Kurt showed up on Zach's doorstep fifteen minutes after his last text. Zach's house was small with two bedrooms, an office, living room, bathroom and kitchen/dinning room.

Kurt looked like he'd been crying. "That didn't take long," Zach said as when he opened the door. "Come in." Kurt walked in Zach's house and looked around quickly. He had never been inside before.

"Thank you for letting me come over."

"No problem. I saw Blaine sitting outside when I got into my car and figured you'd be calling me."

"What made you think that?"

"Because if you didn't call me that meant that you two got back together and wouldn't need me anymore." He said it matter-of-factly, like it was simple truth that he'd known all along. Kurt didn't know how to answer that. Zach smiled. "It's okay. I know we're friends, but I also know what this is. One day, instead of needing to hold my hand and trying to stay strong, you'll maybe want to play video games and talk about the weather."

"I hate video games."

Zach chuckled. "I hate talking about the weather."

Kurt managed a smile. A woman with blonde hair twisted up in a clip, wearing a sundress walked into the room. He knew this to be Zach's mom, but Zach didn't wholly resemble her. He had some familiar features, but not enough to say "Oh, I know who's son is yours."

"Mom, this is Kurt," Zach introduced.

Kurt noticed a slight twitch in her face when Zach introduce him, which he found odd, but she still smiled and greeted him warmly. "I'm Beth," she said.

"Thank you for having me over."

"We're glad for the company." Beth turned her attention to Zach. "Why don't you two hang out while I finish up in the kitchen." She smiled and Kurt now saw the family resemblance. They had the same perfect smile that could light up a room. She turned on the balls of her feet and walked out of the room.

"So, what happened with Blaine?" Zach asked,

"He kissed me."

Zach raised his eyebrows as if to signify that he was now at full attention. "And?"

"It didn't feel the same."

"What do you mean?" They walked over to the couch and sat down.

Kurt faced forward, talking animatedly with his hands and looking at nothing in particular. "I used to be able to get swept away in his kiss without even meaning to. Like, if love had a texture, it felt like that. I don't know how stupid that sounds, but I don't know how to explain it."

"And now?"

"I couldn't help thinking about seeing that clip on my phone of James and Blaine. I get a panicked feeling now."

"Do you still love him?"

"Yes."

"But you don't feel it when he kisses you."

"It's not that. Ugh. This is confusing. I just get distracted by the fact that he cheated. Me loving him has nothing to do with it. Although he thought it was because of you."

"Naturally."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"He doesn't like me. It's not a statewide secret. He's never liked me."

"You didn't exactly give him a reason to." Kurt was surprised that he became so quickly defensive.

"Even before that. In the coffee shop. He hated me then too."

Kurt didn't want to get into it because he knew Zach was right. "I told him that I wasn't ready to get back into something and needed time to get over what happened."

"And then he left?"

"Yeah."

"Then you called me?" Kurt saw the look on Zach's face.

"Was that bad?"

"No. Not exactly."

"What part of the not exactly was bad?"

"Nothing. Never mind. Why did he think it was my fault?"

"Because he saw you holding my hand and hugging me. He thought we were together. When I told him we weren't he then asked me if I wanted to be."

Zach wanted to ask what Kurt's answer was, but didn't want to make the moment awkward. Kurt continued talking. "I don't know, Zach. I miss him and I want to be with him. I love him."

"But?"

"But I can't get him with someone else out of my head. I know I can trust him again, but I don't know how to get back to where we were. I don't know how to forget about it."

"Maybe you two need to date other people to appreciate what you had."

"I don't want to see him with someone else. That's kind of why I'm not with him now, because he was with someone else."

"But if you're not together, he has full right to see other people."

"UGH!" he put his head in his hands, exasperated. "Why does this have to be so difficult?" Zach scooted closer and rubbed Kurt's back. "If I'm with him, all I can think about is him with James, if I'm not with him, he has the freedom to be with James or anyone else."

