For what felt like the hundredth time, Blaine sneezed. In reality, it was probably only the tenth time, but it had been so many sneezes that people stopped saying "Bless you" and the professor was glaring at him.

Kurt leaned his mouth towards Blaine's ear and whispered, "Are you okay?"

"It's nothing," Blaine muttered, trying to ignore the pounding in his head.

In reality, Blaine felt awful. He couldn't breathe through his nose it was so stuffed up, his head was throbbing, his throat felt like a seamstress was using it as her pin cushion, he'd been throwing up all night and was still nauseas this morning, and his entire body just felt like the muscles were so worn out they would never move again. He was in pain and exhausted, but he didn't want to worry Kurt. It was probably just a cold or flu or something like that; if he went to a doctor they'd just tell him to buy over-the-counter drugs and he'd have gone for nothing. He could make it for a few days until he felt better.

Or not. A wave of nausea rolled over him and hit him so hard he bolted out of his seat, class be damned, and headed across the hall to where the bathroom was conveniently located, thank God.

A steady hand was rubbing soothing circles on his back and dabbing a warm, wet paper towel to his forehead. Whoever that person was, they were his favorite. Seriously, they could have anything they wanted. His house? Take it. His first born? Take it. His soul? Take it. This person was the most amazing person on the planet and he would love them for forever because in that moment nothing felt better than those circles and that damp paper towel.

"How are you doing? Do you think you're done?"

The relief that hit him at Kurt's voice was even better than the circles. If it was Kurt doing that, he was lucky; his first born would probably be Kurt's too. He definitely lucked out on that heat-of-the-moment promise.

"Yeah," he rasped, trying to clear his throat. "I think so."

The nausea had subsided again and he felt well enough to stand up. Kurt fixed him with a pointed look and said, "You're going to the doctor."

"I really don't think that's necessary," Blaine said. "Seriously, it's not a big deal. A stuffy nose, a headache, nausea; they're all pretty run-of-the-mill symptoms." He cut off abruptly and sneezed, then finished, "I'll be fine."

Kurt pressed the back of his hand to Blaine's forehead, then his cheeks, and grimaced. "You have a fever."

"I'm fine."

"Was this your first time throwing up?"

Blaine hesitated, wanting to lie but knowing he shouldn't. "No. I threw up all last night."

Instead of seeming angry that Blaine didn't tell him, Kurt's features softened. "Poor baby. I'm sorry. You could have texted me, you know. I would have come down and taken care of you."

"I'm fine," he insisted again.

"You're being stubborn," Kurt stated, slipping his hand into Blaine's and pulling them out of the bathroom and down the hall, both of them having given up on class. "And I'm making an appointment. Do you have insurance?"

"Yes, I'm covered under Laurel."

"Good."

Blaine rolled his eyes. There was no getting out of it now. Kurt was completely determined that Blaine was deathly ill and until Blaine did as he said, he'd never hear the end of it. He might as well just go to a stupid doctor appointment, have them tell him it's a simple cold, and be done with it. At least then Kurt might leave it alone, if he heard from a doctor instead of just Blaine himself.

"Fine," Blaine said, "You win. I'll go to the doctor."

"That was never in question, Blaine, but I'm glad you'll go willingly instead of me having to drag you kicking and screaming."

"I'm more than capable of making my own appointments, you know," Blaine remarked.

They walked hand-in-hand out of the building and down the sidewalk, headed back to Blaine's dorm until Carter got back from classes. "I know. But sometimes you don't take care of yourself very well or look out for your own well-being. So this is me doing that for you."

He decided not to say anything in response to that. Really, what more could he say? Kurt was right. And it was touching that Kurt wanted to take care of him. He already knew that, of course, but neither of them had really had any medical issues yet or anything like that. It was more of just emotional stuff. This was a nice reminder that in sickness and in health they'd be together and there for one another, for whatever the other needed. Sure, they weren't married yet, but why did that mean their level of commitment had to be limited because of that? They could hold true to those vows regardless of whether a piece of paper from the government gave them permission to.

They arrived at Blaine's room in a matter of minutes and immediately Blaine started climbing the ladder to his bed and collapsed, feeling dead just from the walk to his dorm. Kurt headed straight for Blaine's desk and opened his laptop, logging on.

