Mia wanted to cry. She breathed out quickly, big mouthfuls of air until she thought she was going to hyperventilate. She put the air conditioner on full blast, pointing at her face, as she tried hard to calm down. She looked at her reflection in the mirror. Her face flushed from crying, her eyes red-rimmed and swollen, she looked the way she felt - desperate, unhinged. Her whole world was crumbling, falling apart.

When she had presence of mind enough not to be a blubbering mess, she could direct her hate and anger right where it belonged.

Kurt Hummel.

Mia had started out a gangly, teenaged nobody, and had transformed into a hot Hollywood property. Now, she had everything she ever dreamed of growing up. She spent her entire career as the female lead in the biggest show on t.v. She had the guy everyone wanted. Of course, there was a part of her that realized Blaine didn't love her, and that she was essentially sharing him with another man, but those were all incidentals. As long as they looked hot together and she got her turn in his bed, what did she care about little details like love and commitment?

Mia looked over at her phone, sitting in the passenger seat of her car, with Brad's message still visible on the screen.

From: Brad
Your boy called yesterday and guess what? He says he's out. Ditched stardom and you for his twink and his kids. What do you think about that?

What did she think about it? The broken screen of her iPhone was evidence of exactly what she thought of it. How dare he? Who did he think he was, trading her in and costing her everything in the process?

Well, no more. She didn't intend on sitting back and watching some dandy little fruitcake destroy everything she had built for herself. It was time Mia Bradley took matters into her own hands.

Or, in the case of the red dress she had on, into her own cleavage.

Mia drove up the driveway that led to Blaine's house before noon. If Mia knew Blaine, he had just had his afternoon gin and tonic and put himself to bed for a nap.

'So cute,' she thought. 'A grown man who naps.'

She also knew that he napped in the nude. With any luck, she'd catch him a little tired, a little unaware. She'd seduce him, fuck him, show him what he'd been missing all this time he'd spent with that fag, and she'd have her man and her job back before dinner.

In Mia's mind, it was pretty much a done deal.

Mia knocked on the door and adjusted her top, pulling it up and then down to best showcase her assets.

She waited a moment, listening at the door for signs that Blaine had heard her and woken up. She bounced nervously on the balls of her feet, her stiletto heels clicking on the cement step. She knocked again, harder this time.

She heard mumbled cursing on the other side of the door and smiled.

'Do I know my man, or do I know my man?' she thought with a smug grin. 'Score one for Ms. Bradley.'

The door swung open slowly, and there stood Blaine, hair a mess, eyes squinting into the light. He looked Mia up and down.

'That's right, Blaine,' Mia preened beneath Blaine's tired looking eyes, tossing her hair over her shoulder to expose the lines of her tanned neck. 'Take a look. Take a good long look.'

"Can I help you?" Blaine asked. He had answered the door wearing only a white towel draped low on his hips. Mia smiled, feeling confident that her work was already half done.

"Aren't you going to invite me in?" Mia purred seductively. Blaine looked her up and down one more time.

"No," he said curtly, moving to close the door. Mia reached out and caught it.

"Wait!" she almost yelled. Blaine's eyes popped open at her sudden outburst. Mia was relieved that she had his attention. "It's been a while since we last talked." Mia tried to get back into her sexy state of mind, but things seemed to be slipping out of control. Seducing Blaine used to be easier. In this dress with these heels, she should have him wrapped around her in no time, but he wouldn't even let her in the door.

Blaine looked at her blankly, his face expressionless. She put a hand on Blaine's shoulder, attempting to push her way into his arms. A sharp slap connected with Mia's wrist, a loud snapping noise cracking the air. Mia pulled her hand back quickly, a look of shock on her face.

