“Okay, Mr. Anderson, if you would just sign here … and here … and initial here … there you are. Thank you very much.”

“Thank you,” Blaine said, taking his envelope from the delivery man. “Have a nice day.”

“You, too.”

“What is it? What is it? What is it?” Kurt sang, racing in just as Blaine shut the front door. Kurt had been lured to the house all the way from his studio in the backyard by the doorbell. He cut two clients short in his haste, a snafu that Nick was currently in the process of patching up.

But that’s what Kurt paid Nick for - with money, but more importantly, with crepes and cupcakes.

Kurt couldn’t help being excited. He and Blaine had been watching large envelopes arrive at their door day after day for the past few weeks, waiting on the edge of their seats for news of Blaine’s possible star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, or his new recording contract, or his book deal. In reality, those would get passed along to Blaine through his agent, but still, it was always exciting when an important-looking envelope came in the mail.

It was also an indicator to Kurt of just how far he’d come. He could remember a time not too long ago when anyone showing up at the door of his little run-down trailer in San Diego filled him with dread. Between the creditors, the asshole neighbors, and CPS, life seemed to find any opportunity to try and bring him down.

But that wasn’t his life anymore. He and his family had moved forward towards a brighter future, and even though Kurt worked his ass off to get there, it was also due to the persistence of one amazing man - the man joining him on the sofa, tearing into his envelope with the same level of curiosity and excitement as Kurt felt.

Blaine ripped open the top and pulled a thick sheaf of stapled pages out that definitely resembled a contract. Kurt felt his heart race. He didn’t want to read over Blaine’s shoulder, so he watched Blaine’s face for his reaction. That was the best part anyway – Blaine’s expressive face, contorting through stages of happiness. Blaine smiled big at first, but then his jaw went slack, hanging partially open in awe.

“What is it?” Kurt asked, slapping the couch cushion. “Tell me!”

Blaine swallowed hard, his eyes scanning the words he’d just read a second time before he spoke. Then he said the impossible - something that Kurt had hoped to someday hear, but never honestly thought he would.

“It’s … it’s from my dad.”

“Oh, honey! That’s … that’s wonderful!” Kurt said, clapping his hands. That sentence was music to Kurt’s ears - a long sought symphony finally written. After all this time, Blaine’s parents had come to their senses. They’d contacted their son - a few decades late, but as the saying goes, better late than never. Kurt just prayed they didn’t expect some sort of apology from Blaine for leaving home, or for living as his authentic self. Kurt’s compassion where Blaine’s parents was concerned only extended so far.

But not even halfway down the page, Blaine’s smile froze, and Kurt felt his heart shudder.

“No, I … I’m wrong,” Blaine retracted, slowly shaking his head. “It’s … it’s from my dad’s lawyer.”

“His lawyer?” Kurt yelped indignantly. “Why would his lawyer be contacting you?” There was only one reason Kurt could think that Blaine’s parents would contact him through a lawyer, and if he was right, that made them the lowest of the low. “Are your parents trying to sue you or …?”

“No. No, it’s---it’s a will,” Blaine interrupted. “It’s my father’s will. According to this, he passed away … three months ago.”

Blaine’s voice faltered on those final words. When the period fell at the end of his sentence, the air sucked completely out of the room.

“What!?” Kurt gasped. “But … why didn’t your mother tell you?”

Blaine had already gotten to that part. He cleared his throat, but he almost couldn’t continue. “B-because she passed away. O-over a year ago.”

“Oh my God!” Kurt put a hand on Blaine’s shoulder. “Blaine …” Kurt wanted to comfort him, but he felt dumbstruck. Even with everything Kurt had been through, he couldn’t imagine the devastation Blaine must be feeling. Blaine had held on to hope for so long that his parents would decide to come back into his life, but now that would never happen.

And Blaine didn’t even get the chance to say goodbye.

“I’m … I’m sorry, Blaine.” Kurt squeezed Blaine’s shoulder, but for the first time in their relationship, Kurt had no idea what else to do. He didn’t know how to help him. He didn’t know what to say. He’d think he would, considering the loss he’d suffered in his life, but nothing came to him. “I’m so sorry.”

“It’s …” Blaine was on the cusp of saying that it was alright, except it wasn’t all right. How had it gotten to this point? How did things get so outrageously not right that his father didn’t think it was necessary to tell him that his mother had died? Was she sick? And if so, with what? Blaine didn’t know. Why shouldn’t he be informed? Why didn’t anyone feel the need to invite him to the funeral? There were family friends and neighbors who knew, weren’t there? People who’d watched Blaine grow up, who knew that he was famous, who could have contacted him. Did his parents warn them away? What crime had Blaine honestly committed that it no longer concerned anyone to let him know that his parents were dead?

