Fic: Il Maestro
Artie and Blaine don't have what you might call a close friendship. They don't talk about personal things: Artie doesn't ask Blaine how he's dealing without Kurt, and Blaine doesn't offer; Blaine doesn't ask about Sugar or Artie's family or his hopes for life after Lima, and Artie doesn't feel the need to share.
But it's close in its own way. It's the relationship of two artists or, more often, of the artist and his muse. Blaine is the Leonardo DiCaprio to Artie's Martin Scorsese - inspiration and instrument, both.
They mostly talk about music and movies and, occasionally, Dungeons & Dragons.
Except right now, they're not talking about any of that. Blaine is gushing about Tina, which he does a lot lately. It's kind of annoying. "She came over last night and I felt so awful, but she gave me her chicken soup, and I have no idea what she puts in there, but it's like heaven meets your mouth. And then she gave me some magic cold medicine and the next thing I knew, it was this morning and I could breathe again. I feel fantastic. I still don't understand why the straight guys in this school aren't lining up to woo her."
Probably because she's not that nice to her actual boyfriends, Artie thinks, but he doesn't say it. The couple times he got sick while dating Tina, she told him to stay home and away from her because she didn't want to catch whatever he was spreading. Of course, that was a while ago. Maybe she was nicer to Mike.
"I mean, she's amazing. She's like a renaissance woman. She can cure the common cold and she's a great dancer and -" Blaine glances behind Artie and his eyes go even brighter. Artie follows his gaze. Tina is marching toward them. She looks so menacing; Artie's not sure how Blaine can smile at that. "Tay-tay! I was just telling Artie how awesome I thought -"
To put it mildly, Artie has a complicated relationship with Tina. Sometimes he loves her (mostly in a brotherly way) and sometimes he loathes her. She's got gumption, which he admires, but she's also really self-centered. He may still be a little bitter over the way she dumped him for Mike two years ago. Or maybe he had already started to be bitter about her behavior before she dumped him, and that's why he ignored her in favor of playing Halo. He's not sure.
"Will you excuse us please, Artie?" Tina says, but it's not a question. It's a command. She doesn't even bother looking at Artie when she says it.
Artie knows that there are times to make a scene. Now is not one of them. So he wheels himself away, even though he's a little afraid for Blaine. The last time he saw this particular expression - confused with the slightest hint of fearful - was when Sebastian Smythe walked up to the New Directions in the Lima Bean and announced that the Warblers were planning a Michael Jackson set for regionals.
So Artie wheels himself backward into the music room in the pretense of leaving them alone. But he doesn't leave them - not really. He watches the whole conversation, because the look on Blaine's face worries him.
The conversation, if you can call it that, makes no logical sense. It's like a scene from Catch-22. Blaine effuses gratitude for the chicken soup and VapoRub, and Tina berates him at length for not showing any gratitude.
(Artie's favorite line - and yes, he's started to observe conversations like they're scenes in movies, and analyze what people say like their words are lines from a script - is when Tina says, "I give you all of my heart, gladly," with a tone of shrill rage. The irony is as pointed than anything Woody Allen could come up with.)
Then she marches off in disgust, and Blaine turns around and walks away, shoulders sagging under the weight of Tina's grief.
---
A week later, Artie's looking through the school library's paltry selection of film history books when he overhears a familiar mumble at the end of the stacks. He turns his head to see Tina at one of the study tables, writing something in her composition notebook. Becky Jackson is sitting next to her, hands propped under her chin, scowling at the open page. "Seriously?" Becky says in her customary tone of disgust.
A few months ago, Artie never would have imagined the two girls hanging out, but he's seen them together on and off lately. It started when Tina was in Cheerios, and then abruptly stopped when she left, and then started up again. Sugar says it's because they're both in the Too Young to Be Bitter Club, but that doesn't really explain it, because so is Sugar, and she doesn't hang out with either of them one-on-one.
Well, Tina and Becky are both pretty mean. Maybe they like to bond over that.
Tina tilts her head toward Becky. "What? You don't like the sound of Tina Andercohenson-Chang? Do you think Tina Cohen-Chanderson would be better?" Tina chews her bottom lip and muses, "Tina and Blaine Cohen-Chanderson. It sounds pretty good, actually."
Becky slides the notebook out from under Tina's hands and drops it in the wastebasket at the end of the table. She does it with poise, confidence, and a lofty expression of disdain. She looks almost exactly like Coach Sylvester, except shorter and rounder and more attractive. "What part of 'Gay Blaine is gay' don't you understand, Tina?"
"He's young," Tina says. "He has plenty of time to discover himself."
Becky stands up and pulls her backpack over her shoulders. "You are an idiot," she says slowly, enunciating each word with her special brand of spite. "You are no longer worthy of being my protégé. Goodbye, Tina." She turns away, her tight red skirt clinging to her thighs as she marches out the library door.
Tina gets out of her chair and squats down to retrieve her notebook from the trash. She catches sight of Artie as she's standing back up. "Oh, hey, Artie." She makes no effort to wipe the scowl off of her face. "Can you believe her?"
Artie wheels toward her and nods. "Yup."
Tina sinks back down into her chair. "How did you ever date her? She's such a bitch."
Artie shrugs. "She calls it like she sees it." He pulls up at the end of the table where there's no chair to get in his way. "And you have to admit she's right about at least one thing. Blaine Anderson is one very gay dude."
"You don't know that. You can't possibly know what goes on in his head." She folds her hands across her chest. "And he made out with Rachel."
"Yeah, and if I were drunk enough, I'd make out with him, so -"
Tina glares at him. "Keep your hands off of him."
Artie raises his hands in surrender. He doesn't mean it - it's not really her business who touches Blaine and who doesn't, as long as Blaine's good with it - but the gesture seems to placate Tina. Her shoulders relax a little. He grimaces. "Probably not the best example, anyway."
Tina lets out the smallest smile. "You'd make out with Mr. Martinez, too."
"We're not talking about me."
"See, but if you date girls but would make out with Blaine and Mr. Martinez -"
"Can you keep your voice down, please?"
"I'm just saying, Blaine could be bisexual, too. He probably is. Alcohol is a tool that helps people do what they secretly want to do all the time, but are afraid to try."
Artie resists rolling his eyes. It's a struggle, but he needs Tina to feel like he's taking her seriously right now. And he is. Which is why he really, really wants to roll his eyes at her. Because she was serious when she said that, and that's just sick. "Tina, people get into cars and paralyze eight-year-olds when they're drunk, too. I doubt that's anyone's secret wish."
Tina flinches, but it's so momentary that most people wouldn't notice it. Artie does because he used to think he was in love with her; he's spent more time studying her face than anyone at McKinley has. Tina straightens her back. "You know that's not what I was talking about, Artie."
Artie leans slightly forward, his hands folded in his lap. "You have a problem, Tina Cohen-Chang."
"Tell me about it." Tina unfolds her arms and reaches her hands down to the table, starts fiddling with the corners of her composition book as she speaks. "I do everything for Blaine and he just acts like I'm … his friend, or something, when really - I see the way his eyes light up when he looks at me and when I hold his hand and - He gave me a red rose and he asked me to a wedding, Artie. Everyone knows what that means." She sighs heavily. The poor girl must see herself as so put-upon. "Why is he so afraid to admit he loves me?"
