The Ghost and Mr. Hummel (4/9)
Today was the best day in his life, perhaps for the rest of his life. Kurt couldn’t help but give an inner squeal as he got out of his car and walked into the house. When his dad saw him, he stared for a minute, but Kurt didn’t care right now. He would tell his parents later.
Kurt ran up the stairs, giddy at what had just happened. He quickly threw all of his school supplies onto the floor and flopped on the bed with a huge leap. When he landed on his bed, he couldn’t help but kick his heels like a school girl.
“What is wrong with you?” asked Dave, eyeing his roommate’s crazy antics. He’d seen Kurt get freakishly overzealous over the craziest things before, but he had never seen him this ecstatic to wear his shoes on the bed-unless they were Prada, then it was somehow alright. But he was very confused why Kurt was little rolling around on his bed as if he just won the lottery.
“He kissed me!” yelled out Kurt excitedly. “He gave the best speech and then he kissed me and he asked to be my boyfriend and I said yes!”
Dave’s stomach, or whatever his ghostly equivalent was, turned unpleasantly at the news. “Oh… That’s great!” said Dave with fake enthusiasm.
“Isn’t it?” said Kurt. He rolled over to his side to look at Dave, a humongous grin on his face.
It hurt him to see Kurt so happy over another boy, but he couldn’t hold a grudge when Blaine had made such a toothy grin emerge from the self-conscious boy. “Yeah,” replied Dave. “It is.”
Kurt blissfully was ignorant to Dave’s subdued answer and continued to chatter on about the event. Dave wasn’t really listening until he heard, “I can’t believe I have my very first boyfriend.”
“Oh,” said Dave, “yeah, congrats man. You’re the first one out of the two of us to get a boyfriend, so yeah, congrats.”
“Huh, you’re right,” said Kurt. He calmed down a little, his smile going from a thousand megawatts to a still radiant grin. “But that doesn’t matter so much. So,” began Kurt, “what have you been doing?”
“Oh, this and that, the usual,” said Dave, waving his hands about.
“Oh come on, I know that you’ve been doing something all day,” said Kurt.
“Yeah, but I don’t think I can top that news! I mean, I beat your record on Halo,” drawled Dave. “Again.”
“Hey!” Kurt said with mock anger. “That was not my best score, that was a test run.”
“A test run that left you dead after fifteen seconds,” Dave teased.
“Which is why I only play this game against Finn when he’s depressed, because I know he’ll win.” Kurt paused for a moment, a look of reflection on his face. “What am I going to tell Finn when he sees all those high scores? He’ll know they’re not me.”
Dave shrugged. “You can delete those, I’ll show you later.”
“Thanks. So.”
“So?”
“Play a game of Scrabble with me?”
“Only if you promise not to use ‘dolce’ or ‘gabbana’ again, because I swear those are not words!”
Kurt huffed and said, “they are too words, you just wouldn’t know them because they are above you.”
“Yeah, yeah, Mr. Smartypants, now get over here so I can beat you and reclaim my crown as Scrabble Master.”
“You wish, uncultured behemoth.”
Sitting on Blaine’s bed, shoulder to shoulder, felt so easy. Their legs dangled back and forth, tangling together from time to time. There was just something so peaceful about Blaine’s room, unusually formal, that made it feel like they could sit in there forever just enjoying their time together.
It was their little routine to go to Blaine’s house and chat on his bed, even before they were boyfriends. Lying on the bed next to Blaine’s warm body felt nice in the way having someone next to you always did, but it left Kurt wondering.
Kurt knew he was lucky to have such a wonderful boyfriend, one that knew him so well even though they’d known each other for five months. They had the same interests, they worked well together singing and dancing like it was fate. So why did he feel a state of contentment without any spark or electricity thrumming through his body when they were alone?
“Kurt?” He looked up from their shared Vogue magazine to see Blaine’s concerned face. “Are you alright?”
“Yeah,” Kurt replied. “I’m just thinking.”
“Ah,” Blaine hummed. “What about?”
“Just,” Kurt began, “does this all seem too easy, too idealistic?”
“Does what?”
“This-our relationship. It was so easy to go from friends to boyfriends, which is good, don’t get me wrong… But do you ever feel interested… sexually?”
“Yeah,” said Blaine. “You’re hot, so that’s kind of a ‘duh’ question.”
“I mean past knowing we’re both attractive. I like kissing you, and holding your hand, but… Nothing more than that.”
Kurt felt Blaine’s hand on the small of his back, rubbing soothing circles. “And that’s okay,” reassured Blaine. “So you’re not ready to go past that point, that’s completely fine.”
“I feel like we’re already like an old married couple, that we skipped something vital.”
“Hey,” said Blaine, and Kurt looked over to him. “It’s okay, there’s nothing wrong with what we have. As long as we care for each other, right?”
Kurt smiled, nuzzling closer to Blaine. “Right.”
Despite his conversation with Blaine, he still felt there was something off about their relationship. There was nothing wrong-they were great together, they made each other better, there was no denying that.
So why did it feel like he was with the wrong person? Kurt laughed sardonically to himself, thinking it was rich to think that. ‘Who else in Lima is even gay and alive?’ wondered Kurt.
Kurt stopped for a moment. Why did he add the alive part? That seemed like a given, to be in a relationship with someone. It made it kind of difficult to love and be loved when one of them was dead… Yet it made him think of Dave.
‘Dave,’ realized Kurt. ‘Dave is who I keep thinking about.’ It washed over him, all the times he felt so happy being with Dave, even when they were doing something completely ridiculous as playing a game of Hangman.
He tried relating this to how he felt about Blaine. There was definitely friendship there, and they both cared for each other. The same could be said about Dave. They had been friends for over half a year now, ever since he had been living in the new Hummel-Hudson house, and they had told each other so many things they’d admitted to not telling anyone else. Maybe the last part was different for Blaine, but the basis of friendship was the same.
But it felt like something was missing, as if a part of him wasn’t into the relationship as much as he should be. Perhaps that was the part of him that was taken by Dave, he realized.
But what could he even do about that? Dave was dead, that was for sure. They could talk, play video games together, sing together. But they could never touch. Even when they lay next to each other on the bed, there was no chance of real intimacy when all Kurt would feel was a rush of cold air.
It seemed so unfair for Dave to be so real in almost every way but the one that Kurt craved. He didn’t realized how much he took touch for granted; his father’s pats, Carol’s hugs, Finn’s loathed hair tousles. When he tried to imagine his life without them, it seemed almost devastating. He wondered if that’s how Dave felt sometimes.
But touch shouldn’t be the most important thing. He clearly liked Dave, and it wasn’t just for his cute little smirk, although that was very adorable. They had come to known each other so well through just talking and hanging out together, that it could be considered a relationship.
The only question was how would he approach this with Dave?