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Fic: Garçon / Fic: somewhere only we know
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Title: Garçon
Fandom: Glee
Rating: PG
Characters: Kurt Hummel, Tina Cohen-Chang, mentions of Blaine
Summary: Kurt never should have left his iPhone with Tina. It's hard to keep a secret when someone is reading your texts.
Count: 2705 words
Notes: This is going to get jossed faster than anything I've ever written! Written for this prompt.
Tina has apparently been lying in wait like some kind of blue-haired goth-chic lioness, because the second that Kurt comes back from the bathroom, she is brandishing his iPhone at him. "Who," she says, "is this."
Kurt nearly trips over his Doc Martens. He stands frozen in the doorway. Tina just keeps looking at him, sitting cross-legged on her bed with her arm extended and the phone in her hand. Kurt can see the screen -- cracked, after Karofsky swatted it out of his hands, but still readable -- from the doorway. It says BLAINE, who has apparently texted him three times in the last two minutes. Kurt is momentarily distracted by knowing that it's 4:30 and Blaine should still be in Warblers rehearsal -- but Tina is steadily watching him.
Kurt takes refuge in as much hauteur as he can muster up. "Do you regularly snoop through your friends' text messages, or am I a special case?" he asks, taking three quick steps across the room to grab his iPhone out of her hand. His fingers itch to open up the texts and see what Blaine said, but he keeps his phone clutched low by his side.
"Your texts automatically pop up," Tina points out, giving him a friendly-but-unimpressed look from her perch on the bed. "If you didn't want me to read them, you probably shouldn't have said I could use your phone while you were in the bathroom."
She's right, of course. But it's hard; no one knows about Blaine, and Kurt actually likes it that way. He doesn't have to explain anything, or listen to faux concern for his happiness/personal safety or the inevitable -- insulting -- comparisons to Jesse St. James. And he doesn't have to deal with the knowledge that no one has asked about the texts he's been constantly sending and receiving, the picture in his locker, or how distracted he has been. Nobody in the New Directions seems to have noticed that anything is different; that Kurt is distracted by something that's making him happy or that he's taking more abuse in the hallways and at lunch than normal. No one in the student body seems to have even said a word about the day when Karofsky drove a stranger in a prep school uniform up against a chain link fence and Kurt shoved him off. That, Kurt thinks, is how little anyone cares.
"Kurt, seriously, come on," says Tina, and then she leans in and her whole face lights with the force of her mischievous smile. "Is it a boy?"
"We're supposed to be doing French homework," he protests.
Tina rolls her eyes. "Fine. Est-il garçon?"
Kurt ignores her dreadful syntax and accent. He admits, "...Oui," and Tina laughs with surprised delight.
"Come on," she says, patting the bed beside her. She laughs again, impatient, when he hangs back. "Come on! Kurt! Who is he??"
Blaine is Kurt's secret, both because he doesn't think that everyone in New Directions will understand and because he just wants to keep Blaine his, close to his chest. The thrill that runs through Kurt when he feels the buzz of a new text; the way Blaine's smiles make his heart beat like it's trying to escape from his body, the fact that he has someone now who really understands where he's coming from -- Kurt doesn't want to share that. But Tina is smiling and insisting and she seems excited, and she has seen the texts (whatever they are), so he can't exactly deny Blaine's existence.
With as much dignity as possible, he walks over and perches on the edge of Tina's bed, crossing one leg over the other. They look at each other for a long minute. "Can I read my texts first?" Kurt asks, finally.
Tina recites promptly: "He got out of practice early, he sent you a YouTube link that I didn't look at, and then he linked some song lyrics."
Kurt is grateful that the texts were all innocuous, silly things; that there was nothing about courage or closeted jerks or being shoved into lockers or how many players on the hockey team called him a fag today. More importantly: Blaine sent him song lyrics. Kurt lifts up his phone and opens the last text; it says: "I'm sending you this at the risk of typecasting myself forever as That Guy, just so you know," and then there is a link to a song lyrics website.
Kurt clicks it and reads as far as:
Do you ever feel like a plastic bag
Drifting through the wind
Wanting to start again
before he realizes what the song is, and he quietly smiles to himself.
When Kurt glances up, Tina is watching him with a hand pressed over her knowing smile. She looks like she might explode a little with impatience but she's trying to rein it in. "Kurt, who is this guy? What did he send you?"
"The lyrics to 'Firework,' " says Kurt, knowing that he has a fellow Katy Perry appreciator in Tina, and he knows that she immediately gets it; her smile tempers into something softer -- and a little worried. Kurt keeps going before she can ask. "You cannot tell anyone about this," he tells Tina.
His seriousness apparently comes across; Tina nods vigorously -- then she pauses. "Not even Mercedes?" she asks, cautious.
Kurt hesitates. Mercedes is the one exception he has considered making to his Non-Blaine-Disclosure policy. She may be a gossip (Kurt loves that about her), but she has faithfully kept each and every one of his secrets that she has been entrusted with, and they're best friends, and she's going to be hurt when she finds out that he avoided telling her something this big. But he has a half-formed suspicion that Mercedes would be one of the most skeptical of Blaine and his motives, and Kurt can't deal with that. Not right now. "No one," he says. "Not Mike, either."
"I won't tell anyone," Tina promises.
Kurt eyes her for several seconds and then he finally sighs. "As you probably know, when Mr. Schuester added the twist to the boys vs. girls competition, I was excited to bring my ideas to the table. As you probably also gathered, they weren't particularly interested in anything that I had to say," (Tina's slightly guilty face speaks volumes about what Mike has told her about that meeting), "and they suggested that I do something more useful with my time, like spy on the Dalton Warblers." Tina's eyebrows have started to furrow. Kurt finishes: "So I did."
"--Really?" she asks, half-smiling and incredulous. "Kurt, that's, like, two hours away."