Artie reaches over and puts a hand on her forearm. It's something he did a lot when they were dating, but he hardly does anymore; it's intimate and friendly and he usually doesn't feel that friendly toward Tina. But he needs to be her friend right now. Not the kind of friend she wants, probably, but the kind of friend she needs. "He does love you, Tina. It's called friendship."
Tina rolls her eyes. "It's more than friendship."
"Maybe from your side, but not from his." Artie clears his throat. "Look, Tina. As the de facto leader of the New Directions, I feel it's my responsibility to intervene in interpersonal dramas that could interfere with our chances of succeeding at regionals."
"You're not the leader. I won the diva award, remember?"
"I do, and it was well-earned. We're all as terrified of you as we were of Rachel."
Tina is smug. "Good. It’s time that you all saw what a powerful woman looks like."
Shannon Beiste, Artie thinks. But he doesn't say it. "Look, you need to let go of this Blatina Cohen-Chanderson fantasy. You're trying to turn Blaine into something he isn't. It's not fair to him."
Tina huffs. "You don't know what he is. Blaine and I … we have a connection."
Artie lets go of her arm. This isn't a conversation that Artie wants to have. He's avoided it for the past three years. But he's the glue that holds the New Directions together - even if most people refuse to see it - and if he doesn't do his thing, they're going to fall apart fast. "No, Tina. You have a delusion. And you're trying to make him change to fit that delusion. Just like you did with me and dancing our freshman year."
Her lip curls. It's practically a snarl. "You wanted to dance."
Artie shakes his head. "I thought I did. But what I really wanted was to stop being invisible. My chair makes me invisible to people, Tina. They don't see anything but the chair. And the most opposite thing I could think of to being in a wheelchair was dancing. That's why I said dancing was my dream. Because it would mean I wasn't invisible anymore."
Tina frowns. "You're not invisible to me."
Artie could argue with that, but now is not the time. "Look, I got caught up in the idea of being able to walk again, but you got really caught up in it. And what I needed right then was a friend who would tell me the truth, like I'm trying to tell you the truth right now. I can't walk, and I probably never will. And I'm okay with that. Blaine is gay, and he's not going to turn straight for you, and I'm sure he's okay with that. And you're Tina Cohen-Chang, not Tina Cohen-Chanderson. You don't need a guy to make you complete. I want you to be okay with that."
Tina scoots her chair back loudly, squeaking it against the floor. "Look, Artie. It takes two to tango. I pushed you to dance because you wanted to be pushed. And I'm pushing Blaine because that's what he needs. He needs to get over Kurt and realize that love is sometimes found in unexpected places and that he needs me to take care of him." Tina swings her bag over her shoulder and stands up. "It's about time he saw that I'm the only person willing to do that for him."
"Bull, Tina. We all take care of each other. That's what New Directions is about."
Tina leans into Artie's personal space so that he has to crane his neck up to look at her face. He hates it when people do that. (She does it a lot when she's angry or annoyed, and if his neck is too achy to arch all the way back, she accuses him of staring at her boobs.) "Then where were you last week when his parents were out of town and he needed someone to sleep next to him and rub Vick's VapoRub into his chest every two hours all night? I'm the one who did that for him." She emphasizes the I'm by slapping her hand to the boobs he's not supposed to look at. "I'm the one who stayed by his side. I certainly didn't see you in his bedroom."
Artie's sense of revulsion is almost physical. He doesn't understand why. He used to like Tina's hands on his body (although, admittedly, she never showed much interest in touching anything that his clothes usually covered). But Tina touching Blaine that way - there's something unnatural about it, something unbalanced. "Seriously, Tina? You and I dated and you never touched my chest. You would have gotten a whole lot more action out of that than you ever will from Blaine."
It's the exact wrong thing to say, but it's too late.
"You're just jealous." She straightens up and steps back. "You're definitely not invited to our wedding."
"Gay, Tina. He's gay, and he's not in love with you."
"Fuck you," she mumbles under her breath. She turns around to strut out of the library, moving so fast she leaves her composition notebook behind on the table.
For the most part, Artie has accepted not being able to walk. But sometimes, he finds himself wishing he could strut like that. He fantasizes about fleeing at a moment's notice without having to figure out first if the nearest exit is wheelchair accessible, and whether he can take a straight path to it or if he has to circumnavigate tables and chairs that are pressed too close together to allow his wheelchair to pass through.
But more often, he just wishes that people like Tina couldn't run away so easily.
----
Artie needs to say something to Blaine, but he can't do it in the hallway where Tina can barge in on them like it's her God-given right. He needs privacy. So he waits a couple days until he sees Blaine walk into the one place in the school that's safe from Tina's prying ears: the boys' locker room.
Artie veers off his course (he'd been heading for Sugar's locker, but bros before hos) and heads in after Blaine, who pulls a couple rolls of hand wrap out of his messenger bag and sets them on the bench next to his locker.
"Hey, Blaine."
Blaine looks up and smiles. He's always so quick to smile - it's charming and saddening at the same time. The world is going to eat him alive one day. "Oh, hey, Artie. You here to do weights? I'll spot you."
"No." Artie clears his throat the way he does before giving stage directions. "We need to talk."
The slightest hint of concern flits over Blaine's face, but he doesn't pause in what he's doing. He unbuttons his cardigan and pulls it off of his shoulders before folding it neatly and setting it into his locker. He's reaching for the top buttons of his polo shirt, when Artie waves at him to stop. "Please, keep your clothes on." Artie can't bear to look at Blaine's chest right now.
"Is something wrong?" Blaine furrows his eyebrows. Artie wishes his own eyebrows furrowed like that. They're so dark and thick and masculine.
"Yes," Artie says.
Blaine sits on the bench in front of Artie, and Artie lets go of a breath he didn't know he was holding. It's so much better this way, to talk at eye level with each other. "What is it?" Blaine says.
"Let me cut to the chase. I think there might be a little miscommunication going on between you and Tina, and I'm worried about how that will affect our cohesion as a group as New Directions prepares for regionals."
"Um, Tina and I are getting along great," Blaine says. "We're going to Macy's tonight to get our wedding gift for Ms. Pillsbury and Mr. Schuester. I've been looking forward to it all week."
Artie shakes his head. It's so much worse than he imagined. "You're buying a present for them together?"
Blaine shrugs. "Well, sure. I was going to get one on my own, but Tina pointed out that if we pool our money together, we can get something from higher up on their registry. And I really like Ms. Pillsbury. I kind of want her to have all the nicest things, you know?"
"You realize that Tina thinks you guys are a couple, right?"
Blaine lets out a surprised laugh. "Um, a couple of friends. I mean, I know she had a little crush on me but whatever, that happens. I'm pretty sure she's over it by now." There's the slightest touch of color to Blaine's face; it doesn't quite rise to the level of a blush. It's pretty similar to how he looked a few weeks ago when he realized that Tina was singing that Jesus Christ Superstar song to him. And it's not hard at all to see why Blaine is Tina's Jesus, albeit in a weird semi-sexualized kind of way.
"No, Blaine. Last week, I ran into her in the library and you know what she was doing?"
"Studying?" Blaine asks it so unsuspectingly, like that might actually be the answer. Poor, sweet fool.
"No. She was trying to figure out what your last name should be when you two get married. I think she was leaning toward Cohen-Chanderson."
Blaine shakes his head and laughs like it's the funniest joke he's heard all week. His smile is wide and innocent and heartbreaking. "She must have been messing with you. I mean, I'm 100 percent gay. Everyone knows that."
