They’d driven out to the hospital come Sunday morning, stopping at the Lima Bean on the way just to sit and stare at each other, waking up over the steam of caf� coffee.

When he’d climbed from the driver’s seat at the hospital and pressed the auto-lock, he held his hand out behind him, stretched open in the air and blindly waiting to be filled like it always was a moment later. It was subconscious now, reaching back for Blaine.

By the time they got to Cooper’s room, Blaine’s palm was sweating, warm and clammy against his own. Kurt turned at the door and wrapped an arm around his shoulders, pressing a light kiss to his temple in passing as he let Blaine go into the room ahead of him.

Cooper was on his feet, mostly dressed and shuffling around the rumpled hospital bed as he pulled on his shirt and nodded along to the tones of Jo’s voice.

It took a moment for Kurt to register her words over the noises of the hallway.

“-with your brother, but I do think you’d recover faster if you were settled and safe.”

Cooper stopped when he caught sight of them in his peripheral vision. He grinned, dropping the tank top he was carrying in his mouth and catching it atop the pile of random toiletries in his hands. “Hey!”

Blaine smiled at the greeting, eyes flicking to the bed while he buried his fists nervously in his pockets. “You’ve been discharged?”

“It’s Sunday,” Cooper nodded, “like clockwork. The stitches are good, my lung’s in the clear. Now I’ve just gotta sit around and wait for my bones to knit. They figured I can do that at home.”

Wetting his lips carefully, Blaine glanced to Jo and back. “Home?”

All sound seemed to fall away from the room after the word hit the air. Kurt knew that Cooper could hear the change in pitch, that telling lift in Blaine’s voice, just like he could.

Cooper grew still and barely seemed to notice Jo as she moved to his side, gently gathering the stack of toiletries and the shirt from his hands and sliding them into the old leather carry bag that lay open on the bed.

Blaine watched her as she moved, letting his gaze linger on the tattered bag. That bag was Cooper; it held almost everything he owned, he took it everywhere he went. Blaine knew that bag meant Cooper was here. But it was being filled again, packed and zipped up by long careful fingers that didn’t belong to his brother.

“I’ve decided,” Cooper began slowly, “to go back with Jo, to Ann Arbor. While I recover.”

Spurred by the sharp flare of discomfort that tightened his chest, Kurt reached out instinctively and rested his hand on Blaine’s back.

Blaine’s nod was too quick, and his eyes cast too low, betraying the ease of his words. “Of course, I mean… that was the point of Jo coming. It’ll be better.” He drew a quick breath. “She can take care of you.”

“Exactly,” Jo said softly. “And you know, it’s not like you boys can’t come up whenever you want. Hey, you could come back with us for awhile?”

Kurt shook his head sharply. “School,” he reminded her.

“Fuck school.”

“Jo,” Cooper warned, trying not to smile.

“Fine,” she rolled her eyes, “but you can still come stay, anytime. I have a sofa. And a balcony, which is a great place to throw milk balloons at passing suits.”

With a breathy laugh, Cooper shot her a fond scowl.

Blaine smiled hesitantly at them both, but couldn’t keep the ache from showing in his eyes.

“I’m two or three hours away, tops,” Cooper insisted, moving around the bed and closing the gap between them. “You have Kurt, now. When I heal up, well… we’ll see.”

“You’ll be happy,” Blaine said with a shaky voice. “You know you will.”

He opened his mouth to argue, but Blaine cut him off quickly.

“Cooper.” Blaine’s brow lifted as his brother met his eyes. “You’re smiling now.”

Cooper pressed his lips together tightly, gaze dropping in a moment of silent guilt.

“Don’t,” Blaine added. “Don’t feel bad, and don’t stay because of me. You should go. You need time to recover, and who knows, I mean,” he glanced to Jo briefly, trying his best to smile, “you might be exactly where you’re supposed to be.”

Sighing softly, Cooper rested an open hand on top of his little brother’s head. “You’re where I’m supposed to be. You always have been.”

“Not anymore,” Blaine told him firmly, smiling through the building tears.

Kurt could sense it prickling his skin; they were both holding on to something, keeping it just barely in check.

