March 26 2013, 9:45 PM

Blaine was decidedly uncomfortable.

The rally had gone well, for the most part; he'd held up his "Let Me Marry" sign and Micheal, ever the leader, had been at the front of the march. He'd met some interesting people. Everyone wanted to know his story, and he wanted to know theirs. It hadn't been aggressive. The few groups with "Adam and Eve" signs had left early, and some tried to be fairly vocal, but for the most part, they were quiet.

After the rally and a light dinner, Blaine, Micheal, and some of their friends (mostly Micheal's friends--Blaine still didn't have many of his own) retired to Spectrum. The idea was that, after a day of marching for rights, they would go to their favorite gay bar for a few drinks and relax with people who didn't need to be marched at.

Now Micheal was well over a few drinks in and he was flirting rampantly with nearly every patron. Blaine included.

"C'mon, babe. Danny's down for it. I'm down for it. Just gotta get you in on this now," he was saying, tapping at Blaine's arm. His breath smelled like rum. A short, buff guy, presumably Danny, was walking his fingers up Micheal's other arm and staring at Blaine intently.

"Sounds fun, but I'm not interested."

"Blai-ine." Micheal put his chin on the bar and pouted. "You are NOT fun. I thought I was making you fun."

"You have made me fun. I'm in a bar, drinking in public. I marched in a rally today. That's more than I would have done three years ago." He sipped his drink and coughed a little. It was stronger than the last.

"You did march." Micheal hiccupped and laughed. "You marched in a political rally."

"Yeah, I did."

"Blaine Anderson." He put his hand on Blaine's arm. "Blaine-Don't-disturb-the-water-Anderson. Look at you now."

"I'm a regular heathen." He took another sip.

"You're a rebel. A rebel with a cause." Micheal laughed again. "It's kinda hot."

Blaine raised an eyebrow.

"What? It's after sunset," Micheal whined. "We don't have to--look, forget about Danny." Danny made a protesting noise in the background, which they both ignored. "Let's just go. I know, you don't wanna do it in a bathroom stall, you wanna go home, you wanna go to bed, everything proper, I get it."

Blaine took a gulp of his drink and he slid off his barstool. The second his feet hit the floor, he realized he was drunk. Everything was fuzzier than usual. And he really had to pee.

Micheal stood, too, and put a hand on his chest. "Let's go," he hissed, and licked up Blaine's neck to kiss him on the lips. Blaine let him. He kissed back, alcohol-fueled and wet.

"Wait," he said. "I've just gotta--I have to use the bathroom first." He stepped away from Micheal and made his way to the back of the bar, swaying a little as he walked. He still had his drink in hand. It was nearly empty; he wondered what happened to it. It had been full only seconds ago, it seemed.

He'd had his share of drunken hookups since college started three years ago. Mostly in sophomore year, at the tail end of which he'd met Micheal. They were fast friends and Blaine crushed on him for a while. Micheal wasn't the boyfriend type, though. Blaine pushed it down and they just became better friends, decided to live together junior year (Micheal's senior year). Somewhere down the line, Blaine realized he didn't really have a crush anymore, but he missed sex; and Micheal, who had been somewhat promiscuous from the start, jumped at the idea of Friends with Benefits. "But we won't call it that," he said. "Too big of a stigma."

So they'd settled into whatever they were. Friends, roommates, sexual partners. They enjoyed each other's company during the day; they brushed teeth in the same bathroom, ate meals together, hung out with the same people. And at night, they enjoyed each other's company in a different way. So far, it had been working well. Micheal would occasionally find some stud in a bar like Danny, but he'd rarely bring them back to the apartment. Blaine didn't look for anybody else. He found himself struggling to define what the difference was between whatever he and Micheal had and a "relationship", but decided that the feeling was what counted, and it didn't feel quite like a relationship.

Blaine was thinking about these things when the bathroom door was flung open. He jumped, zipped his fly, and turned around. Someone he recognized from the rally came in and slid into a stall. Blaine sighed at himself--I'm too drunk to be this jittery, he thought--and went to find Micheal.

Micheal was draped over Danny, groping at him drunkenly. Danny didn't seem to be reciprocating anymore. Blaine marched over in as straight a line as he could manage and tugged at Micheal's arm.

"C'mon, we're going home, remember?"

"Yeah, yeah," Micheal said. "Going home."

"Let's go." Blaine pulled him towards the door.