"Everyone but Tina," Artie says sternly. "She's holding on to the hope that you're only 99.44 percent gay and that the rest of you is straight for her."
Blaine keeps laughing. "What? She told you that?"
"Not verbatim, but that was the general gist of it. She might actually think you're more than 0.56 percent straight. If I had to guess, she'd probably say 15 percent, or maybe a four-and-a half on the Kinsey scale."
Blaine's laugh goes suddenly, horribly silent. The look on his face is like the one he sported so often last fall: a lost little boy. Honestly, Artie had hoped never to see Blaine look that way again.
"Wait," Blaine says. "So, does Tina think this date to the wedding is like, a date date?"
"Yup."
"Huh." Blaine's eyes go unfocused, like the lightbulb that just went off in his head is so bright that he's momentarily blinded.
Artie waits until Blaine's eyes refocus. It takes a while.
"Sorry," Blaine says. "I just … I don't know what to say."
"That's okay," Artie says. "That's why I'm here. I'm a director. I'm good at telling people what to do."
Blaine nods. "That's true."
Artie chest swells a little before he remembers the task at hand. Then he's all business. "You need to show Tina that you're just friends. Don't take her to the wedding. Don't go to Macy's to pick out a present from the both of you. Stop letting her hold your hand all the time, and stop letting her put VapoRub all over your chest at your sleepovers. " He clears his throat. "Actually, you should probably stop having sleepovers at all."
Blaine has this look on his face that's halfway between amused and confused. It's kind of adorable. "Artie, Tina and I have never had a sleepover. I mean, with the crush - that would just be awkward."
Artie waves a hand in the air. "Fine, whatever you want to call it, she shouldn't be sleeping in your bed and touching your half-naked body."
"Artie," Blaine says, and it's just on the edge of being condescending without quite falling over it, because this is Blaine, and Blaine doesn't do condescending. "I don't know where you get your information, but the only time Tina's been in my room was last week when she brought me chicken soup. She didn't even stay that long. I was so wiped out from the cold medicine I pretty much fell asleep before she even lef-"
Blaine has another one of those lightbulb expressions, except this one is a hundred times more - and worse. Blaine's gaze is far-off, like he's watching a lost hope disappear over the horizon.
Artie waits for Blaine's eyes to come back to him, but they don't. Instead, Blaine closes them, and inhales a breath so deep it sounds like it entered the lungs of a horse. His eyes pop open as he shoots up off the bench, but he doesn't look at Artie. Still, Artie can see how shiny they are. Blaine's bottom lip is quivering and he blinks and blinks and blinks, his hands shaking as he tries to pull his cardigan back on. He misses the sleeve opening on the first two tries.
Artie reaches toward him, but doesn't touch. "Blaine, let me help -"
"No!" Blaine tightens like a coil.
Artie startles back. It's not so much from the loudness of Blaine's voice - although it's so loud that it makes the metal of the lockers buzz - but the way it's shaking. It's the sound of a timber snake rattling its tail in warning.
Blaine doesn't apologize like Artie expects him, too, like he does constantly for much slighter infractions. He just bolts, stuffing his cardigan into his messenger bag as he runs out of the locker room.
Blaine's locker is still open. Artie picks up the forgotten rolls of hand wrap from the bench and reaches up to put them into Blaine's locker before shutting the door.
Artie's not sure what just happened. He only knows that he doesn't feel like much of a director anymore.
---
Artie has nightmares that night. There are a lot of them, snippets of panic that toss him awake before he's pulled back under into sleep, subsuming him into a running narrative of grief whose source he can't name.
He's running after Blaine through the backstage of the McKinley High School theater. Blaine is dressed as Tony from West Side Story - no, he's Danny from Grease - no, he's Jesus. Definitely Jesus. Jesus with slicked back hair and penny loafers and mustard-yellow pants that stick out from the bottom of his white robe.
"I was wrong!" Artie calls after him, breathless. "You don't have to lose your virginity to play Jesus. I got him confused with Hap from Death of a Salesman."
Blaine stops and turns around. They're in the dressing area, mirrors all around them. Artie doesn't see any reflections, though. The mirrors just look black.
"That's not what this is about, and you know it!" Blaine mutters, tearing off the robe and throwing it to the floor. He's wearing that godawful Freddy Mercury leather jacket beneath it, and the mustard pants have turned into assless chaps. "It's about your production values!"
"My production values are impeccable. Staged realism. It's so real it becomes fantasy, transforming the extraordinary into the mundane." (He's going to remember that sentence when he wakes up, and wonder why he thought it was so brilliant when he spoke it in his dream.)
"It just seems a little excessive to crucify me on stage, Artie. I want to go to NYADA next year. There's Kurt, and we haven't even gotten to regionals yet. I have so much to live for."
"It won't hurt," Artie says. He knows he's lying, but sometimes you have to lie in order to get actors to express the truth. You have to fake the confidence they don't have until they find it for themselves. "And anyway, Jesus was only dead for three days, and then he came back to life. That'll happen with you, too." Artie is 100 percent convinced that this part is true. Blaine is a consummate actor. He can tell the story exactly as it needs to be told.
Pages appear suddenly in Blaine's hand. Blaine crumples them one by one into tight little balls, tossing each right up into Artie's face. "But there's no resurrection in the script. That's why the Cheerios are boycotting it."
They're not backstage anymore. They're on the stage. The floor is littered with script pages and crosses - mostly the kind you find on pocket rosaries, but also a few fist-sized ones like the Scooby Gang carries around in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. In the center of the stage is a cross that's just the right fit for Blaine. But as they walk toward it, it keeps getting taller like the fairytale beanstalk until it's top is up past the catwalk.
Blaine cranes his head back. "I don't even know how I'm going to get up there."
"Don't worry," Artie says. "We'll help you." And right on cue, members of the New Directions start filing in with ladders and ropes and nails.
Finn claps his hands. "We'll get you up there, Blaine. Don't worry about it!"
"I think this is a bad idea," says Sam.
"Will he resurrect in time to take me to the wedding?" says Tina.
"I've always wanted to see the resurrection," says Joe.
"The killing's the good part," says Kitty.
The rest of them are silent, setting up a rig to lift Blaine to the top of the cross.
Somewhere in the middle of the argument about who gets to hammer in the first nail, Artie's alarm goes off.
---
Blaine doesn't show up to school the next day. Artie texts him:
Are you OK?
I'm worried about you. Are you OK?
Please answer my text.
Seriously, Blaine, just answer.
You're freaking me out.
Just one message?
I don't know what happened and I know I can't make it better, but please, please answer.
Finally, halfway through his history exam in third period, Artie's phone lights up three times in a row. All the messages are from Blaine:
I'll be back tomorrow.
I just couldn't face her today.
I trusted her.
---
Tina looks lost when she walks into the cafeteria. She's been eating lunch with Blaine every day for the past - Artie doesn't know how long. Maybe since they were in the Cheerios together. If Blaine's not there when she arrives, she waits for him to get into the lunch line, and then she follows him to whatever table he's sitting at (usually the Gleeks, but sometimes the Student Council or the Superheroes or the Sewing Club or the hardcore D&Ders - the last of which particularly irks Artie, because back when they were dating, after the first flush of romance was past, Tina teased Artie about his Dungeons & Dragons obsession at every possible opportunity).
