It’s not that he’s not ready. He’s ready. He’s had the rings tucked into the back of a kitchen cupboard inside the spare milk pitcher for his espresso machine (the only place he’s fairly certain Kurt wouldn’t stumble upon them) for more than a year - since their first anniversary. He couldn’t hide them in the sock drawer the way he did the apartment key; even though they technically have their own drawers, Kurt’s socks tend to end up nestled next to Blaine’s and Blaine’s t-shirts end up folded in between Kurt’s.

One warm September afternoon, when he knew Kurt was out of the office for a few hours, he called and asked Carrie if, for some reason, she happened to know Kurt’s ring size. He tried to play coy about the reason for the call, but she saw right through his awkward, stuttering question. Carrie did him one better by offering style suggestions - how the rings shouldn’t match, but complement each other; how a diamond was only necessary if he was trying to prove something. And then she informed him that if she wasn’t invited to the wedding, Kurt would be fired. Blaine went out a week later, to a little jewelry store in the neighborhood, owned by a kind, round-faced little woman, that he’d passed by a couple of times, and he picked out two rings. They weren’t the most expensive in the shop, but the cost of them meant nothing in comparison to the meaning of them.

Blaine sent a photo of the rings via text message to Cooper the afternoon he bought them, and then Blaine spent the next hour listening as his brother alternated between sobbing his congratulations and yelling at him for not letting him help ring shop. Blaine can’t imagine what kinds of gaudy, priceless rings Cooper would have attempted to force on him, but his brother’s enthusiasm will always mean everything to him.

He hid the box in the milk pitcher before Kurt got home that night, where it sat insistent and obvious as a tell-tale heart. The first few months after he bought them, Blaine’s own heart jumped and his breath caught fast in his throat whenever he heard Kurt open a cabinet door, as though he’d somehow stumble upon the little box. As though, if he did, Blaine wouldn’t immediately get down on one knee and beg for Kurt’s hand.

As though he doesn’t have it already.

It’s not that Blaine is waiting for the time to be right – the time has always been right. He’s thought about asking since their first night in their townhouse together, when Kurt was flushed and sleepy against him and everything smelled new and fresh and already like home. He thought about it when they flew off for a long weekend together in Toronto for their one-year anniversary, using Cooper’s inexhaustible frequent flyer miles. They spent a few hours at the AGO, and a few more browsing through the St. Lawrence Market early on Saturday, where Blaine ate too much and Kurt almost got lost in the cheese section. But they spent most of it lazing in bed together. Their cozy little B&B had a big bed and a bigger bay window, and on Sunday morning before they left for home, Blaine watched the play of sunlight across Kurt’s smooth, pale skin and thought about digging the little black box out of the bottom of his overnight bag.

And it’s not that Blaine thinks they’re too young to get married. He knows twenty-four is young (twenty-two was younger and he was almost ready then), but what’s the point in waiting another couple of years? Every age is young to someone older, and if he waits until they’re thirty, Blaine knows he’ll regret every day he didn’t call Kurt his husband.

His husband.

During their second Christmas together in Ohio, Blaine cornered Burt in his shop and told him about the rings and showed him the picture he’d sent Cooper. He hadn’t brought them with him on this trip, too afraid he’d somehow lose them going through airport security, or drop the box in front of Kurt when unpacking. His knees were trembling so hard he thought he might collapse to the cold concrete floor of the shop at any moment. He didn’t ask for Burt’s permission, but he needed Kurt’s father’s approval; he understood what family meant to Kurt and he respected that. The tears in Burt’s eyes and the massive, bone-crushing hug Blaine received were all he needed to know that Burt would be there in the wedding party whenever and wherever it happened. And the “welcome to the family, son” murmured into his hair was more than enough to break something deep inside of him and send Blaine crying like a little boy into Burt’s arms.

Blaine is not waiting for anything. But his graduate program is intense and it takes up all of his spare time. He has to focus on that – on his writing and his composing – because that is his future. He wants to make it, wants to make something of himself. Those are his dreams and they have been since he was a little boy. He can’t put them on the back burner to focus on something else, even if that something else is saying I do to the person that he loves during a small, intimate ceremony in New York City.

But when he graduates that June, at the top of his class, after two long, trying, intense years in the program, he knows he can finally pull that little black box out of its secret place and put it into Kurt’s hand. No regrets.