“What do you need?” Kurt asked when Blaine’s sentence didn’t resolve and he stared off into space like he was searching for the rest of it. “Anything. Whatever you want, just … how can I help you?”

“I …” Blaine got caught on that word and stayed there, lost with his eyes open, clutching the paperwork that had changed everything for him in a matter of a few minutes. He’d heard that life could change in a blink. He believed it, too. His life altered entirely when he came out to his parents, when he got the part on Sing, and then again when he laid eyes on Kurt. But when it came to his parents, Blaine thought he had time. Take time, give them time, they would forget in time, forgive over time – they would come back to him given enough time.

But whatever time he had ran out more than a year ago, and he never even knew it.

“I … need a little time,” he said. “That’s … that’s what I need right now … if that’s okay.”

“Sure. Of course.” Kurt rested his head on Blaine’s shoulder. “Take as long as you need.”

***

Blaine was numb for the rest of the day. He barely spoke three words, and they were all for Eva. He excused himself early from dinner and locked himself in his and Kurt’s bedroom. Kurt understood. Their house was full nearly 24/7. That was one of the things Kurt loved about it. Family and friends gathered at their dinner table at eight on the dot to eat meals that Kurt made, and Kurt, Blaine, and Dave welcomed them. It reminded Kurt of the Friday night dinners he’d shared with his mom and dad, and for Blaine, it replaced the family gatherings he hadn’t been invited to. But Blaine couldn’t right now. It wasn’t that he didn’t need his family; he needed them more than ever. But he didn’t want an audience for his pain.

Blaine apologized, and explained as best he could without giving too many details. He didn’t want to say anything that might trigger the kids. It came out choppy, stuttered. Thoughts ended without picking up again, but he was still processing. Kurt did his best to ensure that conversation continued to flow after Blaine’s departure - for Blaine, who would hear them if he was listening in; and for the kids, who didn’t need any more solemn dinners - but it wasn’t easy. Everyone at the dinner table felt for Blaine. With him gone, his vacant chair represented every sad event in their lives, every heartbreak.

It was difficult not to get caught up in the sorrow of it.

After dinner, Kurt and Dave cleaned-up the kids and tucked them into their beds. Blaine always lent a hand with Eva, and it was with Eva that his absence was most deeply felt. But Kurt took over the job of brushing her hair, helping her with her jammies, and reading her her favorite story half a dozen times before she yawned and let Kurt go.

Kurt thought that he was the patient one when it came to Eva, but he’d taken for granted the amount of patience Blaine had with her. Even growing up and mellowing out, she was still a handful. She required so much specific attention. Everything in her life needed to be ordered just so, but that never seemed to deter him. He did everything she needed without being asked. Blaine and Eva were as close to soulmates as two people could get. If they weren’t so absolutely adorable together, and if Blaine didn’t confirm daily how in love he was with Kurt, Kurt might feel jealous.

When Kurt joined Blaine, he found his sub dressed for bed, re-reading the documents that had come in the envelope. To think that it had filled them with such joy before they knew the truth, a hope for reconciliation.

It was a goddamned shame.

Along with the will, there had apparently been other papers. Kurt peeked at the pile, hoping one of them would be a letter from Blaine’s parents, something that they might have arranged to have sent to their son after their death. Kurt grasped onto one last shred that there would be closure for Blaine, but no luck. The papers were a deed to a vacation property, a title to a car, a storage agreement, the remains of a bank account, and an IRA. A photograph shuffled in amongst the mix caught Kurt’s attention. He lifted it out, wondering if it was a family photograph, but it looked too recent, and there were no people in it. It was of a house – a single family residence, similar to the one Kurt lived in. He thought that it might actually be his house except that, in the white border, the address had been printed on it.

This house was in Ohio.

“What’s this a picture of?” Kurt asked, climbing under the covers.

“That’s my house,” Blaine said. “Or it was. It’s where I grew up, where I lived until I got the role on Sing.”

“It looks charming,” Kurt said, snuggling in beside him.

“Yeah, well, it does from the outside. Inside is a different story. Or it was. What the hell do I know? It could look completely different now.” There was a bitterness in Blaine’s voice, one that Kurt knew well. He’d heard it in his own voice right after Finn and Rachel died.

“What are you going to do with it?”

