Here I Am, Honey (12/12 + Epilogue) - Klaine Dirty Dancing AU
Title: Here I Am, Honey (12/12 + Epilogue)
Rating: I'm going to leave this as R for the duration, unless I need to uptick to NC-17
Pairings: Klaine, background Finchel (with very little focus)
Word Count: 5,397 this chapter / 62,667 overall (so far)
Spoilers: I'll be making nods to canon throughout, so I'll say "all aired" just to be safe, but this is very AU
Warnings: As with the movie, this story does include significant allusions to abortion. Also mild angst and slow burn/buildup.
Previous Chapters: One / Two / Three / Four / Five / Six / Seven / Eight / Nine / Ten / Eleven
Summary: When Blaine Anderson visits Kellerman's Mountain Home with his family in the summer of 1963, he isn't expecting anything more than days in the sun and games of croquet, but when he and his cousin Rachel meet the staff dance instructors, his plans get thrown for a loop. Blaine's family vacation might just end up being the time of his life. A Klaine Dirty Dancing AU.
Author's Notes: Title from Solomon Burke's "Cry to Me." Many thanks to my wonderful beta shandyall! If you're so inclined, feel free to come say hi on Tumblr over here. Additional author's notes after the cut.
The next few days were the worst Blaine could remember since the black weeks after he lost his parents. Perhaps the pain was duller, but he felt the emptiness like an echo, the helplessness and the all-too-familiar way his footing had been yanked away from him, leaving him stumbling.
Even though he didn’t have cause to go to the places that reminded him strongly of Kurt - the dance studio, the boathouse, the staff quarters - he told himself that he was avoiding them, giving them wide berth on purpose. It didn’t matter; he felt Kurt’s absence everywhere, even when it didn’t make sense, like at meals, when he found himself restlessly scanning the dining room.
When he opened his eyes in the morning after a fitful night of sleep, it made the whole resort seem empty around him to know that Kurt wasn’t waking up a few hundred feet away. He wondered if Kurt was back in Ohio. He hadn’t asked because there hadn’t been time and he didn’t want to know. If going home would bring him closer to Kurt, it would have been a daily struggle not to climb into the car and drive until he found Kurt himself. He didn’t want to know if leaving for New York would take him farther away again.
Blaine found that it was hard to think about New York at all. The decisions he had to make now were the same ones he’d faced before, but they seemed so much bleaker now - marry a nice girl and live a lie, spend his days alone, or, now, try to find another man. Blaine scoffed at the idea of trying to find someone else. Everything with Kurt had fallen so easily into place, like two leaves drifting to the ground to land on top of each other. He didn’t have the first clue about how to find anyone else. When he tried to imagine it - another man’s kiss, another man’s touch, another man’s hand in his - he rejected the idea outright. He didn’t want those things with some stranger. He wanted them with Kurt.
He found himself watching Rachel jealously. She was allowed to spend hours shut into her room only to appear with red eyes and a grim face, wearing her heartache like a badge. When Hiram and Shelby asked him why he was so quiet, Blaine mumbled vaguely about feeling bad for Rachel, and it was all such a lie that sometimes he felt like he wanted to explode.
Blaine thought that his resentment might have been unfair - after all, Rachel was hurting too - but that didn’t stop him from giving her a lukewarm reception when she knocked cautiously on his door during the afternoon on the day before the talent show. He was flat on his back on the bed, staring at the ceiling with an unopened book beside him.
“Come in,” he said listlessly when Rachel peeked into the room, and she did, sliding the door shut behind her and leaning against it. Blaine managed to pull himself into a sitting position.
“Hi,” she said.
“Hi, Rach,” Blaine answered dully. “What can I do for you?”
“Nothing.” Her forehead was wrinkled as she watched him. “Is everything okay?”
Blaine started to turn away again. “Fine.”
“Do you miss him?”
Every muscle in Blaine’s body went rigid as he brought his eyes back to Rachel. “Who?” he asked tightly.
There was sincere concern written all over her face. “Kurt,” she said haltingly. “He was - special? To you?”
Blaine was fairly sure that his heart had stopped beating. His breath came in measured gasps as he sputtered out, “I - I don’t -”
“It’s okay,” Rachel blurted out. She took a half step forward, her gaze pleading.
There was a long moment before Blaine collected himself enough to force out a few thin words. “It doesn’t… bother you?”
Rachel shook her head, and Blaine could see that she was trying not to cry. There was wetness already gathering at the corners of his own eyes, and Rachel swiftly crossed the room and perched beside him on the bed.
“How…?” Blaine whispered.
“You’ve been my best friend for four years,” she said. “I know I can be a little self-centered, but I’m not completely unobservant. Why do you think I stopped setting you up with my friends?”
Blaine thought that he was supposed to laugh at that. His lips twitched, but a sob escaped instead, and before he knew it, he was crumpling against Rachel’s side. Her arms went around him and he was crying in earnest, shaking out not just the past two days, but years of stress and secrecy and loneliness.
Rachel made shushing sounds while she rubbed his arm. “We’re going to get through this, Blaine,” she said. Her voice was choked but determined. “We’re going to get through this and go to New York, and we’re going to be amazing. I know it.”
Blaine just held on tight, wishing he shared the same conviction.
- / / -
Somehow, even though he’d seen the talent show over and over again in rehearsals, first in snippets and then in its entirety, Blaine found watching the actual performance interminable. He didn’t want to pay attention, but any time his mind wandered, it went directly to Kurt, and the gnawing ache started up in his chest again. It made for a very long evening.
To his shock, the audience seemed to be enjoying the show, and even Hiram and Shelby were laughing and clapping in a way that went beyond basic politeness. Blaine couldn’t bring himself to force even the smallest of smiles, but he did lift his hands for a few rounds of half-hearted applause. Rachel was even less enthusiastic and stayed motionless in the chair she’d wedged back against one of the columns that lined the room, her arms crossed over her chest.
The only thing of interest to come out of the evening so far had happened when Noah had wandered by their table earlier. Hiram had jumped up to draw him aside, pulling him partially behind the column. Blaine had furtively tilted his head to try and listen.
“…just wanted to give you a little something to help out with life in New York,” his uncle was saying, and Blaine pretended to look across the room. He saw Hiram draw an envelope out of his pocket and extend it to Noah.
“Wow, thanks, Dr. Berry,” Noah said, “and hey, thanks for the help with the Quinn situation too. I guess we’ve all gotten into messes before, right?”
“What?” Hiram asked blankly.
“Oh… I thought they would have told you. Look, I’m not sure. You know how it is with girls like that. They’re liable to pin it on any guy in the place.”
Hiram snatched the envelope back without another word. He returned to his seat, looking flustered, while Noah slunk away.
Things went right back to being tedious after that.