Zach stopped rubbing Kurt's back, but kept his arm slung over his shoulder. He was thinking. "Kurt, can I ask you a question?"

"Of course."

"If or when you do go back to him, I say that because it seems like an inevitability; what does that mean for us?"

"Us?" Kurt lifted his head.

"Our friendship," Zach corrected. "Blaine doesn't like me and obviously feels threatened by our relationship. He has to be able to trust you around me just as much as you trusting him around the boys at his school. So… what does that mean?"

Kurt blinked a few times, his face going blank. "I hadn't thought about that. You're right though. I guess I don't really know. I don't want to not be your friend. I don't want you to have to go away."

"I don't want to go away either."

"I guess he'll just have to deal then."

"Would it be that simple though?"

Kurt knew Zach was leading him. Damn, he's trying to make me realize something. I hate it when he does this. "He can't control who I go to school with."

"Kind of like how you can't control that he goes to school with all boys, a small chunk of them being gay."

"Oh. I get it. You're trying to say that I can't expect Blaine to accept us being around each other the way we are, if I can't accept him being around other gay guys."

"That is what I'm saying, but I think you're making trust issues up in your head now."

"I am?" Kurt sounded annoyed.

"Yeah. Do you honestly think that he's going to cheat on you again? For Christ sakes, he had blacked out when he did it, and neither you nor I know or even him know what brought him to that point anyway. It's not other people you have to worry about and it's not Blaine you have to worry about. It's you."

"Me? Why me?"

"You admitted that you can't get the picture of them out of your head. It's your thoughts. YOUR thoughts, not his or anyone else's actions."

Kurt was silent for a minute and then made a face, knowing Zach was right. It was him. Blaine wasn't the problem. It was Kurt.

"Now, all you have to do is figure out what's keeping you from letting it go and letting yourself be with him."

"Who are you? You're like a Yoda with all the answers."

Both boys were laughing when Beth came back in the living room. "Dinner is about ready if you want to show him to the kitchen."

The kitchen table was round, with four chairs around it. One chair had mail piled on the seat, with Zach's back pack hanging on the back of the chair. The table was set for three with a glass of water and a bowl of salad in front of everyone's setting. Beth was bringing the items for the entr�e from the counter to the table.

"It's just the two of you?" Kurt asked when they all sat down. He expected Beth to answer, but she didn't.

"Yeah, my dad is still in Europe," Zach answered for her.

"That must be hard, being so far away."

"Skype is a wonderful invention."

"So, you and Zach have been pretty inseparable lately."

Kurt glanced at Zach who seemed unphased by the question and took a bite of his meatloaf that he dipped in his mashed potatoes. "I'm kind of going through something right now. He's been a great friend." He saw her eyes flicker to her son and she smiled lightly.

By the time dinner was over Kurt had begun to wonder why Zach's mother kept doing certain things. She seemed to make the same facial twitch whenever Zach said Kurt's name, and never said anything about her son or husband. Don't mothers do that? he thought. Carol talks about Finn, Dad, and me all the time to everyone who'll listen.

Beth was cleaning up and told Zach and Kurt to go hang out. They went into the living room and Kurt found himself looking at all the pictures in the room. There were many and 95% of them were of just Zach. Then, behind a cluster of framed photographs, Kurt saw a photo of Zach and another boy who looked exactly like him and the amount of photos made sense. "You have a twin brother?" he asked.

He sighed and cleared his throat as if a little uncomfortable. "Had, Kurt. I had a twin brother."

"Oh. I'm so sorry." Kurt's tone was sympathetic, but apologetic because he caught on too late that there was probably a reason for Zach and his mom to only have one picture of the two of them together. Separately, they could have all been Zach, but together, there was a photo of someone who was no longer there. "What was his name?"

"Curtis."

Kurt turned his eyes down. "Curt?" he asked, saying it more like a statement.

"Yeah."

"I'm sorry," Kurt repeated, not knowing what else to say and now understanding why Beth had flinched whenever she heard his name. He felt Zach's hand slide into his own and tangle his fingers shut tightly around Kurt's.

