disclaimer: without prejudice. the names of all characters contained here-in are the property of FOX and Ryan Murphy. no infringments of these copyrights are intended, and are used here without permission.

author's notes: prompted by watchingstarsdie.

Coming Clean;;

In hindsight, it really shouldn't have surprised him to find out that McKinley had a Time Capsule club. Or that his boyfriend had been a member of said club. He finds the box inside a package sent by Blaine's mom, and Blaine's face lights up like a kid's on Christmas morning when he catches sight of the contents, the time capsule decorated with different color sharpies, sequins, gold stars–apparently anything Blaine had gotten his hands on.

"You never made one?" Blaine asks, plunking down on the bed in his tiny dorm room, grinning like an idiot as he breaks the seal on the time capsule.

"Yeah, when I was five," he says, and sits down next to Blaine. "And only because the teacher told me that criticizing the other kids wouldn't get me extra credit."

Blaine giggles and kisses his cheek, and he'd be a liar if he said Blaine wasn't at his cutest like this, excitement vibrating through his body as he opens the box.

"Correct me if I'm wrong," he says, pulling out a small note that reads 09/13/'12 - Artie makes me the New Rachel! in Blaine's tidy penmanship, and even he can't stop himself from laughing at the smiley faces Blaine added, "but aren't these things meant to be buried?"

"Figgins wouldn't give us permission for that." Blaine pouts, but it's short-lived once he studies what's inside the box. "I filled my capsule with pictures and made these little notes with my favorite memories," Blaine explains, and reads out the first note he plucks from the box: "November 22nd, 2012 - Sebastian and Hunter try to re-enlist me as a Warbler." Blaine cackles. "Aww."

He smiles, happy that afternoon made it into Blaine's 'favorite memory' pile. "Try being the operative word."

Blaine hoists his legs into his lap. "It was a very good try," he says and presses a kiss to his lips with a loud 'mwah'. Then he pulls out note after note, interspersed with pictures, and he hears things like performed Wham for Guilty Pleasures week, founded the Secret Society of Superheroes club, got Tony in West Side Story... until Blaine hits a note that makes him smile, but doesn't read outloud.

And he can guess why.

"It's okay," he says, running a hand down Blaine's back.

"February 14th, 2012. Celebrated first Valentine's with Kurt," Blaine reads, and when he looks at him his hazel eyes spell out a very specific apology.

"He was part of your high school life," he hushes, even though Blaine's right in thinking these kind of memories aren't his favorite thing to hear. High school's three years behind them, and they're no longer the schoolboys who sat opposite each other at the Lima Bean, but the past colors and defines them, and try as he might, he can't forget Kurt was a significant part of Blaine's life.

"Hey," Blaine's soft call pulls him back to the present and next thing Blaine's settling in his lap, legs thrown around his hips and he's curling his arms around Blaine's waist, pulling him closer. "High school's over," Blaine says, hands drawing maddening patterns through his hair. "I'm right here."

"I know," he says, his shoulders relaxing once Blaine leans in closer–that is until Blaine kicks his glittery time capsule off the bed, scattering most of its contents all over the floor.

"Shit." Blaine pulls back and studies the devastation, quickly lowering himself to the floor.

He sits up, absentmindedly picking up another note that had drifted from the pile Blaine was restoring. He smooths it open with his fingers, but when the words 05/09/'13 - Found the perfect ring to propose to Kurt make it into his field of vision, he feels the breath knocked right out of him, and the simple sentence echoes through him.

"You asked–Kurt to marry you?"

Blaine looks up, reaches out and snatches the piece of paper from between his fingers, reading the words carefully. "It was stupid," Blaine shrugs nonchalant, while he feels the ink linger on his skin. "I was way too young to know what I was doing," Blaine adds, picking more pictures from the box and staring at all of them fondly. "We weren't even together."

He pulls away from Blaine and looks at him, watching him rifle through more pictures with a pointless nostalgia that nevertheless makes his eyes shine.

"It's all him," the words escape like grains of sand through fingertips, but Blaine just dropped what he considers to be a pretty big bomb and he's acting like it's no big deal.

"No, it's not." Blaine shakes his head, scattering the pictures on the floor out further for what he seems to recall hid deeper inside the box. "Here's Dalton," Blaine says, bringing up picture after picture of faces he recognizes too, "and the Warblers", but all he really sees is the Blaine he missed at Dalton by a few months, a Blaine he fell for despite his conviction that it was something he didn't do, a Blaine tied inextricably to another boy.

Kurt's a sore spot, one Blaine rarely realizes remains painful to the touch, especially when he's the one poking at it. He swallows hard and wills his momentary panic down, reluctant to stifle Blaine's enthusiasm. "It's only three years' worth," he says, noting that there aren't any pictures from before Dalton.

Blaine casts down his eyes. "I didn't want to remember anything before that," he says, and he wishes he hadn't said anything. But if Blaine told him about McKinley and Dalton and his time at public school before that, why hadn't he shared this memory?