Thankfully, the scripted portion of the talent show was finally drawing to a close, and the performers were lining up to sing the last song of the evening, which turned out to be a hackneyed song about Kellerman’s itself. It went on for verse after verse, while the singers urged the audience to join in on the chorus about voices, hearts, and hands. By the third time through, many of the guests were singing along, which may have been why Blaine barely noticed the surprised murmur that ran through the entertainment staff members who were hovering in the back of the room. He wasn’t aware of anything out of the ordinary until a tall figure loomed next to their table, and they all looked up to see Finn Hudson standing there. His eyes swept each of their faces, and then fixed on Rachel, who Blaine heard gasp behind him.
“Nobody puts Berry in a corner,” Finn said, extending a hand to her. “Come on.”
Rachel jumped up immediately, sliding behind Blaine’s chair and following Finn with scarcely a look back at her parents. Hiram started to climb to his feet, looking furious, but much to Blaine’s surprise, Shelby reached across the table to stay him with nothing more than a touch and a warning look. Blaine turned away to watch round-eyed as Finn and Rachel climbed the stairs at the side of the stage. The singing faltered and then died, and even Mr. Kellerman watched in shock when Finn approached the microphone.
“Sorry about the interruption,” he said awkwardly, his voice echoing too loudly throughout the room before he shifted back. Rachel clung to his hand, looking small and scared and thrilled all at once. “I, uh, I always do the last dance of the season, and this year, someone told me not to. But this summer, I met someone who taught me that you should stand up for other people, no matter what it costs. She’s someone who deserves to have me stand up for her, and she deserves a chance to shine like the star that she is. Ladies and gentlemen, my partner, Miss Rachel Berry.” He glanced down at Rachel fondly, and she beamed out at the audience.
“Sit down, Hiram,” Shelby hissed suddenly, and Blaine saw that he was halfway out of his seat again. He sank slowly back into it and folded his arms.
Finn retreated offstage for a moment, reappearing as an unfamiliar song started playing over the speakers. He and Rachel started the same dance that Blaine had watched them learn weeks ago, the one that had started everything, and as the song’s instrumentation began - sounding unlike anything Blaine had ever heard - Finn spun Rachel out, the skirt of her pink party dress twirling around her. Shelby leaned across the table, her eyes sparkling as she commented, “I think she gets this from me.” Hiram sighed and shot her an amused look, some of the tension going out of his posture.
The audience got more and more excited as the dance ramped up, clapping and even giving the occasional whistle or cheer. One particularly raucous female catcall from the back of the room made Blaine turn, and then everything froze and muted and blurred.
Because Kurt was there.
He was standing tall and straight among his friends from the staff, watching the dance with an appraising eye. There was a tiny smile playing around his lips, which grew when he flicked his gaze to Blaine, just for a second.
Blaine forced himself to turn back to the front, knowing that he couldn’t stare, even if it was unlikely that anyone else would notice with the spectacle currently taking place on the stage. He wasn’t really seeing it anymore himself - it was all just a flurry of motion and color through his dazed eyes, and he barely registered when Rachel actually succeeded in doing the lift that had given her so much trouble before. His heart was beating in his chest like it was trying to find a way out. Kurt was here.
A burst of enthusiastic applause and cheers shocked Blaine out of his reverie. He looked up to find Rachel and Finn hugging, and then all at once everyone was on their feet, moving chairs and starting to dance. Shelby even pulled Hiram out to the floor, and Blaine shooed them away, sensing his opportunity. When his aunt and uncle had been swallowed by the crowd, Blaine stood and made his way quickly toward the back of the room.
Kurt was still standing where he’d been when Blaine first spotted him, even though everyone else who’d surrounded him earlier had taken eagerly to the dance floor. As soon as he caught sight of Blaine, Kurt smiled, gave a little nod, and slipped out through one of the doors behind him. Blaine forced himself not to break into a run, to measure his footsteps and follow at a distance, taking a quick glance around before he exited to make sure that no one he knew was watching.
As he eased the door shut behind him, he saw Kurt’s back disappearing around a corner. Blaine followed, and even though he tried to keep his pace relaxed, he knew that he was walking faster. He couldn’t help it; there was so much excitement buzzing in his veins that he was lucky he wasn’t flying down the hallway or jittering apart into nervous dust on the floor. It was just - when he turned the corner Kurt was going to be right there.
He was right there.
“Kurt,” Blaine breathed, unexpectedly rooted to the spot after rounding the corner and finding Kurt watching him, his smile sincere and wavering and his eyes bright. Blaine had been so startled, so gobsmacked and bowled over by the very sight of him, that he hadn’t even noticed Kurt’s clothes. Gone were the plain cotton t-shirts and the dark denim jeans, which had been replaced by a suit that set him apart from everyone else in the building - the pants were narrow and the jacket trimly cut with thin lapels. Blaine could have looked at him forever.
Instead, he barreled forward, letting Kurt catch him in a tight grip as he squeaked out, “Hi, Blaine.” Blaine just clamped his own arms around Kurt, his breath shuddering out and something inside of him that he thought would be knotted up tight forever uncoiling for the first time in days.
Blaine didn’t know how long it was before their arms started to slacken, but when they did, he leaned in to kiss Kurt, once, twice, a third time that lingered. Kurt tasted like mint and himself, and he allowed the kisses, but then moved back, gently pushing Blaine away. “We can’t do that here,” he said, sounding reluctant.
“I know,” Blaine breathed, opening his eyes to look into Kurt’s, which seemed even more watery than before. “I’m just so happy to see you. I thought I would never see you again. What are you doing here?”
Kurt’s grin turned a little impish. “Well, Finn was insistent on doing that dance,” he said with a shrug, and then he turned more serious. “And I wanted to tell you something.”
“What is it?” Blaine asked, his voice coming out a bit breathless.
“I made a decision about something.”
Blaine raised an eyebrow. “Tell me?”
Watching him carefully, Kurt sucked in a deep breath. “I think it’s time I gave New York a try.”
For a moment, Blaine was dumbstruck. “You mean it?”
Kurt nodded. “Quinn has a friend who’s going to let me rent a room in her apartment. I’m going to -” He was cut off unceremoniously as Blaine grabbed him again, hugging him so hard that Kurt sounded strangled as he let out an admonishing “Blaine!” Undeterred, Blaine squeezed harder, letting out a joyful noise against Kurt’s neck even though his eyes were filling up. He had that feeling again, the overwhelming incredulity that this just couldn’t be, only this time, he couldn’t believe that the thing he wanted most in the world was actually going to happen.
Once again, Kurt disentangled himself first, laughing. Blaine grudgingly moved away, running one hand down Kurt’s arm until he was holding onto the side of his hand. Kurt returned the pressure, and that was how they were standing, beaming at each other, when the figure of a man turned the corner.
Blaine’s heart leapt in alarm, and he turned his head to look into the startled eyes of his uncle.
“Oh shit,” Kurt said quietly, his voice panicked. “Oh no, oh no, shit, Blaine…” He tried to tug his hand back, but Blaine’s fingers tightened instinctively.
“No,” Blaine whispered.
“Blaine, let go.” Kurt pulled harder.
