Glee!fic: When All Of New York City Misses You
*kicks internet connection* Trying to catch up on comments OH MY GOD fuck my internet connection. Let's see if it'll let me post *this* =P
When All Of New York City Misses You, glee!fic
Disclaimer: While we're quite OC-heavy in parts, the prettiest ones aren't mine, alas.
Rating: Pff, R. I'm predictable like that.
Summary: Set in the Unscripted universe; you don't necessarily have to have read it to read this, I'll post a summary (spoiler warning for my own fanfic! ^^) under the cut. Future!fic: Selected correspondence of Kurt and Blaine across the summer before they get married.
Note: So, Unscripted is actually ridick long, you can just read the last two sections to know all you need for this; Kurt and Blaine are by this point living in New York, twenty-four and engaged (Blaine proposed in a diner after accusing Kurt of infidelity and getting slapped for it; of course), Blaine's the cutest little student doctor, Kurt's working with an all-male theatre company specialising in Shakespeare, and Santana and her latest in a long string of girlfriends are hanging around making their lives more interesting. 'Research' for this universe is *so* awesome, I'm reading so much Shakespeare it's great <3 Theatre has never been an area I've known enough about, so if people want to nominate plays for an all-male troupe to make awesome, very appreciated! I have lived with a student doctor before, so that bit's vaguely covered at least? Sometimes you find forceps in the dishwasher and textbooks open on squeam-inducing photographs, basically =P
In the airport Blaine lifts Kurt completely off his feet in a hug, and Kurt laughs into his hair. They can both do this, neither of them finds the other's weight too much, though Kurt has too much grace to actually pick his boyfriend (fiancé, my love) off his feet in public and usually saves it for their bedroom. Blaine has to put him down, Kurt's too tall, it puts him off-balance, he staggers on the squeaky airport floor.
Kurt hits his shoulder and laughs and hugs him again. "I'll miss you," he says, rocking Blaine left and right with the hug, and Blaine nuzzles his face into his hair beside his ear, sucks the smell of him in deep. If he can hold his breath for the next six weeks then he'll be able to smell Kurt the whole time, but then Kurt kisses him again and his lungs empty themselves. He puts his hands up to cup Kurt's jaw, tries not to moan out loud. Six weeks. They haven't been apart for six weeks since -
In all honesty, they haven't been apart for more than odd weekends since college, and before that they were only apart on the nights because they were teenagers living at home and had to be, but they still saw each other almost every single day. And before they were dating they still saw each other almost every single day because they were at the same school and they just loved hanging out and now Blaine isn't entirely sure what to do with his life if Kurt isn't going to be in it. This is in his contract, it's what the Blue Elephant Players do every summer - they take culture to the masses, fly halfway across the country, hire a bus and drive back, performing at each stop, always two nights at a time; a tragedy, a comedy. This year it's their critically acclaimed Othello (Blaine makes sure to always refer to it as that, it makes Kurt grin that amused, pleased grin) and their version of A Midsummer Night's Dream, Kurt's second time in that play, his first time as Titania.
It feels like less of a comedy when they play it. It's mostly down to Kurt, but it actually feels downright dirty, borderline pornographic. Titania doesn't play falling for Bottom with a donkey's head for laughs, he plays it like he's fully aware that this is a man with the head of an animal and it turns him on. Blaine had felt incredibly, incredibly strange watching Kurt, lips parted in a slight smile, eyes dangerously drowsy, running his fingers down that donkey's snout. Quick-breathed turned-on freaked-out strange about it. The rest of the play is a bawdy mess of clothes getting wrenched off and partner-swapping farce and everyone wanting god even knows what from that poor Indian boy, who Kurt acts mostly motherly towards, while slinking across the stage like sex personified the rest of the time. It's a weird play. But Kurt's aloof, moody, sultry Titania tinges the whole mood of it, kept Blaine on edge in his seat for the whole play and then sort of crazed in bed with him afterwards, when he was Kurt again and laughing and warm.
"I'll miss you too. I bet I wake up freaked out every morning when you're not in the bed."
"You'll get used to it. You'll sprawl." Kurt rubs at the bridge of Blaine's nose like he's stroking a pony's snout, and Blaine wrinkles his face up but it is oddly nice. "When I get back I'll have to train you into one side of the mattress again."
Blaine puts his face into Kurt's shoulder. "When you get back you'll probably have to crowbar me off you."
Kurt's arms fold him in, and he kisses the top of Blaine's head, breathes there, "I will miss you."
"Call me."
"I will. Send emails."
"I will. Text."
"I'll write postcards. I'll write letters."
"I love you."
Kurt's shoulders slump under Blaine's hug. "I love you too."
"You'll be amazing."
"I know I will." Kurt kisses him again. "You will too."
"Hummel! Get your pretty butt over here or we miss our flight!"
"God, someone throw cold water on 'em. People in love can go fuck themselves, seriously."
"Bitter enough, Andy?"
"Boyfriend troubles, Andy?"
"Fuck all of you."
"Coming!" Kurt yells across at them, and scoops up his carry on bag, and grabs Blaine's arm to kiss him one last long lingering time while Blaine puts a hand to a cheek he knows so well and thinks, Oh god, before Kurt whispers, "When I get back, we get married."
And it lifts in Blaine like a balloon, because being married to Kurt is going to be so amazing he starts grinning whenever he thinks about it and can't stop. Kurt laughs at his face, clutches his hand, says, "I love you," and squeezes before he turns and strides off for his theatre troupe, singing, "I'm coming, I'm coming, I hope you people appreciate what I sacrifice for you."
"He's adorable, sweetheart, but he'll keep." Sean says, moves to ruffle Kurt's hair and gets ducked with a start. "Bye Blaine! Keep the bed warm and the affairs secret!"
"God I hope you get herpes," Kurt snaps back at him, and Blaine cups his mouth to call after them, "Bye guys! Break lots of legs!"
Samuel and Jean-Paul are talking quietly at the side of the group, before they kiss - once, sweetly, Jean-Paul coming off his heels and Samuel leaning down as graceful as a giraffe - and Jean-Paul walks over to where Blaine's standing. "How are you!" Jean-Paul says, in his boomingly enthusiastic English. "Long time no see!"
"Jean-Paul, hey, ça va?"
"We must get a drink!"
From the queue to board Sean calls back at them, "They're not even on the plane yet guys, a little restraint!" and Kurt smacks him in the arm, Samuel gives a quick twitching smile. Jean-Paul takes a second to translate to himself and laughs, hard, while Blaine throws an arm around his neck. "We'll keep each other company, you guys have fun without us!"
Kurt is giving Sean such a bitch face. Blaine spares a grateful thought to not having to be on that plane journey, and Jean-Paul shakes him by his shoulders, still laughing.
From: desdemonathanthou
To: dr_warbler
Subject: Kill me already & fly my ashes back to you
That was the worst, *worst* plane journey I have ever been forced to endure. I had to sit next to Tony and he just makes me *twitchy* and Sean was in *high* spirits and Phil was really down because his kids couldn't come to the airport to see him off. And as soon as we could take our seatbelts off John stood up and gave us this *speech* (it must be the same speech every year because Sean and Rico were mouthing along with him behind his back), this speech about how none of us are allowed to sleep with each other for the duration of the tour and I was just *flabbergasted*, and I told him I'm *engaged* and he said that that'll seem like less of an issue after six weeks in single beds.
It won't seem like less of an issue if the world ends tomorrow. It is the ONLY issue. And like I would want any of them anyway, none of them are my type. My type is you <3
So John is going to do random checks on our hotel sheets, isn't he a sweetheart. He said he doesn't care what a good idea it seems at the time, it will bring the company to the ground ('we don't want a repeat of 2014', apparently, which made everyone groan so that must have been a year of much ill-thought-through bed-hopping for the BEP) so we're all sworn celibate until we're back in NY. And an entire planeload of innocent bystanders were subjected to this. And I have never been so humiliated.
Well, no, I have, but never above cloud level before.
So then Sean's being Sean and Rico's being loud and Samuel's looking uncomfortable and Tony's trying to talk to me and I don't *like* Tony so I pretended to go to sleep. And he pretended to go to sleep on my shoulder. So I put a magazine between his head and my arm and actually went to sleep for a bit after that. But it was horrible, and I hate how plane travel makes my skin feel, and I am *so* many miles away from you now and how is that fair?
I haven't said that I miss you yet, I do miss you, *ridiculously* much since it's only been one day. We're on stage in an hour and a half, they're just prepping the lighting and everything, I've borrowed Phil's laptop to type this out quickly, he needs it back for Skyping the kids. Skyping *with* the kids, that sounds strange and violent. I don't feel like doing a stupid play tonight. I'm tired and I want to curl up with you and watch a stupid movie or something. Instead I'm going to get into my costume and go get killed onstage for the amusement of a bunch of yokels. And I know that I used to be a yokel but at least I was a yokel who knew who Shakespeare *was*.
I'm a bitch when I'm tired, I know. I hope I'll sleep well tonight but I bet I don't without you. I hope you're alright, use up the red cabbage coleslaw tonight if you can, it'll go bad. I love you. I really, really do, Blaine, and I don't need a few hundred miles between us to realise that but it does make me feel it *hard*. I love you. Sleep well without me. Remember to clean the shower screen after you use it.
I love you xx
You have 1 new voicemail
Hi Kurt, I guess you're onstage right now. So, this is for when you finish tonight. [a thumping noise, and then the strum of a guitar] I miss you! [the rest of the message is filled with Come Back From San Francisco, until the beep cuts it off]
You have 1 new voicemail
Kurt, Kuuurt, hi! You'll be onstage again, okay, I met up with Jean-Paul, we're keeping each other company while you guys are off being, you know, epic on stage and stuff, oh my god Kurt the man can drink, it's like his insides are made of asbestos or something, he just doesn't feel it, I really feel it, oh god I am drunk. Kuuuurt. I'll feel horrible tomorrow. Text me kisses.
Okay, so, Jean-Paul is like amazing though and we were medical geeks about dental technology and I have this beer mat on which we designed a guitar that is also a boat. I am so getting it patented, it is the most amazi- [thump, muffled words, second thump] I totally just fell over. You're not here to pick me up, but you're also not here to laugh at me, actually I wouldn't care if you laughed, I love your laugh.
Crap my ankle. Kuuurt. Text my ankle kisses.
I love you! [beep]
From: desdemonathanthou
To: dr_warbler
Subject: One week, one day, three hours, twenty minutes
That's how long it's been since I last saw you. Not that I'm counting or anything.
Last night after Dream there was a kid waiting outside the stage door, he looked about twelve but I think he was actually around sixteen, have you noticed that kids look younger the older you get? This kid, anyway, holding two programs in one hand and looking really painfully like he *needed* to say something, so I took him to one side a bit because Sean is so not subtle. He'd been to see the performance the night before as well, he looked like he was about to *cry*, he said that he'd never seen anything like that before, not in his town. He looked so incredibly *young*, Blaine, and I knew what he was talking about, and he just looked - do you remember the first day I met you? I went to Dalton to spy on our school's glee competition, but I didn't learn anything I expected, I learned - different, difficult things. Because it just seemed like a dream, to me, at that time in my life, a place like *that* existing. And then I had to go back to McKinley and it felt like Dalton was still stuck in my throat, that *that's* out there but what I had was *that* -
You can endure a lot if you don't know that you could have better, and there was this kid looking at me like I'd just crammed Dalton down his throat. And I didn't know what to say, I didn't know how to tell him that of course things will get better, if he can just be strong and *himself* he'll just *shine* one day, I hope I said the right things. I wanted to pick him up and run back to NY with him, we could adopt him! But we can't, obviously, so I just said what I wished someone had said to me back then, and gave him a hug. He was such a sweet kid. I hope he'll be alright.