Artie is sitting with Sam, arguing over whether Wolverine's adamantium claws could cut through Captain America's vibranium shield. Sam is con because the adamantium contains vibranium and steel, and steel is weaker than vibranium; but Artie's pro because several lesser metals, combined into an alloy, can make a stronger one. Just look at the iron and nickel in steel.
"Yeah, yeah," Sam says, "but the chemical bonds …" and he has this really good scientific argument to support what he's saying (Sam is smart; it's the system that's not for letting him fall through the cracks), but Artie loses track of it because that's when Tina walks in. His stomach lurches; the tots he's been popping into his mouth suddenly seem too greasy and tepid. He pushes his tray away.
"You done eating already?" Sam says, pointing at the tots with his yogurt spoon.
Artie forces himself to tear his eyes away from Tina and look back at Sam. "Yeah. My stomach's not feeling so good all of a sudden."
Sam waves his spoon at Artie. "Probably because you just ate a crapload of tots, bro. Maybe you should pick out something a little healthier next time."
Tina appears suddenly next to Sam's shoulder. "Sam," she says. "Is Blaine okay? He didn't show up to school this morning and he hasn't answered any of his texts."
Sam turns halfway and shrugs. "I talked to him last night and he said that cold of his was coming back with a vengeance."
Tina pulls out the chair next to Sam and flops down dramatically. "But I called him last night and texted him like twenty times and he never answered. I could have brought him more of my chicken soup."
Sam closes his mouth around another spoonful of yogurt, studying Tina as he slowly drags the spoon out. "Maybe he was asleep. Or maybe you're coming on a little strong. Twenty times seems like a lot."
Tina scowls. "Did Blaine tell you that?"
"No. I'm just saying. I know you like him, but you're never going to be Kurt, and if I were him - I don't know. It might annoy me that you're trying."
Tina stands up so fast she almost knocks her chair over. "I'm not trying to be Kurt. Kurt was never a diva because it was more important to him that the New Directions be some kind of big happy family than for him to take what he deserved. And what did that get him? No solos and a rejection from the only school he wanted to go to."
Artie clears his throat. "Um, actually, he's going to NYADA now, and I heard he actually won -"
Tina waves her hand at Artie dismissively. "Dreams deferred, Artie. That's not how Tina Cohen-Chang conducts her life. What Tina Cohen-Chang wants, she gets. And she gets it now."
She turns abruptly and marches toward the lunch line, ignoring the glares when she grabs a half-filled tray out of Dottie Kazatori's hands and cuts ahead to the cashier.
"She's going to be the death of us," Artie mumbles.
"Seriously," Sam says. "It's like she's our own Jean Grey."
Tina doesn't sit down after she pays for her (née Dottie's) food. She heads out of the cafeteria into the main hallway. Artie thinks he might know where she's going; freshman year, she'd sneak into the auditorium and eat her lunch in the wings when she wanted to be alone.
That's exactly where he finds her after excusing himself from the lunch table. She's sitting on the floor between the two heavy black drapes, her legs folded under her. When she was a freshman and mostly wore jeans and longer skirts, she usually crossed her legs. But the minidress she's wearing now doesn't really give her the freedom for that.
"Tina, we need to talk."
She doesn't look surprised to see him. She looks more resigned than anything else. "Fine. Whatever." She sighs and sets her half-eaten slice of pizza on her tray. She turns to look up him.
"Did Blaine know that you slept over at his house last week? Or about …" He can't bring himself to say it. "The other stuff?" He tries for gentle but authoritative - the same voice he often used when directing Rachel. But it comes out angry and unsure.
Tina's eyebrows furrow as she frowns at him. He's seen a lot of that lately. It's her go-to expression with everyone except Blaine - and sometimes it's her go-to expression with Blaine, too. "What Blaine and I do is none of your business."
"Maybe not. But it's Blaine's business. And if you did all that stuff when he was passed out -"
"He wasn't passed out!" Tina snaps. "He was just tired."
"Tina."
She looks away, picks up the pizza remnant and starts pulling it apart into rough strips.
"Tina," he says more sternly.
"What?" she barks, turning toward him. Tears are quietly streaming down her face.
"I think you know that's not true."
She tosses the shreds of pizza onto her tray. "What did you tell him?"
"I mentioned the sleepover and the Vicks. I thought he knew about it, Tina. But it became pretty obvious that he didn't. And that it's not okay."
Her face tightens like a fist. "Why do you have to get into everybody's business? Artie Abrams, directing everyone's lives but his own. You have no idea how hard it is, Artie." She takes a heaving gulp of air. "I'm all alone here and I was supposed to be Rachel this year, she told me I would, but everyone wants me to keep sitting down and shutting up and swaying in the background and accepting it. That's what you want me to do, too. You should have chosen me as the new Rachel, Artie. Blaine could have been Finn, but no. And he's not a Rachel at all. He never stands up for himself and he puts everyone else first, or he pretends to, but he doesn't, because if he did he wouldn't hold back from me the way he does and I wouldn't be stuck wanting him and wanting him and never get to be close to him except when he's not even there."
She sobbing now - huge, pink-faced sobs, her shoulders shaking and her face curled and despair seeping from her skin. Artie has no idea what to do. Rage is boiling up inside him - he knows what it feels like, having people handle your body like it's not your own, poking and prodding at it, telling you it's okay, it's for the best, it won't even hurt - but it does. Even when there's no physical pain, it hurts because they think you're nothing but a lump of flesh and bones, a problem to be solved, and they don't even see that you're right there or that maybe you can do whatever this thing is yourself, that maybe you'd prefer to do it yourself, and sometimes you have to shout for anyone to even hear that. You have a brain and a heart and you like the X-Men and Halo and Federico Fellini and you fall in and out of love and your body might not be perfect, but it's yours.
And right alongside this rage, this other feeling is blooming. When Artie was 10, he found a baby bird that had flown or fallen too soon out of its nest onto the sidewalk near his house. Its wing was twisted and he went inside to ask his mother what he should do.
"There's nothing we can do," his mother said. "If it can't fly, it won't live for long."
He'd always been an obedient son, but he shouted at her then. "And what if the doctors had said that about me?"
Tina is a broken bird, a pathetic heap of dashed dreams, a Sméagol transformed into a Gollum.
He wheels closer to Tina. She's bent over, crying into a thin paper napkin. "You were never alone, Tina." He risks putting her hand on top of her hair.
She leans into his knees and cries until the fabric of his jeans are soaked through. He thinks about this girl he knows but never knew: the fake-stuttering goth and the happy-go-lucky go-go-girl and the insufferable prima donna and now something much, much worse. Maybe she doesn't know who she is, either, is just trying this persona on for size like all the rest, will discard it when she realizes it doesn't suit her.
He hopes the realization is now.
----
When Artie's dad drops him off at school the next morning, Blaine is waiting outside the ramp entrance by the parking lot. "I'm sorry about the other afternoon," Blaine says.
"You have nothing to be sorry about," Artie says.
"I should have given you an explanation."
"I think I figured it out. I'm sorry."
Blaine shrugs. "You don't have anything to be sorry about, either."
Artie lets Blaine push his chair up the ramp and into the school because he knows Blaine needs something to hide behind and something to hold onto. Blaine stays with him as he gets stuff out of his locker, and then they head together toward Blaine's.
