"Have a nice flight," the assistant told him uncertainly, her eyes taking in Kurt's crumpled clothing, the hem and sleeves of his shirt spotted with damp patches; his messy hair; red, swollen, tear-stained face and eyes. Kurt just nodded at her, not trusting himself to open his mouth without screaming about how much he wanted to turn back the time, to back before he left a broken Blaine outside his apartment, back before he accused Blaine of cheating, back to that wonderful day in Central Park. He would laugh as Blaine kissed him, before putting his hat back on and when they went to go back to the apartment and he caught that flash of movement out the corner of his eye, he would drop Blaine's hand and go and look behind the tree and see...

And see who? Who was it that had followed them through the park that day and waited for the opportunity to get pictures that would prove he and Blaine were dating? Was it this same person who had been supplying the media with information on their relationship? Was this all the work of one person or were there several of them hunting for any scrap of information that the media would pay them for?

Kurt rubbed at his temples where the beginnings of a headache were taking up residence. Those questions had been swirling around inside his head whenever images of Blaine's hurt face and broken eyes weren't printed there, causing him to bring his knees to his chest and curl up as stabbing, piercing pains attacked his body and he gasped for breath as tears dampened the stiff fabric of his jeans. But no matter how often those questions presented themselves, no matter how long he stewed over them, they remained unanswered.

He dropped down into his seat on the plane, grateful that the flight wasn't a busy one and it looked like the seat next to him would be remaining empty. He didn't want someone shooting him covert glances throughout the flight, their recognition of who he was and their wonderings of what had caused him to be in the state he was in practically stamped across their forehead. He was in a window seat and he could see darkness beginning to fall over New York through the window. Blaine was out there...

He slammed the blind shut and turned his back on the window, curling up in his seat and closing his eyes against the tears blurring his vision as the pain hit again.

None of the flight attendants offered him a pre-flight drink this time. Maybe they thought he was asleep or maybe they just didn't want to approach someone who was crying silently as they walked up and down the aisles, closing all the overhead compartments and checking that the cabin was ready for take-off. He was glad they didn't, he didn't want drinks, he didn't want food, and he didn't want to talk to anyone; he wanted to go back to Blaine. He wanted to run back to him and apologise over and over, get down on his knees and beg for forgiveness and tell Blaine how much he loved him and he didn't mean anything he said earlier. But he couldn't. He needed to get away from it all: New York, the paparazzi and the rest of the media, his job, even Blaine. He needed to go to Ohio where he would have the space, the peace, and the freedom to think and breathe. He didn't know if he had just ended it with Blaine or not, but he knew he couldn't live without having Blaine in his life and he couldn't imagine not loving him. He couldn't go a day without seeing Blaine's face or hearing his voice. He needed Blaine in his life like he needed air, but he couldn't take all the constant photographing and the leaked secrets or the speculation anymore. He couldn't deal with not being able to have a normal life or a normal relationship with his boyfriend anymore.

A roaring and whirring of engines filled the cabin and Kurt opened his eyes as the plane shuddered slightly as it took off - he hadn't even realised the plane had started moving. He rolled over to face the plane's plastic, off-white walls when a man reading today's edition of The New York Times shot him a curious look from his seat across the aisle.

He squeezed his eyes shut again as the plane climbed steadily higher. The memory of Blaine's broken face when Kurt had shouted at him, when he had watched the elevator doors close after Kurt had told him to leave him alone, swam to the surface of his mind again and floated there, unwavering and as detailed as if Blaine stood in front of him. He could see every line of pain carved into Blaine's face, could see Blaine's heart cracking behind his hazel eyes. ‘I destroyed him,' Kurt told himself and his throat burned again. ‘I hurt him so badly.'

Blaine was bound to think it was over between them, that Kurt had broken up with him; after everything Kurt had said to him, why wouldn't he think that? Kurt had destroyed the best thing that had ever happened to him, had torn it apart like a bomb destroying a town, crumbling all the beauty to the ground and leaving nothing but ugly rubble and memories behind. All that was left of his and Blaine's relationship were the ugly memories of Kurt's snarled accusations and the shattered pieces of what they once had - rubble that could possibly never be cleared away or re-built into the beauty that was once there.

With a small sob, he broke down again, tears creating wet tracks on his raw cheeks as the plane carried him away from New York and Blaine.

With a soft ‘ding' the elevator doors opened and Blaine shuffled wearily out onto the landing and made his way to Kurt's apartment feeling disheartened. He didn't really know why he had come back here; he didn't really expect Kurt to have come back here - not yet, anyway. But he didn't know where else to look for him, his list of places to search had run dry and now there was nothing else to do but return here and wait for Kurt to return; he had to come back eventually, and then, what? They needed to talk, that was certain, but did Kurt mean he wanted to end it when he said it was a bad idea dating him? The very thought of that, of not having Kurt in his life anymore, forced the air out of his lungs in a harsh gasp and the fragile pieces of him that remained, held together only by the knowledge that it wasn't completely over with Kurt yet, threatened to crack.