It wasn't Dalton I wanted really, back then, it was just you. But I settled for Dalton; I liked having both for a while, because I'm greedy, but being able to go back to a less-shitty McKinley *and* having you, that was the best. It was like I could be strong and myself and love someone who loved me and made me shine, *and* tell that whole damn school that they couldn't take any of those things away from me.
I hope he finds someone he loves who'll love him someday soon. Until then I just hope I said the right things. He made me sign his programs 'for when I'm famous'. Doesn't he know that my glee club used to almost win competitions all the time?
I love you, miss you, wish you were here in this squeaky hotel bed. If you were here I'd wish the bed didn't squeak, too.
I love you xx
SMS received from Blaine:
What color helmet do you want?
SMS received from Kurt:
Blaine. What?
SMS received from Blaine:
I bought a scooter! :D
SMS received from Blaine:
This guy was selling it cheap bc hes moving or something.
SMS received from Blaine:
& you always complain about the subway but we cant afford a car. im a GENIUS.
SMS received from Kurt:
Do you even know how to drive a scooter?
SMS received from Blaine:
Its red! i love it. looking at helmets, what color do you want?
SMS received from Kurt:
Do not buy me a helmet. Take the scooter to a garage to get it checked. Book lessons.
SMS received from Blaine:
Im john dorian!!
SMS received from Kurt:
Traffic in NY: I disapprove entirely of the scooter.
SMS received from Blaine:
I would be careful, & look very suave.
SMS received from Kurt:
Traffic in NY: I disapprove ENTIRELY of the scooter.
SMS received from Kurt:
You would look suave though. Euro-chic.
SMS received from Kurt:
Obviously I need to choose my own helmet. BOOK LESSONS.
SMS received from Blaine:
Its SO RED i love it i will polish it every day.
"Kurt! Hey! Where are you?"
"God I don't even know. On a bus halfway between the ass-end of nowhere and the ass-end of nowhere else. Where are you, are you at the hospital?"
"Changing my scrubs in the locker room."
"Exactly how half-dressed are you as we speak?"
"It's less sexy than you think, someone just puked on me. How was last night's performance?"
"Oh, dull. I don't know. Everything's easier when I'm onstage, I'm not me then, I can't miss you because . . . it's just the only time I don't feel my missing you."
"I miss you too. I think about you all the time. When I was being puked on what I was thinking was Kurt would think this is so gross."
"You think the sweetest things."
"So, did you want to talk about anything or did you just want to trade sweet nothings about vomit?"
"I wanted to hear your voice. Um. Will you - do something for me?"
"Actually anything. And you know that."
"Okay. First, will you not laugh? And second - if I give you the address of where we're staying in three days - will you mail something to me?"
"Sure. Hold on, let me get a pen. What do you want mailing?"
". . . would you send me something you've slept in? Something. That smells of you.
"I'm not sleeping great, I miss . . . I don't like sleeping on my own anymore.
"Don't go quiet. Please. You promised you wouldn't laugh."
"I'm not laughing, I swear to god, I'm just . . . I love you. Oh god, Kurt, I do, you know that, don't you?"
"I do. And I miss you too much. And it's really stressful and tiring and I never get a proper night's sleep and -"
"Oh, Kurt-"
"-and just everything would be better if you were here. I can't even talk properly now, I know that half the bus is listening in you bastards. I just never get any privacy-"
"It's only four more weeks."
"Oh god four more weeks."
"Hey hey hey, hush hush hush. I'll send you a parcel. Okay? Give me the address. I'll send you a parcel. And if you remember that I am never not thinking about you, will that help? Because I always always am. You are the middle cerebral artery in my head, filling my brain with oxygen-rich thoughts of you."
"I can't work out if that's cute or gross."
"Some things are both. Like placenta-covered newborn babies. See, things are better when you laugh."
"Oh god, Blaine. So, just - just something you've slept in, something I can - have in bed. Please. Have you found a pen?"
"Yep. Go for it. My négligée will wing its way to you."
"God, I miss you. Okay, the hotel's called The Vacation - like every hotel so far I know it will be foul - on Stevenson Street -"
SMS received from Blaine:
Thinking of you x
On a postcard from a town Blaine's never heard of:
Someone in the ass-end of nowhere loves you!
xxx
SMS received from Kurt:
Little group of cretins with placards outside the theater.
SMS received from Kurt:
They misspelled 'Leviticus'.
SMS received from Kurt:
I moved to NY for a reason.
SMS received from Blaine:
You know what i just thought?
SMS received from Blaine:
Were *betrothed*.
SMS received from Blaine:
It made me all excited for getting married again!
SMS received from Kurt:
Waking up makes you excited for getting married.
SMS received from Kurt:
It is romantic though, my betrothed x
You have 2 new voicemails
Hey, I guess you're onstage again, I hope the yokels appreciate you. So, I just got home, it's weird you not being here, I really need you here to talk to tonight, it's been - it was a day. [clink, hiss] So I'm going to ramble into your voicemail for a while and then do beer and TV and then go to bed, and meditate on how really lame I am without you. So lame.
So, still on my stint in ER, mixed reviews so far? A guy fell off his seat in the waiting room today, just bang and down, heart attack. He wasn't breathing. And I was the first one there since I don't have anything real to do and I just started CPR because it's what you do, and - you know in the movies they show CPR and it's, it's not like that, it's hard, you're trying to make someone's lungs work through their ribcage, I was just banging away at this poor guy's chest like a Neanderthal with a rock, I just - forgot everything else while I was doing it, the whole room went away, it was just - breathe, breathe, breathe, breathe, please breathe -
God it is - such hard work. And I couldn't even think about stopping, do you know what I thought about? I thought about your dad, and how people helped him out in hospital once, and what it meant to you. So I couldn't stop, because this guy means something to people, but I was sweating and my arms hurt and then all of a sudden he just - breathed. And I nearly crapped myself. And Janek sort of gave me a well-done pat on the shoulder and then they got him onto a gurney and like, started actually helping him, but -
I wish you were here, I don't feel right about it, it should be a happy thing, right? But I just keep thinking - I don't even know what I keep thinking. That being a doctor is going to be the weirdest power trip in the world, because for every person you bring literally back from the dead, there's going to be like, twenty you can't save, and I - I just feel weird. Kurt. I miss you. If you were here- [cut off by beep]
So hi, still me, I forgot what I was going to say. Just I wish you were here, I need a hug. Do you think I'm ready to be a doctor? I still feel about thirteen sometimes, I don't know if they should be letting me do this stuff. No, I feel sixteen, I still feel like I was when I first met you. When you're here I feel so much - more, I just feel more when you're here, like I'm more. I just feel sort of young and sort of lost and like everything is sort of too much without you.
I love you in ridiculous ways, please don't ever leave me, I would actually go to pieces. This on half a bottle of beer, I have no tolerance for anything when you're not here.
I love you. Be awesome and then come back home and marry me, okay? I love you. G'night. [beep]
SMS received from Kurt:
Crappy little theater's lights blew before performance. Sang to keep the audience quiet while fixed.
SMS received from Kurt:
Homeward Bound sounds really lonely on an empty stage. Miss you bad.
SMS received from Kurt:
& Sean is right on my ass about it I will BRAIN him before we get home.
SMS received from Kurt:
Standing ovations make me feel better though x
You have 1 new voicemail:
Three weeks! Halfway there! [followed by a guitar and La Cienega Just Smiled until the beep cuts it off]
SMS received from Kurt:
I keep putting my jacket over my head to listen to your messages without the bus listening in.
SMS received from Kurt:
Everyone thinks I'm crazy. I won't ever care.
(Kurt naked on their kitchen table like spilt milk. They don't have much time, Kurt has to get back to the other end of the country for a play, Blaine fucks him urgently urgently too fast and Kurt says faster faster and nothing can be faster than this, and the orgasm is twisting clasping too good too good oh oh oh and then Blaine wakes up, and feels like a teenager, alone in the bed.)
SMS received from Blaine:
Sex dream about you last night. not the first.
SMS received from Kurt:
Don't make me horny, please don't, I do not get a second's privacy.
SMS received from Blaine:
I wont go into detail then but DAMN kurt
SMS received from Blaine:
Only then i wake up sad without you there
SMS received from Kurt:
I'm sorry. I love you.
SMS received from Blaine:
I love you too. & seriously. DAMN.
SMS received from Blaine:
Thinking of you x
You have 1 new voicemail
Hi Kurt, me and Dawnie had a threesome with your boyfriend last night, hope you don't mind! No, we went over to cheer him up because he is being weird without you, and we totally got crap burnt all over your stove making chilli, have fun cleaning it off. And we slept over because he does the hurt puppy eyes when you try to leave him, my god you picked a clingy one, so we all slept in your bed. He hugs your pillow when he sleeps, I'm veering towards thinking it's more cute than sickening? Dawnie says she still might hurl though. Love you baby, even if your play is a bunch of nonsense crap. Ciao!
"How is he being weird?"
"Well hi to you too Kurt, haven't seen you in forever, how's things?"
"Yes, hi Santana, fabulous to talk to you, how is Blaine being weird?"
"Oh, god. You remember when you first met him? When he was this hair gel helmeted dancing blazer?"
"He was a lot more than that."
"Yeah, in a kind of TARDIS-y only on the inside way. But you know what I mean."
"Ye-es. I - I get subjected to these things because of Blaine, but I am curious how you know what a TARDIS is."
"Oh god, it's Dawnie's fault. She's all like, We have to go back in time and have a threesome with Amy Pond and daaaaammnnn we do. Hotter than your boyfriend."
"Oh please, they haven't invented people hotter than my boyfriend. How - how is he being weird?"
"I think he's acting again. Like, all the time. Except when you try to go home and he does the worried puppy face."
". . . he seemed okay. We've been texting and talking and . . . he seemed okay."
"Yeah, Kurt, take five minutes to remember how good at seeming okay he is. How's your trip?"
". . . you know. Awful. Playing Shakespeare to hicks who barely understand modern English is soul-destroying enough, but everyone does nothing but bitch. I bet all-women theatre companies don't have this problem."
"You live in a sheltered little corner of the world, Kurt."
"How's Dawn?"
"She is the biggest fucking bitch I ever met."
"Fine, then."
"I love her. She's awesome."
"You're awesome too."
"I know, baby, I know that. I appreciate the fact a little bit more every day."
"I have to call Blaine. But - thank you for looking after him."
"Please. I just don't wanna go through the trauma of managing your grief after he throws himself off a bridge. There ain't enough ice cream in New York."
"I hate you. Bye."
"Love you too. Bye bye, baby."
"Hi Kurt! Where are you?"
"On the bus, with a jacket over my head. Only way to get any damn privacy, I know they're all still listening in though. They're as subtle as monkeys in heat."
"You love them."
"I love eighty percent of them. Eighty percent of the time. Where are you?"
"Home. On the couch."
". . . what are you doing?"
"I was thinking that if I'm JD that makes you Turk and that makes no sense at all."
"Okay. I'm glad you're doing constructive things while I'm away."
"But then I thought oh my god you're Elliott, Kurt! You're Elliott! And Santana is Carla-"
"Watch less Scrubs, read books. Um, Santana called."
"Did she? I only saw her last night. How's she doing?"
"She's Santana. Um, she said . . ."
"You're doing the embarrassed skirting-around-the-subject thing. What did she say? Oh god. Did she do something to me while I was asleep?"
"She psychoanalysed you."
