In early February Burt, Kurt, and the entire Anderson family stood around the freshly covered grave.  Coop draped his arms around Blaine's shoulders holding him close while Blaine held Kurt's hand.  Tom placed his hand on Burt's shoulder and held his wife around her waist.  Nobody said anything while the rest of the people who attended the funeral slowly made their way to their cars.

"If you just want a night to yourself, Burt, we can always take Kurt for you."  Tom looked warily at his wife as she offered their house up to Kurt like she had so often in the last three months.

"No.  I think Kurt just needs something familiar right now.  You guys have been honorable about this whole thing, really.  I think I just need to take Kurt home and be alone with him for a while.  Thank you."  Burt slowly turned on his heels and faced Kurt, "Hey, bud, it's time to go home."

"Alright, Daddy, I'll be right there."

Kurt looked down at his shoes and then shifted his eyes to look at his and Blaine's intertwined fingers giving them a little squeeze.

"Blaine... I..."  Without making Kurt suffer through trying to find words Blaine reached over and pulled Kurt into a tight hug.

"I'll see you soon, okay?"  Kurt nodded against Blaine's shoulder and pulled him a little tighter before letting go and walking over to take his daddy's hand.  The two of them walked side by side to the car and pulled away leaving Tom, Tracy, Cooper, and Blaine to stand alone facing each other.  Tears streamed down Tracy and Blaine's face. 

Blaine didn't understand how he could be so sad; it wasn't his mommy who had died, it was Kurt's.  But at the same time Blaine loved Liz.  He spent so many Saturdays with Kurt and his mommy and she was always so nice and made them really good cookies.  And when he had a nightmare at Kurt's house she would hold him and rock him just like his own mommy did.  He loved Liz and now she was gone and Kurt was going to be all alone and he didn't deserve that.  And Blaine couldn't stop thinking about his own mommy and how sad she looked right now.  Blaine remembered the night after they first met Kurt and Liz; he and his mommy had stayed up talking about them and how they were all going to be best friends.  Now Kurt didn't have a mommy, his mommy didn't have a best friend, and everything wasn't going the way he had planned.

Slowly Tom made his way over to Blaine and picked him up and they all made their way to the car.

About two minutes into the car ride Blaine began going into full on hysterics.

"Daddy! I need to be with Kurt. I told him I wouldn't leave him after his mommy died. I need to be with him! I promised, Daddy! I promised...." Cooper leaned over and smothered Blaine into a hug pulling his head into the crook of his neck.

"It's okay, B.  Kurt's going to be okay."  Blaine lost himself in his brother's arms and the two boys stayed silent in the back seat while Tom gave a cautious look to his wife.

"Tracy, I think they need time apart.  Both of them are just so lost right now, they need to be with their family."

But Tracy didn't respond.  She didn't even acknowledge that Tom had spoken; she simply kept her head turned out the passenger side window looking out at the passing trees through her watery eyes.

The rest of the car ride was silent besides Blaine's muffled sniffles from the back seat.  Cooper and Tom didn't know what to say and Tracy and Blaine were too broken to pull themselves together.

It was a whole week before Kurt got to see Blaine again.  He and his daddy had spent most of their time together in silence, Kurt was too scared to ask his daddy anything because he didn't want to see his dad cry again.  Burt could barely pull himself together enough to hold back the tears in front of his son but somehow they both managed. 

But now it was Friday and Tracy and Burt had decided that they needed to get together for their usual Friday dinners.  Much to Tom's dismay the two of them were determined to keep Kurt and Blaine as close as possible so they wouldn't have to go through being apart on top of everything that had happened.

Kurt sat not so patiently on the couch waiting to hear the Anderson's car pull into the driveway so he could finally see Blaine and get the hug he so desperately needed.

As soon as the doorbell rang Kurt was on his feet running to open it.  The second the door was unlocked he felt someone on the other side push it open and Blaine came running through the door and ran at Kurt engulfing him into a bear hug almost knocking the two boys off their feet.

Kurt wrapped his arms tightly around Blaine and hid his face in his shoulder.  This was as close to home as Kurt had felt since his mommy had died.  Kurt could feel the tears rolling down his face but he had been crying so much lately that it didn't faze him.

