There you go messing with my mind.  I am usually better when I lie.  You play me like I am made of strings – I'm the violin; a melody I want your lips to sing

In the Next Room – Neon Trees

                It is finally Friday evening – the longest time before she has to return to work.  The hours, minutes, seconds before her husband gets home and now are hers alone.  She smiles to herself and changes out of her work clothes while the kitten weaves herself around her feet and between her legs, purring. 

The plan was to dance, or read a book, or watch a film, or do something for her.  Something relaxing.  Instead she checks her e-mails – one is from her mother and the Guilty feeling resurfaces.  Then all of the things she is worrying about break out and run around her mind – her 6 month review at work, her mother's test results, her father's health, getting the cats their vaccinations, the new car she's bought and her guilt at selling her faithful red 1.0L Y-reg VW Polo Bertha, money, bills, cleaning, things she should be doing.

                Blaine looks around the house he's come to know.  He tries not to think about how he got here.  He takes deep breaths.  In.  Out.  In.  Out.  Calming himself.  Waiting for everything to stabilise.  It is not as bad as it was that first time – looking in the mirror and seeing himself but layered.  The woman is there too and if he looks too hard he'll slip away again.  He glimpses her in the corner of his eye.  He tries to concentrate on remaining in the present.  On remaining Blaine.  The kitten (Dinah - he knows her name just as he knows without trying all the details of her life and where everything is in this house he finds himself alone in) looks at him.  He bends to scratch her ear then lies down on the bed.   She follows him, purring.

He's in his parents' house – he runs a hand through his hair, left natural and free from gel as it dries from his shower; and pads towards the kitchen.  He starts to make coffee when he hears a vehicle pull up outside.  He tilts his head to the side. 

Curious… 

His parents are in Italy and his older brother, Cooper, is still in Los Angeles.  He's not expecting anyone.  He listens.  A car door opens.  Closes.  Footsteps approach the door.  He listens.  The footsteps are graceful with the click of a slight heel.  There is a hesitation.  Then a light knock.  Faint but there.  Blaine makes his way to the door expecting it to be a parcel perhaps, or someone needing directions or to use the phone.  In the doorway, framed by the weak morning sun, is Kurt.  Blaine's eyes drink him in – he's immaculate as always, but there's something wrong.  Blaine knows that instinctively, but he wants so desperately for nothing to be the matter.  For it to be last year when they were KurtandBlaine and for Kurt to have that glint in his glasz orbs.  That smile that lightens his heart.  But it is not then - it is now. 

Blaine remembers to breathe and his manners take over –

‘K-Kurt!  Come in.  I was just making coffee – would you like some?'

Smooth, Anderson.  Almost no hint that you're coming apart.  You're not even looking your best – you're in sweats and a trashed t-shirt, and your hair is a mess.  That's really going to win him back.  This was your chance and you've already blown it.  He's probably here to tell you that he's thought about it and no, you attending NYADA, you being in New York even, is a terrible idea.  That you should move on.  That you are pathetic.  Why would Kurt want a boy when he can have a man who probably looks like a model even when he's relaxing or when he's just out of the shower.  Hell – he probably is a model.

His inner torture is suddenly cut short by Kurt bombarding his every sense.  Kurt's lips hungrily claim his.  Kurt's body is pressed against his, enveloping him.  Kurt's arms around him – one hand fisting in the loose curls, still damp, at the nape of Blaine's neck, holding him in place; the other against the small of his back lifting his t-shirt and groping for contact with skin.  For an eternity Blaine is overwhelmed by a sense of being, of wholeness, of belonging.  All he can feel is Kurt, all he can taste is Kurt, smell is Kurt, hear is Kurt.  He kisses Kurt back – his passion matching Kurt's, harmonising with him.  His heart thrums.  One of them has closed the front door at some point and somehow they made it to the wall as Kurt is pressing Blaine up against it.  He can feel Kurt's need through the tight black jeans he's wearing and he's certain Kurt's aware of his own through his baggy sweatpants.  A moan escapes him and his eyes roll backwards as Kurt feverishly kisses his jawline, his neck, down to his collarbone, down to that place that makes Blaine's knees weak… 

Something in Blaine snaps. 

‘K-Kurt… Kurt, stop, stop.  Please…'

He's kicking himself as soon as the words are out of his mouth.  Kurt is frozen – Blaine cannot read the expression on his face.  Kurt backs away from Blaine and makes for the door embarrassed, and a little shocked.

‘What am I doing?  Sorry.  So stupid.'

‘Kurt, wait.  Please.'  Blaine goes after him.  Reaches for him.  Kurt pulls away.

‘I've got to go.'

‘Kurt.  Stop!  Please don't go.'

Kurt stops and looks at Blaine.  Blaine's mind is a whirling mess of curses but he manages to draw himself together.  Something a couple of months ago he would have been incapable of even considering, so desperate for Kurt to forgive him that he would probably have just continued along the path that Kurt had not a minute ago been taking him.  Repeating the events of the Wedding-where-no-one-was-wed.

