“Kurt, are you okay?”   Zoe leaned across the café table, scooting her cup of coffee to the side with her elbow.  “You’ve barely said a word in the past hour and a half, and usually you’re overflowing with stories of Amber and Lucas.”

Blinking blankly, Kurt lifted his head from where it had been resting on his fists, clenched in front of him.  He had dark lines under his eyes, as if he hadn’t gotten much sleep the night before, and the corners of his mouth were turned down into a frown.  “Sorry.”

Zoe’s brow furrowed in confusion.  “Don’t apologize, just tell me what’s wrong.  You were so happy yesterday about Lucas, so what happened?”

Sighing, Kurt reached into the leather messenger bag hanging on the back of his chair and, after digging around for a moment, pulled out his cell phone.  He slid it across the table without a word.

His friend picked up his iPhone, a little confused, and turned it on.  The lock screen popped up.  “What’s your passcode?”

“Five-four-five-three.”  Kurt’s tone was listless, but his face had flushed bright red.  If Zoe noticed, she didn’t say anything, and Kurt was grateful.  He might have made the passcode during the months when he and Lucas had been relentlessly emailing and texting and he couldn’t bring himself to change it just yet.  It had only been a day, after all.

Zoe tapped in the numbers and watched as the screen popped open, displaying a picture of Kurt and his father standing in front of a huge poster for Wicked, both grinning happily.  “Um, what am I supposed to be looking at?”

“Messages,” came the sad, tired reply.

When, with one poke of a finger, the messages screen popped up, Zoe immediately saw what had put Kurt in such a melancholy mood.  “‘Not coming after all. Sorry. I think maybe we should end this,’” she read, then looked at Kurt in disbelief.  He had put his head face down on the table and was rubbing the back of his neck.  “Is he being serious?”

She could barely make out Kurt’s reply, muffled and quiet.  “Yeah, I think so.”  He sighed again, picking his head back up and pressing the heels of his hands to his eyes.  “I texted him a few times this morning and got no reply, and he deleted his profile on the dating site.  I don’t know why, I don’t know what I did or- what did I do?  Did I do something wrong?”

His mind flitted back to the texts that had followed Lucas’ announcement, a once-sided conversation that had kept him up much of the night.  “Are you serious?” “Lucas, what happened?” “I don’t know why you’ve decided this, but I hope you’re okay.” “I don’t really understand, did I do something?” “When you’re ready to talk, I’m here.” He unconsciously shook his head, trying to forget and shake the embarrassment that comes with feeling clingy but unable to stop yourself from sending just one more text, just because there is still a grain of hope that the receiver will respond.

“Oh, honey.”  Zoe set the phone on the table and pulled Kurt’s left hand from his face, covering it with her own.  “You didn’t do anything wrong- all you did was talk to him, and be nice to him.  If he’s going to set you up just to drop you again, just to cause you pain, he’s not worth it.  And it’s his loss, Kurt, because you are one of the nicest, smartest, strongest, and most honest and caring people I know.”  She searched Kurt’s face, sighing when she saw the tears beginning to fall from his cerulean eyes.  “There’s more, isn’t there?”  When he nodded, she lifted her cup of coffee to her lips with her free hand and took a sip, nodding at him to continue.

Kurt leaned his elbow on the table and rested his chin in his right hand.  “It’s just… it’s been years since I’ve had an actual relationship and… I guess I was just thinking- no, I guess I was just hoping- that this would actually, maybe, be one, you know?”  He kind of waved his hand around as he talked, trying to help Zoe understand the extent of his hope.  “Maybe I’m just getting desperate.”

“You are not.”  Zoe set her coffee down and patted Kurt’s arm.  “It’s understandable that you got excited; people always do when something seems like it could be, forgive me for this, the start of something new.”

Chuckling in spite of himself, Kurt pulled his hand back from Zoe’s and picked up his phone, turning to drop it back in his bag.  “I’m going to forget you just quoted High School Musical and instead say thank you for being such a good friend.  I would love to stay here all day and chat, but, if I’m not mistaken, you have to get to work,” he said, checking his watch, “right now.  Because you have five minutes to get to Amber’s, and it’s at least ten minutes away.”

Zoe downed the rest of her coffee at once before she, too, got to her feet.  She waved off his worry with her hand.  “I can be late once.”

He stared at her, shaking his head, a small smile tugging at his lips.  “Amber will dock your pay,” he said, as if uttering a warning.

Raising and eyebrow and planting her hands on her hips, Zoe stared at Kurt.  “Does it look like I care?”  She smiled when he shook his head.  “I’ll just tell her I had more important things to do and then hope she doesn’t fire me.  Oh, shut up, I’m kidding,” she added when Kurt opened his mouth to protest.  “But I guess I should get going.  If you need anything, call me, ‘kay?  I’ll see you later.”  Zoe pulled him into a tight hug and kissed his cheek.

“Bye, Zoe,” Kurt said, patting her back.  “And thank you.”

“Don’t mention it, Hummel,” she said, starting to walk away.  “And change your passcode!”

:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:

Blaine was packing for his trip to New York when his phone vibrated the first time.  He sighed before picking it up, swiping open the screen and seeing a text from the last person he wanted to receive one from; Kurt. 

Are you serious?

Blaine bit his lip.  It was so, so tempting to reply- to just send a message back and say that, no, he wasn’t serious, that he never wanted to stop talking to him, and that, hey, by the way, this Lucas guy he’d been talking to was really his ex-boyfriend who was just sort of lying to him, but maybe would he like to get back together?

But then Porter’s words from the day before popped into his head.  “Call it off.  Get rid of Lucas.”

Porter was right.  Blaine turned his phone on silent and tossed it onto his bed before running his hands through his hair.  Just one more day, he thought.  One day, then I’ll be in New York and I can find him.  I can find him and make this right.  

Anxiety temporarily quelled, the actor returned to his closet and pulled out a few casual shirts, which he folded and placed in his rolling suitcase on top of his socks, shoes, jeans, and underwear, and then lifted a few dress shirts off the rack, sliding them into a hanging bag with some slacks.  He went back to his closet one last time to retrieve his suits and a few ties.  As Blaine flipped through his suits, he analyzed each one.  He had bypassed getting a stylist all these years, instead choosing his outfits by himself.  If he were being completely honest, he would admit that he had taken this route not only because he had only ever trusted one (besides his mother when he was very young) very special and stylish person to choose his clothes, but also because he had hope that maybe that person would be willing to help him once again one day, and preferably sooner rather than later.

There were two navy suits, one with wide lapels, one with slimmer ones.  He ran his fingers over the buttons of a gray pinstripe suit, one he had just gotten and had never worn before, and lifted its hanger off the rack.  He could definitely wear it to the red carpet event he was attending in the city; the only problem was that it hadn’t been tailored yet.  There was always the chance he could find a place to alter the suit in New York….

That’s it.

:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:

“Yes, ma’am.”

“You do know why Zoe was late yesterday?”

“Yes, I do.”

“Would you care to explain it to me?”

Kurt licked his lips nervously as Amber’s green eyes aimed a piercing glare at him.  “I was having some… personal problems, Amber, and she-”

“Should’ve left you alone and gotten to work on time,” his boss said firmly, cutting him off.  “I docked her pay for the week, and she has you to blame.  Come to think of it, I should dock yours, too.”

“But Amber, we-”

“Nope, it’s too late, it’s done.  Now,” Amber said, turning on her heel and stalking to the back room, tossing over her shoulder, “sweep the floor and organize the threads by color and thickness.”

“I- yes, ma’am.”

Sighing as Amber crossed the threshold, Kurt got the broom from the corner behind the cash register and crossed the store to start sweeping on the far side of the room and work his way backwards.  He had just started swinging the broom back and forth, singing a Katy Perry song that had been playing on the Subway that morning under his breath subconsciously.

“Summer after high school when we first met

We made out in your Mustang to Radiohead.

And on my eighteenth birthday,

We got matching tattoos.

Used to steal your parents’ liquor

And climb to the roof,

Talk about our future

Like we had a clue.

Never planned that one day

I’d be losing you.”

Kurt moved across the room, feeling his spirits lift as he sang.  Even if the song wasn’t a particularly happy one, he enjoyed the sensation of having the words pass easily through his lips, prewritten and arranged, one less thing in life that he had to puzzle out for himself.  Add that to the fact that he hadn’t just sung in so long, and he was in heaven, even if his singing voice was a little scratchy from being underused.  That is, as long as he forgot that his pay was temporarily docked and the man he thought he might be in love with after just a few short months had basically cut him off.

Yeah, it was better to forget that.

“In another life,

I would be your girl.

We’d keep all our promises,

Be us against the world.

In another life,

I would make you stay

So I don’t have to say

You were the one that got away.

The one that got away.”

Kurt, putting all his soul into this personal performance, didn’t notice when the door opened and a customer stepped inside.  The man was carrying a hanging bag over his shoulder, and stopped just after sidling quietly over to the counter so as to not disturb Kurt.

“I was June and you were my Johnny Cash.

Never one without the other, we made a pact.

Sometimes when I miss you,

I put those records on,

Whoa.

Someone said you had your tattoo removed.

Saw you downtown, singing the Blues.

It’s time to face the music;

I’m no longer your muse.”

Still unaware that he had company, Kurt began dancing, shaking his hips in time to the music playing in his head.  The man standing at the counter raised an eyebrow and cocked his head to the side, slightly amused, but even more turned on.

“But in another life,

I would be your girl.

We’d keep all our promises,

Be us against the world.

In another life,

I would make you stay

So I don’t have to say

You were the one that got away.”

He was just holding out the wavering notes in the next line when he added a spin to his dance, with the broom still clenched in his hands.  Kurt had spun halfway when he saw something out of the corner of his eye, and he planted his feet, the note dying in his throat.  The broom fell to the floor with a thump.

“Blaine.”