"Did she draw something on me somewhere I can't see it? Did she shave some of my hair out-?"
"She worried about you, Blaine. Santana worried about you. Which made me nearly have a damn heart attack, if she's worrying."
"Why would she worry? I'm fine."
"Blaine? I'm not fine. I'm okay. I get through the days, and some of it's fun, and I still love acting and I love when I can feel the audience feeling it properly. But I miss you like hell, it actually physically hurts me how much I miss you, and I never get enough sleep and I'm stressed and ratty and I want to come home. So, that's me being honest, so will you do the same, please?
". . . Blaine?"
"Being a doctor is. Going to be really heavy."
". . . I know it is. I know. But you like helping people, and you're good at it, Blaine."
"I never . . . I guess I didn't notice how hard it was, because I came home to you every night and you make things better for me, you don't even have to try to, you just do. But it's hard on my own. I don't know, I don't - I don't want to whine about it, I know I'm in a ridiculously privileged position here, I have nothing to whine about. But it's-"
"It's not whining. It's not easy."
"It's not. It's just, it's not. And I just - I got into a fight with one of the residents, or I got yelled at by a resident and did not snap back and thought about like, smashing a bedpan over his head, because there was this old lady who couldn't stop shaking and she was really nervous about having her blood taken so I sat with her for a while and talked to her and - I don't know, old ladies like me, I don't know why."
"Because you're an impeccably mannered, incredibly handsome dashing young doctor, Blaine."
"Almost-doctor. I am pretty dashing, though. So it took a while to get the bloods and then Chris - the resident, Chris - started asking me how the hell long it takes to draw a little bit of blood and I explained how nervous she was and he said I could've done four patients in the time it took and I was like, this is a hospital, not a factory, and he said yes it's a hospital so I should be 'professional' and treat them like patients and I said I do treat them like patients, I just don't treat them like battery chickens-"
"Oh, Blaine."
"And then he told me I was naïve and young and he's seen a hundred students like me and I don't have a clue yet. And walked off. And. I just - I'm still angry, I'm sorry, I don't want to talk to you when I'm angry like this-"
"No, no, you should, because it's still a part of you and you know I still love you, Blaine, I always love you. And that resident sounds like a dick. You did the right thing."
". . . he is right, though. There isn't the time, half the time. There isn't the time and you have a dozen patients to keep an eye on and you're stressed and you - you - I don't want to be that, Kurt, I don't want to not care, but if I do care all the time then I'm going to have a nervous breakdown-"
"You won't. Because I'll be there and I'll look after you. I'm never doing this again. Stupid horrible tour, I'm never doing it again. I'm staying at home with you and looking after you."
"I'm not a dog, I don't need 'looking after'. It is - easier, though. When you're here."
"I'll always be there."
"I'm so glad I found you. It feels so ridiculous to me sometimes, that I found you, because no-one else would be right like this and then what would I do? I wouldn't even be me, I'd be someone else, and I just want to be me, with you."
"You are you with me. You're you and you care and it's one of the reasons I love you, Blaine."
"I love you too. Come home and marry me."
"I will. Two weeks, four days. And it's two months and eight days to the wedding, I worked it out last night."
"It's weird. Our apartment without you. It's dinnertime I hate, being alone in here. Cooking for one is - I'm eating a lot of takeout."
"I'll come home and make you so much salad."
"I look forward to it. My digestive system won't know how to handle vitamins anymore, though."
". . . did you get the chilli off the stove?"
"Oh, uh, Santana told you about that, huh."
"Yes, yes Blaine, she did. Tell me it came off. Tell me you did not ruin my stove."
". . . I'll spend some time with a wire brush this weekend. I'm sure it'll come clean.
". . . please don't be mad. It was really nice to have them over, please don't be mad."
". . . I'm not mad. I don't even care. You could've painted the walls with chilli, I still just want to come home to you."
"Okay. I won't paint the walls with chilli though. Strong smelling stuff."
"I love you."
"I love you too, beautiful. I do."
SMS received from Kurt:
Thinking of *you* x
SMS received from Kurt:
Woken up by Rico talking in his sleep in Italian. Taking a walk.
SMS received from Kurt:
Really ridiculously beautiful dawn. Sending you a photo.
SMS received from Blaine:
Watching it out the window. cant see much for the buildings, your views better.
"Hey."
"Hey."
"Sorry if I woke you up."
"Don't be, it's better being awake talking to you than being asleep and not talking to you."
"I feel like the only person in the world."
"Me too, apart from the homeless guy kicking trash cans over in the alleyway, and all those cars."
"It's so quiet."
"Do you ever miss Ohio?"
"I don't know. I miss - this. Do you?"
"Sometimes. When we buy a house-"
"Somewhere quieter. Yes. We'll need a yard."
"For the dog and the kids."
"And I can plant roses. We can eat breakfast out there in summer, watch the sun come up like this."
"How was the play last night?"
"We made a guy in a non-ironic plaid shirt cry."
"I'm so proud of you."
"I know, me too."
SMS received from Blaine:
I miss having sex with you so much :(
SMS received from Kurt:
You are the last of the great romantics.
SMS received from Kurt:
I miss it too :(
You have 1 new voicemail
This is the connoisseurs' favourite Marvin Gaye sex song, just so you know. [the rest of the message is a guitar-accompanied Come Get To This, until the beep]
Dear Blaine,
I've never actually written to you before, it looks strange to write that. Your name looks lovely in my handwriting. Even my horrible jogged about by the bus handwriting.
I have to write because I can't tell you this, not over the phone, because everyone listens in, there's never any privacy. But last night was just the worst, I got about two hours sleep and I cried for half the night and it was just horrible, horrible, and now hardly anyone's talking to each other and I know half the bus blames me and hates me and if Samuel wasn't here I'd just walk out and catch a greyhound home. But I would give anything to see you tonight, I feel like crap, Blaine, it's all so horrible. And I'm not going to cry again, not now.
Last night Sean and Rico slept together, and everyone knows it. They've been on-again off-again for years but I've never known them 'on', and John's furious and yelled the hell out of them, but that was this morning and it was too late then. Because I've been sharing rooms with Rico, only Rico wasn't in my room last night because obviously he was in Sean's room, which meant that Sean kicked Tony out of his room. So at midnight there's a knock on my door and it's Tony with nowhere else to sleep and what was I supposed to do, make him sleep in the hallway? I let him in. He had a bottle of wine, I said I didn't want a drink and pretended to go to sleep. But I could feel him just sitting there on his bed watching me, I can't even tell you how creepy it was. Blaine - I know I probably have issues about these things, I know in my head it's probably creepier than it is in reality, but I just can't stand people other than you looking at me like that. I just feel sixteen again, and terrified.
So at two in the morning he stood up and I thought that if he touched me I might never stop screaming, but he just stood still for a bit and then went in the bathroom. I got out of bed and went to Samuel's room. Samuel opened the door and I was a nervous mess and he just let me in and Andy cursed and rolled over and went back to sleep and oh Blaine, you were right all along, I got into bed with Samuel after all. Just not in the fun way.
We spoke in French for a bit, very quietly, and then we were almost asleep when someone else came pounding at the door yelling enough to wake the whole hotel up, Tony, drunk, calling me names I am not. Samuel got up but I beat him to the door. I was so angry I was shaking. I told him that I can't be both frigid and a whore and I am engaged and incredibly uninterested and he should go back to bed and sleep. He called me more names. Samuel loomed at him over my shoulder - he is so good at looming - but he didn't shut up until John came storming up the hallway and yelled us all out, shoved me and Samuel back into the room (where Andy had a pillow over his head and was moaning how much he hated us all) and started to have a fight with Tony in the hallway.
And now Tony is gone. Fired. Said the wrong things to John and now we're down a lighting designer and we'll just have to manage with the techies at the theaters as we go, and hope they know what they're doing. And everyone knows it's my fault there's an empty seat on the bus and everyone keeps not looking at me. Sean and Rico are sitting at opposite ends of the bus pretending they don't give a crap and I'm sitting next to Samuel and trying not to cry. It was stressful before, now I want to be sick. I wish I was at home with you, two weeks feel like the rest of my life right now, I need you.
You won't even get this letter until tomorrow or the day after, that's the part that hurts the most. You won't even know how much I need you right now. I know that this will make you worried and I'm selfish for wanting to worry you, I know that. But you know me, more than anyone does, you know what I'm like. You know how much I need you.
I did end up crying again after all. Samuel is looking after me, I'm not alone. But it's you I really need, and I just can't wait to come home.
I hope your day's been better. You will be the best doctor, Blaine, you care so much and it's the best part of you, don't ever stop. If other people aren't brave enough to care the way you do then it's their loss. You're special. They can't take that away from you. You're going to be better than them and their bitterness won't change that.
I love you, love you, love you. Two weeks. I love you.
Yours, and you know it,
Kurt xxx
SMS received from Blaine:
Thinking of you x
SMS received from Blaine:
Thinking of having sex with you specifically x
SMS received from Kurt:
I love you.
SMS received from Blaine:
You know i love you too.
You have 1 new voicemail
Hi Kurt! I've been listening to a lot of Ryan Adams while you've been away, which I think means you can tell I miss you. [a guitar strums and then starts to play, and the rest of the message is Call Me On Your Way Back Home, until the beep]
Dear Blaine, again, in pain, again,
You'll probably only get the last letter today, and it's already worse. I don't even know how I'll get onstage tonight, I want to be curled up in a ball crying where no-one can see me and I have to go onstage in front of strangers and act like someone else. Acting like someone else will at least be easier than being me right now.
We all went to a bar after last night's performance, John wanted us to re-bond or something since Tony got sent home and we're all a bit shaken up. As a bonding exercise it failed utterly. I ended up having a fight with Sean, or Sean had it with me, but we fought, anyway. I don't even know how it really started, it just got worse really quickly, and then he's telling me I haven't been in the company five minutes and I've already wrecked things for other people and who the hell do I think I am, and I don't have a clue who I am without you anyway.
His exact words, I might as well write them down because I'm going to remember them until the day I die anyway, were, 'Tony's always felt people up and it never meant anything, what the fuck kind of blowjob did you give John that you're his favorite fucking princess now'. And there's a level I can't even judge him on because Blaine, that's me, ten years down the line and bitter, that's me if I don't stop myself. I know I can be cruel, but please tell me I can't be that.
I started crying, anyway. Sean sneered at me that I was doing it for sympathy, I wasn't, I didn't want to be crying, I just wanted to be somewhere else. I walked out of the bar and Samuel came after me and we just went back to the hotel and went to sleep. It's nice to just hold someone. Don't be jealous, please, you know there's no need to be, you know he's a friend and I love you more than anyone in the world, Blaine, but I need him right now, he's holding me together and everything is so awful. He's older than us, he looks out for me, it's nice to feel that someone's taking my side right now. I'm still wearing your t-shirt to sleep in. I've never worn something so long without washing it before.
Sean keeps making loud bitchy comments about me on the bus. I make them back but it doesn't mean they don't hurt. And I won't cry again. I won't. I can't.
It feels like it is all my fault, and I know it isn't but I can't convince my stomach not to feel so guilty. I don't know how I'll go onstage tonight. I don't know.
I love you, too much. I hope you're alright, I hope you're better than me, Blaine.
Yours, Blaine,
Kurt xxx
SMS received from Blaine:
I got your letter. Call me as soon as you can. I love you xx
From: desdemonathanthou
To: dr_warbler
Subject: Hi Blaine <3
It was so good to talk to you last night, I think you knew that anyway. I haven't liked to ask Phil to borrow his laptop with everything going on but he just handed it to me before breakfast and told me I looked like I needed distracting. So I'm eating a bagel and emailing you. Two of my favourite things.