Kurt slid up from behind Blaine, the dominatrix in him assessing Mia with unamused eyes. He saw Mia's high-cut red strapless dress, the black stockings, the overwhelming amount of make-up applied hastily and thick in an attempt to hide the fact that she was barely keeping it together. On anyone else, this expression might have melted Kurt's heart, but he had enough of this woman. Kurt fixed the nervous woman with an unfeeling smirk. He sashayed seductively in his sleek black cat suit, his stiletto boots making him significantly taller than Mia. He gripped Blaine's riding crop firmly in his hand. He stepped in front of his sub, effectively blocking Blaine's body from the view of the shell-shocked woman at the front door. Kurt glared at her with gray eyes, hard as steel, carefully rimmed in black liquid eyeliner. As soon as Kurt stepped forward, Blaine wrapped his arms around him possessively, hands coming to rest on Kurt's chest. He turned his head to rest his cheek against Kurt's back. Blaine sighed. Kurt smiled.

"Good boy," Kurt purred, tossing a fond look over his shoulder at his obedient sub before turning his attention back to Mia.

"Can I help you?" Kurt's cool voice dripped with venom.

Mia pulled herself up to her full height, trying her best to match Kurt's glare.

"I was talking to Blaine," she said firmly, but her voice wavered. She watched as Blaine gripped Kurt tighter, curling his fingers into the vinyl.

"Well, Blaine's not available at the moment," Kurt said dismissively. "In fact, he's not going to be available for you again. So, I suggest you run along, little girl, before you get hurt." Kurt motioned past her with the riding crop. Mia eyed the riding crop warily, taking a quick step back to avoid whatever it might do.

Mia huffed in frustration, at the end of her rope with man and his sick hold over Blaine. She tried to maneuver around Kurt's body, tried to get Blaine's attention, but Kurt smacked her again, this time on her exposed upper arm.

"I wouldn't try that again," Kurt warned, his voice soft and dangerous.

Mia's eyes shifted from Kurt, to what little she could see of Blaine, and then back to Kurt.

"Blaine!" Mia's walls broke down. She had to reach Blaine, she just had to. It couldn't all end like this, not for her. "You can't do this! You can't leave the show, and me, for this twink!"

"Oh, he can..." Kurt chuckled darkly, "...and he will. Now, you need to run along, because Blaine and I have a lot of things to do." Kurt summoned Mia closer with a long, glove-clad finger. Mia leaned closer, in spite of herself. "You see," Kurt continued in a conspiratorial, but slightly exaggerated whisper, "Blaine here is going to suck my cock, and lick my ass, and then we're going to talk about moving him into my house. Isn't that right, sweetheart?"

"Damn straight," Blaine answered, his reply slightly muffled by Kurt's skin-tight outfit. Mia stood, frozen in place. Kurt looked at her shocked expression, shrugged his shoulders at her non-responsiveness, and slammed the door in her face. Kurt and Blaine chuckled at the yelp of anguish that came out of Mia when the door struck her nose.

Dave drove down to the university early of Friday morning to check if he had been paired with anyone for his internship project yet. He hoped to see his name paired with some up-and-coming new hopeful...with Adam as his mentor. Dave bit his lip and looked over the list, carefully reading each and every name. Even though more than half of the students in the program had gotten their assignments already, his name wasn't on the roster.

He let out a long sigh of disappointment.

'That's okay,' he thought, trying to stay upbeat. 'I'm not the only one who doesn't have a client yet. But the internship hasn't officially started. I have time.'

Dave turned away from the board, but a niggling, cold feeling settled in his stomach, and he turned back to look over the list again to see. He didn't want to admit it, but he wanted to make sure Adam hadn't been assigned to anyone yet.

He sighed in relief when he reached the end of the list.

Adam's name wasn't on the list.

He didn't want to seem too excited. Adam was sweet and handsome, and going out for coffee with him was better than Dave had expected, but he had to face facts. He wasn't exactly a catch. He had always been considered 'big boned'. In high school, playing football and working out in the gym every day had given him a more muscular physique, but years of working behind a desk had transformed him from toned to husky. He didn't currently have a job, and he was raising four kids with the man he had been crushing on since high school...and recently the addition of that man's boyfriend.

