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Blaine is an independent/amateurish photographer that discovers an abandoned hospital. Upon exploring it, however, he starts to get the feeling that he's not alone.

a/n: supernatural! here there be ghosts. eeehhh kind of (it's a little bit fantasy too). pretend I wrote this before halloween, okay. ~6k [2015 EDIT: now posted on ao3]

warnings: prior character death, mentions of mental asylum practices, internalized/general homophobia with reference to said asylum

He shouldn't be doing this without a permit or backup or something, but he can't help it. Blaine had spotted the ruins while driving to work (his actual work as a bartender in Columbus) and immediately felt the need to go back and photograph them.

The building itself, an old hospital the name of which has long since given way to rust, is partly collapsed and ridden with moss. There are signs of people having been here recently -- footprints in the soft, dry dirt where plants haven't yet taken over.

Blaine doesn't know how long the hospital has been left like this. He has no idea how to figure it out, either; abandoned places don't usually fill his photo galleries. They creep him out a little bit but for some reason, this hospital is drawing him in.

There's no front door -- well, there is, but it has long since broken off its hinges and now lays flat on the ground just outside the doorway.

Blaine hesitates. He's wearing thick, heavy boots so as not to worry about broken glass or wood splinters, and he scuffs the ground nervously with them. This isn't his forte, not even close. Blaine normally photographs wide-open spaces -- scenic panoramas and the like. He also does wedding pictures, family pictures, and just about any other job that'll get him some extra money and some use out of his camera.

Staring into the dark hallway, a tipped, torn lobby chair just barely in sight, he's starting to have doubts.

But not enough to stop him.

Blaine takes a deep breath, grips his camera tighter even though he has the strap draped loosely around his neck, and heads inside. Worn-out rubble cracks under his feet; other than that, there's no sound except for the quiet of his own breathing.

What used to be a lobby is on the right -- the glass that once separated the front desk from the visitor has long since shattered, pieces laying innocently on the countertop and floor. A layer of dust covers everything, rendering the windows clouded and useless for all but vague natural light.

Blaine ventures down the hallway and finds himself wishing he had a flashlight. Sure, there's some light that streams in from open spaces and rooms along the corridor, but it's not much. He could use his phone, but the thought of looking down, even for the mere seconds it would take to get it out of his pocket, is terrifying. Yet something continues to draw him in; Blaine's as fascinated as he is scared, so maybe that's it. Maybe it's something more.

He peers into each room with open doors that he passes, a part of him unable to stop thinking that he might run into something horribly creepy like a skeleton.

"Stop that," he mutters to himself, shaking his head. One of the first few rooms he comes across is completely bare except for a rusted bed frame. A sense of foreboding comes across him as he discovers that the following rooms are similarly clinical.

A memory surfaces slowly -- a newspaper article regarding an abandoned mental asylum, something Blaine had read years ago, but he stops in the middle of the hallway when he realizes that that's what this hospital is. That is, not so much a hospital as an originally well-meaning institution of torture.

The air around him feels heavier with that knowledge, like the weight of everything that once happened here is pressing, ruthless. Blaine almost wants to run, sprint back to the door and leave, never to return. But he doesn't. Instead, he lifts the camera, checks its settings, and snaps a photograph of one of the rooms from its doorway.

At least he's not seeing any weird stuff through the lens. Not that that's a very comforting thought to have in the first place.

Another deep breath later, Blaine keeps going, though at a much slower pace. His eyes skim quickly over a set of uncomfortable-looking leather restraints, his heart jumping into his throat while his imagination runs on overdrive.

The corridor eventually splits two ways, and Blaine instantly takes the right turn -- the left is dark and full of the silhouettes of discarded furniture and who knows what else. He might as well be in a haunted house, except it's a thousand times worse because he's alone and there's nothing cheesy or commercial about a place where people thought to have lost their minds soon did.

Despite the clear history of the place, however, Blaine's terror fades into numbness with each step. He's no less alert; rather, his curiosity is starting to burn a little brighter. There's no questioning the fascination factor of an abandoned mental asylum -- it's a piece of history as intriguing as it is terrible -- so Blaine decides to take advantage of his position by boldly stepping inside the next room he sees, hoping for more close-up photos.