There's a rose taped to the door with a tiny envelope embellished in Tina's handwriting. Blaine pulls them both off his locker. "Excuse me for a second, Artie," he says, and walks across the hall to the boys' bathroom. His hands are empty when he steps out of the bathroom five seconds later.
----
But it's close in its own way. It's the relationship of two artists or, more often, of the artist and his muse. Blaine is the Leonardo DiCaprio to Artie's Martin Scorsese - inspiration and instrument, both.
They mostly talk about music and movies and, occasionally, Dungeons & Dragons.
Except right now, they're not talking about any of that. Blaine is gushing about Tina, which he does a lot lately. It's kind of annoying. "She came over last night and I felt so awful, but she gave me her chicken soup, and I have no idea what she puts in there, but it's like heaven meets your mouth. And then she gave me some magic cold medicine and the next thing I knew, it was this morning and I could breathe again. I feel fantastic. I still don't understand why the straight guys in this school aren't lining up to woo her."
Probably because she's not that nice to her actual boyfriends, Artie thinks, but he doesn't say it. The couple times he got sick while dating Tina, she told him to stay home and away from her because she didn't want to catch whatever he was spreading. Of course, that was a while ago. Maybe she was nicer to Mike.
"I mean, she's amazing. She's like a renaissance woman. She can cure the common cold and she's a great dancer and -" Blaine glances behind Artie and his eyes go even brighter. Artie follows his gaze. Tina is marching toward them. She looks so menacing; Artie's not sure how Blaine can smile at that. "Tay-tay! I was just telling Artie how awesome I thought -"
To put it mildly, Artie has a complicated relationship with Tina. Sometimes he loves her (mostly in a brotherly way) and sometimes he loathes her. She's got gumption, which he admires, but she's also really self-centered. He may still be a little bitter over the way she dumped him for Mike two years ago. Or maybe he had already started to be bitter about her behavior before she dumped him, and that's why he ignored her in favor of playing Halo. He's not sure.
"Will you excuse us please, Artie?" Tina says, but it's not a question. It's a command. She doesn't even bother looking at Artie when she says it.
Artie knows that there are times to make a scene. Now is not one of them. So he wheels himself away, even though he's a little afraid for Blaine. The last time he saw this particular expression - confused with the slightest hint of fearful - was when Sebastian Smythe walked up to the New Directions in the Lima Bean and announced that the Warblers were planning a Michael Jackson set for regionals.
So Artie wheels himself backward into the music room in the pretense of leaving them alone. But he doesn't leave them - not really. He watches the whole conversation, because the look on Blaine's face worries him.
The conversation, if you can call it that, makes no logical sense. It's like a scene from Catch-22. Blaine effuses gratitude for the chicken soup and VapoRub, and Tina berates him at length for not showing any gratitude.
(Artie's favorite line - and yes, he's started to observe conversations like they're scenes in movies, and analyze what people say like their words are lines from a script - is when Tina says, "I give you all of my heart, gladly," with a tone of shrill rage. The irony is as pointed than anything Woody Allen could come up with.)
Then she marches off in disgust, and Blaine turns around and walks away, shoulders sagging under the weight of Tina's grief.
---
A week later, Artie's looking through the school library's paltry selection of film history books when he overhears a familiar mumble at the end of the stacks. He turns his head to see Tina at one of the study tables, writing something in her composition notebook. Becky Jackson is sitting next to her, hands propped under her chin, scowling at the open page. "Seriously?" Becky says in her customary tone of disgust.
A few months ago, Artie never would have imagined the two girls hanging out, but he's seen them together on and off lately. It started when Tina was in Cheerios, and then abruptly stopped when she left, and then started up again. Sugar says it's because they're both in the Too Young to Be Bitter Club, but that doesn't really explain it, because so is Sugar, and she doesn't hang out with either of them one-on-one.
Well, Tina and Becky are both pretty mean. Maybe they like to bond over that.
Tina tilts her head toward Becky. "What? You don't like the sound of Tina Andercohenson-Chang? Do you think Tina Cohen-Chanderson would be better?" Tina chews her bottom lip and muses, "Tina and Blaine Cohen-Chanderson. It sounds pretty good, actually."
Becky slides the notebook out from under Tina's hands and drops it in the wastebasket at the end of the table. She does it with poise, confidence, and a lofty expression of disdain. She looks almost exactly like Coach Sylvester, except shorter and rounder and more attractive. "What part of 'Gay Blaine is gay' don't you understand, Tina?"
"He's young," Tina says. "He has plenty of time to discover himself."
Becky stands up and pulls her backpack over her shoulders. "You are an idiot," she says slowly, enunciating each word with her special brand of spite. "You are no longer worthy of being my protégé. Goodbye, Tina." She turns away, her tight red skirt clinging to her thighs as she marches out the library door.
Tina gets out of her chair and squats down to retrieve her notebook from the trash. She catches sight of Artie as she's standing back up. "Oh, hey, Artie." She makes no effort to wipe the scowl off of her face. "Can you believe her?"
Artie wheels toward her and nods. "Yup."
Tina sinks back down into her chair. "How did you ever date her? She's such a bitch."
Artie shrugs. "She calls it like she sees it." He pulls up at the end of the table where there's no chair to get in his way. "And you have to admit she's right about at least one thing. Blaine Anderson is one very gay dude."
"You don't know that. You can't possibly know what goes on in his head." She folds her hands across her chest. "And he made out with Rachel."
"Yeah, and if I were drunk enough, I'd make out with him, so -"
Tina glares at him. "Keep your hands off of him."
Artie raises his hands in surrender. He doesn't mean it - it's not really her business who touches Blaine and who doesn't, as long as Blaine's good with it - but the gesture seems to placate Tina. Her shoulders relax a little. He grimaces. "Probably not the best example, anyway."
Tina lets out the smallest smile. "You'd make out with Mr. Martinez, too."
"We're not talking about me."
"See, but if you date girls but would make out with Blaine and Mr. Martinez -"
"Can you keep your voice down, please?"
"I'm just saying, Blaine could be bisexual, too. He probably is. Alcohol is a tool that helps people do what they secretly want to do all the time, but are afraid to try."
Artie resists rolling his eyes. It's a struggle, but he needs Tina to feel like he's taking her seriously right now. And he is. Which is why he really, really wants to roll his eyes at her. Because she was serious when she said that, and that's just sick. "Tina, people get into cars and paralyze eight-year-olds when they're drunk, too. I doubt that's anyone's secret wish."
Tina flinches, but it's so momentary that most people wouldn't notice it. Artie does because he used to think he was in love with her; he's spent more time studying her face than anyone at McKinley has. Tina straightens her back. "You know that's not what I was talking about, Artie."
Artie leans slightly forward, his hands folded in his lap. "You have a problem, Tina Cohen-Chang."
"Tell me about it." Tina unfolds her arms and reaches her hands down to the table, starts fiddling with the corners of her composition book as she speaks. "I do everything for Blaine and he just acts like I'm … his friend, or something, when really - I see the way his eyes light up when he looks at me and when I hold his hand and - He gave me a red rose and he asked me to a wedding, Artie. Everyone knows what that means." She sighs heavily. The poor girl must see herself as so put-upon. "Why is he so afraid to admit he loves me?"
Artie reaches over and puts a hand on her forearm. It's something he did a lot when they were dating, but he hardly does anymore; it's intimate and friendly and he usually doesn't feel that friendly toward Tina. But he needs to be her friend right now. Not the kind of friend she wants, probably, but the kind of friend she needs. "He does love you, Tina. It's called friendship."
