Fic: Beauty (9/10)
Title: Beauty (9/10)
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Blaine Anderson was blessed with the perks of being beautiful in a world where people are literally separated into classes based on being "beautiful" or "ugly". Kurt Hummel was not. This is their journey together in throwing off the world's labels, of finding true beauty among a constellation of charades. This is their love story.
Word Count: this chapter, 2,434
A/N: I'm back with a new update! Only a chapter and the epilogue left til' we're done with the story... wow
Chapter 9
Sebastian had pardoned his failure to carry out the deal.
Sebastian was letting them go scot-free.
Kurt couldn’t believe it. He had expected Sebastian to give him another ultimatum, to run off and tell the world about Blaine, or to go tell Blaine himself. But he hadn’t. After Kurt had told him he couldn’t do it, he couldn’t break up with Blaine, and that Sebastian could do whatever he wanted to them but they were stronger than him or whatever he was planning to throw at them, he just… capitulated. With a sleazy smile and a shrug, he had just said “Alright”, called Kurt a “Crafty piece of shit” with an appreciative pat on the back, and then left.
There was more to it though, because Sebastian couldn’t and wasn’t giving up that easily, and Kurt was determined to find out what had made him so content as to give up the battle on Kurt’s front. There had to be a reason.
~~
Kurt was slushied at school. It wasn’t as if this hadn’t happened before, or as if it were a rare occurrence, but this slushie was different. Because it was the second of the day.
Kurt was slushied frequently, but he was never slushied more than once per day. He figured it was a bizarre outlier of human morality his tormentors possessed, the decency to limit a person’s icy suffering to one dose per day. It was a twisted thing to find grace in, but find grace in it he did.
Until today, when a jock came up to him in between fifth and sixth period, slushie in hand, the usual taunting and artificial leering before deliverance of blow in effect. The only difference in the sad routine was that he had yelled “Hope your new prep school boy gives you AIDS fucker!” as he walked past, throwing a crude peace sign over his shoulder, and then meeting up with his group of friends further down the hallway, a group that included one who had slushied him earlier in the day.
~~
Burt was, strangely enough, becoming more and more invested in Kurt and Blaine’s relationship. It started out with little things, asking how his day had gone and smiling whenever Kurt mentioned Blaine, and progressed onto asking after Blaine and how he was doing a couple of times, and then it became suggesting that Blaine come over for dinner more, and eventually it digressed into Blaine and Burt watching football games on the couch as Kurt was either preparing dessert or desperately trying to signal to his dad that he’d like his boyfriend back.
Kurt went home that day, after talking to Sebastian, worried that Blaine hadn’t come to the Lima Bean, but assigning his fears to mere paranoia. Everything was going to be absolutely fine, he kept reassuring himself. This had happened once before.
Raising his head as Kurt entered the house, Burt asked about how Blaine was.
“I’m not so sure at the moment,” Kurt replied. “He didn’t show up to the Lima Bean today, which you know is kind of our thing, and I’m beginning to get worried…”
“Have you called or texted him since this morning?” Burt asked practically, sitting up on the sofa.
“No, I actually haven’t,” Kurt said, fiddling with his phone. “School,” he mumbled absentmindedly more to himself than Burt as he sent out a text to Blaine.
Burt smiled knowingly. “Think a little before you start freaking out, Kurt. I’m sure he’s fine.”
Kurt nodded idly.
Kurt Hummel: Hey sweetie! Any particular reason you weren’t at the Lima Bean today? Missed your presence this morning.
The reply was almost immediate.
Blaine Anderson: Could we talk? In person? I swear I’m not trying to create drama, just need to clear up a few things.
Kurt stared at the words for a few moments. They seemed almost… inauthentic, something he wasn’t used to seeing in Blaine around him.
Kurt Hummel: Sure thing! Come on over to my house. Although, by saying you’re not trying to create drama, I’m becoming increasingly suspicious that you are! Haha jk. When should we meet up?
Blaine Anderson: As soon as possible if you don’t mind. And haha, you know it! I’m covertly employed in a secret government organization and my mission is to make you trust me and then steal all your secrets. What could you know that would be of importance to the government? Can’t tell you that. Classified information.
Kurt Hummel: You’re a huge dork. Remind me why I like you again?
It took Blaine a few minutes to answer.
Blaine Anderson: I’ve never been quite sure.