Blaine joining their clan was by no means a problem. They had a family meeting and it was pretty much decided that Blaine's moving in was inevitable. As it was, the kids were convinced he lived there anyway, so posing the question to them as to whether or not they minded came as a bit of a surprise. An ecstatic Eva demanded that a blanket be put out on the floor for Blaine to sleep on, determined that if he was living at the house, he would sleep in her room. Kurt became nervous that she would melt down if he didn't, trying to think of way he could share Blaine with Eva. In the end, Blaine sat her down and gently explained things in that special way they had developed of communicating with each other. After being reassured that she would always be his best girl, she had no problem with Blaine spending the night in Kurt's room.

Over the week, the house had started to feel a little more crowded than usual, with the workers and the film crew around eight hours a day. Everything was fine when they worked on the studio, but the times they filmed inside the house had been difficult for Dave to handle. Kurt managed with his usual charm and finesse, a trait that Dave had always envied. The kids were left out mostly as Kurt wasn't too fond of the exposure they would get by being on t.v. When it was Dave's turn in the five second spotlight, he felt like a deer just moments away from being flattened by a semi. They didn't expect him to say a word, and to just go about his business like he would any other day, but he felt like he had been trapped in a Prius with an angry wasp, and as soon as the taping was over, he went outside for some air.

He had been assured by Kurt that everything was done, and the film crew would wrap up and be gone by the end of the day, but Dave still couldn't take it. He told Kurt the night before that he needed to hit the university in the morning. He was so eager to get away from the throng of strangers swarming his house that he left before anyone else woke up. He sat at a booth in the campus McDonald's, nursing a coffee for over an hour, just to have a moment alone.

This time to himself, this ability to escape, was a luxury he hadn't really had since inheriting the kids. He almost didn't take it, skeptical at first that leaving for his own sanity was the right thing to do. Mostly he felt guilty for telling Kurt a little white lie in order to steal the time. He decided it was a gift, and he wasn't about to take it for granted.

Besides, there was really no fooling Kurt, and his sullied conscious knew that Kurt had given him this time that he needed.

Dave took one last look at the roster, preparing to go back to the house and put up with the intrusion as best he could.

"Well, hello, stranger," a smooth voice behind him said, a warm hand squeezing his shoulder. The voice warmed Dave all over, but he didn't want to turn around. It had never crossed his mind that Adam would be at the university, especially not at eight in the morning. When Dave had escaped, he did so in his dad jeans, an old t-shirt, and a ripped up pair of Converse sneakers. He felt ridiculous being this self-conscious, but he couldn't help it. Seeing no way to get out of being caught in his Saturday-mow-the-lawn-clothes, he turned around to face Adam.

"Hey!" Dave said, extending a hand to greet the taller man. Adam rolled his eyes, stepping forward, and drew Dave into his arms instead, rubbing Dave's back before releasing him, slightly stunned and a little more red in the face than before.

"I didn't expect to see you here." Adam leaned against the wall and crossed one leg over the other.

"I...uh...came down to check the project roster," Dave explained, trying not to look Adam up and down, but noticing his tan suede shoes, his brown corduroy pants, and his slate blue shirt that seemed to fit him like it was made specifically to hug every muscle in his chest and upper arms. Adam wasn't wearing a cap this time, and his dirty blond hair looked wind-blown and a bit wild.

"You know, you could have just called." Adam glanced over the roster himself, skimming it cursory as if he already knew what it said.

"I know, but I was kind of...uh...running away from home." Dave chuckled and shook his head. "Wow. That sounds horrible when you say it out loud, doesn't it?"

Adam laughed, and the sound of his sincere, heartwarming laughter made Dave's skin tingle.

"Not at all," Adam said. "I come from a big family, so I know that you need to get away every once in a while."

With his beautiful accent, every word Adam spoke sounded like a song. Dave wanted to listen to him talk all day - about everything...about nothing...heck, he could just read the phone book for all Dave cared.

"Yeah," Dave agreed. "We actually have people working on the house right now..." Dave kept talking, not ready to say good-bye to Adam.

"Really?" Adam said, and to Dave's joy Adam looked genuinely interested.

"Actually, it's kind of a...show..."