Sean and I are kind of awkwardly not arguing anymore, but the atmosphere's still not good. We tried to talk, last night, and it wasn't nice, but I suppose at least it's done. He says I have only been here five minutes, and some of them have been in this company for years, and I just swan in and skim off the best parts and it isn't fair but damn it I'm *good* and I'm not going to stifle that for anyone else's ambition. I'm *good*. Even Sean said that. Cursed me for it. For being younger than him and more talented than him and 'prettier' than him and set up to marry 'some perfect doctor' and live happily ever after. And I told him that you're not perfect and you make me watch Star Trek movies and he at least laughed. But he's avoiding eye contact with me and I'm not really talking to anyone right now, because I don't know if that's how they all feel. I just sit next to Samuel, and try to sleep as much as possible.
I don't want people to hate me for being good at something I love. And if they think horrible things about me then I can't stop them, but it's really not easy being stuck on a bus with them eight hours a day if that is what they're thinking. I just keep picking myself apart, trying to work out if I *am* such a horrible person, and I don't think I am, am I? I know I'm not always as good as I should be, I know I'm selfish and petty and small sometimes, but I'm not *bad*. I don't think I'm bad. Oh god I miss you.
Write and tell me how nice I am, please?
I love you xx
From: dr_warbler
To: desdemonathanthou
Subject: Re: Hi Blaine <3
You:
Are the best cook in all of the world and you know it, I could eat your food until my stomach ruptured and die bloated and happy.
Are ludicrously, jaw-droopingly beautiful, and I keep staring at photographs of you without you here and making little whining noises at just how much you rip the breath right out of my lungs, they shouldn't *make* people as pretty as you, Kurt.
Are so good an actor that you disturb me and I feel like I need to check you're still you after I see you perform, I *believe* that you're not you when you're onstage. You will always be a star. We just don't live in a world where people are always honest instead of jealous. Webcomics say it better than I do: http://www.asofterworld.com/index.php?id=34
Smell amazing. It's like you secrete really expensive cologne. I keep sticking my head into your side of the closet just to smell you.
Make me smile with my heart.
Are the *kindest* person I have ever met, I have never known anyone who gives so much without ever thinking about it, you made me realise that there's never a reason to be shy of being kind because you can keep on giving kindness and you never do run out of it. You have the most generous soul I have ever known. You are good. You are *good*.
Are the rest of my life, I am so excited to get to marry you, we are going to be EPIC.
Smile like an angel, it makes me need to kiss you but need to not take my eyes off your face, I want too much all the time around you.
Are so patient with me when I am so stupid sometimes, you teach me every day how to be better, a better person and a better me.
Make my spine clench when you sing, I keep listening to MP3s of you, your voice makes me feel giddy. Never stop, songbird. You're special.
Shake it like a Polaroid picture when you dance and really get into it. I love it.
Are my favorite person.
Touch me in ways no-one's ever touched me, and no-one else ever will.
Don't even know how much people love you. If you did I don't think you could ever feel anything but loved.
Give the best handjobs in all of creation, though I would never want you to demonstrate that fact to other people and win the title in any official capacity.
Will come back to New York, and back to our bed, and after we have made love a *lot* because I am incredibly horny for you, I will never let you go again.
Better believe I'm serious about that last one, I am seriously going to handcuff you to me. We can alternate your rehearsals and my ward rounds, but you're never leaving my sight again.
Are the best thing that ever happened to me. Thank you so much, Kurt.
- Blaine xxxxxxxxx
SMS received from Blaine:
I won an accordion on ebay!!
SMS received from Kurt:
I knew I should have hidden the credit cards when I left.
You have 1 new voicemail:
Hi Kurt, it's me. Met up with Jean-Paul again, we are such BFFs now, he's amazing, he's just so funny, I'm not even drunk and it's not just because I made a point of not drinking so much this time but he made me keep snorting beer out of my nose so I guess I didn't absorb so much alcohol, god.
I got the stuff off the stove! It only took a week of on and off scrubbing. But it's one week to go! One more week! I don't even know what I'm going to do when I see you, I might just, like, ravish you on sight. I might be too excited to speak. I know I'm going to need to kiss you entirely senseless, either way.
I love you! [beep]
SMS received from Kurt:
I went out and bought a book, too many magazines rotted my brain.
SMS received from Kurt:
i like my body when it is with your/ body.
SMS received from Kurt:
as yes is to if,love is to yes.
SMS received from Blaine:
Cummings!
SMS received from Kurt:
I *love* you.
SMS received from Blaine:
Thinking of you x
"Hi Blaine, where-"
"Kurt I delivered a baby! It just - came out and screamed it was the most beautiful thing I've ever seen covered in mucus it-"
"Oh my god, Blaine-"
"There was this pile-up and all the trauma rooms were full and this woman came into the ER just screaming and fell over and Janek got a screen and it was already crowning so I just - just, I mean basically all I did was catch it because it was happening anyway but oh my god Kurt it was the most-"
"Oh god, Blaine . . ."
"- amazing, amazing, amazing thing ever, it screamed like what the hell is this world it's come into, but then we cleaned him up and gave him to his mom and he was all tiny and cuddly and oh my god, Kurt, I want one."
"I know, I know, Blaine."
"We have to get married and adopt babies."
"We will, Blaine. We are, Blaine."
"Lots of them."
"We will, I promise, we will."
"How many?"
"As many as we can support, I promise. As many as we can."
"Oh god, it was the most amazing . . ."
"I love you."
"Are you crying?"
"Yes. I don't know why."
"I cried a bit too. Kurt-"
"I know."
"Life is amazing."
"I know, I know, I know."
SMS received from Blaine:
Hows he doing?
SMS received from Samuel:
He reads, he looks out of the window and smiles.
SMS received from Samuel:
He loves you.
SMS received from Blaine:
I know. believe me, i know.
SMS received from Blaine:
(i do not know what it is about you that closes/ and opens; only something in me understands
SMS received from Blaine:
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)/ nobody,not even the rain,has such small hands
SMS received from Kurt:
People think I'm an idiot the way I smile at texts.
SMS received from Kurt:
I won't ever care.
SMS received from Kurt:
Is it wrong that applause makes everything better?
SMS received from Blaine:
Even tinkerbell needed it.
SMS received from Kurt:
Tinkerbell was a bitch.
SMS received from Blaine:
I do believe in you, i do.
SMS received from Kurt:
At least I'm not Wendy in this scenario.
From: desdemonathanthou
To: dr_warbler
Subject: Two days!
We are so close to home I feel like skipping the performances and just *running* to meet you. We're sold out both nights though, I think it's mostly New Yorkers who couldn't get tickets to the original performances. Yes I'm flattered that they drive for four hours to see us. They should, we're good.
I've started crying every performance of Othello, it's not intentional, it just happens. I just think about you and I dissolve. Luckily it looks like it's supposed to happen but Samuel looks worried, when he's 'killing' me he's actually wiping my eyes off with the sheets. I can feel how close you are, it's like being plugged into an electric circuit. My head is full of Blaine Blaine Blaine and I can't believe I'll see you in two days, I will see you and touch you and kiss you and oh god our *bed*, I can't wait to be in our bed with you, I'm never getting out of it again. Neither are you.
Being away from you I keep realising like it's for the first time how perfect you are, how amazing you are, how you're so intelligent and wear it so lightly and well, and you're so funny but you're never, never cruel in it, how you're so full of hope and happiness all the time, how you'd do *anything* to make people happy, and you love me. And I've always been a little astonished by that, by someone as good as you loving me. By someone as ridiculously attractive as you loving me. But now I feel *proud* of it too. You love me, even when I'm not there, even when I'm at my lowest points and I don't have any energy for anything but myself and I'm not doing anything for you and there's no reason I deserve it but you still love me, you're so good and you *love* me, and I feel so proud of it. Like I must be a good person, to have you loving me like that. Like your loving me like that makes me a good person.
How much sense does this make? I feel drunk on sheer proximity to you, I may pass out when I actually see you. You'll have to carry me home.
I love you. I will be a good person, for you. I will make sure I deserve the way you love me.
And I will love you with every part of me so you can never doubt it and never feel alone, not ever, because I will never let you be, I *love* you.
So they can take their tour next summer and shove it up their ass, I'm staying home with you.
I love you xx
SMS received from Blaine:
One night. go on stage and kill them.
SMS received from Kurt:
We mutinied en masse & John folded. We're driving straight to NY after the performance.
SMS received from Kurt:
We won't be back until about 2am. None of us wanted to wait for the morning.
SMS received from Blaine:
Seriously? ill be there. parking lot near the theater?
SMS received from Kurt:
I can't believe I'll see you. Going onstage, will text when free, yes that parking lot xx
SMS received from Blaine:
So excited
SMS received from Blaine:
SO excited
SMS received from Blaine:
SO EXCITED
SMS received from Kurt:
On bus! See you in four hours! I love you xxx
SMS received from Blaine:
SO EXCITED
SMS received from Blaine:
Meeting j-p in the parking lot, forming welcoming party
SMS received from Blaine:
Cant buy balloons this time of night, i thought this city never slept?
SMS received from Kurt:
I don't want balloons I just want you.
SMS received from Blaine:
SO EXCITDD!
SMS received from Blaine:
*excited
SMS received from Kurt:
Yes, I can tell.
SMS received from Blaine:
I love you
SMS received from Kurt:
With all my heart, I do I do I do
They can see them as the bus pulls in; Sean and Rico and Ewan (referred to as 'Token Straight Ewan', and as he's Sean's roommate as well as a Blue Elephant Player, this road trip probably didn't do anything to shock him) lean out of the window to yell as they turn into the parking lot in the middle of a New York night with a little party there yelling back at them, and Kurt can hear an accordion playing an awful, awful rendition of New York, New York and his heart beats in his throat like a bird trying to fly out.
There's a general good-natured shoving to get off the bus when it stops. Sean spreads his arms to offer Kurt space to get off before him, meets his eye, says wryly, "You have so much and no idea how young you are, sweetheart."
It still all hurts too much to think about right now. Kurt says, a little roughly, "I really have felt it, this trip." and Sean offers him a tight sort of smile, pushes gently at him to get him off the bus. Kurt skips onto the tarmac, broken glass grits under his boot - ah, New York - and Blaine is trying to fold the accordion up before he gives up, drops it with a wheezing broken bellow of noise, throws his arms out. Kurt's in them like he's fallen into them. Blaine's arms wrap in too tight around his back and Kurt stuffs his face into Blaine's hair and breathes in oh so much Blaine and every breath of Blaine's crushes his lungs and every breath of his pushes hard back against Blaine and he doesn't ever ever want to be any less close to him than this ever not ever again never never never.
They stagger, tangled and hard-clasped, one of Blaine's hands gripping in his hair as he pants at Kurt's ear, "-missed anyone like this ever I'm so proud you got through it I'm so-"
Kurt chokes, "Love you so much so much so much-"
It's two in the morning and the parking lot is full of shrieks and shouts and hard-clapped hugs; Jean-Paul takes Samuel's hand and Samuel leans down, runs a hand over his head, kisses him there, while Phil's kids' mother hands him a sleeping three year old while the seven year old leans into his side and mumbles drowsily, "Hi Dad." and John's partner, thin and bespectacled, sighs like he and his theatre company are so much trouble as he climbs out of his car. Kurt can't let go of Blaine. He'll hold him until they suffocate each other, it's the best way to die.