Blaine doesn’t quit Starbucks, not yet, because as much as he’d love to finally hang up his apron, he needs the money and the insurance. He’d sold the script that came out of his final project, right after graduation, and he’s pretty sure either Cooper or his professor had at least a little something to do with it. It certainly didn’t hurt anything that Cooper showed up at the presentation of his full-length musical. Blaine thought he wouldn’t be able to part with the notes and pages that so clearly, so obviously describe his innermost feelings about his relationship, but he’s beyond satisfied with the work, and if some director wants to make something of it, then who is Blaine to stop them? His name is getting out there, and both money and work are coming his way. It’s not a lot, and it’s not yet steady, but it’s a start. It’s something to be proud of.

And if he’s perfectly honest with himself, Blaine actually loves to make coffee. He loves the skill and the craft of it. He loves the way his hands know what to do without him needing to really think about it. Of course, he wishes that Starbucks employed manual machines where he could actually fine-tune and tweak the espresso pulls, or that anyone gave a shit when he does a clever little bit of art in the foam of their lattes. No one ever seems to appreciate the pumpkins he gets really good at during Halloween, or the Christmas trees he spends a little extra time to make during the holidays. At least Kurt knows to take the lid off his drinks to see the hearts and leaves that Blaine makes for him.

But his future is coming together better than he could have ever imagined it. He’s getting recognition as a writer and composer. He has a home and a life with the man he loves. There’s not much more he can ask for.

There’s just one last thing.

***

Blaine glances up at the clock.

8:45am.

He sighs a little at the time and snaps a lid onto the light room Americano in his hands. The woman who ordered it, teetering in her obnoxious heels and carrying a tiny dog in her purse, asked for a double-cup as well as a sleeve, and Blaine wrinkles his nose at the waste, but he does it anyway because he’s not allowed to say no.

The day is moving at a crawl, which is a little unusual for his store. The opening shift usually flies by in a whirlwind of breakfast sandwiches and drip coffee, empty carafes and spilled sugar. But the normally hectic Times Square store is a little slow that morning - Blaine doesn’t know if it’s because it’s a Friday and people have taken the day off for one of the last gorgeous three-day weekends New York is likely to have before fouler weather sets in, or if it’s just him. His mind is on something else, something far more important than the bathroom that is somehow already out of toilet paper, so it’s no surprise that it’s only 8:45 in the morning, and not at least 11am like he’d expected it to be. But his distraction doesn’t mean he can slack on his job. His customers expect goddamn that is damn good, and hot too.

His customers don’t care that Blaine is going to ask his boyfriend to marry him tomorrow.

His crew actually had enough downtime before customers started trickling in to dust the windowsills and Spirit-clean the drains, when normally those things have to wait for the closing shift. Blaine is even thinking about getting Jeff to take the mats out back into the alley and scrub them down. They’re getting sticky with spilled milk and sloshed frappuccino and they’re starting to smell. Blaine would do it himself, but he’s Shift Supervisor that morning, and Jeff has a strange propensity for deep-cleaning that Blaine takes advantage of whenever possible. It’s also a dirty job, and Jeff is wearing black pants that day - the suds and grime from the mats won’t show up as badly on him as it will on Blaine’s khakis. They’ve got more than enough people, and not enough customers, to spare Jeff leaving the floor for half an hour.

Blaine doesn’t even get the joy of having Kurt come through his line that morning. Kurt has the day off from his regular duties at Vogue in order to finish up a suit for Mr. Preston, Carrie’s husband. There’s yet another Vogue gala next week (and if Blaine’s learned anything at all about the fashion industry, it’s that they love to throw themselves parties) and Carrie told Kurt to focus on the suit instead of his usual job. And when Carrie Bradshaw tells you not to come in to work because the cuffs of her husband’s suit need tweaking, well, you don’t come to work.

Kurt is getting rather well known as designer, even though he hasn’t come out with his own line yet; so far his work is commission-based, but it’s getting him somewhere. His rising notoriety is partially in thanks to Cooper’s continued vocal support and refusal to wear anything but Kurt’s designs, but mostly it’s due to Kurt’s obvious and innate talent. But because of his position as Carrie’s assistant, his work directly reflects Vogue - it has to be perfect. Blaine knows that Kurt would never accept anything less than his very best work from himself. They both have a touch of perfectionism in them, though they manage to leave that at the threshold of their front door.