The room he ends up in shows signs of having once been slightly cheerier than the rest. Blue paint covers the walls, though it's peeling severely, and the shattered remains of what seems to have been a vase for flowers lay on the floor next to a round table. Blaine inches closer to the table, mindful of layers of dust and dirt under his feet, and spots a clipboard stuffed full of decaying sheets of paper.

He's not sure what to expect when he finally gets close enough to look at the top page, other than the possibility that any writing will be illegible. It's a surprise, then, when Blaine discovers that it appears to be some kind of patient's records paper, and even more so when it turns out to be readable.

Patient: Kurt Hummel Age: 17 Admitted: 8 November 1952 by legal guardian, Richard Hummel (relation: uncle) Affliction: Homosexual behavior Possible Cause: Trauma linked to the deaths of both parents Notes: Difficult to communicate with. Remains quiet even when prompted, repeatedly, to speak. Occasionally shakes head; otherwise no response is given. However, the patient remains firmly lodged in ideas of homosexuality, expressing no desire whatsoever to accept help. It is evident that the patient's prior castration has had little to no effect on condition. Recommendation: A lobotomy, preferably as soon as possible in order to have the patient on the way to recovery and release in good time. See Dr. Hanson for scheduling.

Finally, scrawled in at the bottom:

Lobotomy scheduled for 15:30 on 27 May 1953.

Blaine backs away sharply, nearly tripping over his own boots in his haste to put some distance between himself and... that. Written proof that a real person, a teenager, had been in this very room somewhere around sixty to seventy years ago. That he'd had any number of outrageous procedures performed on him simply because he was gay, among them a lobotomy. Blaine doesn't know much about the practices of the time, but he remembers clearly from a high school psychology class that lobotomies were essentially performed with ice picks.

He shudders, officially creeped out and ready to leave. It isn't until he starts for the door when he hears it, a voice, soft and gentle.

"Wait."

Blaine freezes, glancing around. "Hello? Is someone there?"

"Of course there's someone here. Why wouldn't there be?"

"Because there's no one here," Blaine mutters, mostly to himself. "And I'm imagining things, and I need to get some fresh air."

"I'm not 'no one,' thank you."

Blaine wants to move, but he's rooted to the spot out of fear by now, eyes flicking around the room in a desperate attempt to find some proof that he's not going crazy.

At least I'm in the right place for it, he thinks, but there's no humor to it.

"But who are you? It's been so long since anyone's been here, and you aren't dressed like any of the doctors."

Well, if he's going to be stuck here listening to his own mental spiral, he might as well indulge in it. "Blaine Anderson."

"It's nice to meet you, Blaine."

"It's Kurt, right?" Blaine asks tentatively, unsure if he wants to know the answer. "Your name?"

"Yes, I believe so. I'm uncertain some days, but that seems correct."

"Kurt?"

"Hm?"

"Are you real?"

It's a stupid question, really, but Blaine desperately needs the Kurt-voice to say no, this is all your imagination, Blaine, of course it is.

"I've never been asked that before, and the doctors have asked a lot of strange questions. But yes, I'm real as can be." So much for that. "Wait, you're not a doctor, are you?" Kurt asks then, an edge of panic creeping in.

"No," Blaine says quickly, shaking his head. He holds up his camera almost sheepishly. "Photographer."

"Oh. Newspaper?"

"Independent."

"I see."

"Do you?" It's with a note of irritation that Blaine asks, because there's no way he's talking to Kurt Hummel, who lived in the 1950s. It has to be his own head and it's ridiculous that the voice won't just tell him what he already knows.

"I'm not dumb," Kurt responds, his voice sharp, slightly lower. "I may be stuck here, but that doesn't mean a damn thing about my intelligence, Blaine Anderson. Not yet, anyway."

"Not yet?"

"Some of us aren't so lucky, as I'm sure you've seen."

"I haven't. Kurt, do you realize that it's 2018?"

"Excuse me?"

"It's not 1952 or whatever anymore, if that's what you think," Blaine explains slowly to the empty room. Or maybe it's not so empty. He honestly has no fucking clue at this point. "It's the year 2018."

"No, that can't be possible. It's just been a few long weeks since I last saw a doctor, I'm sure of it."

"Well, I don't... I can't see you," Blaine says. "That's why I don't think you're real. You're just a voice in my head or something, you have to be."

"You're not making sense. Sit down? I've found that that helps sometimes, when I feel like I really am losing my mind."