He lifts Blaine off his feet because he can. Blaine laughs hard at the sky and his heels bump the ground again, and he holds Kurt's face as he kisses him, and no; this is the best way to live.
When All Of New York City Misses You, glee!fic
Disclaimer: While we're quite OC-heavy in parts, the prettiest ones aren't mine, alas.
Rating: Pff, R. I'm predictable like that.
Summary: Set in the Unscripted universe; you don't necessarily have to have read it to read this, I'll post a summary (spoiler warning for my own fanfic! ^^) under the cut. Future!fic: Selected correspondence of Kurt and Blaine across the summer before they get married.
Note: So, Unscripted is actually ridick long, you can just read the last two sections to know all you need for this; Kurt and Blaine are by this point living in New York, twenty-four and engaged (Blaine proposed in a diner after accusing Kurt of infidelity and getting slapped for it; of course), Blaine's the cutest little student doctor, Kurt's working with an all-male theatre company specialising in Shakespeare, and Santana and her latest in a long string of girlfriends are hanging around making their lives more interesting. 'Research' for this universe is *so* awesome, I'm reading so much Shakespeare it's great <3 Theatre has never been an area I've known enough about, so if people want to nominate plays for an all-male troupe to make awesome, very appreciated! I have lived with a student doctor before, so that bit's vaguely covered at least? Sometimes you find forceps in the dishwasher and textbooks open on squeam-inducing photographs, basically =P
In the airport Blaine lifts Kurt completely off his feet in a hug, and Kurt laughs into his hair. They can both do this, neither of them finds the other's weight too much, though Kurt has too much grace to actually pick his boyfriend (fiancé, my love) off his feet in public and usually saves it for their bedroom. Blaine has to put him down, Kurt's too tall, it puts him off-balance, he staggers on the squeaky airport floor.
Kurt hits his shoulder and laughs and hugs him again. "I'll miss you," he says, rocking Blaine left and right with the hug, and Blaine nuzzles his face into his hair beside his ear, sucks the smell of him in deep. If he can hold his breath for the next six weeks then he'll be able to smell Kurt the whole time, but then Kurt kisses him again and his lungs empty themselves. He puts his hands up to cup Kurt's jaw, tries not to moan out loud. Six weeks. They haven't been apart for six weeks since -
In all honesty, they haven't been apart for more than odd weekends since college, and before that they were only apart on the nights because they were teenagers living at home and had to be, but they still saw each other almost every single day. And before they were dating they still saw each other almost every single day because they were at the same school and they just loved hanging out and now Blaine isn't entirely sure what to do with his life if Kurt isn't going to be in it. This is in his contract, it's what the Blue Elephant Players do every summer - they take culture to the masses, fly halfway across the country, hire a bus and drive back, performing at each stop, always two nights at a time; a tragedy, a comedy. This year it's their critically acclaimed Othello (Blaine makes sure to always refer to it as that, it makes Kurt grin that amused, pleased grin) and their version of A Midsummer Night's Dream, Kurt's second time in that play, his first time as Titania.
It feels like less of a comedy when they play it. It's mostly down to Kurt, but it actually feels downright dirty, borderline pornographic. Titania doesn't play falling for Bottom with a donkey's head for laughs, he plays it like he's fully aware that this is a man with the head of an animal and it turns him on. Blaine had felt incredibly, incredibly strange watching Kurt, lips parted in a slight smile, eyes dangerously drowsy, running his fingers down that donkey's snout. Quick-breathed turned-on freaked-out strange about it. The rest of the play is a bawdy mess of clothes getting wrenched off and partner-swapping farce and everyone wanting god even knows what from that poor Indian boy, who Kurt acts mostly motherly towards, while slinking across the stage like sex personified the rest of the time. It's a weird play. But Kurt's aloof, moody, sultry Titania tinges the whole mood of it, kept Blaine on edge in his seat for the whole play and then sort of crazed in bed with him afterwards, when he was Kurt again and laughing and warm.
"I'll miss you too. I bet I wake up freaked out every morning when you're not in the bed."
"You'll get used to it. You'll sprawl." Kurt rubs at the bridge of Blaine's nose like he's stroking a pony's snout, and Blaine wrinkles his face up but it is oddly nice. "When I get back I'll have to train you into one side of the mattress again."
Blaine puts his face into Kurt's shoulder. "When you get back you'll probably have to crowbar me off you."
Kurt's arms fold him in, and he kisses the top of Blaine's head, breathes there, "I will miss you."
"Call me."
"I will. Send emails."
"I will. Text."
"I'll write postcards. I'll write letters."
"I love you."
Kurt's shoulders slump under Blaine's hug. "I love you too."
"You'll be amazing."
"I know I will." Kurt kisses him again. "You will too."
"Hummel! Get your pretty butt over here or we miss our flight!"
"God, someone throw cold water on 'em. People in love can go fuck themselves, seriously."
"Bitter enough, Andy?"
"Boyfriend troubles, Andy?"
"Fuck all of you."
"Coming!" Kurt yells across at them, and scoops up his carry on bag, and grabs Blaine's arm to kiss him one last long lingering time while Blaine puts a hand to a cheek he knows so well and thinks, Oh god, before Kurt whispers, "When I get back, we get married."
And it lifts in Blaine like a balloon, because being married to Kurt is going to be so amazing he starts grinning whenever he thinks about it and can't stop. Kurt laughs at his face, clutches his hand, says, "I love you," and squeezes before he turns and strides off for his theatre troupe, singing, "I'm coming, I'm coming, I hope you people appreciate what I sacrifice for you."
"He's adorable, sweetheart, but he'll keep." Sean says, moves to ruffle Kurt's hair and gets ducked with a start. "Bye Blaine! Keep the bed warm and the affairs secret!"
"God I hope you get herpes," Kurt snaps back at him, and Blaine cups his mouth to call after them, "Bye guys! Break lots of legs!"
Samuel and Jean-Paul are talking quietly at the side of the group, before they kiss - once, sweetly, Jean-Paul coming off his heels and Samuel leaning down as graceful as a giraffe - and Jean-Paul walks over to where Blaine's standing. "How are you!" Jean-Paul says, in his boomingly enthusiastic English. "Long time no see!"
"Jean-Paul, hey, ça va?"
"We must get a drink!"
From the queue to board Sean calls back at them, "They're not even on the plane yet guys, a little restraint!" and Kurt smacks him in the arm, Samuel gives a quick twitching smile. Jean-Paul takes a second to translate to himself and laughs, hard, while Blaine throws an arm around his neck. "We'll keep each other company, you guys have fun without us!"
Kurt is giving Sean such a bitch face. Blaine spares a grateful thought to not having to be on that plane journey, and Jean-Paul shakes him by his shoulders, still laughing.
From: desdemonathanthou
To: dr_warbler
Subject: Kill me already & fly my ashes back to you
That was the worst, *worst* plane journey I have ever been forced to endure. I had to sit next to Tony and he just makes me *twitchy* and Sean was in *high* spirits and Phil was really down because his kids couldn't come to the airport to see him off. And as soon as we could take our seatbelts off John stood up and gave us this *speech* (it must be the same speech every year because Sean and Rico were mouthing along with him behind his back), this speech about how none of us are allowed to sleep with each other for the duration of the tour and I was just *flabbergasted*, and I told him I'm *engaged* and he said that that'll seem like less of an issue after six weeks in single beds.
It won't seem like less of an issue if the world ends tomorrow. It is the ONLY issue. And like I would want any of them anyway, none of them are my type. My type is you <3
So John is going to do random checks on our hotel sheets, isn't he a sweetheart. He said he doesn't care what a good idea it seems at the time, it will bring the company to the ground ('we don't want a repeat of 2014', apparently, which made everyone groan so that must have been a year of much ill-thought-through bed-hopping for the BEP) so we're all sworn celibate until we're back in NY. And an entire planeload of innocent bystanders were subjected to this. And I have never been so humiliated.
Well, no, I have, but never above cloud level before.
So then Sean's being Sean and Rico's being loud and Samuel's looking uncomfortable and Tony's trying to talk to me and I don't *like* Tony so I pretended to go to sleep. And he pretended to go to sleep on my shoulder. So I put a magazine between his head and my arm and actually went to sleep for a bit after that. But it was horrible, and I hate how plane travel makes my skin feel, and I am *so* many miles away from you now and how is that fair?
I haven't said that I miss you yet, I do miss you, *ridiculously* much since it's only been one day. We're on stage in an hour and a half, they're just prepping the lighting and everything, I've borrowed Phil's laptop to type this out quickly, he needs it back for Skyping the kids. Skyping *with* the kids, that sounds strange and violent. I don't feel like doing a stupid play tonight. I'm tired and I want to curl up with you and watch a stupid movie or something. Instead I'm going to get into my costume and go get killed onstage for the amusement of a bunch of yokels. And I know that I used to be a yokel but at least I was a yokel who knew who Shakespeare *was*.
I'm a bitch when I'm tired, I know. I hope I'll sleep well tonight but I bet I don't without you. I hope you're alright, use up the red cabbage coleslaw tonight if you can, it'll go bad. I love you. I really, really do, Blaine, and I don't need a few hundred miles between us to realise that but it does make me feel it *hard*. I love you. Sleep well without me. Remember to clean the shower screen after you use it.
I love you xx
You have 1 new voicemail
Hi Kurt, I guess you're onstage right now. So, this is for when you finish tonight. [a thumping noise, and then the strum of a guitar] I miss you! [the rest of the message is filled with Come Back From San Francisco, until the beep cuts it off]
You have 1 new voicemail
Kurt, Kuuurt, hi! You'll be onstage again, okay, I met up with Jean-Paul, we're keeping each other company while you guys are off being, you know, epic on stage and stuff, oh my god Kurt the man can drink, it's like his insides are made of asbestos or something, he just doesn't feel it, I really feel it, oh god I am drunk. Kuuuurt. I'll feel horrible tomorrow. Text me kisses.
Okay, so, Jean-Paul is like amazing though and we were medical geeks about dental technology and I have this beer mat on which we designed a guitar that is also a boat. I am so getting it patented, it is the most amazi- [thump, muffled words, second thump] I totally just fell over. You're not here to pick me up, but you're also not here to laugh at me, actually I wouldn't care if you laughed, I love your laugh.
Crap my ankle. Kuuurt. Text my ankle kisses.
I love you! [beep]
From: desdemonathanthou
To: dr_warbler
Subject: One week, one day, three hours, twenty minutes
That's how long it's been since I last saw you. Not that I'm counting or anything.
Last night after Dream there was a kid waiting outside the stage door, he looked about twelve but I think he was actually around sixteen, have you noticed that kids look younger the older you get? This kid, anyway, holding two programs in one hand and looking really painfully like he *needed* to say something, so I took him to one side a bit because Sean is so not subtle. He'd been to see the performance the night before as well, he looked like he was about to *cry*, he said that he'd never seen anything like that before, not in his town. He looked so incredibly *young*, Blaine, and I knew what he was talking about, and he just looked - do you remember the first day I met you? I went to Dalton to spy on our school's glee competition, but I didn't learn anything I expected, I learned - different, difficult things. Because it just seemed like a dream, to me, at that time in my life, a place like *that* existing. And then I had to go back to McKinley and it felt like Dalton was still stuck in my throat, that *that's* out there but what I had was *that* -
You can endure a lot if you don't know that you could have better, and there was this kid looking at me like I'd just crammed Dalton down his throat. And I didn't know what to say, I didn't know how to tell him that of course things will get better, if he can just be strong and *himself* he'll just *shine* one day, I hope I said the right things. I wanted to pick him up and run back to NY with him, we could adopt him! But we can't, obviously, so I just said what I wished someone had said to me back then, and gave him a hug. He was such a sweet kid. I hope he'll be alright.