Blaine held Kurt in his arms until they both lost track of time.  Eventually Tom came up the boys and forced them to let go telling them that dinner was ready.  Kurt couldn't help but notice how flat his voice sounded compared to usual.

Dinner started off as awkward as ever.  Burt and Kurt sat quickly picking at their food like they had for the past week, Tracy silently chewed her food although her brain was obviously somewhere else, Tom sat staring at Tracy just wishing she would become the girl she used to be, and Blaine stared at Kurt trying to find a way to make him smile again.  Blaine missed Kurt's smile a little more than he missed the rest of Kurt because his smile was so pretty.  At one point when they were first sitting down for dinner Blaine even reached over to take Kurt's hand because that always made Kurt smile; but not tonight.  Tonight Kurt looked at their hands for a moment before pulling it away to grab his fork and start eating.

Tom couldn't take the silence, and he couldn't stand the sad looks on the faces of the people he loved or Burt and Kurt.  He eventually just started talking; who he was talking to or at wasn't an issue in his mind, he just needed to stop the silence.  Burt slowly began to join in and make it more of a two sided conversation once the topic hit cars.  Burt appreciated what Tom was trying to do by keeping the topics to something familiar that he could lose himself in.  Tracy even chimed in a few times with an "mhm" or a head nod but she never said anything beyond on that.

Once the adults were as wrapped up in their conversation as they were going to get Blaine thought it would be a good time to try to get Kurt to cheer up, too.

"Hey, Kurt." Blaine leaned over and whispered close to his ear.

"What?"  Kurt took a quick look at his father to make sure he was distracted before he turned to face Blaine, their faces just inches from each other.

"So, I was talkin' to Coop earlier today and he told me a really funny joke, you wanna hear it?"

Kurt looked away from Blaine back down at his half eaten plate of food.  He thought about his mommy like he had so many times this week.  He thought about this one time when he first started school and his mommy came to pick him up and she told him a joke and the two of them laughed the entire drive home.  He asked her to repeat the joke probably five times and she did each time with a smile on her face.  He remembered all the times he and his mommy and daddy would sit around the table and he would watch her tell stories.  He would very rarely listen to the actual story because he always got swept up by her facial expressions and the way her eyes would light up when she laughed.  Kurt loved his mommy and Kurt missed his mommy and Kurt defiantly wasn't ready to laugh without his mommy.  He didn't deserve to laugh without his mommy.

"No."

"Are you sure? It's real funny."

"No. I don't want to hear your joke, Blaine.  I don't want to hear any jokes."

Kurt silently went back to passing his food around his plate unknowingly being watched by Tom.

Dinner went on as awkwardly as it had started for the next twenty minutes until everyone was finished eating and the table was silent.

"Well, I think we should get going, Cooper will be coming home soon."  Tom stood up and began to clear the table.  Burt and Tracy silently joined him while Kurt and Blaine sat staring blankly at the tablecloth.

"Are comin' to sleep over tomorrow?"

"I can't, Blaine. My daddy really needs me."

"Oh, okay." Blaine looked disappointedly at his lap, "I get it."

"I'm sorry, I really am. I just don't want to leave my daddy right now."

"I know. I get it. But we're still best friends, right? Even though you're real sad right now?"

"Of course. We'll always be best friends."  Kurt gave Blaine a small hug before Tom came over with his coat and the Anderson family left just as quickly as they had come.

Burt had been avoiding talking to his son about how he felt about losing his mom the entire week.  Burt was barely holding himself together and he knew that if he asked Kurt how he was doing he would lose it.  But tonight after dinner and seeing how sat Kurt next to Blaine he decided it was time for the two of them to have a talk.

"Hey, bud," Burt tucked Kurt in before sitting down next to him on his bed, "How are you feeling?"

Kurt didn't answer at first.  He took his time analyzing the situation as best he could before finding the best words he could.

"I feel... funny, Daddy."

"Funny?" That was the last thing he expected to come from his son's mouth.  "What do you mean?"

