Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone

Hi. :)

I recorded an audio book for you. I hope you like it.

Here’s the story:

Chad has me read a lot at speech, which I’ve mentioned to you. When I started speech he made me choose a book to read and I started with Harry Potter because it’s comforting and makes me happy. During most speech sessions, I would sit for 10-15 minutes and listen to the Sorcerer’s Stone audiobook through headphones and read the book, word for word, while Chad recorded it. And then we’d listen to the recording.

It’s apparently important for me to hear myself speaking fluently, who knows why. I can’t say that it helps me at all. However, what it did leave me with was that by late November I had about 2/3; of a reading of Harry Potter with my speech sounding pretty good. Also I really like doing all the voices.

So then I took a couple hours one weekend to finish it off and now it’s on your flash drive. This way when you really miss my voice you have 8 and a half hours of it.

~~~~~

To: k.hummel@nyu.edu
From: b.anderson6@nyu.edu
Date: Sun, Jan 18th, 6:43 pm
Subject: Inevitable email about all of the reasons you are wrong.

Eloquent? No way. N-O. It’s not even worth addressing fully. You know why you’re wrong.
Orgasmic? Sexy? Blushing font, Kurt. Just... blushing font.
Squiriferous? That’s so made up, I could only find it on urbandictionary.com. And I’m not a gentleman! I recently burped in your face.
Pulchritudinous? We’ve been over this. Only if you use the secondary definition that I made up for it.

And the most absurd thing on that list is brave. I’ve never been brave a day in my life Kurt. Guys like me, we’re not brave. We’re just happy to have someone like you to let us try. You’ve made me feel brave, but that’s not the same as actually being brave.

I could take issue with more on that list, but these are the ones that made me particularly argumentative (and emotional) while reading.

However, I’m pretty sure you’re right about one of them. I am the Blainiest Blaine who has ever Blained. So, score one for you, dumbass.

Thanks for the chicken and the milk and cupcake and telling Matt and Kerry to give me hugs.

I hope you had a good flight!

Love you.

~~~~~

To: Blaine, From: Kurt
Date: Mon, Jan 19th, 3:53 am
Subject: I have two rules.

1. I’m never wrong.
2. If I’m wrong, see rule #1. Also, I win.

I hope those rules clear everything up.

If not, I’d like to start a transatlantic argument with you over the definition of brave. Seeing as how it’s nearly 4 in the morning here, I figure this is as good a time as any to discuss what being brave means.

According to dictionary.com, brave is “possessing or exhibiting courage or courageous endurance.” (Yes. I’m starting this debate with a definition. What are you going to do about it?) And now I shall quote Mark Twain. “Courage is not the absence of fear. It is acting in spite of it.” (Yes. I’m continuing this debate with a quote. You can’t stop me.) And that, my dear poophead, is the crux of your essence.

Sometimes I can tell you’re paralyzed by fear, by what you perceive you can or can’t do and by all the things that make you feel powerless in this world. But what do you do? You act in spite of it. You make the rest of us look like schlubs. Like crappy, worthless schlubs who never bother with anything. You think you walk away when things get hard, and sure maybe sometimes you do, but a lot of the time you don’t. Your persevere.

You were terrified to sing at open mic night with Matt. You’ve never specifically told me that, but I know you were. You barely lifted your eyes off the floor to look at the assembled crowd. I remember thinking about how unfocused you seemed, how nervous. I can picture your face and knowing your expressions as well as I do now, I know you were extremely relieved when you were done, but also happy, excited. Your face when I bumped into you in the hallway was your “if my mouth worked, I would talk” face. I love knowing that about you now. I love translating your faces. Anyway, my point is, you did it, you played. And you kept doing it. You went back to open mic night every week and soon enough you were playing your heart for the crowd. For me. You couldn’t talk to me, but you found a way to communicate. That was brave, Blaine. No matter how you cut it.

And what about going to speech, Blaine? Asking for help is brave and telling people you’re getting help is even braver. Kissing me on the top of a ferris wheel is super brave, because ferris wheels are scary to begin with and kissing people can lead to rejection.

Then there’s everything with your dad. I’m not just limiting this to confronting him. Talking to him in general, assenting to going ice fishing, hell, even sitting next to him on the couch after confronting him. It’s all brave, Blaine, because you’re going outside your comfort zone. You’re meeting him halfway when what you really want to do is stay right where you are. You’re certainly braver than he is. If he was brave, you wouldn’t be going ice fishing with him, he’d be going somewhere with you. Meeting you on your terms and conditions, not whatever happy sitcom family bullshit he cooked up. (Did that sound judge-y? I didn’t mean for it to be judge-y, but it’s how I feel about these shenanigans with him. I’d like to give him a stern talking to, but I’m pretty sure he wouldn’t give a shit about my opinion.)