He doesn't pry any further, but keeps turning those eight simple words around in his head and the longer he does the clearer it becomes: Blaine had visited a jewelry store and picked out a ring, Sam or Tina by his side maybe, he'd stood in front of the cases and weighed his options, whether to go with a diamond or something more simple, wondering what ring with be right for Kurt.

It was only three years ago and Blaine had wanted to spend the rest of his life with Kurt.

How does he compete with that?

The time capsule is the topic of conversation at dinner that night, Blaine exchanging stories with Santana and her girlfriend, Rachel, Finn and Artie, and he smiles at all the appropriate moments, mocks Blaine's unabashed enthusiasm, makes a comment or two about public schools and their idea of proper extracurriculars, but for the first time he feels like he's third-wheeling his own boyfriend, because right where he's sitting, Blaine had once envisioned Kurt as a permanent fixture.

He's pretty sure Santana notices something's off with him right away–she has this uncanny ability of picking up on his moods–but she's kind enough not to disguise her caring with one of her well-aimed insults.

If Blaine notices anything he doesn't say a word.

They head back to Blaine's dorm, walking hand in hand, and Blaine starts talking about organizing a Warbler reunion for old time's sake. He can't tell if Blaine's oblivious or trying to make him feel better, so he decides to come out and say what's been bothering him: "What if he'd said yes?" he asks.

"What?" Blaine blinks.

"Kurt," he says, and stares down at their locked hands. "What if he'd said yes?"

Blaine halts in his tracks. "He didn't."

"What if he had?" he insists, because this is a scenario Blaine had to have dreamed up at one point in his life and he'd like to know what that fantasy looked like. Did it include reminiscing over the contents of a time capsule almost exclusively devoted to their relationship? Did it include dinners out with friends, walking down the street hand in hand, joking about future plans to live together but secretly hoping that one day it would come true?

Blaine throws him an apprehensive frown, but loses himself in thought.

He lets go of Blaine's hand.

"You'd be married and living together," he says. "You'd be having dinner with him and Rachel, and not–"

Blaine takes a step closer, a hand on his chest. "But I'm not," he says, searching for something in his face he's not sure is there. "Sebastian, I'm with you. I love you."

His voice sounds small once he finds it again. "You'll always love him too."

Blaine huffs a laugh. "Don't be ridiculous."

And he's not sure if it's Blaine careless laughter or his words that do it, but something inside him snaps, Blaine's reaction triggers a pain beneath the sore spot that cuts him right open and he starts bleeding out. "Don't say that to me." He pulls back and turns on his heels, heading for the park.

Thunder sounds overhead.

"Sebastian!" Blaine calls after him, and it's the onset rainfall that disguises Blaine's footsteps hurrying behind him. "Sebastian, stop!" he shouts again and the wound deepens–he doesn't want to be the one to start this, but if Blaine's choses to be blind, choses to think him ridiculous, then why not test how solid their six-month foundation has become?

He turns around so fast Blaine almost runs into him, towering over his boyfriend. "I see what that breakup does to you every time someone brings it up, even after all this time," he says, words spilling as his heart overheats and in Blaine's eyes he sees the stark realization it might be more obvious than he believes it to be. "You haven't forgiven yourself, Blaine. So don't you ever say that to me."

"I'm sorry," Blaine says, voice barely reaching over the sound of rain. The water soaks into his clothes, chilling him to the bone. Blaine wraps his arms around himself. "Can we talk about this somewhere else?"

He shakes his head, burying his hands in his pockets to stop himself from doing anything stupid like forgive Blaine on the spot. He's not sure there's anything to forgive–this is his problem, his insecurity bleeding through the scabs.

"Sebastian–"

"You go ahead," he says. Blaine's usually more insecure than he is, and it kills him to know that he could do this to them too. "I think I'll just go home."

But he's no sooner turned around or Blaine decides to have a say. "You know what I think?" he shouts. "I think you're trying to sabotage us."

He closes his eyes to the sound of Blaine's voice–he heard that once before from Santana after another terrible fight, but they'd come out stronger and learned to communicate their feelings more clearly. Maybe that's what Blaine's doing now.

"Because you're afraid you'll get hurt and God forbid Sebastian Smythe should show any kind of emotion!"

He sighs, turning back only halfway because there's that boy he loves more than he thinks he should be able to, and one of these days he'll spill over because of it. "There's a reason you didn't tell me about the proposal, Blaine," he says, all too aware that he knows what most of those notes inside the time capsule say, because Blaine shared all that with him. "He was your first love."

"I can't change that!" Blaine yells, lines of water dripping from his eyebrows and obscuring his eyes.

"And you never would!"

"No, I wouldn't," Blaine says. "I wouldn't change a damn thing."

He throws up his arms. "Then what's the point?"

"The point?" Blaine asks. "The point is that right here, right now, I love you."