Cooper watched his brother for a moment, studied his determined face just long enough to realise that Blaine had already made up his mind. He laughed softly, and rubbed his hand over Blaine’s head.

“Stop gelling your fucking hair,” he teased with a grin.

Blaine ducked away before his hair was messed up completely, and gave a short, wet laugh. “And you watch your language.”

“My bad,” Jo offered, lifting a hand in apology.

“Come see me,” Cooper instructed. “Next weekend, or the weekend after, don’t wait too long.”

Blaine nodded obediently, eyes falling to the floor.

There it was again, Kurt could feel it coming; the change in pressure, the awareness that Blaine needed him. He shifted at the sudden unbearable urge to reach out and hold Blaine so tight it almost hurt them both.

Cooper beat him to it.

Jo’s hand was on Kurt’s arm in an instant, guiding him towards the door.

“We’ll give you boys a minute,” she said as she ushered him outside.

“No, wait-”

“You’re not what he needs,” she said.

Kurt glanced back inside long enough to see Blaine bury his face into Cooper’s shirt, to feel the sob he let out reverberate in his bones.

“No, I need to-” His second attempt to step towards the door was halted by two strong hands, pulling him away.

“Sweetheart,” she said, squeezing his arms gently. “Let them say goodbye.”

“But it’s not,” Kurt snapped, and on edge from the jarring wave of Blaine’s emotions. “He’s only a few hours away, we’ll come up next weekend, it’s not like…”

“It is,” she said. “They’re cutting a tie. All they ever had was each other, and now their paths are splitting apart, and no matter how good it is for them both in the end, it hurts. It’s not supposed to be easy. But they should never have had to do this alone for so long.”

Kurt nodded, fighting back the tears that threatened to well in his eyes. He could feel every inch of Blaine’s grief, still creeping and sticking in his veins. Cooper wasn’t a Dom, holding Blaine did nothing to ease the pain. It simply clung there, raw and hollow, unmoving against the wrong kind of comfort.

He eyed his aunt curiously. “Have you ever had dependent Subs before? At Missive?”

Her mouth twitched at the side in confirmation. “If two Subs who are close go long enough without a Dom to care for them, they become… twins, basically. It doesn’t happen a lot. It’s usually siblings, usually in care facilities where they only have each other for constant company.”

“But they’ve never been in a facility.”

“Doesn’t matter,” she went on, “they still only had each other, all those years. But they’re both Subs, they can’t care for each other like they want to, they don’t have the genetics to give each other the comfort they both need. But they do want to, and that’s what matters. The link just keeps building up as time goes by. Every time they can’t fix each other, they just become more and more connected for trying.”

“We’re making them leave each other,” Kurt whispered, eyes falling shut. His body ached as he kept fighting to resist his instincts. “I did this, I called you-”

“It’s for the best, for both of them,” she cut him off. “They know that, or they wouldn’t be doing it. Don’t you dare feel like you’re to blame for anything here. This is their choice. Their free will. Subs may be obedient, but in my experience, their will is like iron, tempered by years of learning how to use the word no. And you know those boys are stronger than most.”

He sniffed, nodding and pressing his nose with the back of his hand.

“It’s easier for the fact that you already claimed Blaine,” she added, trying to ease his tension. “The division began then, naturally. When Cooper gets claimed, they’ll just be like normal brothers. It won’t hurt anymore.”

He tried to think of something to say, but found nothing. Instead he simply nodded again, mouth flinching into an attempted smile as she rubbed his shoulder.

“I’ll be right back, I’m just gonna go get Coop’s paperwork sorted out,” she told him, and he barely registered the sound of her flat shoes tapping down the hall.

After a moment he shifted on his feet, sinking into a chair by the door and burying his face in both hands. His mind wandered over the pull he felt in his chest; Blaine’s all-encompassing loss still lingering too heavily. Focusing on it and trying to will it away did little but agitate the discomfort, so he cast his thoughts to absent things, anything he could think of that had no real meaning at all.

Why couldn’t he think of a single song about Sundays?

It was funny, he realised; he could think of at least a dozen songs about goodbyes.

With a soft huff of helpless, humourless laughter, he tried to swallow the lump in his throat. He’d get to hold Blaine soon enough. If he had his way, he’d get to hold him the rest of his life. He could wait.

