Blaine didn't knock.

Kurt was fine with that in and of itself. Blaine tended not to knock when he walked inside their apartment - he had a key, after all, Kurt had never taken it away from him after that night in October. He'd been too distraught to remember to do it, and by the time he remembered he was well on the way to calling him up to mend things somewhat so there was no need. Blaine always made sure he opened the door while saying something to make himself known, so it was never a surprise and they could turn him away if they needed to. It was considerate and respectful while still being intimate - in other words, it was Blaine exactly, Blaine on the dot.

This time was no different. Rachel had him with his mouth opened wide on the couch, an ice cube on the clean rag in her hand so it didn't melt quite so fast as it would should she hold it with her own flesh, and was looking at the wound when the door creaked as it slid open and Blaine stuck his head in.

"I'm here," he said, and Kurt looked at Rachel with a glare. He'd known she'd called someone while he was in the bathroom cleaning out his mouth, and he didn't mind having Blaine over, but he hadn't expected it.

Rachel smiled gently, and somewhat sheepishly, before turning to Blaine. "Great," she said, waving him in. He stepped in all the way and slid the door closed behind him. It gave a tiny, almost unheard click that let them know it locked; Blaine paid no mind to it, striding across the room to kneel by Kurt. Kurt's glare vanished without him being conscious of the change when he saw the book Blaine held out to him.

"I was thinking I could read it to you," he said, and Kurt smiled, his mouth closing a bit, and Rachel was caught between her desire to sigh at his distraction and smile at his distraction. Kurt nodded then, and Rachel turned to Blaine once more.

"Thanks for coming," Rachel said, stifling a yawn when she leaned forward to kiss his ungelled head. She purposely avoided mentioning the lack of gel; she knew he hated going without it, even for sleep, and that he allowed very small amounts of contact that included it, though she didn't know why those things were. She was touched that he'd completely forgotten to gel before he left, or simply didn't care, in his haste to help Kurt. She'd had to remind him they had some before he'd recalled it to begin with when he'd been talking about coming over, and this was something that was, for whatever reason, important to Blaine.

But not as important as Kurt. Never that important. Nothing could be, not to him.

And so Rachel took her leave after catching Kurt's eye and drawing it to the curls with a yawned, "Goodnight, boys. I'll see you tomorrow, and Kurt, don't doze off. Okay?" When Kurt had nodded, she'd kissed his head too, and ruffled his hair affectionately - for someone who used so much product, he loved people messing with his hair, unlike Blaine. "Love you guys."

And then Rachel left the room after giving the ice cube back and tossing the rag aside, and Blaine grinned at Kurt, toothy and wide, his eyes crinkling and still too huge and sparkly to be anything but puppy-dog eyes. "Do you want me to read to you?" he asked. Kurt nodded again, and Blaine seemed to consider something for a minute. "Hold on," he said, and was up like a shot, rummaging through one of the drawers in the chest they hardly ever opened. "I organized this earlier," Blaine said, "before I moved in with Santana." And then, with a cry of triumph, he pulled out a small, personal whiteboard and a dry-erase marker. "Here we go!" he said, handing the two to Kurt and picking up the book again.

Kurt patted the cushion next to him and Blaine snickered once before plopping down beside him. Kurt shifted so he was pressed against Blaine and could read the words, too, even if he didn't really want to. Blaine automatically bent his head so it rested on Kurt's shoulder and Kurt, in turn, rested his head on top of Blaine's, secretly loving how a few curls would shake every time he exhaled.

And then Blaine started to read.

"So congratulations, we pulled an all-nighter!" Blaine said with as much enthusiasm as one could muster who had gotten maybe an hour of sleep. Blaine was a fast reader and could speak quickly, and so, when he shut the book at around four in the morning, it didn't surprise Kurt.

