The Guilty Ones 》Glee/Klaine ✓

1. Sneakers

The raven haired boy's head fell back onto the wood with a soft thud. In the silence of the long stretching hallway, he had resorted to tracing the carpet's intricate design beneath his outstretched legs.

Any other day, this hall would be bustling with activity and familiar faces passing in and out of the many doorways. But of course today was the one exception. The day that he had precisely one hour and a half to complete his English essay, which was currently half-typed and saved on the laptop that lied on the other side of the door.

He groaned to himself, knowing he should have taken his key, or even a cell phone, before heading down to the dining hall earlier. But it was far too late now; everyone had already scattered to their recreational evening activities. Looking for help would be practically useless in the academy as large as this.

So waiting was decided as the best decision. And as the minutes continued to slip by, the boy was suddenly thinking twice about his choice.

It wasn't like him to forget his room key- not like him at all. But it was certainly like his roommate to promise he'd come back shortly after dinner (and fail to do so).

Just as his finger had run over a particularly interesting carpet swirl, hasty footsteps from the left instantly brought him back to full attention.

"Blaine!"

"Nick...!" he melted into a sigh of relief before scrambling to his feet.

"I've been looking all over for you!" Nick exclaimed.

"I've been looking for you!" Blaine replied. "Well, I've actually, um, been here but..."

The smug-looking boy eyed Blaine over. "Forget your key again?"

"What? No! I did not forget my key again," he protested as Nick shoved a hand into his grey trouser pockets, "I've never forgotten my key. But maybe you've forgotten that you were supposed to meet back at the room. Like, right after dinner."

"You know that I'm a sucker for Jeff's charades night in the common room," Nick grinned un-apologetically. "I just came up to find you, thinking you'd be slaving away on that report instead of having actual fun."

Blaine watched his roommate pull out everything from gum wrappers to small toys from his pockets. "You do have the key, right?!"

Nick fished out a small ring, jingling the brass key in response.

"And maybe you're right," Blaine said as he impatiently waited for him to turn the lock, "because I would be working on the assignment. You didn't blow it off, did you?"

"Are you kidding? Do you know how often my parents hound me for keeping up my grades so I can stay at Dalton?" he gave a visible shudder. "The sound of their nagging practically puts me to sleep at night."

He wasn't unfamiliar with the concept of good grades at Dalton Academy. Similar to Nick's parents, Blaine's mother and father called once a week to check up on him here at school. What began as casual conversations of activities and news almost always turned into reminders of his grade point average. It wasn't that the Andersons were dependent on Blaine's academics financially, but their family definitely held standards for what they thought of as their son's success.

Dalton Academy wasn't a regular high school. It was an all-boys private institute located in the posh Westerville, Ohio. Notable for its flourishing programs in academics and art, Dalton was probably Blaine's favorite place in the world (even compared to his own home) where he had the opportunity to study and express himself freely every day, surrounded by all his closest friends. Even when most boys went home for the weekends, Blaine often enjoyed leisurely walks around campus or curling up with a novel in the cozy common room. To him, Dalton was home.