singer of the Warblers. I would have never be brave enough to join a choir at a public school – makes you too much of a target-, but I'm at Dalton now, so ..."

"Dalton Academy? The private school? Ragazzo, only the best of the best for you, huh?"

Blaine rolled his eyes. "Oh, come on. You know how my parents can be, but tell me about you." He clapped his hands together excitedly. "What happened in your life apart from the school change and competitions? What's new on the Seth-front?"

"Ah, well," Seth said, a slow smile stretching his lips. "I have a girlfriend now."

Blaine grinned back at him, slightly surprised, but at the same time Seth had never made a secret out of his bisexuality. "Really? Congratulations! She cute?"

"Very. She's my little leprotta." Seth grinned widely at a joke, only he seemed to understand.

With that the air was cleared and Seth launched into an animated talk about his seemingly perfect girlfriend. Blaine countered with tales out of Dalton, filling him in about Kurt's transfer and David and Wes's newest adventures.

Before they knew it darkness had fallen and Seth jumped up with a baffled and startled look at his watch. "Porca miseria! I'm sorry, but I promised to be home for Dinner." He reached for his bag, slipping hastily into the arms of his jacket. Blaine followed suit, rising and slipping into his coat. "No worries, I've a curfew too," he replied, "Do you need a lift?"

Seth shook his head, gesturing out of the window to the parking lot. Together they left 'The Lucky' and with the promise of arranging another meeting soon – maybe even with Seth's girlfriend, or one of Blaine's friends – both boys headed to their respective cars.

~*~

The next day was Thursday, the only day in the week on which Blaine could not wait for assembly to end and his first period to start. Because as soon as Mr. Wright would clear his throat, shuffle his weight from right to left, while scanning his notes one last time, before releasing them with the wish of a successful school day, Kurt would nudge him playfully, indicating for them to make their way across the room, towards their shared calculus class. While dreaded by most students, calculus had always been one of Blaine's strongest subjects and he found an unexplainable joy in connecting and adding imaginative numbers, feeling the strongest surge of pride every time his calculations fit together and everything suddenly connected in his head. Having Kurt join him in his class, who, although he did not quite share Blaine's enthusiasm, was not nearly as opposed to it as most of his fellow students, who were groaning and complaining as soon as Blaine even mentioned the topic, was just an added bonus.

Nick and Jeff waved lazily after them, cuddled together on one of the benches and obviously reluctant to leave their secluded spot in favour of getting to class. Together with hundreds of students they crossed the room, waiting patiently until Wes and David, convinced that they would be able to fit through the door simultaneously, realised their error and stopped blocking the entrance. Blaine looked after them as they strolled down the corridor, engrossed in a silent thumb-battle and smiled relieved. On days like this his friends could be truly exhausting, and while he loved them dearly, it was nice to leave them behind for once and concentrate all his attention on himself and Kurt, instead of babysitting Wes and David.

"So ..." Kurt said, as soon as they had left the jostling crowd of students behind, climbing up a staircase. "You didn't answered my text yesterday."

"Oh, shoot. I totally forgot about that. Me and Seth were talking, lost track of time and then I had to complete my english essay and ... I'm sorry."

"Oh," Kurt sounded strained. "Well, I can totally understand if you and Seth had a lot to catch up." Blaine eyed him from the side for a moment, not sure if he has been imaging the sarcastic pronunciation, but soon enough Kurt was smiling again. "I take it your meeting went well then?"

Blaine grinned relived. "Yes, surprisingly so, I'm glad. No awkwardness at any time and I think we talked for hours."

"Oh," Kurt said again in the same strained voice and his eyes are actively avoiding Blaine's. "How nice."

"I know! You know how worried I was, but it was as if we had never stopped talking! We got along so well."

"That's great," Kurt said in the same tone that indicated he found it anything but great. They rounded a corner, crossing the following corridor in silence. Kurt seemed lost in thought, fingers playing nervously with the strap of his bag and Blaine waited patiently for him to finish his train of thought and share whatever is on his mind. He did not have to wait long, for Kurt cocked his head, half-turning towards him. "I was wondering how exactly you two know each other?"

