Wes entered Blaine's room half an hour later to find him still curled on his bed, eyes swollen and half-closed. His hands were fisted in his hair and he was shivering, despite the summer heat. Quietly crossing the floor, Wes put a hand on his friend's shoulder. 'Blaine?' Blaine turned away from the touch. 'Blaine, what's wrong?'

'It hurts,' Blaine croaked. 'It hurts so badly.'

'What happened, Blaine? I, ah, saw Kurt leaving Patrick's room.'

Blaine blinked, not even trying to absorb that fact. It hardly mattered at this point. He rolled into his pillow. 'This is everything I was afraid of,' Blaine whispered.

'What did you say, Blaine?'

Blaine's pillow was still salty-wet, and it chafed against his raw skin. 'This is everything I was afraid of,' Blaine repeated. He wasn't sure if he was speaking to himself or Wes. 'This hurt is exactly what I was running from, and -' he faltered, struggling around a dry sob. 'I brought it all down upon myself anyway.'

Wes stared uncomprehendingly. He didn't understand a shred of what Blaine had said, and this was certainly not how he'd imagined his last day with Blaine at Dalton would go. But maybe this was fitting; maybe his last act as the leader of the Warblers should be a kindness to the boy who had represented them so well, and to provide comfort to a friend. He sat down on the rumpled bed next to Blaine, settling his hand more firmly on the boy's back. 'Do you want to talk about it?'

'No. God, no.'

Wes nodded. 'In that case, it's time to get up, Anderson,' he said, and gently but firmly pulled Blaine into a sitting position. He looked down at Blaine's half-full suitcase on the floor and chided, 'It's moving day, and you're not even packed. Typical.' This last word with a gentle nudge to the shoulder. 'Since I happen to be entirely packed, I guess I can help you out while you shower.' He pushed Blaine into a standing position and towards the bathroom. Blaine wavered on his feet for a moment before shuffling in and closing the door. Wes sighed in relief when he heard water strike tile and began to pack Blaine's things.

Not being the most precise of packers, Wes was almost done by the time the water had turned off. Grabbing a set of clothes that he'd put aside, he tentatively rapped on the door and took the hum in response as an invitation to enter.

Blaine was standing in front of his mirror, towel wrapped around his waist, fingering a bite mark low on his neck, almost at the join to his shoulder. It looked recent, and although shallow, was purpled around the edges. Blaine's eyes were fixed on it with a mix of sadness and pain that made Wes fumble the clothes he was holding. Setting them on the counter, he caught Blaine's eye in the mirror and said evenly, 'One day, you'll tell me about that, okay? But not today.'

Blaine didn't overtly respond, but his face softened slightly. Wes touched a hand to the shorter boy's shoulder for the briefest of moments, and went out to finish packing.

An hour later found them standing outside the school, waiting for a taxi to pick Blaine up and take him to the airport. There was mostly silence between them beyond the occasional idle comment from Wes. Then, as the taxi appeared at the end of Dalton's rather long drive, Blaine abruptly flung himself at Wes, tightly engulfing him. Wes, shocked, took a moment to return the hug, but he found himself squeezing just as hard as Blaine whispered, 'Thank you, Wes. So much.'

'You're more than welcome,' Wes replied gently. He pulled back and looked Blaine in the eye. 'Blaine, I know Kurt and I know you. This is all going to turn out okay.'

Blaine sniffed, pulling Wes close one last time as the taxi pulled up. 'I'll miss you,' was the only reply he had.

'I'll make it to New York sometime over the summer,' Wes said. 'Text me when you get to your apartment.'

And then Blaine was in the taxi leaving Dalton, and Wes turned away to spend a few last, cherished hours with any remaining Warblers.

x

Blaine arrived at his parents' apartment in New York and locked himself in his room.

And then, sitting alone, he began to think.

He thought all the way back to singing 'Collide' with Kurt in the attic - a place he'd never shown anyone else. He thought about how peaceful Kurt had looked, half-asleep as Blaine sang him a lullaby. He thought about how, standing under strikes of lightning, Kurt shone.

On the third day, he thought about Patrick, a boy Blaine hadn't loved and who hadn't loved Blaine. He thought about the Warblers, who loved him dearly, dearly enough to let him live a lie if it was what he wanted. Who had let him cut another person out of their circle, if it would preserve that lie.

To finally really think about this, to not run but be still, was a huge strain. It didn't feel like he was thinking with his brain, but his soul. It was so exhausting that sometimes he felt like he didn't even have the energy to slide his eyelids shut. He pretended that was the reason his eyes misted over so often.

