The balcony again, it’s always the balcony, and he can feel the wind through his clothes like a thousand icy needles. Blaine balances on the railing though it seems like the wind itself should push him off, bare feet and legs blue with cold.

“Don’t!” Kurt tries to yell, but he can’t tell if he actually makes a sound, if Blaine can hear him at all - the wind blows the sound away as soon as it falls from his lips.

“Save me.” Blaine says, his face and voice devoid of all emotion, more terrifying than if he were screaming or crying. “Save me, Kurt.”

“I’m trying, I swear -“ He can’t move, feet frozen to the floor, and he knows that if he could move he could stop what he knows is about to happen. This is his dream, yet he can’t control it.

“Try harder.”

“I will! I swear I will, please, just -“

Blaine closes his eyes and tips backwards.

Kurt wakes up with a gasp, but to his relief he is aware of what’s happening, that he was dreaming, and can calm down immediately. He stares straight ahead at the window, barely lit with the dawn light, and takes deep, even breaths, trying to slow the beating of his heart.

When awareness of the world around him starts to seep in, his first thought is that it’s far too warm, even with the blankets tangled around his feet and halfway falling off the bed. Even with no blankets there’s still something covering him, something warm and heavy across his waist that radiates heat.

“Oh my god!” He sits up ramrod straight, knocking the arm that had wrapped around him off to the side, staring wide-eyed at the body next to him. Blaine’s hair looks like it could house a few baby birds, and there’s a little bit of drool at the edge of his lips as he groans and blinks his eyes open, blearily staring at Kurt. And they are both very naked.

“Shit,” Kurt whispers - he remembers now, everything about last night. Remembers dragging Blaine into the bedroom, undressing him, remembers Blaine’s mouth all over him, and even if he didn’t remember what came next the familiar soreness he feels leaves absolutely nothing to the imagination “Shit, shit, shit.”

“Good morning to you too,” Blaine mumbles, rubbing his face with the back of his hand. He sits up and tries to pull the blankets back over their naked bodies, but they’re too tangled, so he gives up and flops back down onto the pillows.

Kurt doesn’t know what to do - he can feel himself start to panic as he stares at the man lying next to him. What can he do? He slept with Blaine. No, he’d slept with his ex-husband, ex being the key word. What on Earth could he have possibly been thinking? After all these weeks of telling himself no, don’t get too close, don’t let him hurt you again, he had gone and done this, like Blaine was just another one night stand. That’s the worst part of it, he thinks miserably. He feels so cheap in a way that he never gave himself a chance to feel with other hookups.

Not that it wasn’t good - god, it was, as if it could be anything short of mind-blowing. Sex with other men is fine but simply that: just sex, something Kurt thought he could never feel about something that should leave him open and vulnerable.

But sex with Blaine, oh. Sex with Blaine is the closest he’ll ever come to believing in some higher power. Blaine takes him apart with every touch and puts him back together again with kisses. Blaine still knows Kurt’s body as intimately as his own, maybe even more so, and he touches Kurt as if he is something to be worshiped.

It’s the same now as it was when they were seventeen, and it’s scary.

Blaine catches Kurt staring and props himself up on his elbows, head tilted to the side and eyes, still bleary from sleep, looking at him in concern. “Are you okay?”

Kurt shakes his head, not trusting himself to speak without bursting into tears. One last time, he’d told himself; what an idiot he’d been. Now all he wants is to snuggle back into Blaine’s arms and maybe go on for round two. One push was all it had taken and now he can’t just go back to the distance they had before, not with the memory of Blaine’s skin against his so fresh in his mind.

“What’s wrong?” Blaine sits up, finally managing to pull the sheet over his lap, and watches as Kurt scrambles off the bed, searching the floor for his discarded clothes, at least his underwear.

One night of Blaine being himself, being kind to him for once, and all of his weak defenses had crumbled. “I can’t do this.” He chokes out - it’s a lie, he can and he wants to, but his fear strangles any notion of that. He can’t. He just can’t.

“Do what? Kurt…?”

“This!” He finished pulling on his boxer-briefs and gestures wildly at Blaine. “This, you, us.”

Blaine’s mouth falls open in a silent Oh. “I - I thought…” his brow furrows. “I thought that maybe we… were okay now.”

Another shake of the head. “No. No, we’re not, I’m not. One one-night-stand does not make us okay.”

