Heavy footsteps sounded up the stairs and Blaine quickly hid his phone, there was no way his Dad was getting hold of that. He picked up a book and pretended to read, waiting for his Dad's entry with baited breath. Mr Anderson kicked open the door, a cocky smile curving his lips and his eyebrows arched. Blaine lowered the book to look at him, trying to hide his revulsion.

"What do you want?" he asked, settling for verging on civility. The eyebrows raised even higher and the smile turned into a smirk. Blaine wished he could cut off those stupid eyebrows, so he could never make that face again - it would assist, at very least, in his attempts not to hit his own father.

"I saw that fag outside again," he said casually and Blaine's muscles tightened – hearing his own father talk about Kurt like that was somehow worse than when the jocks said the same.

"What about him?"

"He looked upset," Blaine knew exactly what his Dad was doing, he was trying to get him to react, to shout at him, to prove once and for all that he was gay. And that pissed Blaine off more than anything. He kept himself calm, deferring to the situation as if it was a play .

"I guess it's to be expected." He hated what he was saying. He hated this. He hated his Dad. He hated himself.

"You're right, he's pathetic." There was a pause.

"Is that all you wanted?" Blaine asked, trying not to let his character break, but failing miserably.

Mr Anderson carefully surveyed his son, he knew that Blaine was close to breaking and he enjoyed watching the facade crack. "How's your girlfriend?" The boy almost visibly twitched at the mention of the word.

"Laura's fine," he answered through gritted teeth, wanting to curl up and cry at the thought of her.

"You should invite her around for lunch soon, how's, say, Sunday?" Blaine's stomach churned at the idea of being in a room with two of the people he hated most of all, but he knew it wasn't really an offer that could be denied.

"Yeah, I'm sure that will be fine," he answered, desperate to make the man leave.

"Okay, I'll leave you to it then." Blaine nodded, waiting for the door to close and then breathing a sigh of relief. He would wait to call Laura tomorrow, for now he would just curl up in Kurt's pajamas and try to sleep.

Sleep didn't last long enough. It was all too soon that he was getting up, washing his body, that seemed forever stained with her touch. He looked around his room, it was larger than most people's he knew, stretching across half of the top floor of his house so he had a view into both the back yard and the front. It was so big and yet so...empty. Ever since he had taken down the posters and decorations that he and Kurt had put up, it just didn't seem like his any more, the bland walls and nondescript furniture could belong to a hotel room. It felt like the story of his life, with Kurt everything was enjoyable, meaningful. Without him it was a shell, it wasn't his life. It wasn't what he wanted his life to be.

Blaine put his head against the cool window, staring out into the garden. He could remember when he first met Kurt, the strange boy in his new garden who climbed up to his window to talk to him. The two of them then sat, shoulder to shoulder, as Kurt taught him to make daisy chains. Blaine smiled, rubbing his eyes free of the moisture that was gathering. He remembered when it had been Kurt's birthday and Kurt's dad had helped him to surprise his best friend with a picnic (everything was low fat of course). Kurt had come outside – Blaine's hands tight around his eyes, so he couldn't peak – the two of them were giggling furiously, he had released Kurt's vision and the boy had hugged him tight, squealing that he'd even managed to get the classic red and white blanket. The two had laughed and smiled, ending up throwing most of the food at each other, much to Kurt's initial distaste ("Blaine, do you know how long it took me to find this? It's limited edition Marc Jacobs!"). The laughter echoed in his head and as it began to dim, his smile started to fade. But those weren't his memories any more. And they most definitely weren't his future.

His fingers grasped tighter around his phone, breaking the illusion further. He scrolled through his contact, finding Laura and sighing heavily before pressing call. If anything could shatter the effects of those memories, it was his girlfriend. She was quick to pick up, her voice a little strained.

"Blaine?" She breathed.

"Hey, Laura," he answered, trying to animate his voice as much as possible.

"I'm so glad you called me, I was worried after the whole thing with yesterday," she paused, evidently horribly regretting bringing it up.

"No, I'm sorry, I was acting a bit off with you," he lied, he knew she'd lap it up simply enough. "I just wondered if you were free tomorrow at about one?"

"Sure," Laura replied, slightly too quickly.

"Cool, well, would you like to come to lunch at mine tomorrow and meet my..." His sentence trailed off, as the vision started again. Except, this time it was no memory, the porcelain pale boy really was outside, wandering about his garden idly. Blaine's head fell back onto the glass, breathing heavily until he could no longer see through the glass due to the fog.

"Blaine?"

"To meet my parents," he finished, coughing a little. Trying to keep his eyes focused away from the brown hair that gleams so nicely in the sunlight and the blue eyes that dance around the garden, a certain beautiful sadness in them evident even from this distance.