Dave winced, realizing he wasn't making any sense. Adam furrowed his brow as he waited for Dave to explain.

"The show Extreme Home Makeover...have you heard of it?"

Adam nodded, his smile growing larger and warmer as Dave got more and more flustered.

"They have a...celebrity...edition..."

Dave mumbled the last few words, a little embarrassed at the attention their family had been getting lately. It was all for Kurt, though, and Kurt deserved every minute of it.

"Oh, wow," Adam said, impressed. "So, you're a celebrity now?"

Dave knew he was being teased, but he didn't mind.

"Not me," Dave clarified quickly. "Kurt."

"Ah, yes. The designer roommate dating the famous Blaine Anderson."

"You remembered." Dave smiled.

"Of course, I remembered." Adam moved closer to Dave, leaning on the wall right beside him, arms touching lightly as Adam crossed his arms. "They were really all you talked about at coffee the other day."

"Did I?" Dave asked in surprise. Honestly, he couldn't remember a lot of what he said when they went out for coffee. In fact, he was surprised to discover that he had spoken at all.

"Yup." Adam turned to face Dave again, fixing the full power of his sky blue eyes on Dave's hazel ones. "So, when I take you out for coffee now, I want you to tell me everything about you."

Dave's eyes opened wide as Adam's meaning dawned on him.

"N-now?" Dave stuttered. "You want to take me out for coffee again?"

"No time like the present," Adam said, grabbing Dave's hand and pulling him away from the wall.

"But...I need...I mean..."

"Would you rather go to a nice, quiet coffee house with me?" Adam asked, "Or back to the noisy house you were running away from?"

Dave was stunned into silence. He really wanted to go. Kurt would tell him to go. Blaine would tell him to go.

"Okay," Dave decided. "Coffee it is."

Adam didn't let go of Dave's hand as they walked away together.

"Okay, okay," Ty said, "let's get together for the big reveal."

Ty Pennington, host of Extreme Makeover, gathered everyone together in the backyard to see Kurt's new work space. Jeff and Hunter agreed to watch the kids so that Nick could join them. Kurt insisted, since the renovations had been done following Nick's blueprints. All the design and decorating ideas were Nick's. In fact, it was entirely due to Nick's hard work and dedication that any of this had even been possible. During his in-home interview, Kurt had made sure to talk Nick up for the cameras, so that everyone in America would know exactly how amazingly talented (and not at all fluffy) Nick Duval really was. Who knew? Maybe the exposure might be a step in getting Nick the change he was hoping for. It had worked wonders for Kurt.

Ty said a little prepared spiel for the cameras which Kurt had heard him rehearse a hundred times, so Kurt concentrated instead on the feeling of Blaine's fingers laced with his, his warm palm pressed against his skin, holding on tight.

Ty opened the door with a carefully practiced and dramatic flourish. Nick covered Kurt's eyes with his hands as Blaine led Kurt inside. Kurt heard Blaine gasp and knew without even having to see it that everything was perfect. Nick removed his hands. Kurt blinked, letting his eyes adjust to the light, which came from a tiny gold chandelier that matched the one in his bedroom perfectly.

Kurt's first look into his new studio was like waking up in a magical wonderland created just for him. Besides his own beautiful bedroom, he had never seen such an amazing space. This one had been designed for him by his best friend, which made it even all the more special. He walked to the center of the room and turned around in place, looking at the gorgeous red walls, patterned subtly with a brocade lace stencil in a slightly lighter color. The walls were lined with hand made bench seats, each one painted a cream color, and covered with cushions made of pale gold velvet. Kurt's designs, printed on hand-aged parchment and mounted in unique antique frames lined the walls at eye level.

"Oh, Kurt," Blaine breathed, looking around with wide eyes, "it's amazing."

The bathroom had been completely renovated, with a door that led to the main workspace for customers to use. The walls in the bathroom were patterned the same way the red walls were, but these were painted in the same cream and pale gold that matched the seats.

