It took Kurt twice as long to walk home with the bag of brown sugar cradled in his arms then it did for him to get to town in the first place. He couldn't get his fingers to curl around the lip of the bag, so he had to carry it in the crook of his arm. But after walking a few feet, that didn't work too well either. So he wrapped his arms around it, holding on to his forearms, but he still had to stop every once in a while to shift the position of the bag.

In reality, the bag wasn't that heavy, but it might as well have weighed a thousand pounds, the way his body refused to work correctly.

He was only eighteen. He didn't like feeling this weak and feeble.

As he walked, Kurt thought over everything Blaine had said to him – a job at The Canary Cage with room and board, having someone deal with David, and best of all, an offer to help Carole and Rachel. The more he thought about it, the more he started to wonder - why again was it that he was walking back to David's house? Why was he continuing on with this farce?

Why did he have to walk all the way outside of town to realize that he should have jumped at Blaine's offer?

Kurt still wasn't entirely convinced that Blaine's proposal would work. Paul Karofsky was a powerful man, with property and money to his name. Kurt didn't know if Blaine, with The Canary Cage under his belt, would prove to be a match. But agreeing to let Blaine try would be better than doing what he's been doing.

Kurt can't go through the rest of his life like this. He can't wake up every morning in agony, and then go through the day terrified of what he's going to do or say that might set David off. He can't spend every night with his stomach tied up in knots, waiting for the day that David snaps to the point of beating him to death. Kurt already had marks on his body that would never heal. His right leg wouldn't straighten, and he thought his knee might have dislocated.

Blaine was right. Kurt was a human being. He didn't deserve to be treated like this. It needed to change. Kurt needed to find the strength to change it.

Kurt started making plans – plans that wouldn't necessitate running to Blaine for help. He'd find another way to make money. He'd save it up, one coin at a time if he had to, then find a place away from Ohio that would be able to help him and Rachel and Carole. There were places in the city that took in abused spouses, and widowed women with children. He'd heard about them. They weren't widely talked about, but they were there. It wouldn't be easy. It would mean staying with David a while longer, but he could do it. He'd survived this far. He would just have to keep on surviving. He would wake up every day and remind himself what he's living for, what his goal was. He'd obey the rules, do what David wanted for the time being – even if that meant that his days at The Canary Cage were done. Kurt couldn't have anyone telling on him to David, and he couldn't make Blaine think that he needed his help so badly.

Kurt could do this. He could definitely do this.

With every step toward the house, hugging the bag of brown sugar till his arm made a dent in the middle of the bag, Kurt became filled with the vigor of his own righteousness.

But it wilted like a rose in the mid-summer heat when he saw David's buckboard parked outside the house, and his horse feeding in the stable. Everything from his stomach to his throat spiraled into knots. David was early. He had come home early, and he knew that Kurt had gone.

Kurt stopped walking.

He knew what he'd find when he walked in the house. David would be sitting on the sofa in the living room, waiting for him, with his jug of rye in his lap, most likely half-drunk. Depending on when David got home, he could have been nursing that bottle for hours. But Kurt hadn't been gone that long – an hour, maybe two. And David wasn't home then. Still, Kurt hoped his jug was most of the way gone, because then David would be more amorous than angry, and Kurt had discovered that being fucked he could handle. He could shut his eyes and wander away, take his mind to The Canary Cage – to Kitty teasing Sebastian over the way he styled his hair, to Sebastian smiling at him and offering him a drink, to Brittany and Santana chasing each other on the dance floor while their customers hooted and hollered, hoping one of them would slip up and lose control of their skirt, which one of them always did, but on purpose.

He could travel back in time, stand out on the street with Blaine, Blaine's hand on Kurt's arm, begging him to go to the saloon with him, to leave his husband and his terrible life, and come with him where he would be safe.

Kurt kept all of these things tucked away in his head, bringing them to the forefront so that they would be available to him, to combat whatever awaited him in that house.

Kurt straightened his back, squared his shoulders, and kept walking, his brain screaming at him with every step to turn around, go back into town, and take Blaine up on his offer.

Do anything.

But his thoughts from his wedding barreled back like a freight train to change his mind.

Someone needed to take care of his stepmother and his sister-in-law.

If Kurt didn't stay married to David, they'd have no place to live.

Without this marriage, their lives would be over.