"There's nowhere to sit!" Blaine shouts suddenly, though the quiet quickly swallows up the sound. "This place is falling apart and you're invisible or not real or whatever, and--"

"Blaine."

For some reason, Blaine stops at the sound of Kurt's voice. Kurt doesn't seem angry or anything at all but calm, if only a little bit confused. "Sorry."

"Don't be, that kind of thing happens sometimes. I've seen it plenty during group sessions." A soft thump, then more, like footsteps. Blaine's throat tightens. "You really can't see me?" He shakes his head, fingers twitching where they cling to his camera like a lifeline. "And... falling apart?"

"Yeah, um, the walls are peeling like crazy and the bed is just a wire frame. The round table there's the only thing besides that that's in here, really, except for all the dust and broken glass."

Suddenly it feels like something ice-cold is being pressed through the skin of his right cheek; Blaine gasps, stumbles backwards on feet that have forgotten how to move. "Wait, come back here."

"What are you doing?" Blaine hisses, but he steps forward obediently.

"Touching you."

"What?"

Blaine feels it again and forces himself to stay still. He's always heard that ghosts, when passing through, feel cold, but he'd never really thought about it in any detail. After all, ghosts don't exist. Or, well, he didn't think so until right about now.

"It just... goes right through you," Kurt says, voice soft in awe. "I don't understand."

The sensation sticks and Blaine wonders if Kurt's just holding his hand there, under his skin. He's about to ask Kurt to please stop because it's starting to feel like he'll get frostbitten (ghostbitten? Is that a thing?) but as soon as he thinks of it, the chill gives way, bit by bit, to a kind of comfortable warmth much like sitting near a fireplace in winter. But then it's gone entirely as Kurt presumably moves away; Blaine leans in to find him again, embarrassingly enough, without thinking.

"So, if it really is the year 2018," Kurt begins, the sound of his footsteps barely intelligible, "I couldn't possibly be alive."

"Probably not."

"Dr. Hanson was saying something about a certain procedure," Kurt mutters, low enough that Blaine has to strain to hear him. "I wonder..."

"You're awfully calm for someone who's just found out that he's dead," Blaine blurts out against his better judgment. His eyes widen, but he hears laughter. Not maniacal laughter like in those movies, but sweet, slightly self-deprecating laughter.

"May I be blunt?" Kurt asks after it fades.

"Sure."

"I always expected to die here. So many do, after all, and the ones that get out don't fare well from what I hear. It seems like such a noble cause, to be curing people of afflictions of the mind, but I wonder sometimes if all of this is worse than the illnesses themselves."

"They are," Blaine says in earnest. "None of it is totally foolproof, but there are so many better ways to treat mental illness now. People can live with them and they aren't shut away."

"Sounds like some kind of fantasy to me."

"I promise you, it's reality."

"The line between the two is somewhat blurred to me at the moment," Kurt says with a quiet chuckle. "I'm curious, though. How is homosexuality treated in your time?"

Blaine blinks. "Um, it's not a mental issue or anything, so there's no treatment. Well, there are people that try to treat it, but that's rare nowadays."

"But it's wrong." Kurt's frank response, innocently bewildered as it is, makes Blaine's stomach drop unpleasantly.

"It's... really not. It's a part of who you are. I'm gay, myself."

"And you're okay with that?"

Blaine nods. His hands have relaxed now; they still hold his camera, but loosely. "Things are changing. The world isn't perfect and won't ever be, but I don't have to hide anything about myself to live in it."

"My father knew."

"What?"

"I think he knew about me, but he never said anything. Uncle Richie did, though, after he caught me watching a busboy too closely."

"He was the one that brought you here, wasn't he?" Blaine asks, remembering the report.

"He said it was for my own good, and I believed him." Blaine can almost imagine Kurt shrugging, despite not having any idea what he looks like. "I still do, but-- I don't know. It's all very confusing."

"You shouldn't," Blaine says, sharper than he means to. "Believe him, I mean."

Kurt lets out a short, humorless laugh, one that actually belies his history. "It's not quite that easy. I assume you spent many days as a child learning the colors?" Blaine nods, unsure where Kurt's going with this. "You were told that the sky is blue, the grass is green, and the sun is yellow. It became second-nature. Except now, a stranger comes along and tells you that everything you've been told is wrong. Do you believe him?