"Gonna get fucked," Micheal said loudly. A couple of members of the sparse crowd turned to look. "Sorry, Danny. You're gonna miss out. Blaine's so good at it. He can--"

"Michael."

"It's okay if he knows! He was gonna come." Micheal followed him out the door.

"Let's just--find out how to get home. We've gotta call a cab or something." Blaine rooted in his pockets for his phone. Rooted again. Nothing. "Let me see your phone, Mike."

"I can call a cab for you." Blaine looked up. The guy from the rally, the one who'd come in the bathroom, stood in the doorway. Blaine nodded.

"Thanks. Um, I have a free pass for the Blue Cab--"

"I could even take you home, if you want."

"Oh, well--" that was nice. Wait, was that nice or was that weird? Blaine tried to remember. He'd definitely had too much to drink, but he could do this. It was a little weird. Yeah. Weird. "That's okay. We'll take a cab."

The guy stared at him for a second. "Alright." He pulled out his phone and dialed some numbers.

Blaine exhaled. Micheal leaned into him and trailed his hand up to his chest. "We should get home sooner," he said.

"Mm." Blaine nodded and reached for Micheal's hand. He evaded him and grabbed Blaine's ass instead. Micheal laughed.

"He said he'd meet you at the corner of the street," the Rally Guy interrupted. "Do you want me to wait with you? He looks pretty far gone," he motioned to Micheal, "and you don't look that great either. It gets pretty rough out here after the bars close."

"Is it closing time already?" Blaine asked. He hadn't answered Rally Guy's question, but he was following him to the corner anyway. Rally Guy held up his phone so Blaine could see the clock. It was nearly midnight.

"Closing time," Micheal hummed, steadying his walk with one hand in Blaine's back pocket and the other on his arm. "Remember when you used to sing all the time, Blaine? You don't sing that much anymore."

"Yeah, it got..."

Blaine didn't finish his sentence because Micheal was suddenly gone from his arm. He looked down and saw him on the concrete and tried to register it. He was bleeding from his head.

"Hey, Mike--" He knelt down. "Come on."

Micheal didn't move. Blaine looked up to ask Rally Guy for help, and fell backwards when he saw that Rally Guy was very close to his face, holding a long piece of green wood.

"Don't move," Rally Guy hissed.

Blaine didn't move. He heard footsteps and tried not to move his head as he looked for the source of the sound.

"Did you get them, Randy?" The footstepper asked. Rally Guy--Randy--stepped away from Blaine. "Yeah, I got them. Hurry up, Martin."

Martin held out a hand and Randy handed him the wood. Martin took it and leaned down close to Blaine.

"We saw you little faggots dancing tonight," he whispered. "We saw you marching at that rally."

Blaine didn't meet his eyes. Martin pulled back and before Blaine knew what was happening, the wood cracked down on his left shoulder. He cried out and fell all the way to the ground.

"You think you're special? You think you get to just rub up on each other in a public place? Think you can lead a bunch of animals to do the same?" He spat the word "animals" and brought the wood down on Blaine's other arm. There was a loud crack. Blaine turned his head to look at Micheal. Micheal wasn't moving.

"You're not special. You're nothing. You're bringing us down and I'm gonna make sure you don't get far."

Martin hit him again, this time in his side. Blaine curled up against the pain. He felt himself choking for air; it was hard to breathe.

"Mike," he tried, and Martin brought the wood down into his stomach. "Mike."

"Martin--"

"Check the other guy, Randy."

Randy leaned over Micheal. Blaine craned his neck to watch.

"He's passed out."

"Good." Martin stood over Blaine and turned to Randy. "Hit him a few more times."

Blaine tried to move. He scooted around, holding his stomach, trying to turn. "No, no--"

"Shut up." Martin leaned down again. "You got any brothers, faggot?"

Blaine didn't answer. He thought of Cooper and felt a fleeting sense of homesickness.

"Well, I've got a brother. And my brother there needs to learn a lesson about faggots." He lifted the wood and pointed it at Randy. Blaine glimpsed Randy out of the corner of his eye, and he looked boyish now. Blaine tried to think of why. "They aren't like us. They shouldn't live like us." He brought it down a final time, this time on Blaine's head. The world swam in front of Blaine's eyes. He was vaguely aware of Martin and Randy moving towards Micheal, and he realized why Randy had looked boyish. It was because he was crying.

The last thing Blaine saw was the wood, the painted wood, he recognized it; it was from a rally sign. A sign he'd seen. A sign in their group.

Randy and Martin had marched with them, not against them.