Blaine continues to stare at Kurt, who smiles back sweetly, as if it's the most normal thing in the world for a broken puppet to come to life and start talking.

“Hello, Blaine,” Kurt repeats. “It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

Blaine can barely breathe. The room spins along with his brain stuck deciding between screaming and running, only it hasn't committed to either one yet.

But his body sure as hell doesn't need to be told twice.

Blaine scrambles backward, trying to stand up on the way. His feet tangle in his blanket and he falls hard on his tailbone. His hands flail in the air, reaching for something to steady him. He grabs for the chair by the dining room table, but only succeeds in shoving it across the floor where it falls with a loud CRACK. Blaine takes one more lurch to the right and hits the scrolled leg of the table with his shoulder. He bolts upward and smacks his head on the underside.

Stunned, Blaine lays on his back on the floor beneath the dining room table, staring into the amused but concerned eyes of the puppet that he had seconds before been trying to coax to life. He doesn't know if he should believe his own eyes, or his ears for that matter, but in his fruitless attempt to get away, Kurt's smile has disappeared and the puppet has gone still. He lays on the sofa unblinking, unspeaking, but with that glint of intelligence shimmering in his glass eyes.

Blaine stares at Kurt, daring him to move, but Kurt doesn't. Blaine's eyes start to water. He begins to think that what he saw had to have been an illusion – a stress-induced hallucination. The voice he heard had to have been in his head, simply an echo of all the things he had imagined already, or possibly a sound bite from the television which he had neglected to turn off. The puppet blinking, that could have been a trick of the low light. He should replace the bulbs in the overhead fixture with a higher wattage. Squinting in its dim glow is killing his eyes. Perhaps he needs glasses …

Then, with a soft clinking sound, the puppet blinks again.

“Okay …” Blaine says out loud, needing to hear his own voice to know that he's awake and not dreaming, “I think that maybe I'm a little over tired … or there's a gas leak. There was a gas leak in the McKinley choir room when …” Blaine climbs out from beneath the table. He gets to his feet and heads for his room. He reasons with himself, trying to convince himself that he's not losing his mind (not at all missing the irony of the fact that he was trying to get Kurt to talk to him moments ago to prove the same exact thing), but a voice behind him pleads, “Please, Blaine … please, don't go.”

Blaine stops walking.

He reaches out a hand and turns off the television to see if that changes anything.

In the quiet of the room, he hears a heavy sigh.

“Blaine …”

Blaine shoots a glance at Sebastian sitting in the loveseat with a head but no arms and legs, making no movements or sounds whatsoever.

Then Blaine faces Kurt.

Kurt blinks again, but his smile hasn't returned.

“Please,” Kurt begs, “don't leave. I've been trying to pluck up the courage to talk to you, but I …”

Blaine pads slowly back into the living room. He feels sluggish, like he's walking through individual frames of a lucid dream. He wraps his arms around his torso, his hands gripping hard at his biceps, his body trembling from shock.

Maybe Blaine did wish for this, maybe this was the outcome he had been hoping for, but it's mind-boggling (and slightly terrifying) to see this puppet talking on his own.

Kurt looks on hopefully as Blaine approaches.

“Look, I'll stay quiet,” Kurt promises resignedly. “I'll close my eyes and lay still just, please, don't leave me.”

Don't leave me.

Those words fill Blaine's head with images of that dreary, damp room in the basement of the Victorian house, that horrible cell where Kurt and Sebastian were kept for all those years, and Blaine snaps out of his stupor.

“You … you're really talking to me,” Blaine whispers, kneeling at Kurt's side in front of the sofa, “aren't you?”

The bisque face with the iridescent blue eyes smiles.

“Yes, I am,” Kurt replies.

Blaine raises a shaking hand and presses gentle fingers to Kurt's delicate skin. He traces a line from the center of Kurt's forehead down to his chin.

“And … I'm not going crazy?” Blaine asks, retracing the line back to Kurt's forehead.

Kurt chuckles, light and airily, the same as the sound in Blaine's head that he had dismissed as wind chimes.

“Well, I wouldn't go so far as to say that,” Kurt says.

Blaine furrows his brow, confused. They stare at each other for a few tense moments until Blaine understands what Kurt said.

“A joke!” Blaine says triumphantly. “You … you just made a joke!”

Kurt rolls his eyes, but he laughs. “Well, I tried.”

Blaine nods, a fond smirk pulling up the right corner of his mouth. “It was good.”