Blaine's whole body froze for a moment, because of course he had planned on telling Kurt sooner or later, but ... better later than sooner and for sure not in the middle of a school corridor, meters away from their calculus class. What happened back then still made Blaine shudder and it had been hard enough to confide his therapist, or later Wes and David during a late movie night, two months after his transfer. "Oh, uhm you know, from my old school."

"Yes," Kurt said slowly, "That somehow opens more questions up than it solves. Like which old school? What happened back then? Why was there even an old school?"

Blaine squirmed uncomfortably, luckily saved from a direct answer by the arrival of their teacher, Mr.Tanger. "Nah, that's really not that big of a story," Blaine lied, while they took their places behind one of the tables in the middle of the room. Understandably Kurt looked everything but satisfied with this explanation, but their conversation was cut short, when Mr. Tanger cleared his throat with a pointed glance in their direction and started class.

"We'll talk about this later!" Kurt hissed, while their teacher read out the attendance list and Blaine nearly forgot to raise his hand, when debating what his friend could possibly define as 'later'.

"There really isn't much to tell," he tried again, while Gordon Banchkin was called to the front to present his homework. Kurt turned his head sharply to him, ignoring the warning look Mr.Tanger sent to their table. "There isn't much to tell? I'm very sure there has to be more to this than you've told me, which is ... oh, wait a second. You've told me nothing!"

"That's not true," Blaine murmured back, desperately trying to keep their voices and heads down. "Just because I haven't told you every-" He quickly broke off, when their teacher turned to them and tried to act as if the messy and completely wrong solution Gordon had written on the board was the most fascinating thing in the room. As soon as Mr.Tanger sighed and crossed out Gordon's writing though, Kurt leaned towards him again. "At least promise me we'll talk about this at lunch?"

Blaine's eyes widened and he hastily shock his head. "Kurt, no!" he hissed forcefully, causing their neighbours to turn and look at them curiously. Blaine ducked his head, smiling apologetically, while Kurt glared and bared his teeth, until everybody diverted their attention. As soon as the last boy was concentrating on their equations again, Kurt's glare was trained on Blaine again. "If you don't want to tell me, just say so," he snapped in a tone that made it very clear to Blaine that he shouldn't even dare to exclude his friend like that.

"Kurt, no," Blaine said again, much softer. "That's really not it." His hand found Kurt's under the table and Kurt leaned forwards curiously when he continued in a hushed whisper, throwing one last glance at their teacher. "It's just ... I haven't told told any of the others yet."

Kurt raised his eyebrows. "What? Not even Wes and David? Why?"

Blaine squirmed under his gaze. "Well, first of all Wes and David know a lot about my past, my transfer, have always been incredibly overprotective and worried and then I received this mail and at first I thought it wasn't a big deal. We would meet and greet and forget about everything, but the you asked and I had to tell you something and I thought maybe then you would clue the others in. But you didn't and I was nervous and tried to avoid the topic, which worked surprisingly well, even though I wanted to tell them, but then they would freak out and insist on coming with me and complicate everything and then I just ... didn't."

Only now that he had stopped whispering, Blaine noticed how quite it had gotten around them. He raised his head and was met with the sight of Mr.Tanger looming over them angrily.

"Is there something you would like to share with us, Mr. Anderson, or do you think you can manage to sit next to Mr. Hummel without disrupting my class again?"

"No. I mean, yes. I apologize, Sir. We'll be quiet." Blaine lowered his head, quickly starting to copy the notes from the board and seeing Kurt next to him do the same. His friend kept shooting glances at him though and after a while a piece of paper was shoved across the table.

How about we talk after class then?

A smiley had been drawn underneath the message and Blaine couldn't help but smile back at it, when he wrote: 'If you insist' underneath it. Kurt looked awfully smug, when storing the paper again.

The rest of the day passed surprisingly quick, a constant stream of subjects, nobody paid attention to so close to spring break, flowing by, only interrupted by lunch.

