The next few days Blaine was at war with himself. Even though Blaine considered himself a fairly decent writer, the unconscious mind is probably even better at making up stories. They may seem ridiculous to anyone else, but to Blaine they were absolutely realistic and his mind was on a rampage. Part of it kept telling him that he was being ridiculous and that he should go apologize to Kurt right that moment, while the other part screamed at him. It scolded him for his idiocy, for the decisions he’d made. How could he have been so stupid to sleep with someone while drunk? Again. He knew what came out of those kinds of situations; he’d been in one. He never quite realized the effect the night with Ginny’s mother had had on him, but apparently it was big. The problem was that, even though part of him realized that his past had nothing to do with Kurt, the other half was so persistent in telling him what a horrible human being he was, that eventually, he came to believe it.

Kurt kept texting him, but Blaine never replied. He even hid his phone in his nightstand and after a while the buzzing became less frequent and eventually it stopped completely. Blaine didn’t like to admit it, but he was disappointed. Somewhere in his mind he’d hoped that Kurt would keep calling him or run into his room and declare his love. Even crazy men can dream, right?

Saturday night, he had the first nightmare. He was tied to his bed, completely naked and Ginny’s mother was screaming at him. Blaming him for all kinds of things he had done or never done. When she left, his father took her place, telling him how much of a disappointment he’d been, how much he despised him. Blaine cried, telling him how he only wanted his father to be proud, but he was ignored. Next was Ginny. Ginny. A sad look was plastered on her face. How could he have done that to her, her own father? Blaine writhed on the bed, pleading with her, begging her to forgive him, but she left without even acknowledging what he said. It was when Kurt entered the room that Blaine woke up with a scream.

“Coop, I’m a mess.” Blaine was hiding under the covers on Monday yet again, clutching his phone to his ear.

“Tell me something new, Squirt.” Cooper said calmly from the other side of the line.

“I’m serious, Cooper.” Blaine whined. “I’m just spiraling down into some dark deep hole and I don’t know how to stop it.”

“Okay, dramatic much? How about you tell me what’s going on, first?”

“Ugh. You know that – that guy I told you about?”

“Mister Gorgeous-Eyes-Great-Ass-Perfect-Overall? That one?”

“Coop.”

“Sorry, continue.”

“Well, I – Um – I – I kind of had sex with him.”

“Oh my God, get OUT.” Cooper sounded like an overexcited teenage girl, which at least made Blaine smile a genuine smile for the first time in days. “Was he good? Was it everything you hoped it would be? Please don’t give me details.”

“Coop, I was drunk.” A silence fell.

“How drunk?”

“Not That-Night kind of drunk, but – well, drunk.”

“Hmmm.” Cooper seemed to think about this for a while. “Do you regret it?”

“I just told you I’m a mess, Coop, what do you think? I slept with a guy I have genuine feelings for and that just messes everything up, it always does.”

“And exactly how many times have you had drunk sex?”

“Two. Now.”

“Exactly. So ‘always’ is a tad bit dramatic, Blainers. I honestly think that if there’s anything to mess up, you’re doing it right now.”

“Thanks for that.”

“I’m serious, Blaine. The way you were talking about the guy, you really care about him and he cares about you. And believe it or not, he’s not going to leave you because you’re gay. He had his private bits in your butt, for crying out loud – or the other way around, whatever floats your boat. I think that’s a pretty clear sign that he’s okay with the gay.” Blaine spluttered. His brother had a point, of course, but he didn’t know if he was quite ready to hear him talk about this now – or ever.

“But what if he hates me because I even did what I did while drunk? What if he thinks I have no self-control and I’m an asshole and –“ Cooper interrupted him.

“Hold up. Stop it right there.” Blaine was pretty sure Cooper was holding up his hand on the other side. “Was he drunk when the magical sex happened?”

“I – yes.”

“I swear to God, Squirt, sometimes you’re such an idiot.”

“Thanks?”

“I don’t think I have any more to say. Go get your man meat, little brother.”

“Coop-“ But he had already hung up.

Blaine’s mood didn’t quite change, even though he knew perfectly well that Cooper was right. He was still down and even though he tried to put on a brave face, Ginny noticed, of course. Blaine woke her up in the morning, brought her to school and then crawled in bed. When it was time to pick her up, he came back out and acted like nothing happened. Blaine sometimes just chose to forget that he raised a smart young girl and that she picked up on his feelings faster than most of his closest friends would.

Blaine was in his study, the Wednesday after the Incident, as he referred to it now, trying to write. He never got very far, because every time he finished a page, he read it and deleted it completely. As he erased yet another page, the door opened with a soft crack and Ginny’s head appeared around the corner.