"What are you doing?" Blaine asked. He knew better than to ask how Kurt knew his password. Kurt knew everything about him.

"Looking up a doctor not too far from here that we can call and make an appointment with."

"Already? It could wait a little bit."

Kurt turned in the desk chair and fixed Blaine with a glare. "Blaine. Please. This is serious."

Blaine rolled his eyes. It wasn't that serious. Nonetheless, he let Kurt peruse the internet, googling the nearest doctor; generally, he'd have gone to his routine doctor, but since that was a pediatrician in Ohio he'd have to find a new one in New York to go to—preferably one for adults. When Kurt found one he was satisfied with, he pulled out his cell phone and started dialing a number he read from the computer screen.

A moment later, Kurt began speaking. "Yes, I'd like to make an appointment for my boyfriend, Blaine Anderson…He's got a stuffy nose, headache, fatigue, scratchy throat, and he threw up all last night and this morning in class…Yes, he has insurance…Oh, tomorrow at 8am? Yes, that works, his classes don't start until 10am. That should be good, right, Blaine?"

"Oh, I actually get a say in this?"

Kurt narrowed his eyes at him. "Yes, that's fine. Thank you for getting us in so quickly…You too." He hung up the phone and shut the laptop, walking towards the bunk beds. "We have an appointment at 8am tomorrow so you better be awake on time. I know how much you hate waking up early."

"We have an appointment?"

"I'm going, of course. You didn't think you were going alone, did you?"

"I don't know," Blaine shrugged, reaching out his arm to brush some of the longer hairs out of his boyfriend's eyes.

"Well, you're not. I'm taking you. Okay?"

Really, what could Blaine do? If his boyfriend wanted to take care of him, who was he to object? "Alright."

Kurt smiled. "Good. Now since you're sick, we're not making out. If you get me sick then I can't take care of you. So, I'm going to do homework. Do you need anything?"

Blaine shook his head and curled onto his side with his back to the wall, smiling sleepily at Kurt. "No, I think I'm just going to take a nap."

"Okay, sweetie. Just let me know if you want anything, okay? I'm going to stay here just in case you need me."

"Sounds good," he muttered, already closing his eyes.

All of the craziness going on in his body made him so tired that the second he really got comfortable, he was fast asleep.

…

Blaine woke up after what he guessed must have been a few hours, but he neglected to open his eyes. He vaguely registered hushed voices in his room. Cracking one eye open, he spotted Kurt still at his desk chair and Carter sitting on the floor in front of the television, game controller in hand but game paused. He shut the eye again and concentrated on going back to sleep.

He couldn't, though. Not when he started paying better attention to their conversation.

"How is Scotty doing, anyway? I know Blaine texts him a lot. Is he doing better?" That was Kurt.

"Yeah, a lot better. Talking to Blaine is really helping. He needed that mentor, you know? Someone who had gone through the same things and came out on the other side." That was Carter.

"I definitely understand that."

They both paused, and Blaine wondered if maybe their brief intimate moment was over. But then Carter picked right back up. To be honest, Blaine was surprised that it was Carter continuing it and not Kurt, but he'd always had a sneaking suspicion that Carter wasn't the dick he made himself out to be; how he acted about Amanda said it all.

"Listen, I don't know Blaine very well, but that dude is like my brother now. If you hurt him—"

"That talk is really unnecessary, Carter. Blaine is my entire world."

He heard Carter take a deep breath. "Look, I'm just saying that because I can see the way he looks at you, and the way he talks about you when you're not around is like he'd die without you."

"I assure you, the feeling is mutual."

Another pause.

"You know, you and Blaine remind me of me and Amanda."

Even without looking, Blaine knew Kurt was smiling to himself. "Thank you. It's always nice to be compared to a heterosexual couple in a positive light."

"I really don't understand what the big deal is about gay people. Any idiot could see you two are head-over-fucking-heels in love. How could anyone be against that?"

Kurt hesitated before speaking in a soft voice, "You know, Carter, I like you. You're a good person."

"Did you not like me before?"

"I had my doubts. But I can see now that the whole douche bag, typical frat boy stereotype you have going on is just a mask."