Kurt and Blaine managed to occupy one of the newer tables for themselves, closest to the large window front and furthest from the suspicious smells coming from the kitchen and Blaine found himself feeling unreasonably proud when Kurt uttered not a single word about his meeting. Instead they listened to Wes' complains about his geographic teacher, who was seemingly unable to bring across the simplest contents and refused to let David copy their english homework, because seriously? You had over three weeks for that, David. Shortly after that they were joined by Nick and Jeff, trays in their hands, who claimed to have been held up by Mrs. Sargton, but their ruffled hair and kiss-swollen mouths told a different story. To avert the attention and Wes' dangerously gleaming eyes, Jeff hastily squeezed himself between Kurt and Blaine, striking up a conversation about their family lives. Blaine stayed mostly silent during that, because being a full-time boarder didn't give him much to tell, but Kurt, obviously glad to have escaped another round of 'Isn't Niff the cutest couple? Guess who brought them together?' launched into the topic and told them in all detail about Finn, his possible-soon-to-be stepbrother, who seemed to have made the acquaintance of one of Kurt's friends from his old school - from the adjectives 'attention-seeking' and 'drama queen', Blaine suspected Rachel – and now these two were going on a date next Saturday, both more than panicking about the oncoming event and seeking Kurt's advice in that matter. Blaine shook his head at that much unnecessary drama, taking another sip of his water.

His last lesson was history and he spent it brainstorming song ideas with Wes, instead of listening to his classmates analysing the beginning of the first world war for the third time. It was only minutes before the final bell rang, that Blaine was reminded why exactly he had such a bad feeling about meeting Kurt today after school. He rushed out of the class room, the minute their teacher dismissed them and managed to catch Kurt in front of his French classroom, stopping him with a guilty smile. "Kurt! I know we promised to talk after school, but I forgot I had fencing practice and - "

"No worries," Kurt interrupted quickly, bouncing on his toes and shooting quick glances past his friend. "I don't have time either. Promised to meet Mercedes. When does your practice end?"

"Uhm, five thirty most of the times. Sometimes the course overruns for a few minutes, but -"

Another significant look to the end of the corridor. "Nevermind. Meet me in my dorm afterwards? Then we'll talk?"

"Yes, sure. See you then." And with that he is off, practically running down the corridor and dodging students right and left.

~*~

Approximately two hours later Kurt was drawing a deep breath and knocked on the door to Blaine's dorm room. He had been in there only twice so far, once to work last-minute on a school project and the other time because they needed a quiet break from their friends, Nick and Jeff's obtrusive flirting was sometimes equally as exhausting as Wes and David's scheming. Strangely enough both events had ended in a movie night, but oh well, who was Kurt to complain about that?

Several moments passed in silence, while Kurt waited to be let in and just as Kurt raised his arm to announce his presence once more, Blaine threw open the door.

"Soh – Sorry!" he panted, eyes wide and a little wild and Kurt would have laughed at his panicked expression if Blaine had not stepped back in that moment, opening the door fully and letting him in.

Because Blaine - handsome and charming Blaine, who Kurt had developed an honest to god crush on? - was shirtless. As in not wearing a shirt – shirtless. As in only a towel slung across his neck, wet hair splashed straight to his head, expect for a few already dried strands curling into his eyes and making him blink sheepishly at Kurt, while he scratched the back of his head embarrassed – shirtless.

"Practice ran late and I thought I had enough time left to take a quick shower, but obviously I've been wrong and I had literally just hopped out of the bathroom, when you knocked, so I didn't have time to put a shirt on and I didn't want to make you wait for too long, so - " Blaine rambled on, but Kurt wasn't listening, eyes wide as hubcaps and staring at his naked torso. Single droplets of water were making their way down his body, when Blaine raised his arms – wonderful, muscular, tanned arms – to towel his hair dry.

"- I just ran towards the door and – Kurt, are you alright?"

Kurt's head snapped up. "Huh? Uh, yeah, fine," he squeaked, "What did you say?"

Blaine opened his mouth, regarded him with a strange look and closed it again, shaking his head. "Never mind. You want to sit down, while I go and change real quick?"

"Sure," Kurt said, carefully avoiding any further staring at his friend and lowering himself onto the edge of his bed. Blaine smiled at him, before thankfully taking his towel and naked skin back to the connected bathroom. As soon as the door closed behind him, Kurt let out the breath he had been holding, ever since entering the room, evaluating if it would be too dramatic of him to fall back into the mattress and bury his burning face in one of the pillows.

