Kurt was in Blaine’s lap and working a spot behind his ear that was particularly sensitive, judging by the stunted little noises he gasped out. It took him a moment to register that Blaine had gone very quiet and still, and Kurt’s panting suddenly sounded very loud in his ears. He pulled back, confused, to see Blaine looking surprised and a little alarmed, staring at something over Kurt’s shoulder.
“Blaine? What’s wrong?”
Blaine’s answer consisted of a nervous cough, his eyes still glued to the something behind Kurt. Then there was the sound of someone clearing their throat. A someone with a deep, gruff voice, who was standing almost directly behind Kurt. He scrambled off Blaine’s lap, almost toppling off the bed in his hurry, before finally untangling himself from the blankets and Blaine’s legs enough to turn around and look up in his father’s face.
“Dad!”
His father was looking at them with a shrewd glint in his eyes, his mouth twisting into a small smirk. Kurt thought to himself that he had the look of a man who was already mentally preparing his speech for his son’s wedding and adding the current situation to his list of all the most embarrassing anecdotes he was going to tell. The notion sent more blood rushing to his already scarlet cheeks. One glance at Blaine showed him to be positively aflame, his cheeks and ears blazing and his eyes trained on Burt as if the eye contact was the only thing preventing the man in the doorway from disembowelling him with his bare hands. Blaine opened his mouth and gave a small, choked off cough.
“Oh. M-Mr Hu – “ Another cough.
Kurt wanted to run away. He wanted to shrink and to fit in the smallest hole and never come back out. Instead, he gulped and looked back up at his father, who could no longer hide his amusement, and then took a steadying breath.
“You… Uh. You’re home early.”
His father chuckled.
“Yeah. I… I had some paperwork. Ted’s locking up the shop instead. He’s staying late anyway.”
There was a pregnant pause in which Blaine fiddled with a loose thread from his sleeve, Burt scratched his head, still looking a little punch-drunk for all his amusement, and Kurt tried his hardest to sink through the floor.
“So. Who’s this?”
“This? Oh. Um. This is… This is Blaine, dad. Erm. Blaine, meet my dad.”
Blaine shot him a panicked, sideways look before waving his hand feebly and offering a quiet “Hi” in a small piping voice. Burt offered his hand, and Blaine shook it. Kurt thought he saw Blaine trying to suppress a wince and made a mental note to chastise his father later for trying to crush his boyfriend’s hand. Apparently, something about it showed on his face, because his father shot him an apologetic grin before releasing Blaine’s hand. He stepped back, eyeing Blaine curiously.
“Blaine, huh?”
Blaine nodded and Burt smiled.
“It’s good to meet you, finally. Kurt’s talked about you, of course, and he may not have said so, but you make him really happy, you know.”
Blaine, whose face had just begun to look normal again, blushed madly, and then furrowed his brow in confusion.
“…Kurt?”
But Burt kept talking, and Kurt’s small hope that this would be a salvageable situation died in his chest.
“And I know Carole has been dying to meet Kurt’s secret boyfriend, too. Don’t worry, though; we won’t tell anybody. Your secret’s safe with us.”
By now, Blaine was looking bewildered, and Kurt could tell what he was going to say, even before he opened his mouth. And sure enough.
“Wait, who? Kurt? I don’t. I mean; no! I’m Colin’s boyfriend, not… not Kurt’s.”
Burt’s face darkened in confusion, the smile disappearing completely.
“Colin? Who the hell is Colin? Kurt, what’s going on here?”
He turned to Kurt, who had never been so aware of just how tall and imposing his father could be. Kurt felt as if he had had live snakes for breakfast, but there was nothing for it.
“It’s… um… I know it looks weird, dad, but – “
“You’re damn right it looks weird! It looks like you’re fooling around with somebody else’s boyfriend, is what it looks like! You’d better start explaining.”
There was a short silence following that outburst and Kurt tried to organise his thoughts, but they kept shooting of in every direction like frightened rabbits searching for a way out of a trap.
“Now, Kurt!”
That was what did it. Understanding and hurt flared in Blaine’s eyes.
“You’re Kurt? Your name isn’t Colin?”
Burt’s mouth fell open. Kurt couldn’t tear his eyes away from Blaine’s shocked face, and there was a faint ringing in his ears.
“Yes, I am Kurt. My name’s… my name’s not Colin. I made that up. In… in the bookshop.”
Burt’s voice, though quiet, seemed to echo in the room.
“What is this? Kurt, kiddo…”
Blaine looked more hurt than ever, his voice faint and high-pitched when he spoke again.
“You lied to me? Why would you lie to me?”
“I… I panicked! I couldn’t think properly!”
“So you decided to pretend to be someone else! Why?”
Kurt could feel his throat closing up, whether in panic or shame, he could not tell.
“I… I… I just…”
Blaine strode over to the door, avoided Kurt’s hands reaching for his arm, but paused in the doorway to turn and fix big, wet eyes on Kurt.
“I’m going to go home. Please don’t call me.”
And then he was gone, leaving Kurt to explain to a confused and angry Burt, and feeling like his heart had just dropped out of his stomach, leaving a terrible hollow feeling in its place.