He shrugs in one sharp movement, hearing his voice go brittle. "I do have access to a car, and I clearly wasn't needed at the boys' team meeting."
Tina hesitates for a second -- then she impulsively leans over and rests her hand on his, on top of his knee. "For what it's worth," she says, "Mike thought the other guys were jerks, talking to you like that. He felt really bad about it."
"I know," Kurt admits, allowing a tiny smile. "He apologized when we were rehearsing the final number later." Kurt's relationship with Finn varies by the day, Artie can be a jackass, and Puck is now literally a juvenile delinquent (and proud of it), but Mike has actually been civil and reasonably friendly to Kurt. When he talks, anyway.
Tina squeezes Kurt's hand -- her fingernails are blue with black tips today -- and then pulls back into her own space, sitting in a cloud of petticoats with her feet tucked beneath her. She's looking at him expectantly.
He sighs. "I met Blaine at Dalton. He's the co-captain of their glee club."
Tina's eyebrows slowly rise, like she's surprised and waiting for more information. When Kurt doesn't add anything else, she says, "He's -- our competition?"
That is exactly, exactly how Kurt knew everyone was going to take it. He doesn't realize how hard he's gripping his phone in his lap until he hears the plastic case creak under his hand. "He's my friend," he corrects tightly.
"And ... he knows you go to McKinley," Tina says. Kurt inclines his head in a yes. "And that you were spying." He nods again, once, economical of motion. "And he doesn't care?"
"Apparently," says Kurt, "my musical and sartorial skills don't extend to show choir espionage."
Tina looks at him blankly.
He sighs sharply. "I was a terrible spy and they thought it was funny."
She smiles a little bit, clearly unsure. "Kurt," she says. "Do you really think--"
"If you say the name 'Jesse St. James,' I'm going to tell Brad to play the accompaniment up a half step the next time you perform a solo," Kurt interrupts, words clipped. "It's not the same. I am not Rachel Berry. Blaine is not some -- Machiavellian tool who's seducing me in order to ruin us at Sectionals. He is funny and he's," he casts a glance at the ceiling, looking for the right words for what Blaine is, "implausibly nice and concerned and perfect, and he gets things in ways that none of the rest of you will, and he's done more for me in three weeks than anyone at McKinley has in two years."
"Okay," Tina says quietly, after several long seconds. Kurt refuses to feel bad about snapping at her. (He feels a little bad. Tina never draws in on herself like that anymore; she hasn't since last year, when she finally started coming out of her shell.) She stares at her knees, and then she eventually glances at him, her mouth tilted up, and she asks, "Is he seducing you?"
Kurt determinedly doesn't flush. "No," he says firmly.
"But he is gay," Tina questions.
"Yes," he says. Her questions are obvious peace offerings, and Kurt takes them in the spirit that they were intended. "I thought the whole club might be gay, at first," he admits, and Tina laughs.
"Why would you think that?" she asks.
"They performed 'Teenage Dream' in front of a huge portion of the student body," he says. "They didn't change any of the lyrics."
"Skintight jeans?" Tina asks, and apparently his expression is answer enough, because she somehow manages to suck in her breath and laugh at the same time. "Come on, Kurt. Spill it." She flops down onto her stomach, sending the mattress bouncing, and she settles her chin in her hands. "Tell me everything." Her smile fades; she adds, looking up at him more seriously: "I won't say anything about the competition. I promise. I know you're not Rachel."
Kurt's smile is close-lipped and contained, but grateful. He shifts until he's sitting with his back pressed up against the wall and the soles of his boots just barely hanging off the edge of Tina's bed. "They were very good," he says to her. "And I'm saying that objectively, not just because Blaine was singing the lead."
"So you think they're a threat?"
"Their choreography was tight and the harmonies were flawless. The entire effect was both highly competent and charming," Kurt says matter-of-factly. "We're going to have a lot of work to do to beat them."
Tina nods thoughtfully, her hands moving with her chin, and then she suddenly smiles. Kurt has learned to be moderately wary of that smile. "Is he cute?"
Whatever his expression is in response to that comment, judging by Tina's reaction, it's very funny. Kurt colors; he can feel the heat in his face, and he covers it by picking up his phone and opening Facebook in a browser window. He types 'BLAI' on the touch screen and the option for Blaine's profile pops up. Kurt taps it, and then he hands the phone to Tina.
"Oh my God," says Tina.
Kurt has opened that page often enough to know exactly what she's seeing. Blaine's profile picture is a close-up shot of him from the neck up, his chin lowered, his head at an angle, and his hand just visible at the knot of his own uniform tie. One eyebrow is low and the other is raised. It's a moderately silly face, but also a decent take on a mock-debonair Mad Men sixties sort of a pose.
It's very, very attractive.
"Kurt," Tina says, without looking away from the phone, "you need to get on this. Immediately."
He resists the urge to roll his eyes, and he holds his hand out. "It's not that easy."
"It should be." Tina is ignoring him so that she can page through Blaine's other profile pictures. Kurt knows what those are, too -- Blaine laughing with a bunch of the Warblers, their arms all around each other's shoulders; Blaine with longer curly hair, bent over the guitar that Kurt hasn't heard him play yet; Blaine and David facing off in mock combat, their fists raised; Blaine smiling directly at the camera with the specials board of a coffee shop up behind him.
Tina glances up at Kurt and says somberly, "He's a serious hottie. Respect."
Kurt snorts lightly. "It doesn't--"
"Wait." Tina's head tilts to one side as she stares at the phone, and Kurt suddenly realizes what picture she's looking at. "Is that -- ? That's the coffee place behind the school. Behind our school." She glances up at Kurt. "He's been here?"