The hurt that passes over Blaine’s face makes Kurt physically ill.� “Is that all it was to you?” He asks quietly - he looks so small, so exposed, and it breaks Kurt’s heart. Kurt doesn’t answer, doesn’t have an answer. He grabs a random shirt from the floor - it’s Blaine’s, he tosses it onto the bed where Blaine catches it without looking and crumples it up in his hands. Kurt turns around and goes to his closet, searching for something, anything to wear, but freezes when Blaine says, “You said you love me.”

Kurt feels his chest tighten. He can’t breathe. “What?”

“Weeks ago. I didn’t dream it, you said so.”

“You were drunk,” Kurt says as if that’s a legitimate excuse, fighting to keep his voice calm.

“You weren’t.”

“Blaine…”

“It’s not like I planned this,” Blaine says. “I didn’t think, hey, I’ll throw the dorkiest birthday party in history and I am going to get laid tonight. Don’t make me feel like shit about this, it was just as much to do with you as me.”

“I can’t.” His hands tremble until he clenches his fists at his side. “I’m not trying to make you feel like shit, I don’t want that, I just… I was lonely and… vulnerable and you were saying such wonderful things and - and you were there. I’m sorry.”

Blaine stares at him, and Kurt can see it, the way he retreats into himself. The Blaine of last night fades away, goes back into his shell and leaves him cold again. Being the one to put that look on Blaine’s face makes Kurt feel like the worst person in the entire world. “That’s all?”

No, he wants to say. No, no, you are everything to me don’t go don’t let me do this to you don’t let me let you go again please. “I’m sorry,” he whispers instead.

Blaine climbs out of bed, gets dressed in yesterday’s clothes while Kurt sits down and makes himself hold back his tears until Blaine is out of sight. “Okay, then,” Blaine says, and leaves the room. He doesn’t even slam the door, and that makes it even worse. Kurt wants him to be angry. He wants Blaine to scream in his face and reinforce what a shitty person he is, anything is better than just accepting it.

There have been so many times since taking Blaine in that he’d had to do everything in his power to keep from crying. Now, as soon as the door shuts, a quiet sob escapes Kurt’s lips, and he covers his mouth and hides his face in his hands as his shoulders shake to keep more back.

He doesn’t know how long he sits there, miserable and hating everything about himself, but he becomes aware of the world around him when the doorbell rings.

Kurt breathes in deep, shudders, and wipes his eyes. He doesn’t know where Blaine is right now or if he’ll bother to answer the door, so he stands up and finishes pulling on his pants, putting on his fakest smile and getting ready to face real life. Right now, it’s all he can do.

--

The woman standing in his kitchen, all high-heeled boots and a dress that isn’t the least bit suitable for the weather and a faux-fur coat, hugging a stunned Blaine, is the last person he expects to see. Amelia, sitting at the table with a piece of toast in front of her, stares at Santana with the same expression that Kurt is sure is on his own face.

“Heyyyy, Ladyface!” Santana releases Blaine and tugs Kurt into her arms, the embrace brief and almost sisterly. “It’s been a hell of a long time.”

“Yes it has.” Kurt shoots a glance at Blaine, who shrugs helplessly, though he looks a little happier for her presence. She was always Blaine’s friend more than Kurt’s even though he’d known her much longer, but neither of them had seen her in years. No one had as far as he knew. “Where have you been?”

“Here and there.” She waves a hand and looks around the room. “Nice little place. This the kiddo?”

“Yeah.” Blaine puts on a smile. “Amelia, you probably don’t remember Auntie Santana, do you?”

She shakes her head, eyes wide and looking uncharacteristically shy, and Santana laughs. “Hey, cutie-pie. You were still teeny-tiny last time I saw you.” She holds her hands a vague distance apart, about the size of Amelia at two years old. Had it really been that long since Santana had surfaced? She calls Blaine regularly, but that doesn’t quite count. She does this a lot, has been doing it since graduation - disappearing and travelling wherever she could and then dropping in on some former member of New Direction’s doorstep with no one knowing where she had been for all those years. “Well, I guess you’re still teeny-tiny, but so is your dad, so it makes sense.” Amelia giggles, and with that, Santana has her approval. “Still weird to think about you guys being dads.”

“Not that we don’t welcome your presence,” Kurt says, “but how exactly did you find me? You haven’t visited before I moved.” It had been Blaine she visited, in truth; Kurt hadn’t seen her since before the divorce. He supposes it was fair - Blaine had to have some support system after that whole mess.

