Where Wind and Water Meet - Chapter 2
Title: Where Wind and Water Meet
Artist: morph0fairy
Author: firefly_ca
Rating (art/fic if different): PG
Word Count: 24K
Warnings (if any): Major character death wrapped up in magic realism.
Fic Summary: Inspired by/loosely based on George MacDonald's At The Back of the North Wind. Blaine has never behaved the way normal children do and has always been too quiet and detached from the world around him. Everything changes the day he meets a strange boy named Kurt with the ability to change his appearance and who says he can control the wind. Blaine doesn't know why, but it feels like he's known Kurt forever. AU, but not totally detached from the Glee universe.
Chapter 2
School starts and Blaine's best friend there is Tina, who is in the same classroom as he is. They laugh and play, and Tina doesn't even mind when Blaine forgets to act like other people in front of her.
"Why do you do that?" She asks one time. "You're so quiet and you stop moving, like you've gone away."
"I think I do," Blaine admits. "Sometimes I don't feel like me. I feel wrong, like I'm too big for six years old and I don't fit."
"Maybe you'll grow to fit you," Tina suggests, like she hears people say such strange things all the time.
He tells her about Kurt, too, and she tells him all about her own special friend that no one can see, whose name is Tina, too.
"Tina is very brave," she tells him. "She always says when she knows the answer, and she never has to hide behind her mom when she's meeting someone new. She's teaching me to be brave like her."
It's not long before Blaine figures out that the second Tina is just the first Tina playing pretend, but it's nice to be able to talk to someone about Kurt, even though she doesn't really understand. He talks to Kurt about Tina sometimes too, when he comes to the now always-open window and they run off for adventures together. At first Kurt doesn't like hearing Blaine talk about Tina and says very nasty things about her.
"I shouldn't have let you stop to help her that first night I took you with me," he says. "She didn't deserve your help anyhow. We should have just left her there."
Blaine closes the window for the next three nights and locks it tight, just to make sure Kurt knows that he's not allowed to say mean things about nice people, and Kurt is a little sheepish when he's finally allowed back into Blaine's room again, apologizing and promising to share.
"Do you like her more than me?" He asks one Saturday afternoon, looking at Blaine like he's worried. "Are you going to close the window now that you talk to someone your age?"
"You and me are like the same age now," Blaine points out.
They're sitting together in the backyard, not going anywhere this time. Kurt is softer and gentler right now, and not feeling strong enough to carry Blaine, so they sit side-by-side on the swings, rocking gently. Kurt looks different, younger, when he's calmer. His looks change a lot when his strength changes, because even though he says he could stay the same size all the time, "it feels better when the insides and the outsides match." It's taken Blaine a long time to recognize him in all his different sizes, but he's starting to like them all. This particular Kurt is one of his favourites because Kurt is small like he is, and round like he is, and he looks like a five-and-a-half-year-old, too. He's still bossy, and he still orders Blaine around, but he doesn't fight as hard when Blaine doesn't want to listen. If this Kurt was his all-the-time Kurt, he might get tired of it, but sometimes it's very nice not to have to look up to the person you spend so much time talking to.
(click for link to higher quality) (alt link)
"And Tina's not my age," Blaine adds, even though he knows they've been alive the same number of years. He's not sure why that doesn't matter, but he's sure he's older than Tina. "And I might close the window sometimes, if she's here and I can't come, but I'll never leave it closed forever. There's no one in the world who I like more than you."
"Good," Kurt says, nodding to himself in relief. "The other winds were talking and they were saying that you might have left to find a new favourite. I should have known they weren't telling the truth. They're always so jealous."
Kurt isn't making much sense, but there are a lot of times Kurt doesn't make sense. Kurt always seems to think that Blaine knows more than he does, when sometimes Blaine can't understand even one word of what Kurt is telling him. When this happens, Blaine always starts to worry that Kurt has mistaken him for someone else. He never says anything, just in case there really has been an accident and asking more questions chases his Kurt away from him. It's the only time he doesn't ask when he wants to know.
"What are the other winds like?" Blaine asks, a little to change the subject but even more because he loves hearing about the things Kurt hasn't shown him yet. "What are their names?"
Kurt looks sulky again, which is very funny on something as strong as the weather.
"I don't know why you care about them," he says, darkly, and the wind around them blows just a little bit colder. "I thought you liked me most."
"I do," Blaine reassures, "but I've never even met the other winds. I want to know who it is I like you more than."
Kurt sighs, but gives in. Kurt always gives in when Blaine asks. It's one of the best things about him.