"Yeah, I'd love to," her voice was sharp and she was obviously irritated by Blaine's inability to concentrate on her, even if she didn't know what it was that was distracting him so completely. He thought about her resentment, decided he didn't care, and hung up.

Mr Knightly was right. There was nothing he could do about Blaine, but he had to wonder, after having seen him the night before, whether there was something more to his sudden aversion to Kurt. Maybe he was just trying to convince himself that it was anything but the truth, that Blaine wasn't comfortable with Kurt's sexuality. That he thought he was a 'freak' for it. Kurt bit his lip and pinched the bridge of his nose, his new strategy for stopping himself from getting over emotional.

Burt's head popped around the back door and Kurt managed to pull himself together, to look normal for his dad. "What's up?"

"What you doing out here?" he asked, watching Kurt – whose fingers seemed to be subconsciously chaining together the daisies around him. The boy looked down at his hands, dropped the beginnings of a bracelet and coughed, self-consciously.

"Just...getting a bit of fresh air." Burt nodded, understanding the unsaid. Kurt wanted to be near Blaine, near the good memories that he'd once shared with the boy he loved. But him understanding, didn't mean that it was a good idea.

"Well, I'm going to Carole's," he said, gruffly. Kurt's head flicked up, his eyes bright and inquisitive.

"As in Mrs Hudson? Finn's mom?" a smile was starting to spread across his face.

"Yes, erm...to thank her for helping yesterday I told her I would help with her car for free," he answered, as if there was no more to the situation than that, Kurt was grinning even more now.

"Of course, that's all that's happeni-"

"Still," Burt interrupted. "I would prefer if you would stay inside, just, after...yesterday." Kurt nodding, understanding that his Dad was still on edge from the day before, and that was without knowing the full extent of the situation.

Kurt nodded, his eyes flicking up toward Blaine's room and catching the glint of a silver bracelet, their eyes met once more and Kurt thought he could sense the loneliness behind them. It held much longer than the previous day, neither wanted to relinquish this reestablished contact, to go back to how it had been over the last week. Kurt was confused, he recognized the bracelet, it had been a present from Kurt himself. What was going on? The pajamas and now the bracelet. If Blaine hated him so much, why was he wearing things that were reminiscent of him. Kurt shook his head, breaking eye contact and ruffling up his hair in frustration, before going inside.

Blaine groaned, throwing his phone at the wall and hitting his hands against the window. Why couldn't he just leave it? He couldn't talk to Kurt any more and the more he ignored that, the less resistance he had to not do it again. Unwittingly, the boy was dissipating Blaine's ability to keep himself, his mom and Kurt safe. He exhaled heavily as he fell back against his bed, he was going to savor the time he had on his own, because tomorrow was going to be hell.

It seemed like minutes before the next day had dawned and the doorbell was ringing, he wished he could rip the damn thing off the wall and throw it at the girl pressing it. Blaine looked down at himself and the clothes that his mother had set aside for him to wear, he was still wearing pajamas and he really wished he didn't have to take them off. He'd decided to stop wearing Kurt's since they were starting to lose the smell of him and be replaced by his own. He took off his clothes, putting on his now crumpled shirt and jeans, he remembered Kurt explaining to him that the mix of the two made it "smart-casual".

"Blaine, I said a shirt," chided Kurt lightly, as he looked fondly at Blaine.

"This is a shirt!" whined Blaine, his face utterly baffled, Kurt rolled his eyes.

"Yeah, a polo shirt," he laughed, his face scrunching up adorably as he began to search through Blaine's wardrobe, who just lay back against his bed, giving up on dress-codes all together.

"Why wear a shirt and jeans together? I mean I'd get it if the shirt was patterned and fun and the jeans were...I don't know, red or something. But the jeans and the shirt are both so boring."

"It's smart-casual, that's what you do. You can't wear anything too flamboyant..." Kurt looked at Blaine, and Blaine looked at Kurt, they both burst out laughing. Blaine was laughing so hard he fell off the bed, and that only made them laugh harder.

Blaine smiled at the memory, realized he was just standing in the middle of his room grinning and made his way down stairs. His expression changed as soon as he saw Laura. His father was complimenting her, his mother shaking her hand fondly. Of course they liked her, she was a girl. Her blue eyes and brown hair were both shining in the light, Blaine knew why he'd picked her. Apart from having had an obvious crush on him since they'd started, he thought her looks would make it easier. Her pale skin, her eye and hair color, if Kurt was a girl, the two of them would not look too dissimilar, although Kurt would be much better looking, of course. His father looked up at him, an eyebrow quirked as if he had noticed the similarity between his son's girlfriend and best friend. Blaine still called Kurt his best friend, because even if he didn't deserve to call him by that title, he couldn't bear to admit he'd destroyed their friendship.

"Blaine," said Laura, her smile sweet but her eyes suggestive. Blaine hated that expression, it was the expression she'd used before she'd touched him. He controlled his emotions, forcing his face into looking happy.