It wasn't Dalton I wanted really, back then, it was just you. But I settled for Dalton; I liked having both for a while, because I'm greedy, but being able to go back to a less-shitty McKinley *and* having you, that was the best. It was like I could be strong and myself and love someone who loved me and made me shine, *and* tell that whole damn school that they couldn't take any of those things away from me.
I hope he finds someone he loves who'll love him someday soon. Until then I just hope I said the right things. He made me sign his programs 'for when I'm famous'. Doesn't he know that my glee club used to almost win competitions all the time?
I love you, miss you, wish you were here in this squeaky hotel bed. If you were here I'd wish the bed didn't squeak, too.
I love you xx
SMS received from Blaine:
What color helmet do you want?
SMS received from Kurt:
Blaine. What?
SMS received from Blaine:
I bought a scooter! :D
SMS received from Blaine:
This guy was selling it cheap bc hes moving or something.
SMS received from Blaine:
& you always complain about the subway but we cant afford a car. im a GENIUS.
SMS received from Kurt:
Do you even know how to drive a scooter?
SMS received from Blaine:
Its red! i love it. looking at helmets, what color do you want?
SMS received from Kurt:
Do not buy me a helmet. Take the scooter to a garage to get it checked. Book lessons.
SMS received from Blaine:
Im john dorian!!
SMS received from Kurt:
Traffic in NY: I disapprove entirely of the scooter.
SMS received from Blaine:
I would be careful, & look very suave.
SMS received from Kurt:
Traffic in NY: I disapprove ENTIRELY of the scooter.
SMS received from Kurt:
You would look suave though. Euro-chic.
SMS received from Kurt:
Obviously I need to choose my own helmet. BOOK LESSONS.
SMS received from Blaine:
Its SO RED i love it i will polish it every day.
"Kurt! Hey! Where are you?"
"God I don't even know. On a bus halfway between the ass-end of nowhere and the ass-end of nowhere else. Where are you, are you at the hospital?"
"Changing my scrubs in the locker room."
"Exactly how half-dressed are you as we speak?"
"It's less sexy than you think, someone just puked on me. How was last night's performance?"
"Oh, dull. I don't know. Everything's easier when I'm onstage, I'm not me then, I can't miss you because . . . it's just the only time I don't feel my missing you."
"I miss you too. I think about you all the time. When I was being puked on what I was thinking was Kurt would think this is so gross."
"You think the sweetest things."
"So, did you want to talk about anything or did you just want to trade sweet nothings about vomit?"
"I wanted to hear your voice. Um. Will you - do something for me?"
"Actually anything. And you know that."
"Okay. First, will you not laugh? And second - if I give you the address of where we're staying in three days - will you mail something to me?"
"Sure. Hold on, let me get a pen. What do you want mailing?"
". . . would you send me something you've slept in? Something. That smells of you.
"I'm not sleeping great, I miss . . . I don't like sleeping on my own anymore.
"Don't go quiet. Please. You promised you wouldn't laugh."
"I'm not laughing, I swear to god, I'm just . . . I love you. Oh god, Kurt, I do, you know that, don't you?"
"I do. And I miss you too much. And it's really stressful and tiring and I never get a proper night's sleep and -"
"Oh, Kurt-"
"-and just everything would be better if you were here. I can't even talk properly now, I know that half the bus is listening in you bastards. I just never get any privacy-"
"It's only four more weeks."
"Oh god four more weeks."
"Hey hey hey, hush hush hush. I'll send you a parcel. Okay? Give me the address. I'll send you a parcel. And if you remember that I am never not thinking about you, will that help? Because I always always am. You are the middle cerebral artery in my head, filling my brain with oxygen-rich thoughts of you."
"I can't work out if that's cute or gross."
"Some things are both. Like placenta-covered newborn babies. See, things are better when you laugh."
"Oh god, Blaine. So, just - just something you've slept in, something I can - have in bed. Please. Have you found a pen?"
"Yep. Go for it. My négligée will wing its way to you."
"God, I miss you. Okay, the hotel's called The Vacation - like every hotel so far I know it will be foul - on Stevenson Street -"
SMS received from Blaine:
Thinking of you x
On a postcard from a town Blaine's never heard of:
Someone in the ass-end of nowhere loves you!
xxx
SMS received from Kurt:
Little group of cretins with placards outside the theater.
SMS received from Kurt:
They misspelled 'Leviticus'.
SMS received from Kurt:
I moved to NY for a reason.
SMS received from Blaine:
You know what i just thought?
SMS received from Blaine:
Were *betrothed*.
SMS received from Blaine:
It made me all excited for getting married again!
SMS received from Kurt:
Waking up makes you excited for getting married.
SMS received from Kurt:
It is romantic though, my betrothed x
You have 2 new voicemails
Hey, I guess you're onstage again, I hope the yokels appreciate you. So, I just got home, it's weird you not being here, I really need you here to talk to tonight, it's been - it was a day. [clink, hiss] So I'm going to ramble into your voicemail for a while and then do beer and TV and then go to bed, and meditate on how really lame I am without you. So lame.
So, still on my stint in ER, mixed reviews so far? A guy fell off his seat in the waiting room today, just bang and down, heart attack. He wasn't breathing. And I was the first one there since I don't have anything real to do and I just started CPR because it's what you do, and - you know in the movies they show CPR and it's, it's not like that, it's hard, you're trying to make someone's lungs work through their ribcage, I was just banging away at this poor guy's chest like a Neanderthal with a rock, I just - forgot everything else while I was doing it, the whole room went away, it was just - breathe, breathe, breathe, breathe, please breathe -
God it is - such hard work. And I couldn't even think about stopping, do you know what I thought about? I thought about your dad, and how people helped him out in hospital once, and what it meant to you. So I couldn't stop, because this guy means something to people, but I was sweating and my arms hurt and then all of a sudden he just - breathed. And I nearly crapped myself. And Janek sort of gave me a well-done pat on the shoulder and then they got him onto a gurney and like, started actually helping him, but -
I wish you were here, I don't feel right about it, it should be a happy thing, right? But I just keep thinking - I don't even know what I keep thinking. That being a doctor is going to be the weirdest power trip in the world, because for every person you bring literally back from the dead, there's going to be like, twenty you can't save, and I - I just feel weird. Kurt. I miss you. If you were here- [cut off by beep]
So hi, still me, I forgot what I was going to say. Just I wish you were here, I need a hug. Do you think I'm ready to be a doctor? I still feel about thirteen sometimes, I don't know if they should be letting me do this stuff. No, I feel sixteen, I still feel like I was when I first met you. When you're here I feel so much - more, I just feel more when you're here, like I'm more. I just feel sort of young and sort of lost and like everything is sort of too much without you.
I love you in ridiculous ways, please don't ever leave me, I would actually go to pieces. This on half a bottle of beer, I have no tolerance for anything when you're not here.
I love you. Be awesome and then come back home and marry me, okay? I love you. G'night. [beep]
SMS received from Kurt:
Crappy little theater's lights blew before performance. Sang to keep the audience quiet while fixed.
SMS received from Kurt:
Homeward Bound sounds really lonely on an empty stage. Miss you bad.
SMS received from Kurt:
& Sean is right on my ass about it I will BRAIN him before we get home.
SMS received from Kurt:
Standing ovations make me feel better though x
You have 1 new voicemail:
Three weeks! Halfway there! [followed by a guitar and La Cienega Just Smiled until the beep cuts it off]
SMS received from Kurt:
I keep putting my jacket over my head to listen to your messages without the bus listening in.
SMS received from Kurt:
Everyone thinks I'm crazy. I won't ever care.
(Kurt naked on their kitchen table like spilt milk. They don't have much time, Kurt has to get back to the other end of the country for a play, Blaine fucks him urgently urgently too fast and Kurt says faster faster and nothing can be faster than this, and the orgasm is twisting clasping too good too good oh oh oh and then Blaine wakes up, and feels like a teenager, alone in the bed.)
SMS received from Blaine:
Sex dream about you last night. not the first.
SMS received from Kurt:
Don't make me horny, please don't, I do not get a second's privacy.
SMS received from Blaine:
I wont go into detail then but DAMN kurt
SMS received from Blaine:
Only then i wake up sad without you there
SMS received from Kurt:
I'm sorry. I love you.
SMS received from Blaine:
I love you too. & seriously. DAMN.
SMS received from Blaine:
Thinking of you x
You have 1 new voicemail
Hi Kurt, me and Dawnie had a threesome with your boyfriend last night, hope you don't mind! No, we went over to cheer him up because he is being weird without you, and we totally got crap burnt all over your stove making chilli, have fun cleaning it off. And we slept over because he does the hurt puppy eyes when you try to leave him, my god you picked a clingy one, so we all slept in your bed. He hugs your pillow when he sleeps, I'm veering towards thinking it's more cute than sickening? Dawnie says she still might hurl though. Love you baby, even if your play is a bunch of nonsense crap. Ciao!
"How is he being weird?"
"Well hi to you too Kurt, haven't seen you in forever, how's things?"
"Yes, hi Santana, fabulous to talk to you, how is Blaine being weird?"
"Oh, god. You remember when you first met him? When he was this hair gel helmeted dancing blazer?"
"He was a lot more than that."
"Yeah, in a kind of TARDIS-y only on the inside way. But you know what I mean."
"Ye-es. I - I get subjected to these things because of Blaine, but I am curious how you know what a TARDIS is."
"Oh god, it's Dawnie's fault. She's all like, We have to go back in time and have a threesome with Amy Pond and daaaaammnnn we do. Hotter than your boyfriend."
"Oh please, they haven't invented people hotter than my boyfriend. How - how is he being weird?"
"I think he's acting again. Like, all the time. Except when you try to go home and he does the worried puppy face."
". . . he seemed okay. We've been texting and talking and . . . he seemed okay."
"Yeah, Kurt, take five minutes to remember how good at seeming okay he is. How's your trip?"
". . . you know. Awful. Playing Shakespeare to hicks who barely understand modern English is soul-destroying enough, but everyone does nothing but bitch. I bet all-women theatre companies don't have this problem."
"You live in a sheltered little corner of the world, Kurt."
"How's Dawn?"
"She is the biggest fucking bitch I ever met."
"Fine, then."
"I love her. She's awesome."
"You're awesome too."
"I know, baby, I know that. I appreciate the fact a little bit more every day."
"I have to call Blaine. But - thank you for looking after him."
"Please. I just don't wanna go through the trauma of managing your grief after he throws himself off a bridge. There ain't enough ice cream in New York."
"I hate you. Bye."
"Love you too. Bye bye, baby."
"Hi Kurt! Where are you?"
"On the bus, with a jacket over my head. Only way to get any damn privacy, I know they're all still listening in though. They're as subtle as monkeys in heat."
"You love them."
"I love eighty percent of them. Eighty percent of the time. Where are you?"
"Home. On the couch."
". . . what are you doing?"
"I was thinking that if I'm JD that makes you Turk and that makes no sense at all."
"Okay. I'm glad you're doing constructive things while I'm away."
"But then I thought oh my god you're Elliott, Kurt! You're Elliott! And Santana is Carla-"
"Watch less Scrubs, read books. Um, Santana called."
"Did she? I only saw her last night. How's she doing?"
"She's Santana. Um, she said . . ."
"You're doing the embarrassed skirting-around-the-subject thing. What did she say? Oh god. Did she do something to me while I was asleep?"
"She psychoanalysed you."
"Did she draw something on me somewhere I can't see it? Did she shave some of my hair out-?"