Wow. That was quite the tangent. In any event, you’re brave and every other word I put on that list. Believe me.

Now I’m getting all emotional and I haven’t even thanked you for the flash drive. The idea that you read me a book makes me even more emotional. I’m a little bit speechless about the whole thing Blaine and I can’t wait to see what else you have in store for me.

So, I’m going to go to sleep now, because I’m exhausted by the whole day and the whole prospect of everything I have to do over the next several days and weeks and months and life and stuff. I was going to start listening to the audiobook, but I decided I should save it for when I really need it. I heard your voice today. I have a feeling there are going to be much harder days than this one.

I love you, so much, and I can’t wait to spend 132 years being Kurt and Blaine, too.

~~~~~

To: k.hummel@nyu.edu
From: veryrachelberry@gmail.com
Date: Sun, Jan 18, 8:50 pm
Subject: Blainers

As you requested sir, here are my observations on how Blaine was doing after you left.

He was a weepy, sniffly, but seemed content with the chicken. He hung out with Puck and I for a couple hours and then went back to his dorm. When he left I shot Kerry a text to make sure she and Matt were around and ready with the cupcake.

All in all, things went well. He’s sad Kurt, but he’s not exactly the same lonely boy you randomly picked up on the internet last May. We’ll take care of him. I think he’ll honestly be fine while you’re away. I hope you don’t think I’m going to spy on him the whole time you’re gone. And send you daily updates on his well being. He’s a grown up Kurt, talk to him and I’m sure he’ll tell you he’s fine, too. And it won’t be a lie.

Tina’s here and we’re going to give each other pedicures.

I miss you!!! I hope your travels went well and I’m sure we’ll talk soon.

Love- Rachel

~~~~~

To: veryrachelberry@gmail.com
From: k.hummel@nyu.edu
Date: Mon, Jan 19, 4:08 am
Subject: Re: Blainers

First of all, I told you he prefers Poophead to Blainers.

Second of all, I did not “pick him on the internet.” You make it sound like I was trolling websites for mail order grooms or something.

Third of all, it’s not spying, it’s... checking up on him. Getting a third party observer’s opinion. Not spying. Never spying.

Fourth of all, the man loves his chicken. No doubt about that.

Anyway, thank you Rachel for participating in this survey of my, often reserved, boyfriend’s feelings. You claim he would tell me how he’s feeling, and for the most part he would, but I also know that he wouldn’t want to tell me if things are really bad, because he wouldn’t want to make me feel guilty.

But if you let me know if things are bad, maybe I can find a way to cheer him up. Or maybe things won’t ever be bad.

On the other hand, if things are never bad, does that mean he doesn’t care about me? That he doesn’t miss me as much as I miss him? What are my emotions doing? I don’t think I’ve ever been so insecure about anything. How can the shyest man on the planet make me feel this insecure?

I feel weird. I think I need to go to sleep.

Traveling was fine. The city, even driving through it at 3am, is amazing. I can’t wait to explore.

Miss you!
Kurt

~~~~~

To: mattmattmattmatt@nyu.edu
From: k.hummel@nyu.edu
Date: Mon, Jan 19, 4:15 am
Subject: WTF your email address

How did you get that email address? There’s no way NYU generated that for you. What is this magic?

How’s Blaine? Is he ok? Did he eat his cupcake? Did he eat dinner? Make sure he doesn’t oversleep for his 8am class.

~~~~~

To: Kurt, From: Matt
Date: Sun, Jan 18, 11:18 pm
Subject: Re: WTF your email address

These time stamps confuse the shit out of me. It’s like you emailed me from the future.

I can’t reveal my sources with regards to my email address. It’s awesome though, right?

And JFC, Kurt. Seriously? Blaine’s fine and he’s not actually your child. He was maybe a little teary eyed earlier, but he’s perfectly fine now. What if I told you all he ate for dinner was the cupcake? And some Skittles? And washed it all down with an extra large Dr. Pepper? What are you going to do, ground him? (Not to be a tattle tail but that IS actually what he ate for dinner. He was sad and didn’t feel like going out with Kerry and me to the dining hall. But I don’t think this is going to be his regular diet for the whole time you’re gone or anything. Not to mention, he did eat that entire chicken for lunch.)

I can’t believe I’m even responding to this email. If you send me another one like this one, I’m going to forward it to him and he’s going to be maaaaaad at you.

He’s Blaine, he’s the most resilient mofo I’ve ever met. Stop worrying about him and go have fun on your Parisian adventure.