For Cooper, he could wait.

When Blaine re-emerged, he was flushed and blinking slowly, expressionless and suddenly walking like the world was far too heavy.

The way he used to, Kurt thought.

Cooper was close behind, and he reached out to rest a broad hand on Kurt’s shoulder as Blaine moved aside.

Kurt stepped into the hug gingerly, careful not to put any pressure on Cooper’s injuries.

“Thank you,” Kurt croaked softly.

Cooper’s fingers brushed through the hair at the back of his neck.

“Thank you,” he echoed in a whisper. “Thank you for everything, and please just - take care of him. Please.”

Kurt smiled, and lifted his hand to return the gesture, threading fingers through a handful of dark, messy hair. “I don’t think I know how to do anything else.”

When Cooper pulled away, he was smiling. His gaze wandered over Kurt’s shoulder as Jo came back, scooping Blaine into a quick hug and kissing his hair.

“You be good, sweetheart,” she instructed in a soothing voice. “I promise I will get him back to you, good as new.”

Blaine nodded weakly into her shoulder and slumped again when she pulled away.

She shifted past Cooper, tapping him lightly on the ass. “I’ll get your bags, sweetcheeks,” she teased. “You just, y’know. Stand here. Do nothing. Make me do all the work. Slacker.”

Cooper chuckled, voice still raw from his tears. “Cute, that’s... That’s real cute.”

“We should go,” Kurt said softly.

“Us too,” Cooper agreed. “Come up in a week or two, please,” he insisted again. “Or I will probably go mad and kill her.”

Kurt smiled and nodded. “Trust me, I know what you mean. We’ll be there.”

He reached out blindly for Blaine’s hand, and couldn’t keep his own from closing too tightly when he found it. He could feel Blaine’s fingers squeezing around his palm, still shaking even as they made their way down the hall.

Kurt was certain he’d never walked so fast in his life, but it still didn’t feel fast enough. They made it to the parking lot, shielding their eyes from the sudden glare of daylight. He only glanced around once or twice to see if they were alone, but even if they weren’t, he didn’t care anymore. The ache had grown too strong, was becoming too thick in his throat and too heavy in his chest, and he couldn’t bear it any more.

He turned and engulfed Blaine in his arms, cradling his head as he rested their temples together. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.”

Blaine sniffed lightly, blinking like a small child trying to understand. “I… I don’t…”

“You can let go now,” Kurt said, rocking back to press kisses over both swollen eyelids and down his tear-stained cheek. “It’s alright.”

Blaine sank against his chest, boneless but for the legs holding him up off the ground. Clinging tight to his frame and keeping him steady, Kurt swayed lightly on his feet as the relief of simply holding on rushed over him so hard he could almost taste it on his tongue.

He could feel the splinters of doubt already forming in the aftershocks; unwanted, empty, gone, left me.

“I need you, I love you, I’m here,” Kurt whispered.

There was no reply but for the staggered jerking of Blaine’s breath, coming too shallow and too fast.

Kurt pushed his fingers through Blaine’s hair, rested his mouth against the side of his head and closed his eyes, reeling with the weight of it. For the first time as a Dom, he didn’t know what to do.

There was a hole in Blaine now, he could feel it. The place where he kept Cooper had been cut away before its time, and Kurt was left shaking in the helplessness of not knowing how to fill it back up. It was the one part of Blaine he never owned; a place that was carved for his twin. It was never made for a Dom to fill.

He didn’t know how long they’d been standing in the parking lot of the hospital, bathed in daylight, holding on to each other in clear sight of anyone who wandered down the stairs. The sudden awareness struck him like an anvil, and he curled his arms tighter around Blaine’s body.

Protect.

“We need to go. Blaine?” He tilted back to see his face, to look for any sign of recognition.

“Come with me,” he commanded as he stepped back and took Blaine’s hand, guiding him away from the main building.

He moved on instinct, got them both to the car and inside as fast as he could, pulling out of the lot and onto the road. He didn’t know where he was going, only that he had to find something, anything. There was no quick fix, he already knew that much, it would take time to heal. No, he just needed something that would serve as a bandage.