"Maybe you're right," Kurt continues before Blaine can say anything. "In all honesty, I hope desperately that you are, because as much as I'd like to be like the other boys, I can't. I've given up trying."

Blaine wants to say "It's never too late," but sixty-five years after one's death does seem a little late. Not to mention that Kurt's spent this entire time believing in his uncle, the doctors, and the world he grew up and died in.

And now Blaine's trying to determine the likelihood of a ghost accepting his own sexuality. Great.

"Are you sure there's nothing you can sit on?" Kurt asks again. "You've been standing for some time."

Blaine glances around, biting his lip before he sinks into a crouching position. It's not the most comfortable thing, but for now it's better than standing. "So, what, you still see everything exactly as if you're still in the fifties?"

"Yes. Almost."

"Almost?"

"I'm not sure how to explain." The sound of a chair scuffing the floor startles Blaine before he remembers that there's probably a chair in Kurt's reality or whatever. "I can see you well enough, but most everything else seems a bit fuzzy. It wasn't like this before."

"Before what?" Blaine feels silly for asking so many questions, but Kurt's intriguing whether he's an imagined voice or not. He tries not to let himself hope that he's not just lost in his head, overwhelmed by the location and its hollow background, that Kurt's real in some sense.

"Before you."

There's an intensity to Kurt's voice now that Blaine can't decipher, and maybe he shouldn't even try to figure it out. All he knows is that he definitely wishes he could see Kurt's face right now, so he can respond appropriately. But what do you say to someone who's long dead and yet possibly the most interesting person you've ever met?

Blaine scoffs quietly to himself. It's clear he's drifting far, far away from common sense -- ghosts and spirits don't exist, it's as simple as that, but to continue believing that means he has to stop believing in Kurt's current presence entirely. He doesn't want that to happen, he wants to learn more, immerse himself in Kurt's voice.

"Is something wrong?"

Snapping back to attention, Blaine shakes his head. "Sorry, I was just thinking."

"It's fine. May I ask you a question?"

"Go ahead."

"Who are you?" Blaine frowns. Kurt's voice turns light, teasing. "That is, what are you like when you're not speaking to dead boys in old madhouses?"

Against his better judgment, Blaine laughs. "I'm not a photographer by trade, I work as a bartender," he admits. "I'm... searching."

Kurt prompts him to continue with a gentle hum and suddenly he's spilling half his life story -- how he'd planned on being a stage actor in New York, how he'd stayed in Ohio for matters of convenience and money, how he'd graduated college with a degree in psychology but had no idea what to do with it. He still plays music, mostly piano, and he sings on occasion.

It inevitably comes up that Kurt wants to hear him sing; Blaine politely declines. He's not sure why, exactly, but it seems like to sing for Kurt would be to cross some line. Not a boundary or a social construct, but some undefined barrier behind which waits a complete mystery.

"I used to sing," Kurt tells him in the middle of his wondering. Blaine perks up. "Not often. My voice, well, you can imagine."

Blaine furrows his brows and before he can stop himself he's saying, "I think your voice is beautiful."

"Oh, I--" Kurt cuts off, a little breathless. "I'm flattered. I never could sing outside of my old home, though, unless I wanted to draw unfriendly attention."

"Would you sing for me?" Blaine asks hopefully.

"We'll see."

The conversation quickly winds down to easy silence, and it occurs to Blaine that his legs are aching something fierce. He stands, wincing, and apologizes. "I didn't really expect to get hung up here like this."

"I understand. But Blaine?"

"Yeah?" Blaine's in the middle of stretching his legs and mentally preparing himself for the walk back through the asylum and out the door.

"Come back once in a while? Not necessarily for this long, but now that I know I won't be seeing anyone else for maybe a century or more... it's not a nice thought."

"I get it," Blaine says, nodding. "I'll try."

"Thank you." There's a flash of blue near the table, pale and lively like the rest of the room isn't, but it's gone before Blaine can even begin to wonder what it is. He lets himself forget about it and waves to the room in general as he backs out, jitters returning as he once again takes in the building's atmosphere where it's devoid of Kurt.

He doesn't stop to take pictures; Blaine walks as quickly as he can, head down as though that'll keep his mind off of... of everything, really. By the time he's reached fresh air and sun-streaked ground, Kurt again seems like nothing more than a figment of his imagination.