A chirp out of the corner of the room distracted him and made him hiss unintentionally. Oh, shoot. Pavarotti. Kurt's whole body straightened up, tail straining against the back of his pants and ears twitching against his hair as his eyes fixated the little bird, chirping innocently in his cage. His feet were pinched into a tiny swing and a small part of Kurt's mind pondered whether this was standard-cage-equipment, or if Blaine had installed the plaything himself to please the bird, but the rest of his brain, the larger and far more instinctual part, was following every tiny movement of the animal, clawed fingers twitching with the urge to snatch. As if feeling the nearing danger, Pavarotti paused, head jolting to the side, considering Kurt for a moment, before obviously deciding that the hybrid did not pose any threat to him and continuing to clean his feathers. Kurt slowly lowered himself to his knees, back straight and nails digging into the bedspread, ready to pounce.

"I'll be right out!" Blaine's voice floated through the bathroom door, snapping Kurt out of his trance. With a jolt he set back on his heels, blood rushing to his face as he realised what nearly had happened. No way he was getting through a talk with Blaine AND the bird in the room. He threw a quick glance across the space, eyes finding a thin cloth under his fingers and a decision falling in his head. Before he could think better of it his hands clawed into the bedspread, tearing the fabric from the duvet and clutching it close to his chest as he jumped up, just as Blaine bumped open the door and stepped into the room.

"Oh, by the way, how was your meet – What are you doing?" They stared at each other for a moment, Kurt slowly lowering the blanket he had held up in protection.

Kurt blinked at him. "Uh ... covering the bird's cage?"

"O-kay?" Blaine said slowly. "Why?"

"Because ... it seemed nervous and I read somewhere that darkness is able to soothe birds?"

Blaine looked from the peacefully chirping bird, to the cloth in Kurt's hand.

"He seems fine to me," he observed.

"Can we still cover it?" Kurt pleaded. "He looks at me with this ... this eyes."

"This eyes?" Blaine raised an eyebrow and Kurt ground his teeth.

"Judging eyes!" he exclaimed, clutching to the fabric in his hands and something in his face must have convinced Blaine to let the issue go.

"Fine, go ahead." Blaine gestured towards the cage. "Whatever makes you comfortable."

With a satisfied smile, Kurt dropped the fabric across the bars, successfully covering the yellow bird and his angry chirping.

Blaine shock his head. How he always managed to pick the crazy ones was a mystery to him, but right now there were more urgent matters do discuss. He plopped on his bed, swung his legs over the edge and crossed them gingerly in front of his body. Kurt plucked one last time at the cover, before the ultimate time to stall had passed and he turned around, looking unsure.

"So, uhm ... where's Jeff?"

"With Nick. He said they were doing some Warblers-business, but I can't imagine why he would need to take his playstation with him if that was the case."

"Hah. Right." Kurt shuffled a bit on the spot. Blaine looked at him. Kurt looked back.

"Uhm, do you maybe want to sit?" Blaine asked after a moment of silence, patting the empty bed next to him.

"Sure." Kurt lowered himself on the mattress, much more gracefully than Blaine before him, turning so that he sat cross-legged in front of his friend.

"So ..." Blaine said.

"So ..." Kurt answered. "The mysterious story of your life before Dalton, that you can in no way tell me in front of Wes and David?"

"Wes and David know the brief outline, it's just the recent developments that complicate the whole thing."

"And what is the brief outline?"

"Ah, you know .. being gay, bullying, leaving school, the usual stuff."

"The usual – Blaine! Being bullied is never 'usual'!"

"I know, I know ... I just ... don't like to do this whole piteous sob-story-thing."

"Blaine. The first few times we managed to talk in private ended in three of four cases with me crying into your Blazer, so I don't really think I've any room to judge."

"So, you really want to hear the whole story? It's pretty long and I have an excellent short-version, that includes –"

"Blaine. Spill, now. Or I'm telling Wes that you were the one hiding his gavel last year."

His friend gasped. "You wouldn't!"

"Try me."

"Okay, fine, whatever," Blaine grumbled, "You get the whole, long, boring story."

