“Are you sure you’re ready for this?” Santana asks, as discreetly as she can from her locker across the hall. The corridor’s mostly cleared, but it won’t be for long; second period bell is about to ring.

“As I’ll ever be.”

Blaine hates the fact that he had to miss French with Kurt to do this, but he knows it’s an essential test.

“Remember; lock down your muscles as much as you can-“

“-get hot and bothered, but not angry.” Blaine winks cheesily, makes a gun with his hand and shoots at her. She flutters her hand over her chest, mimicking being shot in the heart.

“You did your homework.”

“You nagged it into me.”

She giggles, retrieving the last of her books and shutting her locker with a firm thud of finality.

“Good luck, Blaine.” She says sincerely, skittering off to wait at her second classroom. Blaine hums an affirmation to himself, leans back against his locker, whistles. Waits.

The moment where the shrill bell finally tunnels through the hallway seems to drag on forever, and then he’s off. Students flood the corridor – he’s briefly reminded of a stampede – as his eyes scan over each of their faces – no, no, no, yes.

“Hey, Karofsky!”

*

“You should be in class.”

Kurt glances up from tracing imaginary circles on the cafeteria table, lets his eyes dance across the room until they reach the door. He scoffs, looks away.

“So should you.”

Sebastian shrugs, steps a little further towards Kurt. They’re both alone in the cafeteria; Kurt swears he can feel his heartbeat echoing through the empty air.

“What do you want, Sebastian?”

A moment passes.

“I want to apologize.”

Kurt sucks in a silent breath, eyes widening. “And why on earth,” he asks slowly, carefully. “would you want to do that?”

 He can feel Sebastian’s eyes on him, hear his footsteps growing closer and closer.

“Because,” and he can hear the preparation behind each word – Sebastian’s sat down, he’s thought about this, he’s practised what he’s about to say. “As much as you might not want to believe it now, I am trying to be a decent person.”

Kurt finally wills himself to turn around. Sebastian’s standing there, arms hung loose by his sides, eyes bloodshot and dark-circled; he doesn’t look like he’s slept in days. Kurt steels himself.

“You look a mess, Seb.” He tries, half-heartedly laughing. “What’ve you been doing, marathoning Sex and the City all week?”

All Sebastian does is stare at him, and Kurt can’t tell whether he’s crying or it’s just his eyes’ bloodshot state.

“I’ve been thinking about you.”

*

Blaine steels himself as the boy – well, he’s not really a boy, he’s more like a U-Haul, to be honest – turns towards him, carrying that self-satisfied smile that Blaine’s far too used to.

“What’s up, loser?”

Blaine scoffs, slowing his footsteps until he comes to a halt a few inches from Karofsky’s face.

“Oh, just wondering how long it’s gonna take your mom to recover from last night.” Blaine sneers, before he can stop himself.

I know Santana told you to get creative, but seriously?

“You’re gonna want to watch your mouth, Anderson.” Karofsky huffs, and Blaine can feel his skin start to heat up. He breathes carefully through his nose, glances at his shoes for a moment, clenches his fists. “And why on earth would I listen to you?”

Karofsky lets out a sound almost like a growl, and swings wildly at Blaine’s face.

*

Kurt gulps.

“Oh.”

…Are you seriously going to leave it there?

Sebastian’s still moving towards him, and for some strange reason, Kurt isn’t moving away.

“…Anything in particular about me?” Kurt says, trying to relax his tense shoulders.

Sebastian audibly gulps. “What I did at the party, and the phone thing, and-”

“-you know, Sebastian, I certainly hope you’d be thinking about what you did at the party because you almost fucking killed someone.” Kurt snaps, all in one breath, rushing towards Sebastian so that they’re a few inches apart.

“I was drun-“

“-are you seriously making excuses right now?”

Sebastian sighs, holds out his arms in surrender, eyes visibly watering. “I – I just – I’m so fucking sorry, Kurt.”

“That’s nice.”

Sebastian sniffs a little. “Were you serious, before?” He says nasally.

“About what?”

“When you said we were through.”

Kurt pauses. “Yeah.”

A moment passes.

“I still love you.”

The simple statement catches Kurt off guard, and he feels like he’s been winded, like he’s falling but he can’t see when or where he’s going to land, so he just lets himself fall.

“I love you too.”

*

Blaine’s face hits the cheap lino, and he can feel bruises forming on his ribcage – surprisingly, the only place where Karofsky managed to hit him before.

Remember, don’t fight back – one punch, and you’ll get suspended.

Blaine grudgingly pulls himself back up, turns to face Karofsky again, dodges his right hook – the guy’s a tough fighter and he has a reputation for a reason but, you know, Blaine has superpowers. He wants to dodge every punch, but that option was quickly cancelled out by Santana’s default it’ll look suspicious, so all Blaine can do is fall and run.

He finally manages to manoeuvre his way to a few metres from the teacher’s lounge, and sure enough, Karofsky stops.

“Your call.” Blaine huffs out, breathing slightly erratic.

Karofsky pauses, hold up his arms, and finally walks away aggressively. Blaine waits until he’s around the corner before he lets himself lean forward, clutches at his ribcage. Santana is with him in an instant.

“Are you okay?” She says, hands spluttering over his back in an attempt to somehow fix it.

Blaine coughs a little, tries to straighten up, winces. “I’ll get there.”