So Blaine forgets.

--|--

Two months pass before the abandoned asylum crosses his mind again, and it does so with a shiver. He remembers Kurt, of course, but he's well convinced that the entire conversation had been his mind's strange way of coping with the location. Some nights, when he can't sleep, he tries to recreate that -- time and again, he fails, and he has to admit that he misses Kurt, real or not.

"I'm insane," Blaine mutters to himself as he stares at the doorway to the asylum. "I'm actually insane."

That doesn't keep him from walking inside and breathing slowly, evenly, until he reaches Kurt's room. For a moment, it looks exactly the way Blaine remembers -- ruined, abandoned. But a shimmer near the old bed frame catches his eye and his breath.

"You actually came back," comes Kurt's voice, and it sounds even sweeter now. "I didn't think you would."

Blaine blinks, surely seeing things, but nothing changes. What he sees is the faintest, transparent, three-dimensional outline of what can't be anything other than a teenage boy. "Kurt?"

"Don't tell me you've forgotten me," Kurt says wryly. "Unless... how long has it been?"

"Two months, I think?"

"Oh, good. I worried that maybe I'd lost track of time again and it had been years."

Blaine shakes his head dumbly. "I think I see you."

The outline, the ghost, tilts his head. "Really?"

"Not-- Not like you see me, I don't think, but I can tell you're there and your shape..." Blaine trails off, eyes wide. If ever there was proof of ghosts, he's found it.

Kurt raises a hand and wiggles his fingers. "Can you see this?" Blaine nods. "What can't you see?"

"Your face," Blaine says after a moment, subdued. A tiny burst of confidence prompts him to continue. "I wish I could see it."

"Why?"

Blaine bites his lip as he contemplates his answer. Would Kurt take offense to something too reverent, still being (understandably) wary? He decides to take that chance. "I'm sure you're beautiful."

He can't see Kurt's expression, but he does notice his shoulders when they tense up, spine straight. Kurt's head is angled towards one wall, away from Blaine, who's starting to regret his decision. "Thank you," Kurt murmurs, barely loud enough for Blaine to hear. "You're very kind."

"I'm sorry--"

"Don't be." Kurt takes a deep breath, facing Blaine again after a second during which he relaxes somewhat. "I'm being honest; I appreciate your compliment. It's just... different."

"Bad different or good different?"

"Both?" Kurt laughs, slightly strained. "It felt nice, to hear that from you. Still, that, the way you look at me, it's all so foreign."

"The way I look at you?" Blaine asks, brows furrowed. "I can't even see you, really, this is the first time I've seen anything."

The figure, Kurt, shrugs. "Maybe it's just how you listen to me, then. As though you're actually listening to what I'm saying and enjoying the act of it."

"I do. Enjoy it, I mean. I could listen to you forever." A part of Blaine rebels, telling him that this is useless, Kurt's a ghost for fuck's sake -- but at the moment, he really couldn't care less. As terrifying as it is, it just feels right to be here, listening to Kurt's soothing voice in an otherwise intimidating place. Blaine can almost imagine the room as it once was, bright and falsely cheery, complete with a boy that managed to hang on to his sanity until he no longer needed it.

Why couldn't Blaine have existed in Kurt's time? Or, even better, Kurt in this time, when he wouldn't have to worry about being locked up for having feelings for boys. For Blaine. And, oh god, he's setting himself for disaster now; he needs to find a boyfriend. One that's alive.

Kurt hums. "The last time anyone listened to me was when the doctors would interview me. I'm not sure they really listened, though, so I stopped talking. Even then, they took notes."

"I promise I'm not writing anything down," Blaine says quickly. Kurt laughs.

"I know. You're-- You're sweet." Kurt's head ducks down and Blaine has to fight an urge to grin ridiculously wide. "Next time you return... that is, if you will come back?" Blaine nods slowly. "Don't wait so long, okay? I know I said once in a while was fine, but I'd almost convinced myself you were a hallucination."

"I won't, I promise." Kurt lets out a quiet sigh of relief and Blaine can almost imagine that he's smiling.

--|--

Blaine visits every week after that. It gets complicated sometimes; his friends and family can only be fooled in so many ways, and it's not like Blaine's going to tell them that he's visiting an abandoned mental asylum because he has a really sweet and witty ghost friend that he likes to talk to. And that he might have a crush on, as crazy as it is.