By that time, and for a while, Kurt had closed his eyes and just listened to Blaine's voice talking, speaking, acting out the words and reaching different parts of the book with different tones. He really was a fantastic actor; he acted out the entire book, and not in the way English teachers did, either, but as if he were narrating a movie for someone who was blind. It was perfect and descriptive and the words felt like gold when they rolled off his tongue into the air.

Kurt had let exactly one tear slip past his eyelids when they reached the end, and Blaine had just congratulated them on staying up all night, and Blaine froze. "Kurt?" he asked, his voice already a ton different again - his own, this time, personalized, and tender. "You alright?"

Kurt's hands moved without the rest of him moving, and they scrawled sad book on the whiteboard.

"So you're not in too much pain?" Blaine inquired.

The ice cube had melted only minutes into the book, so Kurt's tongue had already begun to throb and stopped; no, just tired.

"I don't think you should sleep yet," Blaine told him softly. "You could have a nightmare again."

Kurt reacted without meaning to. He dropped the whiteboard and marker and snuggled his arms around Blaine, clutching him close, his eyes flying open for fear he wouldn't be able to see color, the nightmare's effects flying back at him in full force. "Hey," Blaine crooned, hugging him back just as tightly, especially when another tear dropped down onto his curls. "Hey, what is it? I'm right here, it's okay."

"Nightmare," Kurt said, and was pleased to find that he could speak properly again, even if it hurt a bit.

"Shh, you don't have to talk about it," Blaine said. "You probably shouldn't. Write it down if you need to tell me."

"Too much."

"Shh, you're alright. It's okay. It's just a nightmare."

It was a less blunt realization this time, less sharp than the one that this might be another nightmare, that was that this was real and Blaine was fine and he didn't need to be scared. He took a deep breath and batted back the rest of the tears stinging his eyes and just said, "Right. Sorry."

"Okay," Blaine chuckled, "As much as I love your voice, you shouldn't be using it right now."

With yet another deep breath, Kurt released him, and felt the cooler air of the apartment slam into his chest and nearly knock his breath away when Blaine's warmth was no longer pressed to him. Fighting back the feeling, he bent down and picked up the whiteboard. He started to write, and Blaine waited patiently for him to be done.

When he was, he held up the board:

I had a dream that you died. It wasn't the first one I've had. We were singing Come What May and you died in my arms like Satine in Christian's.

Blaine blinked and then looked at Kurt, his face carefully put together to display comfort and not anything else that Kurt needed to see. "I'm okay," he reassured him. "I'm right here. I'm not dying."

Kurt swiped his hand across the board until it was clear, and wrote, I know, but the dreams keep getting worse. You die differently each time.

Blaine read it, his face hardening a bit as much as his eyes softened. "When did it start?"

Back in March.

"Really?" It was whispered and Kurt knew it was because he didn't trust his voice not to betray him.

At first it was a daydream I had watching Moulin Rouge where we were the ones singing. That one ended well but too soon, and now the others end badly and slowly.

"You had a daydream of me while watching Moulin Rouge?"

Yeah. Now it's nightmares that end in you dying.

"Kurt." Blaine's voice broke, even in the murmur. "I'm not dying. I'm not going anywhere."

Promise?

"Promise."

It doesn't happen every night, Kurt went on. Sometimes once a week, sometimes three times a night.

"That bad?"

Worse since Adam dumped me.

"What?!"

When Rachel walked out of her room the next morning, Kurt was asleep on the couch under a blanket, and Blaine was making pancakes while staring bleary-eyed at the stove. He'd been crying, and recently, because his eyes were still shining. But - wait, no, he was still crying.

"Blaine?" she asked, increasing her speed until she stood ext to him. He looked up at her and smiled despite the tear dripping from the corner of his eye. "What's wrong?"

"Adam dumped Kurt."

"What?" Rachel reeled back. "Since when?"

"Last week," Blaine answered. Rachel was familiar with the tone; he was hurting and didn't expect anyone to care. He'd heard it in Kurt's voice enough. "And then his nightmares got worse. About me dying."