"Once," Kurt says. Tina looks uncertain and he can feel the anger bubbling up again. "He wasn't here to twirl his mustache and record our rehearsal," he says. "He drove 90 miles in the middle of an afternoon for me; we were nowhere near Glee. We went to lunch and before that, Karofsky pushed him up against a fence and he still wanted to be my fr--"
"Kurt," says Tina, and instead of shrinking back this time, she reaches out and grabs his wrist. She must be able to feel his pulse jumping crazily. Kurt's shoulder still hurts from the last shove into the lockers he took this afternoon. "It's okay. He sounds amazing. I'm really sorry if it sounded like I was saying anything different."
"--No," Kurt says, and he doesn't realize just how tense he was until he exhales and lets his shoulders droop. "You didn't say anything wrong. I--" And then his phone chimes with the sound of an incoming text, and he lunges for it. That puts him into an awkward sprawl across Tina's bed, but it gets him his phone back. Worth it.
"What'd he say?" Tina asks, and he doesn't have to look away from the screen to know that she's smiling.
"He wants to know what I think of the YouTube clip," Kurt says absently, and he's already going back to the old text message to get the URL.
"What do we think of the YouTube clip?"
"I don't--" says Kurt, and then the page loads and he realizes what he's looking at. "--Oh my God."
"What?" Tina impatiently cranes her neck so that she can see the screen. Kurt wordlessly tilts it toward her and turns up the volume. He is staring.
"--ng to be singing 'Part of Your World' from The Little Mermaid," says Blaine in the video. His webcam is of horrible quality, but it's obvious that he's in a bedroom, he's wearing something other than a uniform (jeans and a T-shirt, and Kurt should be disappointed by how pedestrian that is, except that he is distracted by the fact that Blaine is actually following up on that stupid joke he had made. and also by Blaine's pixelated arms). "This is for the guy who said it couldn't be done," Blaine finishes and then he actually winks at the camera.
"Are you the guy who said it couldn't be done?" Tina asks breathlessly, grabbing at Kurt's elbow.
"Possibly," Kurt admits, strained.
Then Blaine begins to strum the guitar.
Nineteen seconds into the video, when Blaine has opened his mouth and begun to sing, Tina says fervently, "Keep. Him," and a wide-eyed Kurt can't help but agree with the sentiment.
Title: somewhere only we know
Fandom: Glee
Rating: PG
Characters: Kurt, Blaine
Summary: There is ... pretty much nothing I can say here that is not full of spoilers for upcoming events. Kurt and Blaine talk!
Count: 1324 words
Notes: There are spoilers here for something that will go down in 2x08, and also for the Warblers' set list at Sectionals! Written for this prompt.
"What?" says Kurt. He really does have amazing vocal control; his voice cracks like a whip and it echoes around the pool.
"It's Warbler tradition," Blaine explains, to appreciative laughter from the rest of the guys. "You get awarded your first solo, you go for a swim."
"I already sang a solo," Kurt says, staring at all of them. "All of you sing solos all the time; Mr. Clifton actually mixes things up and shares the wealth."
Jamie shakes his head. "This is your first official solo with us, Kurt. You're doing it at the winter concert, in public."
"Jacket," says Wes, holding out his hands with a grin. A couple of the guys whoop cheerfully.
There's a half a second where Blaine is not sure that non-warning was the route to take; Kurt stands there, staring at them all, clearly uncertain. He's so used to getting thrown around by groups of guys. Blaine should have taken him aside and told him that this was coming and not to worry about it -- but he hadn't thought Kurt would want to be coddled; he has as much as told Blaine that, as much as he likes to stand out, one of the nicest things about being at Dalton is the fact that he can be treated like everybody else.
Yeah, that's stupid. Blaine definitely should have warned him.
Just as Blaine reaches that decision and opens his mouth -- Kurt starts shrugging out of his jacket. Acid-tongued but calm under it (like he's being sarcastic more for show than anything), Kurt says, "Am I allowed to toe off my shoes, or is it also tradition to soak Salvatore Ferragamo loafers in corrosive pool-cleaning chemicals?"
A couple of the guys chuckle and Blaine sees the set of Kurt's shoulders -- now all the more visible in his white button-up shirt, as he hands his perfectly-pressed uniform jacket to Wes -- relax a little bit more. Wes looks to Blaine for a ruling on the question.
Blaine clears his throat and says solemnly, "I'll allow it."
Ten seconds later, Kurt shoves his shoes against Blaine's chest and instructs him to guard them with his life.
Kurt takes being tossed into the pool with more head-raised-high ridiculous dignity than anyone Blaine has ever seen.
"You were a really good sport," says Blaine, sitting beside Kurt in the bleachers. "A couple of guys haven't been so cool about it, in the past." He smiles, so Kurt knows it worked out okay and they didn't throw anybody into the pool against their will or anything. He thinks it still helps Kurt to get a reminder, once in a while, that this isn't his old school.
"It was infinitely more pleasant than being tossed into a dumpster," Kurt says wryly. He's wrapped in the biggest, fluffiest towel Blaine had been able to get his hands on this afternoon; David had laughed when he had seen it, and shot Blaine a total you are such a sucker, dude look.
Kurt lifts one hand. "Water." He holds up his other hand. "Coffee grounds and rendered pork fat." He pretends to weigh the two, then lifts the water hand much higher than the dumpster hand.
Blaine gives a quiet breath of a laugh. They're sitting close enough together that he barely needs to shift his weight in order to press his shoulder against Kurt's. It's a gesture of silent solidarity, to say that he knows that Kurt is joking about it but it sucks that he ever had to learn what landing on day-old hot dogs feels like. He glances at Kurt and finds that the corners of Kurt's mouth have lifted and that he is staring at his damp socks. So basically, Kurt is smiling (very faintly) at his feet.