“You should go get something to eat. I’ll tell Belaney that you’re sick, okay?”

Blaine smiles. “Thanks, Santana.”

*

“What?”

Kurt looks him in the eye, tries to breathe steadily. “I love you, but I can’t do this anymore.”

Sebastian reaches for his shoulder, and Kurt jerks it away. “I can’t be with someone that I don’t trust.”

“Learn to trust me again, then. Please, Kurt, I –“

“What? You think you can waltz in here and have love fix all your problems? You think I’m just going to push away the fact that you almost killed Blaine-“

“-what is so fucking great about Blaine, may I ask? Why are you constantly defending him?”

“Because he’s been dropped at the bottom of the heap by this stupid social hierarchy and I remember what it was like!”

“You don’t need to waste your time on him, okay? I want to try again with us so, so badly and I swear if you give me one more chance-“

Kurt scowls, lowers his voice. “So what, you’ve got a right to a second chance but he isn’t worth a second of my time?”

“I love you, Kurt-“

“-how do you think that’s going to change my mind now? I told you, we’re done, and that is the fucking end of the line!”

“You can’t just give up on a person like that, Kurt, you can’t fucking cut off your emotions until they disappear-“

“-why not, huh? What would you know about emotions?”

Sebastian slides shaky hands to Kurt’s shoulders, and he barely notices through how hard he’s crying.

“Because I’ve already tried.”

And then they’re kissing and Kurt just wants to melt into his arms and forget about bad and good and right and wrong and-

“I don’t need anyone to hate me more than they already do.”

Kurt freezes, pushes at Sebastian’s shoulders until he finally lets go.

“Tell me you didn’t feel anything.”

Kurt picks up his satchel, pushes past Sebastian. Pauses at the door. Closes his eyes, tries not to cry.

“I can’t.”

“It’s him, isn’t it?”

Kurt doesn’t answer, doesn’t leave. He can hear Sebastian sniffling behind him.

“Do you love him?” He asks, and it’s the softest Kurt’s ever heard him speak.

“Yes.” Kurt answers, barely a whisper. He lets out a breath he didn’t know he was holding.

“Kurt?”

*

“I love you, Kurt-“

“-how do you think that’s going to change my mind now? I told you, we’re done, and that is the fucking end of the line!”

Kurt.

“You can’t just give up on a person like that, Kurt, you can’t fucking cut off your emotions until they disappear-“

“-why not, huh? What would you know about emotions?”

Blaine’s walking faster than he’s ever walked before and why won’t his stupid legs work, if Kurt’s hurt by that fucking psycho because Blaine was too slow-

“Tell me you didn’t feel anything.”

Blaine stops just outside the cafeteria door, freezes as it opens and Kurt stops, eyes closed and crying.

“I can’t.”

I love you.

“It’s him, isn’t it?”

Kurt doesn’t answer, doesn’t leave, doesn’t move. Sebastian spots Blaine, tries to steel his face, looks Blaine in the eye.

“Do you love him?”

Blaine can’t fathom how he could explain how much he loves Kurt Hummel, and he opens his mouth and takes a breath and prepares to spill his heart to it’s owner but Kurt beats him to it.

“Yes.”

Wait, what?

Blaine sees Kurt shudder with a breath, trembling lips slightly parted, and he couldn’t stop himself if he tried.

“Kurt?” he says, voice cracking.

Kurt’s eyes flash open before him, and his heart breaks at how sad he looks.

“Blaine?”

Blaine glances into the cafeteria, but Sebastian’s gone. He pushes gently on Kurt’s shoulder until they’re each sitting at a table, chairs facing one another, Kurt’s head resting carefully in the crook of Blaine’s neck.

“Hi.” Blaine says softly, reaching up to caress the side of Kurt’s head.

Kurt laughs, warm breath dancing onto the skin of Blaine’s neck, and Blaine feels his heart swell.

“Hi.” Kurt hiccups, and Blaine tugs him closer.

A moment passes.

“I’m tired of pretending, Blaine. I’m tired of hurting other people and feeling like a horrible person,” he sniffs. “but most of all, I’m tired of hurting you.”

Blaine takes a breath through his nose, tries not to cry too hard.

“I love you.” Blaine sobs out, finally letting his arms go slack.

Please. Tell me I’m not imagining things.

Kurt freezes, scrambles for his hand, raises his head, looks Blaine in the eye.

“I love you too.”

It’s simple and it’s unbelievable and it’s utterly perfect.

“I think I’ve loved you since the day we met.” Kurt says quietly, and Blaine can’t help himself, fitting his palm into the curve of Kurt’s jaw and bringing those slightly parted lips closer and closer and – oh, god, I could die happy here.

They break apart – after what, a minute, a month, a thousand years? Why does it matter? – chests heaving, skin sweaty, hearts filled to the brim.

“So, could we get coffee sometime?”

Great way to ruin the moment, Blaine.

Kurt laughs a little, clutches Blaine’s hand tighter.

“Yes,” he says, in-between kisses. “We can get coffee,” kiss “or tea,” kiss “or bagels, or anything you want, anywhere you want-”

“-can we fly to Canada? I heard they have this bagged milk, it sounds quite versatile-”

-and Kurt’s kissing him again and he’s not stopping, letting go of his hand and clutching his face with both palms, smiling into his lips.

“I love you, Blaine Anderson.”

Easy as breathing.