One of the small bedrooms had been transformed into Kurt's sewing room, as per Nick's plans. The futon Blaine wanted was nestled discreetly in the corner. Nick also added a lot of personal touches to this room - framed pictures of the kids, a couple of photos of Kurt and Blaine together, a collage of the more PG-13 rated shots from Blaine's boudoir photo shoot, printed in black and white and color tinted by hand. Nick had also set up two special monitors that allowed Kurt to watch the kids in the house when he came out to his workspace at night, one dedicated specifically to Eva's room. The flat screen monitors could be carried where ever Kurt decided to work.

In the foreground of the room stood several drafting and cutting tables, a special cabinet made specifically for storing fabrics and trim, and a special present from Blaine - five brand new and very special sewing machines: a Serger, a machine for delicate fabrics, a machine for heavy fabrics, a machine specially made for sewing leather, and the flagship of the collection, a sewing machine that embroidered with the use of a special computer program and drafting software.

Kurt didn't want to cry on television, but he couldn't help it. He wrapped his arms around his boyfriend, and buried his head in Blaine's shoulder.

"I can't believe you did that," Kurt whispered.

"I think of it as an investment," Blaine said softly, "in the man I'm going to marry."

Kurt sniffled, smiling as he placed a dainty kiss to Blaine's neck.

"Don't propose to me on t.v.," Kurt pleaded jokingly.

"When I propose to you," Blaine assured him, "you won't see it coming."

Blaine realized that their private moment had gone on a little too long, and been caught entirely on camera. Blaine looked over to Nick, standing with a tissue pressed against his eyes.

"Too bad you couldn't do anything with that other room," Blaine interjected loudly, bringing the attention back to the studio. "Are you turning it into storage?"

"Actually," Nick said, taking Blaine's arm and pulling him towards the closed bedroom door. "Kurt has a surprise for you, as well."

Blaine looked over at Kurt, eyebrows raised. Kurt rolled his lower lip between his teeth, watching Blaine intently as he reached for the door knob. Blaine trained his gaze on Kurt's face as he turned the knob and pushed open the door.

The cozy room was covered in acoustical tiles and paneling from floor to ceiling. Kurt and Nick had gone to Blaine's house and brought over all of his instruments - his guitars, his violin, and his Casio keyboard. Kurt had stumbled upon them once, shoved in a corner of Blaine's closet, each in their cases, untouched for far too long. Kurt had filled in the gaps, though, by outfitting the room with professional quality recording and mixing equipment, a specially built computer programmed with midi and composing software, and a few special microphones - each one calibrated specifically to pick up the timbres of each individual instrument.

It was a simple room, all things considering, but Blaine had never seen anything so beautiful in his life.

Except, of course, for his incredible boyfriend.

Kurt stepped back from his dress form, looking at the silhouette of Lucy's fifth dress - a midnight blue charmeuse satin gown, with a delicate contrast of hand crocheted black lace, special ordered for her first album debut party in Milan.

Blaine had been in the room with Kurt when Lucy's stylist had ordered the dress. Kurt had smirked at Blaine, giving him a pointed look, which was why Blaine had suddenly become so dedicated to completing songs for his own first solo album. He worked in his small recording space in the back of Kurt's studio every night since, playing his new piece over and over while Kurt set about to the difficult task of matching biases.

Kurt bit his lip, inspecting the dress from all angles, observing the drape, and the way the shadows fell in long vertical lines across the fabric, giving Lucy the illusion of height with the help of special made, six-inch, Manolo Blahnik heels.

'Poor girl,' Kurt thought with a small smile and a shake of his head. At only 5' 2", she needed every inch of those heels, too.

Kurt hummed along subconsciously to the refrain that Blaine picked out over and over on the keyboard. Blaine had offered to wear a headset so Kurt could concentrate, but he refused, saying he wouldn't have had Nick add the recording space to his studio if he hadn't wanted it filled with music, even unfinished music.

A light tapping on the door broke Kurt from his deep concentration.