It's too crazy, actually. Blaine's spent too many nights restlessly shifting, unable to sleep as he wonders how the hell he got himself into this. But he's not about to let it stop when it's the best part of his week.

Of course, the best part of the best part of his week isn't just talking to Kurt, though that's pretty amazing too. No, it's the fact that, with each visit, Blaine can see more of him. Color and form seem to fill in the outline over time until, three months later, Kurt's smiling at a dumb joke that he made and he can see it. Can see the dimples in his cheeks and the glimpse of his teeth between sweetly pink lips. Can see the sweep of his hair and his blue-grey eyes that still hold the barest sliver of dull, jaded vacancy -- though less so the more Blaine talks to him.

All of that really doesn't help him get over the fact that he's falling hard for this boy, long gone and available to him only as an intangible companion.

They'd tried touching again. It had been Kurt's idea; he'd wanted to hold Blaine's hand after he learned of Sadie Hawkins despite that he had his own deeply-embedded demons, and it seemed weirdly reasonable that as Kurt became visible, he would become tangible. Blaine, surprised by the offer since Kurt still isn't quite comfortable with the whole 'gay' thing, had taken it up in earnest. He'll never forget the way Kurt's face fell when their fingers slipped right through each other's, the sinking, hopeless feeling in his own stomach and chest. That was two weeks ago now.

It's in a moment of quiet when Kurt turns to Blaine, legs crossed on the mattress that Blaine had brought for himself (he won't let Kurt ask him how he got it in). Apparently Kurt's illusion of the room allows new items inside, so they both use it as a place to sit together.

"I need to tell you something," Kurt says with a note of quiet urgency. Blaine frowns.

"Go ahead."

"You said this room is falling apart, at least in your view of it." Blaine hums in affirmation. "It's starting to look that way to me."

"What?"

Kurt nods fervently; he looks almost scared for some reason. "It's been a few weeks in the making, but I thought it was my brain playing tricks as it does on occasion. Now it fades in and out, and I catch glimpses of a ruined version of the place that has been my home for so long. I don't know what it means except that I must be catching up to time at last."

"Is it such a bad thing?" Blaine asks carefully; Kurt can be sensitive about talking about his life here at times. "To know for sure that this place isn't used anymore?"

Kurt draws himself in, arms wrapped tight around his torso. "It's unnerving. As terrible as it is... was, this room has been my greatest safety. No one but the doctors could touch me here. That I can see that it's nothing but dust and ruins is hardly comforting."

"I'm sorry," Blaine says sincerely, unsure what to do since he can't do what he wants to do -- which is to hug Kurt close. "Is there anything I can do?"

"No" is Kurt's blunt answer. "It's my weight to bear."

"Well, I could do something to make you, I don't know, feel better?" Okay, so maybe he's a little overly desperate to help Kurt somehow, but whatever. "I could sing?"

Kurt lifts an eyebrow. "You'd do that?"

"If you join me," Blaine tosses in quickly, and Kurt laughs.

"I should have known. I would if I knew any songs beyond a few words, and I don't think you'd recognize those anyway."

"You'd be surprised," Blaine says, smiling at the thought of his mid-20th century playlist. So he organizes his music by time period, that's not weird at all. He won't tell Kurt about that yet, though. "Does the title Night and Day ring any bells?"

"Somewhat." Kurt's brows knit together slightly as he tries to remember. He hums a few notes and watches Blaine, who grins encouragingly.

"Yeah, that's it. Night and day, you are the one," he starts. "Only you 'neath the moon or under the sun..."

Kurt waits, eyes wide, for the second verse. It's there he joins in, and Blaine drops his voice off so he can listen.

"In the silence of my lonely room, I think of you day and night," Kurt finishes, then Blaine joins him for the remainder of the song. There's no music, but it's as if it's there between them, something tangible and swinging and upbeat. It's impossible to remember that over half a century divides them, that they don't exist on the same plane of reality, that Blaine can't simply take Kurt's hand and dance him around the room as this music begs him to.

When the lyrics speak to making love, Blaine can't help flushing slightly like he's never been intimate in his life. Kurt, for his part, holds their gaze through it, almost curious and wondering, embarrassment the secondary emotion to both.