~~
“Looks like Blaine’s great disappearing act is up,” Kurt heard Burt call out. He stepped out of his room, patting his dad gently on the shoulder.
“Thanks, dad,” he said quietly. Burt went to return the gesture, put a hand on Kurt’s shoulder, but as he turned to face him, he saw noiseless moisture in Kurt’s eyes.
“You okay bud?”
“I’m okay, it’s just,” Kurt laughed mirthlessly, “relationships are harder than I imagined they would be.”
“I…” Burt started, but soon surrendered the effort of words and just pulled Kurt into a tight hug.
Burt nodded as he pulled out, wordlessly telling Kurt, with eyes alight with pride and envy, everything is going to be okay. The world cannot break a strong, handsome son like you. I’m proud of you, bud. Never forget that, okay?
I know, dad. Kurt nodded in response. I love you.
ldquo;Blaine’s probably fixing to come inside,” Burt said gruffly. “You should go open the door.”
“Of course.”
A familiar smile greeted Kurt as he let Blaine in. He knew he shouldn’t be relieved because he recognized the same pure joy in Blaine upon seeing him that he felt when seeing Blaine, but the mutuality and the intimacy put him a little more at ease, and a little less afraid, for what was going to happen to their relationship next.
“Shall we head to my room?” Kurt asked nonchalantly, inwardly praying that Burt would not object.
Out of his peripheral vision he saw Burt stir, but, mercifully, he relaxed back into the couch.
“We shall,” Blaine answered, beaming again.
Taking Blaine’s hand, he pulled them into his room, and immediately fell down onto the white covers, taking Blaine with him. They laid side by side on his pristine bed, looking up at the speckled ceiling, finding patterns and images in the sorts of raised plaster.
“That cluster right there looks like Simba,” Blaine pointed out, keeping his finger aloft but turning to look at Kurt.
“I disagree, I don’t think it looks like a lion at all. I don’t see anything there, really. Here,” he pointed to a cluster on the opposite side of the ceiling, “is something though. It looks like a constellation transcribed right to the ceiling,” he said, straining his neck further to look at it.
“It could be a Zodiac constellation,” Blaine supplied, turning back to the ceiling. “Maybe Gemini since you were born in May.”
“Yes,” Kurt hummed quietly, training his gaze back to Blaine. “What are you thinking about?” he asked suddenly, unconcernedly.
“Us,” Blaine answered, just as calmly. “How it feels when you kiss me, the way your arms tighten against me when we hug, the way you smell, the softness of your voice when you’re thinking, the way your cheek is cold when I hold it, the way your eyes widen and seem to get clearer when you’re surprised…”
Kurt didn’t know how to react, so he just laid there, still.
“Is it hard for you to believe?” Blaine asked him in a whisper, shifting closer. “That I could think like that about you?”
“No one’s ever paid that much attention to me,” he answered slowly. “It’s just hard to believe that someone would do so on purpose, and like what they see. I guess it’s just sort of ingrained in me to believe I’m the worse of the options.”
“I know more than one person who thinks you’re gorgeous, Kurt.”
Blaine said it so gently that he almost didn’t catch the undercurrent of jealousy.
“Green’s not a flattering color on you, Blaine.”
“But it is on you, and this morning was evidence not only I enjoy that,” he said quietly again.
Kurt propped himself up on his elbow. “This morning?”
“Look,” Blaine began, not motioning to get up and still gazing unfocusedly at the ceiling, “I saw you and that other guy at the Lima Bean. “
“You did?”
“Who was he, Kurt?” Blaine shifted up and turned a gaze on him that was raw. “Are you hiding something from me?”
“N-no! You don’t understand! He’s-“
“Why are you so flustered?” Blaine asked, half suspicious.
Why was he acting like this? He had nothing to hide! “I, he just… His name is Sebastian.”
“Sebastian?” Again, with a voice so gentle Kurt felt it would shatter if he made a wrong tread. “That’s it?”
“He… he was trying to make a deal with me.”
“A deal? Kurt, if he was trying to do anything to you, I can report him! He goes to Dalton!”
“He wasn’t trying to do harm to me,” Kurt said reluctantly. “He didn’t care about me.”
“What was he trying to do then?”
“He was…” Kurt swallowed, “he was trying to get to you.”
“Me,” Blaine repeated in disbelief. “Me?”
“I was trying to protect you, Blaine. I swear, I was only trying to do the right thing. And I was trying to hide this from you, but I realize now that we don’t hide things from each other. It’s sort of the building block of our relationship.”
