Two weeks after Mercedes moved to New York, and one week after Sam and Blaine moved into her spare bedroom, she decided her apartment was ready enough to hold her very first party.

Sam's eyes lit up when she told him during brunch. It was just the two of them at the table; Blaine had left earlier to go help Kurt shop for a new pair of boots.  Sam took a swig of coffee and bounced with excitement in his chair.

“A party, definitely. How many people do you think this place can hold? I can get as many models as you want. I think one of the guys I met through the agency is a DJ on the side.  Or maybe his name was DJ, I'm not sure.”

“Not that kind of party,” Mercedes said firmly. “Had enough of those when I was in LA. No, I invited my girls over for a good old-fashioned slumber party tonight. Think you and Blaine can find something else to do?”

“Totally. We were planning to hang out and watch movies tonight anyway. We'll just chill in our room.”

When Blaine got back from shopping, he too agreed to stay out of the girls' way. 

“We'll be hanging out in the living room for most of the night,” Mercedes said. “Might sleep in there, too.”

“No problem,” Blaine replied. “We'll stay in our room and have our own slumber party. Sam, let's do a run to the market and pick up some manly food for the occasion.”

“Ooh, like Hungry Man dinners?”

“No, like mini bacon quiches. They're truly decadent.”

They argued their way through the supermarket, debating which foods qualified for a manly sleepover. Blaine vetoed all processed meats, Sam vetoed any form of quiche, and they had a heated debate in the frozen food aisle about whether sorbet and ice cream were basically the same thing. 

It was close to six o'clock by the time they got back to the apartment, laden down with bags of food and a stack of DVDs from the Redbox on the corner. Blaine was still trying to get Sam to go back and add Frozen to the stack, but Sam was adamant that Disney had no place at a “slumbro party.”

“Slumbro? That's not even a—” Blaine stopped short as he stepped into the apartment. “Kurt?”

“Hey Blaine.” Kurt waved from the couch, where he was sitting with Rachel's foot in his lap, painting her toenails with one hand as Mercedes filed the nails of his other hand. All three of them were dressed in flannel pajamas, despite the early hour.

“What are you doing here?”

“We're having a sleepover, didn't Mercedes tell you?”

Sam pushed his way past Blaine into the apartment. “Hey girls,” he called.

“Hi,” chorused Mercedes, Rachel, and Kurt.

“Just gonna put some stuff in the freezer and we'll be out of you ladies' hair.”

“They're not all ladies,” Blaine said, still looking confused. “Kurt's not a lady.”

“We used to have these sleepovers all the time in high school,” Mercedes said. “It's one of the things I missed most when I was out in LA. All those late nights eating ice cream and watching bad TV and having heart-to-heart conversations with my girls.”

Blaine opened his mouth to correct her again, but Kurt's pointed look stopped him. “Okay, well… I guess we'll… leave you alone, then?”

Sam returned from the kitchen, his arms full of chips, salsa, cookies and soda. “Let the slumbro party commence!” he crowed.

“It's not a word,” Blaine mumbled, looking longingly toward the couch as he followed Sam into the bedroom.

They'd debated how best to arrange the room when they moved in, but eventually they decided to put the two twin beds on adjacent walls to form an L.  That way, the old TV Blaine had found on a curb — which worked great, except for the cracked top left corner of the screen — could occupy the far corner, and they could both lie in their respective beds and watch movies. 

Blaine plopped unceremoniously onto his bed, a pout starting to form on his lips.

“What's with you?” Sam asked, rifling through the bag of DVDs. “You've got that expression like you had after Principal Sylvester stole your Kurt puppet.”

“It's fine. I'm fine. Boundaries are… fine. What do you want to watch first?”

“Either Gravity or Anchorman 2.”

“If we watch Gravity will you just do astronaut impressions the whole movie?”

Sam pretended to breathe through an air mask, saying in a muffled voice, “Houston? Houston, do you copy—”

“Anchorman. I vote Anchorman.”

They were halfway through the movie when a peal of laughter from the living room caught Blaine's attention. He shifted on the bed, staring at the door. “I'm hungry. You hungry?”

Sam was on his second bag of blue tortilla chips, and gave him an odd look. “Dude, we have enough food in here to last us a week.”

“Yeah, but I could go for some sorbet. I'll be right back.”

He cracked the door open and saw that the living room was mostly dark. Mercedes, Rachel and Kurt were huddled together on the floor under blankets, watching something on a laptop. They looked up when they saw Blaine, and he blinked when he noticed that all three of them were wearing seaweed masks.

“Hey,” Kurt said sweetly. “You guys having fun in there?”

“Fine, just wanted something from the kitchen. What are you watching?”

“Mercedes downloaded season 3 of Girls, so we're catching up.”

“Sounds fun.” Blaine smiled. “Can I join you?”

“Girls only,” Mercedes said flatly.

“Kurt is not a girl, why do you keep saying that?”

“It's meant with love,” Rachel piped up. “We know he's not a girl, but he's one of us. I mean, back in high school he used to get all moody and emotional with us every month. We used to call it—”

“Manstruation,” the three of them said in unison, breaking into giggles. 

“Well if Kurt's a girl, then I'm a girl too.”

“You're so not,” Mercedes said.

“Nope,” Rachel agreed. “I made out with you in high school—”

“Can we please stop bringing that up?”