“I’m going to sell it,” Blaine said in a cut and dry tone that made Kurt shiver, not because of its sadness or its underlying anger, but because of its total lack of emotion.

“And what about their things?”

“I’m going to have them boxed up and put into storage until I can hire someone to go through them.”

“Well, you and I can go through them if you’d like,” Kurt suggested. He knew this was a difficult time for Blaine, but Kurt was eager to do it, take this journey with Blaine into his past. It might help Blaine come to grips with his parents’ death. It might also help Kurt understand more about Blaine than he did. Not that Kurt didn’t know Blaine. He knew Blaine in dozens of unique and intimate ways. He knew him from his words and from his actions, from pictures and videos and yearbooks, from his friends. But you could learn a lot about someone from seeing where they grew up, how they lived. What remained in that house might be a distant shadow of Blaine’s childhood, but Kurt was still intrigued by it.

“I’d … I’d rather not,” Blaine said. “I really don’t need to do it myself. I don’t think there’s anything there that I want. They sent me everything that belonged to me.”

“But, Blaine …” Kurt didn’t want to pressure Blaine, but he was concerned for him. He saw Blaine coming face to face with his past as an important step forward “… it might help if you …”

“Kurt” – Blaine’s harsh use of his Dom’s name sliced through Kurt’s sentence, and Kurt almost jerked away – “do you remember when I showed up at your house in San Diego? You didn’t want me to come in because you said that it wasn’t you, it was just the horrible situation you and your family were in.”

“Yes.”

“That’s the same way I feel about my family home. For a long time that I lived there, I wasn’t me. I was scared and confused, and in the closet without even realizing it, or how far deep. The last year I spent there, my parents … they weren’t the family I knew. They’d already given up on me. I don’t want that house painting a picture for you of a person who doesn’t exist anymore. Can you understand that?”

“Yeah,” Kurt said softly. “I understand.”

Blaine sighed. He put down his papers and turned to his Dom. “I’m … I’m sorry, Sir. I didn’t mean to cut you off or snap at you. I just …”

“I get it.” Kurt wound his arms around Blaine’s middle and sank into his sub’s sadness, trying to find a way to lift him out. “I just want to help you through this. I don’t like seeing you upset.”

Blaine slid down the mattress and curled into Kurt’s body, begging Kurt to hold him. And Kurt did. Holding Blaine seemed like the only thing he could do for him.

“Thank you, Sir,” Blaine said. “And if I could think of a way, I’d tell you. But this will pass.” He gathered up the papers with one hand and set them aside. “Once I get over the initial shock, it will fade. I know it will. I’ve been without my parents for a larger part of my life. Believe me when I tell you … I’ll get over it.”

“I hope so,” Kurt said, but what he thought was I’m not so sure.

“I know I will.” Blaine was trying to reassure Kurt. Kurt felt it ironic. “I’ll be fine. I promise, Sir.”

“Alright,” Kurt said, but he had the nagging feeling that Blaine wouldn’t be.

And sometimes Kurt hated being right.

***

For weeks after, something in Kurt’s beautiful submissive changed, broke loose. He was distant. He didn’t get angry, didn’t get frustrated, didn’t laugh or smile. He would sit in one place and get lost in his thoughts. And he was sad. So incredibly sad. He moved through life like there was a fog around him. He no longer sang to himself. He barely wrote any music. He tried recording, but more times than not he sat on his piano bench with his hands poised over the keys ready to play, but he couldn’t. He was blocked.

Kurt had mentioned to him in passing that maybe he’d feel better if he cried. Kurt hadn’t seen him cry since the day he’d gotten that letter. In Kurt’s opinion, Blaine needed an outburst, something to jolt him out of his funk. Kurt remembered being in a similar state, trying to stay strong for the kids, but he had been denying himself, neglecting his own needs. Once he could surrender to a soul-crushing cry, he was able to move past it. The pain of loss was still with him, but it no longer consumed him. But Blaine repeatedly told Kurt he’d be fine. Give him time. Time healed.

Time would take care of everything.

Kurt worked in his studio as often as possible since Blaine spent his days in his music room. Kurt liked being able to keep an eye on him. Kurt never gave Blaine a schedule to follow. That wasn’t how their dynamic worked. They both had their own jobs, their own hobbies, their own lives, but regardless, they remained in close proximity to one another. It sort of happened on its own. Kurt always knew where Blaine would be and when. But Blaine had started skipping out on breakfast, grabbing a slice of toast, a cup of coffee, and a kiss on the forehead from Eva before he set out, getting to his music room most days before Kurt got to his studio. He wasn’t avoiding Kurt, he was just focused on his work.

