If he’s being honest with himself, Blaine really does not enjoy all the sneaking around.

Tina asks him, gaze sympathetic and voice brimming with not-quite-authentic cheer, if he’d like to join her for a marathon of British romantic comedies after Glee practice (because “really, Blaine, Colin Firth has nothing on Hugh Grant when it comes to being the sexiest middle-aged man alive”). Blaine has a hard time of reminding himself that she wouldn’t understand the truth, and waves her off with muttered excuses that are only half a lie (his Ancient History assignment isn’t due for another 3 weeks, but she doesn’t have to know that).

Because while Tina spends the better part of the week pining over lost love through song, taking advantage of the solos Rachel and Mercedes’ parting have afforded her, Cincinnati is only a few hours’ drive from Lima. On any given weekend, when the heartache gets to be too much, she has only but to fork out a fifty for petrol and she can restore herself into Mike’s arms, where she can feel at home.

Artie’s enthusiasm, however, is entirely genuine when he invites Blaine around for a bit of a jam-sesh (because “I’ve found a really good replacement for Puck on bass and I know you can rock that keyboard, brother”). Knowing homework won’t pass as an excuse this time (they share all the same classes), Blaine sends a silent thank-you to Tina as he mumbles a quick “can’t, sorry, sexy British men await my judgment at the Cohen-Chang household tonight.”

And he knows that Artie really misses the brotherhood, but he also knows that the whole truth will go a little over his head. Sugar sits right beside him every afternoon, head resting on his shoulder during the rare moments she has chosen to keep silent.

Kurt, staring at him through the camera with eyes that retain just an iota of hurt and confusion when Blaine once again logs in an hour late, accepts his choppy excuses with a smile a change of topic, cheeks flushed as he chatters about his least favourite lecturer. A blind man could see that Blaine’s exhausted, but Kurt tries not to wonder at his unkempt curls and sweat-stained brow, choosing instead to gently berate him for the bags under his eyes (“honestly, honey, you can’t keep doing this to yourself. You need to get some sleep, and not just for beauty’s sake.)

Kurt’s eagerly awaiting coming home for Thanksgiving, as he reminds Blaine nightly, but that’s still near two months away and Blaine’s wondering whether he can truly last that long.

In the end, Blaine knows no one will get it. Because all of his friends are blessed to have their loved ones right here with them in Ohio, while the man that is his home is hours (and more importantly, hundreds of dollars’ worth of travel) away fulfilling his dreams.

Skype chats and phone calls, while never dwindling in their frequency, aren’t quite the same as the quiet domesticity they had built for themselves while they were together. Coming home to an empty house day in, day out, is wearing Blaine’s nerves down. Kurt’s arms are the only place he’s ever truly felt at ease, but right now those arms are far out of reach.

Besides, damnit, Blaine’s a 17-year-old boy, and he has needs.

His love for Burt only grows when the older man simply raises an eyebrow at Blaine’s request that he keep this quiet from his son. When Blaine hastens to add, by way of excuse, that he’s finally realized that college won’t pay for itself, Burt simply nods and passes him a clean set of coveralls. What his boyfriend’s father doesn’t know is the Andersons, in a typical (read: emotionless) display of love for their son, had opened a fund for him at age 5, when he’d first expressed his wish to pursue law. It’s the first lie Blaine tells, and the guilt he experiences the following night threatens to overwhelm him, but as his deception grows and builds, each lie comes easier than the last.

One afternoon at the shop turns to every evening and weekends too, and soon his friends begin to accept that he’s lost interest in social events. But while $15 an hour doesn’t seem like a lot for hard hours covered in grease and sweat and feeling a little claustrophobic as lies under yet another vehicle, the money soon adds up and his friends remain none the wiser.