Blaine smiled.
“Do you, do you remember that night in your car when you drove us to your parent’s house?”
A nod.
“I looked deathly afraid of something?”
Another.
“Sebastian had given me an ultimatum,” he said. “An ultimatum that was meant to injure you, not me. I was to break up with you,” Blaine’s intake of breath, “or let him… let him spread your secret.”
“My… secret?” His eyes were so tender in their confusion. “I don’t understand, I don’t have a secret.”
“I wish you didn’t,” Kurt murmured under his breath. “But unfortunately, honey, you do.”
“If it’s how I knew your name the first time we met, I swear I wasn’t being a stalker, you just made a lasting impression on me!”
“How you knew my name?” Kurt asked amusedly, stifling a laugh. “How did you know my name?”
“Oh, I thought you didn’t notice,” Blaine mumbled, looking down. “Never mind that then.”
“Blaine,” he admonished playfully, still withholding his childish smile and grateful for the brief comic relief. “Tell me!”
“I… my father brought me into the id-ing rooms in the hospital as a child once,” he said, “and I remember watching the faces as he classified them. Unsightly, standard, comely. But there was this particular person up on the screens that had captured my attention. He had had the most striking blue eyes, and even my infantile mind could appreciate their beauty. They never let go of me, those eyes.”
“I probably should’ve told you that my dad worked in the id-ing rooms,” Blaine sighed. “He was also the one that made you an unsightly.”
“You would’ve told me if it came up in conversation,” he responded, not upset at all. “Your dad is kind of the root of this entire problem anyways, I wouldn’t be too harsh on yourself.”
“My dad? For not approving of us?”
“Do you know why he doesn’t approve of us?” Kurt asked stiffly. “It’s not what you think.”
“Because he’s prejudiced and it’s all really very thoughtless?”
“Partly,” Kurt lowered his voice, “but not entirely.”
“Why then?” Blaine asked just as quietly, the affected warning mood coming to him.
“Do you know of how he manipulated your classifications that day?” Kurt knew his eyes were aglow then, even though this was definitely not something he sought enjoyment in.
“No,” Blaine answered. “but I have suspicions.”
“Your suspicions are probably right,” a misguided flare of enjoyment from gossiping in him combated the crushing feeling in his chest. “Were they that you aren’t a comely?”
Blaine looked at Kurt, eyes sleek with ready to be born tears.
“You are right,” Kurt announced suddenly, not being able to bear drawing it out, instead issuing a definitive statement he couldn’t take back. “You’re like me, I guess.”
The tears didn’t fall like they should have. Kurt kept watching Blaine’s eyes, but there was a hazy layer flicked over them to mask the true emotion Blaine was feeling. He just sort of… sat there for a few long seconds. A monochromatic emotional scheme.
Then everything burst into color.
“Kurt,” Blaine kept muttering, over and over and over. “Kurt, Kurt, Kurt.”
“Shh, Blaine, it’s alright,” Kurt whispered, moving to hold him, stroking his arm.
“I don’t understand… my entire life he’s been fighting with me about this… and I’ve actually been right this entire time? Every time I say I don’t belong… I was right. I’ve been chaffing under this label I knew didn’t fit me for so long and I’ve been right.”
“Shhh, Blaine, it’ll all be okay. Not much will change. Your dad doesn’t know about it. It just sort of causes… an existential crisis.”
“I’m not who I thought I was,” Blaine added. “They’re going to go beserk when they find out I’m not who they pulled strings for me to be.”
Kurt pulled him into an all-out hug, squeezing him tightly.
“I can’t believe they tried to control that,” Blaine repeated numbly into Kurt’s shoulder. “They essentially tried to control the environment in which I grew up to make me who they wanted me to be.”
The words I think I may love you were spry on Kurt’s tongue, but he forced them down reluctantly. He didn’t want to give Blaine even more emotional turmoil after what he’d just been through.
“You’re the same to me,” Kurt reassured him. “You’re still my idiotic, persevering boyfriend.”
Blaine seemed to know Kurt meant more than he said, so he just nodded and hugged Kurt tighter. They clung to each other, Kurt feeling like he knew Blaine more intimately than he ever had before, despite Blaine’s very persona being deconstructed right in front of him. But it was a mutual act, a shared cleansing, and it almost felt like, once the storm had gone, they were going to be capable of building something much bigger between them.