"That's what it was about?"

Blaine nodded and reached for the flipper to slide under the pancake and turn it over. "He's been having them since March, apparently. They got worse when Adam left."

"Why did Adam leave?"

"Me."

Blaine could have spit the word onto a puppy for how much hatred he filled into the word. "You?" Rachel repeated, incredulous.

"I chase everyone away from him, don't I?" Blaine shook his head. "Chandler, myself, Adam - no wonder he has dreams about me dying. I don't blame him for wanting me to."

"Blaine, if he wanted you to die, they wouldn't be nightmares," Rachel pointed out.

"But that's just it!" Blaine exploded, turning to face her completely, and where she'd expected anger to be was desperation. "Don't you see what I've done to him? I've completely destroyed him! I make him care for me when he should hate me."

"He shouldn't hate you," Rachel defended, unsure of what to say. "And he doesn't."

"He needs to."

Rachel had seen a lot. She'd seen betrayal, and total heartache, and lies and their consequences; she'd seen truths that hurt too much and truths that hurt too little, and she'd seen people cry through laughter and laugh through tears. But never, in all nineteen years of her life, had she actually met anyone who expressed, through every movement, every breath, every thought - hell, just in the way he stood, he spoke, he existed - that there was nothing about them to love. And yet in front of her stood the perfect example, and he'd gotten fifteen sentences into their conversation, which somehow was enough to tell her that Blaine is not okay.

"I do."

Rachel lurched forward and flung her arms around his neck, and he stumbled back before catching her and spinning slightly from the force with which she attacked him. "Never!"

"I hurt him so badly he has dreams of me dying, Rachel," Blaine choked in her ear.

"You loved him so strongly he has nightmares of you dying," she corrected vehemently.

"I broke his heart."

"And still managed to fix it."

"His subconscious is trying to tell him to get rid of me."

"And his heart is fighting it."

"God, I've messed up."

"Everyone messes up, Blaine. You're human. And you're a good one."

"No I'm not."

"Yes, you are."

"I feel - I - never mind."

"Tell me."

"It's not -"

"- important?" Rachel pulled away enough so that her face was right in front of his, his uncharacteristically dark eyes downcast and glistening with a sheen of saltwater. "I don't care. It's important to me. Tell me. What do you feel?"

"Guilty." Blaine sucked in air like it didn't exist and his lungs were burning; it seemed to have no effect but to make him yet more desperate. "I feel guilty." It was said simplistically but with an undercurrent of nonnegotiable sorrow, of emotions too intertwined to navigate.

"Look at me," Rachel ordered, and when he did, she continued. "You are not to blame for Kurt's state. If he'd get out of the denial he's in and remained the same, then some blame could be attributed to you. Blaine, you're trying so hard," she begged him when he averted his eyes again.

"But is he okay?" Blaine demanded.

"He'll be alright," Rachel said.

"That's not what I asked." Quoting Santana inadvertently didn't help matters, but it gave him a sense of rightness; Santana was so certain in all her actions and beliefs that it was hard not to take a part of that, too. But his certainty was with his lack of self-worth as opposed to value, and though Rachel didn't know what brought on the clamp on his loathing, she could tell it was there.

"I don't know," she answered, wary now, hating her words and wishing she had the heart to lie to him about it. "I hope so."

That's what I said earlier.

"But what about you?" Rachel pressed. "You're not okay, and -"

"Not everything is about me," Blaine sighed, the fight whisked away from him, and he pulled out of her arms and turned back to the stove.

"But some things are," she insisted, "This is."

But he wouldn't turn to look at her again, and he wouldn't speak, and she had a meeting to catch.

Kurt, on the couch, his tongue sore and still a bit swollen, covered by a thick blanket, the couch cushions holding him warmly, was crying again, but this time he wasn't asleep - and was all too aware of the need to scream.

"Kurt?"