Work which, for the moment, wasn’t going well.

They didn’t talk about the will, didn’t talk about the house. It seemed like Blaine had put the whole thing behind him, but he was far from back to normal. One morning, instead of grabbing his slice of toast and heading for the yard, he grabbed his car keys and headed for the front door, which set alarms ringing in Kurt’s head.  

“Blaine?” Kurt put down his spatula, took a pan of eggs off the stove, and chased after him. “Blaine, where are you going?”

“I’m going to my old house,” he said apologetically since he hadn’t given Kurt a heads up that morning, but he had only just decided. “There are some things I have to sort through, and I need to be alone. Completely alone.”

Kurt didn’t like that. He didn’t like Blaine going off to work through his problems without him. That’s what Kurt was there for, both as his lover and his Dominant, to help Blaine in every capacity. But Kurt also knew what it was like to suffer a huge loss, how raw that made you. There were pains that no one could help you with, no matter how much they wanted to try. These were Blaine’s feelings, and they were valid. Kurt had to respect them.

“Alright,” Kurt said. “Just, please, do me one favor.”

“Anything.”

“Don’t get drunk over this. Please? If you need to take out your aggression, take it out with me, but please … don’t do that to yourself. Not when you’ve come so far and made so much progress. It’s not worth it.”

Blaine looked stung, but only for a second. Blaine’s drinking, though not a point of contention during their relationship, had been an issue for a good portion of his adult life. It wasn’t that Kurt didn’t trust him. Kurt had all the faith in the world in him. But Kurt needed Blaine to be safe. If anything happened to Kurt’s sub, to this man that he loved, he would never forgive himself.

Blaine kissed Kurt gently on the lips. “I promise I won’t.”

***

Kurt had gotten so used to Blaine spending time in the studio that he found he couldn’t work with Blaine gone. To make matters worse, it had started raining (even though it was far from winter), and Kurt loved the rain. It was one of the things about being an East coaster that he severely missed when he moved to San Diego. He was usually his most creative when it rained, but most of all, he loved spending rainy days with his sub. The drops pattered musically on the glass-tiled roof. They could look up at the sky while they made love to one another, imagine they were outdoors on the soft, fragrant grass. But Kurt wasn’t with Blaine. He was alone. And he wasn’t making love; he was working – working hard and getting nothing done. When Kurt looked at the gowns he’d finished, all he saw were tacky knock-offs of his other work.

He worried about his sub, wondered how he was dealing.

Blaine had promised not to get drunk over this, but did that mean that maybe he’d have one drink? Two? The rule against Blaine’s drinking to excess had been written into their contract, but it didn’t specify an amount that he could or couldn’t imbibe. The less Blaine drank over time, the more of a lightweight he’d become. Maybe he’d get drunk without even realizing it. Kurt didn’t want to slip into that line of thinking. Blaine was better than that. He wasn’t purposefully self-destructive. He was careful. He wouldn’t do that to himself, to the kids … or to Kurt. But Kurt wanted to check up on him, just to make sure. And it was within Kurt’s scope to do so. It wasn’t a matter of distrust. It was Kurt’s responsibility to take care of Blaine. This fell under that umbrella. Kurt would be fine with Blaine feeling hurt as long as he knew his sub was okay. Kurt pulled out his phone to message him only to find that Blaine had beaten him to it.

To Kurt:

Come over please, Sir. I need you.

By the speed in which Kurt ran to his car and shot over to Blaine’s old house, the casual onlooker might have assumed the place was on fire. Even while trying to be cautious on the wet streets, it took Kurt only a few minutes to get to Blaine’s house. He drove there on autopilot. From the calm nature of Blaine’s text, Kurt didn’t assume he was in danger, and the fact that nothing was misspelled (Blaine didn’t believe in autocorrect) meant that Blaine wasn’t drunk.

But Blaine needed him.  

Kurt had his suspicions as to where Blaine could be, so when he got to the house, he went straight there. He opened the door to the playroom and was struck by the intense quiet. It was so eerily quiet that Kurt had a hard time believing Blaine was even there, but three steps into the room, Kurt found him, undressed, kneeling at the foot of the bed in picture perfect submission. Kurt paused, watching Blaine’s shoulders to check his breathing. He seemed calm. And still. So still, he might have been asleep.