He staggered up to Kurt's door, keeping himself from crumpling to the floor through sheer force of will. He leant against the wall by the door for a moment; he was worn out both emotionally and physically. Since discovering Kurt's phone was switched off, he had been searching throughout New York City for him, visiting any place that came to mind as somewhere he may go: his favourite coffee shops, his studios, the gym he went to, Central Park, his favourite stores... He went to the theatre where Rachel's show was playing and asked if Kurt was backstage, thinking that he may have gone to be with his friend, but they told him that they hadn't seen him. He even went to his own apartment as a last, desperate attempt to find him, though he had never expected Kurt to be there.

Pulling the apartment key out of his pocket and sliding it into the lock, he felt tears well up again as he remembered the day Kurt had given him the key: the smile on his boyfriend's face making his blue eyes sparkle as he pressed the key into his hand, the melodic voice he heard in his dreams telling him he should have his own key seeing as he spent so much time at the apartment, the soft, silky smoothness of Kurt's lips beneath his as they shared a sweet kiss, his heart light with a happiness unlike anything he had ever experienced...

The lock clicked and he pushed the door open, stepping into the apartment, keeping his eyes averted from the couches in the living area. Nudging the door with his foot, it swung shut with a soft thud and footsteps echoed from the kitchen - Blaine's heart leapt.

Rachel came through from the kitchen, looking worried, but with a hopeful spark in her eyes. When she saw Blaine she faltered.

"Blaine?" she said weakly. Her eyes took in his ragged appearance: his hair a tangled mess, gel long gone; eyes bloodshot and red-raw; face pale and drawn beneath the blotchiness from tears; clothes hanging limply off his slumped frame. The hopeful spark had fizzled out and her look of concern had deepened along with the lines on her forehead. "What happened?"

Blaine swallowed tears and shook his head. He couldn't talk about it, not yet, the wounds were too fresh, too raw - he was still bleeding.

She moved closer to him and placed a hand on his arm. "Blaine, please, what happened?"

He bit down on his trembling lip and inhaled deeply through his nose in a valiant attempt to hold himself together. It didn't work; the air held a trace of Kurt's scent and his resolve collapsed like a sandcastle hit by a wave. "Kurt left me!" he cried, before falling forward onto Rachel, his head landing on her shoulder.

She rubbed his back gently and tried to calm him, but nothing could soothe him, nothing could put back the shattered pieces of him; only Kurt. "Kurt sounds just as torn-up about it as you are, so I don't think he has left you," she reassured him in a low voice.

Gulping some air into his lungs through his tears, Blaine stepped back and frowned at her. "What do you mean? Have you talked to him? Do you know where he is?" His eyes searched hers frantically.

Rachel looked strained. "He's gone," she said slowly.

The words hit Blaine like a punch in the stomach and he stumbled backwards a step, his legs trembling and his fragile heart thumping erratically. His knees threatened to give out; he braced his hand against the wall beside him to steady himself. "Gone?" he repeated in a despairing whisper. "Gone where?"

Rachel looked like she was fighting some internal battle with herself. She watched Blaine with apprehensive, conflicted eyes, her teeth worrying at her bottom lip.

"Rachel, please," he begged her. "I can't lose Kurt - please." His voice broke on the final word.

The battle raged on behind Rachel's eyes for another, agonisingly long moment, then, "Ohio," she whispered. "He's gone to his family in Lima."

Blaine removed his hand from the wall and turned back towards the door. "Thank you! Thank you!" he called back at Rachel who was still watching him.

He thundered down the corridor and through the door and out into the stairwell. For the second time that day he flung himself down the stairs as fast as he could. He shouldered open the door leading out into the entryway and he sprinted across it to the front doors, ignoring the shocked look from the doorman. As soon as he hit the street he scanned the traffic for an approaching taxi, his eyes desperately seeking out a yellow car with black checkers. Spotting one coming towards him, he frantically flagged it down, breathing a sigh of relief when it pulled up to the curb by him.

Yanking open the door, he threw himself into the cab's backseat. "JFK airport, please."

The tears had finally dried at some point during the flight and now, as the taxi rolled to a stop with a slight squeak of brakes outside his family's house in Lima, Kurt felt empty, like he was just a hollow shell, moving and breathing robotically. He mechanically thanked and paid the cab driver and climbed out onto the sidewalk and stared up at the house he had lived in as a teenager.