The laughter between them fades and another tense silence returns. Kurt's eyes gaze down his body lying vulnerable and disconnected on the sofa cushions.

“Uh … do you think there's any chance that you might attach my arms and my legs to my body?” Kurt asks. Blaine watches in amazement as Kurt's cheeks appear to color, as if his inanimate porcelain flesh might be capable of blushing.

Well, sure, Blaine thinks. As long as I'm imagining things …

He's not imagining it though. He knows he's not, but it's taking his brain longer than he'd like to come to terms with it. He reaches out a hand again, tracing the contours of Kurt's lips to be sure.

Kurt's eyes dart away, and the stain on his cheeks becomes darker.

“Yeah,” Blaine says. He pulls his hand away, not wanting to make Kurt uncomfortable. “Sure, I … oh …”

Blaine looks down the length of Kurt's body, struck by the fact that Kurt isn't wearing clothes. He is ambiguously constructed, but naked.

Which, of course, means that Sebastian is also naked, but Blaine is only prepared to deal with one issue at a time.

Blaine's hands hover over Kurt's body, preparing to touch him, but he doesn't see him as made of porcelain anymore. He sees him as flesh and blood … naked flesh and blood.

“I … um …”

“What's wrong?” Kurt asks, raising his head to look at the boy whose hands stutter amidst his limbs.

“Nothing,” Blaine says. “It's only that I …”

“Yes?”

Blaine blows out a long breath to keep the nervous chuckles locked away in his throat. “You're not wearing any clothes, Kurt,” he says outright, turning to look back in Kurt's eyes.

Kurt's face goes blank. His lips part in an expression of surprise, then a slow smile blossoms on his painted face. “That didn't seem to bother you before,” he comments in a voice so smooth it borders on seductive.

Blaine's whole body warms at the sound of it.

“No, it didn't,” Blaine agrees, “but now you're …”

“I'm broken,” Kurt interrupts. “Please, put me back together?”

Blaine inhales deep. “Of course,” he says. “Of course I will.”

Blaine finds the rest of the wire he brought over from the house underneath the sofa, shoved there unintentionally in his mad dash. He looks at the parts of Kurt's body he has left to repair, and decides to start with Kurt's arms first.

Kurt's eyes follow Blaine's fingers as Blaine positions his right arm. He lines up the holes in the shoulder joint, then buffs out any stains with the Porcelain Paste and his chamois before threading the wires through. Blaine feels Kurt's eyes on him, his gaze burrowing beneath Blaine's skin. An ember begins to simmer in Blaine's stomach, growing hot and vibrant, lighting him up from the inside. This is all so unreal, but incredibly so. Blaine got his wish. For whatever reason or purpose that it serves in the universe, for however long it lasts, he gets time with Kurt.

Blaine pulls the wire taut on Kurt's right shoulder and ties the ends off, snipping away the sharp edges. He then moves down Kurt's upper arm to his elbow. He hears Kurt clear his throat - a tinkling like crackling glass, but an otherwise adorably shy sound. Blaine bites his lip to keep from giggling.

“Did you mean what you said?” Kurt asks.

“I'm going to need you to be more specific.” Blaine twists the wires to join them, and repositions Kurt's arm so that the ends stay hidden. Then he continues on to Kurt's wrist.

“W-when you said …” Kurt pauses, and the arm Blaine is repairing trembles. “When you said you have dreams of us … you know … together?”

Blaine bends Kurt's wrist back and forth. He moves each finger one at a time, checking the finer movements of the smaller joints.

“Yes,” Blaine says. “It's true. I did.”

Blaine risks a look at Kurt whose clear blue eyes stare at their combined hands.

“I thought about what it would have been like to know you, to go to school with you, to … uh …” Blaine stops at the words date, touch, kiss …

“W-why do you think you did?” Kurt asks. Blaine feels Kurt's fingers move against his palm … Kurt moving them on his own.

Blaine shrugs.

“I'm not entirely sure,” he admits, watching Kurt make a fist, twist his wrist, and finally straighten his arm and bend the elbow. “I …”

I what? I'm lonely? I think I'm high on mold spores from the house? I have a thing for puppets?

I saw all that stuff in your bedroom that I thought belonged to you until I found out you never lived there?

Yikes. This isn't starting out well.

Kurt turns his hand and waves in Blaine's direction – a playful wiggle of his fingers. Blaine smiles. Then he frowns.

“Uh, you have some dirt on your fingertips.” Blaine takes Kurt's hand in his and grabs his chamois again.