“Blaine?” Step by step he approached his sub, the sound of his footsteps almost too harsh in this space. “Blaine, what’s going on?” Blaine didn’t move. He didn’t answer, and Kurt realized quickly it was because he hadn’t been given permission to. They were in the middle of a scene – Blaine’s scene. Kurt had to decide if he wanted to join in. “You may respond.”

“I needed to be here, Sir,” Blaine said. “It was … necessary.”

“What’s necessary, sweetheart?” Kurt jumped at the chance to do something for him. He wanted to hug Blaine, raise him to his feet and surround him with his love. But Blaine had put himself into this position – came to the playroom and kneeled on his spot on his own. He had possibly been here for hours, texted Kurt from here, his phone on the floor by his knees. But he hadn’t texted Kurt, his lover. He’d texted Kurt, his Dominant. This was what he needed.

So this was what Kurt would give him.

“I need …” Blaine’s lips locked tight around his wants and his needs, the lines blurring as he couldn’t tell one from the other – what was good for him, what was important, what Kurt would be willing to do. “I want you to hurt me, Sir.”

Kurt suddenly felt cold. Cold and sick. Pain had been a part of their relationship from the beginning, but not like this. Not with a heartbroken Blaine kneeling at his feet, asking for it so outright, so plain. Not in that defeated voice. Not the way he looked, like the world had ended, and Blaine needed to find a way to live in the ruins.

“And why do you want me to do this?” Kurt asked.

“Because, you’re right, Sir. I need to get this out of my system. And in order to do that … I need to cry.”

Kurt knelt in front of Blaine. He knew he risked derailing Blaine’s headspace by doing so, but he had to see Blaine’s eyes. Blaine avoided looking directly at him out of respect. Kurt placed a hand to his cheek.

“Are you sure?” he asked, hoping there was another way. They could do a regular scene. They could make love, go for a run, box, go dancing. Anything but this. Kurt had the final say, but he felt like he’d been failing Blaine so far. “Are you sure this is what you need?”

“Yes, Sir,” Blaine said. “I’m sure.”

Kurt nodded. He kissed Blaine’s nose, his lips, his chin. “Okay, sweetheart. You stay here. I have to … I have to do something first.”

Kurt stood and walked out of the room, leaving Blaine to continue kneeling. Kurt called Dave, told him he’d need a few hours. Then he went to Blaine’s old office, found a yellow legal pad and a pen, and began writing. He wrote and wrote without stopping. He’d met masochists before in his line of work, and men who wanted to be punished for the sole sake of being punished, but he’d never had to do this before for anybody. He didn’t think it would be easy coming up with a plan for it, but the second the pen hit the paper, the words just came. Without even looking at their contract, Kurt knew exactly what he wanted to write. It took him close to forty minutes to get everything down, then to re-write it to make sure it was clear and left no stones unturned. He went over it a third time, then a fourth. Part of him hoped that agreeing to the idea of this, then leaving Blaine alone to mull over the logistics of it, would be enough, and that when he returned to their playroom, he’d find Blaine on the verge of tears, relieved that he’d found an out. Then all he would need was a stern remark from Kurt to get the tears flowing.

But no such luck. When Kurt returned, he saw Blaine kneeling in the same position as before, staring at the floor, a melancholy resolve on his face. Kurt should have made him kneel on rice to get the ball rolling, except that wasn’t something Kurt had ever made Blaine do before. It was a type of pain Kurt had never had to inflict. Kurt didn’t really punish Blaine. He had before, but there was rarely a need. But this wasn’t punishment, either.

To Kurt, it sounded like torture.

But no more than the way Blaine was already torturing himself.

“Here …” Kurt sat on the mattress beside Blaine where he knelt on the floor “… I drew this up. It’s an addendum to our contract.” Without a word, Blaine put his hand out for a pen. Kurt shook his head. “Blaine, you have to read it before you sign it, or I won’t do this for you.” Kurt had a feeling Blaine wouldn’t read it – out of trust or stubbornness, or simple self-hate. So Kurt read it to him, line after line, about how this was an addendum for this one day, this one time, so that Blaine could get over this hurdle. Kurt went back over their limits, outlined the techniques he would use, swore that he wouldn’t stray into territory considered forbidden. Then he told Blaine to repeat what he’d said, to make sure his sub had heard him and understood. And Blaine, knowing this was his only means to an end, recited it back perfectly.

And yet, Kurt still didn’t want to hand Blaine the pen.

Blaine wasn’t a client. He never was just a client. But then, in essence, that should make this easier. Blaine was in pain. He was begging for Kurt’s help. He needed this, and, to be honest, this wasn’t a hard limit for Kurt. He could do this if Blaine needed him to.