"East Wind is the best when she's cold and strong like me. She likes to throw ice on the people who live close to her side of the water, but that's only because she wants attention. East Wind always wants attention."
"Do you play with each other?" Blaine asks, but Kurt just snorts a little.
"I like Rachel - that's East Wind - fine, but I don't like playing games with her. She always tries to win, even though the only one who should be winning anything is me. I do work with her sometimes, though. I work with all the winds."
"What do you do?" Blaine asks.
"It depends where we are, and how many of us are working." Kurt says. "Hurricanes are the hardest. I don't like it when we have to build those."
"It sounds like a lot of work," Blaine offers.
"It used to be easier," Kurt says, glancing at Blaine out of the corner of his eye as his feet trail in the dirt beneath them, stirring up clouds. "But hurricanes don't work without the water helping, and the water isn't as helpful as it used to be. It's like there's a piece missing, like the part that listens to us has gone missing. We can't really talk to the water at all anymore."
"I'm sorry," Blaine says, not sure why he feels guilty.
Kurt only shrugs.
"Maybe it will come back one day," he says. "It would be good. We all miss it."
"Who else is in the wind?" Blaine asks. "What are the other names?"
"You keep forgetting everyone has more than one name," Kurt smiles. "But the other winds are West and South. If you call me Kurt and East Rachel, then you could call the other two Mercedes and Finn. They're much warmer to walk against, and people like them a lot more because they think they're so gentle and peaceful."
"You're gentle and peaceful," Blaine points out.
"But people don't think of me like that," Kurt says. "And I am more used to yelling than I am to talking quietly. Finn is usually pretty quiet, even though he's very strong. The other winds boss him around a lot."
"What about Mercedes?" Blaine asks, sounding out the name carefully, because even though it's beautiful it's very long and hard say in the right order.
"Mercedes is warm," Kurt smiles, and Blaine thinks that maybe it means Mercedes is Kurt's favourite. "But she's very strong, especially in mountains, and she can hurt a lot of people if they're not careful, or if they're where they're not supposed to be."
"Why do you like that she can hurt people?" Blaine asks, because he can tell that Kurt does and still doesn't know what to make of someone who likes pain the way he seems to.
"I like it because I like strong things that get mistaken for weak things," Kurt says. "That's why I like you, Blaine. You're strong in unexpected ways."
"Cooper says I'm not even a little strong," Blaine says, skeptically. "And he makes me hit myself, which isn't what strong people do."
"I said you're strong in unexpected ways," Kurt says, patiently. "In special ways, you're stronger than Cooper."
"How?" Blaine asks.
"You were brave enough to understand when people have to die," Kurt says. "Even though you know what dying is."
It's true that Blaine does know about death, because last year they had to put the family cat to sleep. It's also true that on the night Kurt brought him home early because he had to go to a house fire, he cried himself to sleep when he found out that Kurt wasn't going to be there to help stop it.
***
"Remember what I said that first night about how most people can only climb onto my back if I'm taking them away forever?" Kurt says, gently. "They go away after they're too hurt to go on living. I take them to a place where it doesn't hurt anymore, and I keep them safe. But the only way they get to come with me is if they leave here and don't come back. They have to be dead before they leave, or else it doesn't work."
"But if people are scared and in trouble you should be helping them," Blaine says.
"I do help," Kurt says, "Just in a different way than you want me to. The fire is hot where I'm going; it's scary and out-of-control and is making very scared people hurt. Where they are is terrible for them, and they can't get out, so my job is to blow the smoke over them until they get sleepy, so they don't feel when they're put on my back. I get to help the hurting stop and then I get to take them to a place where everything is good again."
"How do you know they can't get out?" Blaine insists. "What happens to those people if you're wrong?"
"I'm never wrong," Kurt says. "There's music in the air all around us Blaine, only you can't hear it with your little human ears. But I hear, and I listen. It always tells me who I can save and who I can't. It tells me who needs to be carried and who will be able to walk. I can't make mistakes. The song won't let me."
Blaine thinks about the people, scared and hot inside a house burning bright enough to burn them to ashes, and then he thinks about how safe and lovely it is to go flying with Kurt and nods once to himself.
"You'd better hurry," he says, waving goodbye at their window before throwing himself onto his bed and sobbing for the people who are going to leave soon and never come back. He's never felt so much before.
***
"You're not very brave if you cry about it," Blaine tells the small Kurt as they sit next to each other on the swings.
"Sometimes the bravest people are the ones who are crying," Kurt says. "Sometimes the people who are crying are the only ones who understand enough to be brave."
"Where do you take the dead people?" Blaine asks, curiously.