Blaine looked back at him. “No, it’s okay,” he said, keeping his voice low. Kurt froze, confusion and fear warring on his face. Turning back to Hiram, who had started to walk slowly toward them, Blaine called out, “Hello.”
“Hello, boys,” Hiram said. His voice lacked its usual cheerfulness, and he was watching Blaine with a serious, concerned expression.
“Hiram,” Blaine said, barely getting the word out. He cleared his throat and made himself continue. “Have you met Kurt Hummel? Kurt was one of the dance instructors here. He’s Finn’s stepbrother.”
A hint of understanding dawned on Hiram’s face, and he turned to give Kurt a brief nod. “Nice to meet you,” he said, extending a hand.
“Hello,” Kurt replied faintly. All the color seemed to be drained from his skin, and he had switched over to clutching Blaine’s hand like a lifeline.
“You must be the reason that my nephew has been walking around looking like someone told him Howdy Doody was cancelled,” Hiram commented.
Blaine gaped. His uncle was going to make jokes at a time like this? “Hiram,” he hissed.
Despite his teasing, Hiram’s expression remained somber when he addressed Blaine again. “Your aunt and I were concerned because you seemed to have disappeared. I think that you and I should have a very serious conversation later, but in the meantime, I’ll let her know that you’ll be back in five minutes. Does that sound fair?”
“Yes,” Blaine said, and it sounded more like a sigh of relief than an actual word.
“It was a pleasure to meet you, Kurt,” Hiram added, and then he left them alone again.
As soon as he disappeared, Kurt let go of Blaine’s hand and slumped against the wall, rubbing his face. “What just happened?”
“It’s okay,” Blaine said again. Perhaps it wasn’t the most reassuring of platitudes, but he felt shaky all over, like he might collapse at any second.
“It’s okay?” Kurt repeated, his voice high and nervous.
Blaine moved to lean against the wall beside Kurt, very much afraid that his legs might not hold him up much longer. “He’s like us.”
Kurt’s eyes widened. “Really?” At Blaine’s nod of confirmation, he continued. “Does he know that you know? Does he know about you?”
“Not before today,” Blaine said. “But I think those cats are pretty far out of the bag now.”
“Do you think he’ll be mad?” Kurt asked quietly.
“Maybe, if he finds out about all the times I snuck out. But I hope not about this.” Blaine dropped even more heavily against the wall and stared at the floor with wide eyes, his nerves multiplying exponentially the more he thought about what he’d just done.
Kurt nudged his side. “Hey.”
“Yeah?” Blaine glanced up at him, and just being able to see Kurt’s face at close proximity again was comforting.
“Maybe it’ll help to have him know,” Kurt suggested, and his face was so earnest that Blaine wanted to hug him all over again.
“Maybe,” Blaine said.
Kurt gave him a little smile. “You should get back. Don’t give him any more reasons to be upset.”
“Yeah,” Blaine agreed, but he didn’t move.
Pushing himself away from the wall, Kurt swung around to stand in front of Blaine. He reached out to tug him up, one hand around his bicep, but let go as soon as Blaine was supporting his own weight. “What time are you leaving tomorrow?”
“We have to be checked out by one, but it will probably be before that,” Blaine said. “Maybe sometime in the late morning. Will you still be here?”
“Finn and I are staying here for the night, with friends. Do you think you could find your way back up to the bench by the old gazebo?” Blaine nodded. “Good. I’ll wait up there in the morning. Come when you can. I’ll wait until noon.”
Blaine looked right into Kurt’s eyes, trying to project every ounce of sincerity he could when he said, “Kurt, I’m so happy. I never - I’m just so happy.”
“Me too,” Kurt said. He peeked around Blaine at the empty hallway, pecked him once on the lips, and sent him on his way. If he hadn’t been so anxious about having to talk with Hiram, Blaine would have floated back to the auditorium.
- / / -
Although they’d been preparing to leave for several days, the next morning was spent in a flurry of frenzied packing. Blaine was still on edge - to his surprise, Hiram hadn’t spoken to him again about Kurt the night before. The whole family had stayed in the main hall dancing for longer than Blaine had expected, and then they had all gone to bed shortly after an excited rehash of Rachel’s performance back at their cabin. They were up again early to eat breakfast with the first seating and finish their preparations to leave.
Just as Blaine was jamming the last of his clothes into his suitcase, Hiram poked his head into the room with a knock on the doorframe. “Blaine, did you ever return your library book?”
Blaine glanced over at the mystery novel, still unfinished, which he’d planned to leave where it was on the bedside table. “Nope,” he said.
“I need to go up to the main house to drop something off for Max. Why don’t we walk together?”
Blaine took a deep breath and nodded. “Okay.”
Much to his surprise, Hiram talked only about mundane topics as they made their way toward the lodge - the weather, the drive, the scenery. When they’d disposed of their errands, however, he suggested, “Why don’t we walk down to the lake one last time?” There was no other choice. Blaine agreed.
They ended up standing at one edge of the beach, the wind blowing fast around them and making the water lap up on the shore. There was no one around to hear when Hiram turned to Blaine and said, “So.”
“So,” Blaine echoed.
“What you did last night was very foolhardy,” Hiram said sternly. Blaine could feel himself going pale as he gave a few jerky nods of his head. “I hope you know that, and I hope that you would only choose to introduce Kurt to people that way if you had a very good reason to assume that it was safe to do so.”
Blaine’s mouth and throat felt too dry, but he knew that Hiram was waiting for an explanation. “A couple of years ago, there was a field trip.” He cleared his throat and looked out at the lake, shining and blue beneath the mountain. “You had been called into the office, and Shelby was visiting her mother. I was looking for our permission slips in your desk, and I found a magazine. One. And there was a note.”
When he hazarded a glance back at his uncle, Hiram was nodding thoughtfully. “It was from Leroy,” he said.
“It was from L,” Blaine clarified. “Who is he?” When there was no immediate answer, he started to babble. “I’m sorry. That was - I shouldn’t have ask-”
“Leroy is the love of my life,” Hiram said, his voice cutting evenly across Blaine’s words.
A thousand questions raced through Blaine’s mind at once, but he didn’t know if he could ask any of them, so all he said was, “Oh.”
Hiram took a deep breath, angling his head up toward the sky for a moment. “We met about nine years ago. I was in Columbus for a conference. Several of us met for a drink in the hotel bar after one of the meetings ended, and he was playing the piano. He was the most handsome man I’d ever seen.”
Blaine felt the ghost of a smile flit across his face - it was a feeling he could relate to - but he sobered almost instantly. “What about Shelby?” he asked, almost afraid to hear the answer. His aunt wasn’t an affectionate type, but she’d never begrudged Blaine a place in her household. She’d pushed him as hard as she pushed Rachel, and he knew that meant that she cared about him in her own way. Blaine might not say it often, but he did love her, and it had always upset him terribly that she was being played for a fool. He looked down at his feet, wedging the tip of one shoe into the sand.
“She knows,” Hiram said.
Blaine’s head snapped back up. “She does?”