There were noises that sounded like they were coming from the TV and Blaine cracked his eye open again for a second to see Carter had unpaused the game, but was smirking.

"Yeah, well. If I let people know how nice I am I just sound like that pathetic loser that can't function because his girlfriend is on the other side of the country and he feels lost without her. See how lame that sounded?"

"On the contrary. I think that sounded beautiful."

"Exactly."

The last thing Blaine registered before falling back to sleep was Kurt rolling his eyes.

…

There was a gentle nudging that made him roll from side to side, but Blaine was so comfortable and still just felt utterly exhausted that he didn't move.

"Blaine, sweetheart, you have to get up. We have to get to your doctor appointment."

"Shut up, Kurt. I agreed to let you stay on the condition that you wouldn't wake me up early."

"I don't really have a choice, Carter, I have to wake him up and he's being stubborn. He's not a morning person."

"I know. Neither am I. And since he spent all of the night before last throwing up, and now you're waking me up early today, he's keeping me from my sleep."

"No offense, but you're not really my top priority right now. You could have gone to sleep early last night. You chose to stay up late playing Modern-Day War Tactics or whatever that ridiculous game was."

"Modern Warfare, Kurt. It was Modern Warfare: 3."

Blaine groaned. "For the love of God, if you two will shut up, I will get out of bed."

"Praise Jesus," Carter sighed; Blaine heard the bed shift below him and pictured Carter rolling over and getting comfortable again to go back to sleep.

Kurt leaned his forehead against Blaine's temple and pressed a kiss to his cheek. "Time to get up," he whispered.

"I know," Blaine whispered back.

Neither one of them moved. Kurt was curled around his body, playing big spoon. He felt Kurt shift upwards a little bit and hook his chin over his shoulder, talking with their cheeks pressed together. "Blaine, we're going to be late."

"Just one more minute, Soulmate. I promise I'll get up in a minute." Blaine decided to leave out the fact that he didn't want to get up because he felt like he might throw up.

Carter groaned. "Did you seriously just call him Soulmate? That's just…"

"Go back to sleep, C."

"No can do, B. Unfortunately, between your lovey-dovey boyfriend and your fatal illness, I can see now that I won't be able to sleep until you two leave for the doctor. So get your dead ass out of bed and get dressed and get the hell out of here."

"Don't play dumb. I know you secretly think Kurt and I are adorable."

"Disgusting."

"You said we reminded you of you and Amanda," Blaine pointed out, slowly climbing down the ladder so as not to jar his stomache too much. When he got to the bottom, he let out a breath of relief and treaded carefully over to his closet to pull out an outfit for the day.

"You were awake?" Carter asked.

Kurt came up behind Blaine with clothes in hand. "I already picked your outfit out last night. Your welcome."

Blaine turned around to step away from the closet and get dressed; Carter was still staring at him in awe before switching his gaze to Kurt. "How are you not surprised that he was awake last night when we were talking?"

Kurt shrugged. "Because I knew Blaine was awake, at least for a little bit. I could tell."

"How could you tell that?"

"He breathes more deeply when he's sleeping than when he's awake."

"You do realize how creepy that sounds, right?"

"That's not creepy," Blaine defended, kissing Kurt on the cheek. "Kurt makes these facial expressions when he sleeps. It's like this," Blaine attempted to make the face Kurt did, which earned a half-hearted slap on his arm from Kurt.

"Stop doing that!"

"That's what you look like!"

Kurt said something else, but suddenly Blaine felt too woozy to pick up on it. He clamped a hand over his mouth and shut his eyes tight, trying desperately not to vomit. He'd had enough of that over the past two days.

"Shit," Carter muttered, grabbing the trashcan and dumping the trash out on the floor, holding the now-empty bin out to him. "Here. In here."

"We need to get him to the bathroom," Kurt said, at Blaine's side with the reassuring circles on his back.

Blaine just held onto the plastic can for a second, not throwing up but feeling the overwhelming need to; he heard Carter retort, "Do you not see him? He's not going to make it to the bathroom. Just let him throw up here."

"It's okay," Blaine breathed out, holding the trash bucket back to Carter. "I'm fine. Let's just get dressed and go, okay?"

All this arguing was just making Blaine feel worse; especially since he knew Kurt and Carter had a bromance going on and just didn't want to admit it.