"I take them to the country at my back," Kurt says. "Behind the North Wind."
"What's it like there?"
"I wouldn't know," Kurt says. "The people who see it seem to like it very much. At least, they almost never leave once they've gone inside, but I can't see it. It's always behind me."
"That's not fair," Blaine says. "It's not fair for you to have to take everyone to a place that's so good but never be allowed to see it for yourself. Why don't you get to go there?"
"If I went there it wouldn't be real anymore," Kurt says, and he looks extra sad as he says it, when his body is so small and unimportant-looking like it is right now. "I'll never know what it's like."
"Yes you will," Blaine says, determinedly. "One day, you'll take me and I'll get to go. As soon as I'm there, I'll come right back out and I'll tell you about everything. I'll tell you so good it's like you get to go in, too."
Kurt is looking at him strangely again.
"Most people don't want me to take them to that place," he says. "They almost always ask for more time when they see me coming. They're almost always scared. Why do you talk about 'getting' to go with me?"
Blaine is quiet for a moment, thinking carefully about what Kurt is asking, before he finally settles on saying,
"It sounds like a hard place to get to."
Kurt confirms this.
"It's the hardest place to get to."
"It takes a long time to do hard things, and I like you more than anyone. If I get to go with you, maybe getting there will feel like forever, and that means I get to spend forever with you. That's so much nicer than staying here by myself."
Kurt sits quietly for a moment, diminishing until he almost seems to be disappearing before Blaine's eyes. Then he suddenly charges up out of his seat, catching Blaine up in his arms as he does so. Blaine can feel Kurt's lonely sadness in the hug so strongly it's like a living thing, so he hugs back just as hard, hoping to chase some of it away. Kurt's arms feel strong again and when he looks harder he sees it's because the first Kurt, his favourite Kurt, is here now, and Blaine smiles. Little Kurt is nice, but this Kurt is his.
"I'm so glad I found you," Kurt says, setting Blaine down and taking his hand as they walk to the end of the yard. They jump over the gate instead of opening it, and suddenly they're flying again. Blaine tries to guess where they're going next.
"Me too," he says, and he wonders if it's wrong that he might love Kurt more than Cooper and Tina, and even Mom and Dad. He wonders what it means when you know the wind better than you know your own family.
To Chapter 1 | To Masterpost | To Chapter 3
Artist: morph0fairy
Author: firefly_ca
Rating (art/fic if different): PG
Word Count: 24K
Warnings (if any): Major character death wrapped up in magic realism.
Fic Summary: Inspired by/loosely based on George MacDonald's At The Back of the North Wind. Blaine has never behaved the way normal children do and has always been too quiet and detached from the world around him. Everything changes the day he meets a strange boy named Kurt with the ability to change his appearance and who says he can control the wind. Blaine doesn't know why, but it feels like he's known Kurt forever. AU, but not totally detached from the Glee universe.
Chapter 2
School starts and Blaine's best friend there is Tina, who is in the same classroom as he is. They laugh and play, and Tina doesn't even mind when Blaine forgets to act like other people in front of her.
"Why do you do that?" She asks one time. "You're so quiet and you stop moving, like you've gone away."
"I think I do," Blaine admits. "Sometimes I don't feel like me. I feel wrong, like I'm too big for six years old and I don't fit."
"Maybe you'll grow to fit you," Tina suggests, like she hears people say such strange things all the time.
He tells her about Kurt, too, and she tells him all about her own special friend that no one can see, whose name is Tina, too.
"Tina is very brave," she tells him. "She always says when she knows the answer, and she never has to hide behind her mom when she's meeting someone new. She's teaching me to be brave like her."
It's not long before Blaine figures out that the second Tina is just the first Tina playing pretend, but it's nice to be able to talk to someone about Kurt, even though she doesn't really understand. He talks to Kurt about Tina sometimes too, when he comes to the now always-open window and they run off for adventures together. At first Kurt doesn't like hearing Blaine talk about Tina and says very nasty things about her.
"I shouldn't have let you stop to help her that first night I took you with me," he says. "She didn't deserve your help anyhow. We should have just left her there."
Blaine closes the window for the next three nights and locks it tight, just to make sure Kurt knows that he's not allowed to say mean things about nice people, and Kurt is a little sheepish when he's finally allowed back into Blaine's room again, apologizing and promising to share.
"Do you like her more than me?" He asks one Saturday afternoon, looking at Blaine like he's worried. "Are you going to close the window now that you talk to someone your age?"
"You and me are like the same age now," Blaine points out.
