Chapter 14b:

 Blaine flicked his eyes to the sleeping form of Kurt now curled tightly into a ball at the other end of the sofa, blanket that he had covered him with half an hour ago, gently rising and falling with his soft murmured sighs.

 They'd returned to the apartment shortly after Kurt had given him the notebook, Blaine adamant that he didn't want to invade Kurt's privacy but the other man insistent that he needed him to understand; to help him. It had lain unread on the coffee table between them amidst the, now empty, wine glasses as they'd tried to drink away the evening's horrors and ignore the gnawing ache in both their stomachs.

 At some point in the awkward conversations and wine filled pauses, Kurt had drifted off, head resting against his forearms and breaths becoming deeper and more contented. Blaine had allowed his eyes to rove over the painfully beautiful features of the sleeping man's face, mapping contours and redrawing each one in his memory, filing them away. He didn't want to admit that by doing so he was silently consigning himself to the unspeakable.

 Draining the bottom of his glass, he'd reached for the notebook.

 Kurt's curled precise hand-writing and collection of scraps and memos had become increasingly blurred as Blaine had forged on, through the painful wrench in his heart. The diary was a record of a man laid entirely bare. Unforgiving, unrelenting. Each entry a small part of a heart that was increasingly fading even before the truck had careered into his path.

 Tears slid down his cheeks now as he looked again towards the fragile and seemingly tiny man visibly shrinking into the furniture. One soft, powder white foot was peeking out from beneath the blanket; the thin skin translucent, a network of tiny capillaries and deep purple veins that throbbed with blood, with life. Almost reverently, he reached out his fingers, following the path of his arch, down from his ankle and ghosting over his toes. Kurt stirred slightly but remained lost to his dreams.

 The window was still open, allowing a gentle whisper of air to seep into the room and Blaine welcomed it. Everything had suddenly become too hot, too broken and painful and full of despair.

 Blaine knew what it was to be lonely; he'd spent years at school watching life seem to shuffle around him, sidestepping his little island carefully before ploughing onwards. He remembered what it was to long for someone. Anyone. Blaine had stood in rooms surrounded by people and felt completely desolate. He understood that.

 But he'd changed at college. Things had got better. People had imprinted little passport stamps in his life and he had felt alive, real. They hadn't all come back with him; he was still relatively alone in Columbus, but he knew he could do it now; knew he could make those connections.

 He felt Kurt shift slightly and murmur another soft sigh. His eyes trailed over his face again. Kurt had given up. He wasn't ‘unhappy' he'd said, but Blaine knew he'd given up fighting. It wasn't really a life worth fighting for. Existence maybe; blood pumping and lungs inhaling and nerves feeling, but he'd already given up. There was no one to fight for.

 "I don't want to wake up on my own anymore"

  The words throbbed through Blaine. He could already see ribbons of pink filtering across the sky outside the window that screamed at him, mocking him with each ticking second. He had one day left. One day with a man he didn't even know forty-eight hours ago.  One day with a man he knew with all his heart and everything he had ever felt, had already re-written his past and future.

 Blaine needed to show Kurt he had something to fight for. Blaine needed to fight for him.