A/N Enjoy! This will be a multi-chapter story: steamy like the midsummer night air, sweet as an Italian ice bought on the fairway, with twists and turns like an antique wooden rollercoaster, complete with side trips to the fun house, where illusion reigns supreme (and romance can sometimes get even steamier).

This is of course somewhat AU, but McKinley is basically the same, as is Dalton. Rated T for language, and situations.

I don't own Glee, or any name brands or songs that crop up here!

Yes, Rachel, I'm here now! See you in the choir room. Kurt snapped his phone shut . I'd actually get there faster if you didn't keep hounding me! he grumbled to himself. Yes, he was (checking the time) three whole minutes late, but what the hell! First day of junior year, and yes, he was impressed by her enthusiasm, but why did it also have to involve waking him up extra early?

His phone vibrated again in his pocket as he strode down the halls of William McKinley High. I have coffee for you! He smiled at the text message, and decided he could forgive Rachel for this summons to a meeting. He was almost there when he was violently shaken out of his reverie by a brutal body slam into the wall of lockers.

"Hummel! Gay much? What the hell are you wearing, your granny's cologne?" Not waiting for an answer, Karofsky sauntered away with a sneer as Kurt slumped to a sitting position on the floor.

Damn! Kurt thought he'd remembered what those slams felt like, but the memory didn't compare at all to the painful original. He closed his eyes, breathed deeply, and looked up in surprise when he felt his shoulder being lightly tapped.

"Hey! You OK?"

Kurt shook his head, took the hand extended to him, and stood up to greet… a stranger. "Uh, thanks. I'll be all right." He looked, and was pretty sure he'd never seen this guy before. He wasn't someone he would have expected help from, for sure: whoever this was, in his black skinny jeans with a black rock band shirt (who the hell were Freelance Whales?), motorcycle boots, heavy silver chains dangling from his jeans and jacket in odd places, with slicked black hair, looked scarier than Puckerman.

"Good. Later!" The stranger flashed a gorgeous smile at Kurt, and then turned to go the other way down the long hallway.

"Yeah. Later." Kurt whispered. He smiled at the retreating form of the mystery boy. He'd barely seen his face at all. Kurt wished he'd looked at his face instead of his clothes.

"Kurt! Come on! Your coffee will get cold!" Rachel scurried down the hall, looking for Kurt, her patience wearing thin as she waited to get their glee strategy meeting started. "Artie, Mike, and Tina are already there!" Rachel stopped to look at Kurt, noticing he looked a little stunned. Seeing no evidence of a slushie attack, her brows furrowed as she tried to figure out what was up with her friend. "Where's Finn?"

Kurt went along down the hall with her, as Rachel had gripped his arm, leading him to the choir room. "Rachel." She looked at him, opening the door. "I know my way, you know. You don't have to lead me around like some kind of frantic seeing eye dog!" He was about to launch into a snarky remark about Finn not living in his back pocket when Rachel handed him a cup from the Lima Bean. He took his first sip, pure heaven, and looked down at Rachel, whose eyes suddenly brightened: Finn had slipped in just behind them. "Sorry, Rach, you didn't deserve that. And thank you so much for getting me this."

Kurt was glad Mike was in his honors English class. It was right before lunch, and they both had the same lunch period, which meant he wouldn't have to go alone to the caf to find the glee club table. They'd chatted about the heavy reading list, gotten out their lunches (neither one of them liked the school food) and settled in to wait for more friends to join them at a table outside.

"I said get away from my stuff!" Their heads snapped at the very angry,very loud voice a few tables away, on the outside rim of the enclosed courtyard. Kurt recognized the boy who was yelling: the stranger from this morning.

"Hey! it was an honest mistake, all right? My bag looks just like yours. Sorry!" Mike recognized the boy who was backing away fast, Justin Mara, from his AP Bio class.

"Maybe we need to make them look a little more different, asshole!" Justin watched fearfully as the boy reached to throw something at him, and Kurt and Mike were horrified to hear the thunk of a knife thrown with great force at the bag, right in front of Justin's chest.

Kurt looked on, terrified. Slushies and getting slammed were routine occurrences at McKinley, as was the occasional trip into a dumpster. But knives? He hadn't seen anyone with one at this school, let alone witnessed one being thrown like that. The jocks clustered at the table near where Justin had been standing just sat there, mouths opened wide, as Justin fled without another word. They moved away a bit as the boy sat at the table next to them that Justin had just vacated.

Finn and Brittany sat down next to Kurt, as Mike leaned over, saying, "I'm going to go check on Justin. Catch you later, Kurt."

"Everything OK, Kurt? You, um, don't look too good right now." Finn frowned at Mike's retreating form.

"Fine. I'm fine. You didn't see anything, did you?" Kurt glanced over to where the new boy was calmly eating his lunch. He really wanted to get a better look, but brought his gaze back to Finn.

"No! What? Did I miss something?