The idea came to him three blocks from the hospital, and he straightened in his seat, flicking on the turning signal and finding the best place for a u-turn.

When they arrived at the school, Blaine stirred in the passenger seat, blinking slowly. Confusion flickered across his features, but was gone just as quickly as his face fell back into the defeated, expressionless mask he’d worn since the hospital.

Kurt managed to get them both to the doors, fumbling with his keys and sending up a silent thank you to Puck, for making them for Rachel so she could practice in the choir room and the auditorium, and to Rachel, for making him copies.

By the time they reached the end of the second hall, Blaine still didn’t seem to register where they were going. It wasn’t until Kurt pushed through the doors and the sharp scent of chlorine struck them that Blaine’s eyes finally lifted.

Kurt turned, studying his face worriedly. He wet his lips, held his breath, and waited for a reaction.

It only took a moment. Blaine shifted on his feet, dropping Kurt’s hand as he toed off both shoes and slid out of his jacket. He pulled his polo shirt over his head on his sprint to the water, throwing it aside a split second before he dove head-first into the pool.

Kurt skittered back from the splash, gathering Blaine’s clothes quickly and piling them on the concrete steps. He turned and pressed both hands together over the bridge of his nose, watching and waiting for Blaine to resurface.

When he breached the water on the other side and gasped violently, Kurt finally let go of the breath he’d been holding since they’d stepped inside. It rode out of him on a shaky wave, and his hands dropped as his eyes fell closed, body settling at the sudden calm.

The world outside forgotten, he let the numbness bleed through him, choking back a sob of relief at how suddenly safe everything felt.

This is what it’s like for you here, he thought as he watched Blaine dive down again. Nothing hurts.

He wrapped both arms around himself, eyes trailing over the dark line of Blaine underwater, only visible past the distorted ripple by his dark jeans and his hair. His body was bowed and sinking lower and lower, floating in the freedom of weightlessness.

Kurt’s hands had unbuttoned half his jacket before he even realised he was undressing himself. He froze, blinking in surprise at the involuntary action. It wasn’t until Blaine came back up again, spraying water and clinging to the side of the pool, that he knew why.

Blaine turned, kicking up off the wall like he had the day Kurt had first come to him here. The day he’d taken him home, had taken care of him with his own two hands. It was a sharp shock of memory, the d�j� vu bleeding into the real moments that were still so clear in his mind; the taste of his skin, the smell of his hair, the weight of his body on top of him.

Staring across the water, hair plastered to his face and body rising and falling on slow breaths, Blaine reached out in the air with his fingers splayed in a silent plea.

Kurt was out of his jacket in a moment, kicking off his shoes and socks and peeling away his shirt. He slipped his jeans down his hips and off, folding them quickly and laying them over his other clothes before he turned and ran.

The water was colder than he remembered, rushing along his overheated skin in an exquisite head-to-toe ripple of sensation. When he came up, he flicked his head rapidly to keep the water from his eyes, pushing his hair back with both hands and looking around to figure out where he’d surfaced.

Blaine’s arms found him first, pressing along his sides as they slipped around his waist. Kurt sank into them, coiling his own around Blaine’s shoulders and holding on tight.

“I love you,” Blaine confessed breathlessly, the words heavy and broken like he’d been waiting for years to say just that. Like he hadn’t said it every day since the first time.

Kurt wrapped his legs around Blaine’s hips underwater, anchored aching for the solidity of him; to know he was there, and safe, and his. He slid their mouths together, tipping Blaine’s head back with both hands to kiss him deeply and taste as much as he could through coffee and chlorine.

“I will never stop loving you,” Kurt promised, pulling back to meet Blaine’s eyes.

Blaine nodded, blinking rapidly as he tightened his grip on Kurt’s waist.

Kurt slid both arms over his shoulders, tilting for another kiss, sucking gently and slowly on his lower lip like a promise. He felt Blaine’s hands slide over his back, gripping at his sides as they dipped and rose in the water, floating and rolling smoothly while their mouths and hands grew more and more needy.

Drawing deep breaths, they sank together, twisting underwater, still kissing blindly and holding on to each other even when they reached the bottom.