“Ugh! How uncouth!” Kurt exclaims.

“I'll just give you a little manicure here and clear that up.” Blaine winks at Kurt and Kurt titters.

“What a gentleman,” he says with an exaggerated flutter of his eyelids.

Blaine carefully turns Kurt's hand over and examines the stains. The dirt is dark grey and seems to be embedded in the porcelain, in rough scratches at the tips and the pads of Kurt's fingers.

Blaine buffs the dirt away, but this stain is harder to clean than the rust stains. The color puts Blaine in mind of the walls in the basement room.

Blaine wants to know, but he shouldn't ask. Now's not the time.

But Blaine has so many questions burning inside his head, and Kurt might be his only key to answering them. Kurt has obviously been through an ordeal that Blaine can't even fathom. He should wait and give Kurt time to come to terms with what's happening to him, and in a perfect world Blaine would. But what if this is some sort of Cinderella deal? What if tomorrow evening rolls around and Kurt goes back to being a normal-ish puppet again? Blaine has those journals, but the entries he's read so far are vague. If they're all like that, Blaine could read every one from beginning to end and be no closer to knowing anything than he is right now. What if Blaine loses Kurt forever and never finds out the truth?

He decides to go for it. He figures there are a hundred ways he can broach the subject; it's only a matter of finding the least offensive one.

Then, unexpectedly, Kurt gives him an in.

“Thank you,” he says, watching Blaine scoop another dollop of Porcelain Paste onto his chamois to clean up the scratches, “for getting us out of that basement.”

“You're welcome,” Blaine says with a reassuring smile. He keeps his eyes glued to his work, waits a second before diving in. “How did you guys get in that basement anyway?” He goes for nonchalant as he moves on to the left arm. Kurt flexes his fingers, raising them to his face and examining the finished product.

“I … I really don't remember,” Kurt says sadly. “We've been down in that basement for so long, some of my memories just … end at certain points.” Kurt shakes his head, his eyes narrowing as he tries to recall anything. “My first memory is of being in that room, listening to music on the radio, and that's all.”

Blaine's shoulders slump.

“I'm really sorry,” Kurt says. “I wish I could tell you more.”

“That's alright,” Blaine covers, feeling tremendously guilty for pouting. “I was just curious.”

Insanely curious.

Blaine leans over Kurt's body and pulls on the wires that connect his left shoulder joint.

“So, Sebastian is your brother?” Blaine asks, hoping that this line of questioning might help trigger some memories.

“My brother?” Kurt sounds confused. “My brother's name was Finn. Well, he was my stepbrother.”

Blaine looks up from the elbow joint he's threading to Kurt, whose eyes have flicked over to the wooden puppet.

“So, that's Finn over there?” Blaine asks befuddled, following Kurt's gaze to the other puppet.

“No,” Kurt says, “that's Sebastian alright. Only he's not my brother.”

“Oh.” Blaine turns back to the elbow joint and twists the wires tight. “So, he's a …”

“He's a friend,” Kurt explains with a sigh. It's exasperated and wistful at the same time, full of regret and a touch of longing.

Blaine feels a small arrow shoot straight through his heart. Kurt watches Blaine's fingers pause for a moment, then move on to his wrist.

“Oh!” Kurt laughs nervously, finally understanding the dejected boy leaning over his body. “Not that kind of friend.”

“Oh.” Blaine smiles. He doesn't like being so obvious but he can't help it. He likes Kurt. He's had days to start liking him and the feeling won't seem to go away. 

“Are you going to put him back together, too?”

“I started to.” Blaine ducks his head to keep his blushing cheeks out of Kurt's line of sight. “I wanted to get you fixed first.” Blaine moves from Kurt's wrist up to his ear and leans in close. “To tell you the truth, Sebastian kind of gives me the heebie-jeebies.”

Kurt's voice catches at Blaine's closeness, but he laughs at his comment. “Sebastian!? Oh, don't worry about him. He's a big sweetheart, really.”

“Phew! That's a relief,” Blaine says. He returns to his work, but he can't help feeling that Kurt's comment sounded a bit forced, like he doesn't entirely believe it himself, and Blaine's less than comforted.

“Has he … has he said anything?” Kurt asks.

“No, he hasn't.” Blaine watches Kurt move his fixed left arm experimentally. He rolls his wrist and wiggles his fingers. Blaine sees more scratches on the fingertips of this hand, filled with more grey dirt.

