As he did his morning moisturizing routine, Kurt thought back to dinner the night before. Finn truly deserved an award for his obliviousness. It was welcome this time. The entire evening was spent listening to Finn go on and on about the fight, and how Puck now wanted to kick Blaine’s ass. When he finally finished, it was late enough for Kurt to head to bed without raising too many questions. 

Today would be better though. On Tuesdays and Thursdays he drove Mercedes since they had Glee. He had to rush through getting dressed, and remembering to grab a spare changing of clothes. The lesson about slushy facials should have been learned a long time ago. Not that they happened every day, being prepared helped though. Expect the unexpected when it came to red food coloring, and don’t wear white were two of the phrases the New Directions lived by. 

Kurt did a once over in the mirror, making sure his hair was perfect, then dashed down the stairs and out the front door. He was already running late, as usual, and wouldn’t have time to stop at The Lima Bean for his second cup of coffee if he wanted to make it to class on time.

Luckily, his best friend knew him too well. The diva hopped into his car seconds after he pulled up with a large travel mug in hand just for him. She even fixed it the way he liked. 

“You’re a life saver, Kurt,” she said tiredly. Neither of them were morning people. 

His response was mumbled, too tired to form real sentences.  By the time they made it to their history class, Kurt had finally begun to wake up. He loathed history though. It was the worst subject in his opinion, and once the hour finally ended, Kurt felt like he needed five more cups of coffee just to make it to his locker.

His locker.  An intense dread filled him momentarily. Dealing with the extremely rude Blaine was not something he was mentally prepared to do. 

“Please come with me to my locker,” he all but begged Mercedes as they left the room. 

“I can’t. If I’m late to math, Mrs. Norris will murder me. You know how she is.”

Kurt sighed, but assured her he would be fine. 

“It’s not Karofsky is it? I’ll face her wrath if it keeps him away from you.”

“No. Blaine.”

“If he does anything, other than act like a jerk, I’ll kick his ass for you,” she said with a smile. 

Mercedes was right though. He hadn’t actually done anything to Kurt other than be exceedingly rude. That wasn’t enough reason for him to dread being near the boy. Something about the new kid truly unnerved him though.

As his locker came into view, Blaine was once again there with the Cheerios. This time Santana was among them. She would be able to get the boy to at least be a decent human being for five minutes. The girl has this thing about her, possibly the psycho factor, which made people do what she wanted. He’d never fully trust her though. Cautiously he approached them. 

Blaine didn’t even spare him a glance. The Latina Cheerio had his undivided attention, if anything was to be said from the way his hand was running down her arm softly as he whispered something into her ear.  Santana laughed breathlessly as he pulled away.

Her eyes quickly locked on Kurt’s. “Let Porcelain get his books. I don’t want to listen to him bitch in Glee later.” The tone was bitchy, but for Santana is was nice.

When Blaine huffed at being inconvenienced, she shot him a sultry look. The promise of being able to “tap that” as the Cheerio would say was all the convincing a boy like him needed.

It was fitting, in Kurt’s head that she would go for someone like Blaine. She ‘dated’ Puck, and since he had effectively stolen Puck’s crown in less than five minutes…well Santana did have to sleep with the biggest bad ass in the school. 

Keeping the grateful smile off his face was difficult as he exchanged his books. 

French started out well enough. Then Blaine stormed in exactly twelve minutes after the late bell, and interrupting Mme. LeFebvre as she went over their vocabulary words. 

After a quick scolding and being threatened with a detention, Blaine moved towards his seat. His satchel hit Kurt in the back, knocking him forwards when Blaine slung it over the desk.

 Kurt recognized the satchel; it was part of Gucci’s winter collection. It also cost about six grand, though he was sure the bag was a knock off. Not that he could be sure without actually touching the bag. The rude boy just didn’t give off the vibe that he would buy anything designer. Part of him was curious though, because it really looked like the real deal to Kurt. He knew his designers.

To make things worse, the teacher decided to pair them up to work on pronunciation of the words. It was his luck that Blaine had to be his partner. 

He turned to face the other boy and said, “Please don’t make this difficult.”

"Pourquoi devrais-je faire cela?” Blaine said sarcastically.

Kurt, who was fluent in French, was taken aback by the suddenness of the words. Possibly because they were actually in French, not English. It was a first. 

“Tu parles Francais?” he asked. 

“Un peu. Mais je parle Italien couramment.” The leather clad boy shrugged like it was nothing. 

Of course he would speak Italian. The boy looked like he just walked off of some Tuscan beach, all dark and tan.

“Pouvons-nous simplement ce faire avant que je attraper ton maladie?” Blaine asked

Kurt was confused by that comment. “Mon maladie?” 

“Tu est une tante.”

Kurt gapped at Blaine, who just called him a fag in French. “Va te faire foutre!” He turned back around in a huff. Apparently the asshole was a homophobe regardless of the language spoken. 

The question in the back of his mind was how the hell did someone like Blaine Anderson speak French as well as Kurt himself did? Thinking about the boy speaking Italian fluently also blew his mind. 

Stop thinking about it! he scolded himself. 

Thankfully the bell rang a couple of minutes later. Kurt wasted no time fleeing the class room. His favorite class was quickly becoming torture. Knowing Mme. LeFebvre’s love of pairing people up, Kurt thought moving to a different desk might be a good option. It was the first time since the first day of school freshman year Kurt thought about moving his desk. 

His next class was Honors British Literature, or BritLit, with Santana. He felt it would be a good time to let his fellow glee member know what her new friend thought of him. She probably wouldn’t do anything about it. 

