Blaine walked into the studio on Friday with Kurt's hand in his and it felt like triumph. Granted they were greeted by a lot of staring and whispering but it was all just gossip. Blaine Anderson had returned and settled down, that alone was reason to talk. Mr Gabriel asked to have a moment alone with Blaine which was mainly to congratulate him for his ‘valiant recovery' and offer him a place in the school's next art show. Blaine accepted cautiously, the contacts and potential offers would be helpful but he'd always been wary of the faculty.

Instead of setting up their pieces they both went for the desks. Their final products were complete so all they needed to work on were their portfolios. They worked in silence side by side, trading pencils, and charcoals and pastels here and there. Kurt kept finding Blaine's sketches wedged between the page of his sketchbook and Blaine kept finding his. Minutes ticked by and everything they'd worked for had led to that point, those images in graphite and oil. For Blaine every doodle of an eye or a hand or a toe was precious, just another part of what Kurt was but more than that, a scrap of what he had, one flawless being all for him.

When art is your life, you drown in it. Time slips by and the artist submerges himself in a creation, every thought and feeling consumed by brush strokes and shading. That submersion is the goal, an intent focus that may leave you without sleep or food but in the end there'll be a masterpiece. Or a painting that looks like the work of a sleep deprived five year old. Strangely enough sometimes they're the same thing.

As the session crept into the final hour Blaine began to panic. His portfolio was perfect but when he thought about the assignment, what he had just didn't quite fit. He had this conceptual piece, Kurt in all his angelic glory but it felt exaggerated, misinterpreted and then amplified. The real Kurt, the Kurt he saw was soft and strong, subtly wild with fierceness unparalleled by anyone Blaine had ever known (except maybe Helena). When he looked at Kurt it was a surprise he didn't just sprout wings but alternately that wasn't who he was. Kurt was just human, with flaws that didn't make Blaine love him any less and a heart the size of Jupiter that made him love him even more.

Blaine was up out of his seat and halfway down the stairs in a matter of seconds. Kurt stumbled down behind him. "Blaine wha- what are you doing?"

"I forgot something. I need to go get it." Blaine replied furtively.

"But you can't just leave!" Kurt whispered back.

"I need to. I'll play the wounded soldier card if I have to!"

Blaine made it down the stairs, almost tripping and breaking his neck on the third from the bottom step but he made it. He sidled up to Mr Gabriel's desk, smiling, the epitome of charm as he managed to cajole his teacher into allowing him half an hour to retrieve what ever he needed (within reason) and then return. Blaine thanked him profusely, grabbed Kurt's hand and ran from the room, leaving his boyfriend thoroughly bemused.

.oO0Oo.

The apartment wasn't that far away from NYU but it seemed like hours before they finally arrived. They wasted precious minutes avoiding almost every puddle. "These boots are expensive Blaine, unless you want to buy me a new pair." Kurt hissed as Blaine tried to drag him through another puddle. "Honey neither of us can afford to buy you new boots, we're students." He replied, steering Kurt around a puddle when he wouldn't go through it.

Travelling through even the smallest part of New York in the middle of the day when it's raining was irksome. The streets were even narrower with the insurmountable amount of umbrella's clogging up the sidewalks and no one was particularly pleasant toward the two art students, hand in hand and running like mad men, splashing through the rain toward the apartment building on the corner.

"I swear to God Blaine you better get a good grade for this." Kurt muttered looking gloomily down on his rain spattered outfit as they opened the door to the apartment. The place was a mess and Kurt watched fondly as Blaine hopped over piles of clothes, jumped over spreads of sketchbooks and skittered around stray pencils and paint brushes. "I thought you said I was, and I quote ‘a genius'?" He yelled as he disappeared into the studio. "I believe I didn't say that about your art sweetheart," Kurt bellowed back, idly tidying some of the mess "and besides everyone knows you don't trust what your lover says in the throws of passion."

Blaine popped his head round the doorframe and smirked, "yeah because coming three times in one night doesn't mean there might be truth in that statement." He winked before dashing back into the studio and rushing back out with a covered canvas under his arm and a twinkle in his eye.

