As far as Kurt knew, he was born with that red string tied around his left ring finger, but, as a child, he didn’t know why. It was only tied, single knotted, but he couldn’t seem to remove it. He was too afraid to cut it. It didn’t really bother him as much as it confused him. Whenever he asked his parents or his teachers about it, they would look at it significantly, sigh with a strange, wistful look in their eyes, and then tell him he’d find out what it meant when he grew older, partially because they didn’t know themselves. What they did know they had learned from fairy tales. People close to Kurt were expecting him to unravel the mystery for them.

Except he didn’t know either - not completely. Because as far as he had been told, he was the last one; the only human in over a century to be born with a red string of fate tied to his finger, and it didn’t come with an owner’s manual. This stage of human evolution would more than likely end with him, and whomever else the string was tied to, if that person actually existed. Genetics and biology had decided to trust humankind’s ability to find their own soulmates.

It didn’t, however, trust Kurt, and there were pros and cons to that.

The pro was he was the only one among his friends whose family didn’t constantly berate him over when he would finally settle down and get married, start a family, etc. So, aside from the whole typical, “What college are going to go to?” and “What are you planning on doing with your life?” the far more uncomfortable topic of “Why haven’t you found someone to fall in love with you yet?” was out of the equation.

Temporarily, at least…and that led to the only real con.

Kurt was expected to wait for his soulmate. Not just society expected him to wait, but his body did as well. He felt no attraction, no affection for anyone. He loved his parents, he adored his friends, but as far as romance was concerned, he didn’t have any interest. And while the majority of people in his social circle were finding people to spend their lives with, he was lonely. He might not feel attraction, but he craved human touch, which was something that, apparently, he was not allowed to have until he found his soulmate.

It wasn’t a painful thing if he didn’t think about it too much.

At one point, he threw himself into research, trying to determine exactly what the string was supposed to do. Maybe he was being too passive about it. Maybe he was supposed to activate it or something. Way back, when these red strings were common, it was so much a part of normal, everyday life, that nobody thought it was important to document it. Red strings disappeared long before the age of the Internet, but he found an old article written online that said when his soulmate appeared on Earth, the string would begin to pull. And when Kurt and his soulmate came closer together, the tugging would become stronger. Emboldened with this new information, Kurt waited for the string to work its magic. It had to be only a matter of time. It wasn’t like Kurt was going to live forever. And he wouldn’t have this string if his soulmate wasn’t expected to make some kind of appearance.

Five years after discovering that information he waited, but nothing ever happened.

Physically, the string didn’t cause him any trouble. It didn’t keep him from doing the things he wanted to do. It didn’t get tangled up in his feet. It didn’t get caught on things. It didn’t keep him from riding the train or the plane. He worked, he traveled, and if he ignored the looks from curious people, all eager to know the story behind his red string, he went on with his life pretty much like everyone else.

But, as decades went by, his father and stepmother started to wonder why Kurt hadn’t found his soulmate. Was Kurt not trying hard enough? Did he not travel far enough? What was Kurt doing wrong that the string wasn’t “working”? Because it didn’t move, didn’t pull, didn’t vibrate or hum or do any of the things it was supposed to do when a soulmate appeared. Kurt told his parents to be patient, but the truth was Kurt had begun to believe that there was no one on the other end of that string, and there never would be.

Kurt’s life was a good one, but the life he created inside his head, the one he wanted to spend with his soulmate, was better. It wasn’t better because of ambitious things, like living in a mansion on the French Riviera, or vacationing every summer in Belize. It was better in the daydreaming about waking up beside someone. It was about knowing them, the good and bad things – their favorite movies, their favorite foods, all their secret bad habits, like drinking milk from the carton or chewing on their fingernails.

Except, in Kurt’s mind, his soulmate was nearly perfect. From time to time, an uninvited image of a young boy with hazel eyes and curly brown hair would pop into his head, but Kurt would immediately shut it out. It was too painful to think about. He didn’t want to spend his life searching for this boy everywhere he went, knowing that he most likely did not exist. But as he grew older, he dared to picture him. He created a backstory for him. His soulmate would be fond of music and dancing, the way Kurt was; take an interest in fashion, and even though his style sense might differ from Kurt’s a little bit, the two of them would coordinate unconsciously. In the end, no matter what they wore, they would match. The curly haired boy would have an appreciation for gourmet food, which would work since Kurt fancied himself an excellent chef. They would have parallel upbringings, similar experiences as young gay men growing up in small towns. Kurt often imagined that his soulmate would come from Ohio, too, so that they could tell everyone the bittersweet story of how they lived so close, and yet, didn’t meet, until…

And therein laid the problem. They wouldn’t ever meet, because the boy Kurt dreamt up without even trying, who sang like Frankie Valli and danced like Fred Astaire, who boxed and fenced and played polo, who attended an elite private school but would switch to public school just to be with him, was only a figment of Kurt’s imagination.

But what a figment he was.

Regardless, Kurt felt like he existed, in his brain and in his blood, real somewhere, or in some time.

And one night, the only night that Kurt could remember dreaming of making love to him, (when Kurt was in his late thirties, and, for some reason, his soulmate looked no older than a teenager) Kurt even called out his name.

His dream soulmate’s name was Blaine. Kurt had never heard that name before, but still, there it was, passing through his lips like a song he’d sung a hundred times.

Whoever this person was, real or not, Kurt longed for him. He wanted to share everything with him.

But he was running out of time.

Kurt had no choice about dreaming of this man. It happened whether he wanted to or not, whether it was breaking his heart or not. Every dream began the same, with Blaine coming for him, a smile on his lips as he reached out his hand and slipped it into Kurt’s grasp. Kurt saw every day of this man’s life play out in his head, from the moment he was born, to the day they would supposedly meet, and every day after. But no matter how real any of those dreams seemed, no matter how many times he woke expecting Blaine to be there, lying beside him; no matter how often he’d look up from his morning coffee and think he saw a head of curls and deep set hazel eyes, Blaine never appeared.

And that string remained still.

Eighty-five years to the day when Kurt Hummel arrived kicking and screaming onto the planet, he found himself lying in a sterile hospital bed, waiting for his life to end, and throughout it all, the long years of his life, his deeds and his accomplishments, he only had one regret. Maybe the string on his finger was pointless. If he was the only person who had one after such a long time, and no one else since him had been documented being born with one (which he knew for a fact, as many news outlets kept a constant look out, eager to snatch up the story of uniting Kurt with his soulmate) maybe he had been his own soulmate all along. Or maybe the string was an aberration, a defect, like a benign mole. Maybe it didn’t mean anything, and he should have just taken the risk and removed it. How different might his life have been had he simply taken matters into his own hands and been free of the damn thing?

Even though he didn’t want that to be his last thought in life, it wouldn’t go away. It wouldn’t leave him at peace. He felt that he would depart from the world with unfinished business. He didn’t create it for himself; it was bestowed upon him. It was up to him to complete it, and somehow he failed. But that shouldn’t be an issue now. He felt something pulling, wrap around his heart and lift, trying to carry him away. It felt like his whole body had started humming when, in reality, it had started from a single solitary point. And as he shut his eyes, the beeping of machines in his room growing fainter and more distant, Kurt saw Blaine for what he thought was the last time – his curly brown hair, his hazel eyes, his lips pulling up at the corners in the most handsome smile Kurt had ever seen. It wasn’t until Kurt took his final breath that he felt a hand slip into his, and that red string tied around his finger began to tug.