But don’t cheat on him with this hypothetical, beautiful Parisian he keeps babbling about or else I will have to stab you in your sleep.

~~~~~

To: Kurt, From: Blaine
Date: Sun, Jan 18, 11:54 pm
Subject: Re: I have two rules

You definitely haven’t emerged the victor yet. Particularly when one considers all the time and effort your wonderful boyfriend put into making the soundtrack of your life for the next 132 days and all you did was leave him some chicken and a cupcake.

One cupcake, Kurt, not even multiple cupcakes. Weak.

And I suppose you did leave him a relatively heartfelt note about how wonderful he is. Even if he doesn’t agree with you on several of the points. He’s going to stop talking about himself in the third person now.

I don’t know what to say about all that talk about bravery. I didn’t know you thought so much about it. I didn’t know you thought so much about me. Like, I know you listen to me and you love me, but the idea that you’ve been paying attention to me for so long almost makes me nervous or something. I feel... perhaps conspicuous is a good word for it. I don’t really like thinking about people noticing me. If I can keep a low profile I can greatly minimize public embarrassment and whatnot.

It’s weird because hearing that you remember so much about my demeanor from that first week at open mic night makes me feel so happy and at the same time very shy. I was terrified that night. And I really couldn’t look anyone in the eye. I remember you walking in and I thought you were beautiful. I may have even used the word ethereal, at least in my head. The idea that you saw me and noticed me, when I all I wanted in the world was to be invisible, makes me feel a lot of stuff that I can’t articulate at the moment. And I wanted to talk to you so much when I ran into you by the bathroom and my mouth was just … not working. But after that, I told Matt all about you and how you were so nice to me and how you complimented us and how I was going to talk you if I could just get up the nerve.

Wouldn’t brave have been talking to you that night? Or one of the other nights? Or that windy day in the street? I guess I don’t know the answer, but that’s how it seems to me.

And I see what you mean about my dad. And I agree on the scale of him too me, I’m the braver one for meeting him on his terms. But I’m not necessarily afraid of him anymore. At this point in my life, I don’t fear him in the least. I don’t think he would ever dare try to hit me, particularly with Cooper there. (Cooper’s definitely coming, by the way, I found that out a little while ago.) I mean, the man hasn’t laid a hand on me in years anyway, not since I was like 14 or 15. So if being brave is doing something even if you fear it, that wouldn’t exactly be right in this case. I’m hesitant, apprehensive, but not fearful.

YOU’RE afraid of ferris wheels dumbass, not me. Not to mention that in the moment, I didn’t have to fear rejection because you had already brought up kissing. You’re the one who was like “I’ve been thinking about kissing you and so on and so forth, ramble, ramble ramble.” And then you were taking too long, so I had to do it myself. Also, kissing was a much less scary prospect for me than making conversation.

As for my speech... shrug. I guess I can kind of, maybe, almost see how asking for help is brave. And telling people, particularly you, especially so early on in our relationship, was scary. So maybe, I’ll let you call me brave when it comes to speech therapy. But mostly I still just feel embarrassed that I have to go. I’m feeling better about the results all the time (even though I’m pretty sure I’m currently plateauing), but I still hate that I need it in the first place. I also get kind of pissed at myself for not trying harder as a kid because maybe by now it wouldn’t still be an issue. I don’t know. Hindsight, as they say, is 20/20. I have so many other thoughts and emotions about my speech that feeling a little bit brave about asking for help with it is kind of a moot point.

Ok. Enough contrariness for one evening.

Love you, write back soon.

~~~~~

To: Kurt, From: Rachel
Date: Mon, Jan 19th, 12:39 am
Subject: Re: Blainers

I think I’m way more worried about you than I am about Blaine. I’ve never heard you talk like this Kurt. You’ve only wanted to go to Paris for a million years and you’re going to let some boy keep you from having fun? (Fine, he’s not just “some boy” but I’m just trying to make a point.)

You’re there for *you* and whether or not Blaine is okay really shouldn’t be your main concern. He has all of us here to look after him, and he doesn’t really need looking after from thousands of miles away. Not to mention that he’s 20 years old and doesn’t actually need “looking after” period. He loves you and I’m sure he’s going to miss you a lot, but I don’t think that should affect your trip.

You were seriously spiraling when you wrote that email and I’ve decided to assume that it was exhaustion fueling such serious emotional insecurities. I’m worried that you’re feeling like this so early on. I really hope it’s the just the jet lag talking and you’ll get over it.

Let me know if you need to talk. We could Skype or whatever. Try to forget what’s going on here and have fun while you’re *there.*

While you’re in Paris, try to keep your mind in Paris. We’ll all be waiting patiently when you get back. Blaine included.

Love you!

~~~~~

To: Kurt, From: Blaine
Date: Mon, Jan 19th, 12:57 am
Subject: Please forgive me!

I was teasing you about the cupcake thing. You know that right? It wasn’t weak. I wouldn’t have minded if you didn’t leave me any cupcakes!

Because you left me chicken. And you understand that chicken soothes me.

It’s all about the chicken, Kurt.