Kurt said up a little bit straighter, shuffling into a more comfortable position. "Alright. Let's hear it."

Blaine put on his most respective narrator-face, clearing his throat. "It all began long, long ago at the beginning of my freshman year -"

"So, a little over a year ago?"

"Am I telling the story, or is it you?"

"Right. Sorry. Shutting up." Kurt made a zipping noise over his lips.

"As I was saying, it all began in my freshman year, well actually everything started when I came out in high-school. Never officially, of course, but a few well-placed comments here and there and rumours quickly turned into knowledge. But even despite that fact, I still managed to maintain fairly popular. My older brother advised me to join one of the sport teams to keep it that way and so at the beginning of the freshman year I entered in a lack of better talents, the swim team."

Kurt snorted quietly into his hand, causing Blaine to stop and glare at him. "S-sorry. I- just. The swim team? Seriously? Even at McKinley they were the lowest of the low, despite being a legitimate sport team."

"Sport is sport." Blaine shrugged. "And especially the girls of the school seemed to like it well enough. Lots of them always came to our competitions and watched practice, sitting on the benches and giggling concerningly frequently."

Kurt snorted once more. "Yeah, I wonder why."

"Hm, me too ..." Blaine said thoughtfully, forehead twisted in honest confusion and Kurt looked at him for a moment. "Think very sharp for a moment, Blaine. Boys. Half-naked boys. In swim-suits. Wet. Working out."

His friend considered this for a moment, before his eyes widened."Oh. Oh! You really think that was the reason?"

"Blaine. I've been on the benches during swim practice before, I know that this was the reason."

"Oh ... suddenly all the squealing during warm-up makes much more sense," Blaine said slowly, shaking his head. "Anyway, back to topic?"

Kurt snickered, but nodded. "Back to topic."

"Freshman year, swim team, gay. That's how far I was and I've to say it wasn't the worst life. I had no close friends there, or anything like that, but a few shallow acquaintances I knew from my courses – It's hard to visit a school for over a year, without getting to know anybody – and the guys from the team tolerated me enough so I could sit with them during lunch and greet them in the corridors."

"More in the friendly 'how are you, how was your weekend'-way, or in the 'whatzup?'-way?"

"Kurt."

"What? This is relevant for the story!" Kurt cried out, throwing his hands in the air.

Blaine ignored him and continued. "It almost seemed like as long as I didn't act on being gay, everybody could just ignore it. Despite that though, I was well aware of how lucky I was. There was one other boy in my school, fortunately even in the same year as I, that was out. We shared a few courses and interacted briefly, but apart from that we didn't have much to do with each other. In hindsight that was mostly my fault, since he was anything but popular. Nearly as old as me, but even smaller, in height as well as in width, insecure and incredibly shy. Besides inhibited by a pair of thick glasses, that made his eyes look as big as plates and gave him together with the greatest scientific knowledge, known to freshman students so far, a nerdy touch. That combined with the fact that he had been outed as gay – wrongly by the way, in fact he is bisexual - at the beginning of the year in the cruelest way by one of the hockey players, made him in the public eye the perfect target. While I walked unmolested through the corridors and maintained a shallow air of popularity around me, he was shunned by his friendlier class mates and actively bullied by the rest. And sometimes I saw how some bulky athlete would shove him into a locker and just stood there, watching, because this could be me. I could be the one being tortured and no matter how guilty I felt whenever I caught a glimpse of the boy, my fear of a similar treatment was far too high. So I stood there, watched him, too cowardly to help."

Blaine needed to make a pause, voice breaking at the end of his sentence. Kurt leaned forward, rubbing a soothing hand over his forearm, before looking searchingly around the room. "Do you have something to drink? Maybe it'll help your throat."

Blaine's eyes were fixated on his friend's comforting hand for a moment, before he shook his head briefly at himself and straightened up, breaking their contact. "Sure, Jeff and I keep some drinks under the desk. You want something, too?" He hopped from the bed, crossing the room and kneeling in front of the table. "Coke, water, apple juice?"

"Apple juice would be nice," Kurt replied, yawning and letting himself fall back onto the comforter. "So, you're blaming yourself for acting reasonably?"

