Let’s Play Pretend – anxioussquirrel & headbandxbowties
35,000 words — 11 chapters — complete
Rachel and Kurt Hummelberry, new transfer students at McKinley High – unapproachable, mysterious, not to mention virtually inseparable. What is their story? What are they hiding? What will it take to get close enough to learn their secrets? Blaine Anderson is dying to know. But if he succeeds, won’t he regret it?
An AU tale of mystery, hard choices and complicated relationships written by anxioussquirrel, completed with beautiful visual content created by headbandxbowties.
Wow. This has been on my reading list for weeks, but I have been putting it off because of exams. With the first ones out of the way, I stuck in… and didn’t stop reading until it had finished. Although not noticeably different, the language and phrasing used made my own writing style different in emails sent whilst I was reading it. And as for the plot of the story itself? I won’t give too much away. There are dark moments, sexual moments, and moments that are so unexpected that you wonder if you actually read them. If you want to know more about the warnings and possible triggers, please contact the writer directly. The visual content itself makes the fic a must-read, and the careful editing makes you question what the original pictures and videos were, because surely this is what it’s meant to be. This is one story that I shall certainly be reading the sequel for.
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Excerpt
Every high school feeds on it, depends on the steady influx of juicy news to liven up the dull process of learning. William McKinley High School in Lima, Ohio is no different. Be it through the whispers in the corridors and over lunch, the rag of the school newspaper or Jacob Ben Israel’s blog, gossip flows through the veins of the student body and keeps it alive.
This week – the first week of Blaine Anderson’s junior year – the hottest topic is a couple of new students transferring in from LA. They are immediately fascinating because wow, LA, why would anyone move from LA to Lima? – but it’s not the only thing that makes them gossip-worthy.
They’re just… different.
Blaine has never cared much about the rumor mill, but by Friday even he can’t escape the whispers that spread through the school in waves. The girls from his Glee club won’t stop babbling about the new students, spinning more and more fantastic stories. Soon Blaine knows more than he’s ever wanted to know about the two strangers, even though he suspects that most of it has nothing to do with facts.
And okay, his curiosity might be minutely peaked.
Their names are Rachel and Kurt Hummelberry. They are siblings – both in the junior class, so probably twins, though they don’t look remotely alike. They moved into a neighborhood not far from Blaine’s at the beginning of August, and yet no one had really seen them around until the first day of school.
Someone heard they’ve been homeschooled so far and this is their first time in a normal high school – or even a school in general. Someone else swears they overheard something about a witness protection program, which leads to wild guesses about mafia connections, or the siblings witnessing a murder – or participating in one, because why not, right? That would explain the strange vibe they give off. Something unsettling, some kind of distance they keep, which immediately earns them curious stares and, in some cases, mean comments.
Klaine fanfiction 