Zach turned and face Kurt abruptly with a serious expression. "I'm not friend's with you because you're a replacement for him."

"I wasn't thinking that." He was thinking that.

"I just really want you to know that." Kurt chewed on his bottom lip, his eyes soft. "I think the reason I was so happy to meet you was because the teacher said 'Why don't you take a seat next to Kurt.' I wanted to be around you at first because it was so nice to hear his name again. Then I quickly found that you're nothing like him and that turned out to be the best part about you to me, including that fact that you didn't treat me that same, but we've been over that already. Being around you didn't make him any less dead, but it made me forget that it made me miss him so much.

"It that why you told me today that you need me too? Because if you have me with you then the hurt is less."

"In a way, but there more to it. A lot more."

"Do you want to talk about it?" He felt Zach's thumb tracing lines on the top of his hand like he had earlier in the car.

"I haven't talk about it with anyone."

"Do I need to help you out of a tub to get you to talk to me?" Kurt grinned while he said it.

Zach smiled lightly. "Come on." He led Kurt by his hand to his bed room and shut the door. They sat on Zach's bed together because there were no chairs in the room. They both sat facing each other and Zach took a deep breath before speaking. "I don't talk about Curt. If I do, I talk about him as if it were me. I know that sounds crazy, but that's how we felt. We were the same person. You saw the pictures, no one could tell us apart. No one. Not even our parents. They were always mixing us up." He smiled. "We used that to our advantage as kids." His smiled faded. "I know you lost your mother, but you can't know what losing a twin is like. He died and I feel like half of me died with him."

"How did he die?" Kurt asked when Zach went silent.

Zach bit his bottom lip. "He threw himself off the bell tower at our school."

"Oh my god. Zach… He…?"

"Yeah. He killed himself."

"I'm so sorry."

"Some rumor went around school about him and he became a shell of a person I once knew because of the taunting and bullying. In the last month of his life, he looked like you did when you found out Blaine had been with another person. Just… broken and empty and so alone." He swallowed hard. "It didn't matter what I said or did because by the time I noticed anything, he was far past the point of wanting help."

"You blame yourself."

"Sometimes, but no. I blame those assholes who get to live when they murdered my better half with a stupid label."

Now Kurt understood why Zach snapped at him in the hotel about labeling him. He pushed the thought away and stayed on topic. "But you feel guilty. I can see it."

Zach's eyes welled. "I- I c-" a tears streamed down his cheek. "I couldn't-" He breath was catching. "I tried so hard and I couldn't protect him or keep him safe. I couldn't save him, Kurt."

Kurt leapt to his crying friend and wrapped his arms around his torso. Zach kept one hand tight behind Kurt's head and the other on his back. "I saw the look on your face when Blaine broke up with you and I couldn't stop myself from thinking: here's my chance. This time I can save him. I can keep him from feeling empty and alone." He breathed heavily. "I can't lose you."

"Hey, hey, hey," Kurt soothed. "I'm not going anywhere. You got me, I'm here." Without thinking, he kissed his cheek as he would have done for Blaine.

Zach pulled back slightly, his right hand still holding his face, and looked Kurt in his eyes, drowning himself in the honesty of Kurt's oceanic orbs.

For a split second, Kurt caught Zach's eyes flick down Kurt's face and then fly back up to his eyes. Kurt's facial expression changed and felt both pity and something he wasn't sure what. He felt the familiar electric feeling that he used to feel with Blaine that made him think Zach was going to kiss him. Zach looked like he was waging a war within himself.

Zach let go of Kurt and leaned against his wall, bringing his feet up and onto the bed. Kurt let go of the thought that Zach would even want to kiss him and moved to sit next to him against the wall, when his phone rang.

A picture of his Dad popped up on the screen when he took his phone out of his pocket. "Hi Dad," he greeted.

"Hey Kurt. Uh, do you think that you could come home early tonight, before curfew? I'd like to talk to you."