“The hobbit told me. Well, the other hobbit.” She winks at Blaine and takes a seat at one of the barstools, crossing her legs and stretching out like a cat. “Couldn’t find Blaine at his place, so I tracked down Berry and she said that he would be here, so here I am. Why the fu- oops, children present, sorry - why the fudge are you here anyway, Blainers? You and Twinkletoes finally get back together or something?”

“I’m right here, you know,” Kurt snaps.

Blaine shifts uncomfortably. “Uh, no, we’re… not.” he mumbles, and Kurt can feel his face turn red. “It’s… a long story.”

“I got all the time in the world.” She raises one perfectly manicured eyebrow. She hasn’t changed much, over the years. Not as far as Kurt can see.

Santana Lopez suddenly waltzing back into his life is not exactly what he had on the agenda today, not before his first cup of coffee, and he feels exhausted just thinking about it. “It’s wonderful to see you, Santana, really but - it’s just not a very good time.” He smiles shakily.

Santana, however, only looks at Blaine. She stands up, towering over Blaine in those ridiculous shoes. “C’mon, Blainers,” she says. “I’m taking you out.” He hesitates, a moment too long. “Boy, Hummel still has you on a tight leash.” As if Kurt’s not even listening.

“It’s not that,” he snaps. “I just can’t go to a bar or anything.”

“Damn boy, bit early for that, don’t you think? You’re buying me coffee, duh.” She takes him by the arm, grins and waves at Kurt over her shoulder as she drags Blaine out the door. Like a tornado, she swoops in and back out, and leaves Kurt flustered and confused in the way only she can do.

Amelia tugs on his arm, jolting him out of his thoughts. “Daddy, I’m done with breakfast.” He’s impressed to look down and see an empty plate.

“Good girl. Why don’t you watch cartoons for a while? I need to make a phone call.”

“Okay!” She rushes off and Kurt snatches up his phone, automatically dialing Rachel’s number.

When she answers, her voice is fuzzy and muffled with sleep. “Kurt? ‘S really early.” She yawns.

“I slept with him,” Kurt blurts out.

There is only silence, and shuffling on the other line. Kurt heads to his bedroom where he’ll have more privacy, waiting for her to respond. “Um. With Blaine? Or are we reenacting Cabaret, because you got the line wrong -”

“Yes, with Blaine, what other man could I have been with last night?” He hisses.

“Well, I don’t know! You’ve managed to get around pretty well in the past!” He falls face first on the bed and groans into the pillow. Rachel sighs and continues. “Okay, so I’m assuming this is a bad thing?”

“Uh, yes? What part of I slept with my ex-husband and then basically told him it was a mistake don’t you understand?”

“It’s far too early for you to be this bitchy.”

“I don’t know what to do, Rachel.”

She yawns loudly. “What happened?”

“He was just - being so sweet and he danced with me and I let my guard down and… god I was such a little shit this morning.”

“Well, at least you were honest with him. Wait, it was a mistake, right?”

“Yes - no - I don’t know. But now I’m freaking out and…. I can’t do it, I can’t let this happen.”

She stays silent for a long time, mulling it over. “I don’t know, Kurt. If it was such a bad idea why did you let it happen?”

He sighs and rolls over onto his back, staring up at the ceiling. The sheets and pillows still smell like Blaine’s sweat and it’s really, really not helping him focus. “Why do you think?”

“Obviously you still have feelings for him.”

“Give the girl a medal.” It should feel like a relief to admit it aloud, but no. It just makes him ache. “It’s hard,” he whispers, not sure if she can hear him when he’s being this quiet, not caring. “It’s so hard having him here, more than I thought it would be, and - and him and Amelia and I together again, it’s just - too much like before, and now this and I can’t -“ He breaks off with a sob that he tries to hold back, closing his eyes tight against another onslaught of tears. If there’s anyone he can cry over the phone with, it’s Rachel Berry, but that doesn’t mean he wants to cry any more today.

“It’s a reminder of everything you lost, isn’t it?” Rachel finishes for him. He can hear the ‘I told you so’ trying to break through her voice - she practically did tell him so, after all - and the fact that she doesn’t let it through makes him love her even more.

“I’m sorry, I’m being stupid.”

“No you’re not.” She insists. Kurt wipes his eyes and the tears stop, and he knows that no more will come for now. If only because he’s cried all he physically can today. His chest is tight as he takes deep breaths, slowly calming himself. Being hysterical isn’t going to help him, Blaine, or anyone. “Sooo, you have feelings for each other. What exactly is the problem?”