Until one chilly afternoon when Tina pulls him aside by his locker to accuse him of cheating, and it becomes apparent that Blaine’s absence has not gone entirely unnoticed. After the initial shock has worn off, Blaine glances around him and reveals the truth in low, clipped tones, and just like that the lies begin to unravel. Blaine doesn’t mind, really; it’s like a weight of his chest that he can finally talk with someone about the mess he’s been. Tina scolds him a little for neglecting his schoolwork more than he should, but her (surprising) full support gives him the courage he needs to use his newfound financial freedom and book flights to New York for the following Friday.

*********************************************************

Which is precisely how Blaine winds up leaning against a railing outside of baggage claim in JFK airport at 9:15pm, iPod headphones jammed into his ears as he attempts to block out his too-loud thoughts with the soundtrack to his relationship. The song switches from ‘Let it Snow’ to ‘I Have Nothing’, and he’s suddenly hit by a wave of anxiety as he remembers that spontaneous is just not what Kurt does.

Six weeks spent away from his boyfriend are clearly six weeks too many if he’s already forgotten one of his most basic quirks: Kurt loathes surprises.

Blaine’s hand twitches towards his phone, a half-formed idea in his mind already telling him to text his boyfriend and warn him of his arrival, when a flash of bright green in his periphery distracts him. As quick as they came, the doubts seem to disappear as he races to drag his (“very now, Blaine, I promise”) luggage from the belt and out into the cool night air to join the queue at the cab rank.

His cabbie is overly talkative for the hour as they sit in traffic on the roads into Manhattan, excitedly pointing out a building that was featured in ‘Men in Black’ (“or was it the sequel?”), and explaining the pros and cons of travelling via the tunnel they’re about to enter. It’s just what Blaine needs to soothe his frazzled nerves, so it’s with an even more exuberant “oh, thank-you, sir”, that the cabbie drives off, large tip in hand, leaving Blaine standing on the corner of 5th and 37th. He stares around him at the tall buildings, randomly wondering that he had assumed, from the songs, that the lights would be brighter here than they are.

Suddenly he feels rather overwhelmed.

He climbs the step to the apartment building he knows Kurt is so proud of discovering and buzzes number 31, Kurt’s neighbor. After briefly explaining his predicament to the elderly lady (“Oh, that Blaine. Why of course, dear, he’ll be so glad you’re here), he finds himself climbing the stairs to the 8th floor rather than taking the lift. He needs a way to rid himself of all this excess energy anyway.

Kurts door is as unobtrusive white. Blaine takes a deep breath, steeling himself, and reminds himself that this is Kurt. The boy who loves him. The love of his life.

*********************************************************

6 sharp knocks at the door rouse Kurt from his study-filled haze. From her room, Kurt can hear Rachel humming Sondheim’s ‘No one is Alone’, content in the knowledge that she has finished the assignment he’s currently desperately trying to tap out.

It’s a review due next Thursday and his schedule had required that he finish by last night, but a particularly long (and unusually steamy) phone call with Blaine had put an end to that idea. Clad only in his classiest sweats for comfort, he stretches his legs and plods to answer the door. It’s not customary for even Rachel to receive visitors at this hour.

He swings the door open, and his draw drops at the apparition before him.

Blaine, curls loose and ruffled, capris pants rolled to reveal his usual (read: exquisite) stretch of ankle, stands but a few feet from him, dopey grin in place, hazel eyes a little uncertain.

A silence stretches between them. Kurt licks his lips sub-consciously, taking in the glorious man before his eyes. Each man’s gaze rakes up and down the body of the other, eyes drinking in the sight like starved men. Minutes seem to pass, and Blaine is beginning to wonder whether he should move first when Kurt, voice hoarse, calls, “Rachel.” His voice sounds barely above a whisper, and it cracks on the second syllable.

Blaine smirks. “Haven’t changed that much, have I.”

That voice –his voice, clear as day without a crackly phone line or cheap microphone to mar its beauty- is what shakes Kurt from his stupor. Kurt rolls his eyes at him a little, clears his throat, and, at a rather impressive volume and with no small amount of urgency, turns to yell.

“RACHEL!”

The girl in question scurries from her room within seconds, fluttering over towards the door as she loudly grumbles. “This had better be important, Kurt. I’ve just discovered that if I raise my arms just so…” Her voice tapers off as she sees Blaine waiting in the entranceway.