“Oops … one minute.” Blaine grabs a hold of Kurt's hand and starts cleaning the marks with his chamois and paste. Blaine tries not to show his worry as he works at the scratches. Two similar sets of scratches in the same spot on each hand, filled with the same dirt. They're not just normal scratches either. Not the kind Kurt would have gotten from being dropped, or from running his fingers over a hard surface. These look violent, like everything else in that room.

They look like Kurt got them clawing his way away from something.

Or someone.

“Sebastian?” Kurt calls out, inexplicably cautious. If this other puppet is Kurt's friend, why does he sound so apprehensive calling out his name? “Sebastian? Can you hear me?”

Blaine looks over his shoulder to where the wooden puppet sits. Sebastian doesn't move, doesn't blink his eyes, doesn't make a sound.

“I don't understand,” Kurt says. “He should be able to hear us. He should be able to respond. Why is he not …?”

“Maybe because I haven't put him back together as much as I have you?” Blaine offers as an explanation.

The fingers of Kurt's right hand tap skittishly against the wood frame of the sofa.

“Uh … actually …” If Kurt could have looked sheepish, he would have “… it wasn't you putting me together that brought me back. I've … kinda … been here with you the whole time.”

“Oh.” Blaine puts Kurt's hand down gently and moves to repairing his legs. He recalls the sickening, on edge feeling he had while starting this repair, how his hands shook after he placed each piece, how he strove for perfection, believing that that was the secret to bringing Kurt to life. But Kurt had been aware, locked inside that puppet, awake this whole time. Suddenly, Blaine feels very foolish.

“Don't get me wrong,” Kurt rushes when he sees Blaine's face drop. “You putting me back together is a gift, Blaine. One I will never, ever be able to repay. But Sebastian and I …” Kurt looks at the wooden puppet sitting stoically, watching them with empty, lifeless eyes “… we've been in that basement for a long time. A long time …” Kurt sighs. When Blaine peeks up from the leg he's repairing, Kurt's eyes are distant, gazing out the window. “When we were first locked in there, all we had was each other. We talked and talked, as if being broken and stuck in a dark room was only a hiccup. We thought that we'd eventually find a way out or someone would rescue us. Then we could pursue our dreams, all of our original plans … our human plans. But after a while, we knew no one was going to save us, so we stopped talking, stopped planning. It didn't seem worth it. We knew we were done for, that if we didn't pass away on our own somehow, we'd be forgotten and eventually demolished with that house. Th-that w-was one of my b-biggest fears.” A lump lodges in Blaine's throat when he hears that confession, so large that he can't find a way around it to comfort Kurt. “But we weren't quite finished. We have heard time pass over our heads, heard it in conversations outside our door, and television shows from somewhere inside the house. I know all about progress and technology - things like microwaves and compact cars, cell phones and the Internet. We listened to life swirl by us, unable to raise a hand or lift a foot to meet it. It's been frightening and lonely.” Kurt watches Blaine work his way from joint to joint, bending his leg at the knee to make sure the wiring fits the holes competently. When Blaine moves up to the hip of Kurt's left leg, Kurt reaches out a hand to pull his focus, and glass eyes meet watery ones. “I'm so glad you found us, Blaine. You have no idea.”

Blaine covers the hand cupping his cheek with his own, and smiles through banished tears. “I'm glad I found you, too.”

Blaine works longer on Kurt's legs than he did his arms, triple checking every joint, every connection, before he gives Kurt the go ahead to try and stand. Blaine puts an arm beneath Kurt's arm and helps him to a sitting position. Kurt gasps at the change, his face beaming with happiness that might have turned to tears of joy if he'd had tears to shed.

“Looking good,” Blaine says, watching Kurt stretch his arms out ahead of him and wiggle his fingers, then straighten his legs and wiggle his toes. Kurt sets his feet down on the floor, pressing them firmly into the blanket Blaine has laid out. Blaine stands first. He reaches his hands out for Kurt and Kurt takes them, wrapping smooth porcelain fingers around warm human flesh and holding on tight. “Okay, on the count of three …”

Kurt nods at Blaine's instruction, keeping his eyes on Blaine's face.

“One … two …”

Before Blaine reaches three, Kurt vaults up off the couch. His foot slides beneath him, sending him stumbling forward into Blaine's arms.

“Three.” Blaine finishes his countdown with a chuckle, speaking into the silky strands of Kurt's hair. Blaine hadn't really paid much attention to Kurt's hair before other than to notice that it existed, but with it beneath his nose, tickling his face, it feels full and soft … and human.

