Room 107. This must be it.

I walked into this fourth classroom and saw sombreros on the wall. Sombreros? I thought. But I remember something about Mr. Shuester teaching Spanish, so that must work.

“Hey Blaine!”

I snapped my head up to see Rachel’s friend Tina calling to me.

“You’re in Mr. Shue’s homeroom class?”

“You go to school here?”

I shuddered slightly at the second voice. Kurt.

“I do now,” I said, as I slinked as nonchalantly as I could into the open desk next to Kurt. “Exciting, right?”

Kurt was even more exciting up close. I mean, we’ve had a few little conversations here and there, but I really didn’t know him all that well. To tell you the truth, when Rachel told me that I shared my homeroom with Kurt, I had gotten stupidly excited. I only hope she hadn’t noticed.

Kurt was talking to Tina on my left side, and I whipped out my planner to see what classes I had next. First block, chemistry. Second block, pre-calculus. Lunch. Third block, spanish. Fourth block, english. Exciting day. I knew that Kurt shouldn’t be in any of my classes, being a year ahead of me, but I couldn’t help but to hope. Maybe I was advanced in something, or that he was deficient in something else. But that wouldn’t happen - I doubt Kurt is deficient in anything.

I flipped to the current week in my planner, and decided to write myself encouraging notes in the margins. It was a habit of mine, and it always turned out well. Just when I thought the week was going to be terrible, there, on Thursday or Sunday was some silly quote from my life, and it made things just a little bit better.

Don’t forget to smile at him once in a while, I wrote on Sunday. I ended it with a smiley face.

When I looked up, Kurt and Tina were giggling at each other. They heard the rustling of my papers, and looked over. I looked up at the clock, and it read 7:57. Only three more minutes. Let’s make some use out of them.

“So, what classes are you taking?”

“Who, me?” I said with confusion.

“Yes, you,” Kurt giggled at me. His smile could light up the night sky.

“Um, today, it’s Chemistry, Pre-Calc, Spanish, and English. And lunch,” I added. “Don’t forget lunch.”

“Chemistry isn’t too bad,” Tina said. “And, unless you’re actually good at math, pre-calculus will be tough.”

“That’s what I hear,” Kurt added. “That’s why I stopped at algebra.”

So, Kurt’s not much of a mathematician. Good to know.

“You’ll probably have Mr. Shue for spanish, and he’s amazing at working with you if you’re struggling. He’s also a pretty decent teacher, so that shouldn’t be much of a problem for you. And english… Well, there it is.”

“What do you mean, Kurt?”

“Well,” he started. “It’s basically a waste of a class.”

“It is junior year, at least,” Tina chimed in. “In theory, you’re supposed to read and write and other english-y things, but you don’t. Mrs. Cohen doesn’t seem to have any interest in actually teaching junior english. But I’m sure that Ms. O’Shea will let you transfer into her english class - as long as you can prove yourself.”

Prove myself to an english teacher?

“Oh yeah!” Kurt exclaimed. “We get to watch that now!”

Oh shit. Watch what?

Before I could open my mouth to ask the question I so desperately wanted to ask, Mr. Shuester came into the classroom. 8:00, on the dot.

***

Chemistry and pre-calculus passed without incident. Being the first day, the teachers merely gave out their syllabi, and left us the rest of our class periods to occupy ourselves with something. I’m not sure what exactly they thought we might be doing, seeing as though we didn’t have any homework, and almost no one had thought to bring a book, but they gave us free time anyways. I filled in my planner with all sorts of things. My friends’ birthdays, my parents’ anniversary, quotes from musicals. In my free time in pre-calculus, I noticed a little sticky note paperclipped to the back cover.

Dear Baby Brother,

I hope you’re having a wonderful first day. Don’t forget to chase your dreams. You’ll regret the things you didn’t do more than the things you did do.

I love you.
R

She really could be adorable some days.

When I finally got out of pre-calculus, I packed everything back up in my bag and wandered the halls again, hoping to stumble upon the cafeteria. But, as luck would have it, I stumbled into Rachel and my locker instead.

“Blaine!” she squeaked as I approached. “So, how are things?”

I smiled at her. “They’re just fine, Rach. And you? How are your things?”

“They are delightful,” she replied. She seemed a little more excited to see me than usual, but I attributed it to the first-day-back-to-school excitement. “Simply delightful. You’re going to lunch, right? Come with me this way.”

I suppose I’m lucky I’m actually going to lunch, because Rachel grabbed my arm and was forcefully leading me to where I could only hope was the cafeteria. She burst through the door of the cafeteria, and dragged me to a table filled with people whose faces looked familiar. I wasn’t quite as familiar with the shocked looks on their faces. The table was full of a mixture of people. On one side sat Finn, Tina, and the asian football player I had crashed into this morning. On the other was Mercedes and a small, pretty blonde girl. There was a boy in a wheelchair at the end of the table.

“Rachel, what are you doing to your brother?”

“I thought he might be lost,” she replied to the small blonde girl, whom she called Quinn. “So I used my big sister privileges to find him and bring him to lunch.”

I didn’t get embarrassed easily. Somehow though, every time I was able to get embarrassed, it was either with or because of Rachel.

“Hi, everyone. So, how are all of your days going?” I tried my damnedest to break the ice.

“It’s going great,” the guy in the wheelchair responded. “I’m Artie, by the way, I don’t believe we’ve ever met.”

Thank goodness for men with manners. Unfortunately for me, my sister didn’t have any.

“Everyone! This is my little brother, Blaine. Blaine,” she said as she looked my way, “this is everybody.”

I closed my eyes instead of rolling them.

“You’d better stop calling him that, Rach. He may not be super tall, but he’s still taller than you. And you may only be four minutes older, but that doesn’t make him ‘little’ by any means.”

My heart caught in my chest. When did he get here?

Kurt had come up from behind me to give Rachel a small verbal lashing. The entire table laughed while Rachel only scoffed. With a grace and poise I thought only existed in ballet and fairy tales, he floated to the table and sat down next to Mercedes, who promptly wrapped her arm around his shoulder.

“Yeah, Rachel, you don’t want to upset Kurt and your brother.”

While I know she hadn’t really meant to do it, Mercedes had just referred to Kurt and myself in the same sentence. My stomach melted.

Rachel had just gotten a big hole in her ego balloon, and simply went and sat back down next to Finn.

“Blaine, come and sit with us. We’ll protect you from Rachel - promise.”

I took Quinn’s invitation, and sat down on the empty space on the bench between Quinn and Kurt. I, of course, no matter how hard I might try, can’t keep my big yap shut when I need to.

“Look,” I said, looking across the table. “I’m so sorry for running into you this morning. Thank you so much for not, y’know, beating me to a pulp.”

The asian footballer looked stunned. “Man, don’t even worry about it. I trip over things all the time. Even those invisible things on the floor.” His face creeped into a smile.

“Not all football players are evil,” Tina chimed in. “This is Mike.”

“Some of them are,” chimed in Finn. “But not the ones that hang out with us.”

I wasn’t quite sure how to take all of these new developments, but it felt good. I dug an orange out of my bag, and started to peel away at it.

I felt a body next to me breathe in deeply, and sigh.

Unf.

“I love oranges. I love the way they smell.”

Kurt likes oranges. Good to know.