"Laura," he grinned, jumping down the last few stairs toward her. She hugged him and he tried not to recoil, which became even harder when she gave him a peck on the lips. His eyes glanced to the satisfied look on his father's face and he took her hand, leading her into the dining room – as long as he was happy, everyone was safe.

"SHUT UP," Blaine wished he could shout those words, force them down his father's throat until his silence reigned supreme. But he said nothing, he just let the man continue; his obnoxious, false laugh booming out throughout the house.

"We thought Blaine would never get a girlfriend," drawled Mr Anderson, as he waved his fork around. Blaine was thankful that he didn't really like the girl, because otherwise he would be even more embarrassed. "But I can see that he was just waiting for such a girl as you." Laura blushed crimson and Blaine nearly threw up. There was something his father wanted from the girl, there was no way he was just being that nice for no reason.

Blaine looked to his mom, she looked so uncomfortable, she always did around his father after that night. He'd hardly talked to her, but he could see the pain in her eyes whenever she looked at him. He closed his eyes, counting up to ten in his head in an attempt to calm himself down. The main course consisted mostly of the light conversation between Mr Anderson and Laura, with Blaine dipping in occasionally. More jokes were made at Blaine's lack of girlfriend as well as more inappropriate (and yet heavily disguised ones) considering his 'lack of action'.

"Well I'm going to sort out the dessert," Mr Anderson announced and his son stared at him curiously, the man never volunteered to do anything himself, unless he had some kind of ulterior motive. "You couldn't give me a hand could you Laura?" Oh, there's the ulterior motive. Blaine's eyes grew clouded, he wasn't sure that he should let this happen, but the smirk in his father's eyes told him there was nothing he could do. He gritted his teeth, as the two of them headed to the kitchen.

Blaine turned to his mom and a new fear filled him, she hadn't spoken at all since they'd sat down, usually she was quiet, but not this quiet. "Mom?" he whispered, keeping an eye out for the other two. She ignored him, his brow furrowed. "Mom, are you okay?" She shook her head fractionally, Blaine's heart was quickening. What the hell was going on? "What's wrong?" Once again she shook her head. "He's not coming back yet, just tell me," this time she looked toward the door a little, as if double checking his word, when she seemed satisfied she began to speak.

"I...I..." she paused. "I'm not feeling very well," she finished and Blaine huffed.

"That's bullshit. Just tell me...please?" Her mask cracked a little as he pleaded with her.

"He told me not to talk when we got in here," she started, her voice low and shaky. "He wanted to talk to Laura and didn't want me to give her any ideas."

"Ideas? What are you talking about?" he asked, confusion taking center stage over his worry.

"He wants you two to stay together, he thinks it's my fault that you're..." she shrugged, as if to say 'well, you know' and Blaine sighed, he knew his mom loved him, but he also knew that she would tell his dad what he said.

"Mom, I have a girlfriend, I'm straight. Glee was just a joke with some guys," he reassured her, cursing every false word that came out of his mouth. She nodded, frowning a little and the two of them waited in silence

Laura smiled as the two of them entered the kitchen, Mr Anderson was what her friends liked to refer to as a 'DILF'. He was taller than Blaine and more tan, with muscly arms and dark, suggestive eyes. She decided that he must be around forty, but the age had definitely done him well. She'd been fond of Blaine for a while, but that didn't mean she wasn't open to anyone else. Besides, Blaine wasn't as eager as most of the people she dated. She pulled up her already short skirt and pulled down the front of her top to show more cleavage. This was her chance.

Mr Anderson turned suddenly, pinning her against the wall and leaning his head down to hers, she spread her legs, so her feet were either side of his. "So, Laura," he whispered, pushing further against her. "I hope you and Blaine are being safe," he tucked her hair behind her ear, carefully, as she stared deep into his eyes, not even able to comprehend how odd a question it was.

"We're not...we haven't even..." she broke off, moaning in pleasure. "We've pretty much only kissed," she finished, her breath heavy.

"Oh," he quirked his eyebrow. "Have you not tried?" Laura's mind flashed back to the time in library, when Blaine had been too disgusted by the boy in front of them, for it to go anywhere. But she decided not to mention it.

"Not yet..."

"Maybe you should," he cut in, his voice low and teasing. "And maybe you could get his little homo stalker to leave him alone, too." She smiled, her hands teasing around the edge of his pants.

"I'm sure I could," she whispered, before kneeling to the floor.

Kurt Hummel had been walking between the two houses when he'd turned and caught sight of a scarring image, he now sat beneath the Anderson window, hands over his mouth, trying not to throw up. He heard everything the two had whispered to each other through the open window, but didn't know what to do. There was no way that Blaine would believe him, he couldn't tell anyone at school and that had left him one thing, he really didn't want to do. Confront her himself.