One life is all we have and we live it as we believe in living it. But to sacrifice what you are and to live without belief, that is a fate more terrible than dying.
-Joan of Arc

Blaine doesn’t text Kurt back that night. He doesn’t call. Kurt receives no response to any of the seven texts he sends.

He’s restless the entire night, tossing and turning in his bed and he can’t stop wondering if something went wrong.

The next morning, Kurt wakes early to be sure he has plenty of time to stop for coffee on the way to school. With two cups in his cup holder, he speeds into the McKinley High School parking lot and breathes a sigh of relief when he sees Blaine’s car already parked. Blaine is standing outside of his car, leaning against the trunk with his schoolbooks wrapped in his arms. Kurt parks behind him and jumps out, coffee in hand.

“I’m so glad you’re here,” Kurt says.

Blaine takes the proffered cup without so much as a nod or any kind of acknowledgement of Kurt’s presence. The parking lot is very nearly empty, save for them and a handful of other cars parked near the front of the lot. Kurt doesn’t know how Blaine knew that he would be here so early, but he’s so thankful he’s here now.

“Are you okay? What happened? You didn’t text me after Bible study like you said you would and-”

“I freaked out.”

“…What?”

“I got home and I freaked out. I started crying again and my parents kept asking what was wrong and I – I-”

“And you what?” Kurt prompts nervously.

“I almost told them,” Blaine says brokenly. “I almost told them everything. I almost told them so that I could be the one to tell them before your dad did.”

“But I told you my dad wouldn’t say anything. I explained the entire situation and he said he wouldn’t tell. I sent you a text-”

“I went straight to bed when I got home,” Blaine informs. “I turned off my phone and I just cried until I couldn’t think straight and fell asleep.”

“I’m so sorry,” Kurt says, taking a step closer.

Blaine tightens his hold on the books in front of his chest, as if they could protect him like a shield.

“It’s not your fault,” Blaine whispers. “It’s mine. I never should have – I was so stupid. I was stupid to think we could keep this a secret forever.”

“But it’s just my dad,” Kurt reminds. “It’s just my dad.”

“It could have been anyone. Carole could have walked out instead of your dad. Or Finn,” Blaine says miserably. “Finn could have been the one to walk out and then everything would have been ruined. The entire school would have known. The entire town would have known.”

“He didn’t, though,” Kurt says. “He didn’t see anything. He doesn’t know anything.”

“That’s not the point. The point is that he could have because I was stupid and reckless and thought it would be okay to kiss you on your front porch.”

“You kissed me on my front porch months ago,” Kurt recalls.

“I wasn’t thinking straight at that time either.”

Blaine looks like total shit, Kurt notices. He doesn’t have any gel in his hair, which, to be honest, isn’t that bad, but he knows how Blaine likes to appear put-together at school. He’s paler than normal and the dark circles under his eyes are stark against his washed out skin.

“It’s too hard,” Blaine says, staring down at Kurt’s feet over the top of his books. “It’s just too hard.”

“I – I don’t know what you’re saying.”

“It’s too hard to do this, to keep this secret,” Blaine explains. “I’m lying to everyone I know. I’m lying to my parents. And I’ve been lying to myself, thinking this could ever work.”

Unwilling to believe what he’s hearing, Kurt rushes to say something that might change his mind.

“We – we can go back to the way it was before,” he says quickly. “We can go back to just holding hands. We don’t have to kiss anymore. We can take things slower.”

Finally, Blaine looks into Kurt’s eyes. When he does, Kurt immediately recognizes just how painfully sad he is.

“We’ve been taking things as slowly as possible,” Blaine says. “You’ve been so – so patient with me. You’ve been waiting so long-”

“I’d wait for you forever,” Kurt states. “I’ll do anything it takes.”

“You shouldn’t have to wait for me,” Blaine says, shaking his head. “You should be with someone who’s just as proud as you are. You should be with someone who isn’t afraid to hold your hand in public.”

“I don’t care about that,” Kurt says desperately. “I don’t care about any of that. I love you and I only want you.”

“Kurt,” Blaine says softly. “You shouldn’t have to settle for something less than what you deserve.”

“But-”

“And you don’t have to pretend you don’t want something when I know you do.”

“I don’t want anything else,” Kurt says, wishing he could reach out and touch Blaine’s face.

But he can’t. He can’t reach out and touch Blaine’s face. He can’t hold his hand, he can’t kiss him, he can’t do everything a normal couple would do.