Rachel’s eyes dart between the two men, gaze questioning. “Uh, hi Blaine! Can’t say we were expecting you! Here, let me…” she reaches forward to take his suitcase, but is halted as pale fingers wrap tightly around her wrist.

Kurt fixes his eyes on hers. “Rachel,” he starts. He struggles to find the words.

“Out.” He winces at the harsh sound of his own voice, but this needs to be said.

Rachel starts. “But…. What?”

“Out,” he repeats firmly. “I want you gone.” He sighs, and his fingers unclench from her arm.

“Can’t you just… ugh… could you spend the weekend at Finn’s, or something.” He doesn’t say ‘please’, because he knows his voice will break and the barely-there control he still retains over his own body will shatter. His eyes say the words for him though, and Rachel looks back between the two. Blaine is still standing there, silent, and clearly in a little shock.

Rachel steps out into the corridor, clasps Blaine in the briefest of hugs, whispering greeting and love into his ear, and cheerfully says “right, I understand completely. See you Sunday night for dinner, perhaps?”

Blaine just nods, and with that, she is gone. It’s just the two of them, alone. The tension between them is palpable; the air thick and strained…

Until it snaps and recoils as Blaine closes the distance between them in two strides, wrapping his strong arms around Kurt’s waist and spinning him, laughing, before placing him gently back onto his feet.

Kurt buries his face in the junction between his neck and collarbone, mouthing across his skin as though he can’t decide between kissing him and muttering “you’re here, you’re here oh God you’re really here” into Blaine’s skin.

Because this boy, this man, his lover has come home to him and as much as he wants to just hold Blaine, to lie tangled together and breathe each other in at though they do it every night, a much bigger part of him wants to be as close to Blaine as possible, and he tells him as much. He means to sound sexy and enticing, but his rushed “I need you in me, like, yesterday”, just sounds like a bad line from a porno to his ears, and he winces a little into their kiss.

Blaine doesn’t seem to think so. Not needing to be told twice, he hooks his arm under Kurt’s thighs, cradles him close to his chest and damn near runs toward his bedroom. Unwilling to be away from Kurt for long, he places him gently on the bed before shucking off his pants as fast as his shaking fingers will allow. A button catches on his hair as he attempts to remove his shirt and the breathless, slightly desperate laughter that follows as Kurt helps him untangle himself is just what had been missing.

The moment is just so them, so KurtandBlaine, that Blaine wonders how he had any doubts at all. Surprise or no, schedule or no, Kurt’s eyes are so clearly full of want as he slides the shirt from Blaine’s arms before shimmying out of his own pants and laying back.

The sight of the love his life lying back against the pillows, eyes hooded and dark and body stretched prone before him, is a little too much for Blaine and he dives, heart pounding, for Kurt’s lips, capturing them in kiss after wanton kiss. Kurt’s hands are a little lost- there is so much heated skin to touch; stroking that vast expanse of taut muscle there or tracing that tender spot here or palming him “right there, oh, just like that, Kurt”. It’s all so hot and fast and clumsy and yet he knows now that this is exactly where he belongs.

Blaine’s hands wander more surely down his lover’s sides, tracing familiar patterns on his skin as he moves to worship the body of this man, this man who has and always will feel like home.

*********************************************************

Later that night, as Kurt lies intertwined with Blaine and whispering into his hair, he mentions how distant the other boy has been lately. His tone is pure curiosity- no hint of accusation- yet Blaine can’t help but sound a little defensive as he explains the events of the last few weeks.

Kurt is less forgiving than Tina for all the lies, and berates him non-stop for a good 5 minutes.

Try as he might, Blaine finds it pretty difficult to take offense to anything Kurt says while he’s naked, sweat-soaked and rocking into him slow and deep.

He decides on the spot that it isn’t worth arguing his point. And when Kurt runs out of reprimands and he pulls him into a kiss, Blaine’s pretty sure Kurt gets it, anyway.