He thought about Kurt saying he'd live a lie for Blaine. And then he thought about all the other things Kurt had sacrificed. It took him almost a whole day to eliminate from his head the image of Kurt, bruised all over and an IV in his arm, holding Blaine's iPod and saying, 'I was getting out of your way.'

On the sixth day, he thought about how Kurt had stood in the middle of the music room and said, 'I'll protect you when you're vulnerable, but you need to stop hiding.'

He thought about what he'd said to Wes - 'This is everything I was afraid of.'

He pulled a crumpled piece of note paper out of his bag and wondered how much it took to make the bravest person in the whole world scared enough to run.

On the eighth day, he picked up all his thoughts like toy blocks and rearranged them into every different pattern he could conceive of.

On the eleventh day, he thought about the odd wording he'd used in his promise to Kurt - not a pledge to figure out what they were, but to find their place together.

He thought about the fact that Kurt hadn't made sacrifices without purpose. He had made sacrifices to Blaine. Blaine let the worlds 'I love you' reverberate through his chest.

On the twelfth day, he finally faced the agony he was feeling head on, and let himself cry again one last time.

He thought about how it had felt to be pressed against Kurt, lying together as they burned, and about the difference between falling and flying. He let himself live the moment again - the twined tongues, the shared breaths. It had felt like Kurt had surrendered entirely, that he had taken all of himself and poured it into Blaine.

Blaine gasped when he realised that, in that moment, he'd actually felt...strong. Holding Kurt's everything, he'd felt strong enough to conquer anything.

He thought about the edge of the cliff -

And realised that if there was a difference between flying and falling, it didn't matter.

All that mattered was that he'd left the edge, and Kurt had taken him home.

On the fourteenth day, Blaine asked to go back to Ohio.

x

Blaine was impatient, exhausted and anxious beyond belief, but finally, he was almost in Lima.

He'd refused to take 'no' as an answer from his parents - not that they'd paid a huge amount of attention - and had caught the last flight out of New York to Columbus, where he'd been unable to escape the airport until after 11. Then he'd had to wait for a taxi to take him to the storage complex his car had been locked in for the summer - where he had a frantic moment of panic, thinking he'd misplaced the key - before finally being able to start the two hour drive to Lima around midnight.

He knew that it probably wasn't safe, driving along empty stretches of road in the middle of the night like this, hampered by nerves and tiredness. Occasionally he'd start to drift off the road, jerking back on track at the last moment. And yeah, it was probably really stupid to be pulling a stunt as dramatic as this. But he couldn't bring himself to care. He needed to talk to Kurt desperately. He'd already waited two weeks - no, hell, he'd really waited months to get to this point - and waiting any longer, extending the pain for both of them, seemed like the most stupid thing of all.

Ten minutes out of town, Blaine finally picked up his phone and dialled a number, putting it on speaker. He was counting on his knowledge of Kurt's habits to help him get through this bit. If he knew Kurt well enough and was very, very lucky, Kurt would be asleep but still have his phone on and nearby. He'd be woken by the call, being a light sleeper, and hopefully be too confused by the rather rude awakening to properly read the caller ID before he answered. Blaine was banking on that; he knew otherwise, he probably had no hope of Kurt answering his call.

The dial tone abruptly cut out and a hushed, sleepy voice drifted from the speaker. 'Hello?'

'Kurt!' Blaine half-yelped. He was pretty sure he'd rehearsed this bit, but he definitely couldn't remember what he was supposed to say. 'Uh... it's Blaine.'

'Blaine?' the voice asked, a lot brighter, but still masked by the drowsy tone. Blaine felt a bittersweet pang when he realised, in this stolen moment before Kurt's consciousness fully roused, the boy's subconscious still trusted him. He heard the moment when Kurt properly came to himself, though - there was a hitching breath, and suddenly Kurt's voice, though dropped to a whisper, was markedly harsher. 'Blaine, what do you want?'

'In ten minutes, could you please come outside?'

There was a long silence as Kurt tried to comprehend this strange request. 'Come outside? Why? You're in New York.' Another pause, and then, 'Blaine, is that a car I hear in the background?'

'I'm driving to your house now.'

'At two in the morning? Blaine, what the hell?'

'I really need to talk to you. Please come outside.'

'Blaine. It's two in the morning. And... I don't want to talk to you.'

Blaine's heart twisted. He played Kurt's voice over and over again in his head, that same gasp of, 'I love you. I love you, god damn you. I love you.'

'Please, Kurt,' he said. 'Please, just come outside and talk to me. Just for a little while. That's all I'm asking for.'

'Why should I? What could you possibly say that could make this better?' Kurt sounded weary and wary and sad and angry all once. Blaine was amazed that just his voice in isolation could be so expressive.

