Chapter Three
“Hello”, the man said holding Kurt in his arms and smiling down at him. “Hi”, Kurt said quickly, standing up straight again, although he found it strange how he suddenly missed the man’s arms around him, he shrugged off the feeling and held out his hand. “Kurt Hummel, you’re the new groom? Blaine, right?”, Blaine took Kurt’s hand and shook it letting his hand linger there a little moment longer than it should have done. “Blaine Anderson, nice to meet you Kurt”, smiling as he said it.

Kurt took in his appearance – curly black hair, gorgeous hazel eyes, and a tight navy shirt showing off his muscular build. Kurt also noticed he was at least half a head shorter than himself.

The two boys looked at each other for a while and Kurt pulled himself together first. “You err, probably want the tour then?” Kurt said wondering why he had managed to turn into a bumbling fool around this insanely gorgeous man. “Sure”, Blaine smiled again. Kurt gestured for him to follow him inside the barn – mainly because he had become incapable of speech after witnessing Blaine’s smile again.

“And finally, we have Max, Silver and Tia” Kurt said pointing to the final three horses at the end of the barn. Blaine reached out to pat Tia’s muzzle as she playfully nudged his side in the hope of food. “She’s a bit of a greedy one, careful” Kurt laughed. “She’s like me then” Blaine answered cheekily, pulling a mint out of his pocket and holding it to Tia who took it gratefully.

Muffin the cat was rubbing herself against Kurt’s leg mewing sweetly. “And this is the delightful cat that, um, introduced us earlier” Blaine said, crouching down to pick up the tabby cat who settled into his arms, still purring. “That’s Muffin” Kurt said scratching the cat under the chin. “She is our resident mice-catcher” Kurt was watching Blaine cuddling the cat and thinking how working here suddenly just got a little bit better.

“It seems like a great place here, better than my last yard anyway” Blaine said to Kurt as they walked back towards Socks’ stable.
“It is great here, we have fun” Kurt said with a small smile on his face.
“This is my horse Socks, we met when we were little, we were recently reunited” Kurt reached out to pat Socks who was looking wary of Blaine.

Blaine held his hand out for Socks to come to him instead of just patting him and scaring him. Huh, he’s considerate too, Kurt thought trying to hide his smile. Socks’ eyes looked at Blaine carefully and he very slowly stretched his muzzle forward to nudge Blaine’s hand. “You’re the only other person beside me, he even wants to get near” Kurt said with a surprised tone.

“Maybe he likes me” Blaine said winking at Kurt.

“How could you tell he had trust issues?” Kurt asked softly.

“Aside, from the cut on his leg and the small one near his eye, he had the look in his eye my horse had before I found him – the look of a horse that has been mistreated” Blaine said with a sad smile.

“What happened?” Kurt asked. Blaine looked over at him, opening his mouth and then closing it again.
“Sorry, Blaine, I’m a nice person really, I just don’t know how to shut my mouth on occasion” Kurt looked at the ground, mentally kicking himself.
“No, no it’s fine, it’s just, err, Samson died last year, he was my first horse, it’s just difficult to talk about” “Oh, Blaine, I’m sorr-“

“You didn’t know, Kurt, its fine…one day I will tell you what happened, I promise” Blaine said smiling again. Blaine looked conflicted for a moment before reaching out to take Kurt’s hand in his. “You seem like a good guy Kurt; I can’t wait to get to know you”
“Why don’t we go for a ride?” Kurt said quickly, never taking his eyes off their intertwined hands.
“That way, I can show you the yard’s fields”

“Sounds good to me” Blaine smiled up at Kurt.

Kurt what are you doing? You have a tonne of work to do here, you do not need to be riding horses with a handsome stranger, Kurt’s inner monologue screamed at him but reason was just not listening today.

10 minutes later, Kurt had saddled up TJ, a large, muscular chestnut horse with a sweet disposition for himself to ride and Blaine had chosen to ride Darcy, a sleek black horse. They were walking up the paddock of the yard and Kurt couldn’t help but notice how careful Blaine was with the horses, he was clearly an experienced rider and he seemed to understand Darcy.

Blaine was also, not so subtly, looking at Kurt while he was riding. Blaine was pretty sure he never seen such a beautiful man – Kurt was hot and he liked horses, what more could Blaine want? Blaine had also noticed the silence between them was getting slightly awkward when...

“Ah crap”, Kurt shouted as TJ spooked at a bird hopping out a bush and the horse began to gallop wildly up the field. Blaine burst out laughing, letting Darcy chase after TJ.
Soon, after he had caught, he realised this had suddenly become a competition between him and Kurt. Kurt was smirking over at Blaine, willing TJ to run faster – TJ complied quickly, as an ex-hunting horse, he loved running and wouldn’t stop for anyone.

“KURT! Okay, we give up!” Blaine laughed after about the fifth time of Kurt over-taking him by a bit, he could feel Darcy beginning to tire beneath him.

“Well Anderson, that’s what you get for picking to ride one of the laziest horses on the yard” Kurt replied trotting back so he could talk to Blaine properly.

“No fair, you’ve been working here since you were 12 years old, I’ve been working here for an hour…and I haven’t even done any work yet! Shit! I’m gonna get fired aren’t I?” Blaine said, concern suddenly flooding his voice, looking right into Kurt’s eyes.

“Umm, just tell Julia I lead you astray” Kurt said quietly because he realised just quite how close Blaine’s face was to his – well as close as you can get when you are sat on a horse.

Blaine broke the eye contact first. “Race you back?” he winked, kicking Darcy swiftly and cantering back towards the yard. “Looks like working here suddenly got a lot more interesting TJ” Kurt said softly to the horse.