And isn’t that the whole point of this? Isn’t he supposed to be showing Blaine that love is love, no matter the gender, no matter the sexual orientation? Isn’t he supposed to show Blaine that he’s not abnormal, that he’s not wrong?

Now, Kurt knows that the term normal in itself is very relative. What is normal for one couple might not be normal for another. What is normal in one household might not be so normal in another. But they’ve been in their own little world, living in secrecy and kissing behind closed doors and that has become their own variation of normalcy. Yes, Kurt has secretly pined for the opportunity to hold Blaine’s hand in the hallway. Yes, he wants to be able to kiss Blaine hello and goodbye every day. He wants those little luxuries.

Blaine, however, doesn’t see these things as luxuries. He sees them as actions that could result in him becoming a target.

What Blaine needs is the chance to find his own version of normal.

“I’ll wait for you,” Kurt says after a prolonged silence.

“You don’t have to-”

“We can live our lives,” Kurt says. “And if you ever decide that I’m the one you want, I’ll be here. If not…I’ll always love you. I’m not going to push this on you if it isn’t what you want, though. I won’t do that.”

“I’m sorry,” Blaine whispers. “I’m sorry I’m not ready for this.”

“You don’t have to be sorry,” Kurt says, brushing his fingers against Blaine’s arm, the last sign of affection he might ever get to show. “I promised you that I’d never pressure you. And if that – if that means I lose you, then…there’s nothing I can do about it.”

“You’re my best friend,” Blaine says.

Kurt attempts to smile, but the effect is lost when all he wants to do is cry.

“You’re my best friend, too,” he says in return.

At this point, the parking lot begins to fill with other students and Kurt steps back.

“I’ll see you inside,” Kurt says.

Biting his lip and nodding his head, Blaine turns and walks away.

Kurt never thought it would be so difficult to watch someone walk away from him, especially when he knows he’ll see that person later in the day.

But he knows they won’t have the loving looks over lunch.

They won’t share secret smiles at their lockers.

And the promise of a kiss in a pretty, spring field after school has completely vanished.

“You look like hell,” Burt comments later that afternoon when Kurt walks into their house.

“I’m sure,” Kurt snaps.

“Hey, what’s with the attitude?”

“Blaine broke up with me,” he says flatly.

“…What? Why, what happened?”

“He wasn’t ready.”

“Kurt-”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

Kurt slams his door.

He sluggishly descends the staircase and drops his bag on the floor, thankful he’s got the room to himself for a little while. He sinks down onto the edge of his bed, eyes not really focusing on much of anything. Everything seems dull.

School had been horrific. As the day wore on, it had become increasingly difficult to smile when his friends made a joke. He had tried his best to pretend that nothing was amiss when all he wanted to do was lock himself in a bathroom stall and cry until the last bell of the day rang. Every time he saw Blaine, his chest would clench and his stomach would twist into knots.

It’s like Kurt was so close to him, yet so very, very far.

At lunch, Kurt had sat between Mercedes and Rachel, forcing Blaine to sit on the either side of one of the girls. Kurt had felt a foot touch his beneath the table and even now, he clings to hope that it might have been Blaine’s. Glee club was particularly awful; they sat next to each other so as not to arouse any suspicions and Kurt could feel the sadness radiating from Blaine in thick, wretched waves.

They had walked to their cars, side by side, but never said a word.

So Kurt had come home instead of going to their usual coffee shop.

Without Blaine, it felt like nothing would ever be good again.

“You’re home early.”

Blaine spares his mother a glance when he walks through the front door that same afternoon.

“You’re usually never home until dinner during the week,” she remarks.

“I didn’t feel good,” he says.

It isn’t even a lie. He feels awful. He feels like he fell into a well, dark and damp, and like he isn’t even attempting to escape or call for help.

“Does this have anything to do with why you were so hysterical last night?” his mother asks, leaning against the doorway by the kitchen.

Blaine stands at the base of the stairs and stares at her. Unexpectedly, rage bubbles up into his throat and all he wants to do is scream at her.

I hate you.

He hates her for raising him the way she did, he hates her for all the Bible studies, he hates her for dragging him away from Missouri and handing him something perfect while simultaneously being the cause of every single doubt in his mind. He hates her for bringing him to church, he hates her for saying that she wants him to happy when he knows what would make him happiest might actually break their family.

He thinks all of these things but he remains silent. Instead, he continues to stare at her with a flat, unfeeling gaze before he turns and starts heading up the stairs.