‘Kurt, we need to talk.'

‘Why?  What is there to talk about?'  Kurt's defences have slammed up against Blaine.

‘I can't do this, Kurt.  I can't take it.  I'm not strong enough and… and I'm kicking myself because I want you so badly.  But I just…I can't, Kurt.  I need you to be honest with me and I know you owe me nothing, not after what I did to you, to us.  But I can't give myself to you for you to break me so utterly.  I know you told me – you told me over and over that we're just friends now.  But friends don't do what we did, Kurt.  Friends don't…friends don't have what we have.  What…what I thought we had.   Kurt, please talk to me.  Say something.' 

His soul is raw and is pouring out to Kurt and he cannot seem to stop now he's started.  All the hurt the shattered hope, it all floods him now that Kurt is there – standing right in front of him.  He wants Kurt.  Needs him so badly.  But he cannot go through the aftermath again – the heartbreak of having hope that the sex meant something.  That they would be together again, only to be smashed by the radio silence and the third hand knowledge that Kurt was spending all his time with Adam…

Blaine looks up at Kurt and is moved to see a reflection of his own tears in Kurt's clear eyes.  Instinct kicks in and Blaine moves forwards to hold Kurt as if that would fix everything.  Kurt weakens against him and Blaine holds him.  They stay like that wrapped in each other, supporting each other in silence for seasons, for years.  After a millennia has passed Kurt takes a shaky breath -

‘I am so utterly in love with you, Blaine.  I tried to not be.  I didn't want to be.  You hurt me so badly - I wanted to hate you.  But I can't…I can't hate you. ‘

Kurt pulls away slightly from Blaine and their eyes lock – it is like coming home. 

‘I love you, Kurt.'

‘I know.  I'm sorry, Blaine.'

‘What for?'

‘For the last couple of months.  It's just that…  Being with you – you feel so right, Blaine.  I hated you for it.  Singing with you, kissing you, dancing with you.  It all felt so perfect.  Like our lives were just slotting back together effortlessly.  I wanted to prove to myself that I could be OK without you.  That being with you didn't define me, didn't make me feel whole – that you weren't perfect.  But you are.  It was and always is perfect and I hated myself, Blaine.  I hated myself because I realised that I had forgiven you.  I didn't want to forgive you.  I'd thought that being with you again would get you out of my system.  But it only reminded me how everything stops when I'm with you.  How nothing else matters.  And that's not fair.  I needed some space to breathe.  To clear my head and I'm sorry.  I thought that doing what you'd done, being with…with someone else, would... But it didn't.  I just ended up hurting him because every minute I spent with him I was looking for you and you weren't there.  We'd be watching a film together and it'd be lovely and sweet and new and then suddenly I'd remember that we'd watched it together and you'd laughed at how invested I'd been in the characters and I'd thrown popcorn at your head and you'd kissed me… It isn't fair.  He tried.  He took me to see a new film – one that you and I had no association with.  But I spent the entire time knowing you'd have hated it and wondering what you'd have said and knowing that whatever it was would have made me laugh…  I wanted to be in love with him….'

The energy left Kurt's voice and he sounded so hollow.  He sighed and looked at Blaine.

‘I love you.  Only you, Blaine, and I can't do this anymore.  We're not friends.  We shouldn't kid ourselves.  We'll never be friends…  The funny thing is, he was so understanding – even after he'd let me take my time and dictate the pace.  He knew I wasn't over you.  Knew I'd never be over you…'

Kurt had thrown so much at Blaine his mind was racing – first showing up, kissing him, then breaking down and then telling him all of this.  He couldn't process it all.

‘What do you want, Kurt?'  He asked softly.  Dread and hope and fear and desperation gnawing at his insides, circling him.  He felt sick. 

‘I want us, Blaine.  I want to give us another chance.  I need to know that we gave it everything.'

Blood was rushing in Blaine's ears and he felt so faint.  His cheeks felt wet and he knew he must be crying but he didn't care.  Couldn't care because Kurt, his Kurt, wanted to try again. 

‘I love you so much, Kurt.'

‘I love you too.'

Kurt was in his arms again.  Blaine rested his head against Kurt's shoulder steadying himself; he felt weightless.  Kurt brought a hand up to his chin and brought his lips down to meet Blaine's.  This kiss was nothing like the fevered desperation of the previous ones.  This one was full of meaning and unspoken promises.  This one was Hope.

The rumbling of a diesel engine nagged at the corner of Blaine's mind.  He ignored it - too wrapped up in Kurt to care.  The sound of a car door and footsteps.

No no no no no!

He closed his eyes and kissed Kurt, breathing him in, holding him close.

The sound of a door opening.

                Blaine opened his eyes - he was on a bed.  He closed his eyes again, desperate to return.

No!  Kurt?! Not now.  Please.  Nonononono!

The woman's husband had returned:  Kurt was not here.  Kurt had not forgiven him.  Kurt had not come back.  Kurt was not his.

Emptiness.

Nothingness.

Despair.

He let go.