"Sure, yeah. Let me just get my clothes." Kurt headed toward the desk chair where his clothes were laid across the back.

Despite how awful he felt, Blaine had to laugh. "You brought your clothes over already?"

"No. You packed my drawer with your things and unpacked them here." The second Carter opened his mouth, Kurt cut him off. "And don't even with your commentary, Carter. I know if you and Amanda lived together your clothes would mingle together."

"You and Blaine don't live together. In fact, I live with him."

As Blaine finished changing clothes, pulling his shirt over his head, he sighed. "Can you guys just cut it out already? We all know your conversation last night while I was sleeping. You two like each other. You're friends. Admit it. Embrace it."

Kurt and Carter shared a look, and Blaine swore there was even a small smile there. He didn't say anything, though. If that was their version of acknowledging their friendship he'd accept it; just like Kurt knew and accepted that Carter's version of showing affection was a fist-bump.

Finally, Kurt was ready, and he and Blaine were able to head to the doctor's office. Partly because Blaine didn't know where he was going and partly because he was too sick to do anything but sluggishly drag his feet, Kurt led the way. They took a subway for about ten minutes before getting off at a stop they never had before and heading towards one of the many tall buildings of New York City.

When they entered the big glass doors, they took the elevator up to only the third floor. Kurt led Blaine to a desk to check them in.

"Hello, my name is Kurt Hummel. We have an appointment for my boyfriend Blaine Anderson with Dr. Lowe."

The receptionist nodded her head, typing something into the computer before handing them a clipboard with paperwork. "Right. Take this and fill it out. The doctor will see you shortly."

Kurt grabbed the clipboard and pen and sat down on a chair next to Blaine, beginning to fill out his paperwork for him.

"Don't you think I should be the one filling that out?" Blaine asked.

"I'm simply filling in the parts I know so that you don't have to do as much."

"I'm not that sick. I can fill out paperwo—how do you know my social security number?"

Blaine's boyfriend just waved his hand like it was no big deal and said, "Oh, I think I read it somewhere once. I'm good with numbers."

"Where would you have read it?" Blaine asked, leaning his head back against the wall and closing his eyes. He'd been focusing on the tap-tap-tap of Kurt hitting the pen against the clipboard, but suddenly it stopped. When Kurt didn't answer him, he knew something was wrong. He opened his eyes and, with great effort, lifted his head up. "What?"

"It, um…I need your parents' information."

"Wh-What for?"

"Just medical history, I guess…and they need to know if-…if you have any siblings…"

Blaine took the clipboard. "I'll take over from here."

As Blaine finished filling out all the paperwork, answering every inane question and filling in every blank and circling every correct option, he could feel Kurt staring over his shoulder. Eventually, Kurt stopped pretending he wasn't looking and just rested his head on Blaine's shoulder, openly watching.

Kurt had a thing for Blaine's hands.

"Your blood type is AB-negative?"

"Yes."

"That's the rarest blood type. Less than one-percent of people in the US have it."

"I know. That's why I donated at every blood drive Dalton hosted."

"How do you know your blood type off the top of your head? I can never remember mine."

"I…I heard it said the night…the night my parents kicked me out." He took a deep breath, feeling Kurt tilt his head up to look at his face but not saying anything about it. Instead, he continued, almost to himself, "I'll never forget a single aspect of that night. Even the random things doctors were saying around me."

"Blaine Anderson?" A nurse said, walking out of a door in the corner dressed in scrubs the color of a little kid's toothpaste.

Suddenly, Blaine was hit with the wondering thought of if his little brother used the same toothpaste he did when he was Alex's age.

Thinking about Alex gave him a sick feeling in his stomache that had nothing to do with nausea.

"Yes, I'm here," he croaked, standing up. Kurt stood with him and took his hand.

"The doctor will see you now."

…

Turns out, Blaine and Kurt were both wrong. Blaine had strep throat. Which was not just a cold or flu, but not a fatal disease. It was good enough for Blaine. He could accept that maybe he wasn't quite as okay as he thought, just as long as Kurt wasn't right either. They ended up having to go fill a prescription that he'd have to take, and he would have to miss classes for the rest of the week. That part had good and bad aspects; on the one hand, he wouldn't have to go to class, which would be a nice reprieve, but on the other hand, that was a lot of class to miss that he'd have to make up for, and he didn't know how he was going to catch up for three days' worth of missed classes. It would definitely take a lot of help from Kurt.