Kurt shivers in Blaine's arms, and Blaine's fantasies resurface.

“It feels like you … Everything is you … all around me … it's you …”

The breathy voice bounces around Blaine's head and then dissolves away.

Kurt straightens in Blaine's arms, elongating his back till he reaches his full height – an inch or two taller than Blaine.

“Hello, you,” Kurt says, his voice reminding Blaine of the one in his head.

“A-are you ready to walk?” Blaine asks. He's still affected by that voice, but he puts that to the side and concentrates on Kurt's legs, anxiously hoping the magical glue will hold.

“I … I think so.” Kurt takes a tentative half-step out of Blaine's embrace. He takes a full step back, placing his right foot flat on the floor, then follows with the left, until Blaine is holding Kurt at arm's length.

Then Kurt lets go.

He wobbles at first. Blaine prepares to rush forward if Kurt needs help, but Kurt stands steady on his own. Kurt looks down at his feet, then up at Blaine's smiling face. He takes a step, then another, and another, his porcelain feet click click clicking across the wood.

“Oh, Blaine,” Kurt says with a giddy but contented sigh. “Blaine, look at me! I'm walking!”

“You're doing great.” Blaine follows Kurt at a distance, letting Kurt feel freedom for the first time in decades with the assurance of Blaine's arms not too far behind.

Kurt becomes more daring and extends his arms out, swaying them from side to side. He spins once and then continues on, shuffling across the floor like he's dancing. He sways and spins until he reaches the point where he started. Blaine, anticipating Kurt's path, circles back around the sofa while Kurt dances, so when Kurt reaches the start, he ends up back in Blaine's arms.

“I … I can't believe it,” Kurt says, looking at his arms and legs. “I can walk again!”

“Let me take a look?” Blaine requests, holding out a hand for Kurt's arm. “I want to make sure everything held.” Kurt offers up his right arm and Blaine examines it closely, hoping that the stress of moving didn't cause any new breaks. Blaine turns Kurt's right arm into the light, and then picks up his left and examines that one, too. The hairline breaks, the tiny cracks, all the missing chips have healed – completely gone, leaving smooth, unblemished porcelain behind. He drops down to the floor, kneeling at Kurt's feet. He looks over Kurt's legs, brushing his nose against them as he gets the closest view possible, and finds the same thing – no nicks, no breaks, no scratches. Kurt's limbs look as perfect as they must have on the first day they were fired.

Kurt's legs shake when Blaine touches him, but Blaine is so agog at the undamaged porcelain that he doesn't notice right away … until Kurt bumps Blaine accidentally on the cheek with his knee.

Blaine looks up at Kurt from where he's crouched on the floor. Kurt's arms are crossed over his chest, his cheeks flaming red.

“Can you feel that?” Blaine asks, running a hand down Kurt's calf. Kurt jumps and takes a step back, teetering close to falling onto the couch.

“No,” Kurt says, “I can't, but it's still … I was wondering … if you might have something I could wear?”

Blaine has a thought about teasing Kurt for catching a sudden case of modesty after being so suggestive before, but he doesn't - too excited about showing Kurt the suit he brought over from the house for him.

“I have just the thing.” Blaine stands up quickly. He settles Kurt down in the sofa, then rushes to the dining room. “I brought you this.” He picks up the suit, presenting it proudly to Kurt who at first smiles, then looks suspiciously devoid of emotion, and then horrified.

“Uh, th-that's … that's great,” Kurt says, his eyes glued to the suit. His porcelain lips set in a straight line and he grips the sofa for dear life. “But, d-do you think, m-maybe, I could wear something else? Um … maybe I could borrow something of yours? If it's not too much trouble?” Kurt looks like he's trying to swallow something hard that wants to break him at the presence of the suit. Blaine catches on, shoving the suit behind his back so Kurt doesn't have to look at it anymore.

“Yeah, of course.” Blaine rushes to his room, walking backward as he passes Kurt so that Kurt doesn't catch another glimpse of the offending outfit. Blaine feels slightly disappointed when he hangs the suit up in his closet. Blaine had longed to see him in it, the image of Kurt in that suit stamped crystal clear in his memory. But Kurt looked afraid of it, and Blaine has no intention of hurting Kurt further if he can help it. He rummages through his drawers for an extra t-shirt and pair of jogging pants. Kurt is taller than Blaine, and quite a bit thinner, but Blaine is sure that this particular pair of pants will do for now. They're his brother's cast offs. Blaine has to cuff them at the hem in order for them to fit. The only reason he kept them were because they were Abercrombie & Fitch.