The final note is a long one but even Kurt, who Blaine suspects hasn't sung hardly a bar in many years, keeps up. Maybe it's a ghost thing, like his appearance, that his talent doesn't waver over time. Maybe Kurt's just that amazing. Blaine's inclined to believe the latter, biased as he may be.

"That was nice," Kurt finally says after a long moment in which Blaine thinks he can imagine phantom horns and jazzy music. The kind of thing he could imagine himself enjoying sixty-some years ago, in the arms of a boy like Kurt, the two of them privately enjoying each other. "You have a stunning voice."

"Oh-- Thank you," Blaine says around a breathless chuckle. "You, though, Kurt."

"What?"

"I... I don't think I can even describe your voice," Blaine admits. "I was right, though, it's beautiful. More than that, it's... you. I can't imagine anyone but you singing the way you do."

Kurt opens his mouth, then closes it, apparently speechless. Blaine suddenly wants to retract everything he said because it might have made Kurt uncomfortable, he's been getting better about Blaine talking about his sexuality and all but maybe he's not this far yet. And, anyway, it's not like it matters whether Blaine thinks he's the most handsome guy in the world (he does) because it doesn't change the fact that anything beyond companionship between them is impossible. If only his heart would figure that out already.

"Blaine, I'm not... offended, or anything." Blaine catches Kurt's gaze, shrugs noncommittally. Kurt always seems to know what's on his mind, or at least the general idea of it. "I don't know how many times I have to say that."

"Sorry."

"I can't think of a better song than the one we sang," Kurt says with a small smile, then, erasing whatever awkwardness is left. "I do think of you more often than maybe I should."

Blaine just watches him, sensing that there's more he wants to say. He hopes it's not a dismissal, like Kurt wants him to stop visiting so he can stop thinking about him. Would that be better for everyone involved? Maybe. Blaine doesn't care, really.

"I only have one regret regarding how I've lived well beyond my death like this, in this place that I should hate."

"Which is..."

"I can't kiss you." Kurt gives him a rueful grimace; that's all Blaine gets before he's turning away to face one wall, tilting his head up with his eyes closed. "It doesn't feel wrong to want it," he adds. "Except that I'm wanting what I can't have, once again."

"I want it too," Blaine blurts out. Kurt opens his eyes and turns his head slightly to look at him. "Someday, okay?"

Kurt frowns. "It's impossible, I'm dead." Blaine barely keeps from flinching at his matter-of-fact tone. "There's no going back, and I wouldn't go back to the life I had if you paid me."

"It was impossible for me to see you months ago," Blaine says. "Who's to say we won't be able to, you know, touch each other in another few months?"

"You're being a bit of a dreamer."

"Maybe I'm just optimistic."

"I don't want to burst your bubble, but--"

"No, no buts." It's pure instinct that drives Blaine to reach for Kurt's hand where it lies on the mattress, the desire to make some kind of contact. His fingers again slip through Kurt's, but he lets his hand stay there anyway in spite of the cold sensation, the visual being enough for now. "I think I'm falling in love with you."

Kurt's breath hitches. "You shouldn't."

"I can't help it. Just let me hope, okay? Maybe you're right, but I don't think I could stand believing that right now."

"... Okay."

Blaine has to leave soon after that if he's to get home before dark; he stands with a smile, hoping to get one in return. He does.

"See you, Kurt."

"Wait." Kurt stands after him, crossing the room in two strides to where Blaine's already half-turned towards the door. Blaine barely has a second to realize what's happening before Kurt's leaning in, lips brushing ice-cold against his and lingering there until the feeling fades to something cool and comfortable. It's nothing like any kiss that Blaine's ever had before, and he would prefer that they could touch for real, but the fact that it's Kurt kissing him makes it perfect. "I think I'm falling in love with you, too. Just so you know."

With that, Kurt's stepping back, a pleased smirk growing on his face when he sees Blaine's slack-jawed expression.

Blaine comes to himself after a moment, mutters a quick "Bye," and slips out the door, head spinning.

The drive home is quiet except for Blaine's own thoughts, and the conclusions he comes to are as follows:

1. It sucks to be in love with a ghost.

2. Kurt Hummel is worth it.

And really, that's all that matters, Blaine thinks. Maybe he'll get that real kiss one day, maybe he won't. But for Kurt?

Let's just say, he'd wait infinite lifetimes.

--|--

(this is the song)

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