Kurt. Kurt, who was the best boyfriend in the entire world, Blaine was coming to find out. Well, he'd already known, but Kurt was continuing to prove it.

Over the next three days, Kurt went to all of Blaine's professors' office hours and let them know of the situation. Blaine imagined Kurt walking into all of his professors' offices and saying, "My name is Kurt Hummel and my boyfriend is in your (insert class here). He has strep throat and I'm here to ask about any notes or quizzes or homework or tests he might be missing in his absence." It was almost laughable, really. Especially since just because they were in New York didn't mean marching up as a male and announcing you had a boyfriend was acceptable for everyone; ignorance is a disease infecting every city in the world.

So really, after that first day after the appointment, Blaine didn't worry about classwork, because Kurt had him covered. The professors usually had a policy that stated if you miss class you have to get notes from a fellow classmate, but Blaine suspected Kurt fixed that real quick. "I don't think you understand. My boyfriend is ill. He spends entire days sleeping because he doesn't have energy to do much else. When he's not sleeping, he's spending hours curved around a toilet in those god-awful community bathrooms this university deems clean simply because janitors do a quick clean-up twice a day that probably does little for the germs around a toilet. He can't get out of bed to go fetch notes from classmates. I don't have time to go sit in on all of his classes and take notes for him. I'm simply asking for the material you cover so that he doesn't fall behind because of a health issue he has no control over."

Yeah. Kurt was pretty awesome.

But Kurt wasn't the only one. Even Carter was helping out. Since Blaine was on the top bunk, if he ever needed anything, Carter told him to just ask. He was hesitant at first, he didn't want to bother Carter, but when he was woken up in the middle of a nap by the overwhelming urge to vomit, he had no choice but to hastily ask for the trash can. Carter had it to him in record time and held it up to his head at the top bunk until he was done, then went and cleaned it out. When he returned, he had a bottle of water, some Saltine crackers, and grabbed Blaine's medication from the desk and offered it to him. Carter was the best roommate Blaine could have asked for.

Even Jonathan helped out. Jonathan, the guy Blaine had met fleetingly at a frat party that stood up for him before they even formally knew each other. After that party, Jonathan and Carter became even better friends, and soon Jonathan was coming over to play video games and just hang out with Carter all the time. Sometimes, Blaine would wake up from a nap to hear two voices from the lower bunk. It was obviously not Kurt, Jonathan's voice was much lower, but until he peeked his head down over the bottom of his mattress and its frame he had no idea what random person was in his room.

Jonathan remembered him, expressed his condolences at Blaine's sickness and offered him a turn in their video games, which Blaine gladly accepted. Sleeping all day every day got boring after a while.

That was exactly how Kurt found him when he came to Blaine's dorm at the end of his classes on Friday; playing Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3.

"Come on! Shoot him! Shoot him!" Carter yelled, leaning forward and pressing the controller so hard it was like he thought that the sheer force of his playing could take him into the game.

"Blaine, where are you at, man?" Jonathan asked.

"Hiding in the corner on the roof of one of the buildings. I'm being a sniper," he replied.

He spotted Kurt walking through the door and grinned for the first time in days. "Hey, baby. I'm playing a video game."

"Yes, I see that," Kurt stated, looking at the screen like it was covered in swamp algae and cockroaches.

Jonathan and Carter sacrificed a quick glance and nod at Kurt in acknowledgment of his presence before returning their focus to the screen. "Sup, Kurt," they said simultaneously.

Kurt made eye contact with Blaine as he dropped his backpack by the beds and climbed the ladder to get to Blaine. "Do they always do that?"

"Yes," they both answered at the same time.

The couple on the top bunk made eye contact and shook their heads with a small smile. It was nice to see Carter make such good friends who were so accepting of Blaine and Kurt. Not that either of them would mind if Carter had friends who weren't so celebrating of homosexuality, but it seemed as if Carter minded. With that, it was even nicer to know that Carter almost considered himself family with them. Blaine believed it was fate for him and Carter to be roommates just as much as it was that he and Kurt met over the summer at CSCC.