The porch light was on and more light spilled from a few of the windows, casting squares of light on the ground outside. The taxi drove away just as a shadow moved across one of the lit windows, a silhouette that could have been his dad, Carole, or Finn moving around the house preparing to go to bed. It seemed strange how everything here was exactly as it had been when he had still been in high school: same smell of cut grass and cooling plants and concrete, same house with the same lights, same people going about the same routines inside. It felt like something should have changed; he had just broken into millions of pieces, something should have changed. But it hadn't, the house and his family were the same as always: solid, dependable, an anchor to keep him from being dragged off and drowned in the riptides and treacherous currents.

He staggered almost drunkenly up to the front door and rang the doorbell. He dimly realised how it would look to his family that he had turned up at the house unannounced late at night, looking a wrecked mess and with nothing on him but his phone, wallet, and apartment keys. He knew, but he didn't have the strength to try and soften the blow. He needed them more than ever - solid, dependable, unchanging - to cling to and keep him together.

He heard the sound of footsteps approaching the door and then it opened to reveal Carole, her expression one of polite curiosity until she saw who it was. Her eyes widened.

"Kurt!" she exclaimed in shock, her eyes full of anxious concern. "What are you- sweetie, what's wrong?"

Kurt gulped in several lungfuls of the warm night air, trying desperately not to break down again. He felt his throat start to choke up and he clenched and unclenched his fists in an effort to hold himself together.

"Oh, honey," Carole said softly, wrapping an arm around his shoulders and guiding him inside.

Another voice called through from the kitchen as Kurt was led into the living room. "Who was that at the door?" The kitchen door swung open and Burt appeared, looking curious.

The sight of his father's face and sound of his voice was enough to break what little control Kurt had left and he choked out a muffled sob as the tears started again, his dad's face turning into an indistinguishable blur as he hurried towards him.

"Kurt!" He felt hands on his shoulders. "What happened? What's wrong?"

Kurt could do nothing but stand there and cry as pain burned his insides. He was pulled forwards gently and he felt his dad's arms wrap around him.

Sagging against his dad's comforting, solid body, he dropped his head on his shoulder and clutched at his back. His dad held him as he shook and shuddered with pain and his sobs. His nose was running, the skin on his face was raw, and his clothes were ruined, three things that would have greatly bothered the teenage Kurt Hummel who had stood in this living room and hugged his dad dozens of times, but that the current Kurt Hummel couldn't care less about. All he could think about was Blaine.

Blaine. He gripped his dad firmer and screwed his eyes shut tighter, as if by shutting his eyes as much as was physically possible he could shut out all the memories of the past week.

He didn't know how long they stood there, his dad occasionally murmuring in a soothing tone that it was all going to be ok, but he heard the low rumbling of Finn's voice at one point and Carole saying something in response before two sets of footsteps - one heavy and shuffling, the other light and even - left the room.

Eventually, he was able to relax his death-grip on the back of his dad's shirt and take a step back, wiping at his damp face with the back of his hand. His dad just watched him anxiously as he sniffed and said in a dejected and hopeless voice, "I've lost, Blaine." He swallowed thickly and sniffed again. "I really screwed everything up."

His dad just continued to gaze at him, his expression unchanging as he waited for Kurt to continue.

Kurt found he couldn't look his father in the eye as he spoke, so instead he directed his words at the wall over his shoulder. "I blamed him for all of those articles written about me and our relationship, and for the paparazzi constantly hounding me. I- I yelled at him and said some awful things." His voice was breaking again, shooting up an octave and becoming difficult to understand. "I told him that dating him was a mistake and that I wasn't happy being with him anymore." His voice trailed off with a weak, broken whimper. He didn't cry again, he was beyond crying now and had reached a numbness where all his emotions had come together and surpassed his top threshold of pain and he now couldn't feel a thing. It was more terrifying than feeling devastated and anguished.

"I left him and came here," he continued flatly. "And now I've lost the best thing that has ever happened to me."

His dad squeezed his shoulders. "I'm sure it will all work out ok, Kurt. Once you've both had some time and space to think and calm down you'll be able to sort things out." He patted Kurt's shoulder. "Why don't you go upstairs and get some sleep? You look exhausted and maybe things will look better in the morning," he suggested in an overly optimistic voice that didn't fool Kurt. He knew things wouldn't look better in the morning; if anything, they would probably look worse.

He obeyed anyway, climbing the stairs and entering his old bedroom, followed by his dad's worried gaze. After closing the door he went straight over to the bed and collapsed on it, the soft bedding providing no comfort to his battered body. He rolled onto his back and let his gaze wander around the room, taking in the relics of what seemed like another life - he felt like he was in a stranger's room.

Although he was absolutely exhausted, he didn't think he would ever be able to fall asleep with everything going through his mind, but the numbness had spread to his brain and his head was now filled with static and after an indefinite period of time, he fell into an uneasy, fitful sleep.