Kurt walked into the house, keeping his head held high. David didn't mind beating Kurt until he cowered like a kicked puppy, but if he walked around like a kicked puppy, it made David even angrier. David claimed that wasn't the man he married. The Kurt that he married was a force to be reckoned with, not a beat-down bitch.

The constant contradiction drove Kurt out of his mind. Nothing about David made sense, so Kurt didn't know what would tip him off until it happened.

David was right where Kurt knew he'd be – sitting on the sofa, eyes trained on the door, waiting for Kurt to come home.

“Hello, husband,” David drawled, lifting his jug and taking a sip. “You didn't leave a note telling me where you were goin'. I was worried.”

“Hello, David,” Kurt said, not looking directly at the man loafing on the sofa. “You're home earlier than I expected.”

“Is there sumthin' wrong with that?” David mumbled. “Sumthin' wrong with me wantin' to come home and be with my husband?”

Mumbled, not slurred. Not quite as drunk as Kurt had hoped for.

“No,” Kurt said, alarms sounding off in his head, warning him to be careful. “No. Not at all. I'm…happy to see you. More time for us to spend together.”

It was a lie Kurt had found important to learn, no matter how his stomach turned itself inside-out when he told it.

David curled his lip at Kurt as Kurt walked by, clumsily balancing a bag of something in his arms. Probably slipped and fell on his way into town, sprained his wrist, but Kurt would find a way to resent him for that, too. Son-of-a-bitch wouldn't even look at him, not in the eyes. David didn't like the feeling that Kurt was avoiding him. He didn't like being unappreciated, not when he kept a roof over Kurt's head and food in his stomach. He asked Kurt for so little. All he wanted was his husband's love, and to date, Kurt had denied him that.

David did everything in this marriage, and Kurt – Kurt did nothing.

“Don't seem so,” David said, “or the house wouldna been empty when I got here.”

“Well, I'm sorry about that.” Kurt headed to the kitchen with the bag in his arms, holding it like a shield against his chest.

Don't follow me, Kurt chanted in his head. Don't follow me, don't follow me, don't follow me…

He heard David get up off the couch, solid footsteps walking behind him into the kitchen. His heart began to stutter.

“Where did you go today?” David asked.

Kurt's heart drummed so hard, he almost couldn't talk. He didn't look at David, sure his husband would see the terror in his eyes, but that didn't keep David from staring at him. Kurt didn't think he could ever get used to those eyes – the way they followed his every move, every step he took around the kitchen.

If Kurt ever did manage to get away from David, he knew he'd still see those eyes in his nightmares.

Kurt fiddled around the kitchen, getting things out of the cupboards that he needed to make supper. His hands shook as he worked, though he begged for them not to. He needed some space. He needed a way to put David and his eyes out of his mind.

If he was occupied cooking, David probably wouldn't touch him. He'd be fine till after supper. Kurt started thinking of all the things he could make to go along with the ham that would keep him busy – mashed potatoes, candied yams, green beans with fried onions.

A pie? He had a bowl full of apples starting to go south. He could whip up a pie.

Whip! Homemade whip. He could swing that, too.

That would be two hours of prep time in the kitchen.

Two hours that he would be safe.

“I went to the mercantile,” Kurt said without emotion. “We were out of brown sugar.”

“Oh,” David said, as if that explained everything, making it all better. “We needed sugar. Well, that's alright.” David tapped the kitchen table with his fingertips and turned back toward the living room. He stopped at the stove where Kurt was buttering a large casserole dish, and kissed him lightly on the nape of the neck. Kurt dug his nails into his palm to keep from jumping at David's touch. “I'll let you get back to cooking then.”

“Thank you,” Kurt said, making the words as sweet as he could.

Kurt heard David's footsteps fading into the next room, and he almost relaxed. He seemed to be in the clear. David accepted that as an excuse. He hadn't driven through town on his way back to the house, and if he did, no one told him anything was amiss.

Anything about him and Blaine.

Except, again, Kurt had to remember that if something's too good to be true…

“Oh, but wait…” David turned inside the doorway and walked back into the kitchen.

Kurt held his breath.

“…where were you the other night?”

…it probably is.

“Wh---what do you mean?” Kurt asked, turning around quickly.

He'd rather see what's coming at him then have David grab him from behind.

“The other night,” David repeated, expecting a different response, “and the night before that, and the night before that, and every night that I've been gone.”

“Oh…” Kurt felt himself solidify, fear turning his body to stone.