But it’s Blaine’s favorite part of his shift to hear Kurt’s order get called down the line. Two years and he still gets fluttery and flustered to know that Kurt’s there, watching him and only him. (Blaine still puffs up a little when he remembers the borrowed partner they had, almost a year ago, who’d tried to flirt with Kurt, and Kurt hadn’t even noticed him at all.) And when that cup with Kurt’s name scrawled across it reaches his hands, he’s not making it for just another customer. He’s not just steaming milk and pouring shots by rote memory, he’s making something for Kurt. It matters to him that it’s perfect every time, even if that means slowing down the line a little. By now, his regular customers know who Kurt is to Blaine, and they know that the little extra wait is worth the drink they too will get from Blaine. Kurt has never been just another customer.

“Hey you.”

Blaine’s head snaps up in surprise and he almost drops the shot glasses that are brimming with espresso; he knows that voice. He knows it better than his own.

Kurt is standing there, in a dark fitted coat with his hair swept up and back, stunning as always. He’s wearing the same sky-blue scarf as he was when they first met, and it makes his eyes so bright and luminous that it takes Blaine’s breath away. It feels like forever and only yesterday since Kurt first walked into his store.

“Hey!” Blaine manages to pour some milk into the cup marked for a latte in order to save the shots he almost dropped. He doesn’t think he’ll ever get over the way Kurt makes him feel flushed and fumbling, like a schoolboy getting his first touch from a crush.

“What are you doing here?” He’d left Kurt in the pre-dawn hours still asleep in their bed. “You’re supposed to be taking the day off.” Blaine gets a lid on the drink and shoves it toward the woman waiting at the edge of the bar with far less care than he usually does. She’s something of a regular, and she shoots a glance between Kurt and Blaine, a little smile quirking her lips, before she takes her drink and leaves.

Blaine wipes his hands on the edge of his apron, takes a look around the store (currently almost empty), and leans over the bar to press a quick kiss to Kurt’s cheek. From somewhere near the register, he hears something suspiciously like a wolf-whistle and he regrets not making Jeff take the mats out back after all.

“You were already gone when I woke up,” Kurt says, and his voice is low and secret, meant just for Blaine. He adjusts Blaine’s collar over his apron strap. “I missed you.” He quickly brushes his fingers through Blaine’s soft curls and attempts to tuck one behind his ear. Blaine’s hair is longer than ever, wild and gorgeous, and he knows how Kurt loves to run his fingers through it, though maybe not in the middle of a Starbucks.

Blaine blushes a little at the attention, he can’t help it. Kurt will always have that effect on him.

“Can I make you something? Can you stay a bit? My break is coming up.” Blaine asks, and he’s already reaching for a for-here mug. Kurt came all the way up here just to see him - the least he can do is make his boyfriend a drink.

“As if I could say no to that offer.” Kurt winks at him and Blaine wants to reach out, take a hold of that scarf, and tug Kurt into a better kiss. He doesn’t care that it would be in front of his entire crew.

Blaine busies his hands with a gallon jug of nonfat milk to keep from doing just that. He’s got about 10 minutes before his lunch break, and he’s giddy, almost bouncing on his toes, that he suddenly gets to spend it with Kurt when he thought he wouldn’t see him at all until later that afternoon.

As he makes Kurt’s regular drink, Blaine lets the question that’s been sitting in the back of his throat for more than a year begin to rise to his tongue. There is no better time than this. His pulse throbs wildly through his veins and his hands shake a little. He’s full of nervous tension, but he’s not scared; he has courage enough for this. He knows exactly what he wants.

“So,” Blaine begins when he slides the mug of nonfat, no whip mocha across the bar to Kurt. His lips are dry, and so is his throat, and he’s sure Kurt can hear the frantic pounding of his heart over the beeping of the timers and hum of the pastry case. “Tomorrow morning. The Park? I know you’re busy but-”

“Of course.” Kurt smiles at him, and it’s the smile that’s reserved just for Blaine. It’s the one where his eyes go soft and his mouth just barely curves up. It soothes Blaine’s nerves and calms his heart.

He is so very ready for this.

***

Saturday morning dawns cool and misty, with the kind of filtered October sunlight that will break through the haze by 10am. Kurt wakes to the smell of coffee and waffles and an empty space in the bed next to him. He stretches languidly, letting the sheets slide across his naked body, before he gets up and follows his nose into the kitchen.