Kurt swallows past the thick lump in his throat. “I’m scared.” He finally answers. “He… he hurt me, Rachel, and - I don’t think he would do it again, I really don’t, but I…” He pauses, trying to organize his muddled thoughts. “He’s the one person who should never have done that. I don’t even hate him for it anymore, but how can I trust him, how can I - how could we just go back to how things were? After all the ways we’ve hurt each other.”

Rachel stays silent, seeming to know that Kurt needs to talk more than be talked at. Kurt has never been more glad that she finally grew out of that habit of making each and every situation all about her. He goes on, narrating his own inner monologue. “He was so disappointed. I feel like such an asshole.” Kurt groans and rubs his tired eyes with the back of his hand - he’s finally stopped crying, but it drained him. And he still has to get through the rest of the day. “I’m supposed to be here to help him, aren’t I? I mean, that’s the whole point of this. If… if this is what he needs, shouldn’t I be able to do that for him?”

This gets her talking. “Oh no no no,” she says, forceful enough to startle him. “Don’t even start that.”

“What?”

“If you want to get back together, it has to be about you. About both of you, and what you two want. Not Blaine’s problems, not a way to solve them, because it won’t.”

“Rachel, I’m not even sure I do want to get back together.”

“Then don’t let anything else happen until you are sure.”

He closes his eyes, letting the silence drag on a moment. “I just don’t know what to do,” he repeats in a whisper.

“Three options. One - you tell him that you’re not interested, that you can’t be together, whatever you have to do to let him off the hook.” Cowardly, Kurt thinks, but effective. “Two - you agree to take things slow and see where this goes.”

“Mmhm.” Somehow, that doesn’t make things easier. He doesn’t want to hurt Blaine - too late for that, he supposes - but he doesn’t want to get hurt either.

“Or three - you say ‘screw it’ and tap that like I know you really want to.”

That finally makes Kurt burst into laughter, sharp and almost painful where it lodges in his chest, but in a good way. He knows that he won’t follow that advice, but even so. “You always know what to say. Why don’t I just marry you, Rachel?”

“Because we know from experience that when we live together we end up wanting to tear each other’s hair out.”

“And our children would be freakishly loud.”

“Pretty, though.”

He smiles softly, though his brief amusement is tinged with sadness. “I don’t know how to do this without making him feel worse.”

Rachel sighs. “I don’t know, Kurt, but you do need to think about yourself sometimes, too.”

“…What?”

“Do you even have a life outside of Blaine anymore?”

�“Rach, that’s not fair. I’m trying to help!”

“I know, but you’re allowed to have a life!”

That makes him bristle, his affection for her vanishing in an instant. How dare she, how dare she, when all he’s ever done is try to make Blaine better, do the right thing… “Thank you for your advice. Bye.”

“Kurt, stop.” He pauses with his thumb over the end call button. “I’m not trying to be mean, I’m just being honest. It’s wonderful that you still care so much about him, seeing as you have every right not to. I just don’t want you to get yourself hurt.” She sighs. “Do you need me to come over? Maybe this is beyond eating tubs of ice cream and watching Twilight, but…”

He sniffles, laughs softly though it’s painful to do so. “No. No, I’m okay. Well, I will be okay, someday.”

They hang up soon after - there is real life to see to, a child to take care of, chores and all those other things that come with being an adult that won’t wait for him to finish his pity party. Amelia seems to know what he needs, somehow, and when she wraps him up in a hug without any sort of prompt, he can’t help but squeeze her tight for as long as she’ll let him. And even though he feels like crumbling to pieces, all the walls he’d slowly built around himself threatening to fall - after that, he can straighten his spine, lift his chin, and stand tall. He faces it.

Anything less would be giving in.

--

“What’s got you so edgy, Blanderson?”

He doesn’t even react to the old nickname, maybe because he is too edgy. The coffee shop Santana dragged him to is loud and bustling with activity, and all of it overwhelms him as he orders their coffee, plus a decadent looking cupcake for Santana. He hasn’t been out of the apartment much since he fell off the wagon those few weeks ago. Hasn’t needed to - Blaine hasn’t worked for a little less than a year now, was too drunk when he got laid off to give a shit, so mostly he stays at Kurt’s apartment - and hasn’t trusted himself not to take a detour to the nearest corner liquor store.� He’s alone most of the day, but sometimes that’s a good thing, even though it seems to have just worsened his anxiety - he’ll need to work on that, maybe consider those group therapy sessions Naomi told him about, though he’d rather not deal with anyone. He could spend every minute of the day with Amelia, sure, but with most anyone else, with Kurt - that’s a whole other story.