It was the worst two weeks of Kurt’s life since those awful months after his mother’s death. He had disappointed his father immensely and he felt terrible about it. The rest of the family had been informed that same, awful day, and he had been grounded indefinitely, his internet restricted and his phone taken away. He could not bring himself to care at all; in fact he welcomed the punishments, hoping that they would, in some small way, make him feel just a little bit better about himself. They did not, but he still cherished them as an excuse not to talk to anybody and to go straight to his room and hide under the covers on his bed.
Blaine was not talking to him, and Kurt did not blame him. He would probably not want to himself, if the roles had been reversed. In fact, Blaine would probably never want to see him again, and the very thought made Kurt nauseous. He was so ashamed of himself that it overwhelmed him at times. At school, he would suddenly have to go to the bathroom to be sick or to hide for a couple of minutes to fight down the instinct to run until he collapsed. He had kept his promise not to call Blaine, but so many times during the day, he found himself wanting to share something, some little occurrence or joke that he knew only Blaine would fully understand, and he would feel the silence between them so much keener. Not that he could call Blaine anyway, with his phone confiscated and his use of the home phone strictly monitored, but it was the fact that Blaine would not want to hear from him that hurt the most.
So he kept his head down. He did his homework several weeks in advance, kept quiet in class and at home. He stopped fighting Rachel for solos he knew he was never going to get anyway, and, in fact, barely sang at all. School was its regular kind of torture. Because of some very unsubtle comments, Kurt was by now convinced that Karofsky had been the one to break into his locker, but he was so miserable already that this realisation did not really shake him. It was terrifying, yes, but somehow, just knowing who his stalker was, made it much more bearable. Now he knew who to look out for, and the fact that it was someone he knew had a grudge against him suddenly made the rest of the school feel much more welcoming since they were no longer all potential anonymous stalkers. So he hid from Karofsky and his minions and kept quiet about the notes, the locker break-in and the library incident. To his relief, there had not even been any more notes since the break-in, and Kurt counted himself lucky. At least dodging Karofsky helped take his mind off Blaine and the whole guilt circus in his head.
At home, there were no more arguments with Finn over what they were going to watch on TV, or what they were going to eat for dinner. And at any rate, Kurt did not really have much of an appetite lately, so he said nothing about fat or calories or the amount of red meat on his plate and left Carole to fuss over Burt and force him to eat the salads and the greens as well. He spent countless hours starfished on his bed, trying not to let his mind wander back to Blaine and failing pathetically. He wrote several letters to him as well, apologising and explaining, but they all sounded hollow, fake and stupid to him, so they ended up crumpled up in his wastepaper basket instead. How was he going to explain, anyway, when he could not even justify it to himself? He knew what he had done was unforgivable, so there would be no point hoping for some great catharsis that was never going to come.
It was the thought that Blaine may not know the whole truth – after all, he had left in rather a hurry – that finally made him sit down and actually finish a letter, address it and send it. He knew that it would never, could never be good enough, but Blaine deserved to know the full story, at least, and Kurt desperately needed him to understand that he had never intended to hurt him. He needed to know that it had not been a game to him, and that he regretted it.

One evening, three days after he had sent the letter, there was a knock on Kurt’s bedroom door so he sighed and called out for the person to enter. The door opened to reveal his father, who frowned to find that Kurt was once again just lying on his bed, immobile and staring at the ceiling as if it held some great secret. Burt cleared his throat, but Kurt made no move to get up or even turn his head in Burt’s direction. He only gave a small “hmm?” and went back to contemplating the ceiling. Burt cleared his throat again.
“I thought you might need this back. I wouldn’t have looked, but it went completely crazy about an hour ago. Wouldn’t stop beeping or playing that tune you always dance to. So I had a look. I didn’t read your texts or anything. I just checked to see who was so determined to talk to you. And… well, I suppose you can have this back. But you’re still grounded.”
And he threw a black, hard something on the bed. Kurt made no move to see what it was, instead turning his head to look at his father, who was hovering at the door, a concerned look in his eyes.
“Look, kiddo. It was a stupid thing to do, but I’m pretty sure you know that. I also know you’ll never do something like that again. You have to stop punishing yourself for it. You’re a good kid. You’re my kid and you make mistakes, but that’s how you learn. You’re a good kid, Kurt.”
It took Kurt about two seconds to get from the bed and to the door. There, he buried himself in his father’s embrace and cried until he had no more tears.
When he was finally able to extricate himself from his son’s arms, Burt gave Kurt’s shoulder a reassuring squeeze before jerking his head in the direction of the bed and leaving the room. Kurt stared for a while before his brain took in what it was his father had left him on the bed: his phone.
It was full of old messages, of course, from before he had had the chance to tell everybody that his phone had been confiscated. He scrolled through them, seeing, but not really reading until one name caught his attention: Blaine. Dated earlier that evening were not just one but ten texts, and four missed calls, all from Blaine.
His hands shook as he dialled. It was even worse, just listening to the dial tone and waiting for Blaine to pick up. It rang for so long, Kurt felt sure he was going to get Blaine’s voicemail, but just as he was going to hang up, a voice sounded in his hear and he nearly dropped the phone in surprise.