“I’m going to lie down.”

“Blaine-”

But he doesn’t hear what she has to say. Blaine shuts himself in his darkened room. The blinds are shut tight, only a bit of light peeking in around the edges and Blaine decides he hates those too. His room is always dark, always dim, always cold. He’s tired of his lamp. He’s tired of artificial light.

He pulls open the blinds with almost enough force to break the string. He tugs until they’re bunched up at the top of the window and the afternoon sunlight spills into his tiny room, warming his face. Dust specks sparkle in the air.

Blaine drops to his knees, arms resting on his windowsill as he stares outside. Children who are just returning home from school ignore their backpacks and pick up their bicycles. They race down the street, laughing and screaming with their friends while he sits inside, alone and in misery.

It feels like prison.

Once again, he had lied to Kurt.

Blaine is so terribly tired of lying.

He had said he wasn’t ready for all of this, but that wasn’t true. Blaine was completely ready to be with Kurt. They had taken everything one step at a time, they had been careful. After much consideration last night, Blaine had determined that he wasn’t scared of Burt Hummel discovering their secret. He wasn’t scared of Carole Hudson finding out. He wasn’t even scared of Finn walking in on them.

Blaine was only worried about two people finding out about him: his mother and father.

He didn’t care about the church. He didn’t even care if his parents knew that Kurt was, in fact, gay, a secret he had kept well guarded.

But if they found out that Blaine was actually in a relationship with another boy, no matter which boy, he had absolutely no idea how they would react. Ending things with Kurt was the only thing he could do in order to ensure they never found out.

Now, though, as he sits in his quiet little prison cell, he has to wonder if keeping that secret is worth feeling like his heart has just been ripped in half.

Blaine sighs. He doesn’t really hate his mom. He doesn’t hate his dad. He just hates that he’s stuck like this and that they’re the cause of all his doubts now. God has nothing to do with it anymore. God loves him. It’s his parents that might not love him in the end.

Slamming his fist down in frustration, Blaine stands and plucks the journal that Kurt had bought him from in between two other books on his desk. Upon opening it, his heart softens as he catches sight of the pictures nestled just inside the cover. It’s a strip of three pictures, the kind you can get at a photo booth inside the mall. In the top picture, he and Kurt are sticking their tongues out and in the middle picture, Blaine is in the process of shoving Kurt out of the frame. In the bottom picture, their cheeks are pressed together, bright smiles on their faces and he can immediately tell that they had been hugging.

They’re the only pictures he has of the two of them.

He sets the strip of photos aside and flips the journal open to a fresh page.

One of these days, I won’t have to lie anymore. You’re worth more than that.

Blaine pauses. He doesn’t know what else to write and he doesn’t even want to write this on paper at all. He wants to tell Kurt, to his face, everything he has to say.

He thumbs through the previous pages, reading bits and pieces of prior entries.

Since Skylar had discovered his last journal, Blaine had taken to avoiding Kurt’s name in any of his journal entries. It had been too risky, despite the new journal being rather inconspicuous.

But now…now he’s done with being scared of this.

He flips back to the last page and finishes his entry.

I love you, Kurt Hummel.

Feeling proud of himself, Blaine smiles and snaps the little book closed. He replaces it on the desk shelf and picks up the picture strip. Standing, he moves in front of his corkboard and reads the Bible verse he had memorized, thanks to Kurt.

“Owe no one anything, except to love each other, for one who loves another has fulfilled the law,” he reads aloud.

He pins the pictures next to the verse.

From within his desk drawer, he pulls out a small box, one he hadn’t looked at since he had taken it out of the bag when he returned home from the Christian bookstore that day with Kurt. He pops the lid off and extracts the delicate rosary.

He hangs it on the same tack that holds up the Bible verse.

It doesn’t matter if his parents see it. It doesn’t matter if the rosary isn’t part of his own religion because Kurt had taught him that life is full of more than just Bible verses or church.

Life is about more than just right or wrong. It isn’t just about what you’re taught.

And until he finds the courage to admit his supposed sins to his parents, this rosary, these pictures, and this phrase…these are all he has.

Another piece of the puzzle, that doesn't fit
You throw your arms up, you're so damn sick of it
What are you coping for
What are you hoping for
Love
You won't be thinking of cars when
You're on your death bed and dyin'
You'll only be thinkin' of what you are paying for,
What you are praying for
Love
-‘What Are You Looking For’ – Sick Puppies