Blaine scrunches up his face in pretend-thought. "I don't know," he says. "I mean, you are missing out on your chance to learn to swim through rendered pork fat." Their shoulders are still touching, so Blaine feels Kurt's shudder (and he laughs). They've been sitting here long enough that Kurt is actually mostly dry, as far as Blaine can tell; they're just both pretending that he's still too wet to go back out into the late-November snow flurries.
"I don't exactly have a problem with missing that opportunity," says Kurt.
The entire pool is quiet, their voices echoing off the walls. The lights are dimmed for the night and they're mostly watching the water faintly ripple.
Blaine lightly elbows him, after several seconds of comfortable silence. "You know, this is the fastest anyone has ever earned the pool toss."
That gets Kurt's attention; he shoots Blaine a sidelong glance. "Really?" he asks, as he slicks his damp hair back with one hand.
"Yep. I went out for the Warblers twice and then sang back-up for six months before I got my first performance solo," Blaine says. "It took you three weeks."
Kurt's smile curves, quiet and proud and a little -- rightfully, Blaine thinks -- smug. "Two and a half," he corrects.
"Two and a half," Blaine allows, smiling crookedly. Now they're smiling at each other. They make a seriously ridiculous pair. Blaine's roommates tell him that every day, when they also tell him that they're the two most obvious human beings on the planet and he needs to go for it already. It involves a lot of mockery. But pursuing something wouldn't feel right; not when Kurt just got here and is still settling in, and after all of the traumatic stuff that he's still dealing with (the stuff that landed him here in the first place), and considering that Blaine is pretty sure he's the first out gay kid Kurt has ever met.
It just doesn't feel right; not yet. The timing is off.
Which is hard to remember sometimes, when Kurt sits there and looks at Blaine the way he's looking at him now. Their faces are very close together.
Blaine says, "Can I ask you something?" and when Kurt raises his eyebrows and nods, he asks: "Do you wish your solo was going to be at Sectionals?"
Kurt is quiet for so long that Blaine goes through a stage of being uncertain of he heard the question, then knowing that he had to have heard the question, based on how awkward his silence is. Finally, he says, "No. I'm glad it's not." He glances at Blaine quickly, like he's expecting to see disapproval or something; like he thinks he's going to have to defend having mixed feelings about singing against his friends. "It's going to be hard enough competing with Mercedes and Tina and everyone--" he shakes his head, "it would be that much harder, leading against them."
Blaine nods immediately, trying to pack as much understanding into one head bob as he can, and Kurt's face lightens. "Sorry," says Blaine, self-deprecating. "Weird question, I know."
Kurt snorts softly. "What would you have done if I'd said yes? Offered to give up your solo?"
"I would have taken it to Mr. Clifton to see what he thought," Blaine answers honestly, and the stunned expression on Kurt's face stops him short for a second before he remembers how Kurt had to kick and scratch and claw for even a chance at a solo at McKinley. "We're all about what's best for the group; you're one of our strongest voices, and I think 'Somewhere Only We Know' is going to sound amazing," Blaine says, firm. "So if Mr. Clifton thought we could pull it together in time for Sectionals and you wanted to do it, I'd be all for switching out 'Hey, Soul Sister.' "
"What's best for the group," Kurt says, dubious (but his face has pinked up a little with the praise). "Not what's best for me?" He's giving Blaine the side-eye, an eyebrow up. Blaine realizes, belatedly, that Kurt didn't just flush because Blaine complimented his singing voice. He's perceptive; he's got an idea of what's going on here.
"Well," says Blaine, and he coughs, and then he laughs and ducks his head. "I mean-- that, too. Bonus."
It's a matter of timing, Blaine thinks, as Kurt smiles and they assiduously avoid eye contact.
After Sectionals.
Title: Garçon
Fandom: Glee
Rating: PG
Characters: Kurt Hummel, Tina Cohen-Chang, mentions of Blaine
Summary: Kurt never should have left his iPhone with Tina. It's hard to keep a secret when someone is reading your texts.
Count: 2705 words
Notes: This is going to get jossed faster than anything I've ever written! Written for this prompt.
Tina has apparently been lying in wait like some kind of blue-haired goth-chic lioness, because the second that Kurt comes back from the bathroom, she is brandishing his iPhone at him. "Who," she says, "is this."
Kurt nearly trips over his Doc Martens. He stands frozen in the doorway. Tina just keeps looking at him, sitting cross-legged on her bed with her arm extended and the phone in her hand. Kurt can see the screen -- cracked, after Karofsky swatted it out of his hands, but still readable -- from the doorway. It says BLAINE, who has apparently texted him three times in the last two minutes. Kurt is momentarily distracted by knowing that it's 4:30 and Blaine should still be in Warblers rehearsal -- but Tina is steadily watching him.
Kurt takes refuge in as much hauteur as he can muster up. "Do you regularly snoop through your friends' text messages, or am I a special case?" he asks, taking three quick steps across the room to grab his iPhone out of her hand. His fingers itch to open up the texts and see what Blaine said, but he keeps his phone clutched low by his side.
"Your texts automatically pop up," Tina points out, giving him a friendly-but-unimpressed look from her perch on the bed. "If you didn't want me to read them, you probably shouldn't have said I could use your phone while you were in the bathroom."
She's right, of course. But it's hard; no one knows about Blaine, and Kurt actually likes it that way. He doesn't have to explain anything, or listen to faux concern for his happiness/personal safety or the inevitable -- insulting -- comparisons to Jesse St. James. And he doesn't have to deal with the knowledge that no one has asked about the texts he's been constantly sending and receiving, the picture in his locker, or how distracted he has been. Nobody in the New Directions seems to have noticed that anything is different; that Kurt is distracted by something that's making him happy or that he's taking more abuse in the hallways and at lunch than normal. No one in the student body seems to have even said a word about the day when Karofsky drove a stranger in a prep school uniform up against a chain link fence and Kurt shoved him off. That, Kurt thinks, is how little anyone cares.