“Shelby and I have been friends for a very long time, ever since we were children.” Blaine knew the story - how they’d played together as kids, how Hiram’s head had turned when Shelby started high school and all his friends asked him who the pretty new freshman was, how they’d almost missed their chance to be together because she’d fallen for someone else instead - but he couldn’t figure out now where the fact diverged from the fiction. “We know each other very well - probably better than anyone else. She knows about me, and I knew that she never wanted to be someone’s housewife.”
“But… that’s exactly what she is,” Blaine said, his brow furrowing.
“Not exactly,” Hiram replied. “Shelby always wanted to teach people how to sing and dance. We both wanted a child, and she knew that I would never make her give up her job when we had one. It’s worked out remarkably well, and I can assure you that there are worse things in life than being married to one of your best friends.”
Like not being able to marry the person you actually love, Blaine filled in. “Oh,” he said again, and then he added, quietly, “I don’t know if I can do that.”
“You don’t have to,” Hiram said. “Just because I chose something for my life doesn’t mean that you have to choose it for yours.”
“That’s good,” Blaine said softly.
“But whatever you decide, Blaine, I want you to know that I will still love you and support you.”
The words swept over him like a surprise rainstorm, devastating but sustaining, wetting his eyes before he even caught up to his feelings. He’d been afraid that he was beyond ever hearing anything like them, and he watched Hiram tremulously.
“You know that you’ve done some things this summer that I don’t approve of,” he continued, “but I still think the world of you, Blaine, and I hope you know now that you can always come to me to talk about things that are bothering you.
“Thank you,” Blaine choked out.
Hiram clapped his shoulder and squeezed it, and then a stern expression settled over his features. “I also want to make sure that you understand how important it is for you to be discreet.” When Blaine started to nod and speak, Hiram interrupted him. “I know that you think you understand, but I can’t stress enough how dangerous the world can be. There are people who will want to hurt you because of who you are - it’s not enough just to disagree with you. You could be arrested. Or worse.”
Blaine’s mouth dropped shut and he nodded.
“If you want to meet other men who are like you, I can help you find them. Safely. I don’t know how you and Kurt found each other, but I don’t want you to go out looking for adventure when you’re on your own.”
“I don’t want adventure,” Blaine said, a giddy feeling bubbling up inside of him. “Kurt’s coming to New York.”
Hiram’s eyebrows went up. “So this is serious.”
“We’ve only known each other for a few weeks,” Blaine hedged, going back to scuffing his toe in the sand. “And he was going to move there some day anyway.”
“But he’s going now because you’ll be there.”
Blaine shrugged. His hands suddenly felt awkward at his sides, and he jammed them down into his pockets, biting back a grin.
Hiram smiled at him fondly then. “Well, in that case, I hope you’ll both be very safe and very careful, and if either of you need to talk about anything, please come to me first.”
“Thank you,” Blaine said again. He paused, struggling to find a way to express just how much it meant to him, his heart full to bursting with Hiram’s support and Rachel’s acceptance and the fact that Kurt had come back, but finally he just said, “This all means a lot to me. So much. Thank you.”
Hiram reached for his shoulder again, but instead of stopping there, he pulled Blaine into a hug.
- / / -
This goodbye was supposed to be easier.
And it was, Blaine reasoned. He and Kurt had exchanged addresses and telephone numbers. They would both be in New York in less than two months, and they’d be in touch long before that. But the main problem was that he didn’t want to say goodbye at all.
“So we won’t,” Kurt said breezily.
It had been like stepping back in time when he’d arrived at the little clearing in the woods and seen Kurt looking down over the lake, clad in his usual t-shirt and jeans (”They’re more comfortable to travel in,” Kurt had explained when Blaine teased him). Hiram had excused Blaine for half an hour to say his farewells, but Blaine knew that his family had to get on the road soon - it was a long drive to Erie.
Unfortunately, that left him only about fifteen minutes with Kurt, and they’d spent thirteen of them stealing kisses and making plans. Now the seconds are ticking down, and Blaine imagined that he could hear them, like there was a metronome hidden in the gazebo, and he wanted to find it and stop it, or at least slow it down. He was standing forehead-to-forehead with Kurt, their hands tangled together on either side of their bodies and their eyes closed.
“You have to go,” Kurt was saying. “Your time’s almost up.”
“I don’t want to,” Blaine mumbled in response. He leaned forward to capture Kurt’s lips for another few portioned-off seconds. “I have so many more things to say.”
“I keep hearing about these things,” Kurt said playfully, leaning back to look at Blaine, “but you never actually say them.”
Blaine stared at Kurt, his cheeks flushed in the sunlight, his eyes sparkling. “Meeting you is one of the best things that ever happened to me,” he blurted. “You changed everything.”
“Which one of us is moving hundreds of miles away?” Kurt asked, quirking an eyebrow.
“Both of us!” Blaine shot back.
Kurt smiled. “The feeling is definitely mutual. Now go on, shoo. The longer you stay here, the harder it is to let you go.”
“Well, in that case…” Blaine said, tightening his grip around and between Kurt’s fingers.
“Blaaaaine,” Kurt whined. “You have to go.”
“I know.” But he still didn’t let go. Instead, he tugged Kurt forward and kissed him, harder than he meant to at first and then slow and deliberate, with every bit of passion he could muster, tasting and feeling with his lips and his tongue as the wind rushed all around them, knowing that it was the last time - for now.
Reluctantly, Blaine broke away and stepped back, holding onto Kurt’s hands until he had to let them go. “Write me,” Kurt said. “Soon. Tell me more things.”
“I will,” Blaine promised, because he fully expected to start a letter in the car. He opened his mouth, his throat already forming the g, but he quickly clamped it shut again when Kurt pointed an accusatory finger.
“Don’t say it! I don’t want to say it,” he admonished.
“Why do you think you know what I was going to say?”
Kurt tilted his head. “Just a guess. Were you going to say something else?”
Blaine paused, but finally said, “Just that I’ll miss you.”
“I’ll miss you too.”
They watched at each other for as long as they could, and as Blaine backed away, he tried to drink in every detail, from the curve of Kurt’s lips to the cleft in his chin to the width of his shoulders, from the length of his legs to the tips of his toes. He stared until Kurt mouthed the word “go,” and he forced himself to turn and walk away.
Maybe there was more to say. Blaine wasn’t sure yet - maybe he’d find the courage to say it in a letter, or maybe he’d wait, holding the words like a precious treasure to his chest until he saw Kurt again.
In forty-seven days.
He finally had something he knew it would be worth counting down to.
Chapter Notes:
Rating: I'm going to leave this as R for the duration, unless I need to uptick to NC-17
Pairings: Klaine, background Finchel (with very little focus)
Word Count: 5,397 this chapter / 62,667 overall (so far)
Spoilers: I'll be making nods to canon throughout, so I'll say "all aired" just to be safe, but this is very AU
Warnings: As with the movie, this story does include significant allusions to abortion. Also mild angst and slow burn/buildup.
