Feb. 1, 2014, 6 p.m.
The Ghost And His Human
They say you're nobody 'til somebody loves you. Blaine is a ghost and as for now a nobody. Until the new owner moves in.
M - Words: 3,092 - Last Updated: Feb 01, 2014 417 0 0 0 Categories: Angst, AU,
Come and say hello: <a href="http://framby.tumblr.com/">tumblr</a>
If Blaine had any say in the matter no one would ever walk into his flat. But he doesn't, so when once again he hears the click from the door he just waits patiently to see who it's going to be this time.
There are always several people. A group of friends who think they can all fit into the small space and share the rent, a couple of hard working people who are searching for the perfect place to start their family, the older people who are just looking for a quiet place to spend the rest of their lives.
Blaine loves watching them going around the empty flat. Some of them just scrunch up their noses and leave, others study the flat and point every little thing they need to replace. Blaine thinks that those people are the worst because the beauty in buying a flat in an old building are all the little flaws you're going to find. It's what makes the flat soulful.
It's another day, another click and another visitor. He is alone this time, there is no one with him but there is no need. The man who's standing in the doorway is magnificent. Blaine looks carefully at him, a little afraid the man could break under his gaze. He is handsome, his hair is sculpted perfectly, his coat fits his body and hugs him like it was made just for him. The man walks around the flat and Blaine can't help but stare. He's oozing elegance and something utterly masculine.
The man doesn't say a word and walks around, drawing the flat in his notebook before clicking the door shut as silently as he can. Blaine can't help but think that the man is respectful even in the way he closes doors. He really hopes that this man will take the flat.
Two weeks later, the man is back, with boxes everywhere. Blaine floats around, poking his head into each and every room to see how everything is going. For now it's mainly boxes and a big bed in the middle of a room, but the man keeps giving orders to the movers and the flat keeps being filled.
At the end of the day the man in question sits on his bed alone, with a glass of wine in his hand and his eyes look empty. Blaine notices right away because new owners are usually smiling or fighting or already sleeping after the moving in day, but not this man. He just sits on the bed and stares.
Blaine doesn't come near him, and tries to be as careful as possible. Today is not the day to make his presence known.
It's months after the man moved in and Blaine finally knows his name. The new owner is called Kurt. Blaine thinks it's a perfect name for a man like him.
Kurt is a quiet owner. He doesn't throw wild parties like the students, he doesn't put the TV sound at the highest like the elder people, there are no kids around so no yelling either. Kurt is mostly silent when he is home, but he isn't home a lot either. Blaine sees how Kurt looks: tired, sad, dull, empty. If Blaine had a heart he knows he would feel it constricted in pain in his chest. But he doesn't have one, so he doesn't feel anything.
After two months, Blaine decides it's time to do something. Kurt doesn't look happy, probably isn't happy, and Blaine can't have his beautiful owner like that. Blaine wants to make his presence known.
There isn't a lot he can do at first, so one night Kurt is sitting on the couch, drawing something, and Blaine switches on the TV. Kurt yelps and throws himself at the remote to turn it off. So Blaine turns it on again. Kurt looks at the TV in horror and panic and shuts it down, so Blaine turns the TV on again, playfully.
Apparently Kurt doesn't think it's really amusing because he grips the remote tightly and runs into his room and locks himself in. Blaine could go and see how he is feeling, but he doesn't think they're there yet so he stays in the living room, a little embarrassed that he scared off his owner. If he still had a body he'd shrug but he doesn't anymore, so he can't.
Blaine makes his presence known a little more every day but every time it throws Kurt off and the man always runs into his room or outside. Blaine swears to...well himself because there is no one else around, that he doesn't do much. He just pushes a chair when Kurt is looking at it, or turns all the lamps on and off. One day he felt a little wild and blew some air on Kurt's neck. That's the time the man ran outside.
Blaine doesn't want to scare the man, and he really thinks that what he does is funny. Apparently Kurt doesn't because several people come in there to chase a devil.
Blaine would frown in confusion if he had a face, but he doesnt so he cant. The first person who comes in is a little bit overweight, has a mustache and a weird accent. The guy does say that there is something in the flat, something strong and powerful and Blaine beams at that because, yup that's him. He is very strong and very powerful. The man then throws some water with sage in the direction of the bedroom when Blaine is standing right above the counter in the kitchen and Blaine loses all faith in the man.