Everything in Blaine's life was slowly falling into place. It had started happening the day he met Kurt and hadn't stopped since. Although, Blaine had to admit, some of it had nothing to do with Kurt. Regardless of his boyfriend, he would have been assigned to room with Carter. He already knew David and Wes. But he couldn't help but to attach all the good things in his life to Kurt.

"You seem like you're finally starting to feel better, hm?" Kurt asked, bumping his shoulder against Blaine's with a smile. They were both sitting with their feet hanging off the edge of the bed, their backs against the wall.

Blaine shot someone trying to shoot Jonathan and nodded. "Yeah. I haven't felt nauseas at all today."

"Yes! Thanks for that save, Blaine. Yeah, it's been great hanging out with Carter in a room that doesn't reek of puke for once."

"I'd think you'd be used to that living at the frat house," Carter teased, sneaking around a dilapidated warehouse.

"Nice one," Jonathan said.

That was one of the things Blaine liked about Jonathan. He was in a fraternity, but he wasn't snobby about it. He could take the jokes about it if he knew they were true.

They played for another half-hour with Kurt watching patiently. To be honest, Blaine was surprised that it took Kurt that long before he started to get bored. He did assume, though, that when it happened Kurt would start voicing his boredom loudly to the whole room and complaining until the game was shut off or Blaine agreed to stop playing and do something else with him. What he didn't expect was for Kurt to casually place his hand on his knee and then slowly start inching it up his thigh. Once he started dancing his fingers across Blaine's zipper, the controller slipped out of his hands.

He grabbed Kurt's wrist and gave him a pointed look.

"Blaine! What are you doing up there? Get back in the game, man!" Jonathan shouted.

Blaine watched Kurt's eyes turn from feigning innocence to openly mischievous. "Kurt, stop," Blaine murmured in a low voice, holding Kurt's gaze.

A slow smirk etched its way on Kurt's face as he shook his head and swung one leg over both of Blaine's, sitting up on his lap (as best as he could with the ceiling so close to them on the top bunk) and straddled him. He swooped down and latched his lips on Blaine's neck, one hand on his chest and one hand raking through the curls on the back of his head.

"Blaine! What the hell are you doi—?" Carter cut his question off before he could even finish. "Seriously? You're making out the middle of the game?"

"Really?" Blaine heard the bed shifting below him and knew Jonathan was standing up to join Carter in watching them. "Dang. I don't know, Carter, if I was getting action like that I probably wouldn't be playing this stupid game either."

Kurt took his mouth off of Blaine's neck, causing Blaine to whimper, and turned his head around, glaring at them. "You can either watch or get out."

"But this is my room!" Carter protested.

Jonathan shifted from foot to foot. "Well, he did say we could watch—"

"I'm not watching them make out, Jonathan. That's a line I never want to cross with Blaine. Let's just go to the Delta Phi house."

"Whatever. I'm cool either way."

Carter and Jonathan shut off the game system and left, Carter grumbling about being sexiled and Jonathan grumbling about how that would be interesting to watch—for research purposes, of course.

As soon as they were gone, Kurt went for Blaine's lips, but Blaine held a hand between them, gently pushing Kurt back. "I'm still sick, Kurt. Just because I feel better doesn't mean I'm not still contagious."

"I've spent every day with you the entire time you've been sick. So has Carter. Neither one of us has caught anything. I think we're okay."

"I just don't want to get you sick," Blaine insisted.

"You won't."

Blaine didn't want to get his boyfriend sick, but at the same time, it had been over a week since they'd been able to do anything, and he could only ward off Kurt's advances for so long before his self-control collapsed and he gave in.

After all, his boyfriend was kind of really hot.

Even though Blaine was okay with kissing Kurt, the universe wasn't; the second they connected Blaine's cell phone went off beside him.

"Mmm, don't answer it," Kurt muttered against his lips.

"I have to," Blaine sighed, "What if it's important?"

"They'll call a second time. If they call again you can answer it."

That was good enough for Blaine. He went back to kissing Kurt, not really caring about his cell phone. It stopped ringing, and since it was silent for a moment he thought they were in the clear.