“Hello? Col – Kurt?”
“Y-yeah. Hey.”
“Hi.”
“You er... you called me?”
“Oh, yeah. You didn’t pick up.”
“I couldn’t. My dad confiscated my phone. I only got it back two minutes ago.”
“Oh.”
“I’m sorry. I know you told me not to call you, and I wouldn’t have, except you called me and I figured… I mean I hoped it would be okay to call back then. Um…”
“I got your letter today. Well, technically yesterday, but I didn’t read it until today, so.”
“Oh. Well, that’s… that’s good. I wanted you to know ev-everything. I mean, not that it excuses anything, but I still… I wanted you to know why I did it.”
“I know.”
“And I wanted you to know how sorry I am. For… for lying to you and to your family. And for triggering your father’s memory like that. And for bringing that whole thing up again. I can see how it’s haunted your family for years. And I’m so sorry for not giving you the opportunity to choose not to get entangled in this mess all over. You’ve only ever been good to me. You’ve been sweet and caring and funny and wonderful and honest and I’ve lied to you and your family, and to my own, and kept you a secret like you were something to be ashamed of, when you’re everything but.”
“I miss you.”
“…”
“Kurt? Are you there?”
“I miss you too. So much.”
“I really want to talk to you in person. Can we meet?”
“I’m grounded, so I can’t leave the house except for school.”
“Then I’ll come to your school tomorrow. We can talk then.”
“Okay. My last class is glee, but I can skip that. So we have time.”
“Great. I’ll… I’ll be there.”
“Good.”
“So.”
“… I really, really miss you, Blaine.”
“Tomorrow. We’ll… we’ll talk tomorrow.”
“Right. Goodnight, Blaine.”
“Goodnight, Kurt. Sleep tight.”

The next day passed much too slowly, in Kurt’s opinion. Mercedes told him, on no fewer than five separate occasions, to calm down and actually breathe, and even Rachel gave him a worried look when, instead of paying attention in French, which was possibly his favourite subject, he spent the entire class doodling in his notebook. He ignored her and brushed Mercedes off. He was too nervous and excited to concentrate on anything and, at lunch, could not eat more than a few mouthfuls. To be fair, the menu in the school cafeteria did not offer anything but tater tots and a questionable stew with “mystery meat”, as Tina called it, that Kurt, even when not under pressure, would probably have turned his nose up at. As it was, he merely sat by Mercedes, waiting for her to finish her tots, and drumming his fingers impatiently on the tabletop.
When it was finally time for glee, he planted a kiss on Mercedes’ cheek, told her he would talk to her later and all but sprinted to his locker to collect his books before heading out to wait for Blaine in the parking lot.
He spent ten minutes anxiously bobbing from side to side before he received a text from Blaine, telling him he would be there in a couple of minutes. Then, a shadow fell over the display and he looked up to find himself almost nose-to-nose with Karofsky. He jumped and tried to put a little distance between them, but Karofsky grabbed him by the arm, his fingers squeezing hard enough to bruise, effectively preventing from escaping. It was painful, but Kurt felt somehow detached, removed from it all, even as Karofsky tugged him closer, bearing down on him. It was like it was happening to somebody else, like Karofsky was hissing in somebody else’s ear, his raspy voice and bitter words aimed at some other unfortunate soul.
“How did you like your little gifts, huh? Your little notes. Did you like the attention? I bet you did. You’re just a little attention whore, aren’t you. You’ll flirt and prance around in those… outfits, but when it actually comes down to it, you’re just a cold fish, aren’t you. Too picky, too much of a prude to even look at other people. Nobody but Golden Boy is good enough for you, isn’t that right?”
When Kurt did not answer, Karofsky shook him, hard, but Kurt was still too dazed to do anything.
“Answer me! Answer me now! Talk to me, you little shit!”
Kurt was thrown to the ground, hard. He was so unprepared that he did not even have time to cushion his fall, and the back of his head hit the concrete with a dull crack. When he blinked back the white lights that had popped in front of his eyes, Karofsky was no longer looming over him, but striding over to someone. Someone much smaller than him, with dark hair. Someone, who was calling out Kurt’s name in a worried voice. Blaine.
It took Kurt several attempts to get up. He felt strangely light-headed and had to lean on the hood of the nearest car to gain his bearings. Then Blaine cried out in pain and Kurt looked up in time to see him crumple to the ground, clutching his stomach. Kurt called out his name, panicked, and stumbled forward through the dizziness. In what felt like no time at all, he was by Blaine’s side. Blaine’s nose was bleeding and one side of his face was swelling rapidly, almost closing his eye. Kurt spun around and swung his fist at Karofsky’s face, but he was too quick for him. Karofsky deftly caught his arm in a crushing grip and twisted it behind his back. Kurt gasped out in pain and tried to move as little as possible, and Karofsky clutched him to his chest, chanting in his ear as if reciting a mantra.
“Why didn’t you notice me? You should have noticed me! You should have NOTICED ME!”
His final shout was the last thing Kurt heard before the world turned black, a whoosh of white noise in his ears.