Blaine is standing in front of the waffle iron, wearing jeans and his Hummel Tires and Lube t-shirt, and Kurt takes a moment just to admire the breadth of Blaine’s shoulders and the shifting of his muscles under the thin fabric of the worn shirt. His hair is a little damp and Kurt wonders how long he’s been awake if he’s had time to shower and have breakfast almost done.

“You’re up bright and early,” Kurt says, and Blaine looks back at him over his shoulder. He’s got a secret in his eyes that Kurt can’t quite guess at.

“Hey, morning!” Blaine crosses the kitchen, steps right into Kurt’s space, and presses a warm, languorous kiss to Kurt’s mouth. He tastes of toothpaste and of coffee and Kurt hums appreciatively. He presses closer, slides one hand around Blaine’s trim waist, and tangles his other fingers into Blaine’s hair. Blaine’s mouth opens so easily for him and Kurt will never, ever get over the sweet thrill of his lips and tongue and the very taste of him.

“Hey, hey no,” Blaine laughs a little and untangles himself from Kurt’s hold. Kurt whines a protest and twists his fingers tighter into Blaine’s shirt, holding on. “Go and get dressed. We’re taking breakfast to go.”

“But,” Kurt pushes in and finds Blaine’s neck, and he mouths at the warm skin there.

But we could go back to bed, he thinks. He knows he promised Blaine the Park, but the rolling hills and winding pathways will still be there in another hour or two.

It’s probably clich�d, just a little, that Central Park has become their place. But it has. Kurt’s certain they’ve covered every mile of the park many times over in the last two years. They’ve pulled on rain boots and slogged through the mud during a particularly wet spring, huddled together under Kurt’s bright yellow umbrella while Blaine resisted the urge to belt Singing in the Rain. They’ve worn flip-flops in the summer and walked barefoot through the grass. Blaine was stung by a bee, but it was kind of worth it for the way Kurt held ice to his foot and soothed his ankle with careful fingers until the hurt went away. They’ve laced up heavy boots and held gloved hands in the depths of winter when the snow was piled two-feet high and their noses and cheeks turned red with the cold. Kurt smiles every time he thinks of the afternoon when Blaine walked him up to the trunk of a winter-bare tree and kissed him, slow and deep, until he was warm again.

But the fall is when he met Blaine; it’s when he fell in love with a gorgeous man with a generous heart, even though he didn’t say it until later.

It’s fall again, now, and the air is crisp and cool and all the leaves in Central Park are a rich, vibrant splash of color against the grey and black backdrop of the city skyline. Kurt has a waffle dusted with cinnamon and powdered sugar and wrapped in wax paper so he can carry it in one hand while he holds a travel mug of rich, dark coffee in the other. He needs to thank Blaine properly for breakfast when they get home from their stroll. Blaine is at his side, close enough that their shoulders brush with every step, sipping at his coffee and just barely nibbling at his own waffle, and Kurt could not be happier if he tried. The ground could open up beneath his feet and he’d fall to the depths knowing that he’d led a life truly lived.

Blaine is quiet next to him - more so than usual - and Kurt wonders if he’s stressed about the new piece he’s been working so hard on. He’s heard Blaine on the piano in the spare room at all hours over the last week - tapping out notes and scribbling down bars not-quite-as-fast as his brain can come up with them. It’s a beautiful melody, whatever it’s for.

Kurt nudges at Blaine’s arm with his elbow and Blaine glances over at him, a small smile playing on his lips. He quirks a dark eyebrow at Kurt, as if to say, “yes, dear?” and Kurt just grins and shakes his head. He has nothing to say, not really, he just wanted to be sure of Blaine. There’s still something dark and secret in Blaine’s eyes, the same something that was there in the kitchen, but Kurt can’t put a name to it. He shrugs it off and takes a deep breath. New York can be dirty and grimy on the best of days, but the air down in the park is light and fresh and it fills his lungs with the heavy-sweet scent of wet grass and leaves.

They make their way down the long tree-lined Mall, slipping nimbly past clots of tourists and dodging runners with too many dogs. Kurt knows they’re heading towards the Bethesda Terrace. It’s one of their favorite places to come to, and from the upper level Kurt can just barely make out the Belvedere Castle rising high in the distance. That landmark will always hold a special place in his heart.