"Kurt, seriously, come on," says Tina, and then she leans in and her whole face lights with the force of her mischievous smile. "Is it a boy?"
"We're supposed to be doing French homework," he protests.
Tina rolls her eyes. "Fine. Est-il garçon?"
Kurt ignores her dreadful syntax and accent. He admits, "...Oui," and Tina laughs with surprised delight.
"Come on," she says, patting the bed beside her. She laughs again, impatient, when he hangs back. "Come on! Kurt! Who is he??"
Blaine is Kurt's secret, both because he doesn't think that everyone in New Directions will understand and because he just wants to keep Blaine his, close to his chest. The thrill that runs through Kurt when he feels the buzz of a new text; the way Blaine's smiles make his heart beat like it's trying to escape from his body, the fact that he has someone now who really understands where he's coming from -- Kurt doesn't want to share that. But Tina is smiling and insisting and she seems excited, and she has seen the texts (whatever they are), so he can't exactly deny Blaine's existence.
With as much dignity as possible, he walks over and perches on the edge of Tina's bed, crossing one leg over the other. They look at each other for a long minute. "Can I read my texts first?" Kurt asks, finally.
Tina recites promptly: "He got out of practice early, he sent you a YouTube link that I didn't look at, and then he linked some song lyrics."
Kurt is grateful that the texts were all innocuous, silly things; that there was nothing about courage or closeted jerks or being shoved into lockers or how many players on the hockey team called him a fag today. More importantly: Blaine sent him song lyrics. Kurt lifts up his phone and opens the last text; it says: "I'm sending you this at the risk of typecasting myself forever as That Guy, just so you know," and then there is a link to a song lyrics website.
Kurt clicks it and reads as far as:
Do you ever feel like a plastic bag
Drifting through the wind
Wanting to start again
before he realizes what the song is, and he quietly smiles to himself.
When Kurt glances up, Tina is watching him with a hand pressed over her knowing smile. She looks like she might explode a little with impatience but she's trying to rein it in. "Kurt, who is this guy? What did he send you?"
"The lyrics to 'Firework,' " says Kurt, knowing that he has a fellow Katy Perry appreciator in Tina, and he knows that she immediately gets it; her smile tempers into something softer -- and a little worried. Kurt keeps going before she can ask. "You cannot tell anyone about this," he tells Tina.
His seriousness apparently comes across; Tina nods vigorously -- then she pauses. "Not even Mercedes?" she asks, cautious.
Kurt hesitates. Mercedes is the one exception he has considered making to his Non-Blaine-Disclosure policy. She may be a gossip (Kurt loves that about her), but she has faithfully kept each and every one of his secrets that she has been entrusted with, and they're best friends, and she's going to be hurt when she finds out that he avoided telling her something this big. But he has a half-formed suspicion that Mercedes would be one of the most skeptical of Blaine and his motives, and Kurt can't deal with that. Not right now. "No one," he says. "Not Mike, either."
"I won't tell anyone," Tina promises.
Kurt eyes her for several seconds and then he finally sighs. "As you probably know, when Mr. Schuester added the twist to the boys vs. girls competition, I was excited to bring my ideas to the table. As you probably also gathered, they weren't particularly interested in anything that I had to say," (Tina's slightly guilty face speaks volumes about what Mike has told her about that meeting), "and they suggested that I do something more useful with my time, like spy on the Dalton Warblers." Tina's eyebrows have started to furrow. Kurt finishes: "So I did."
"--Really?" she asks, half-smiling and incredulous. "Kurt, that's, like, two hours away."
He shrugs in one sharp movement, hearing his voice go brittle. "I do have access to a car, and I clearly wasn't needed at the boys' team meeting."
Tina hesitates for a second -- then she impulsively leans over and rests her hand on his, on top of his knee. "For what it's worth," she says, "Mike thought the other guys were jerks, talking to you like that. He felt really bad about it."
"I know," Kurt admits, allowing a tiny smile. "He apologized when we were rehearsing the final number later." Kurt's relationship with Finn varies by the day, Artie can be a jackass, and Puck is now literally a juvenile delinquent (and proud of it), but Mike has actually been civil and reasonably friendly to Kurt. When he talks, anyway.
Tina squeezes Kurt's hand -- her fingernails are blue with black tips today -- and then pulls back into her own space, sitting in a cloud of petticoats with her feet tucked beneath her. She's looking at him expectantly.
He sighs. "I met Blaine at Dalton. He's the co-captain of their glee club."
Tina's eyebrows slowly rise, like she's surprised and waiting for more information. When Kurt doesn't add anything else, she says, "He's -- our competition?"
That is exactly, exactly how Kurt knew everyone was going to take it. He doesn't realize how hard he's gripping his phone in his lap until he hears the plastic case creak under his hand. "He's my friend," he corrects tightly.
"And ... he knows you go to McKinley," Tina says. Kurt inclines his head in a yes. "And that you were spying." He nods again, once, economical of motion. "And he doesn't care?"
"Apparently," says Kurt, "my musical and sartorial skills don't extend to show choir espionage."
Tina looks at him blankly.
He sighs sharply. "I was a terrible spy and they thought it was funny."
She smiles a little bit, clearly unsure. "Kurt," she says. "Do you really think--"
"If you say the name 'Jesse St. James,' I'm going to tell Brad to play the accompaniment up a half step the next time you perform a solo," Kurt interrupts, words clipped. "It's not the same. I am not Rachel Berry. Blaine is not some -- Machiavellian tool who's seducing me in order to ruin us at Sectionals. He is funny and he's," he casts a glance at the ceiling, looking for the right words for what Blaine is, "implausibly nice and concerned and perfect, and he gets things in ways that none of the rest of you will, and he's done more for me in three weeks than anyone at McKinley has in two years."