'Kurt, I know I promised I'd think. And I did; I've been doing nothing but thinking. And then I travelled all the way here to you at two in the morning because the very moment I worked it all out, I had to come and tell you about it, so I could fix this.'

'Blaine, disregarding the absolutely ridiculous assumption you can fix this, it's been two weeks.'

'I had a lot to think about,' Blaine said wryly. 'Look, I'm less than five minutes away. Please. You can leave any time you want, but I'm begging you to at least try to hear me out.'

Kurt let out a deep, shuddering breath. 'I don't want to give you another chance. I want to say that you've wasted too many of them and to just stay out of my life.' He stopped there, and Blaine's shaky hands very nearly ran him off the road. Recognising one too many a close call, he slowed, just for a moment. And then Kurt kept speaking. 'But... god, I don't want to give you another chance, but I have to. It's a compulsion. I can't help it.' Blaine heard the rustling of fabric, followed by the sound of a door opening. 'Fine. Meet me out front. Park down the street or you'll wake my dad.' And then the line disconnected.

Blaine pulled into the car park for a playground down Kurt's street only a few moments later, grabbing his bag and practically throwing himself out of the driver's seat. He made his way to Kurt's house, trying to navigate a street plunged into darkness as quickly as possible. When he reached Kurt's front lawn he stumbled, not able to see the low-lying plants edging the grass, uncoordinated from his exhaustion. He struggled to right himself for a moment, starting to topple forward, when arms emerged from the darkness to catch him.

Uncertainty was rife in the atmosphere around them, so thick in the air it almost clotted Blaine's airways and blinded him. And yet, he'd never felt so safe as he had falling back into those arms.

'God, Blaine, you're not usually this clumsy,' came a harsh whisper in his ear, breaking Blaine out of his momentary reverie.

'I know. 'm sorry,' Blaine mumbled. 'Tired. Haven't been sleeping. Took the very last flight to Columbus, then drove straight here.'

Kurt took a moment to ensure Blaine could stand on his own before letting go and stepping back. 'You're an idiot,' he said flatly.

'Maybe,' Blaine said, 'but I still really needed to talk to you. So here I am.'

Kurt surveyed Blaine for a moment longer, taking in his stubbled face and rumpled clothes, before indicating the side gate with a quick wave of his hand. 'We need to go to the back garden, if you're so set on talking. We're outside Dad and Carole's window right now.'

Blaine nodded and let Kurt lead him through the (thankfully soundless) gate, following until they stopped at a patch of grass as far as they could get from the house. There, Kurt paused, looking at Blaine uncertainly. The shorter boy swayed on his feet slightly, and with a sheepish half-smile, asked, 'Can we sit, please? I'm not sure how long I can stand up at the moment.'

The look Kurt threw between his own hastily donned clothes and the grass was almost comical in its hesitancy, but then Blaine swayed a little more violently, and so Kurt tentatively sank to the ground. Blaine followed, sitting cross-legged opposite Kurt, barely an inch between their knees. To Blaine, in his ever so slightly delirious state, the grass was one of the most comforting surfaces he had ever sat on, it was that soft and warm. Even for summer, it was an unseasonably warm night, the kind of night where the heat of the day lingered, seeming not to hang in the air but to have replaced it. The grass, too, had refused to relinquish the sunlight it had absorbed during the day; and thus surrounded and cushioned by such warmth, Blaine felt a momentary urge to just lie down and sleep.

'So?' Kurt prompted, voice still hushed. 'You wanted to talk.'

'I don't really know where to begin,' Blaine replied. 'I should just explain what got me here, I guess. I mean, thought-wise.' Slightly irrationally, he looked to Kurt for approval, as if Kurt knew the direction Blaine was going in and might have some input on a good starting place. When Kurt just kept staring with the same wary look on his face, Blaine ploughed on. 'I said that I've never broken a promise to you, Kurt, and from the very moment you left, I intended to maintain that. And I'd promised to think about this properly, which I didn't do when I should have. So I did nothing but think for two weeks straight, and-'

'You did,' Kurt broke in.

'What?' Blaine asked, confused.

'You did still break a promise,' Kurt said. 'You promised me that you'd take advantage of those ten seconds every day. It's been two weeks, and I haven't heard a word from you.'

'I suspect it won't help me if I point out you broke that promise too,' Blaine muttered, his brain-mouth filter completely shot to hell. Reaching into his bag, he asked, 'Kurt, be honest. If I'd tried to text or call you, would you have replied? Picked up the phone?'