"Hm?" Blaine rummaged on the ground for a few moments, before he sat up with a triumphant cry. "Oh no, I wasn't- I mean I understand today why I did what I did, but I'm not proud of it. Running away from conflict and dodging my responsibilities, something I always knew how to do best." He joined Kurt again, two cans of apple juice in his hands and a dark expression on his face, but his eyes softened when they fell on his friends outstretched form. An amused glint light up his eyes. "Comfortable?"

Kurt smiled up at him, stretching lazily. "Very." His muscles relaxed again and Blaine tried desperately not to notice the way his dress shirt had ridden up. "Now I was promised something to drink and the end of a 'piteous sob-story'."

Blaine snorted, handing him his juice. "Before we come to that part, though I'll tell you about my heroic comeback. No hiding behind shallow friends, or fake popularity anymore. I was finally ready to change everything ... Well, not everything exactly, but I started turning my life around. At home I made up a three-step recovering plan that would make me brave enough to finally stand up for what I believed and not let myself be defined by popularity and fear anymore.

The first step was officially coming out. Of course everybody knew that I was gay, but I felt the need to clarify that issue once and for all. So, after an exhausting practice - in hindsight not the greatest time – I stood on one of our benches and held a long and, in my mind pretty awesome, speech about honesty and trust. I'm actually not convinced anyone on my team understood even a word I was saying, but there isn't a lot you can misinterpret in the words 'Yep, I'm one-hundred percent gay.', so I brought the essential across. They reacted better than expected, even if that was probably due to their shock, but at least I wasn't thrown into a dumpster first thing the next day. Phase one was completed and that brought me to the second part of my plan, that included befriending the unsuspecting other out student, Seth. I told you how we weren't exactly friends up unto that point and therefore he was fairly suspicious when I suddenly started following him. Seth and I shared a few courses and I made sure to claim the seat next to him in every single one – which wasn't exactly difficult, most of the time nobody wanted to sit next to him anyway, afraid to catch the gay -"

Kurt snorted. "Sorry, I just have heard this sentence so often and never really understood it."

"Pft, I know, believe me! It was such a shock to come to Dalton and receive casual touches from other guys. I think I jumped every time Wes patted my shoulder during my first week."

"Oh, really?" Kurt said, eyes growing big. "You too?"

"Of course," Blaine answered softly, reaching for his hand. "Why did you think I took you for that talk your first day here?"

Kurt exhaled slowly, linking their fingers. "Right. I had nearly forgotten about that. I can't believe I never asked about your past after that."

"We didn't know each other very well." Blaine shrugged. "You want to hear the third step of my master plan, now?"

"Sure, enlighten me!" Kurt settled back against the headboard, legs still crossed and knee touching Blaine's thigh. Their hands stayed together during the process and Blaine was thankful for the grounding touch.

"Part three of my plan was Sadie-Hawkins-dance... Well, actually my plan had been prom, but in a last minute arrangement our school decided to host a Sadie-Hawkins dance earlier that year and this opportunity was just as convenient. Seth and I had become friends during the past weeks and I was determined to ask him to go to the dance with me." Kurt tensed next to him and Blaine felt the need to explain, "At that time we hadn't been getting to know each other better for longer than three weeks, mostly in school and we weren't even very close friends, but ... well, we were both interested in boys and I saw that as the ultimate sign for us. Seth was understandably confused when I asked him, but after a lot of convincing from my side, he agreed to accompany me."

"Wait, hold on." Kurt had sat up slightly, body tense and his hand was squeezing Blaine's nearly painfully hard. "You just befriended the boy and now you were asking him out on a date?"

"I didn't see it as a date at that time, even though every protocol would've proved me that it was, but I wasn't even interested in Seth that way, so the thought never really crossed my mind. Today I think I saw it as a compensation of my earlier mistakes, to take him out and make sure he had a nice evening."

"And you needed to prove a point to your school, of course." Kurt had leaned back more casually again and was now playing with Blaine's fingers in an incredibly distracting way.

"O-of course." Blaine cleared his throat. "The evening of the dance arrived and Seth and I agreed on him picking me up at my house. I stood there in the foyer waiting, all dressed up in suit and tie-"

"I bet you looked incredibly dapper," Kurt interrupted with a soft smile and Blaine briefly squeezed his hand.