Tina rolls her eyes. "It's more than friendship."
"Maybe from your side, but not from his." Artie clears his throat. "Look, Tina. As the de facto leader of the New Directions, I feel it's my responsibility to intervene in interpersonal dramas that could interfere with our chances of succeeding at regionals."
"You're not the leader. I won the diva award, remember?"
"I do, and it was well-earned. We're all as terrified of you as we were of Rachel."
Tina is smug. "Good. It’s time that you all saw what a powerful woman looks like."
Shannon Beiste, Artie thinks. But he doesn't say it. "Look, you need to let go of this Blatina Cohen-Chanderson fantasy. You're trying to turn Blaine into something he isn't. It's not fair to him."
Tina huffs. "You don't know what he is. Blaine and I … we have a connection."
Artie lets go of her arm. This isn't a conversation that Artie wants to have. He's avoided it for the past three years. But he's the glue that holds the New Directions together - even if most people refuse to see it - and if he doesn't do his thing, they're going to fall apart fast. "No, Tina. You have a delusion. And you're trying to make him change to fit that delusion. Just like you did with me and dancing our freshman year."
Her lip curls. It's practically a snarl. "You wanted to dance."
Artie shakes his head. "I thought I did. But what I really wanted was to stop being invisible. My chair makes me invisible to people, Tina. They don't see anything but the chair. And the most opposite thing I could think of to being in a wheelchair was dancing. That's why I said dancing was my dream. Because it would mean I wasn't invisible anymore."
Tina frowns. "You're not invisible to me."
Artie could argue with that, but now is not the time. "Look, I got caught up in the idea of being able to walk again, but you got really caught up in it. And what I needed right then was a friend who would tell me the truth, like I'm trying to tell you the truth right now. I can't walk, and I probably never will. And I'm okay with that. Blaine is gay, and he's not going to turn straight for you, and I'm sure he's okay with that. And you're Tina Cohen-Chang, not Tina Cohen-Chanderson. You don't need a guy to make you complete. I want you to be okay with that."
Tina scoots her chair back loudly, squeaking it against the floor. "Look, Artie. It takes two to tango. I pushed you to dance because you wanted to be pushed. And I'm pushing Blaine because that's what he needs. He needs to get over Kurt and realize that love is sometimes found in unexpected places and that he needs me to take care of him." Tina swings her bag over her shoulder and stands up. "It's about time he saw that I'm the only person willing to do that for him."
"Bull, Tina. We all take care of each other. That's what New Directions is about."
Tina leans into Artie's personal space so that he has to crane his neck up to look at her face. He hates it when people do that. (She does it a lot when she's angry or annoyed, and if his neck is too achy to arch all the way back, she accuses him of staring at her boobs.) "Then where were you last week when his parents were out of town and he needed someone to sleep next to him and rub Vick's VapoRub into his chest every two hours all night? I'm the one who did that for him." She emphasizes the I'm by slapping her hand to the boobs he's not supposed to look at. "I'm the one who stayed by his side. I certainly didn't see you in his bedroom."
Artie's sense of revulsion is almost physical. He doesn't understand why. He used to like Tina's hands on his body (although, admittedly, she never showed much interest in touching anything that his clothes usually covered). But Tina touching Blaine that way - there's something unnatural about it, something unbalanced. "Seriously, Tina? You and I dated and you never touched my chest. You would have gotten a whole lot more action out of that than you ever will from Blaine."
It's the exact wrong thing to say, but it's too late.
"You're just jealous." She straightens up and steps back. "You're definitely not invited to our wedding."
"Gay, Tina. He's gay, and he's not in love with you."
"Fuck you," she mumbles under her breath. She turns around to strut out of the library, moving so fast she leaves her composition notebook behind on the table.
For the most part, Artie has accepted not being able to walk. But sometimes, he finds himself wishing he could strut like that. He fantasizes about fleeing at a moment's notice without having to figure out first if the nearest exit is wheelchair accessible, and whether he can take a straight path to it or if he has to circumnavigate tables and chairs that are pressed too close together to allow his wheelchair to pass through.
But more often, he just wishes that people like Tina couldn't run away so easily.
----
Artie needs to say something to Blaine, but he can't do it in the hallway where Tina can barge in on them like it's her God-given right. He needs privacy. So he waits a couple days until he sees Blaine walk into the one place in the school that's safe from Tina's prying ears: the boys' locker room.
Artie veers off his course (he'd been heading for Sugar's locker, but bros before hos) and heads in after Blaine, who pulls a couple rolls of hand wrap out of his messenger bag and sets them on the bench next to his locker.
"Hey, Blaine."
Blaine looks up and smiles. He's always so quick to smile - it's charming and saddening at the same time. The world is going to eat him alive one day. "Oh, hey, Artie. You here to do weights? I'll spot you."
"No." Artie clears his throat the way he does before giving stage directions. "We need to talk."
The slightest hint of concern flits over Blaine's face, but he doesn't pause in what he's doing. He unbuttons his cardigan and pulls it off of his shoulders before folding it neatly and setting it into his locker. He's reaching for the top buttons of his polo shirt, when Artie waves at him to stop. "Please, keep your clothes on." Artie can't bear to look at Blaine's chest right now.
"Is something wrong?" Blaine furrows his eyebrows. Artie wishes his own eyebrows furrowed like that. They're so dark and thick and masculine.
"Yes," Artie says.
Blaine sits on the bench in front of Artie, and Artie lets go of a breath he didn't know he was holding. It's so much better this way, to talk at eye level with each other. "What is it?" Blaine says.
"Let me cut to the chase. I think there might be a little miscommunication going on between you and Tina, and I'm worried about how that will affect our cohesion as a group as New Directions prepares for regionals."
"Um, Tina and I are getting along great," Blaine says. "We're going to Macy's tonight to get our wedding gift for Ms. Pillsbury and Mr. Schuester. I've been looking forward to it all week."
Artie shakes his head. It's so much worse than he imagined. "You're buying a present for them together?"
Blaine shrugs. "Well, sure. I was going to get one on my own, but Tina pointed out that if we pool our money together, we can get something from higher up on their registry. And I really like Ms. Pillsbury. I kind of want her to have all the nicest things, you know?"
"You realize that Tina thinks you guys are a couple, right?"
Blaine lets out a surprised laugh. "Um, a couple of friends. I mean, I know she had a little crush on me but whatever, that happens. I'm pretty sure she's over it by now." There's the slightest touch of color to Blaine's face; it doesn't quite rise to the level of a blush. It's pretty similar to how he looked a few weeks ago when he realized that Tina was singing that Jesus Christ Superstar song to him. And it's not hard at all to see why Blaine is Tina's Jesus, albeit in a weird semi-sexualized kind of way.
"No, Blaine. Last week, I ran into her in the library and you know what she was doing?"
"Studying?" Blaine asks it so unsuspectingly, like that might actually be the answer. Poor, sweet fool.
"No. She was trying to figure out what your last name should be when you two get married. I think she was leaning toward Cohen-Chanderson."
Blaine shakes his head and laughs like it's the funniest joke he's heard all week. His smile is wide and innocent and heartbreaking. "She must have been messing with you. I mean, I'm 100 percent gay. Everyone knows that."
"Everyone but Tina," Artie says sternly. "She's holding on to the hope that you're only 99.44 percent gay and that the rest of you is straight for her."