"Well. I miss Mommy a whole lot and I wish she was hear so I didn't have to miss her anymore.  And I always am thinking about her.  But when I think about her I think about Blaine's mommy and I think about Blaine and I think about how much I miss him, too.  But then I feel real bad cause I should miss Mommy, not Blaine, right?"

"You can miss more than one person at a time, Kurt.  Things with Blaine haven't been easy in the past week.  Do you know how close Blaine was with Mom? He feels the same way about her as you do about his mom.  And Tracy is very sad that Mommy is gone, also."

"But, Daddy, what about when I think something is funny now?  I'm not ready to smile because my tummy always feels bad and my heart is sad all the time."

"I'm going to tell you something, kiddo, and I want you to listen really closely, okay?"  Kurt nodded before sitting up a bit to give his dad his complete attention.  "You want to know what your mommy always told me? That she loved your smile and your laugh.  It was her favorite thing about you.  And now Mommy is watching over you and me and I bet you more than anything in the world she wants to see your smile again.  We don't have to stop living our lives just because Mommy isn't here with us to see it.  We need to show Mommy that she raised us right and that we are going to be happy and love each other and take care of each other.  You got that?"  Burt got choked up as he watched his son absorb his words until eventually he gave up and let the tears fall down his cheeks. 

Kurt sat up then and wiped the tears from Burt's cheeks before placing his palm on Burt's cheek and keeping it there.

"I got it, Daddy.  It's you and me now and we are going to make Mommy proud."

"Yes we are, buddy."  Burt finally pulled his lips into a smile.  It had been so long since he had smile but it felt good to show Kurt that everything was going to be okay.  Kurt smiled back before removing his hand and laying back down.

"Daddy?"

"Yea?"

"Is it okay if it is you, me, and Blaine sometimes? I miss him real bad."

"Of course.  Why don't you invite him over here tomorrow to spend the night and we can have a guy's night?"  Kurt hesitated and began twisting his comforter in his hands.  "We don't have to if you don't want to."

"I want to.  Honest.  But I think I messed up, Daddy.  I don't think Blaine wants to talk to me anymore; I messed up tonight at dinner."

"Don't worry about it.  Blaine is your best friend so whatever you did he will forgive you.  How about we give him a call tomorrow?"

"Okay.  Thanks, Daddy.  Goodnight."

"Sleep tight.  Don't let the bed bugs bite."

Kurt smiled up at Burt as he leaned down and give him a kiss on his hair and left down the hall leaving the door cracked just a tiny bit like Kurt had asked him to ever since Liz had died.

Blaine tried to be a big boy and not cry but once he had put himself in bed he couldn't help but let the tears fall.  He had just been trying to make Kurt smile again but he had just made him mad.  He didn't know what to do anymore.  Blaine's door slowly fell open as Tom came in to say goodnight.

"Blaine? What's wrong?"  Tom got down on his knees next to Blaine's bed and started rubbing his back.

"I don't know what to do, Papa.  Kurt is my best friend and I want to make him happy but I don't know if I can.  I don't know what to say to someone who doesn't have a mommy.  And I miss his mommy, she was really nice to me.  But mostly I miss Kurt's smile a whole lot.  Sometimes when he smiles it just makes me feel good and now he won't smile anymore and he doesn't want to sleepover anymore and everything is wrong."

Tom took a moment to simply look at Blaine.  He could see how broken his son was over his best friend.  He could see how attached the two had become and most importantly he could see how he had broken his promise to himself by letting Kurt break his son.

"I think you and Kurt need to just spend some time apart.  He needs to be with his daddy right now and your mommy really could use your help around the house."

"But, Daddy, how am I supposed to make Kurt feel better if I don't see him?"

"Sometimes, buddy, there is nothing you can do to help someone feel better.  Sometimes you need to stop being best friends and just start over and find a new best friend."

That make Blaine cry even harder.

"I don't want a new best friend! I want my Kurt!"  Blaine pulled the covers over his head and his bed began to shake from him sobs.  Tom tried to rub his back again but Blaine screamed and pulled away.

Silently Tom left the room closing the door behind him knowing that he was doing the right thing by separating the boys.

The next morning when Burt called Tom lied and said that Blaine wouldn't be able to sleepover that night because they had an important family event going on.

Blaine never found out about the call.