Mutely, Kurt shook his head, trying to see what Blaine was getting out of his bag. Blaine smiled slightly as his fingers curled around the edge of a book and he drew it out, pressing it into Kurt's hands. 'I knew full well you wouldn't talk to me, so I put your ten seconds every day - or much more, as the case may be - into this. You're just receiving them on delay.'

'What is this?' Kurt asked, turning the thick book over in his hands. It felt like leather, and was the size of a journal, if a bit thicker than average.

'In there, I wrote all my thoughts from the last two weeks. Everything that I went through while trying to think about all that had happened, all that we'd done, all that I'd felt - it all went into that book.'

Kurt looked down at the journal with something a little like awe, from what Blaine could see with his slowly sharpening night vision. But then the pale boy's face hardened once more, and Blaine wanted to groan.

'You broke another promise, too,' he said, stubbornness infusing his tone. 'You promised you'd find a place for us. And "just friends" certainly didn't count,' he added with a sharp frown.

'That's in the book, too,' Blaine said. Kurt, looking dubious, went to open the cover, but Blaine's hands shot out, grabbing Kurt's and holding them still. 'Don't,' he said softly. 'Not right now. I... I know it's presumptuous of me, but... I was kind of hoping we could go through it together. Later. There's a lot to absorb in there - I mean, hell, there's no easy fix here. I was hoping we could take our time on it.'

Kurt was staring down at their hands, touching once more. Blaine prayed that Kurt was feeling the same burn in the skin that he was. The slender hands were certainly tense, slight spasms running through them that Blaine could feel pulse under his fingers. 'I don't understand,' Kurt whispered, sounding helpless. 'What do you want from me?'

And for the first time, Blaine was really and truly prepared to answer.

'You. I want to be back in your life, in any way you'll have me. Though...' Blaine hesitated, drawing up every single ounce of courage he'd ever had. More than he'd needed to live with being bullied every day, more than he'd needed to take a new school by storm, more than he'd needed putting himself through two weeks of torturous purgatory to get himself to this point. 'More than anything, Kurt, I really want to be with you. As your boyfriend.'

Kurt's head flew up so quickly it was almost a blur. His eyes were blown so wide that even in the dead of night, Blaine could see the glowing white, the brilliant blue of the iris. They were so incredibly, heartbreaking vulnerable. And just for the sheer honestly and exquisiteness of the moment, whatever happened next, everything Blaine had done thus far was worth it.

'W-why?' Kurt stuttered, sounding very young. 'What changed?'

This, Blaine had anticipated. He'd learned it all so well, echoed the reasons through his mind so many times, that he knew he'd be able to repeat what he was about to say until the day he died.

And then inspiration struck. Turning Kurt's hands over in his grasp so they lay palm up in Kurt's lap, he ran his thumbs in slow circles over the smooth skin, cherishing the feel of the life line and the rise to the heel of the hand. Kurt shuddered visibly, the tremors running through right to his fingers, but his eyes never left Blaine.

'When I was thinking, I realised I couldn't think of a single good reason to stay away any more,' Blaine said gently, moving their joined hands into his own lap without meeting any resistance. 'But, more to the point, I came up with ten very, very good reasons for wanting you, ten reasons that I had to have you the very second I could.' Then, lifting Kurt's hands up, the pale palms still facing towards the sky, he kissed the pad of Kurt's right thumb, quickly but tenderly. 'Our voices sound amazing together,' he said with a soft smile, before pressing a similar kiss to the tip of Kurt's index finger. 'I want to be able to kiss you - just like this - whenever, wherever, for the rest of my life. I want to feel my lips and my skin tingle and burn.'

Kurt gasped, closing his eyes, and Blaine's smile widened very slightly. Kurt felt the burn too. He was a little sad to not have Kurt's eyes in front of him for this, the most important thing he'd ever done, urging him on and reminding him second by second exactly how big the rewards would be, if only he could bare that little more naked soul. But, at the same time, if Kurt needed to close his eyes to cope...

Blaine kissed the pad of third finger, Kurt's middle finger. He let his lips linger for a fraction of a second longer this time, his bottom lip dragging very, very lightly over the skin. It was the tiniest contact Blaine could imagine, but he knew Kurt felt it by the way the boy shifted slightly on the grass. 'I need you in my life,' he said. 'It's not an option, not at all. And we both know we can never just be friends.' A little more tension sagged out of Kurt's frame.

The fourth finger now, the ring finger on the right hand, Blaine trying to put as much feeling as he could into such a brief touch of his lips. His voice dropped the slightly teasing tone it had maintained until now, taking on something serious and deeper. 'You woke me up, Kurt,' he said simply. 'I was living in a dreamland, and you came along and showed me that, showed me that there was a whole extra dimension to my personality that I didn't even know existed. Someone who could feel so much more strongly, had so much more to give. You made me a better person when you stopped letting me sleep.'