And Blaine needed him to.

Blaine sat quietly, patiently, hand out for the pen, and Kurt gave it, his stomach knotting as he watched Blaine sign on the line without even looking.

“Are you ready?” Kurt asked when that was done.

“Yes, Sir.”

“Alright then. This session begins now.” Kurt didn’t change his clothes. Mentally, he’d prepared, and he didn’t need armor for this. He wasn’t only Blaine’s Dominant. He was his lover. Armor was just an accessory for them. Besides, if he took the time to change, he might second-guess this whole thing. “Up, princess,” he said, grabbing a handful of Blaine’s hair and bringing him to his feet. “Time to go play.”

Kurt didn’t secure Blaine to his newest toy, his St. Andrew’s Cross, opting instead to do what they’d always done and strap him to the posts on the bed. It gave Blaine less support than the cross, plus it made him vulnerable. There was no place for Blaine to hide when he was strung to the bed, all areas of his body exposed for abuse.

Kurt went for the obvious. He started with physical pain. But Kurt had to find a way to change the game on that one because Blaine was a slut for pain. They both were. He’d bruised Blaine before. He’d made him bleed. But those had always been consequences of play.

Kurt tried to tap as deep into his inner sadist as he could – not just the easily measured cruelty, but down to its heartless core, into the mind of the man who never completely forgave everyone who made his life a living hell … his ex-boyfriend, the cheerleaders, the jocks. That included Dave - the man he had lived with and grown to love had been one of the worst of them all. Kurt pictured the ways Dave tormented him – tossing him into dumpsters, throwing him into lockers, dousing him with Slushies, threatening his life and scaring the shit out of him over a kiss. That kiss burned into Kurt’s brain so hot with its desperation and self-loathing that he never forgot it. Even seeing Dave in the hospital after he’d tried to hang himself couldn’t erase it. And as Kurt started, as he jumped past their usual warm-up and launched into heavy handed paddling, he thought of the ways he swore he’d get back at Dave, the horrible things he’d do, from hacking into the school computer and changing his grades to failing (as if Kurt knew how to hack into a computer) to cutting the break line on his car (which Kurt actually knew how to do).

Kurt thought about his high school boyfriend, Darren, who had broken his heart. Who Kurt had given every one of his firsts to, and who had betrayed him.

Kurt channeled all of that anger, all of that vengeance, into the man he was now, only … he couldn’t use it. He couldn’t. Because he wasn’t the kind of man who could take out on someone else the pain he had endured, especially not someone he loved as much as he loved Blaine. And he wasn’t the kind of Dominant who could unload that amount of hurt onto his submissive.

He needed to find another way.

When one popped into his brain, an extremely obvious one, he wished he had settled on blind hate. It would be less cruel.

Kurt knew every single insecurity that Blaine had. He knew them, and he knew that he could exploit them. Kurt had it in his power to do it, the ammunition he would need to slay Blaine – his body insecurities, his fear of never making it as a musician, his belief that he wasn’t a good enough son to his parents. It was all there. One word, and he could devastate Blaine. Many Dominants might be able to.

But Kurt couldn’t do that, either.

It was one thing having the ammunition.

It was another to know that it should never, ever be used.

So he stuck with physical pain – nipple clips, electro-stim, a flogger he had yet to use because it had metal barbs embedded in the leather straps. He slapped Blaine’s engorged cock and straining balls repeatedly with a stiff leather crop until his twitching body looked like it would bend itself in two. He locked Blaine in a seedpod filled with spiked balls and fisted him, letting his bobbing cock torment itself, but that did nothing.

Kurt went for the slut shaming that he felt comfortable using. He fucked Blaine hard and told him that that would be the only thing his body would ever be good for; called him a princess, a cum slut, and a whore. He said that he’d often wondered how Blaine could let Sebastian and Mia use him, pictured how they’d both made him their bitch and laughed about it behind his back while they fucked each other. Then, after he pretended to cum (because he didn’t. He couldn’t – not like this), he left Blaine there. Left him hanging and alone. Kurt even opened the front door to make it seem like he’d left the house, which he did. He went outside for a breath of air. Then he sat in his car and cried. He let the anger and the tension out, but he had to be careful. He couldn’t drop now. He couldn’t allow himself to, not when Blaine needed him.

Not when Blaine wasn’t in any position to take care of himself, not to mention Kurt.

So he slapped himself in the face, dried his eyes, and went back in for round two.