Especially now - after last night, god. The way Kurt had looked at him this morning, his ocean eyes so full of - well, thousands of emotions all in one, but namely fear. Fear piercing though the brief moment of happiness Blaine had built for himself while swaying in the circle of Kurt’s arms and falling to pieces under his lips and hands - happiness he knew couldn’t last but he let happen anyway. Fucking stupid.

“Blainers?”

He blinks and shakes his head. Santana stares at him from across the table, studying him like he’s a particularly interesting sculpture. How does he even begin to talk to her when it’s been ages since she even bothered to check in? That itself is nothing new but these are the times when he needs a best friend. He reminds himself that she had no way of knowing what was going on and at least she’s back now, but still… “Sorry. Million miles away.”

“Obviously.” She takes a drink of her coffee (“Black,” she’d purred, “like my men,” and winked at Blaine, who mouthed ‘ignore her’ to the flustered barista) and crosses her legs underneath the table, tipping the chair slightly back. Blaine swirls his own drink around in the cup, but doesn’t bother to sip it. “You used to be so much more talkative.”

“What do you want me to talk about?”

She shrugs. “I don’t care. Hmmm. Oh, tell me why you’ve shacked up with Hummel if you’re not back together yet. You said it was a long story, so it should keep you out of the house until the stench of awkwardness wears off.”

“What makes you think things are awkward?”

“You’re living with your ex-husband.”

She has a point. He sighs and looks away. Relating everything that has happened these past years to Naomi is one thing. He likes Naomi well enough but she’s essentially a stranger, and it’s her job to listen to him ramble and not judge him. There’s a weird level of trust to it. Santana is the most judgmental person he has ever met, bless her heart. True, she had listened to him drunkenly confess to slapping Kurt and barely batted an eyelash, just continued on with her bizarrely harsh method of comfort. But he has no doubt that if he hadn’t been such an obvious mess that night, showing up uninvited to her apartment after Kurt kicked him out, that she would have judged the hell out of him. Not that she wouldn’t be right to.

“Jeez, Blaine, what’s so awful that you can’t even talk to me about it?” She asks.

“It’s not that,” he says, even though it kind of is. She had known how messed up he was after the breakup and she still went off travelling again, with only a few phone calls mostly consisting of her ranting about wherever she’d ended up this time. She really has no idea who he is anymore. It’s just weird, is all. “I just… don’t really know where to begin.” He runs his fingers through his wild hair - he hadn’t had a chance to do anything with before she dragged him off; it probably still resembles a large bird nest. “A lot of shit has happened since you’ve been gone, Tana.”

“So spill, I’m getting bored.”

“I tried to kill myself,” he blurts out.

She chokes on her drink, barely avoiding spitting it out. “What?”

“Yeah.”

“No way. You?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

She gestures in his general direction in a way that really doesn’t explain what she means at all. “You! You’re like, the jolliest hobbit in the Shire.”

He bites out a laugh at that. “I’m really not.”

“Shit. When did this happen?”

“A few weeks ago.” He circles his finger around the edge of his cup, eyes following the motion. “That’s why I’m staying with Kurt, I - I didn’t have anyone else. He’s trying to… rehabilitate me, I guess, god knows why. And I don’t really, um, trust myself not to fuck up again if I go back home, so.” He shrugs.

�“Hey. If I had known…”

Blaine shakes his head. “You couldn’t have.”

“You should have called me…”

“I didn’t even know where you were.”

“I’d have come and gotten you, you didn’t have to go home with Hummel, shit, that must have been weird.”

“And you’d have taken me where exactly?”

She doesn’t have an answer for that one, finally falling silent for a moment, and the whole thing frustrates him. He doesn’t want another person being sympathetic. He doesn’t want her to be different around him because of this. “I never even knew you were depressed.” She says, still sounding like she can’t quite believe it. No one had, no one ever notices. He supposes that he has always been good at putting up a fa�ade, good at putting on a smile and active brave when inside he’s anything but - until recently. Now it’s as if every emotion is out there for everyone to see, and maybe that’s why he’s having trouble with this coffee shop and the crowd of people around him. If they only choose to look his way, they will see everything wrong with him and run away screaming.