Kurt looked up from the couch. He almost stayed silent before he remembered that he could talk again, so long as he didn't do it too quickly or with too much force. "Santana?"

"Hey, you're talking," she noted, but she did so in a whisper as she moved into the room. "Is he sleeping?"

"Blaine?" he asked to clarify, and when she nodded, he said, "Yeah. He stayed up all night. He said he didn't need to sleep but passed out while I took a shower." He looked at her. "Why are you here? Don't you have your shift soon? It's nearly noon." She had opened the door as silently as possible and was tiptoeing until she reached him, some sort of journal tucked under her arm. "And what's that?"

"This," she said, holding out the book for him to take when she stood in front of him, "is a journal I found while snooping in Anderson's stuff."

"Santana -" he said, moving to hand it back.

"No, no," she said, pushing it toward him again, her face serious. "You need to read it. I - I almost wish I hadn't."

"What is it?" he asked, opening to the first page. At the top there was a date, and under that a line that separated the page into two columns. One side was labelled "right" and the other "wrong". There were scribbles under each, and at the bottom there was a circled number of how many total there were. "Is this - lists? Of what he did right and wrong?"

Santana nodded. "And your name is all over the place, especially towards the back."

"When was the last time he updated it?"

"About last week. Said he made you hang up because he got too intimate in a phone call. At least, that was the last thing in the column. He adds up the total number of good and bad things at the end of every day's list, including the ones from earlier lists."

"What's the -"

"No more questions," Santana said. "Read it all before you let him know you have it, I have to get to work."

"Santana -!" he called after her in a hushed shout, but she just waved and hurried out the door again, this time not bothering to be quiet. Kurt immediately looked back to the bedroom, just in case Blaine woke up - but there was nothing to indicate that he had, and after a moment, his breath released - he hadn't even noticed that it had caught in his throat - and his heart rate slowed, and he turned back to the page, and started to read.

When Blaine woke, it took a few moments of struggling back into consciousness to realize that he was, in fact, waking up, and then he swore loudly and sat up in bed so quickly his head went fuzzy again and his vision blurred.

"Blaine?" Kurt's voice wafted through the curtain. "Are you okay?"

"I'm sorry, sorry," Blaine called back, tossing the covers off of him and sliding out of the bed. "I didn't mean to fall asleep, I swear. I'm sorry."

"Relax," Kurt ordered, sticking his head in. "It was difficult enough to get you under the covers when you were asleep without waking you up, I don't want you undermining my effort simply because you didn't intend to pass out."

"You did that?" he asked, gesturing to the now-rumpled comforter and sheets.

"Yup," Kurt said proudly. "Didn't wake you up at all, did I?"

Blaine chuckled at his triumphant grin. "No, not at all," he confirmed, and yawned, letting the grogginess of rousing oneself leave with the sound of Chewbacca he emitted.

"Have a nice nap?"

"How long was it?" Blaine countered.

"About four hours," Kurt answered, and pointed at the clock. Blaine turned, wary, to see that the time was, in fact, about half past noon.

"Crap," Blaine sighed, and reached up to run a hand through his hair. "Sorry, you must have been really bored."

"Not at all," Kurt said, holding up the book in his hands, his smile becoming a bit strained beneath the outward exterior of contentedness. "I was reading." Walk Two Moons was between his palms.

"Twice in one day?" Blaine teased, and stretched, pulling at his muscles, standing on his tiptoes and bending his back, his shirt pulling up just enough to show his lower stomach before he settled back into a natural position. He raised his eyebrows a bit when he saw that Kurt's gaze was where his skin had just been showing, but said nothing, and pretended not to notice when Kurt flushed a faint red and looked back up to his eyes.

"It's a good book," he defended. "But you're right, twice in one day is too much. What do you want to do now?"

"That depends," Blaine responded.

"On?"

"On what you want to do."

"Oh." Kurt contemplated for a moment before he said, "I want to go out."

He doesn't mean it like that, calm down. "Go out where? A movie? A restaurant? Both?"