"Sure. When?"

"You know. I don't want to disrupt whatever fun you're having, but the sooner that better."

"Oh. Okay. I'll come home then."

"You don't have to leave now."

"No. I'll come home." They finished up their call and Kurt turned to Zach. "I have to go."

"I know."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be." Zach faked a smile. "You didn't do anything wrong. And I don't want you to feel sorry for me." He paused, turning his head towards the fair skinned boy. "I'll walk you to your car."

Kurt found himself in another hug with Zach's arms wrapped around him when they reached Kurt's car. "Thank you," Zach said.

"For what?" Kurt asked.

"I've never talked about Curt to anyone besides my parents. It felt good to get it out."

"Anytime."

"Do you feel better about what to do about Blaine?"

"No. I'm still confused, but I'm not upset anymore. I know I'll figure it out eventually."

Zach held him tighter, the sides of their heads pressed tightly together. "Just don't forget about me if you decide to go back to him."

"I promise."

"Promise?"

"Promise."

"I can't lose you."

They pulled apart from one another and Kurt turned back to him when he opened his car door. "I can't lose you either."

Zach smirked and Kurt got into the car, turning on the ignition, and driving off.

Kurt reflected on his visit with Zach and became confused. He had originally gone over because he was crying about Blaine. By the end it was about Zach. Not just Zach, but Kurt and Zach, as an 'us.' He thought about how much he wanted Zach in his life and couldn't just leave him behind if he went back to Blaine, even if it made Blaine uneasy because Zach was more than a temporary friend. Then he thought about the looks exchanged between them both and how they made him feel and that floated into a thought about how he thought Zach was about to kiss him. "Why do things keep coming back to that?" he asked himself aloud. "Blaine got the impression we were together, Mercedes thought he had a crush on me when we first met, my dad had to ask if he was straight or gay." He could certainly understand why Zach was so affectionate with him now. He was doing for Kurt what he didn't or couldn't for his brother. But what if Zach had kissed him? Would he have let him? Would he have liked it? And moreover, would Kurt have kissed him back? When he pulled into his driveway at home, he didn't have any more answers, but chalked the possible almost kiss up to an emotional moment that could have been mistaken for something else.

Kurt walked into the house, slipping his shoes off his feet, dropping his keys I the bowl and calling to his Dad that he was home.

"In here!" Burt yelled. He was in living room. Kurt went into the living room and sat on the couch.

"What's up?" he asked.

"Why didn't you tell me that Blaine cheated on you?"

Kurt was taken aback. "How'd you find out?"

"Blaine told me. He came to the shop today. Why didn't you tell me?"

"Because I didn't want to talk about it. What was Blaine doing at the shop?"

"He came to thank me for talking to his Dad and the conversation went into you two."

"What did he say?"

"That he messed up and is paying for it. That he wants you back and he loves you. That he doesn't deserve your forgiveness, but counts himself lucky that you're giving him a chance to earn his trust back."

Kurt couldn't look his dad in the eyes because he knew that he couldn't possibly know the how of the situation and didn't want it to read on his face. "You're talking to me about this, so you must have some thoughts on the matter."

"What I think doesn't matter, Kurt. I wanted to make sure that you were okay with handling everything."

"Yeah, Dad. I'm fine. I was in a pretty bad place when I found out, you saw that, but I'm better now. I've had a lot of help."

"You mean, that Zach kid."

"Yeah. He's been really great through this whole thing." Kurt couldn't help, but smile a little when talking about what Zach did for him, then it went away when he remembered why Zach felt he needed to help.

"You're not developing feelings for him are you?"

"Why would you ask me that?"

"Wow. Okay. Does Blaine know he has competition?"

"What?" Kurt exclaimed. "Wait! Dad. No. You've got it all wrong. Zach and I are just friends."

"That's not what you said though. I asked if you had feelings for Zach, a question which warrants a yes or no answer, and instead of answering you ask me why I'd asked. You were avoiding the question."