"Porcelain!"

Kurt turned, sighing, ready to see what Coach Sue Sylvester wanted this time. The first glee meeting had gone about like he'd thought it would; Mr. Schue had weird ideas to increase their numbers, Rachel wanted to start planning right away for Sectionals (and of course had songs picked out); not much singing this first day. He was tired; ready to go home, thirsty, hot.

"Yes?"

"I'm hoping you've reconsidered your ill-advised decision from last year. You know you want back in."

Kurt could only shake his head. "Ah, Coach Sylvester, by the way, the name is Kurt, and I think I'm going to say no to what I can only assume is your invitation to re-join the Cheerios."

Sue's eyes narrowed as she considered the teen in front of her. "You're making a mistake, Porcelain, but I'm sure you'll come around. I've got some numbers planned out for you, and you know you loved it." She smirked at Kurt. "See Becky to get your measurements re-done; looks like you've grown some since last year."

Kurt rolled his eyes. He knew his measurements in detail; how else to create his own fashions? As if he'd let Sue's minion put a tape measure anywhere on his body! He had, in fact, enjoyed some aspects of his time in the Cheerios quite a lot, but he really didn't have time for this. He smiled at Sue sweetly. "Bye Coach."

He was almost giddy at the Coach's look of frustration as he walked away from her.

Glee let out almost as late as the sports practices today, and he headed towards his beloved Navigator in the nearly deserted student parking lot. Kurt's mind was preoccupied with anticipating getting home, getting rehydrated, and maybe vegging out with reruns of Project Runway.

"Nice ride." Kurt blanched as the new kid from earlier today suddenly came up behind him.

"Thanks." He had no idea what to say, and this throat was instantly dry, noting that he was completely alone with this guy – who'd been nice, friendly even, this morning, and then revealed himself to be a scary, knife-throwing nut at lunch.

"You all right?" The guy was looking at him with concern. Kurt relaxed a little. He certainly didn't look like a threat, for now.

"Yes! Fine!" Why was he here? Kurt decided to try talking to him as he were any other new student. He was glad for an excuse to look at the boy's face. "My name's Kurt."

"Blaine. Blaine Anderson." Kurt saw his face light up with a smile. And those eyes – he had hazel eyes framed by long lashes, topped with black triangular eyebrows. Why, Kurt wondered, did he look so damned amused? Had he done anything funny? How did someone dressed like such a fashion disaster manage to look so amazingly hot?

"You're new here, aren't you?" he managed to say, congratulating himself on not slipping into his highest register.

"Yup," Blaine said. "Moved here this summer. I'm a junior."

Well, Kurt thought, this conversation was going surprisingly normally. If you can call normal having a conversation with a guy in goth-meets-biker gear who throws knives when he gets pissed normal. Somehow he didn't feel like he was in any danger, and part of his mind wondered why that should be so. "Junior. Me too." Brilliant, Kurt, he thought to himself. He must have paused too long, as he noticed Blaine started to speak again.

"Well, Kurt. Nice to know the name that goes with the face. See you around!" With that, Blaine nodded in a friendly way in Kurt's direction as he started towards his motorcycle parked further out.

"Right! See you tomorrow. I guess." Kurt watched him walk away for a moment before getting his keys out. Damn! Maybe those pants at least weren't a fashion disaster. Not on him anyway. OK! he thought, enough! I don't even want to know what would happen if he caught me staring at him in those skin tight jeans!

Blaine pulled into the driveway of the little house he and his mom had moved into a couple of weeks ago. Her family in the area had all offered to take them in, but she'd gently turned them all down, preferring instead to move into their own place a couple of weeks before the semester started. It was smaller than he was used to, but he liked it more: his parents' fights, which alternated with periods of uncomfortable chilliness, had been hard to be around. Much as he'd hated the idea of them divorcing, he couldn't help but see that his mom actually seemed more relaxed now.

Letting himself in, he dumped his bag into his room and shed his outfit in what his mom would describe as the messiest way possible: jacket, shirt, socks, chains, exploding all over the room. He did use care however, with his knives and holsters, laying them out on the top of his dresser. He didn't regret losing the one he'd thrown at lunchtime: he grimaced for a moment, musing that it was a worthy investment. The table full of jocks? They hadn't said a word, including the Neanderthal who'd pushed that boy into the locker first thing this morning.

Blaine peeled off his sweaty socks, leaving them unceremoniously on the floor, as he loped over to the shower. He'd waited after school, so long he thought maybe he'd missed him, but had been glad to find that he hadn't: he'd wanted to stay to make sure the beautiful boy from the morning made it to his car without getting bullied again. Kurt. He'd seemed nervous, but when he'd finally smiled – wow. Blaine made a mental note to ask Justin about him later tonight.

A/N: So, badboy!Blaine ... consider yourselves introduced, dear readers. I will update again soon, and would welcome any feedback, comments, speculation …