The lunch bell rang before he got a chance to talk to her. He’d just have to do it during glee later. On the bright side, there wouldn’t be too many people around, and he could guarantee at least one person would help him convince the Cheerio to avoid the guy. Not that Kurt would ever admit to wanting Puck’s help on anything. 

Rachel was in one of her moods. All through lunch she bitched about what solo she would sing later. Sitting through an hour of Calculus with her was torture enough. 

Blaine of course came in late to that class too. He brought a straw with him, and spent the entire class making spit balls. Most of them landed on Kurt and Rachel. A slushy facial would have almost been preferable.  

The teacher at lest kicked him out for being disruptive before it got too bad. Picking saliva covered balls of paper off his closed was not fun. It was a first for him. Several other students were also used for target practice. The bad boy really didn’t want anyone to like him. 

Art was a welcome break. He had the distinct feeling this would quickly become his favorite class, simply because it got him away from the obnoxious jocks, Blaine Anderson, and Rachel.  The girl may have been his friend, but he could only deal with her in small doses. The fact that she was dating his step-brother meant he saw her way more than he cared to. 

“Having a bad day?” Tina asked. Her quiet nature was perfect company when he needed to relax. 

Flopping very uncharacteristically down in his chair, Kurt said, “I’ll let you know. I have Calculus with Rachel and Blaine Anderson just before this one. “

“And in your next class, with Karofsky and some other football players.”

“Then I have to deal with more Rachel. She’s being particularly annoying today.”

“Your schedule really sucks this year. At least no one in this class will bother you. The jocks avoid this class like the plague. “

“Thank god. Plus, you’re here. You and Mercedes are going to be my life savers this year.”

Both of them laughed. Kurt pulled his sketch book out and flipped to a blank page. An idea for a sweater had been in his head for weeks, but he couldn’t get it to come out right. 

Tina watched him as he moved the pencil across the page. She wasn’t much of a drawer, but she painted. Right now, the teacher had them working on drawing.

“Have you told Rachel?” The Asian girl asked him after a while.

“Tell her what?”

“That you’ve applied to Parsons and FIT also?”

“No. I don’t really plan on it either. If I get in to one of them and not NYADA then I will. Only if that happens. She’ll be upset, but we’ll both be in New York so it doesn’t matter too much,” he explained.

Kurt gave up on the sweater again, and instead spent the remainder of class discussing the pros and cons of going to NYADA with Rachel.  Living with Rachel would be a nightmare, especially without a buffer.

Tina was highly in favor of him choosing fashion design over performing and going to Parsons. She said he’d be happier. Her opinion was the only thing he had to go on. He couldn’t ask Mercedes. She may have been his best friend, but the diva was incapable of keeping a secret for longer than a week.

Physics went by in an uncomfortable blur. The football players wouldn’t actually do anything if a teacher was around. Not that it stopped Karofsky from giving him dirty looks and making rude comments and gestures when the teacher wasn’t paying attention to him. It got laughs out of several people. 

Luckily, Kurt’s group was nice (they’re mostly nerds) and ignored the jock. Ignoring Blaine was harder. The leather clad boy had something rude or suggestive to say to everyone, teachers and jocks included. Despite the quickly forming loathing he was beginning to feel towards the boy and his behavior, Kurt found himself laughing slightly when Karofsky became Blaine’s target. 

Quinn Fabray wasn’t in glee. Once he thought about it, he realized he hadn’t heard from her for most of the summer. Sam’s going away party was the last time he could recall seeing her. Apparently no one else had heard from her since then either. They waited nearly fifteen minutes for her to show up before starting the lesson. 

All of our trophies sat in the middle of the floor. I glanced at the other members slightly confused. From the looks on their faces, it was apparent they were too. 

“Mr. Schue, why are our trophies on the floor?” Mercedes asked.

Our director, who was also the school Spanish teacher, launched into a speech about winning, our massive loss at nationals, and his regret about the April Rhodes musical and letting us down. Rachel just had to comment on his replacement winning a Tony.

“You know what I regret,” Mercedes said. “Being the laughing stock of the show choir world.”

“That’s saying something,” Artie added. 

“Mercedes has a point. Finn and Rachel’s ‘The Kiss that Missed’ already has twenty thousand views on YouTube,” Kurt said, emphasizing the title by using air quotes. He was still slightly angry at them for screwing up the competition. “And the comment section is just full of pithy banter.” The last part he added as a subtle jab at Rachel. 

He’d already taken out his frustration on Finn. They lived together, so Kurt spent the summer making sure his step-brother know he wasn’t forgiven for it.

“How many times do we have to apologize for that?” Finn asked. 

Kurt held back on commenting, as did everyone else. 

“The school hates us even more now!” Mike said.

That launched everyone into complaints about getting people to join. They were already below the bottom of the social food chain before nationals. Now they weren’t even on the radar.  Kurt figured they could find some money to pay people to go to competitions with them. He wouldn’t suggest that just yet though.

Schuester launched into another speech about inspiring people to join. He made a gesture, and suddenly the band members were wheeling three pianos, which were painted varying shades of purple, into the choir room. He began talking about what we as the New Directions had in common with pianos from foreclosed homes. Apparently we’re all cast offs, and in need of repairs.

“But they’re still capable of making beautiful music,” Tina added smiling. 

To be honest, Kurt was excited about the pianos. Following Brittany and Tina’s lead, he got up and ran to the violet piano in the center of the room. 

The three of them began talking about what songs they could do. Soon everyone else became engaged in the conversation. They really needed people; the pianos were a great idea, though he was skeptical about getting in front of the whole school and singing again. Something disastrous never failed happen.