A tear slipped unobtrusively down Kurt's cheek. Blaine didn't want to let go of Kurt's hands, but he wanted to catch every single tear Kurt cried from now until the end. He also couldn't kiss it away - he wouldn't kiss anything more than Kurt's fingertips until he had permission. Instead, he leaned forward, nuzzling into Kurt's cheek with his own. Their breaths mingled, eyelashes fluttering against each other's skin, and for a moment it was heaven. But then Blaine remembered he still had six reasons to go in the first step towards making things better.

He pulled back to kiss Kurt's right pinky finger and left his lips pressed there while he gathered himself. He'd sworn to himself that he wouldn't cry any more after that twelfth day locked in his room, but that didn't stop him from choking as he explained his fifth reason. 'I don't think I'll ever find anyone who loves me quite as well as you do,' he said, half-strangled. 'You've loved me honestly and faithfully and far, far more than I ever deserved. You tried to give me what I needed, even when it hurt you in a multitude of ways. I'll never be able to make up for all the sacrifices you made. And then you stood by your love, even when you were scared and you thought you'd be standing alone. I... I just...'

He pulled Kurt's left hand towards him and desperately pressed a kiss to Kurt's other pinky finger, trying to swallow his feelings. 'I was always scared of getting hurt, so I ran. And right from the beginning, you asked, "And this doesn't hurt already?" It did, but that didn't stop be from being scared.' Blaine sucked in a deep breath. 'But the morning I woke up to find your note... I've got nothing left to be afraid of, Kurt, because nothing could possibly hurt more than that moment did.'

His voice cracked and wavered so badly, and he bent his head in one last frantic attempt to ward off tears. Then Kurt's face was there, buried in his hair, making soothing noises just as he would have a life time ago. And it was enough.

Blaine touched his lips to the left ring finger, slower this time, his lips moulding around the slight curve. 'More importantly, though, when we were together on my bed, and it felt like you'd surrendered something and we were both merging into one person... I felt strong, Kurt. Stronger than I ever had in my entire life. Strong enough to face anything, no matter how scared I was of it. And that's the definition of courage, isn't it?' he asked, raising his head again in the hopes that Kurt's eyes were open. They were, and Blaine found affirmation within them. 'You give me courage,' he whispered.

Blaine let his breath flush hot against Kurt's palm for a second, tracing it all the way up the slender digit before he kissed the tip of the eighth finger. 'Being with you might always be like dancing along the edge of a cliff, I don't know. But you taught me the difference between falling and flying.'

Kurt was crying in earnest now, tears streaming freely over the smooth skin of his cheeks. Blaine tried to nuzzle them all away. 'Just two more now,' he whispered into Kurt's ear. 'Hold on for me, just for two more.'

Kurt nodded, sniffling, so Blaine pulled Kurt's index finger to him, letting his lips part slightly to trap the finger tip between them, feeling the skin drag as he pulled away. 'I swore I'd find a place for us, and in a sense, I did, and I wrote it in the book. But really, Kurt, all I did was figure out where it was. You're the one that actually found it and took us there. As clichéd as it sounds, you took us home, Kurt. There's no other way to describe it, the place where our heartbeats pound in the same space, resonating together. You found the place for us.'

And finally, there was only one more to go, the most exposing of all. But Blaine was more than ready. There was no hesitation as he kissed Kurt's thumb, and said clearly, 'Kurt, I love you.'

Kurt's hands were abruptly ripped out of Blaine's, leaving Blaine reeling for the shortest of moments, before his face was captured between Kurt's palms. 'Oh, you stupid, crazy, amazing-' Kurt started, before his voice failed him. 'I love you, too,' he said finally, and surged forward.

And it was exactly like Kurt described. The rest of the world disappeared when their lips met in a heated lock. Their bottom lips slid over each other with the most amazing friction, their tongues twisted together in intricate patterns, and every time Kurt brushed against the roof of Blaine's mouth he groaned as nerves felt like they were exploding. Their hands grasped closer, closer, until Blaine was toppling backwards onto the grass below; Kurt pushed their torsos together, and the feeling of weight and body heat and intimacy was incredible, but still somehow not enough. Their legs twined and their mouths pushed even closer, staying so close that even when they breathed, the air they sucked in tasted of each other's skin -

And the warm grass didn't matter, the beautiful summer night sky didn't matter. Because there it was, as they merged; their world was a heartbeat in the dark, and another right there in response.