He gave in and made Blaine kneel on rice while he caned his cock; had him kneel on sandpaper while he made Blaine blow him, crowding in on his face so that he’d have to slide back on his knees across the gritty paper. Kurt made Blaine cum using a prostate wand, then jerked him with a fleshjack until the oversensitivity created a dualism of pure agony bred from pleasure, coupled by the humiliation of being milked dry so clinically.

Kurt pulled out every stop he could think of. By the time they were done, Blaine had more welts, cuts, marks, and bruises than Kurt had ever put on a human body. But in the end, it didn’t work. A full afternoon of grueling punishment, and Kurt couldn’t even produce a sniffle. Nothing Kurt did, unleashing as much of his rage and fury as he dared, seemed to make any impact. It wasn’t Blaine’s fault. It was Kurt’s. Blaine needed him. He needed Kurt’s help. And the one thing that Kurt should have been able to do, he couldn’t. He couldn’t break through that barrier. He couldn’t give Blaine what he needed.

It wasn’t fair. None of it was fair. Blaine shouldn’t be going through this. His parents should have realized what an amazing son they had a while ago. They should have gotten over their pride, accepted the keys to the house, and lived happily ever after, making amends with their son. His father should have called him when his mother died. Blaine shouldn’t be an orphan.

He should have had the chance to say goodbye.

But since he was going through this, he should be with someone who could give him what he needed.

And that person, as much as it killed Kurt, wasn’t Kurt.

Kurt safeworded. He untied Blaine from the bed and helped him shower. He held Blaine against his body and bathed him, kissed him and whispered sweet words of love and encouragement in his ear. He told Blaine how much he loved him, how lucky he was to have him in his life, what a good boy he’d been. Blaine said he loved Kurt, too, but Kurt felt like Blaine wasn’t hearing him. His mind was somewhere else. He could be lingering in subspace, but Kurt wasn’t sure he’d made it there.

Kurt did everything he could to keep Blaine from dropping. Blaine needed rest, but he also needed warmth and comfort. Kurt didn’t feel that Blaine would get that at his old house. So Kurt brought Blaine home. He planned on tucking Blaine into their bed and lying beside him. While Blaine slept, Kurt would try to come up with a solution – some way to make Blaine cry that didn’t include destroying the trust and security they had built up together.

Just inside the front door, Blaine began to shake. Low blood sugar, Kurt thought, from over exertion. Kurt walked Blaine over to the wall outside their bedroom and propped him against it.

“Sit here, love,” Kurt said, pushing gently on Blaine’s shoulder to command him down to the floor. “I’ll go get you a snack, and then … we’ll figure something out. I promise.”

“Alright.” Blaine held Kurt’s hand until the last possible moment, his fingers slipping from his Dom’s grasp, then falling slowly to his lap.

Kurt hurried to the kitchen and searched for something he could bring his sub – a juice box, some crackers and peanut butter, grapes. While he bent inside the refrigerator, the door to the backyard opened and closed, and Kurt heard skipping footsteps travel across the floor.

“Hello, Uncle Blaine,” Eva said in her sing-song way.

“Hello, Daisy,” Blaine replied. Kurt knew Blaine was trying to smile for her. He could hear it in Blaine’s voice.

Kurt abandoned Blaine’s snack and peeked out of the kitchen to watch.

He saw the little girl inch along the wall toward Blaine. She stopped when her foot hit his leg, then slid down and sat beside him, legs spread out in front of her the way his were, both with backs bowed like marionettes.

Eva turned her head and looked sideways at Blaine, trying to see his face.

“Blaine?” Eva frowned. “Are you unhappy?”

“Yes, Daisy,” Blaine said. She held out her arms, and he pulled her into his lap. “I am. But I’ll be alright.”

“Are you sad about your mom and dad?” she asked.

“Yeah,” Blaine replied in a voice so soft, Kurt could barely hear it from where he stood. “I am.”

Kurt saw other questions quirking her lips, but she didn’t ask them. All of a sudden, she said, “Hold on one second.” She scrambled off Blaine’s lap and ran into her room. Kurt thought she would come back with coloring pages, or their favorite book to read, but instead she brought back a framed picture from a collage on her wall. She sat back in Blaine’s lap and held the frame for him to see. “This is my mom and dad,” she explained, pointing to Rachel and Finn. “I don’t really remember them. They’re up in heaven now, and Uncle Kurt says they look over me, but … I don’t know if I believe that.”

Blaine’s face pinched with sadness. There were days when he didn’t believe in a heaven either, but as a child, he always did. It would have hurt too much not to. To hear that from a child, one whose parents had already gone, broke his heart.