Blaine keeps laughing. "What? She told you that?"
"Not verbatim, but that was the general gist of it. She might actually think you're more than 0.56 percent straight. If I had to guess, she'd probably say 15 percent, or maybe a four-and-a half on the Kinsey scale."
Blaine's laugh goes suddenly, horribly silent. The look on his face is like the one he sported so often last fall: a lost little boy. Honestly, Artie had hoped never to see Blaine look that way again.
"Wait," Blaine says. "So, does Tina think this date to the wedding is like, a date date?"
"Yup."
"Huh." Blaine's eyes go unfocused, like the lightbulb that just went off in his head is so bright that he's momentarily blinded.
Artie waits until Blaine's eyes refocus. It takes a while.
"Sorry," Blaine says. "I just … I don't know what to say."
"That's okay," Artie says. "That's why I'm here. I'm a director. I'm good at telling people what to do."
Blaine nods. "That's true."
Artie chest swells a little before he remembers the task at hand. Then he's all business. "You need to show Tina that you're just friends. Don't take her to the wedding. Don't go to Macy's to pick out a present from the both of you. Stop letting her hold your hand all the time, and stop letting her put VapoRub all over your chest at your sleepovers. " He clears his throat. "Actually, you should probably stop having sleepovers at all."
Blaine has this look on his face that's halfway between amused and confused. It's kind of adorable. "Artie, Tina and I have never had a sleepover. I mean, with the crush - that would just be awkward."
Artie waves a hand in the air. "Fine, whatever you want to call it, she shouldn't be sleeping in your bed and touching your half-naked body."
"Artie," Blaine says, and it's just on the edge of being condescending without quite falling over it, because this is Blaine, and Blaine doesn't do condescending. "I don't know where you get your information, but the only time Tina's been in my room was last week when she brought me chicken soup. She didn't even stay that long. I was so wiped out from the cold medicine I pretty much fell asleep before she even lef-"
Blaine has another one of those lightbulb expressions, except this one is a hundred times more - and worse. Blaine's gaze is far-off, like he's watching a lost hope disappear over the horizon.
Artie waits for Blaine's eyes to come back to him, but they don't. Instead, Blaine closes them, and inhales a breath so deep it sounds like it entered the lungs of a horse. His eyes pop open as he shoots up off the bench, but he doesn't look at Artie. Still, Artie can see how shiny they are. Blaine's bottom lip is quivering and he blinks and blinks and blinks, his hands shaking as he tries to pull his cardigan back on. He misses the sleeve opening on the first two tries.
Artie reaches toward him, but doesn't touch. "Blaine, let me help -"
"No!" Blaine tightens like a coil.
Artie startles back. It's not so much from the loudness of Blaine's voice - although it's so loud that it makes the metal of the lockers buzz - but the way it's shaking. It's the sound of a timber snake rattling its tail in warning.
Blaine doesn't apologize like Artie expects him, too, like he does constantly for much slighter infractions. He just bolts, stuffing his cardigan into his messenger bag as he runs out of the locker room.
Blaine's locker is still open. Artie picks up the forgotten rolls of hand wrap from the bench and reaches up to put them into Blaine's locker before shutting the door.
Artie's not sure what just happened. He only knows that he doesn't feel like much of a director anymore.
---
Artie has nightmares that night. There are a lot of them, snippets of panic that toss him awake before he's pulled back under into sleep, subsuming him into a running narrative of grief whose source he can't name.
He's running after Blaine through the backstage of the McKinley High School theater. Blaine is dressed as Tony from West Side Story - no, he's Danny from Grease - no, he's Jesus. Definitely Jesus. Jesus with slicked back hair and penny loafers and mustard-yellow pants that stick out from the bottom of his white robe.
"I was wrong!" Artie calls after him, breathless. "You don't have to lose your virginity to play Jesus. I got him confused with Hap from Death of a Salesman."
Blaine stops and turns around. They're in the dressing area, mirrors all around them. Artie doesn't see any reflections, though. The mirrors just look black.
"That's not what this is about, and you know it!" Blaine mutters, tearing off the robe and throwing it to the floor. He's wearing that godawful Freddy Mercury leather jacket beneath it, and the mustard pants have turned into assless chaps. "It's about your production values!"
"My production values are impeccable. Staged realism. It's so real it becomes fantasy, transforming the extraordinary into the mundane." (He's going to remember that sentence when he wakes up, and wonder why he thought it was so brilliant when he spoke it in his dream.)
"It just seems a little excessive to crucify me on stage, Artie. I want to go to NYADA next year. There's Kurt, and we haven't even gotten to regionals yet. I have so much to live for."
"It won't hurt," Artie says. He knows he's lying, but sometimes you have to lie in order to get actors to express the truth. You have to fake the confidence they don't have until they find it for themselves. "And anyway, Jesus was only dead for three days, and then he came back to life. That'll happen with you, too." Artie is 100 percent convinced that this part is true. Blaine is a consummate actor. He can tell the story exactly as it needs to be told.
Pages appear suddenly in Blaine's hand. Blaine crumples them one by one into tight little balls, tossing each right up into Artie's face. "But there's no resurrection in the script. That's why the Cheerios are boycotting it."
They're not backstage anymore. They're on the stage. The floor is littered with script pages and crosses - mostly the kind you find on pocket rosaries, but also a few fist-sized ones like the Scooby Gang carries around in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. In the center of the stage is a cross that's just the right fit for Blaine. But as they walk toward it, it keeps getting taller like the fairytale beanstalk until it's top is up past the catwalk.
Blaine cranes his head back. "I don't even know how I'm going to get up there."
"Don't worry," Artie says. "We'll help you." And right on cue, members of the New Directions start filing in with ladders and ropes and nails.
Finn claps his hands. "We'll get you up there, Blaine. Don't worry about it!"
"I think this is a bad idea," says Sam.
"Will he resurrect in time to take me to the wedding?" says Tina.
"I've always wanted to see the resurrection," says Joe.
"The killing's the good part," says Kitty.
The rest of them are silent, setting up a rig to lift Blaine to the top of the cross.
Somewhere in the middle of the argument about who gets to hammer in the first nail, Artie's alarm goes off.
---
Blaine doesn't show up to school the next day. Artie texts him:
Are you OK?
I'm worried about you. Are you OK?
Please answer my text.
Seriously, Blaine, just answer.
You're freaking me out.
Just one message?
I don't know what happened and I know I can't make it better, but please, please answer.
Finally, halfway through his history exam in third period, Artie's phone lights up three times in a row. All the messages are from Blaine:
I'll be back tomorrow.
I just couldn't face her today.
I trusted her.
---
Tina looks lost when she walks into the cafeteria. She's been eating lunch with Blaine every day for the past - Artie doesn't know how long. Maybe since they were in the Cheerios together. If Blaine's not there when she arrives, she waits for him to get into the lunch line, and then she follows him to whatever table he's sitting at (usually the Gleeks, but sometimes the Student Council or the Superheroes or the Sewing Club or the hardcore D&Ders - the last of which particularly irks Artie, because back when they were dating, after the first flush of romance was past, Tina teased Artie about his Dungeons & Dragons obsession at every possible opportunity).
Artie is sitting with Sam, arguing over whether Wolverine's adamantium claws could cut through Captain America's vibranium shield. Sam is con because the adamantium contains vibranium and steel, and steel is weaker than vibranium; but Artie's pro because several lesser metals, combined into an alloy, can make a stronger one. Just look at the iron and nickel in steel.