There are people roaming around the grand Bethesda Fountain, as there always are - New Yorkers and tourists alike - but there is still something serene and peaceful about the terrace and the surrounding grounds. Off to the side, there’s an older man perched on a box in front of an easel with a case of watercolors at his feet, and a skinny girl in thick-rimmed glasses is taking photos of the fountain with an old Polaroid camera.

Blaine looks nervous; the little smile from earlier is gone. He’s biting his lower lip, worrying it between his teeth, and twisting his own coffee cup restlessly in his hands. His brows are furrowed and Kurt can see a muscle twitching in his clenched jaw. Kurt hasn’t seen Blaine’s shoulders this tense since the night of the presentation of his master’s final project.

“You ok?” Kurt finally asks, when Blaine comes to a stop next to the fountain, in a space where there aren’t quite as many people.

Blaine takes their mugs and sets them down on the edge of fountain before he clears his throat and says, “Give me your hands.” His voice is low, almost gruff, and Kurt feels like Blaine is pulling the words from the very depths of his being, from the soles of his shoes and beyond.

He does so willingly (he would give Blaine anything he asked for), and Blaine enfolds Kurt’s hands in his own. Blaine strokes his thumb rhythmically across the backs of Kurt’s knuckles, and Kurt shivers with something that has little to do with the light, familiar touch, and everything to do with the serious, intense look in Blaine’s eyes. He’s never seen Blaine like this - not on their first date, not when Blaine offered him the key to his old apartment, not even when Blaine whispered I love you, low and fervent, into his ear on Christmas.

Kurt’s heart starts to race and he feels a flush pink his cheeks. He’s trembling, but he’s not afraid. He’s never been afraid of anything with Blaine.

“Kurt-”

And suddenly he knows what Blaine is going to ask him. Of course he knows, and the answer has always been yes.

“You are the love of my life, Kurt,” Blaine says, and his voice is thick and choked with emotion. “And I never want to learn what it might be like to be without you. I’ve been without you before, and the world meant so little to me then. It means everything to me now. You mean everything. I didn’t even know I was looking for you until I found you, until you found me.”

Kurt can’t breathe and he cannot slow the pounding of his heart as Blaine reaches into his coat pocket and pulls out a little black box. There could be a thousand people watching them, but in that moment there is nothing, there is no one, but Blaine and the two shining rings nestled together inside the box. Kurt’s chest is tight and there is no sound on earth save the roar of his blood in his ears and sweet timbre of Blaine’s voice.

“Will you marry me?”

The world narrows and the focus sharpens to Blaine’s eyes, whiskey-gold and shining wetly in the autumn sunlight, and the gleaming bands in his palm. Kurt’s knees feel weak and he clutches at Blaine’s forearm to steady himself.

There is no doubt as to his answer. There never has been.

“Yes,” he breathes out, and it comes from his bones. It comes from his heart, his blood, and his very soul. “Yes of course I’ll marry you.”

The smile that lights up Blaine’s face is brighter than anything Kurt has ever seen, and it doesn’t dim as Blaine slides one of the thick bands onto his ring finger. It fits perfectly and Kurt doesn’t even think to question how Blaine knew. He can think of nothing save for the fact that Blaine is no longer his boyfriend, but his fianc�, and soon enough will be his husband. There are tears in his eyes and slipping down his cheeks and he doesn’t care at all.

Kurt takes the second ring from the box and, with trembling fingers, manages to slide it onto Blaine’s own finger while Blaine continues to grin up at him like he’s the best, most important thing in the world. And Kurt realizes, in a way, he is.

The ring is barely on before Blaine grabs his face with both hands, the ring box dropping to the ground, and pulls him into a long kiss. Kurt can taste Blaine’s tears, and his own, and the bitter salt mingles with the sweet flavor of love and joy and their future.

Kurt pulls away just enough to whisper, “I love you,” and Blaine swallows the words with another kiss.

Blaine reaches down with his left hand, the hand that now bears the engagement ring placed there by Kurt’s own fingers, and curls it around Kurt’s waist. He draws Kurt’s body close and rests his cheek on his shoulder.

“Dance with me,” he says, and it’s not a question.

Somewhere in the distance, a melody plays. Kurt hadn’t heard it before, but he hears it now. Cello notes - sweet and poignant, achingly romantic - echo from the lower passage of the terrace and trail along the wind.

“For as long as the music lasts.”

The music never stops playing.

-FIN-