"It's still not true" Kurt said petulantly, a rosy blush staining his cheeks as Blaine continued to stare him down. "It is and you know it," Blaine fluttered kisses up Kurt's throat before lingering on his lips. "It is" Kurt conceded breathlessly and Blaine crashed there lips together, a short hard press and a promise of later. "Thank you! I win!" Blaine exclaimed with a grin before grabbing Kurt's hand and dragging him off back out of the apartment and onto the streets.

.oO0Oo.

They stood by their easels silent and jittery as they awaited their judgement. Kurt clutching Blaine's hand as Mr Gabriel steadily approached. During their time together the art always seemed to fade into the background, a canvas for their messy and tumultuous journey. Only then did their work seem so important. This was their careers, their future but the pieces they'd submitted seemed so much more than that. Little pieces of each other in the other's eyes there for all to see.

As Mr Gabriel spoke to Kurt about his piece and his concept it was obvious immediately that he understood how Kurt felt, if the way his fingers were entwined with Blaine's didn't give it away. Kurt explained about the first time they'd met, the way he'd studied Blaine's work in awe that first day and immediately fell in love with Blaine's art. What he didn't say was that it only took a little bit longer for him to fall in love with Blaine himself. Mr Gabriel questioned his concept, how the wolf resembled Blaine and he quietly replied, with surety "Blaine was the lone wolf Mr Gabriel, but now he's pack."

By the time Mr Gabriel turned to him Blaine was trying desperately not to cry. All that time and he had never really known all the ideas behind Kurt's piece. It made sense, suddenly, like the whole thing had been shrouded in cloth and Kurt had just whipped it away revealing something that meant more to him than what he could ever express. There were two wolves, one with dark unruly fur and blazing golden eyes and another, with a sleek chestnut coat streaked with white and the most brilliantly blue eyes Blaine had ever seen.

Blaine smiled and shook Mr Gabriel's hand with as much strength as he could muster. He gushed about his piece, explaining every detail and choice he'd made with enthusiasm and it was clear that art was his passion. "And the angelic aspect?" Mr Gabriel questioned "What about that Mr Anderson?" Blaine took a deep breath and stared at his painting as if it held all the answers.

"It's no secret what I've been through," he started "and one of the only reasons I'm still here is because of Kurt. I'd been in the dark so long that even one glimpse of light had the power to shake me up and give me hope." Blaine paused and tugged on Kurt's hand to bring him closer. "When his name was called my first thought was ‘well done Blaine but you don't have a hope in hell of making him yours' but in time I learnt more about him and he was so full of light and compassion and love that even an ounce of him would've had to be enough. It turns out that an ounce wasn't enough for him."

Kurt laughed wetly, squeezing Blaine's hand and flicking tears from his cheeks. "My piece is semantically angelic because that's how I saw him. He understood, he cared and he helped me, to get better and to get stronger," Blaine shook his head and laughed, "but ultimately I helped myself, I idolised him and marked him as something unattainable, out of my reach when all he ever wanted was me, flaws and all."

Mr Gabriel shook his head confusedly. "So what you're saying is that this isn't how you identify Mr Hummel?" He asked intrigued. "No," Blaine considered, "what I'm saying is that Kurt will always be my angel but the more literal, undeniably human Kurt is what's pure. Like this." Blaine gestured to his other easel, the one holding the very first depiction of Kurt Blaine had ever created. Blaine stood proudly by it, the soft pastel of Kurt's skin and teasing, light filled blue of his eyes shining from the canvas like a mirror of Kurt's very soul.

"I would have submitted this if I'd had my stupid epiphany before class because this is what Kurt Hummel is to me. The Kurt I only ever thought I'd see in dreams brought to waking. He's my friend, my angel, my lover," he hesitated winking at Kurt as he let the term slip from his lips, "pure, honest, loving sensual and breathtakingly beautiful."

He reached for the pencil behind his ear. "He's mine," he signed his name in the bottom right hand corner "and I am his."

"Ti amo."