"Yeah, yeah," Sam says, "but the chemical bonds …" and he has this really good scientific argument to support what he's saying (Sam is smart; it's the system that's not for letting him fall through the cracks), but Artie loses track of it because that's when Tina walks in. His stomach lurches; the tots he's been popping into his mouth suddenly seem too greasy and tepid. He pushes his tray away.
"You done eating already?" Sam says, pointing at the tots with his yogurt spoon.
Artie forces himself to tear his eyes away from Tina and look back at Sam. "Yeah. My stomach's not feeling so good all of a sudden."
Sam waves his spoon at Artie. "Probably because you just ate a crapload of tots, bro. Maybe you should pick out something a little healthier next time."
Tina appears suddenly next to Sam's shoulder. "Sam," she says. "Is Blaine okay? He didn't show up to school this morning and he hasn't answered any of his texts."
Sam turns halfway and shrugs. "I talked to him last night and he said that cold of his was coming back with a vengeance."
Tina pulls out the chair next to Sam and flops down dramatically. "But I called him last night and texted him like twenty times and he never answered. I could have brought him more of my chicken soup."
Sam closes his mouth around another spoonful of yogurt, studying Tina as he slowly drags the spoon out. "Maybe he was asleep. Or maybe you're coming on a little strong. Twenty times seems like a lot."
Tina scowls. "Did Blaine tell you that?"
"No. I'm just saying. I know you like him, but you're never going to be Kurt, and if I were him - I don't know. It might annoy me that you're trying."
Tina stands up so fast she almost knocks her chair over. "I'm not trying to be Kurt. Kurt was never a diva because it was more important to him that the New Directions be some kind of big happy family than for him to take what he deserved. And what did that get him? No solos and a rejection from the only school he wanted to go to."
Artie clears his throat. "Um, actually, he's going to NYADA now, and I heard he actually won -"
Tina waves her hand at Artie dismissively. "Dreams deferred, Artie. That's not how Tina Cohen-Chang conducts her life. What Tina Cohen-Chang wants, she gets. And she gets it now."
She turns abruptly and marches toward the lunch line, ignoring the glares when she grabs a half-filled tray out of Dottie Kazatori's hands and cuts ahead to the cashier.
"She's going to be the death of us," Artie mumbles.
"Seriously," Sam says. "It's like she's our own Jean Grey."
Tina doesn't sit down after she pays for her (née Dottie's) food. She heads out of the cafeteria into the main hallway. Artie thinks he might know where she's going; freshman year, she'd sneak into the auditorium and eat her lunch in the wings when she wanted to be alone.
That's exactly where he finds her after excusing himself from the lunch table. She's sitting on the floor between the two heavy black drapes, her legs folded under her. When she was a freshman and mostly wore jeans and longer skirts, she usually crossed her legs. But the minidress she's wearing now doesn't really give her the freedom for that.
"Tina, we need to talk."
She doesn't look surprised to see him. She looks more resigned than anything else. "Fine. Whatever." She sighs and sets her half-eaten slice of pizza on her tray. She turns to look up him.
"Did Blaine know that you slept over at his house last week? Or about …" He can't bring himself to say it. "The other stuff?" He tries for gentle but authoritative - the same voice he often used when directing Rachel. But it comes out angry and unsure.
Tina's eyebrows furrow as she frowns at him. He's seen a lot of that lately. It's her go-to expression with everyone except Blaine - and sometimes it's her go-to expression with Blaine, too. "What Blaine and I do is none of your business."
"Maybe not. But it's Blaine's business. And if you did all that stuff when he was passed out -"
"He wasn't passed out!" Tina snaps. "He was just tired."
"Tina."
She looks away, picks up the pizza remnant and starts pulling it apart into rough strips.
"Tina," he says more sternly.
"What?" she barks, turning toward him. Tears are quietly streaming down her face.
"I think you know that's not true."
She tosses the shreds of pizza onto her tray. "What did you tell him?"
"I mentioned the sleepover and the Vicks. I thought he knew about it, Tina. But it became pretty obvious that he didn't. And that it's not okay."
Her face tightens like a fist. "Why do you have to get into everybody's business? Artie Abrams, directing everyone's lives but his own. You have no idea how hard it is, Artie." She takes a heaving gulp of air. "I'm all alone here and I was supposed to be Rachel this year, she told me I would, but everyone wants me to keep sitting down and shutting up and swaying in the background and accepting it. That's what you want me to do, too. You should have chosen me as the new Rachel, Artie. Blaine could have been Finn, but no. And he's not a Rachel at all. He never stands up for himself and he puts everyone else first, or he pretends to, but he doesn't, because if he did he wouldn't hold back from me the way he does and I wouldn't be stuck wanting him and wanting him and never get to be close to him except when he's not even there."
She sobbing now - huge, pink-faced sobs, her shoulders shaking and her face curled and despair seeping from her skin. Artie has no idea what to do. Rage is boiling up inside him - he knows what it feels like, having people handle your body like it's not your own, poking and prodding at it, telling you it's okay, it's for the best, it won't even hurt - but it does. Even when there's no physical pain, it hurts because they think you're nothing but a lump of flesh and bones, a problem to be solved, and they don't even see that you're right there or that maybe you can do whatever this thing is yourself, that maybe you'd prefer to do it yourself, and sometimes you have to shout for anyone to even hear that. You have a brain and a heart and you like the X-Men and Halo and Federico Fellini and you fall in and out of love and your body might not be perfect, but it's yours.
And right alongside this rage, this other feeling is blooming. When Artie was 10, he found a baby bird that had flown or fallen too soon out of its nest onto the sidewalk near his house. Its wing was twisted and he went inside to ask his mother what he should do.
"There's nothing we can do," his mother said. "If it can't fly, it won't live for long."
He'd always been an obedient son, but he shouted at her then. "And what if the doctors had said that about me?"
Tina is a broken bird, a pathetic heap of dashed dreams, a Sméagol transformed into a Gollum.
He wheels closer to Tina. She's bent over, crying into a thin paper napkin. "You were never alone, Tina." He risks putting her hand on top of her hair.
She leans into his knees and cries until the fabric of his jeans are soaked through. He thinks about this girl he knows but never knew: the fake-stuttering goth and the happy-go-lucky go-go-girl and the insufferable prima donna and now something much, much worse. Maybe she doesn't know who she is, either, is just trying this persona on for size like all the rest, will discard it when she realizes it doesn't suit her.
He hopes the realization is now.
----
When Artie's dad drops him off at school the next morning, Blaine is waiting outside the ramp entrance by the parking lot. "I'm sorry about the other afternoon," Blaine says.
"You have nothing to be sorry about," Artie says.
"I should have given you an explanation."
"I think I figured it out. I'm sorry."
Blaine shrugs. "You don't have anything to be sorry about, either."
Artie lets Blaine push his chair up the ramp and into the school because he knows Blaine needs something to hide behind and something to hold onto. Blaine stays with him as he gets stuff out of his locker, and then they head together toward Blaine's.
There's a rose taped to the door with a tiny envelope embellished in Tina's handwriting. Blaine pulls them both off his locker. "Excuse me for a second, Artie," he says, and walks across the hall to the boys' bathroom. His hands are empty when he steps out of the bathroom five seconds later.
----