"Okay," Tina says quietly, after several long seconds. Kurt refuses to feel bad about snapping at her. (He feels a little bad. Tina never draws in on herself like that anymore; she hasn't since last year, when she finally started coming out of her shell.) She stares at her knees, and then she eventually glances at him, her mouth tilted up, and she asks, "Is he seducing you?"
Kurt determinedly doesn't flush. "No," he says firmly.
"But he is gay," Tina questions.
"Yes," he says. Her questions are obvious peace offerings, and Kurt takes them in the spirit that they were intended. "I thought the whole club might be gay, at first," he admits, and Tina laughs.
"Why would you think that?" she asks.
"They performed 'Teenage Dream' in front of a huge portion of the student body," he says. "They didn't change any of the lyrics."
"Skintight jeans?" Tina asks, and apparently his expression is answer enough, because she somehow manages to suck in her breath and laugh at the same time. "Come on, Kurt. Spill it." She flops down onto her stomach, sending the mattress bouncing, and she settles her chin in her hands. "Tell me everything." Her smile fades; she adds, looking up at him more seriously: "I won't say anything about the competition. I promise. I know you're not Rachel."
Kurt's smile is close-lipped and contained, but grateful. He shifts until he's sitting with his back pressed up against the wall and the soles of his boots just barely hanging off the edge of Tina's bed. "They were very good," he says to her. "And I'm saying that objectively, not just because Blaine was singing the lead."
"So you think they're a threat?"
"Their choreography was tight and the harmonies were flawless. The entire effect was both highly competent and charming," Kurt says matter-of-factly. "We're going to have a lot of work to do to beat them."
Tina nods thoughtfully, her hands moving with her chin, and then she suddenly smiles. Kurt has learned to be moderately wary of that smile. "Is he cute?"
Whatever his expression is in response to that comment, judging by Tina's reaction, it's very funny. Kurt colors; he can feel the heat in his face, and he covers it by picking up his phone and opening Facebook in a browser window. He types 'BLAI' on the touch screen and the option for Blaine's profile pops up. Kurt taps it, and then he hands the phone to Tina.
"Oh my God," says Tina.
Kurt has opened that page often enough to know exactly what she's seeing. Blaine's profile picture is a close-up shot of him from the neck up, his chin lowered, his head at an angle, and his hand just visible at the knot of his own uniform tie. One eyebrow is low and the other is raised. It's a moderately silly face, but also a decent take on a mock-debonair Mad Men sixties sort of a pose.
It's very, very attractive.
"Kurt," Tina says, without looking away from the phone, "you need to get on this. Immediately."
He resists the urge to roll his eyes, and he holds his hand out. "It's not that easy."
"It should be." Tina is ignoring him so that she can page through Blaine's other profile pictures. Kurt knows what those are, too -- Blaine laughing with a bunch of the Warblers, their arms all around each other's shoulders; Blaine with longer curly hair, bent over the guitar that Kurt hasn't heard him play yet; Blaine and David facing off in mock combat, their fists raised; Blaine smiling directly at the camera with the specials board of a coffee shop up behind him.
Tina glances up at Kurt and says somberly, "He's a serious hottie. Respect."
Kurt snorts lightly. "It doesn't--"
"Wait." Tina's head tilts to one side as she stares at the phone, and Kurt suddenly realizes what picture she's looking at. "Is that -- ? That's the coffee place behind the school. Behind our school." She glances up at Kurt. "He's been here?"
"Once," Kurt says. Tina looks uncertain and he can feel the anger bubbling up again. "He wasn't here to twirl his mustache and record our rehearsal," he says. "He drove 90 miles in the middle of an afternoon for me; we were nowhere near Glee. We went to lunch and before that, Karofsky pushed him up against a fence and he still wanted to be my fr--"
"Kurt," says Tina, and instead of shrinking back this time, she reaches out and grabs his wrist. She must be able to feel his pulse jumping crazily. Kurt's shoulder still hurts from the last shove into the lockers he took this afternoon. "It's okay. He sounds amazing. I'm really sorry if it sounded like I was saying anything different."
"--No," Kurt says, and he doesn't realize just how tense he was until he exhales and lets his shoulders droop. "You didn't say anything wrong. I--" And then his phone chimes with the sound of an incoming text, and he lunges for it. That puts him into an awkward sprawl across Tina's bed, but it gets him his phone back. Worth it.
"What'd he say?" Tina asks, and he doesn't have to look away from the screen to know that she's smiling.
"He wants to know what I think of the YouTube clip," Kurt says absently, and he's already going back to the old text message to get the URL.
"What do we think of the YouTube clip?"
"I don't--" says Kurt, and then the page loads and he realizes what he's looking at. "--Oh my God."
"What?" Tina impatiently cranes her neck so that she can see the screen. Kurt wordlessly tilts it toward her and turns up the volume. He is staring.
"--ng to be singing 'Part of Your World' from The Little Mermaid," says Blaine in the video. His webcam is of horrible quality, but it's obvious that he's in a bedroom, he's wearing something other than a uniform (jeans and a T-shirt, and Kurt should be disappointed by how pedestrian that is, except that he is distracted by the fact that Blaine is actually following up on that stupid joke he had made. and also by Blaine's pixelated arms). "This is for the guy who said it couldn't be done," Blaine finishes and then he actually winks at the camera.
"Are you the guy who said it couldn't be done?" Tina asks breathlessly, grabbing at Kurt's elbow.
"Possibly," Kurt admits, strained.
Then Blaine begins to strum the guitar.
Nineteen seconds into the video, when Blaine has opened his mouth and begun to sing, Tina says fervently, "Keep. Him," and a wide-eyed Kurt can't help but agree with the sentiment.