"She worried about you, Blaine. Santana worried about you. Which made me nearly have a damn heart attack, if she's worrying."
"Why would she worry? I'm fine."
"Blaine? I'm not fine. I'm okay. I get through the days, and some of it's fun, and I still love acting and I love when I can feel the audience feeling it properly. But I miss you like hell, it actually physically hurts me how much I miss you, and I never get enough sleep and I'm stressed and ratty and I want to come home. So, that's me being honest, so will you do the same, please?
". . . Blaine?"
"Being a doctor is. Going to be really heavy."
". . . I know it is. I know. But you like helping people, and you're good at it, Blaine."
"I never . . . I guess I didn't notice how hard it was, because I came home to you every night and you make things better for me, you don't even have to try to, you just do. But it's hard on my own. I don't know, I don't - I don't want to whine about it, I know I'm in a ridiculously privileged position here, I have nothing to whine about. But it's-"
"It's not whining. It's not easy."
"It's not. It's just, it's not. And I just - I got into a fight with one of the residents, or I got yelled at by a resident and did not snap back and thought about like, smashing a bedpan over his head, because there was this old lady who couldn't stop shaking and she was really nervous about having her blood taken so I sat with her for a while and talked to her and - I don't know, old ladies like me, I don't know why."
"Because you're an impeccably mannered, incredibly handsome dashing young doctor, Blaine."
"Almost-doctor. I am pretty dashing, though. So it took a while to get the bloods and then Chris - the resident, Chris - started asking me how the hell long it takes to draw a little bit of blood and I explained how nervous she was and he said I could've done four patients in the time it took and I was like, this is a hospital, not a factory, and he said yes it's a hospital so I should be 'professional' and treat them like patients and I said I do treat them like patients, I just don't treat them like battery chickens-"
"Oh, Blaine."
"And then he told me I was naïve and young and he's seen a hundred students like me and I don't have a clue yet. And walked off. And. I just - I'm still angry, I'm sorry, I don't want to talk to you when I'm angry like this-"
"No, no, you should, because it's still a part of you and you know I still love you, Blaine, I always love you. And that resident sounds like a dick. You did the right thing."
". . . he is right, though. There isn't the time, half the time. There isn't the time and you have a dozen patients to keep an eye on and you're stressed and you - you - I don't want to be that, Kurt, I don't want to not care, but if I do care all the time then I'm going to have a nervous breakdown-"
"You won't. Because I'll be there and I'll look after you. I'm never doing this again. Stupid horrible tour, I'm never doing it again. I'm staying at home with you and looking after you."
"I'm not a dog, I don't need 'looking after'. It is - easier, though. When you're here."
"I'll always be there."
"I'm so glad I found you. It feels so ridiculous to me sometimes, that I found you, because no-one else would be right like this and then what would I do? I wouldn't even be me, I'd be someone else, and I just want to be me, with you."
"You are you with me. You're you and you care and it's one of the reasons I love you, Blaine."
"I love you too. Come home and marry me."
"I will. Two weeks, four days. And it's two months and eight days to the wedding, I worked it out last night."
"It's weird. Our apartment without you. It's dinnertime I hate, being alone in here. Cooking for one is - I'm eating a lot of takeout."
"I'll come home and make you so much salad."
"I look forward to it. My digestive system won't know how to handle vitamins anymore, though."
". . . did you get the chilli off the stove?"
"Oh, uh, Santana told you about that, huh."
"Yes, yes Blaine, she did. Tell me it came off. Tell me you did not ruin my stove."
". . . I'll spend some time with a wire brush this weekend. I'm sure it'll come clean.
". . . please don't be mad. It was really nice to have them over, please don't be mad."
". . . I'm not mad. I don't even care. You could've painted the walls with chilli, I still just want to come home to you."
"Okay. I won't paint the walls with chilli though. Strong smelling stuff."
"I love you."
"I love you too, beautiful. I do."
SMS received from Kurt:
Thinking of *you* x
SMS received from Kurt:
Woken up by Rico talking in his sleep in Italian. Taking a walk.
SMS received from Kurt:
Really ridiculously beautiful dawn. Sending you a photo.
SMS received from Blaine:
Watching it out the window. cant see much for the buildings, your views better.
"Hey."
"Hey."
"Sorry if I woke you up."
"Don't be, it's better being awake talking to you than being asleep and not talking to you."
"I feel like the only person in the world."
"Me too, apart from the homeless guy kicking trash cans over in the alleyway, and all those cars."
"It's so quiet."
"Do you ever miss Ohio?"
"I don't know. I miss - this. Do you?"
"Sometimes. When we buy a house-"
"Somewhere quieter. Yes. We'll need a yard."
"For the dog and the kids."
"And I can plant roses. We can eat breakfast out there in summer, watch the sun come up like this."
"How was the play last night?"
"We made a guy in a non-ironic plaid shirt cry."
"I'm so proud of you."
"I know, me too."
SMS received from Blaine:
I miss having sex with you so much :(
SMS received from Kurt:
You are the last of the great romantics.
SMS received from Kurt:
I miss it too :(
You have 1 new voicemail
This is the connoisseurs' favourite Marvin Gaye sex song, just so you know. [the rest of the message is a guitar-accompanied Come Get To This, until the beep]
Dear Blaine,
I've never actually written to you before, it looks strange to write that. Your name looks lovely in my handwriting. Even my horrible jogged about by the bus handwriting.
I have to write because I can't tell you this, not over the phone, because everyone listens in, there's never any privacy. But last night was just the worst, I got about two hours sleep and I cried for half the night and it was just horrible, horrible, and now hardly anyone's talking to each other and I know half the bus blames me and hates me and if Samuel wasn't here I'd just walk out and catch a greyhound home. But I would give anything to see you tonight, I feel like crap, Blaine, it's all so horrible. And I'm not going to cry again, not now.
Last night Sean and Rico slept together, and everyone knows it. They've been on-again off-again for years but I've never known them 'on', and John's furious and yelled the hell out of them, but that was this morning and it was too late then. Because I've been sharing rooms with Rico, only Rico wasn't in my room last night because obviously he was in Sean's room, which meant that Sean kicked Tony out of his room. So at midnight there's a knock on my door and it's Tony with nowhere else to sleep and what was I supposed to do, make him sleep in the hallway? I let him in. He had a bottle of wine, I said I didn't want a drink and pretended to go to sleep. But I could feel him just sitting there on his bed watching me, I can't even tell you how creepy it was. Blaine - I know I probably have issues about these things, I know in my head it's probably creepier than it is in reality, but I just can't stand people other than you looking at me like that. I just feel sixteen again, and terrified.
So at two in the morning he stood up and I thought that if he touched me I might never stop screaming, but he just stood still for a bit and then went in the bathroom. I got out of bed and went to Samuel's room. Samuel opened the door and I was a nervous mess and he just let me in and Andy cursed and rolled over and went back to sleep and oh Blaine, you were right all along, I got into bed with Samuel after all. Just not in the fun way.
We spoke in French for a bit, very quietly, and then we were almost asleep when someone else came pounding at the door yelling enough to wake the whole hotel up, Tony, drunk, calling me names I am not. Samuel got up but I beat him to the door. I was so angry I was shaking. I told him that I can't be both frigid and a whore and I am engaged and incredibly uninterested and he should go back to bed and sleep. He called me more names. Samuel loomed at him over my shoulder - he is so good at looming - but he didn't shut up until John came storming up the hallway and yelled us all out, shoved me and Samuel back into the room (where Andy had a pillow over his head and was moaning how much he hated us all) and started to have a fight with Tony in the hallway.
And now Tony is gone. Fired. Said the wrong things to John and now we're down a lighting designer and we'll just have to manage with the techies at the theaters as we go, and hope they know what they're doing. And everyone knows it's my fault there's an empty seat on the bus and everyone keeps not looking at me. Sean and Rico are sitting at opposite ends of the bus pretending they don't give a crap and I'm sitting next to Samuel and trying not to cry. It was stressful before, now I want to be sick. I wish I was at home with you, two weeks feel like the rest of my life right now, I need you.
You won't even get this letter until tomorrow or the day after, that's the part that hurts the most. You won't even know how much I need you right now. I know that this will make you worried and I'm selfish for wanting to worry you, I know that. But you know me, more than anyone does, you know what I'm like. You know how much I need you.
I did end up crying again after all. Samuel is looking after me, I'm not alone. But it's you I really need, and I just can't wait to come home.
I hope your day's been better. You will be the best doctor, Blaine, you care so much and it's the best part of you, don't ever stop. If other people aren't brave enough to care the way you do then it's their loss. You're special. They can't take that away from you. You're going to be better than them and their bitterness won't change that.
I love you, love you, love you. Two weeks. I love you.
Yours, and you know it,
Kurt xxx
SMS received from Blaine:
Thinking of you x
SMS received from Blaine:
Thinking of having sex with you specifically x
SMS received from Kurt:
I love you.
SMS received from Blaine:
You know i love you too.
You have 1 new voicemail
Hi Kurt! I've been listening to a lot of Ryan Adams while you've been away, which I think means you can tell I miss you. [a guitar strums and then starts to play, and the rest of the message is Call Me On Your Way Back Home, until the beep]
Dear Blaine, again, in pain, again,
You'll probably only get the last letter today, and it's already worse. I don't even know how I'll get onstage tonight, I want to be curled up in a ball crying where no-one can see me and I have to go onstage in front of strangers and act like someone else. Acting like someone else will at least be easier than being me right now.
We all went to a bar after last night's performance, John wanted us to re-bond or something since Tony got sent home and we're all a bit shaken up. As a bonding exercise it failed utterly. I ended up having a fight with Sean, or Sean had it with me, but we fought, anyway. I don't even know how it really started, it just got worse really quickly, and then he's telling me I haven't been in the company five minutes and I've already wrecked things for other people and who the hell do I think I am, and I don't have a clue who I am without you anyway.
His exact words, I might as well write them down because I'm going to remember them until the day I die anyway, were, 'Tony's always felt people up and it never meant anything, what the fuck kind of blowjob did you give John that you're his favorite fucking princess now'. And there's a level I can't even judge him on because Blaine, that's me, ten years down the line and bitter, that's me if I don't stop myself. I know I can be cruel, but please tell me I can't be that.
I started crying, anyway. Sean sneered at me that I was doing it for sympathy, I wasn't, I didn't want to be crying, I just wanted to be somewhere else. I walked out of the bar and Samuel came after me and we just went back to the hotel and went to sleep. It's nice to just hold someone. Don't be jealous, please, you know there's no need to be, you know he's a friend and I love you more than anyone in the world, Blaine, but I need him right now, he's holding me together and everything is so awful. He's older than us, he looks out for me, it's nice to feel that someone's taking my side right now. I'm still wearing your t-shirt to sleep in. I've never worn something so long without washing it before.
Sean keeps making loud bitchy comments about me on the bus. I make them back but it doesn't mean they don't hurt. And I won't cry again. I won't. I can't.
It feels like it is all my fault, and I know it isn't but I can't convince my stomach not to feel so guilty. I don't know how I'll go onstage tonight. I don't know.
I love you, too much. I hope you're alright, I hope you're better than me, Blaine.
Yours, Blaine,
Kurt xxx
SMS received from Blaine:
I got your letter. Call me as soon as you can. I love you xx
From: desdemonathanthou
To: dr_warbler
Subject: Hi Blaine <3
It was so good to talk to you last night, I think you knew that anyway. I haven't liked to ask Phil to borrow his laptop with everything going on but he just handed it to me before breakfast and told me I looked like I needed distracting. So I'm eating a bagel and emailing you. Two of my favourite things.
