I’d convinced Kurt that we should walk around campus after we’d finished our bagels. So there we were, walking by the snow-covered buildings that were so grand, you could have mistaken them for royal castles or something. Snow had just started to fall, but only the lightest snowflakes were falling. The scenery around us was rather romantic. The situation, however, was incredibly nerve-wracking.
We were walking in silence for quite some time. It was the perfect setting for a grand gesture. I had a voice in my head telling me that I needed to stop Kurt, take his hand and confess my undying love for him.
Wait a minute. Love? Did I love him?
As we walked in silence, I thought about it carefully. Every now and then, I’d sneak a look at him. He was so beautiful. His rosy cheeks, perfect complexion, beautiful blue eyes, long, stunning eyelashes and perfectly styled hair just took my breath away. When he started speaking, I found myself hanging onto every word. Maybe I do love him... maybe I do...
“Blaine?” Kurt said quietly as he turned to look at me, still walking at the same slow pace we’d been walking at the whole time.
“Yes?”
“Have you... have you ever been in a relationship?”
This question caught me off guard. Kurt looked really nervous, almost painfully so. There were a million questions running through my mind, wondering why Kurt would ask me a question like this. But I couldn’t even think about it. I had to answer Kurt. I had to be honest.
“Yes. One.”
I had to avoid looking at Kurt – I didn’t want him to think that I was still holding onto my past relationship with Josh. Especially considering that Josh had graduated last year and I hadn’t seen him since. I didn’t want anything to do with him and I really didn’t want to even think about him.
“Can you... can you tell me about it?” Kurt looked at me so intensely I could feel his eyes searching for mine. I looked at him hesitantly.
“May I ask why you’d like to know? It’s just that... It’s not an entirely pleasant part of my past.”
“Well, I’ve never been in a relationship before... I guess I just want to know... If it’s possible.”
I couldn’t not tell Kurt about Josh. Kurt had shared everything with me. I knew more about him than he knew about me. That wasn’t entirely fair, and I knew it. I had to tell him.
“His name was Josh,” I started, slowly approaching a bench and gesturing Kurt to sit down.
“He was a year older than me. He was in the Warblers for a brief period of time. That’s where I met him. We met, we laughed in rehearsals when Wes went power mad, we sang together. It was almost as if we were actors in a rom-com.”
I found it hard to continue. Hell, I found it hard to even start. Thinking of Josh wasn’t painful in the heart-breaking way. It was painful in the “I-So-Desperately-Want-To-Punch-Someone” kind of way.
“...one afternoon, after the Warblers’ rehearsal, he stopped me as I was leaving. He waited for the room to clear out and he told me that he was gay. He knew I was gay – I’d already told everyone when I met them – so he took that opportunity to ask me out.
I thought it would be just a date. Just like teenagers do. Just casual dates, phone calls, cryptic text messages. I hadn’t figured out whether or not I really liked him. I’d never really thought of him in that way before, but there was nothing to suggest that I wouldn’t like him like that.
I accepted the offer. We started dating, but right from the start it was a serious relationship. For me, it was my first relationship and right after the first date we were holding hands, kissing and making out in hallways when no one was looking.
I didn’t really know how to act. At that point, I still wasn’t sure that I liked him that way. That’s what I thought the dates were for. But I wasn’t really involved in the relationship, in terms of deciding where we were.”
Kurt just looked at me thoughtfully. I could see he wanted me to continue but he didn’t want to overstep the friendship boundary by demanding too much from me.
“Things kept moving forward pretty fast. Everyone knew we were an item, and people teased me about it all the time. Jeff was the worst. But we’d only gotten together around four months prior to his graduation.
He quit the Warblers, suddenly. I had no idea why. He stopped showing up to rehearsals, yet he’d be at the door when I’d finished rehearsing and he’d take me by the hand and force me into his car. We’d go out on dates almost every night. I don’t know whether he was clingy or possessive, but I do know that it was moving way too fast for me to keep up with.
I tried mentioning it to him. I tried saying, “Can we just try taking it slow?” But he never heard me.
The day of his graduation came, and truth be told, I had been avoiding him slightly. I didn’t want to have to spend every minute with him. I wanted my space and still I hadn’t made a decision on how I felt about him.
The Warblers were to perform during the ceremony. There we were, up on stage, and I remember looking out into the audience and trying to see where Josh was. In the middle of the performance, I saw him in the corner of my eye, hiding behind one of the partitions, making out with one of the other Dalton seniors.”
“Oh, Blaine...” Kurt looked saddened by what I’d just told him, and he took his right arm and put it around me, shuffling in closer.
“It’s okay. I mean, I wasn’t that emotionally attached to him, but it was still that feeling of betrayal. You know?
Anyway, after he graduated, he saw me before he left for the party. He wanted to kiss me; he tried putting his arms around me. Instead, I just asked him straight out, “So who was that guy you were making out with behind the partition during our performance?”
He stopped trying to make moves on me. He looked at me and said, “I couldn’t help it. Mike gives me what you won’t.”
I just looked at him in disbelief. And then he said, “But don’t worry, we’re still okay. I still love you.”
That made me so angry. Because he had been saying he loved me from day one. He’d been lying to my face. I’d never said “I love you” to him because I knew that one day, I would actually find meaning to those words and I’d regret saying it to him. But he threw the words around carelessly. Like they didn’t really mean anything.
All I could say was, “You don’t love me. And that’s okay.”
I walked away from him, knowing that I’d be able to live again. I was free to be myself.”
Kurt started patting my back slowly and gently. It seemed like he knew how hard it was for me to open up about something like that.
“Blaine... I’m sorry; I shouldn’t have asked you to tell me that story.”
I looked at him with a half-smile, knowing that what I was about to say came straight from the heart.
“It’s okay. I needed to tell somebody. And... I’m glad that somebody is you.”
Kurt smiled at me warmly, and it felt like he was pulling me closer. I moved my arm around to his back and returned the half-hug.
“I’m always here for you, Blaine Anderson. Don’t you ever forget that. You helped me through some of my darkest days. You gave me courage. And I’ll always be here to do the same for you.”
I didn’t have to say anything. I just turned to Kurt, smiled warmly and he knew.