“I'm sorry, honey. We can spend time together tomorrow, I promise,” Kurt said. 

Blaine nodded stiffly before returning to the bedroom. Sam looked up when he came in. “Where's the sorbet?”

“I changed my mind.”

“Well, yeah. Because it's not ice cream.”

They continued watching the movie, Sam howling with laughter and Blaine sneaking longing glances at the door.  Once the movie ended, he stood and stretched. “Well, that was fun. Want to go hang out in the living room now?”

“You heard Mercedes, we're supposed to stay in here.”

“That's stupid, my fiancé is out there—”

“Dude, she's charging us like half of what we'd pay in rent anywhere else. I don't want to piss her off.” Sam sighed as Blaine continued to pout. “But, I mean… if Kurt came in here, that wouldn't be against the rules.”

Blaine looked up. “So you think I should text him or something?”

“No, you gotta be stealthy about it. Make the slumbro party seem way more awesome than the slumgirl party.”

“I really recommend you don't call it that around them.” He chewed his lip in thought. “How can we make it seem more awesome?”

“We could play video games on full volume.”

“Kurt hates video games.”

“We could put on another funny movie and laugh really loud.”

“He's watching a comedy in there already.”

“Maybe we could cook something that smells really good?” At Blaine's dubious look, Sam shrugged. “I don't know, man, what do we have in here that the girls can't offer Kurt?

Blaine shook his head, pacing the room. Then he caught sight of a little bundle of fabric on his dresser, and smiled.

Rachel and Mercedes were bemoaning the lack of diversity in the cast when he poked his head back out.

“No,” Mercedes said sharply, freezing the video when she saw him. “You're supposed to—”

“I just wanted some sorbet,” he said. “It'll only take a minute.”

Kurt glanced up at him and smiled when Blaine walked through the room. Then he did a double-take, his head starting to tilt to one side. Rachel noticed his gaze, and frowned when she saw where he was looking.

“Kurt, has Blaine's butt always been that… onion-shaped?”

The three girls watched in silence as Blaine went over to the refrigerator, bending to reach the freezer on the bottom. He stretched to reach for the sorbet in the back of the freezer, and Mercedes drew in a sharp breath.

“Damn,” she hissed. “Baby got back.”

Kurt just laughed, putting the video back on. Blaine grabbed a spoon from the drawer, looking dejected. And more than a little uncomfortable in his Bubble underwear as he returned to the bedroom.

He and Sam watched The Hobbit next. Blaine seemed to relax and start to enjoy himself, until Sam started reciting all of Smaug's lines in a decent imitation of his voice. Rubbing his temples, Blaine said flatly, “I'm going to take a shower.”

“Should I pause the movie?”

“No, just keep going. I've seen it before.”

He opened his dresser and reached for his pajamas, then stopped, a little smirk forming on his lips. Instead of his pajamas he grabbed his thinnest towel, then headed to the bathroom, pointedly ignoring the living room. He took his time in the shower, conditioning his hair twice. Then he wrapped the little towel around his waist, checking the mirror to make sure it dipped low enough on his hips to be truly enticing.

The only thing he hadn't factored in, of course, was that it wasn't just Kurt who saw him come out of the bathroom. Rachel and Mercedes gave loud, appreciative catcalls when he appeared, and Kurt just shook his head, smiling fondly. Blaine hurried back to the bedroom, changing out of his towel and into his pajamas. Sam was still reciting Smaug's lines and didn't even notice his return.

After the movie ended, Sam looked through the DVDs again and held one up for approval. Blaine shrugged miserably, and settled in to watch.

A couple of hours later, Sam went to shower before bed. Kurt was heading out of the bathroom, his toothbrush in hand.

“How's your girls' night been?” Sam asked.

“Great, it's been great. And your slumdog party?”

“Slum-bro party. It was fine. Blaine was kind of quiet, though. I don't think he liked that last movie very much.”

“What movie?”

“Zombie Soul-Sucker Apocalypse IX.”

Kurt froze. “You let him watch that?”

“I… what?”

“Nothing. It's okay. Have a good night, Sam.”

Kurt stood still in the hallway, listening to the shower start in the bathroom. He glanced over at the living room, where Mercedes and Rachel were already half-asleep on the couches. 

Blaine and Sam's room was dark when he entered. He could just make out the shape of Blaine in his bed, curled up under the covers and trembling slightly. Closing the door behind him, he made his way over to the bed, leaning down to rub Blaine's arm.

“Aaugh, no!” Blaine shrieked, jerking away before he realized who was there. “Oh, Kurt. Hey, I… hey.”

“What did we agree about watching scary movies before bed?” Kurt asked gently, lifting the covers and sliding underneath to lie beside Blaine.

“That it's not a good idea?” Blaine's voice was soft and sheepish, echoing a little in the dark room. “That they give me nightmares?”

Kurt leaned forward to draw him close, kissing his forehead. “Lucky for you, I'm here.”

“What about your night with the girls?” 

“They'll understand. I'll just tell them I wanted in on the sleep-brover.”

“Slumbro,” he said drowsily. “Slumbro party.”

“Close your eyes, honey, I've got you.”

Blaine held him tightly, sighing with relief. “Thank you.”

“And Blaine?”

“Mm?”

“Keep the Bubble.”

“Really?”

“Oh yeah.”

The End