There is a round of people coming in and out, they all say that there is a force, a gnome, a presence, a demon in the flat and that Kurt deeply needs them. They all throw something “at him”, really there is need for quotation marks because not one aims right at him and it's kind of pathetic.
Until a nice lady comes in and looks right at him and waves. Blaine stares, and stares some more and the lady just waits and smiles at him.
“Hello, I'm Mae. I'm really sorry to bother you and I know this is kind of really rude.But I really need to talk to you. If it's alright? Can you answer me at all?” Blaine stares some more and nods a little. Well he thinks it's a nod. The woman smiles broadly at him and starts talking again.
“Okay, great. So Kurt is the new owner of this place. And, well. You're scaring him a little. I know that pushing things around and turning the lights on is your way to communicate or to show that you're here. But we, humans, aren't really open to such forms of communication. So I'm going to have to ask you a huge favor. Would that be okay?”
Blaine nods again and walks around the woman, being careful that he doesn't touch her so she can't feel him. She turns with him, always looking right where his eyes should be.
“Do you think you could try to talk to Kurt?”
Blaine doesn't want to talk, he can't talk! He doesn't have a body! The woman shudders and smiles apologetically at him.
“Of course you can't talk. I'm sorry I even asked. Do you think you could write to him?”
And Blaine knows he can, so the woman finally turns back to Kurt and explains everything to him. Blaine stays right beside them, closer than he ever dared to be, even when he blew air into Kurt's neck. He feels giddy with anticipation when Kurt agrees to talk to him, because not a single previous owner wanted to talk to him, and Blaine thinks that Kurt is amazing for doing so.
Blaine doesn't know how to do it so the first time he writes to Kurt, it's on the mirror above the sink in the bathroom. Kurt is taking a shower, a really hot one and there is steam in the mirror. So Blaine writes “Hi” and waits.
Kurt doesn't seem to like it because he yells and falls in the shower, right on his butt. Blaine feels awkward so he just go straight to the closet and hides there.
It takes Kurt two weeks before he sits on his bed and opens a notebook, scribbles something in it, lays it open on the bed and waits. Blaine looks at him and waits as well, wanting to see what the man is doing. Blaine is in the top right corner of the room, in front of Kurt and they wait together. Kurt writes something else in the notebook and waits some more. Blaine doesn't understand what he is waiting for because there is nothing here, and no one. Except him.
Oh, there is him! So Blaine flies to the bed and looks over Kurt's shoulder to see what's written on the paper.
Hi, I'm Kurt
Is there anyone at all?
Kurt is about to take the pencil and close the notebook when Blaine blows some air in the corner of the book, making the pages turn. Kurt jumps a little and carefully writes something else on the paper.
Who are you?
Blaine doesn't know. He just knows that his name is Blaine and that he is here. Has been here for a while. He is just him, nothing more, nothing less, so he can't really answer the question. He tries to take the pencil and write but it doesn't work very well. He can elevate the pencil and put it over the notebook but that's it. After several tries he thinks he feels tired, though he is not sure.
Kurt says something, it seems nice and friendly, but Blaine doesn't hear it, so he can't know for sure. It's the first time it actually happens. He can hear sound, he can hear people talking and laughing, he can hear the sound of boiling water and scrunching paper. But for some reason he can't hear Kurt's voice.
Blaine guesses it's because he is fading.
They try again. Kurt writes and waits, Blaine elevates the pencil and doesn't do much more. Until one day, when he finally succeeds at writing a short “Hello”. He feels ecstatic, overjoyed. He gets better and better until he can finally write a sentence and then another one. Suddenly he and Kurt are writing to each other every night for hours.
They talk and they talk and it's something just for him. It's just for him and Blaine cherishes every single word. Because those are Kurt's. Because Kurt is the first person to talk to him and to mean every word he writes. Blaine likes how Kurt chose every single words he writes. He puts so much thought in it that Blaine feels.
Before Kurt, Blaine never felt anything. He noticed things, called them by their name because he learnt the words with the previous owners he had. But he never felt, and the more Kurt is talking to him the more he feels.
It's empowering to feel so much. It's scary and fascinating and Blaine can think about an emotion and know what it means. It's amazing to be able to feel and Blaine didn't know he wanted this until now. But he does. He wants to feel, he wants to feel more.
Blaine falls asleep next to Kurt almost every night after a year of talking. They fall asleep next to each other, tired of writing. Blaine usually doesn't see Kurt going out in the morning. Until one day.
It's sharp and high, it's clear and very close. Blaine comes to consciousness rapidly and there is Kurt, pointing right at him, eyes wide and saying again and again.
“Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god!” And then it hits Blaine. He can hear Kurt, and the noise isn't a noise it's Kurt's voice, and to Blaine it feels like a siren's song. He is drawn to it and he wants to hear more, he wants to listen to this song. Kurt is still pointing at him, horror painted on his face.
“Who the hell are you?” Blaine can hear now, so he notices rapidly that Kurt isn't happy to see him and wait... Kurt can actually see him? Blaine reach for the pencil and the book and writes down something before waiting for Kurt to read it.
“Blaine? Yes, I can see you.” Blaine writes some more and Kurt seems to relax a little, there is even a little smile on his lips.
“You have gel in your hair, and you look a little smaller than me. I'd say you have a broad shoulders, and a tiny waist.” Blaine thinks he is squirming under Kurt's gaze. No one has ever looked at him, apart for Mae, but she didn't really see him. Kurt is the first person to look at him and to see him for all that he is and isn't, and it's terrifying to be at someone's mercy like that.
Kurt stays with him that day. Blaine knows that if there was a way, he would be blushing, because Kurt looks at him all day, studies him all day and Blaine thinks that at some point Kurt even tries to reach out and touch him but he doesn't and at the last second, holds out his hand to take the pencil.
It takes two months before Kurt is comfortable with talking and then waiting for Blaine to write something. But when he finally is, Kurt lays on his side in bed, his head tucked in a pillow and he doesn't stop talking to Blaine. When he does he looks right at Blaine, right into his eyes. Blaine feels important, he feels so important when Kurt does that, because he can feel that every word is aimed at him, every word is just for him take and to cherish.
It takes Blaine another year before he can actually talk. They are comfortable with each other. Kurt and Blaine learnt sign language together so it's easier for them to talk. Blaine likes hearing Kurt a lot more than he likes to sign, but signing with Kurt is something beautiful. They learn together and when they sign, they are almost dancing together. Their fingers trying to keep up with their minds until one day Blaine is frustrated and nothing is coming out right. Not the signing nor the writing.
“I need you to hear me!” Blaine yells in frustration.
“And I will. I will hear you and listen to you, Blaine.” Blaine flies quickly back to where Kurt is, looking right at him. “Blaine?”
“Yes.” Blaine hears himself says and it's foreign and different than hearing Kurt's voice, but he can talk, he can finally talk and make sounds and noises that aren't created by moving object. It's delicate, it's new and fragile and Blaine is afraid he is going to break it. So he doesn't say much at first, saving his words, afraid that something might happen to his voice. When nothing bad happens, he talks some more, and more until nothing can stop him. He even laughs, the first time he did he scared himself and turned invisible for a second. But then Kurt explained it to him and he does it again. He laughs and he feels. He never did that before Kurt.
When he opens his eyes one morning, three years after Kurt moved in, he sees the man holding his hand where his cheek is, sort of cupping it. The human can't touch him, they know that, they tried before. Still, Kurt is willing to pretend that he can cup Blaine's cheek, that he can trace the man's features, that he can follow the softness of his cheeks and the sharpness of his nose, that he can trace Blaine's eyebrows and feel Blaine's lips under his thumb. But Kurt can't because Blaine isn't.
He has a voice, he has feeling, he has a body, but he isn't. They don't try to put a word on it, because they don't know how to describe it. They don't how to say that Blaine is real, is part of every important decision Kurt takes, is talking Kurt to sleep when he is sad and laughing at Kurt's not so funny jokes. That Blaine is sharing every little moment of Kurt's life when he is at home, like a human being would. There is no word to explain what Blaine is, so they don't try.
“What is love?” Blaine signs one day, because even after getting his voice there are still things he is too shy to word, so he signs. It's like an armor protecting him. Kurt thinks about it and doesn't say a word for a moment.
“Love is when you fight with someone but still smile at him in the middle of it.” Kurt signs in answer, not really sure that this is a correct definition of love. But just like for Blaine, there is no description for what love is.
“I love you.” Blaine murmurs. Blaine has been feeling for four years now, and everything is still sharp and confusing at times, but he's seen love and even if Kurt's description isn't the best he understands what love is. Love is what he is feeling for Kurt.
“I love you too.” Kurt answers just as shyly.
Fifty years later, there is a legend in the building. A legend about a man who spent his life alone but not lonely. There is a legend about a man who fell in love with a ghost and felt more alive with him than he was with any living human being.