Kurt stuttered his breath. "N-no I wasn't. I was asking why you would ask such a thing when you know how I feel about Blaine."

"Who cheated on you and broke up with you. Then suddenly this new boy, who is very intense about you, by the way, is glued to you like a vacuum seal."

"We're leaning on each other. That's all."

"And when one of you doesn't need a crutch?"

"We'll still be friends."

"I'm sorry Kurt, but I don't think that's what it is. I think you need to re-evaluate what's going on with this boy and you."

"Why do people keep questioning his sexuality. Even if I had feelings for him, it wouldn't matter because he's straight."

"No he isn't."

"What? Yes he is."

"No. I don't think so. When I asked him, he didn't tell me what he was, he told me what he wasn't. Sort of what you did. He avoided the question."

"Yeah, and if he wasn't gay, then he's straight. There's two options dad, it doesn't take a detective to make that deduction if he says he's not gay."

"What if he's questioning, Kurt? Have you ever thought about that? That he plays for both teams?"

"There's no such thing as bisexual men, Dad. Bisexual is just a term gay guys use in high school to hold hands with girls and look normal."

"Are you sure? Kurt, you've only met a handful of gay teens. You can't know what every other guy goes through. The way he looks at you and the look on his face when you're mentioned… It just seems that if he is straight then he's a bit confused on his feelings for you. Straight men don't look like that when another guy is concerned."

Kurt was quick to defend Zach, but in the back of his mind he had been thinking of the different looks and things that the boys shared. Zach held his hand and embraced him often. He could have sworn Zach had wanted to kiss him earlier. Was his Dad right?

"And you still haven't answered my question about if you were developing feelings for him. I'm concerned because if you are giving Blaine another chance, you've got no right to be running around with this kid."

"Dad, Blaine cheated on me, Zach was there for me, why are you on Blaine's side."

"I'm not, Son. I'm just pointing out that if jealousy is an issue, it doesn't make it even to make him jealous by being with him and being close with another guy at the same time. Also that makes you a bit of a whore for leading Zach on too."

"Dad!"

Burt chuckled. "Sorry. I'm not calling you a whore."

"Yes you are!"

"No, really I'm not."

"Do you know how uncomfortable this conversation is for me? Would it make you uncomfortable if I told you I was hooking up with a guy?"

"Yes probably."

"Then in that case, I've blown half the football team and faculty and slept with every Warbler."

He stood up and stomped off to his room, leaving his father calling out, "If I find out that's true, I'm going to send you to rehab for sex addiction!"

"If you start asking around, I really will make it true."

Before he reached the top of the stairs he heard his father at the bottom of the stairs yelling for him to stop. "I'll leave you alone, but in all seriousness, if you have feelings for Zach, you need to explore that and really think about it because if wouldn't be fair to you or Blaine in the long or short run. If you two are serious about making it work, you need to work on each other with a level playing field. Another guy on the side won't be working on things."

Kurt sighed. "I know. Good thing there isn't another guy on the side, then isn't it?" He went into his room and plopped down face first onto his bed. "AAHHHHH!" He groaned into the fabric. "Fuck my life!"

Though, his mind was screaming, his body was betraying him. His stomach tightened and his groin flexed itself. "What the fuck! Seriously?" he yelled to himself. He was annoyed with his body, but chuckled at his situation... He was stressed out, feeling betrayed, anooyed...and turned on? Then he got an idea. What if what everyone was saying about Zach was true? What if what was keeping Kurt from letting go and feeling that spark when he kissed Blaine was an emotional attachment to Zach. He had to find out. He had to know. He had to figure this out... He pulled out his phone and sent a text.

K- I know this will sound confusing after today, but will you meet me for coffee tomorrow?

B- Anything for you.

Kurt felt the urge to say 'I love you,' but didn't know if it'd be appropriate or confuse him more. Then he stopped caring. It would head in that direction again anyway, right?

K-I love you

B- You don't know how good it feels to read that from you. I love you too.