They're sitting together in the backyard, not going anywhere this time. Kurt is softer and gentler right now, and not feeling strong enough to carry Blaine, so they sit side-by-side on the swings, rocking gently. Kurt looks different, younger, when he's calmer. His looks change a lot when his strength changes, because even though he says he could stay the same size all the time, "it feels better when the insides and the outsides match." It's taken Blaine a long time to recognize him in all his different sizes, but he's starting to like them all. This particular Kurt is one of his favourites because Kurt is small like he is, and round like he is, and he looks like a five-and-a-half-year-old, too. He's still bossy, and he still orders Blaine around, but he doesn't fight as hard when Blaine doesn't want to listen. If this Kurt was his all-the-time Kurt, he might get tired of it, but sometimes it's very nice not to have to look up to the person you spend so much time talking to.
(click for link to higher quality) (alt link)
"And Tina's not my age," Blaine adds, even though he knows they've been alive the same number of years. He's not sure why that doesn't matter, but he's sure he's older than Tina. "And I might close the window sometimes, if she's here and I can't come, but I'll never leave it closed forever. There's no one in the world who I like more than you."
"Good," Kurt says, nodding to himself in relief. "The other winds were talking and they were saying that you might have left to find a new favourite. I should have known they weren't telling the truth. They're always so jealous."
Kurt isn't making much sense, but there are a lot of times Kurt doesn't make sense. Kurt always seems to think that Blaine knows more than he does, when sometimes Blaine can't understand even one word of what Kurt is telling him. When this happens, Blaine always starts to worry that Kurt has mistaken him for someone else. He never says anything, just in case there really has been an accident and asking more questions chases his Kurt away from him. It's the only time he doesn't ask when he wants to know.
"What are the other winds like?" Blaine asks, a little to change the subject but even more because he loves hearing about the things Kurt hasn't shown him yet. "What are their names?"
Kurt looks sulky again, which is very funny on something as strong as the weather.
"I don't know why you care about them," he says, darkly, and the wind around them blows just a little bit colder. "I thought you liked me most."
"I do," Blaine reassures, "but I've never even met the other winds. I want to know who it is I like you more than."
Kurt sighs, but gives in. Kurt always gives in when Blaine asks. It's one of the best things about him.
"East Wind is the best when she's cold and strong like me. She likes to throw ice on the people who live close to her side of the water, but that's only because she wants attention. East Wind always wants attention."
"Do you play with each other?" Blaine asks, but Kurt just snorts a little.
"I like Rachel - that's East Wind - fine, but I don't like playing games with her. She always tries to win, even though the only one who should be winning anything is me. I do work with her sometimes, though. I work with all the winds."
"What do you do?" Blaine asks.
"It depends where we are, and how many of us are working." Kurt says. "Hurricanes are the hardest. I don't like it when we have to build those."
"It sounds like a lot of work," Blaine offers.
"It used to be easier," Kurt says, glancing at Blaine out of the corner of his eye as his feet trail in the dirt beneath them, stirring up clouds. "But hurricanes don't work without the water helping, and the water isn't as helpful as it used to be. It's like there's a piece missing, like the part that listens to us has gone missing. We can't really talk to the water at all anymore."
"I'm sorry," Blaine says, not sure why he feels guilty.
Kurt only shrugs.
"Maybe it will come back one day," he says. "It would be good. We all miss it."
"Who else is in the wind?" Blaine asks. "What are the other names?"
"You keep forgetting everyone has more than one name," Kurt smiles. "But the other winds are West and South. If you call me Kurt and East Rachel, then you could call the other two Mercedes and Finn. They're much warmer to walk against, and people like them a lot more because they think they're so gentle and peaceful."
"You're gentle and peaceful," Blaine points out.
"But people don't think of me like that," Kurt says. "And I am more used to yelling than I am to talking quietly. Finn is usually pretty quiet, even though he's very strong. The other winds boss him around a lot."
"What about Mercedes?" Blaine asks, sounding out the name carefully, because even though it's beautiful it's very long and hard say in the right order.
"Mercedes is warm," Kurt smiles, and Blaine thinks that maybe it means Mercedes is Kurt's favourite. "But she's very strong, especially in mountains, and she can hurt a lot of people if they're not careful, or if they're where they're not supposed to be."
"Why do you like that she can hurt people?" Blaine asks, because he can tell that Kurt does and still doesn't know what to make of someone who likes pain the way he seems to.
"I like it because I like strong things that get mistaken for weak things," Kurt says. "That's why I like you, Blaine. You're strong in unexpected ways."