He licks his lips. "Like you loved him."

"No, not like I loved him." Blaine takes a step closer, shaking his head, the distance between them small but respectful. "I was a teenager and stupidly in love with a guy who was just as stupid and clueless," he says. "If he'd said yes we would've gotten married and lived together and it might've been perfect."

Perfect. Like he'd found the perfect ring. But if Kurt was the perfect boyfriend then why did Blaine find reason to cheat?

"For a while."

He looks up, finding Blaine closer than he'd accounted for.

"Kurt was wrong for me, Sebastian," Blaine says. "I was too naive to see that in high school but I know that now."

And he can see it so clearly then, how Blaine would've tried to fix his mistake by making the biggest gesture he could think off, how he'd bought that ring and cherished it, fantasized about Kurt saying yes and living their lives together in New York. But instead he got a no and a boy just as lost as him.

"I grew up," Blaine says.

But that's a thing he can't see: how is he the grown up choice?

"Why me?"

Blaine takes a deep breath and for a minute couple of moments he fears that's that, Blaine will give up on him, will realize that these shouting matches aren't worth the effort if they keep recurring and he'll find someone slightly more perfect than Kurt was. Might've. Could've. Will.

The rain torrents down on them hard and unforgiving.

There's no warning.

"Because every time you mock something I like I know you secretly think I'm cute," Blaine says, forcing him to find his eyes again, eyes made black when lightning flashes through the sky.

Of course Blaine would know this, there are times when he thinks he's so see-through he might as well be transparent–for all his pride and professed apathy he does think Blaine's cute every time he so much as mentions his fondness of bow ties or Transformers.

"Because you're completely intolerable without your morning coffee, except on weekends when you wait for me to wake up and you kiss me until I start complaining."

A smile pulls at a corner of his mouth, the memories of lying spooned around Blaine's body those Saturdays and Sundays, his heartbeat beneath the palm of his hand, the soft rise and fall of Blaine's back against his chest.

"Because we have these shouting matches more often than I care for, but we always fix things with them." Blaine takes a step closer. "Because you see me, Sebastian," he says. "Me. And I think you always have."

He fell in love with that boy sitting opposite him at Dalton, the Lima Bean, that smile and schoolboy charm, the boyish naivety underlain with a maturity he didn't think combined in anyone, but it was there suddenly and completely and Blaine time-capsuled himself into his heart. Whenever Kurt comes up he forgets it just took Blaine a little while longer to feel the same. But that's not a bad thing.

Blaine reaches up both hands and cups his face. "And because most of the time I don't need to answer that question for you to know how I feel," he says. "But I tell you anyway."

He grabs at Blaine's shoulders, chest grown heavy with defeat and warm tears touch his eyes, mixing with the raindrops falling. He doesn't want to be perfect or strive for that, all he's ever wanted to be– "I want to be good enough for you," he spills over, cut wide open and sore, his lips gone numb and shivers running up and down his body.

"I'm sorry that I don't always make you feel like you are." Blaine's hands settle at his waist, his lips turned blue from the cold. "I love you, Sebastian. More than I can ever say."

He thumbs over Blaine's cheeks, teeth clattering. "I love you too," he whispers, voice caught in the quiet of the storm before thunder roars through the sky. He rubs up and down Blaine's arms, trying to get his boyfriend warm again. "Let's get inside before we catch something."

Ten minutes later they stumble into Blaine's dorm, shaking and shivering all over, and they quickly jump into the shower, their wet clothes all over the bathroom floor. They rub each other warm, soap up each other's bodies while their hands explore every patch of skin they can find, fingertips down Blaine's chest, Blaine's down his spine, and their lips not separating for more than a few seconds at a time.

He dresses in a pair of Blaine's boxers and a sweatshirt he'd left there weeks ago, settling down on the bed with Blaine's laptop at the foot end, playing some movie he doesn't really pay attention to. Blaine has his head on his chest and he's already drifting off to sleep, the time capsule forgotten on the bedside table.

He's never seen the point of making Time Capsules or keeping journals as some permanent record of the past. If the past matters it doesn't need recording, it remains in memories, the smell of coffee with a shot of Courvoisier, raspberry gel, the sound of shoes tapping rhythmically on wood panel floors, a capella songs, blue cotton with red piping.

Blaine stirs slightly, fingers teasing circles under the hem of his shirt, before he reaches inside the time capsule again and twirls a note between his index and middle finger. "You missed this earlier," he says, his jaw cracking with a yawn.

He takes hold of the note and reads it carefully: 08/11/'12 - First time having coffee with Sebastian at the Lima Bean. That's all it says, it's small and simple, one of Blaine's favorite memories written down four years ago, and much to his surprise, a heart scribbled in a corner of the note.

"That was a good day," Blaine mutters into his chest, sleep coaxing him away. "You trying to seduce me with talks of Paris."

He draws a hand through Blaine's hair. "I'm taking you there one day," he whispers.

#

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