Kurt looked up in surprise. He lifted his wrist, blinking to focus on the dainty Rolex Blaine had bought him after he had finished and delivered his first dress. The rose pink organza gown had made its debut down the red carpet, and the morning after, all of the little boxes on Kurt's calendar filled up. The clock face, surrounded by chocolate diamonds, read 11:30.

Kurt yawned at the thought. He had been working for over five hours. Kurt looked through the panes of glass on the door as the person outside knocked again.

"One minute," Kurt called in a sing-song voice. Because of the dark outside and the light inside, Kurt couldn't make out any features of the person standing outside his door, but he had a suspicion it was Dave asking him when he was going to call it a night. The last two nights, Kurt had slept on the futon in his studio, wrapped around Blaine, but the two had been so tired that the futon hadn't been properly christened yet.

A problem Kurt had planned on rectifying later that night.

Kurt took a quick peek at Eva's monitor, and saw the girl happily wrapped around one of Blaine's t-shirts, asleep peacefully with her thumb stuck in her mouth.

'Well, at least it's not that,' Kurt said to himself.

He turned the knob and opened the door.

Standing in the threshold was a familiar face that Kurt had never seen in person.

"Oh my God!" Kurt brought a hand to his lips, covering his gaping mouth. A smiling face surrounded by waves of shoulder length brown hair looked back at him. "You Krista vos Sentos!"

"Hi, Kurt," she said brightly, extending her hand. Kurt took it in both of his and shook it enthusiastically. "Is it okay if I call you Kurt?"

"Of course," Kurt said. The music coming from Blaine's recording room had stopped. He stepped out, rubbing his eye with the heel of his hands, and came up behind Kurt.

"Hey, Krista." Blaine stepped forward and wrapped the woman in a hug. "What are you doing in this neck of the woods?"

Kurt moved aside to let the woman enter, still in awe that famed EW entertainment journalist and correspondent Krista vos Sentos was in his studio.

"Actually, I had every intention of coming on by." She turned around and looked at the space, her smile fading a little. "But, unfortunately, I'm here with some news...consider it a professional courtesy."

Kurt didn't understand what that meant, but Blaine seemed to. His bright smile fell. He wrapped a possessive hand around Kurt's waist and held him tight.

"Tell me," Blaine said, his expression serious.

Krista sighed and produced from her messenger bag a crisp new magazine.

"This hits the news stands in about an hour," she said, handing the magazine over. "I didn't know about it until this evening. They pulled the original printing and replaced it with this. I swear, Blaine, I didn't know."

Blaine took the magazine and looked at it. On the cover was a full-page photo of him and Kurt, arm in arm at a recent red carpet event. They were dressed in dark jeans, both wearing dark leather jackets, trying to say incognito among the crowd of photographers and onlookers. They had gone to see one of Kurt's more elaborate dresses, Lucy Bale's second gown, walk the red carpet. He remembered that Lucy had stopped just a few feet from them as a journalist asked her who she was wearing. Not only did she make it a point to gush over Kurt Hummel and the original design of her gorgeous dress, but spelled Kurt's first and last name twice to insure that the man wrote it down correctly. The photograph captured Kurt's beautiful, wide-eyed look of astonishment as he stared in amazement at the dress. Blaine was only looking at Kurt.

Blaine smiled at the picture, remembering that night, remembering Kurt's excitement, remembering the hours they spent in bed celebrating together afterward. Blaine looked down the page to the headline. The wording confused Blaine at first, but after the fifth time, its meaning became clear. He felt sick.

The Dark Side to Hollywood's Hot New Couple

Kurt watched Blaine's face go from quizzical, then sentimental, and finally blank and expressionless.

Blaine flipped to the center of the magazine where he was sure he would find the article. Kurt looked over Blaine's shoulder and went pale.

A two-page exposé, right in the dead center of the magazine. There were interviews with almost everyone Kurt knew - neighbors, the kids' teachers, his students from the rec center, and worse of all, other doms in the business. Kurt swallowed hard as he read. All the dark parts of his life on full display. Of course, a lot of it was hearsay, second hand from other people, but no one would care. Besides, it was all very accurate.