“Daddy?” Blaine looked up and took a deep breath, glad for the excuse to step back from writing for a bit.

“Hey, sweetie. Come on in.” He moved his chair back as his daughter came over to him and patted his knee, inviting her to come sit in his lap. She snuggled close to him and let herself be wrapped in his arms.

“Daddy,” She whispered in his chest “what’s wrong?”

“Wrong?” Blaine tried to sound convincing when he smiled. “Nothing’s wrong, sweetie, why do you think that?”

“You’re sad all the time.” She played with one of the buttons on his shirt and he ran his fingers through her dark curls. “I think that means something’s wrong.”

“Oh, Gin, I’m just tired.” He lied easily. “Nothing to worry about, I promise.”

“You should talk to mister Kurt.” She said softly and Blaine froze.

“I – I cant, I’m busy.”

“You did have a fight with him, didn’t you?”

“Ginny…” Blaine sighed.

“No, daddy.” She grabbed Blaine’s face with both her little hands, pressing his on cheeks and made him look at her. “Mister Kurt is a really good friend and he’s like really nice and he made you happy and even if he doesn’t like-like you back you should still be friends, cause being happy is more fun than being sad. So you have to go say sorry to him.”

“Sweetie, it’s complicated –“

“Promise?” She interrupted him and Blaine sighed deeply, but at the same time tried not to laugh at her serious face.

“Okay, promise.”

“Good.” And Blaine kissed the top of her head as she leaned back against his chest. “Being sad doesn’t look good on you.” Blaine chuckled. No, it probably didn’t.

Blaine thought about it that night. He realized that even though Cooper was his big brother and he’d known him for quite a bit longer than Ginny, Ginny’s was the only voice that could win it from the one inside of his head. He really did want to talk to Kurt. He missed him, there was no denying it and even though he didn’t quite believe that Kurt would even want him back, as just a friend or not, it was probably at least worth a shot. Ginny would spend the next day at James’ house anyway, so he figured it was decided.

Blaine was going over to apologize.

Beg if necessary.

---

It took Blaine a while to pluck up the courage to get out of his car the next afternoon. He was parked on his usual spot on the other side of the street and he’d been watching the store for a little while. Finally, he got out, locked the door, took a deep breath and walked over to the door of the fabric store. He greeted a young woman who was just on her way out and walked inside. It was busy. There was an old lady fussing over some type of thread, a woman with her daughter were discussing fabrics for a dress and a man was comparing patterns, a pencil stuck between his teeth. Blaine found Kurt at the back, carrying rolls of fabric to the man with the pencil. As he put them down, he saw Blaine and he froze.

“Blaine.” He said breathlessly. He seemed almost shocked – maybe even happy? – And Blaine had to admit that he couldn’t really blame him for being surprised. It had been days, after all. After the initial surprise, Kurt’s face turned colder. “What are you doing here?”

“I – I hoped we could talk.” Blaine mumbled, painfully aware of the costumer glaring at him.

“Well, I’m busy right now, so you’ll have to wait.”

“Yeah. Okay.” Kurt frowned then, taken aback a little.

“Okay?” Kurt looked from Blaine at the costumer, who just sighed, shrugged and started studying the fabrics again, and back.

“Yeah, I’ll wait.” Blaine said, silently praying he didn’t actually sound as desperate as he thought he did.

“I – okay. Just – Maybe – Come back after closing time. We can talk then.” Kurt nodded, telling Blaine to leave with his eyes. He was busy after all. Blaine nodded, waved awkwardly and left the shop. The little bell tinkling as he closed the door behind him.

The shop closed relatively early, but Blaine still had about two hours to kill before he could actually go back to talk to Kurt. He debated going home, but he knew that would probably end in him crawling back under the covers and not going to talk to Kurt after all. He was here now; he had to pull through. He decided to go to the little coffee shop around the corner and treat himself to a little caffeine. The shop smelt nice and was full of people. There were couples that were resting after a day of early Christmas shopping, little families with children nibbling on chocolate cookies and groups of friends. Blaine sat alone in a corner, pretending to read a paper while sipping his Medium Drip. In reality he wasn’t actually reading at all. He was preparing his speech in his head. He realized perfectly well that this might be the only shot he still had with Kurt and if he messed it up he would probably never forgive himself. But even if he gave the perfect speech, Kurt might just still be angry with him and what would he do then? One of the reasons he wanted to cut Kurt out of his life in the first place was probably the fear of losing him. He figured that Kurt would want nothing to do with him after the events of Friday night and even if he had said that he did, Blaine had been sure that he’d realize how much of a jerk Blaine really was eventually and then leave him, like everyone did. He had just wanted to get his heart out of this before it could break. The only thing he hadn’t taken into account was that his heart was already too far in.