I’m busy with tuning my guitar and I have nightshift at Fred’s bar today, but Kurt promises it won’t take long. So I let him stay.

The whole time he doesn’t say a word.

Neither do I.

And this is how it goes.

For the next month Kurt visits me once a week, simply being around. I smoke my cigarette and play the guitar, and he just sits and watches me carefully. We don’t say anything more and anything less than “Hi” and “See you soon.”

One day I start playing a song for him and he recognizes the lyrics. We end up singing it together.

Cinder and smoke
You'll ask me to pray for rain
With ash in your mouth
You'll ask it to burn again

And then I light up my cigarette the way I always do, and he watches my every gesture in silence. But this time he sits much closer. He even puts his head on my shoulder, pressing his body against my side. I don’t push him away. I simply let him do it. Kurt sighs happily and that’s it. None of us decides to break the silence.

And finally, there comes a week when Kurt doesn’t come over.

I knew it was going to happen soon. How long could it last? We couldn’t keep meeting like this, it was pointless. And of course, the silence isn’t something you can stand for long. But I would simply lie to myself if I said I wasn’t a little disappointed. Maybe even hurt. Deep down, seventeen-year-old Blaine cries silently inside my head, but the twenty-year-old one simply starts smoking more cigarettes.

Another week comes to an end. I still have a hope Kurt will come, although I would never admit it out loud.

But Kurt doesn’t come. And he doesn’t come the next week. Or the week after that. Or even a month.

The time passes.

When February comes, I’m already sure that Kurt will never come to visit me again. I don’t really blame him, although I don’t really understand why he kept meeting me in the first place. Maybe he wanted to know if there was still something there between us. Or maybe he was lonely. Now I will never know. I tell myself that thinking about him is normal. He was my first real love. And the last one. Of course seeing him after all those years would bring back memories. But then I remind myself that I’ve already moved on.

And then, one cold evening, everything changes.

Well.

'Cold' would be an euphemism.

It’s freaking freezing.

It’s snowing really hard and the snow makes it impossible for me to leave my apartment and to get to the bar on time. I call Fred to tell him that I can’t work today and ask if he has someone else who could take my shift. But Fred doesn’t mind, he can’t leave his house either. He has called few people to see if anyone could make it, but it looks like because of snow the bar is closed today.

I hang up and I go to the kitchen to make some tea, wondering what to do with my job-free evening. I can’t remember the last time when I had so much time for myself and I’m really happy about the perspective. But suddenly, as I make my way to the kitchen, I hear the noise.

Someone’s knocking at the door.

The noise is so quiet that if I was sitting in my bedroom, I wouldn’t hear a thing. It’s really late, I realize. No one visits me in the night. Or, practically at all. I rush to the door, wondering who it could be. And when I open it, I can’t believe my eyes. I freeze completely.

Kurt's leaning against the wall and it's clear that it takes him a lot to keep his balance. He’s blue and stiff from the cold, because he’s not wearing any jacket. He shakes terribly and obviously tries to stop himself from coughing.

“Jesus Christ,” I whisper. Kurt’s legs give out, but luckily I catch him, before he hits the ground. He’s unconscious. Fuck.

He’s really heavy, but somehow I manage to carry him all the way to the living room and lay him down on the couch. I want to call an ambulance, but Kurt opens his eyes, and just as he knows what I’m thinking about, he mumbles:

“No… No doctors…”

He barely has enough strength to push himself up onto his elbows. I run to the kitchen to make a tea. Kurt needs to drink. I don’t know much about medicine, but at this moment, it simply makes sense to me. In the meantime, I find aspirin and I go back to the living room with a glass of water. I make Kurt take the medicine and I help him to hold a glass. He’s shaking too much to do this on his own.

I find spare pajama pants in my bedroom, I take fresh towels and I go back to Kurt. And suddenly it hits me.

I know what I have to do and I don’t like it at all.

I take Kurt’s clothes off and I rub his naked, cold skin with a towel. It would be much easier if I had a bathtub, because there’s no way that Kurt will able to stand under the shower. So I wrap Kurt tightly in a blanket and I bring tea from the kitchen. I poured some honey into it. My grandmother used to do the same when I was sick.

“I don’t want to...” Kurt pouts. “I don’t need…”

“Just drink it.”

Finally Kurt gives in and he lets me hold the cup for him as he drinks. I wrap my arms around him and he rests his head on my chest, closing his eyes. He’s still shaking and it worries me a little.

“Come on, Kurt…” I whisper. “Let's go to the bedroom.”

Of course, Kurt isn’t strong enough to stand by himself, so I pick him up from the couch and I carry him to my bedroom where I lay him gently on the bed. He looks with me through the eyelashes with his half-lidded eyes and he clenches his hands in the sheet.

“I’m cold,” he croaks.

His chest rises and falls heavily, it’s so hard for him to breath. His cheeks are getting red which I think is a good sign. But he still can’t stop trembling.

I bite my lip.

I have an idea.

I know I need to be naked for it to work, so I take off my clothes, but I still decide to keep my boxers on. Then I lie down next to Kurt and I wrap my arms tightly around him, swearing loudly, because his skin is so cold that it hurts. I hope that the heat from my body will help him get a little warmer. I think I saw it on TV, but I can’t be sure and I don’t really care as long as it works. I just want Kurt to stop shaking. He’s so cold that it’s really hard for me not to move away from him, but I clench my jaw and tell myself to suck it up.

Kurt shifts slightly and he rests his head on my chest and we snuggle up against each other, Kurt slowly drifting off. When he falls asleep, I reach for an extra blanket. I’m still worried that he’s cold, even if he stopped shaking. I’m really hot and sweaty so I stare at the ceiling, knowing that I won’t fall asleep in such heat.

The worst part is that now I’m left alone with my thoughts and I can’t stop thinking about what happened. I keep asking myself the same questions, questions I still haven’t got an answer for.

What was Kurt doing alone outside in such a cold day?

Why wasn’t he wearing any jacket?

Why did he come to me?

Where is his boyfriend?

What the hell happened?