Previous Chapters: One / Two / Three / Four / Five / Six / Seven / Eight / Nine / Ten / Eleven
Summary: When Blaine Anderson visits Kellerman's Mountain Home with his family in the summer of 1963, he isn't expecting anything more than days in the sun and games of croquet, but when he and his cousin Rachel meet the staff dance instructors, his plans get thrown for a loop. Blaine's family vacation might just end up being the time of his life. A Klaine Dirty Dancing AU.
Author's Notes: Title from Solomon Burke's "Cry to Me." Many thanks to my wonderful beta shandyall! If you're so inclined, feel free to come say hi on Tumblr over here. Additional author's notes after the cut.
- Three lovely artists shared lovely fanart that they created for HIAH this week. I am so incredibly beyond flattered. You can see them here, here, and here.
- You guys, I am so sad and so happy to be posting this. I don't know what my feelings are doing, quite honestly. If you made it this far, THANK YOU SO MUCH for reading. The epilogue should be up within the week.
The next few days were the worst Blaine could remember since the black weeks after he lost his parents. Perhaps the pain was duller, but he felt the emptiness like an echo, the helplessness and the all-too-familiar way his footing had been yanked away from him, leaving him stumbling.
Even though he didn’t have cause to go to the places that reminded him strongly of Kurt - the dance studio, the boathouse, the staff quarters - he told himself that he was avoiding them, giving them wide berth on purpose. It didn’t matter; he felt Kurt’s absence everywhere, even when it didn’t make sense, like at meals, when he found himself restlessly scanning the dining room.
When he opened his eyes in the morning after a fitful night of sleep, it made the whole resort seem empty around him to know that Kurt wasn’t waking up a few hundred feet away. He wondered if Kurt was back in Ohio. He hadn’t asked because there hadn’t been time and he didn’t want to know. If going home would bring him closer to Kurt, it would have been a daily struggle not to climb into the car and drive until he found Kurt himself. He didn’t want to know if leaving for New York would take him farther away again.
Blaine found that it was hard to think about New York at all. The decisions he had to make now were the same ones he’d faced before, but they seemed so much bleaker now - marry a nice girl and live a lie, spend his days alone, or, now, try to find another man. Blaine scoffed at the idea of trying to find someone else. Everything with Kurt had fallen so easily into place, like two leaves drifting to the ground to land on top of each other. He didn’t have the first clue about how to find anyone else. When he tried to imagine it - another man’s kiss, another man’s touch, another man’s hand in his - he rejected the idea outright. He didn’t want those things with some stranger. He wanted them with Kurt.
He found himself watching Rachel jealously. She was allowed to spend hours shut into her room only to appear with red eyes and a grim face, wearing her heartache like a badge. When Hiram and Shelby asked him why he was so quiet, Blaine mumbled vaguely about feeling bad for Rachel, and it was all such a lie that sometimes he felt like he wanted to explode.
Blaine thought that his resentment might have been unfair - after all, Rachel was hurting too - but that didn’t stop him from giving her a lukewarm reception when she knocked cautiously on his door during the afternoon on the day before the talent show. He was flat on his back on the bed, staring at the ceiling with an unopened book beside him.
“Come in,” he said listlessly when Rachel peeked into the room, and she did, sliding the door shut behind her and leaning against it. Blaine managed to pull himself into a sitting position.
“Hi,” she said.
“Hi, Rach,” Blaine answered dully. “What can I do for you?”
“Nothing.” Her forehead was wrinkled as she watched him. “Is everything okay?”
Blaine started to turn away again. “Fine.”
“Do you miss him?”
Every muscle in Blaine’s body went rigid as he brought his eyes back to Rachel. “Who?” he asked tightly.
There was sincere concern written all over her face. “Kurt,” she said haltingly. “He was - special? To you?”
Blaine was fairly sure that his heart had stopped beating. His breath came in measured gasps as he sputtered out, “I - I don’t -”
“It’s okay,” Rachel blurted out. She took a half step forward, her gaze pleading.
There was a long moment before Blaine collected himself enough to force out a few thin words. “It doesn’t… bother you?”
Rachel shook her head, and Blaine could see that she was trying not to cry. There was wetness already gathering at the corners of his own eyes, and Rachel swiftly crossed the room and perched beside him on the bed.
“How…?” Blaine whispered.
“You’ve been my best friend for four years,” she said. “I know I can be a little self-centered, but I’m not completely unobservant. Why do you think I stopped setting you up with my friends?”
Blaine thought that he was supposed to laugh at that. His lips twitched, but a sob escaped instead, and before he knew it, he was crumpling against Rachel’s side. Her arms went around him and he was crying in earnest, shaking out not just the past two days, but years of stress and secrecy and loneliness.
Rachel made shushing sounds while she rubbed his arm. “We’re going to get through this, Blaine,” she said. Her voice was choked but determined. “We’re going to get through this and go to New York, and we’re going to be amazing. I know it.”
Blaine just held on tight, wishing he shared the same conviction.
- / / -
Somehow, even though he’d seen the talent show over and over again in rehearsals, first in snippets and then in its entirety, Blaine found watching the actual performance interminable. He didn’t want to pay attention, but any time his mind wandered, it went directly to Kurt, and the gnawing ache started up in his chest again. It made for a very long evening.
To his shock, the audience seemed to be enjoying the show, and even Hiram and Shelby were laughing and clapping in a way that went beyond basic politeness. Blaine couldn’t bring himself to force even the smallest of smiles, but he did lift his hands for a few rounds of half-hearted applause. Rachel was even less enthusiastic and stayed motionless in the chair she’d wedged back against one of the columns that lined the room, her arms crossed over her chest.
The only thing of interest to come out of the evening so far had happened when Noah had wandered by their table earlier. Hiram had jumped up to draw him aside, pulling him partially behind the column. Blaine had furtively tilted his head to try and listen.
“…just wanted to give you a little something to help out with life in New York,” his uncle was saying, and Blaine pretended to look across the room. He saw Hiram draw an envelope out of his pocket and extend it to Noah.
“Wow, thanks, Dr. Berry,” Noah said, “and hey, thanks for the help with the Quinn situation too. I guess we’ve all gotten into messes before, right?”
“What?” Hiram asked blankly.
“Oh… I thought they would have told you. Look, I’m not sure. You know how it is with girls like that. They’re liable to pin it on any guy in the place.”
Hiram snatched the envelope back without another word. He returned to his seat, looking flustered, while Noah slunk away.
Things went right back to being tedious after that.
Thankfully, the scripted portion of the talent show was finally drawing to a close, and the performers were lining up to sing the last song of the evening, which turned out to be a hackneyed song about Kellerman’s itself. It went on for verse after verse, while the singers urged the audience to join in on the chorus about voices, hearts, and hands. By the third time through, many of the guests were singing along, which may have been why Blaine barely noticed the surprised murmur that ran through the entertainment staff members who were hovering in the back of the room. He wasn’t aware of anything out of the ordinary until a tall figure loomed next to their table, and they all looked up to see Finn Hudson standing there. His eyes swept each of their faces, and then fixed on Rachel, who Blaine heard gasp behind him.