"I would like you to know that I was complimented on my handsomeness by two persons that evening!" Blaine scoffed, sticking his nose up in the air. "And only one of them was my Mom."

Kurt laughed, edging closer to Blaine. "So, he picked you up?"

"Yes, he picked me up, we drove to the dance and ... we actually had a really good time. We chatted with our friends, drank horribly sweet punch, sang on the top of our lungs to every song and in the end we even slow danced. In hindsight this should have been the moment I should have known everything was too good to be true." Blaine stopped for a moment, taking a sip from his drink and unconsciously worried his bottom lip between his teeth. They were coming to the difficult part of the story now and while everything said before was important for the context, this actually was the essential part of it. Kurt seemed to notice the change of mood, gradually edging closer to him and squeezing his hand.

"I don't really- I mean it was really a rush after that and – I -" He closed his eyes for a moment, drawing a deep breath. "When we left the school after the end of the dance and walked across the parking lot to get to our car ... we were stopped by a group of hockey-players. The ones that were always known as the worst of the worst, the ones tormenting Seth most frequently and they just ... yeah they didn't wasted much time talking, just threw a few slurs at us and before we even had time to react they started circling us and grabbed Seth."

"Blaine," Kurt said, voice barely above a whisper and pulling him back into reality. He had not even noticed his breathing had started to come faster, but now he inhaled shakily.

"Yeah, well I don't remember much of what happened afterwards. Just flying fists, pain over and over again and screaming- so much screaming," he broke off, one hand unconsciously pressed to his side. Tears were burning at the back of his eyes, when pictures came rapidly flashing back. Bodies on the ground and blood. Is that his? Or Seth's? Seth? Where is Seth? Bodies on the ground, everybody is shouting at him, but he can't answer. Why can't he answer? It hurts, it hurts so much. There's pain everywhere and when he tries to talk, to tell them to stop shouting, to stop the pain, he can't. There is no air. Where is the air? A body on the ground. Why is everybody shouting? Please, make it stop! Someone is touching him. It's warm. Why is it warm? Wasn't he outside? He is in somebody's arms. It's soft and warm. Why is his face wet?

Blaine could hear faint humming, when he opened his eyes again, for a moment expecting the plain white walls of a hospital. Instead he found his face buried in the neckline of a navy-blue Dalton blazer, body encircled by two strong arms and breathing coming out fast and panicked. He breathed in deeply, trying to slow down and a wave of fresh wind and strawberry-conditioner hit his nostrils. Kurt. Slowly he raised his arms, resting them around Kurt's waist and returning his embrace. Kurt continued to hum a soothing tune into his hair and after a while Blaine's breathing slowed down, returning to a regular pattern. There were tears on his face that had not been there before, but Blaine quickly buried his face deeper in Kurt's shoulder, letting the wetness be soaked away by his blazer.

"I'm sorry," Blaine murmured, voice muffled by the fabric in front of his face. The humming stopped and Blaine cursed himself for interrupting the moment with his stupid comment.

"What for?" Kurt asked gently, one hand coming up to rub circles on his back.

Blaine breathed against his neck for a moment, thinking. "I don't know," he admitted after a while. "For being a mess?"

"I would think more of it as compensatory justice. I ruined one of your uniforms with my tears, your ruined one of mine... We're even."

Blaine smiled in his shoulder, at a loss for words, so he blurted out the first thing going through his mind, "You're pretty awesome, you know that?"

"I've been told," Kurt said airily, but a pleased little smile tugged at the corners of his lips. Blaine settled back against his shoulder, satisfied to have brought his point across and content to be close to his friend for a while.

"Blaine?" Kurt asked after a little while spend in relaxed silence.

Humming acknowledging, Blaine looked up. "Yes?"

Kurt hesitated. "Uhm, you don't have to answer if you don't want to talk about it, but ... what happened after ... that?"

"It wasn't all too dramatic," Blaine answered, shrugging and trying for nonchalant. "I rested in hospital for the next few weeks, luckily not needing more than two months for full recovery and enrolled at Dalton in March after spring break."