“As long as I can remember.” Blaine answers, staring down at the table. “I guess I didn’t realize it when we were kids, I just thought it was regular teen angst and I had Kurt so, you know, I was too focused on all the good things I had to notice that anything was wrong. It’s only gotten really bad the past few years, though, after the crap with my parents.”

She nods, watching him closely in a way that makes him sort of squirm in his seat. “There’s more,” she says after a moment.

“What?” He takes a sip of his coffee, which is starting to go cold.

“There’s more to it. How long have you and Hummel been sleeping together?”

He chokes, nearly spitting the mouthful of coffee in her face. He swears she must practice making inappropriate comments right when someone has a mouthful of food or drink, though, he muses, it’s not quite as bad as the first time he told Kurt he loved him; later Kurt had admitted that it had taken everything he had not to spew a scalding mocha right in his eye. And that is not what he should be thinking about right now. “We’re not,” he says after too long a pause.

“Oh, please. I’m like a shark. I can smell sex from a mile away, and you reek, Blanderson.”

His face turns bright red, which he’s sure isn’t helping to fool her. “Fine - once, last night. That’s it.”

“Knew it!” She crows.

“And then he told me it was a mistake.”

“…Awkward.”

“Just a bit.” He shoves his coffee away, all appetite forgotten. It’s not as if anything has changed, he still doesn’t have Kurt. So why does it hurt so much? He’d just been so sure last night that things were going to be okay again. “It doesn’t matter.

“No,” Santana says after a moment, startling him with the determination in her eyes, the kind that makes him want to hide under the table and maybe warn the innocent bystanders. “No, this is unacceptable. I always thought that out of all the fucked up combinations we came up with you two would be the ones to make it. No way am I going to let you give up on that boy.”

“And how long has it been since you’ve seen Brittany, Santana?”

“Fuck you,” she says, but her voice holds no malice, just bitterness. “I don’t believe in fate or whatever, but you two are fuckin’ soul mates, okay? So if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to march right back into that apartment and knock some sense into Hummel -“ She stands up and makes to walk out the door until he reaches out to touch her arm, the faux-fur of her coat soft on his fingers.

“Tana, stop.”

She does, sitting back down and looking sullen, scowling at her coffee. “But -“

“No. He’s made it perfectly clear that it was a mistake, so I’m leaving it at that. It’s better this way.” His throat tightens even as he says the words, trying to make himself believe them. “He - he deserves better, anyway, he needs someone better than me. Someone who isn’t broken.” He tries to smile, and can tell it isn’t working. “I want him to have someone who makes him happy, and that isn’t ever going to be me and… I have to be okay with that.”

Even though he’s the furthest thing from okay.

“You are not broken,” she insists, reaching out and grabbing his hand. She’s not the touchy-feely type, so it doesn’t last long, but he squeezes back for as long as she’ll let him. “So what are you going to do now? I mean, it’s going to be super weird staying with him now, isn’t it?”

“I expect so.”

“Are you going to stay?”

“Yeah, if he wants me to. I know I can’t go home yet, I don’t trust myself to be alone, so - yeah. I’m going to see this through.” Blaine shrugs. It doesn’t have to be weird, but he knows it will be.

“You should come with me,” she says with a grin. “It’s awesome, not having to be tied down anywhere.”

“It sounds lonely.” Sleeping in her van, busking on street corners, going anywhere they please - god, it sounds so tempting.

“Sometimes.” She shrugs, as if it’s no big deal, and to her it probably isn’t - she’s never needed people, never needed to please people the way he always has, she just doesn’t care enough. “What do you say?”

He hesitates a moment. “I can’t leave Amelia,” he says softly - sometimes he thinks he needs her more than he needs Kurt, which is saying a lot when Kurt is what holds him together. “Otherwise I would.”

“Yeah, that’s what I figured.” She sighs and slugs back the rest of her coffee in one gulp. “Just thought I’d try.”

“Thanks,” he says, and he means it - this morning he had barely been able to pretend that he was okay, but now he’s calmer, more levelheaded. It all still hurts; of course it does, but just simmering under the surface now. He doesn’t know how he’ll feel when he gets back to the apartment, but Santana is a good distraction for now. “I’m glad you’re back, Tana.”

“For a minute, anyway.” She smirks. “I’ll stick around a bit for you, though.”