Sean and I are kind of awkwardly not arguing anymore, but the atmosphere's still not good. We tried to talk, last night, and it wasn't nice, but I suppose at least it's done. He says I have only been here five minutes, and some of them have been in this company for years, and I just swan in and skim off the best parts and it isn't fair but damn it I'm *good* and I'm not going to stifle that for anyone else's ambition. I'm *good*. Even Sean said that. Cursed me for it. For being younger than him and more talented than him and 'prettier' than him and set up to marry 'some perfect doctor' and live happily ever after. And I told him that you're not perfect and you make me watch Star Trek movies and he at least laughed. But he's avoiding eye contact with me and I'm not really talking to anyone right now, because I don't know if that's how they all feel. I just sit next to Samuel, and try to sleep as much as possible.
I don't want people to hate me for being good at something I love. And if they think horrible things about me then I can't stop them, but it's really not easy being stuck on a bus with them eight hours a day if that is what they're thinking. I just keep picking myself apart, trying to work out if I *am* such a horrible person, and I don't think I am, am I? I know I'm not always as good as I should be, I know I'm selfish and petty and small sometimes, but I'm not *bad*. I don't think I'm bad. Oh god I miss you.
Write and tell me how nice I am, please?
I love you xx
From: dr_warbler
To: desdemonathanthou
Subject: Re: Hi Blaine <3
You:
Are the best cook in all of the world and you know it, I could eat your food until my stomach ruptured and die bloated and happy.
Are ludicrously, jaw-droopingly beautiful, and I keep staring at photographs of you without you here and making little whining noises at just how much you rip the breath right out of my lungs, they shouldn't *make* people as pretty as you, Kurt.
Are so good an actor that you disturb me and I feel like I need to check you're still you after I see you perform, I *believe* that you're not you when you're onstage. You will always be a star. We just don't live in a world where people are always honest instead of jealous. Webcomics say it better than I do: http://www.asofterworld.com/index.php?id=34
Smell amazing. It's like you secrete really expensive cologne. I keep sticking my head into your side of the closet just to smell you.
Make me smile with my heart.
Are the *kindest* person I have ever met, I have never known anyone who gives so much without ever thinking about it, you made me realise that there's never a reason to be shy of being kind because you can keep on giving kindness and you never do run out of it. You have the most generous soul I have ever known. You are good. You are *good*.
Are the rest of my life, I am so excited to get to marry you, we are going to be EPIC.
Smile like an angel, it makes me need to kiss you but need to not take my eyes off your face, I want too much all the time around you.
Are so patient with me when I am so stupid sometimes, you teach me every day how to be better, a better person and a better me.
Make my spine clench when you sing, I keep listening to MP3s of you, your voice makes me feel giddy. Never stop, songbird. You're special.
Shake it like a Polaroid picture when you dance and really get into it. I love it.
Are my favorite person.
Touch me in ways no-one's ever touched me, and no-one else ever will.
Don't even know how much people love you. If you did I don't think you could ever feel anything but loved.
Give the best handjobs in all of creation, though I would never want you to demonstrate that fact to other people and win the title in any official capacity.
Will come back to New York, and back to our bed, and after we have made love a *lot* because I am incredibly horny for you, I will never let you go again.
Better believe I'm serious about that last one, I am seriously going to handcuff you to me. We can alternate your rehearsals and my ward rounds, but you're never leaving my sight again.
Are the best thing that ever happened to me. Thank you so much, Kurt.
- Blaine xxxxxxxxx
SMS received from Blaine:
I won an accordion on ebay!!
SMS received from Kurt:
I knew I should have hidden the credit cards when I left.
You have 1 new voicemail:
Hi Kurt, it's me. Met up with Jean-Paul again, we are such BFFs now, he's amazing, he's just so funny, I'm not even drunk and it's not just because I made a point of not drinking so much this time but he made me keep snorting beer out of my nose so I guess I didn't absorb so much alcohol, god.
I got the stuff off the stove! It only took a week of on and off scrubbing. But it's one week to go! One more week! I don't even know what I'm going to do when I see you, I might just, like, ravish you on sight. I might be too excited to speak. I know I'm going to need to kiss you entirely senseless, either way.
I love you! [beep]
SMS received from Kurt:
I went out and bought a book, too many magazines rotted my brain.
SMS received from Kurt:
i like my body when it is with your/ body.
SMS received from Kurt:
as yes is to if,love is to yes.
SMS received from Blaine:
Cummings!
SMS received from Kurt:
I *love* you.
SMS received from Blaine:
Thinking of you x
"Hi Blaine, where-"
"Kurt I delivered a baby! It just - came out and screamed it was the most beautiful thing I've ever seen covered in mucus it-"
"Oh my god, Blaine-"
"There was this pile-up and all the trauma rooms were full and this woman came into the ER just screaming and fell over and Janek got a screen and it was already crowning so I just - just, I mean basically all I did was catch it because it was happening anyway but oh my god Kurt it was the most-"
"Oh god, Blaine . . ."
"- amazing, amazing, amazing thing ever, it screamed like what the hell is this world it's come into, but then we cleaned him up and gave him to his mom and he was all tiny and cuddly and oh my god, Kurt, I want one."
"I know, I know, Blaine."
"We have to get married and adopt babies."
"We will, Blaine. We are, Blaine."
"Lots of them."
"We will, I promise, we will."
"How many?"
"As many as we can support, I promise. As many as we can."
"Oh god, it was the most amazing . . ."
"I love you."
"Are you crying?"
"Yes. I don't know why."
"I cried a bit too. Kurt-"
"I know."
"Life is amazing."
"I know, I know, I know."
SMS received from Blaine:
Hows he doing?
SMS received from Samuel:
He reads, he looks out of the window and smiles.
SMS received from Samuel:
He loves you.
SMS received from Blaine:
I know. believe me, i know.
SMS received from Blaine:
(i do not know what it is about you that closes/ and opens; only something in me understands
SMS received from Blaine:
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)/ nobody,not even the rain,has such small hands
SMS received from Kurt:
People think I'm an idiot the way I smile at texts.
SMS received from Kurt:
I won't ever care.
SMS received from Kurt:
Is it wrong that applause makes everything better?
SMS received from Blaine:
Even tinkerbell needed it.
SMS received from Kurt:
Tinkerbell was a bitch.
SMS received from Blaine:
I do believe in you, i do.
SMS received from Kurt:
At least I'm not Wendy in this scenario.
From: desdemonathanthou
To: dr_warbler
Subject: Two days!
We are so close to home I feel like skipping the performances and just *running* to meet you. We're sold out both nights though, I think it's mostly New Yorkers who couldn't get tickets to the original performances. Yes I'm flattered that they drive for four hours to see us. They should, we're good.
I've started crying every performance of Othello, it's not intentional, it just happens. I just think about you and I dissolve. Luckily it looks like it's supposed to happen but Samuel looks worried, when he's 'killing' me he's actually wiping my eyes off with the sheets. I can feel how close you are, it's like being plugged into an electric circuit. My head is full of Blaine Blaine Blaine and I can't believe I'll see you in two days, I will see you and touch you and kiss you and oh god our *bed*, I can't wait to be in our bed with you, I'm never getting out of it again. Neither are you.
Being away from you I keep realising like it's for the first time how perfect you are, how amazing you are, how you're so intelligent and wear it so lightly and well, and you're so funny but you're never, never cruel in it, how you're so full of hope and happiness all the time, how you'd do *anything* to make people happy, and you love me. And I've always been a little astonished by that, by someone as good as you loving me. By someone as ridiculously attractive as you loving me. But now I feel *proud* of it too. You love me, even when I'm not there, even when I'm at my lowest points and I don't have any energy for anything but myself and I'm not doing anything for you and there's no reason I deserve it but you still love me, you're so good and you *love* me, and I feel so proud of it. Like I must be a good person, to have you loving me like that. Like your loving me like that makes me a good person.
How much sense does this make? I feel drunk on sheer proximity to you, I may pass out when I actually see you. You'll have to carry me home.
I love you. I will be a good person, for you. I will make sure I deserve the way you love me.
And I will love you with every part of me so you can never doubt it and never feel alone, not ever, because I will never let you be, I *love* you.
So they can take their tour next summer and shove it up their ass, I'm staying home with you.
I love you xx
SMS received from Blaine:
One night. go on stage and kill them.
SMS received from Kurt:
We mutinied en masse & John folded. We're driving straight to NY after the performance.
SMS received from Kurt:
We won't be back until about 2am. None of us wanted to wait for the morning.
SMS received from Blaine:
Seriously? ill be there. parking lot near the theater?
SMS received from Kurt:
I can't believe I'll see you. Going onstage, will text when free, yes that parking lot xx
SMS received from Blaine:
So excited
SMS received from Blaine:
SO excited
SMS received from Blaine:
SO EXCITED
SMS received from Kurt:
On bus! See you in four hours! I love you xxx
SMS received from Blaine:
SO EXCITED
SMS received from Blaine:
Meeting j-p in the parking lot, forming welcoming party
SMS received from Blaine:
Cant buy balloons this time of night, i thought this city never slept?
SMS received from Kurt:
I don't want balloons I just want you.
SMS received from Blaine:
SO EXCITDD!
SMS received from Blaine:
*excited
SMS received from Kurt:
Yes, I can tell.
SMS received from Blaine:
I love you
SMS received from Kurt:
With all my heart, I do I do I do
They can see them as the bus pulls in; Sean and Rico and Ewan (referred to as 'Token Straight Ewan', and as he's Sean's roommate as well as a Blue Elephant Player, this road trip probably didn't do anything to shock him) lean out of the window to yell as they turn into the parking lot in the middle of a New York night with a little party there yelling back at them, and Kurt can hear an accordion playing an awful, awful rendition of New York, New York and his heart beats in his throat like a bird trying to fly out.
There's a general good-natured shoving to get off the bus when it stops. Sean spreads his arms to offer Kurt space to get off before him, meets his eye, says wryly, "You have so much and no idea how young you are, sweetheart."
It still all hurts too much to think about right now. Kurt says, a little roughly, "I really have felt it, this trip." and Sean offers him a tight sort of smile, pushes gently at him to get him off the bus. Kurt skips onto the tarmac, broken glass grits under his boot - ah, New York - and Blaine is trying to fold the accordion up before he gives up, drops it with a wheezing broken bellow of noise, throws his arms out. Kurt's in them like he's fallen into them. Blaine's arms wrap in too tight around his back and Kurt stuffs his face into Blaine's hair and breathes in oh so much Blaine and every breath of Blaine's crushes his lungs and every breath of his pushes hard back against Blaine and he doesn't ever ever want to be any less close to him than this ever not ever again never never never.
They stagger, tangled and hard-clasped, one of Blaine's hands gripping in his hair as he pants at Kurt's ear, "-missed anyone like this ever I'm so proud you got through it I'm so-"
Kurt chokes, "Love you so much so much so much-"
It's two in the morning and the parking lot is full of shrieks and shouts and hard-clapped hugs; Jean-Paul takes Samuel's hand and Samuel leans down, runs a hand over his head, kisses him there, while Phil's kids' mother hands him a sleeping three year old while the seven year old leans into his side and mumbles drowsily, "Hi Dad." and John's partner, thin and bespectacled, sighs like he and his theatre company are so much trouble as he climbs out of his car. Kurt can't let go of Blaine. He'll hold him until they suffocate each other, it's the best way to die.
He lifts Blaine off his feet because he can. Blaine laughs hard at the sky and his heels bump the ground again, and he holds Kurt's face as he kisses him, and no; this is the best way to live.