Kurt sighed, shifting his weight, so that he was breathing against Blaine's collarbone. "Did you need to repeat the year?"

"No, I mean, it was tough, catching up with the lost work, but I had always been a good student and would have hated to sit through another year of useless physics," Blaine said, picking at his trousers. "Besides I was already enough of a showplace, still equipped with a cast around my wrist and transferring mid-term." He paused, gaze falling on Kurt. "But, I guess you can relate to the last point at least."

Letting out a snort, Kurt nodded emphatically. "I felt like some kind of tourist attraction, with everyone staring and whispering behind my back. I had had enough of that at my old school already, thank you very much!"

"Oh, Kurt. You know, nobody meant any harm to you. They were just curious."

"Yeah, well tell that my past-me, scared out of his mind and hiding in the only place I had remembered the location of."

"The library?" Blaine guessed.

"The library. I was lucky that you guys found me shortly after that, or I would've probably been to scared to leave for my first lesson."

A short wave of possible answers to that crossed Blaine's mind, embarrassingly one cheesier than the other, so instead of declaring something horrendous like 'I'm glad I found you too.', or 'I didn't find you, you found me' that would surely send the other boy into a fit of laughter, he chose to change the topic.

"Nah, I doubt that, but if you ever need a good place to hide I highly recommend the janitors closet on the first floor. Wes and David spread the rumour that it's hunted two years ago and nobody has gone there ever since." He let his voice trail of in a grave-deep whisper and Kurt giggled and slapped his arm.

"You're ridiculous! Now let go of me, so I can check the time."

"Excuse me? I wasn't the one clinging to you like an octopus!" Blaine protested, when Kurt started to untangle them.

Kurt rolled his eyes and made sure to pinch his friend one extra time in the ribs. "Pft. I didn't hear you complain." He slipped off the bed and bent down to get his phone out of his bag. "Oh damn," he murmured, when his gaze fell on the display that told him unmistakeably that he had half an hour to meet his curfew.

"Do you have to get going?" Blaine asked, trying to peek over his shoulder, but failing due to his height disadvantage.

"Yeah, are you going to be alright?"

"I'm not twelve," Blaine protested, grimacing, but he caved under Kurt's stern gaze. "Yes, I'm going to be fine."

Kurt let himself fall back onto the bed. "One hundred percent sure?" he asked, blinking up innocently at his friend.

"Yes, mom!" Blaine grinned and Kurt straightened up.

"Alright, I'll -"

"Wait!" Blaine exclaimed suddenly and Kurt turned towards him again.

"Yes?"

Blaine fidgeted on the spot, trying to find the right words. "I just – thanks for listening, Kurt."

Kurt smiled softly. "Anytime."

"No, seriously. I'm incredibly lucky to have found a friend like you that I can be always honest with. There's nothing I have to hide, or be afraid to tell you, just – thank you."

"Anytime," Kurt said again, but – and maybe it was Blaine's imagination -, but he could have sworn Kurt actively avoided his eye. "Anyway, I really have to go, now."

"Uh, okay?" Blaine looked a bit lost as he almost hastily jumped up and collected his belongings. "Drive safe," he said, standing up as well.

"'Course," Kurt muttered, shouldering his bag and throwing Blaine a reassuring smile. "You, sleep tight."

"You too," Blaine smiled, waving after him, when Kurt paused one last time in the doorway.

"Are you sure you're not going to die of a panic attack as soon as I leave?"

Blaine laughed, stepping closely in front of his friend and grabbing his fingers. "Yes, Kurt. I'm going to be fine, I promise." He squeezed his hands.

"If you're sure ..." Kurt trailed off. He considered him for a moment, searching for something in his face and seemingly finding it, because he returned Blaine's smile.

"I'll see you tomorrow," Blaine said, pulling him in for a goodbye hug, that lasted a few seconds to long to be considered quick and chuckled amused, when Kurt started nuzzling his ear. "Okay, it's time for you to go now," he exclaimed, freeing himself and gently rubbing his sensitive ear.

Kurt grinned at him. "See you!" He adjusted his bag once more, before turning and sauntering down the corridor. Blaine looked after him with a fond smile.