"Cooper says I'm not even a little strong," Blaine says, skeptically. "And he makes me hit myself, which isn't what strong people do."
"I said you're strong in unexpected ways," Kurt says, patiently. "In special ways, you're stronger than Cooper."
"How?" Blaine asks.
"You were brave enough to understand when people have to die," Kurt says. "Even though you know what dying is."
It's true that Blaine does know about death, because last year they had to put the family cat to sleep. It's also true that on the night Kurt brought him home early because he had to go to a house fire, he cried himself to sleep when he found out that Kurt wasn't going to be there to help stop it.
***
"Remember what I said that first night about how most people can only climb onto my back if I'm taking them away forever?" Kurt says, gently. "They go away after they're too hurt to go on living. I take them to a place where it doesn't hurt anymore, and I keep them safe. But the only way they get to come with me is if they leave here and don't come back. They have to be dead before they leave, or else it doesn't work."
"But if people are scared and in trouble you should be helping them," Blaine says.
"I do help," Kurt says, "Just in a different way than you want me to. The fire is hot where I'm going; it's scary and out-of-control and is making very scared people hurt. Where they are is terrible for them, and they can't get out, so my job is to blow the smoke over them until they get sleepy, so they don't feel when they're put on my back. I get to help the hurting stop and then I get to take them to a place where everything is good again."
"How do you know they can't get out?" Blaine insists. "What happens to those people if you're wrong?"
"I'm never wrong," Kurt says. "There's music in the air all around us Blaine, only you can't hear it with your little human ears. But I hear, and I listen. It always tells me who I can save and who I can't. It tells me who needs to be carried and who will be able to walk. I can't make mistakes. The song won't let me."
Blaine thinks about the people, scared and hot inside a house burning bright enough to burn them to ashes, and then he thinks about how safe and lovely it is to go flying with Kurt and nods once to himself.
"You'd better hurry," he says, waving goodbye at their window before throwing himself onto his bed and sobbing for the people who are going to leave soon and never come back. He's never felt so much before.
***
"You're not very brave if you cry about it," Blaine tells the small Kurt as they sit next to each other on the swings.
"Sometimes the bravest people are the ones who are crying," Kurt says. "Sometimes the people who are crying are the only ones who understand enough to be brave."
"Where do you take the dead people?" Blaine asks, curiously.
"I take them to the country at my back," Kurt says. "Behind the North Wind."
"What's it like there?"
"I wouldn't know," Kurt says. "The people who see it seem to like it very much. At least, they almost never leave once they've gone inside, but I can't see it. It's always behind me."
"That's not fair," Blaine says. "It's not fair for you to have to take everyone to a place that's so good but never be allowed to see it for yourself. Why don't you get to go there?"
"If I went there it wouldn't be real anymore," Kurt says, and he looks extra sad as he says it, when his body is so small and unimportant-looking like it is right now. "I'll never know what it's like."
"Yes you will," Blaine says, determinedly. "One day, you'll take me and I'll get to go. As soon as I'm there, I'll come right back out and I'll tell you about everything. I'll tell you so good it's like you get to go in, too."
Kurt is looking at him strangely again.
"Most people don't want me to take them to that place," he says. "They almost always ask for more time when they see me coming. They're almost always scared. Why do you talk about 'getting' to go with me?"
Blaine is quiet for a moment, thinking carefully about what Kurt is asking, before he finally settles on saying,
"It sounds like a hard place to get to."
Kurt confirms this.
"It's the hardest place to get to."
"It takes a long time to do hard things, and I like you more than anyone. If I get to go with you, maybe getting there will feel like forever, and that means I get to spend forever with you. That's so much nicer than staying here by myself."
Kurt sits quietly for a moment, diminishing until he almost seems to be disappearing before Blaine's eyes. Then he suddenly charges up out of his seat, catching Blaine up in his arms as he does so. Blaine can feel Kurt's lonely sadness in the hug so strongly it's like a living thing, so he hugs back just as hard, hoping to chase some of it away. Kurt's arms feel strong again and when he looks harder he sees it's because the first Kurt, his favourite Kurt, is here now, and Blaine smiles. Little Kurt is nice, but this Kurt is his.
"I'm so glad I found you," Kurt says, setting Blaine down and taking his hand as they walk to the end of the yard. They jump over the gate instead of opening it, and suddenly they're flying again. Blaine tries to guess where they're going next.
"Me too," he says, and he wonders if it's wrong that he might love Kurt more than Cooper and Tina, and even Mom and Dad. He wonders what it means when you know the wind better than you know your own family.
To Chapter 1 | To Masterpost | To Chapter 3