“Nobody puts Berry in a corner,” Finn said, extending a hand to her. “Come on.”
Rachel jumped up immediately, sliding behind Blaine’s chair and following Finn with scarcely a look back at her parents. Hiram started to climb to his feet, looking furious, but much to Blaine’s surprise, Shelby reached across the table to stay him with nothing more than a touch and a warning look. Blaine turned away to watch round-eyed as Finn and Rachel climbed the stairs at the side of the stage. The singing faltered and then died, and even Mr. Kellerman watched in shock when Finn approached the microphone.
“Sorry about the interruption,” he said awkwardly, his voice echoing too loudly throughout the room before he shifted back. Rachel clung to his hand, looking small and scared and thrilled all at once. “I, uh, I always do the last dance of the season, and this year, someone told me not to. But this summer, I met someone who taught me that you should stand up for other people, no matter what it costs. She’s someone who deserves to have me stand up for her, and she deserves a chance to shine like the star that she is. Ladies and gentlemen, my partner, Miss Rachel Berry.” He glanced down at Rachel fondly, and she beamed out at the audience.
“Sit down, Hiram,” Shelby hissed suddenly, and Blaine saw that he was halfway out of his seat again. He sank slowly back into it and folded his arms.
Finn retreated offstage for a moment, reappearing as an unfamiliar song started playing over the speakers. He and Rachel started the same dance that Blaine had watched them learn weeks ago, the one that had started everything, and as the song’s instrumentation began - sounding unlike anything Blaine had ever heard - Finn spun Rachel out, the skirt of her pink party dress twirling around her. Shelby leaned across the table, her eyes sparkling as she commented, “I think she gets this from me.” Hiram sighed and shot her an amused look, some of the tension going out of his posture.
The audience got more and more excited as the dance ramped up, clapping and even giving the occasional whistle or cheer. One particularly raucous female catcall from the back of the room made Blaine turn, and then everything froze and muted and blurred.
Because Kurt was there.
He was standing tall and straight among his friends from the staff, watching the dance with an appraising eye. There was a tiny smile playing around his lips, which grew when he flicked his gaze to Blaine, just for a second.
Blaine forced himself to turn back to the front, knowing that he couldn’t stare, even if it was unlikely that anyone else would notice with the spectacle currently taking place on the stage. He wasn’t really seeing it anymore himself - it was all just a flurry of motion and color through his dazed eyes, and he barely registered when Rachel actually succeeded in doing the lift that had given her so much trouble before. His heart was beating in his chest like it was trying to find a way out. Kurt was here.
A burst of enthusiastic applause and cheers shocked Blaine out of his reverie. He looked up to find Rachel and Finn hugging, and then all at once everyone was on their feet, moving chairs and starting to dance. Shelby even pulled Hiram out to the floor, and Blaine shooed them away, sensing his opportunity. When his aunt and uncle had been swallowed by the crowd, Blaine stood and made his way quickly toward the back of the room.
Kurt was still standing where he’d been when Blaine first spotted him, even though everyone else who’d surrounded him earlier had taken eagerly to the dance floor. As soon as he caught sight of Blaine, Kurt smiled, gave a little nod, and slipped out through one of the doors behind him. Blaine forced himself not to break into a run, to measure his footsteps and follow at a distance, taking a quick glance around before he exited to make sure that no one he knew was watching.
As he eased the door shut behind him, he saw Kurt’s back disappearing around a corner. Blaine followed, and even though he tried to keep his pace relaxed, he knew that he was walking faster. He couldn’t help it; there was so much excitement buzzing in his veins that he was lucky he wasn’t flying down the hallway or jittering apart into nervous dust on the floor. It was just - when he turned the corner Kurt was going to be right there.
He was right there.
“Kurt,” Blaine breathed, unexpectedly rooted to the spot after rounding the corner and finding Kurt watching him, his smile sincere and wavering and his eyes bright. Blaine had been so startled, so gobsmacked and bowled over by the very sight of him, that he hadn’t even noticed Kurt’s clothes. Gone were the plain cotton t-shirts and the dark denim jeans, which had been replaced by a suit that set him apart from everyone else in the building - the pants were narrow and the jacket trimly cut with thin lapels. Blaine could have looked at him forever.
Instead, he barreled forward, letting Kurt catch him in a tight grip as he squeaked out, “Hi, Blaine.” Blaine just clamped his own arms around Kurt, his breath shuddering out and something inside of him that he thought would be knotted up tight forever uncoiling for the first time in days.
Blaine didn’t know how long it was before their arms started to slacken, but when they did, he leaned in to kiss Kurt, once, twice, a third time that lingered. Kurt tasted like mint and himself, and he allowed the kisses, but then moved back, gently pushing Blaine away. “We can’t do that here,” he said, sounding reluctant.
“I know,” Blaine breathed, opening his eyes to look into Kurt’s, which seemed even more watery than before. “I’m just so happy to see you. I thought I would never see you again. What are you doing here?”
Kurt’s grin turned a little impish. “Well, Finn was insistent on doing that dance,” he said with a shrug, and then he turned more serious. “And I wanted to tell you something.”
“What is it?” Blaine asked, his voice coming out a bit breathless.
“I made a decision about something.”
Blaine raised an eyebrow. “Tell me?”
Watching him carefully, Kurt sucked in a deep breath. “I think it’s time I gave New York a try.”
For a moment, Blaine was dumbstruck. “You mean it?”
Kurt nodded. “Quinn has a friend who’s going to let me rent a room in her apartment. I’m going to -” He was cut off unceremoniously as Blaine grabbed him again, hugging him so hard that Kurt sounded strangled as he let out an admonishing “Blaine!” Undeterred, Blaine squeezed harder, letting out a joyful noise against Kurt’s neck even though his eyes were filling up. He had that feeling again, the overwhelming incredulity that this just couldn’t be, only this time, he couldn’t believe that the thing he wanted most in the world was actually going to happen.
Once again, Kurt disentangled himself first, laughing. Blaine grudgingly moved away, running one hand down Kurt’s arm until he was holding onto the side of his hand. Kurt returned the pressure, and that was how they were standing, beaming at each other, when the figure of a man turned the corner.
Blaine’s heart leapt in alarm, and he turned his head to look into the startled eyes of his uncle.
“Oh shit,” Kurt said quietly, his voice panicked. “Oh no, oh no, shit, Blaine…” He tried to tug his hand back, but Blaine’s fingers tightened instinctively.
“No,” Blaine whispered.
“Blaine, let go.” Kurt pulled harder.
Blaine looked back at him. “No, it’s okay,” he said, keeping his voice low. Kurt froze, confusion and fear warring on his face. Turning back to Hiram, who had started to walk slowly toward them, Blaine called out, “Hello.”
“Hello, boys,” Hiram said. His voice lacked its usual cheerfulness, and he was watching Blaine with a serious, concerned expression.