Now if he could only be like stone – hard, invincible. If he could hurt David back when David touched him.

Didn't have to feel when David made him crumble.

“Yes, Kurt,” David said. “I know. I know about everything.”

David found out. Of course, he found out. Kurt knew it was only a matter of time.

“He's gonna kill you, Kurt. You know it, and I know it. It's just a matter of time.”

Kurt had known it, long before Blaine said it. He just didn't think today was that day.

“David,” Kurt said, automatically putting his hands up for defense, “I…”

David gave Kurt no chance to speak. He stormed over in three strides and punched him, snapping Kurt's head to the left and slamming him backward into the stove.

“Do you think I like being made a fool of!?” David roared, punching him again. “Do you think I like working hard, day and night, for you, and finding out that you're stepping out on me!?”

Stepping out?

“No, David,” Kurt slurred, blood flooding his mouth. “I'm not stepping out. I…”

David punched him again, so hard he lost vision in his right eye.

“Don't lie to me, you little slut! People saw you. They saw you talking up some guy at the saloon. They saw you steppin' out on me!”

Kurt shook his head, blood spraying from his mouth, spattering his shirt, the kitchen table, the floor.

“I didn't!” Kurt pleaded. “I swear to God, I didn't!”

“You don't believe in God,” David growled. “So everything you say is worthless. You're worthless.” He chuckled darkly. “You thought you could cheat on me.” One more punch knocked Kurt to his hands and knees. “I give you everything, Kurt!” David yelled, bending close to Kurt's ear so the words would etch in his head. “I give you everything, and you give me shit! You won't even have sex with me! I gotta make you! Well, you'll learn, Kurt. I'm gonna go down to that fuckin' place, and I'm gonna kill him! You hear that, Kurt? I'm gonna kill him!”

Kurt wanted to laugh. He might have a little. If David went down to The Canary Cage and confronted Blaine, Blaine would gun him down in the street. There would be witnesses. It would end up in the papers, and Paul wouldn't be able to say that Kurt had any hand in it.

Blaine would exact Kurt's vengeance, and Kurt would be free.

It was more perfect than Kurt could have dreamed. He couldn't have come up with a better plan.

Kurt was going to dare him. Even if it got him punched again and he lost vision in his left eye, it would be worth it to have David taken care of.

He almost did it. The words were right there, waiting.

But Kurt remembered that he hadn't talked to Blaine at The Canary Cage. The only man he'd spoken to at The Canary Cage was…

Oh God! David was talking about Sebastian.

Sebastian, who didn't carry a gun on him. Sebastian, who talked people down before they got into scuffles. Sebastian, who was sensitive and kindhearted, and wouldn't hurt a hair on anyone's head.

David couldn't touch Blaine with a ten-foot pole, but he'd kill Sebastian.

“No, David!” Kurt yelled, raising his voice to a level he wouldn't have dreamed. “No! Don't go down there! Don't you dare!”

The world stopped dead. Kurt didn't breathe. He didn't think David did either, but he saw fire burning in his eyes.

“Oh,” David said, “that's exactly what I intend to do. But first, I'm gonna make damn sure that no one will ever wanna lay a finger on you again.”

David grabbed Kurt around the neck and squeezed. Kurt's hands found David's and pulled, digging his nails in, but Kurt couldn't breathe, and he was losing the energy to move or think.

“Ya know,” David muttered as he dragged Kurt into the living room, Kurt losing fight, losing momentum, “I'm getting sick and tired of all your fighting when this is your fault.” David shook Kurt hard till he felt his teeth rattle. “None of this woulda happened if you'd just be a good husband to me – be loving, be grateful. So I brought home a little sumthin' I bought in Hamilton to help you see right.”

Another squeeze, and Kurt lost the last breath he had left. He felt his body drop. He couldn't brace himself against hitting the ground, so his body just hit it. He was flipped over, his arms drawn behind his back, something cold, hard, and metal clapped around his wrists.

Kurt couldn't lift a finger to stop him. Even his fight reflex had been knocked from him.

But one thing hadn't been. The thing he'd use to escape this. The thing he had lodged so deep in his skull, there was no way that David could dig it out, even if he opened Kurt's head and tried to tear it out.

The hands shredding the clothes from his body couldn't remove it.

The shackles around his wrists couldn't make him forget it.