For some reason, Kurt looked mildly disappointed for the briefest of moments, but then perked back up again. "Sure, both. There's supposed to be that new movie with Emma Stone in it."

"But then there's still that one, what's the name..." Blaine pondered over it for a moment, and then snapped his fingers with a smile. "Oh, uh, was it Andrew and Katie?"

"I think that might be the Emma Stone one," Kurt said, with a smug little smirk.

"If we wait a week or so we can see City of Bones," Blaine suggested.

"Mm, but I don't want to wait," Kurt griped lightly. "What about the new Percy Jackson?"

"Oh, god, no," Blaine held up his hands in a surrendering signal, wrinkling his nose. "The books were great, but the movie adaption -"

"Yeah, I get it," Kurt laughed. "Um, Disney's Planes?"

"Elysium?"

"We're The Millers?"

"The Spectacular Now?"

"Best suggestion I've heard so far," Blaine said, somewhat resigned but by no means unhappy. "That stars Shailene Woodley, right?"

"Right," Kurt said. "It's supposed to be a high school love story with the not-so-typical-but-totally-typical 'nice girl' and stupid popular dude."

"Ugh!" Blaine exclaimed, tossing his hands up. "Nothing sounds good."

"Or..."

"Or?"

"Or we could rewatch the Muppets. We have it on DVD."

"And then what? Order Chinese?"

"Hm," Kurt considered. "I know this great Chinese place that you call ahead and order from, but then you have to go pick it up. Does that sound okay?"

"Will it make you happy?"

"Um, sure."

"Then yes, it sounds great."

"He still can't dance."

Kurt laughed outright behind the wheel of the car. When last he'd been in Ohio - at the end of the school year to see Blaine's NYADA audition - he'd driven his truck back up to New York rather than fly, and Blaine arrived by plane only three hours after he got home and crashed with them. It had taken a month for them all to decide that four people in that tiny apartment was too much, and living arrangements had been suggested. Santana suggested, at first, that Blaine and Kurt live together, but that was vetoed quickly by Rachel, who said she wanted Kurt, because he was her first roommate in NYC and her best friend. That left Santana with Blaine and likewise; though they'd been skeptical at first, they had eventually decided to go ahead with it. They'd found an apartment and, with the help of Blaine's almost-but-not-completely unresponsive family's wealth, they managed to snag it. Santana got a job at Callbacks as a bartender/waitress, which really surprised none of them, and Blaine was still given a monthly allowance injected into his bank account, so they got by.

But at that moment they very much did live together in that tiny little bubble of space and air and laughter, and Kurt smiled so widely his vision narrowed because his eyes were squinted with joy. "We've been over this," he said. "That's right, Jason Segel still can't dance, but if you surround a bad dancerswith enough good dancers that he's obcured, it's not so bad."

"One bad dancer in a group of good dancers makes every dancer look sloppy," Blaine declared.

"So Finn made the New Directions look sloppy?" Kurt contested.

"But he made them sound good," Blaine amended.

"And not a thought as to moi," Kurt sniffed. "I'm wounded. You wound me, Blaine."

"You make everything sound good," Blaine rolled his eyes. "You could literally rattle off the contents of a salad and it would be enrapturing."

Kurt reminded himself, not for the first time since climbing into the car, that murdering the drivers in front of you was both illegal and unhelpful. He also reminded himself to pay attention to the drivers in front of him no matter how sweet Blaine got.

"Contents of a salad, huh?" Kurt looked at him out of the corner of his eye; he was beaming, his eyes twinkling, absorbing the city while still drinking in everything Kurt said. "Remind me to do that the next time we have salad. I will enrapture you."

"You already en-"

Blaine never got to finish the sentence.

At that moment, the car in the lane beside them that had been going much too fast suddenly swerved. Kurt heard the screeching of brakes and a metal-crunching, shattering slam, and then the color drained and the sound disappeared - just like in his nightmares.