Title: somewhere only we know
Fandom: Glee
Rating: PG
Characters: Kurt, Blaine
Summary: There is ... pretty much nothing I can say here that is not full of spoilers for upcoming events. Kurt and Blaine talk!
Count: 1324 words
Notes: There are spoilers here for something that will go down in 2x08, and also for the Warblers' set list at Sectionals! Written for this prompt.
"What?" says Kurt. He really does have amazing vocal control; his voice cracks like a whip and it echoes around the pool.
"It's Warbler tradition," Blaine explains, to appreciative laughter from the rest of the guys. "You get awarded your first solo, you go for a swim."
"I already sang a solo," Kurt says, staring at all of them. "All of you sing solos all the time; Mr. Clifton actually mixes things up and shares the wealth."
Jamie shakes his head. "This is your first official solo with us, Kurt. You're doing it at the winter concert, in public."
"Jacket," says Wes, holding out his hands with a grin. A couple of the guys whoop cheerfully.
There's a half a second where Blaine is not sure that non-warning was the route to take; Kurt stands there, staring at them all, clearly uncertain. He's so used to getting thrown around by groups of guys. Blaine should have taken him aside and told him that this was coming and not to worry about it -- but he hadn't thought Kurt would want to be coddled; he has as much as told Blaine that, as much as he likes to stand out, one of the nicest things about being at Dalton is the fact that he can be treated like everybody else.
Yeah, that's stupid. Blaine definitely should have warned him.
Just as Blaine reaches that decision and opens his mouth -- Kurt starts shrugging out of his jacket. Acid-tongued but calm under it (like he's being sarcastic more for show than anything), Kurt says, "Am I allowed to toe off my shoes, or is it also tradition to soak Salvatore Ferragamo loafers in corrosive pool-cleaning chemicals?"
A couple of the guys chuckle and Blaine sees the set of Kurt's shoulders -- now all the more visible in his white button-up shirt, as he hands his perfectly-pressed uniform jacket to Wes -- relax a little bit more. Wes looks to Blaine for a ruling on the question.
Blaine clears his throat and says solemnly, "I'll allow it."
Ten seconds later, Kurt shoves his shoes against Blaine's chest and instructs him to guard them with his life.
Kurt takes being tossed into the pool with more head-raised-high ridiculous dignity than anyone Blaine has ever seen.
"You were a really good sport," says Blaine, sitting beside Kurt in the bleachers. "A couple of guys haven't been so cool about it, in the past." He smiles, so Kurt knows it worked out okay and they didn't throw anybody into the pool against their will or anything. He thinks it still helps Kurt to get a reminder, once in a while, that this isn't his old school.
"It was infinitely more pleasant than being tossed into a dumpster," Kurt says wryly. He's wrapped in the biggest, fluffiest towel Blaine had been able to get his hands on this afternoon; David had laughed when he had seen it, and shot Blaine a total you are such a sucker, dude look.
Kurt lifts one hand. "Water." He holds up his other hand. "Coffee grounds and rendered pork fat." He pretends to weigh the two, then lifts the water hand much higher than the dumpster hand.
Blaine gives a quiet breath of a laugh. They're sitting close enough together that he barely needs to shift his weight in order to press his shoulder against Kurt's. It's a gesture of silent solidarity, to say that he knows that Kurt is joking about it but it sucks that he ever had to learn what landing on day-old hot dogs feels like. He glances at Kurt and finds that the corners of Kurt's mouth have lifted and that he is staring at his damp socks. So basically, Kurt is smiling (very faintly) at his feet.
Blaine scrunches up his face in pretend-thought. "I don't know," he says. "I mean, you are missing out on your chance to learn to swim through rendered pork fat." Their shoulders are still touching, so Blaine feels Kurt's shudder (and he laughs). They've been sitting here long enough that Kurt is actually mostly dry, as far as Blaine can tell; they're just both pretending that he's still too wet to go back out into the late-November snow flurries.
"I don't exactly have a problem with missing that opportunity," says Kurt.
The entire pool is quiet, their voices echoing off the walls. The lights are dimmed for the night and they're mostly watching the water faintly ripple.
Blaine lightly elbows him, after several seconds of comfortable silence. "You know, this is the fastest anyone has ever earned the pool toss."
That gets Kurt's attention; he shoots Blaine a sidelong glance. "Really?" he asks, as he slicks his damp hair back with one hand.
"Yep. I went out for the Warblers twice and then sang back-up for six months before I got my first performance solo," Blaine says. "It took you three weeks."
Kurt's smile curves, quiet and proud and a little -- rightfully, Blaine thinks -- smug. "Two and a half," he corrects.
"Two and a half," Blaine allows, smiling crookedly. Now they're smiling at each other. They make a seriously ridiculous pair. Blaine's roommates tell him that every day, when they also tell him that they're the two most obvious human beings on the planet and he needs to go for it already. It involves a lot of mockery. But pursuing something wouldn't feel right; not when Kurt just got here and is still settling in, and after all of the traumatic stuff that he's still dealing with (the stuff that landed him here in the first place), and considering that Blaine is pretty sure he's the first out gay kid Kurt has ever met.
It just doesn't feel right; not yet. The timing is off.
Which is hard to remember sometimes, when Kurt sits there and looks at Blaine the way he's looking at him now. Their faces are very close together.
Blaine says, "Can I ask you something?" and when Kurt raises his eyebrows and nods, he asks: "Do you wish your solo was going to be at Sectionals?"
Kurt is quiet for so long that Blaine goes through a stage of being uncertain of he heard the question, then knowing that he had to have heard the question, based on how awkward his silence is. Finally, he says, "No. I'm glad it's not." He glances at Blaine quickly, like he's expecting to see disapproval or something; like he thinks he's going to have to defend having mixed feelings about singing against his friends. "It's going to be hard enough competing with Mercedes and Tina and everyone--" he shakes his head, "it would be that much harder, leading against them."