The leather crop, which appeared from God knew where, cutting into his skin while he lay helpless, while he could do nothing but scream, couldn't steal it from him.

The name Blaine Anderson.

Kurt squeezed his eyes shut, and he was in the middle of the street, wearing a fine suit like Blaine's, leather boots on his feet, and a hat of imported wool on his head, one that actually fit.

He walked down that street with his face uncovered, a smile on his un-split lips.

People waved to him as he walked down the street. They said, “Hey,” and called him by his name – Kurt Hummel.

And there in front of him was The Canary Cage, waiting for him to come inside.

Kurt pictured himself climbing the steps.

Right outside the swinging doors, he heard Kitty laughing.

He saw Sebastian smile at him from behind the bar.

Brittany ran up from the dance hall and hugged him. Santana looped an arm through his, resting her head against his shoulder.

Blaine came down from the balcony. He smiled at Kurt, walked over, and put a hand on his arm – a hand that filled Kurt with warmth and comfort.

And love.

Then the music stopped, the lights went out, and everything went black.

***

Kurt woke up in a dark, quiet house.

Dark and quiet as far as he could tell.

If it was, he'd have that to be thankful for.

After the lash to his back that knocked him unconscious, he had thought for a brief moment that that was the end; that he wouldn't wake up this time.

Death would be a relief compared to this torture.

He didn't want to move. The floor beneath his body felt comforting. He could sleep here until the morning, when David would come downstairs and unlocked the cuffs, but Kurt didn't know what David would do after that. What if David expected him to be dead? What if finding him alive angered him more than the idea of Kurt stepping out on him?

What could David do to him that was worse than this – naked, whipped, raped, wrists shackled behind his back, possibly left for dead?

With the exception of his forays to The Canary Cage, Kurt had tried to be good. He'd done everything he was supposed to. He had to go to town. That couldn't be avoided. It was Thursday, and on Thursdays, David expected ham for supper. But Kurt couldn't make it the way David liked it without brown sugar. It was a vicious circle really. Get beat for going to town to get sugar, or get beat for not having sugar in the house.

He'd kept his hat pulled low to cover his face like he'd been told, so no one would see his bruised eye or his split lip. Not that it made a difference. Plenty of people in town knew, and no one did a thing. Beating a spouse was only a moral dilemma; it wasn't illegal. No one had a care for him just because he was being abused by his husband.

No one except for Blaine Anderson, Sebastian Smythe, and the girls at The Canary Cage.

And he had even made plans to avoid Blaine. Peeking in to the saloon from the street shouldn't have been a crime. Kurt couldn't predict that Blaine Anderson would be waiting for him. He didn't expect Blaine to come talk to him. None of that was his fault.

But it seemed like Kurt was being punished for a lot that wasn't his fault.

His father's inability to balance a checkbook, for one.

David's father giving David the impression that Kurt wanted this marriage because he had somehow suddenly fallen in love with him was another.

David's inability to control his temper and keep his hands to himself was a big one.

And the most heinous crime of all - needing a friend. Wanting human contact. Finding compassion.

Those things, apparently, weren't supposed to belong to him.

Kurt didn't know where David would be if he wasn't in the house. He wasn't supposed to hit the trail again for another two days or so. Kurt had no idea what exactly happened after he passed out, but the sore state of his ass and the blood tricking down his leg gave him a clue.

Kurt climbed to his feet, leaning into the wall for balance, muscles screaming, joints resisting. He couldn't put on any clothes with his hands shackled behind his back. It didn't matter anyway. He didn't have any dignity left to salvage anyhow.

Kurt walked through the open door of the house, and swore that this time, hell or high water, he wouldn't come back. He stumbled off the porch and onto the dirt, feet aching, legs buckling, body burning, begging him to lie down on the hard-packed earth and go back to sleep, but he forced himself forward.

At this hour of the night, the only people on the roads were travelers. Also thieves, but he had nothing to steal. One of the town's deacons passed by in his buggy, on his way home from somewhere, but the uptight man rode on without even a glance.

Kurt kept his mind clear, afraid that if he let his thoughts wander, he would lose his nerve, feel ashamed, and run back home.

Not home. That house had never been home.

The thought of Blaine's offer gave him the courage to continue on. He concentrated on his steps, one foot after the other, walking for hours, until he reached town.

People hollered at him, whistled at him, laughed at him, called him cuss words and slurs.

Not a one of them tried to help him.