When Kurt was little and was sleeping at home the night his mother had died, he'd experienced the most intense terror he'd ever felt. It wasn't physical, or exterior to him in any way. He'd been incapable of sleep in the grasp of thoughts that were mostly What am I going to do without Mommy? I don't know how to do this without Mommy, but after a while the fear had become so great that it had dragged him under. He hadn't fallen asleep, he'd fainted - and he woke up about a minute later with more panic and less fear than before, which only served to keep him awake.

Feeling the life leak out of the world around him brought back that same level of terror, and he reached out for Blaine, and then he was gone.

He was awake again soon. The first thing he noticed was that he actually wasn't in any physical pain, despite the amount of terror and panic that had him incapacitated in his seat. The windshield was cracked, and a few large shards were missing from Blaine's side, where the car had hit. Blaine's window was entirely smashed, and his door was obviously dented inward, and the other car's rear-view mirror stuck through the window in a place that made it perfect for having hit Blaine in the head when he was jerked forward. And it was obvious something had hit Blaine in the head, because there was a trail of blood - or maybe two or three - dripping from a thick red cut just below his hairline on his temple. He was pale, and -

Wait.

Wait.

Oh. Oh, no. No, no, no no no no nonononononBlaineBlainenotBlaine-

He was pale. Oh god, he was pale and bleeding. Blaine was pale and bleeding. And looking down made Kurt's stomach wrench sickeningly, even more so than it had done looking at Blaine's head wound, because there was one of the shards from the window impaled in his shoulder. His white polo shirt was decorated now with dots of crimson slipping off his chin and a dark, spreading stain of the color from around the glass.

Kurt was distantly aware that he was screaming but it was as if he were one of the dozens of screaming bystanders - not in the car, not in the situation, because he just didn't understand. Blaine. How had this happened to Blaine? The drunk's car had hit his at the perfect angle to stick their rear-view mirror through the window by shattering the glass, which also broke the windshield. That was all.

And then Kurt remembered that that seat belt had stopped being responsive, and had stopped locking when tugged on. Because Kurt was a remarkably safe driver, they'd figured that it didn't matter, and hadn't bothered paying to repair it. But no wonder Blaine had been yanked forward. Kurt had tried to brake, hoping that the truck was far enough to slide past them, but only subconsciously and on a limb; and he shouldn't have. Had he simply kept going the car would have only hit the back, and Blaine wouldn't be - wouldn't be...

He cried and he screamed and somehow he knew that there were people trying to get them out, but Kurt couldn't move - not because of injury but because of fear - and as soon as Blaine was out of his sight Kurt felt his limbs loosen and he scrambled and fought back fiercely to get to him.

But the arms holding him were strong and he doubled over, straining against them, and wailed. This isn't happening again.

Words were said but went unheard; things were seen but went unnoticed; and pain was felt but went ignored. And there were sirens, he supposed, and screaming, but there were hands on him that were too strong, too rough, hands on him that weren't Blaine's, and Kurt screamed and dropped to his knees, and then the hands were gone, and Kurt was back up like a shot, and ran around the wreckage to see Blaine.

On a stretcher. It must have been Blaine, who else would it be? The drunk was being held by the police up against his car, and those were Blaine's shoes he saw through the throng of EMTs.

And then he was grabbed again and it sent such a shock through him that he fainted again.

"Try to keep him upright. There's nothing wrong with him."

"But he was screaming, and it was bad. There must be something wrong."

"Probably some re-lived childhood trauma coupled with fear and guilt. You know how he went for this kid here, he obviously cares about him. He's just fainted. He'll be fine."

"And the other kid?"

"Nothing too serious. A nice deep cut in the shoulder, but stitches and rest should fix that. He'll most likely have a pretty bad concussion, but the cut isn't too bad, it was just the force of the blow that really affected him."

"So they'll both be okay?"