The written article would have been devastating on its own, but it included pictures - lots and lots of pictures. So many, in fact, that the article continued for another two pages. Kurt didn't even know how they had managed to get so many pictures. There was a picture of Kurt from high school, dressed in his cheerleading uniform. One pictures was from NYADA - a photograph that was taken during his audition at the Winter Showcase. There was one from the rec center that had been published to advertise his Bokwa class - him posing with his class, their faces all blurred, and him in his signature black leotard. There was a picture someone took at the Purple Pageant of Kurt singing on the piano, and another of Kurt and Blaine kissing in the mezzanine.

None of these pictures devastated him.

The ones from the bachelor parties did. Kurt had worked a lot of bachelor parties when he was new in the business. As an extra boost, he had sold photos to people in attendance. Somehow the magazine had managed to print almost all of them. Kurt, in various degrees of dom dress, from plain black leather, to sinful blue satin lingerie, and the last one, the most painful of them all, the one Blaine was sure Sebastian had something to do with, one of Kurt on his cell phone, standing on the back patio of Blaine's house, dressed only in a pair of black boy cut panties. Blaine examined the grainy photograph carefully, gritting his teeth painfully as he realized the photograph was actually a still from a recorded movie. From the angle it was taken, it wasn't shot over the fence. The camera was positioned somewhere in his backyard.

Kurt shook so badly he had to step away and sit down.

"I don't understand," Blaine said, fire burning in his eyes. "What, did you come down here for some kind of expose, or something?"

Krista, her face already crestfallen, looked deeply and sincerely hurt.

"No," she said quietly. "I did it because I didn't want Kurt, or Dave, or his kids, blindsided tomorrow when this came out. I wanted you to prepare a statement, Blaine, so you can protect them. I want to give you the opportunity to come to me if you need anything at all."

Blaine looked into her eyes, his expression softening.

Krista's eyes had misted over.

"Whoever did this," she said, pointing at the magazine, "slipped it by me, knowing that you and I are friends. I know I'm going to sound like a hypocrite when I say this, but...this is cruel. I can't stop it, so I wanted you to be prepared to deal with the fallout."

Blaine nodded, but he couldn't bring himself to give her a smile.

He had none left.

Krista looked past Blaine to where Kurt sat on a small, velvet covered stool, his clouded eyes wandering over the dress in front of him sadly.

"I'm sorry, Kurt," Krista said, her voice catching in her throat. "I truly am."

Kurt nodded, just a single movement from a head that had suddenly become too heavy to move. Krista looked down at her shoes. Looking at the sassy young man sitting, head bowed, shoulders slumped, looking so defeated, was too painful for her. She turned and walked out of the studio, closing the door quietly behind her.

"It's over," Kurt said. "No one's going to buy a single dress from me now."

Blaine knelt beside Kurt, taking his shaking hands in his own, covering them protectively.

"Kurt..."

"And Lucy," Kurt continued, motioning to the gown on the dress form. "Her whole reputation is about staying sweet and innocent in the face of cruel, debauched Hollywood. She won't want this dress."

Blaine's heart broke.

"Blaine," Kurt muttered, sniffling, his eyes red with equal parts humiliation and fury, "they're going to ruin me." Kurt turned his face, his lips twisted as he bit back tears. "They're going to destroy my career before it even begins."

Kurt crumpled for the first time since Eva's accident, falling into Blaine's waiting arms. Blaine held Kurt tight, cradling him, rocking him back and forth, whispering encouragements and promises.

"It's not over yet," Blaine reassured him. "It hasn't even begun." Blaine kissed the top of Kurt's head. "You are amazing." Blaine punctuated each word for emphasis. "You're going to make it. You'll rise above all this."

Blaine spoke the words, and in his heart he believed them, but as Kurt's body became almost boneless, sinking further against him with no strength left to cry or to care, Blaine knew that Kurt didn't have his faith.

Blaine heard his phone ring. He pulled his iPhone from his pocket and looked at the number on the screen. Blaine's faith began to ebb away.

It was Lucy Bale.