“Hiram,” Blaine said, barely getting the word out. He cleared his throat and made himself continue. “Have you met Kurt Hummel? Kurt was one of the dance instructors here. He’s Finn’s stepbrother.”
A hint of understanding dawned on Hiram’s face, and he turned to give Kurt a brief nod. “Nice to meet you,” he said, extending a hand.
“Hello,” Kurt replied faintly. All the color seemed to be drained from his skin, and he had switched over to clutching Blaine’s hand like a lifeline.
“You must be the reason that my nephew has been walking around looking like someone told him Howdy Doody was cancelled,” Hiram commented.
Blaine gaped. His uncle was going to make jokes at a time like this? “Hiram,” he hissed.
Despite his teasing, Hiram’s expression remained somber when he addressed Blaine again. “Your aunt and I were concerned because you seemed to have disappeared. I think that you and I should have a very serious conversation later, but in the meantime, I’ll let her know that you’ll be back in five minutes. Does that sound fair?”
“Yes,” Blaine said, and it sounded more like a sigh of relief than an actual word.
“It was a pleasure to meet you, Kurt,” Hiram added, and then he left them alone again.
As soon as he disappeared, Kurt let go of Blaine’s hand and slumped against the wall, rubbing his face. “What just happened?”
“It’s okay,” Blaine said again. Perhaps it wasn’t the most reassuring of platitudes, but he felt shaky all over, like he might collapse at any second.
“It’s okay?” Kurt repeated, his voice high and nervous.
Blaine moved to lean against the wall beside Kurt, very much afraid that his legs might not hold him up much longer. “He’s like us.”
Kurt’s eyes widened. “Really?” At Blaine’s nod of confirmation, he continued. “Does he know that you know? Does he know about you?”
“Not before today,” Blaine said. “But I think those cats are pretty far out of the bag now.”
“Do you think he’ll be mad?” Kurt asked quietly.
“Maybe, if he finds out about all the times I snuck out. But I hope not about this.” Blaine dropped even more heavily against the wall and stared at the floor with wide eyes, his nerves multiplying exponentially the more he thought about what he’d just done.
Kurt nudged his side. “Hey.”
“Yeah?” Blaine glanced up at him, and just being able to see Kurt’s face at close proximity again was comforting.
“Maybe it’ll help to have him know,” Kurt suggested, and his face was so earnest that Blaine wanted to hug him all over again.
“Maybe,” Blaine said.
Kurt gave him a little smile. “You should get back. Don’t give him any more reasons to be upset.”
“Yeah,” Blaine agreed, but he didn’t move.
Pushing himself away from the wall, Kurt swung around to stand in front of Blaine. He reached out to tug him up, one hand around his bicep, but let go as soon as Blaine was supporting his own weight. “What time are you leaving tomorrow?”
“We have to be checked out by one, but it will probably be before that,” Blaine said. “Maybe sometime in the late morning. Will you still be here?”
“Finn and I are staying here for the night, with friends. Do you think you could find your way back up to the bench by the old gazebo?” Blaine nodded. “Good. I’ll wait up there in the morning. Come when you can. I’ll wait until noon.”
Blaine looked right into Kurt’s eyes, trying to project every ounce of sincerity he could when he said, “Kurt, I’m so happy. I never - I’m just so happy.”
“Me too,” Kurt said. He peeked around Blaine at the empty hallway, pecked him once on the lips, and sent him on his way. If he hadn’t been so anxious about having to talk with Hiram, Blaine would have floated back to the auditorium.
- / / -
Although they’d been preparing to leave for several days, the next morning was spent in a flurry of frenzied packing. Blaine was still on edge - to his surprise, Hiram hadn’t spoken to him again about Kurt the night before. The whole family had stayed in the main hall dancing for longer than Blaine had expected, and then they had all gone to bed shortly after an excited rehash of Rachel’s performance back at their cabin. They were up again early to eat breakfast with the first seating and finish their preparations to leave.
Just as Blaine was jamming the last of his clothes into his suitcase, Hiram poked his head into the room with a knock on the doorframe. “Blaine, did you ever return your library book?”
Blaine glanced over at the mystery novel, still unfinished, which he’d planned to leave where it was on the bedside table. “Nope,” he said.
“I need to go up to the main house to drop something off for Max. Why don’t we walk together?”
Blaine took a deep breath and nodded. “Okay.”
Much to his surprise, Hiram talked only about mundane topics as they made their way toward the lodge - the weather, the drive, the scenery. When they’d disposed of their errands, however, he suggested, “Why don’t we walk down to the lake one last time?” There was no other choice. Blaine agreed.
They ended up standing at one edge of the beach, the wind blowing fast around them and making the water lap up on the shore. There was no one around to hear when Hiram turned to Blaine and said, “So.”
“So,” Blaine echoed.
“What you did last night was very foolhardy,” Hiram said sternly. Blaine could feel himself going pale as he gave a few jerky nods of his head. “I hope you know that, and I hope that you would only choose to introduce Kurt to people that way if you had a very good reason to assume that it was safe to do so.”
Blaine’s mouth and throat felt too dry, but he knew that Hiram was waiting for an explanation. “A couple of years ago, there was a field trip.” He cleared his throat and looked out at the lake, shining and blue beneath the mountain. “You had been called into the office, and Shelby was visiting her mother. I was looking for our permission slips in your desk, and I found a magazine. One. And there was a note.”
When he hazarded a glance back at his uncle, Hiram was nodding thoughtfully. “It was from Leroy,” he said.
“It was from L,” Blaine clarified. “Who is he?” When there was no immediate answer, he started to babble. “I’m sorry. That was - I shouldn’t have ask-”
“Leroy is the love of my life,” Hiram said, his voice cutting evenly across Blaine’s words.
A thousand questions raced through Blaine’s mind at once, but he didn’t know if he could ask any of them, so all he said was, “Oh.”
Hiram took a deep breath, angling his head up toward the sky for a moment. “We met about nine years ago. I was in Columbus for a conference. Several of us met for a drink in the hotel bar after one of the meetings ended, and he was playing the piano. He was the most handsome man I’d ever seen.”
Blaine felt the ghost of a smile flit across his face - it was a feeling he could relate to - but he sobered almost instantly. “What about Shelby?” he asked, almost afraid to hear the answer. His aunt wasn’t an affectionate type, but she’d never begrudged Blaine a place in her household. She’d pushed him as hard as she pushed Rachel, and he knew that meant that she cared about him in her own way. Blaine might not say it often, but he did love her, and it had always upset him terribly that she was being played for a fool. He looked down at his feet, wedging the tip of one shoe into the sand.
“She knows,” Hiram said.
Blaine’s head snapped back up. “She does?”
“Shelby and I have been friends for a very long time, ever since we were children.” Blaine knew the story - how they’d played together as kids, how Hiram’s head had turned when Shelby started high school and all his friends asked him who the pretty new freshman was, how they’d almost missed their chance to be together because she’d fallen for someone else instead - but he couldn’t figure out now where the fact diverged from the fiction. “We know each other very well - probably better than anyone else. She knows about me, and I knew that she never wanted to be someone’s housewife.”