Blaine nods immediately, trying to pack as much understanding into one head bob as he can, and Kurt's face lightens. "Sorry," says Blaine, self-deprecating. "Weird question, I know."
Kurt snorts softly. "What would you have done if I'd said yes? Offered to give up your solo?"
"I would have taken it to Mr. Clifton to see what he thought," Blaine answers honestly, and the stunned expression on Kurt's face stops him short for a second before he remembers how Kurt had to kick and scratch and claw for even a chance at a solo at McKinley. "We're all about what's best for the group; you're one of our strongest voices, and I think 'Somewhere Only We Know' is going to sound amazing," Blaine says, firm. "So if Mr. Clifton thought we could pull it together in time for Sectionals and you wanted to do it, I'd be all for switching out 'Hey, Soul Sister.' "
"What's best for the group," Kurt says, dubious (but his face has pinked up a little with the praise). "Not what's best for me?" He's giving Blaine the side-eye, an eyebrow up. Blaine realizes, belatedly, that Kurt didn't just flush because Blaine complimented his singing voice. He's perceptive; he's got an idea of what's going on here.
"Well," says Blaine, and he coughs, and then he laughs and ducks his head. "I mean-- that, too. Bonus."
It's a matter of timing, Blaine thinks, as Kurt smiles and they assiduously avoid eye contact.
After Sectionals.
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And *sigh* Blaine, and the waiting, and they really should wait, they definitely should, but at the same time, dude, your friends have a point; just get it together already, lol.
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That said, even though I know everyone's going to be a jerk to him about it, I think that given their history, it would be in character for them to be. So it's another...writer!me is going, "Sure, as long as their stupid reactions come from character, I'm fine with it." And Kurtfan!me is going, "No, STOP HURTING KURT." It's a problem.
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<3
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Tina, you are so smart. Love these.
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also loling at tina's reaction to blaine. mte tina, mte.
<3
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The second fic is just too precious for words. I love the intimacy and the level of comfort inherent in their relationship, the way that Blaine is so determined to do what's best for Kurt because he cares about him so much without infringing on what Kurt wants.
Love both of these. Definitely adding this post to my bookmarks.
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I thought it was amazing a few paragraphs in - "Nobody in the New Directions seems to have noticed that anything is different; that Kurt is distracted by something that's making him happy or that he's taking more abuse in the hallways and at lunch than normal. No one in the student body seems to have even said a word about the day when Karofsky drove a stranger in a prep school uniform up against a chain link fence and Kurt shoved him off. That, Kurt thinks, is how little anyone cares"
This really got to me and makes me curious about Kurt's happiness in next's week's episode, in the scene that's been released - I wonder if anyone in the club is going to notice or question his behaviour.
Then you killed me:
You have no idea how much I want Darren to sing 'Firework' - it's my favorite song at the moment. In fact, my tweets from earlier today:
From: @nataliefisher
Sent: Nov 13, 2010 11:13a
I really, really want @DarrenCriss to follow up Teenage Dream with Firework. I fucking love this song and he should sing it to Kurt.
sent via Twitter for BlackBerry®
On Twitter: http://twitter.com/nataliefisher/status/3239027989811200
And holy shit it was epic all the way through. I love ppl playing in Darren's music to fit Blaine.
Reading the 2nd one now.
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Another tweet from earlier today:
From: @nataliefisher
Sent: Nov 13, 2010 4:29p
Darren is going to fucking destroy that song, in a good way. Also, they need to give him some Keane, right?
sent via Twitter for BlackBerry®
On Twitter: http://twitter.com/nataliefisher/status/3318521173905408
Okay, I said Darren, because I love his falsetto, didn't consider Chris for it, but the whole album Hopes and Fears is reminding me of the pairing so much.
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*cracks up* I am pretty sure that's the first time a reader has ever called me a psychic freak as a compliment; SCORE!! I have to admit that I don't particularly like "Firework" (Katy Perry's whole history of weirdly homophobic songs sticks in my craw and makes it hard for me to enjoy her other stuff), but it was just too perfect for Blaine "Courage" ... well, he doesn't have a last name yet. But if he had one, I would have written it right there!
I also have to admit that I didn't even give the lyrics of "Somewhere Only We Know" a second thought; I just picked something that I thought would sound nice in Chris Colfer's vocal range! Now that you mention it, though, it is very apropos!
Thanks so much for your comments!
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"It should be." "
You tell him, Tina. The first is a lovely way of addressing the oh-so-obvious-but-clearly-different St.James parallel and I hope the writers take a cue from you here. And Mike apologizing for the messy homophobia in the planning meeting? Great touch--again, can the writers listen to you?
The second one just about broke me when Kurt realizes Blaine WOULD so give up the solo if it was better for the team as a whole. And, of course, also for him....Kurt's realization of just how bad life was at WM even though he didn't realize it because he had gotten so used to it was gut wrenching. Thank goodness Blaine was (&will be)there for him. thanks for these!
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Thank you so much!
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LOL! MTE, TINA. <3
If Kurt talks to one of his girls about Blaine on the show, which I'm dying to see happen, I hope there's a comment about Blaine being stone cold (super mega) foxy and discussion of the St. James parallel.
He's wrapped in the biggest, fluffiest towel Blaine had been able to get his hands on this afternoon; David had laughed when he had seen it, and shot Blaine a total you are such a sucker, dude look.
Ahahahaha! Awwwwww. <3
I want Blaine being a total lovesick puppy like this, trying and failing to maintain his cool guy demeanor around Kurt.
Fantastic fics. 8D
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The second one is just gorgeous!
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I hope when the inevitable 'you're dating the enemy' shit goes down in ND that she's on Kurt's side :|
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/coherent love
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Great job! :)
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