Until it started ringing again.

Kurt groaned in frustration, a low and guttural sound Blaine had never heard from Kurt before, and answered Blaine's phone himself. "Hello?" he grumbled.

In an instant, the frown left his face and he clutched the phone harder. "Laurel, you're hysterical, I can't understand you."

"It's Laurel?" Blaine asked.

He got a terrible feeling in the pit of his stomache, which would have been a comfort if it was nausea, but it wasn't. It was something worse.

"Okay, okay, hold on. Let me give the phone to Blaine." Kurt held the phone out, eyes wide. "I don't know. I don't know."

Blaine snatched the phone from his hand and held it to his ear. "Laurel?"

"Blaine!" Her voice was at a much higher pitch than normal and as soon as she started talking, it was so fast he almost couldn't understand her. "Blaine, oh my God, I've been trying to reach you all day but my phone wasn't working it was doing that thing that it does where it won't get signal even though it's in a signal range and then it wasn't sending my calls out and it was glitching and then it froze and I had to turn it off then on and that fixed the frozen part but—"

"Laurel, Laurel, calm down. Take a deep breath," he heard her do as instructed through the phone, "Okay. Now count to ten. When you're done, tell me what happened."

There was a pause as Laurel counted to ten in her mind. Then, "I was at school, at Dalton. In the middle of class, the principal pulled me out and said my mother was there to see me."

Already, Blaine didn't like the sound of this. "Your mother pulled you out of class? Sounds like you were a student instead of the teacher."

"I know. And you know I haven't spoken to my mom in months, since she called just to check up on me like she does every so often. She's never visited me in person, Blaine. Ever."

"What was she there to tell you, Laurel?"

"Something…Something's happened. In our family."

"What was it?"

All of these scenarios ran through his head about one of his grandparents dying, or a great aunt or uncle or something.

"My mom found out from my dad who found out from his brother, your father, that Alex is sick."

Alex is sick.

Somehow, Blaine instinctively knew that Alex was sick in a completely different way than Blaine was sick.

Laurel had found out about Alex the night of that horrific party, the day it happened. It took her a while to wrap her mind around it, too, but since that night neither of them had spoken of it. Not at the airport, not on the phone or over Skype. It was forbidden territory. Alex went into the category of his parents and Trevor; not because of anything Alex had done, but because it hurt too much to think of the brother Blaine would probably never get the chance to know.

That seemed even more likely for a totally different reason now.

"What do you mean, Alex is sick?"

"He…Well, I don't know all of the specifics, but he has…um…he has leukemia. Some form of it."

It felt like Blaine's world crashed down around him all over again. When would that ever stop?

"Blaine, that's not it." Why was there always something more? "Alex's parents…your parents…they were telling my dad how Alex has a really rare blood type."

"No," Blaine said, in denial. He shook his head.

Kurt tilted his head to the side, touching a gentle hand to Blaine's bicep.

"He's AB-negative."

"No," he repeated, because he could see where she was going with this and he didn't like it.

"Blaine, you're the only other match in the family. Your parents, they were saying how they might need AB-negative blood for treatment or something for Alex. They're coming to see you."

They're coming to see you.

He felt numb. He didn't know what to do with the situation. It was heartbreaking because of Alex and infuriating because of his parents. He didn't want to see them even more now because of their confrontation at the grocery store.

"When are they coming?" he managed to say. He was surprised at how level his voice sounded.

"Their flight took off two hours ago."

Blaine knew what that meant. He'd flown from Ohio to New York City already. That meant they were already here.

"I'm so sorry, Blaine," Laurel said, and he could hear the tears in her voice.

"It's okay, Laur. Thank you for telling me. I'll talk to you later."

"Blaine!—"

Blaine hung up the phone and tossed it on his pillow, staring at it.

He felt Kurt place his hands on either side of his face and force him to look at him. "Blaine? What happened?"

"Alex is sick."

"Like, how you're sick?"

Blaine could only shake his head; he knew Kurt got the message, just like Kurt got the message when his father told him the same thing about his mother so many years ago.

"Who's coming?" Kurt's tone was scared, like he already knew but needed confirmation.

The knock on the door was all the answer he needed, but Blaine replied anyway.

"My parents."