"Yes, sir. If you don't mind my asking, why are you helping so much?"

"They're human beings, ain't they? I just wanna make sure they're gonna keep being alive ones, is all."

"So you have no connection to them?"

"I've told you, no. I've got their wallets out of their pockets, like you said, and I can tell a lot from that, but that's all."

"You'll probably be forced to leave when we reach the hospital."

"Yeah, I know. So long as I help decent kids stay decent, I'm alright."

"I admire you, sir."

"And I admire you. This is your job, it's just my desire."

"My name is Anne. And yours?"

"Cooper. I've got the same name as that kid's brother, apparently, he's got a picture with their names underneath it in his wallet."

"Do you think they're brother? They look nothing alike."

"Brothers don't tend to keep romantic notes they write to each other and put pictures of them kissing in the front pocket of their wallets, right?"

"So they're boyfriends?"

"Be my guess."

"Ex-boyfriends." Kurt wasn't sure when he'd become awake enough to tell that someone was holding him up and that the vehicle he was in was noisy, cramped and moving, and that the nurse was talking to the strange man who was so helpful; but he felt the need to correct them. "But we're trying to fix that."

"Hey, you're awake!" cheered the man beside him. "Took you long enough. You alright?"

"That depends. Is he?"

Anne, the nurse, fixed him with a green-eyed glare, her dark curls spilling over in soft tresses singing free from the tight bun she had pinned on the back of her head. "He will be."

"That's not what I asked."

Anne cocked her head to the side and raised her eyebrows. "I can't answer what you asked, you might faint again."

"Am I allowed to hold his hand?"

Anne's face softened but grew sadder, too. "Not yet, kid. It'll be a while."

"Santana?"

"Kurt!"

Kurt answered his phone, the bright orange shock blanket discarded from his shoulders. Even though he wasn't in shock, they'd given it to him - but even if he were in shock, he'd hope he'd have enough sense not to wear that hideous color. He was sitting in the hospital waiting room, having already been cleared, and Blaine was still behind those doors, along with news as to his well-being.

"Were you planning on telling us you were in an accident?!"

"Yes, actually, I was dialing Rachel's number when you called."

"Wait, so, if you're fine, does that mean Blaine -"

"No."

There was silence from Santana's side, silence filled with static, and then, "Oh my god. How was -"

"Come to the hospital. Quickly. I don't know anything and I - I n-"

"Right, we're coming."

Burt smiled at Carole as she tossed a piece of lettuce at him from her plate. Lunch with her in the garage may have been unorthodox, but he couldn't leave the shop during working hours, and they'd planned this out. Her salad sat in front of her and his burger in front of him and every now and then he;d offer her a bite and she would say she'd take it if he ate some salad. But Burt didn't want salad. "Beef in buns," he told her teasingly, deflecting the leaf, "that's the lunch of winners."

That's when his phone rang. Not the garage phone, and not the house phone, but his cell phone. He raised his eyebrows and held it up: Kurt.

"Ah!" Carole exclaimed, clapping. "Put him on, I miss him."

"Tell that to him," Burt suggested, and then added as an afterthought, "But not before me. I call dibs."

"You don't get dibs," she remarked scathingly, but with a loving smile, and Blaine smiled back before accepting the call and putting it on speaker.

"Hey, bud!" Burt greeted. "What's -"

"D-Daddy?"

Burt's face transformed, his smile disappearing and his eyes splitting wide, and he looked up at Carole, whose face now matched his. All the levity of the atmosphere before was gone and the air was thick and heavy. "Kurt, what happened?"

"Daddy, Blaine - I - I don't... he's..."

"Kurt, sweetheart, take a deep breath," Carole said soothingly. "We're right here. Are you hurt?"

"No, I'm - I'm fine." He obviously wasn't and Burt curled his empty hand into a fist at the tremor in Kurt's voice. "It's Blaine. We - there was a drunk driver and he - he hit us in the lane, and Blaine... got... hurt."