“Yeah?”

“But only if you tell me all about how kinky Hummel is between the sheets -“

He bursts into genuine laughter, and it feels out of place bubbling up his throat. “The answer is still no, Santana.”

“Prude,” she says, rolling her eyes, but her smile is fond.

---

By the time Blaine wanders back into the apartment, Kurt is cleaning up from the mess Amelia insisted on making with her dinner (she’s taking a bubble bath now, soon he’ll have to go make sure she picks out all the strands of spaghetti stuck in her hair.) He meets Blaine’s eyes but then quickly looks away, feeling his cheeks heat up in a blush.

He’s calmer, now, after talking to Rachel, but yep, it’s just as awkward as he expected. “You were gone a while,” he comments, scrubbing a little harder at the kitchen table.

Blaine nods, looking uncomfortable standing in Kurt’s kitchen, still bundled up from being out in the cold. “Yeah, we decided to stay out for a while. Make a day of it. Um, sorry for… not letting you know.” He mumbles.

“It’s fine, you don’t have to tell me every time you want to go out.”

“Oh. Well. Okay.”

Kurt swallows. He still can’t bring himself to look straight at Blaine, just focuses on the chore. Still, he can’t keep his lips from moving. “For a minute there, I, um… I thought you might have… left.”

�“…Do you want me to leave?”

“No.” The answer comes too fast to be anything but true, eyes still locked on the table, scrubbing, scrubbing, scrubbing.

“Then I won’t.”

“Good. Okay.”

Blaine moves a little closer, his brow furrowed as he watches Kurt. “Um… Kurt, are you okay?”

“I’m fine, why wouldn’t I be fine?”

“You’ve been washing that spot for really long time. I think it’s clean.”

“Need to get the stain out.” Kurt says through gritted teeth. He doesn’t know why this is so hard, why Blaine’s presence is flustering him so much. What can he even say? Why wouldn’t Blaine leave after the way Kurt treated him? The relief he feels knowing that Blaine came back safely is too big to ignore, though, and it’s not just because he was worried for Blaine. The thought of Blaine going home feels like a hand squeezing around his heart, and he knows why, he just doesn’t want to admit it. “I’m fine, just - stop staring at me, I can’t focus.”

“…Okay.”

Kurt imagines that he can hear crickets chirping in the distance; it’s that kind of silence. He finally drops the washrag in his trembling hand, palms pressed flat against the table to steady himself. He can’t be around Blaine without thinking about last night, though he knows that they need to forget it. For both their sakes. “Look, um,” he begins, finally lifting his eyes to look into Blaine’s. Better to get this over with before it festers between them any longer. “About last night.”

Blaine’s expression instantly shifts - he closes off, puts up his wall. “It’s fine,” he says quietly.

“No it’s not, I was so rude -“

“It doesn’t matter.”

“I just panicked,” Kurt goes on anyway, heedless of Blaine’s words. “I freaked out and I took it out on you when I shouldn’t have and I’m really, really sorry about how I handled things this morning.”

Blaine stares at him for a moment, and then nods, still silent, as if waiting for more. Kurt swallows thickly and shifts around on his feet, looking anywhere other than at Blaine.

“The thing is,” he stammers - he’d been practicing this in his head all day, but that doesn’t make it easier. “Last night was - so wonderful but I shouldn’t have lead you on - I mean, I’m just - not ready for that, and I don’t know when I will be, so - I -“

“Kurt,” Blaine says, voice strangely soft, and it makes Kurt fall silent. The look in Blaine’s eyes is infinitely sad and Kurt’s whole heart aches at the sight of it. He stays firm even though all he wants is to pull Blaine back into his arms and give in to this. “I get it. I don’t blame you. You got caught up in the moment, and I - I misinterpreted… us. It doesn’t matter.” He repeats, not sounding at all convinced.

“But -“

“Let’s just leave it at that, okay?” He steps past Kurt too fast to see what emotions might be visible in his face, disappearing from the kitchen. Kurt hears his footsteps grow fainter as he walks down the hall, probably going to find Amelia.

But of course it matters, Kurt thinks. Blaine wouldn’t have been so upset this morning if it didn’t matter. He was getting so close, so close to being able to get Blaine to talk to him, and now he’s ruined everything. Again. One step forward, two steps back, and he doesn’t know if they’ll ever be able to make it stop.

He’s so sick of being the one to put that look of disappointment on Blaine’s face.