He didn't care. Up ahead, with the piano banging out an off-key tune, and girls in garters giggling like debutantes, he'd find his haven.

Kurt didn't know how, but he made it - just inside the swinging doors. That seemed to be the limit of his strength. He saw the lights, heard the music, felt the warmth it lent him, and he smiled.

Kurt decided then that he was wrong before. This was heaven.

His eyelids fluttered shut, and he collapsed to the floor.

Brittany, drinking and playing Faro with some slingers by the door, saw him first. She leapt up before he fell and ran to his side, but he hit the floor before she could catch him. She tore at the seams of her voluminous skirt, and covered Kurt's naked body as best she could with the silky fabric. Blood soaked through, as swift as if the thick material were nothing but thin tissue, and she cried out loud.

“Santana!”

Santana, sitting in the lap of a man at the table with her, reacted next.

“My God!” she screamed, watching Brittany's sky blue skirt turn black with Kurt's blood. “Kitty!” She called across the room to the girl laughing and dancing further in. “Quick! Get my cuff keys! Now!”

A harem surrounded him, much to the dismay of the men who had been throwing around good money for their company.

“Anderson!” Kurt heard a disgruntled man bellow. “Get this faggoteer out of here! He's hoggin' all the fun!”

What Kurt didn't register was the sound of a fist impacting with the man's face.

Kitty had a dry cloth pressed against Kurt's split lip while Santana tried discreetly to remove the cuffs from Kurt's wrists. Rubbed completely raw, they stung with every touch of her fingertips, but compared to everything else, Kurt barely felt it. Such a fuss they made, the clanging of the metal cuffs and orders being tossed, the clamor of tending to their friend, none of them heard the footsteps of three men walking towards them.

Kurt moved his lips to speak, trying to convey a message, but his throat was so dry, it refused to make a sound.

“Sebastian!” Kitty yelled. “Get him some water!” But the bucket was in her hands before she finished asking. Kitty drenched the towel and pressed it to Kurt's lips, squeezing gently to help him take a drink.

Kurt coughed, and then took more, his lips smarting, his mouth too dry for that trickle of liquid to do much good. He moved his mouth again, hoping the words would come this time, before his jaw dislodged completely and fell to the floor.

“What is it, honey?” Santana cooed through tears. She put a hand out to stroke his hair, but pulled it away. She couldn't. There wasn't an area of unbruised skin that she could touch. She couldn't bear to cause him more pain. “What is it you want?”

“T-tell Blaine…” Kurt cleared his throat, a stream of blood passing through his cracked lips. “Tell him I'm taking him up on his offer.”

The girls looked up when they heard a growl, into golden eyes looking down at them, a face shrouded with as much thought of murder as one man can put into a single stare.

A man beside him put a hand on his shoulder, and Blaine turned to the men flanking him – the Puckerman brothers, Noah and Jake, the most ruthless hired gunmen in all of Ohio. Blaine took a long look at the broken man at his feet. He'd just seen to him earlier today, walking around town, hiding his face. He'd talked to him. He'd even made him smile.

Blaine saw that smile when he blinked his eyes, but it dissolved into this image of mutilation at his feet, and his insides broiled, body shaking with simmering rage. Kurt had come to The Canary Cage looking for sanctuary, and he'd found it, the way Blaine had when he built the place, the way his girls had when they first came to his door.

He'd made Kurt a promise. Even if Kurt wouldn't accept his offer, the promise was still there, and Blaine intended to keep it.

Blaine wasn't going to fail him.

This should have never happened to Kurt. It ended now.

“Sebastian,” Blaine commanded, “take Kurt upstairs. Put him in my room.”

“Yes, boss,” Sebastian said, leaping over the bar.

“Tina,” Blaine called across the gambling hall to one of the few girls who hadn't run over when Kurt came through the door. “Go fetch the doctor.”

“But Blaine,” Tina whined, “I'm gonna have to take the buggy out.”

“Then grab a man and go!” he snarled. Tina didn't argue, grabbing ahold of Mike, one of her regulars, and heading for the door.

Blaine watched Sebastian carry Kurt gingerly up the stairs, hushing him softly. A devastated Brittany, wrapped in Santana's arms, followed.

Blaine watched Kurt and Sebastian until they disappeared from view. Then he snapped his fingers.

The two men at his sides turned and walked out of the saloon.

They already knew what to do.