Far be it for Blaine to turn away designer pants over a little thing like length.

Blaine returns to the living room with the new outfit over his arm to find Kurt has moved from the sofa to the dining room. He's standing by the loveseat, bent over Sebastian's wooden body. Kurt raises a hand and runs it down Sebastian's cheek, whispering in his ear. Blaine can make out the dulcet tones of Kurt's voice, but he can't hear what Kurt is saying.

Blaine gives Kurt a moment longer to talk to his friend, then he clears his throat so as not to startle him. Kurt stands bolt upright, turning on an unsteady foot and toppling to the left. Blaine rushes forward to help him, grabbing him around the waist before he can fall. Blaine pulls Kurt up straight, his body light in Blaine's arms, and Kurt ends up with his face inches from Blaine's. Blaine's eyes drop subconsciously to Kurt's lips, painted pink and so human looking – so soft and pliant, like real skin.

Like the skin in his fantasies.

Kurt's gaze drops the same way, but then returns to Blaine's eyes.

“I found something for you to wear.” Blaine sets Kurt on the floor, only letting go after he's steady on his feet. “It's not all that stylish, but it's comfortable.” Blaine holds the shirt and pants out to Kurt. Kurt smiles, relieved when he sees them.

“Thank you, Blaine.” Kurt takes the clothes one piece at a time, slipping the shirt on and then the pants. Kurt putting on clothes is an awkward process, surreal on top of that to watch a puppet dress himself. But Blaine willingly looks past that because Kurt is here. Kurt is here, and that starts to erase the melancholy of earlier when Blaine could only linger on how tragically short Kurt's life had been cut.

Blaine looks sideways at Sebastian, motionless in light of everything going on. It makes Blaine feel uneasy. What if he's trapped in there, watching, with no way to communicate?

What if he's trapped in there, watching, biding his time?

“Do you think he's okay?” Blaine asks in opposition to the question he wants to know the answer to – why is Kurt aware and Sebastian isn't? But Kurt obviously doesn't know that answer, so there's no use dwelling.

“I don't know.” Kurt turns back to his friend. “Maybe he gave up and went away. Or maybe he's …” Kurt turns to Blaine, distressed. “Maybe he's stuck.” Kurt sounds concerned, but as terrible as being stuck sounds, Blaine is willing to let that lie for the night. He would rather concentrate on Kurt.

“We'll find a way to fix it,” Blaine says. “If it means that much to you, I'll do my best to find a way.”

“Thank you, Blaine,” Kurt says, flashing his brightest smile yet. “Thank you so much … for everything.”

Blaine feels Kurt slip a hand into his, and Blaine wraps his fingers around it.

“You're welc-awww-m,” Blaine says, trying to hold back a yawn, but he can't help himself. All of this is too much for his brain to handle. Coupled with the stress at the house and the fright of the unwelcomed cat visitor, he needs to get some sleep.

“Oh, no,” Kurt teases. “Am I losing you?”

“Hmmm, maybe a little,” Blaine mutters. “This has been a long and … kind of … confusing day.”

Blaine yawns again and Kurt laughs.

“Come on.” Kurt tugs on Blaine's hand, leading him back to the sofa.

“No,” Blaine whines, “I want to stay up and talk to you.”

“You can talk to me when you wake up.” Kurt stretches out on the sofa cushions and Blaine crawls beneath his comforter.

“But, what if you go away?” Blaine asks. “I don't want you to leave me.”

Don't leave me.

Kurt catches Blaine's tired eyes. “I'm not going anywhere. I've been around an awful long time, waiting to be rescued. You rescued me, and I'm not leaving now.”

Blaine nods, satisfied with Kurt's answer. He rests his head on his pillow, finding the pathway to sleep easier than he had the past few nights.

“I'm glad you found me, Blaine,” Kurt whispers, running his fingers lightly through Blaine's curls. “Thank you for putting me back together.”

Blaine relaxes instantaneously with Kurt playing with his hair. “Thanks for talking to me.”

Kurt watches Blaine's breathing slow and then follows suit, closing his eyes and shutting off his thoughts, a small smile on his doll-like face.

Blaine drifts away, finally feeling at peace.

From behind him, on the loveseat, Sebastian blinks his green eyes.