“But… that’s exactly what she is,” Blaine said, his brow furrowing.
“Not exactly,” Hiram replied. “Shelby always wanted to teach people how to sing and dance. We both wanted a child, and she knew that I would never make her give up her job when we had one. It’s worked out remarkably well, and I can assure you that there are worse things in life than being married to one of your best friends.”
Like not being able to marry the person you actually love, Blaine filled in. “Oh,” he said again, and then he added, quietly, “I don’t know if I can do that.”
“You don’t have to,” Hiram said. “Just because I chose something for my life doesn’t mean that you have to choose it for yours.”
“That’s good,” Blaine said softly.
“But whatever you decide, Blaine, I want you to know that I will still love you and support you.”
The words swept over him like a surprise rainstorm, devastating but sustaining, wetting his eyes before he even caught up to his feelings. He’d been afraid that he was beyond ever hearing anything like them, and he watched Hiram tremulously.
“You know that you’ve done some things this summer that I don’t approve of,” he continued, “but I still think the world of you, Blaine, and I hope you know now that you can always come to me to talk about things that are bothering you.
“Thank you,” Blaine choked out.
Hiram clapped his shoulder and squeezed it, and then a stern expression settled over his features. “I also want to make sure that you understand how important it is for you to be discreet.” When Blaine started to nod and speak, Hiram interrupted him. “I know that you think you understand, but I can’t stress enough how dangerous the world can be. There are people who will want to hurt you because of who you are - it’s not enough just to disagree with you. You could be arrested. Or worse.”
Blaine’s mouth dropped shut and he nodded.
“If you want to meet other men who are like you, I can help you find them. Safely. I don’t know how you and Kurt found each other, but I don’t want you to go out looking for adventure when you’re on your own.”
“I don’t want adventure,” Blaine said, a giddy feeling bubbling up inside of him. “Kurt’s coming to New York.”
Hiram’s eyebrows went up. “So this is serious.”
“We’ve only known each other for a few weeks,” Blaine hedged, going back to scuffing his toe in the sand. “And he was going to move there some day anyway.”
“But he’s going now because you’ll be there.”
Blaine shrugged. His hands suddenly felt awkward at his sides, and he jammed them down into his pockets, biting back a grin.
Hiram smiled at him fondly then. “Well, in that case, I hope you’ll both be very safe and very careful, and if either of you need to talk about anything, please come to me first.”
“Thank you,” Blaine said again. He paused, struggling to find a way to express just how much it meant to him, his heart full to bursting with Hiram’s support and Rachel’s acceptance and the fact that Kurt had come back, but finally he just said, “This all means a lot to me. So much. Thank you.”
Hiram reached for his shoulder again, but instead of stopping there, he pulled Blaine into a hug.
- / / -
This goodbye was supposed to be easier.
And it was, Blaine reasoned. He and Kurt had exchanged addresses and telephone numbers. They would both be in New York in less than two months, and they’d be in touch long before that. But the main problem was that he didn’t want to say goodbye at all.
“So we won’t,” Kurt said breezily.
It had been like stepping back in time when he’d arrived at the little clearing in the woods and seen Kurt looking down over the lake, clad in his usual t-shirt and jeans (”They’re more comfortable to travel in,” Kurt had explained when Blaine teased him). Hiram had excused Blaine for half an hour to say his farewells, but Blaine knew that his family had to get on the road soon - it was a long drive to Erie.
Unfortunately, that left him only about fifteen minutes with Kurt, and they’d spent thirteen of them stealing kisses and making plans. Now the seconds are ticking down, and Blaine imagined that he could hear them, like there was a metronome hidden in the gazebo, and he wanted to find it and stop it, or at least slow it down. He was standing forehead-to-forehead with Kurt, their hands tangled together on either side of their bodies and their eyes closed.
“You have to go,” Kurt was saying. “Your time’s almost up.”
“I don’t want to,” Blaine mumbled in response. He leaned forward to capture Kurt’s lips for another few portioned-off seconds. “I have so many more things to say.”
“I keep hearing about these things,” Kurt said playfully, leaning back to look at Blaine, “but you never actually say them.”
Blaine stared at Kurt, his cheeks flushed in the sunlight, his eyes sparkling. “Meeting you is one of the best things that ever happened to me,” he blurted. “You changed everything.”
“Which one of us is moving hundreds of miles away?” Kurt asked, quirking an eyebrow.
“Both of us!” Blaine shot back.
Kurt smiled. “The feeling is definitely mutual. Now go on, shoo. The longer you stay here, the harder it is to let you go.”
“Well, in that case…” Blaine said, tightening his grip around and between Kurt’s fingers.
“Blaaaaine,” Kurt whined. “You have to go.”
“I know.” But he still didn’t let go. Instead, he tugged Kurt forward and kissed him, harder than he meant to at first and then slow and deliberate, with every bit of passion he could muster, tasting and feeling with his lips and his tongue as the wind rushed all around them, knowing that it was the last time - for now.
Reluctantly, Blaine broke away and stepped back, holding onto Kurt’s hands until he had to let them go. “Write me,” Kurt said. “Soon. Tell me more things.”
“I will,” Blaine promised, because he fully expected to start a letter in the car. He opened his mouth, his throat already forming the g, but he quickly clamped it shut again when Kurt pointed an accusatory finger.
“Don’t say it! I don’t want to say it,” he admonished.
“Why do you think you know what I was going to say?”
Kurt tilted his head. “Just a guess. Were you going to say something else?”
Blaine paused, but finally said, “Just that I’ll miss you.”
“I’ll miss you too.”
They watched at each other for as long as they could, and as Blaine backed away, he tried to drink in every detail, from the curve of Kurt’s lips to the cleft in his chin to the width of his shoulders, from the length of his legs to the tips of his toes. He stared until Kurt mouthed the word “go,” and he forced himself to turn and walk away.
Maybe there was more to say. Blaine wasn’t sure yet - maybe he’d find the courage to say it in a letter, or maybe he’d wait, holding the words like a precious treasure to his chest until he saw Kurt again.
In forty-seven days.
He finally had something he knew it would be worth counting down to.
Chapter Notes:
- The song that is totally unfamiliar to Blaine with the strange instrumentation is, of course, "I've Had the Time of My Life" by Bill Medley and Jennifer Warnes. The music video is here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RH0lEVMuzzw. Why yes, I am poking fun at the anachronisms in the movie again.
- The outfit that I put Kurt in at the talent show is an homage to the British mod trend of the 1960s, which didn't really carry over to the US until the British Invasion that started in late 1963/early 1964 with the Beatles (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Beatles'_influence_on_popular_culture#Suits). This is me trying to make Kurt fashion forward.
- Howdy Doody''s last show aired in 1960, and although Blaine wouldn't have admitted it at the time, it did make him sad.