“That’s okay,” Blaine said, rubbing her back. “You get to decide what you believe.”

Eva nodded as if she’d always known that. “Can I tell you a secret?”

“Sure.” He spoke to her reflection in the glass. The profile of her face overlapped her mother’s. Aside from her hair, they looked so much alike – same sharp noise, same determined chin, same ambitious eyes.

“When I think about them, I get sad, too. But sometimes, I get angry.”

Blaine looked from the photograph to Eva. “Why?”

“Because they died. They went away and left us. They left us and things got bad. I know they didn’t mean to. I know it wasn’t their fault, but sometimes I feel like it is. Does that make any sense?” She tilted her head, her curls bouncing from one side to the other.

Eva’s remarks felt like déjà vu. Blaine remembered Kurt saying something similar the night they spent in the hospital after Eva broke her leg, about how he was so angry at them for dying and leaving him and Dave alone with the kids. “Yeah. Yeah, it does.”

“So, I try to remember the good times. Finn tells me about them. About dancing and singing and tickling and telling jokes. Did you and your folks have any good times like that?”

“Yeah. When I was a lot younger, like you, we did, I guess.”

“You know, I hear you talk to Uncle Kurt about your parents sometimes. You say they stopped loving you, but I don’t think they did.”

“No?”

“No. I think that, maybe, they didn’t know how. And that … it hurt them because they wanted to, but they didn’t understand. Sometimes, when I don’t understand things, it hurts, too. And sometimes, I take that hurt out on other people. I know I shouldn’t, but I don’t know how not to.”

“It’s good that you’re trying.” Blaine wanted to shift the topic of the conversation from the failures of his parents to Eva’s successes. He’d much rather talk about those. But Eva was an intelligent girl. She waited patiently for him to continue, so he did. He didn’t want to insult her. “Sometimes I think that if I was different, they would have loved me better.”

Eva’s eyes popped open in a way that would have made Kurt giggle if she was reacting to anything else. But she looked so sincere, so sad on Blaine’s behalf, his heart coiled. “But you can’t be different. You can only be you. And if you weren’t you, you might have done something different with your life, and Uncle Kurt would have never met you. Then I would have never met you. And that would be terrible because I love you.”

“You do?” Blaine cracked a fond smile that made Kurt want to cheer. Leave it to Eva to get through to him.

“A-ha. I love you, more than the whole universe, just the way you are. And you don’t have to change for me. Never ever.”

“Is that right?” Blaine wrapped his arms tighter around her, looking happier than he had in days. Kurt felt relieved. Even if this wasn’t exactly what Blaine needed, it was doing the trick for now.

“A-ha. And do you know what else?”

“What else?”

“It’s alright to be angry at your parents for not knowing how to love you,” Eva said in a soothing voice. “And it’s okay to be sad because they went away. And it’s okay to cry for yourself when someone else dies. Because when people die, they leave pain behind, but the person who has to feel it is you.”

Blaine looked at Eva stunned. He had been ready to smile and thank her, wrap her up in a bear hug, read her a book, and call it a day. He wouldn’t be cured, but he’d be emotionally lighter than before. But what she said just then, that sliver of wisdom that Kurt never imagined a girl her age would be capable of, struck Blaine harder than any of Kurt’s hits, any of the lashes, any of the physical pain Kurt had tried so expertly to inflict. But whereas those blows seemed to bounce off of Blaine’s skin, deflect the way he’d been deflecting everything else for weeks, this one found its mark.

It hit him straight in the heart.

“Oh, Daisy. I …” Blaine’s mouth hung open. He sucked in a few shallow breaths trying to get his mouth to move and his voice to work, but his body wouldn’t let them. There was only one thing he could do.

A second later, Blaine was in tears.

Kurt rushed past the kitchen doorway to help them. Eva had never been very good with crying, or any display of emotion. It hurt her ears, she said. She would put her hands over them and scream to drown out the sound. Crying, laughter, it was the same to her. But she did something to Blaine that caught Kurt by surprise, though it shouldn’t have. Eva was a different girl than she had been before they moved to L.A., so much different from the girl he’d been helping raise the past few years. She wrapped her arms around Blaine’s shaking torso and pulled him into her embrace. She hugged him tight and rocked him, not even minding when his tears soaked her shirt.

“It’s okay,” she murmured, running her fingers through his curls and patting his back with her open, flat palm. “It’s okay. You can cry. I understand. I understand, and I love you.”