“Harry Potter?”

“Love it.”

“Excellent, then we can be friend’s again.”

“It’s not my fault that Katy Perry is a disgrace to the human voice in concert Blaine-”

“Hush child. I’m going to block out the fact that you just said that and concentrate on my next question. Gryffindor or Slytherin?”

“Pft, do you even have to ask? Ravenclaw, obviously.”

Ok yes. Blaine had lied to his best friends. To be fair, it hadn’t been a full lie. Kurt had given Mrs. Anderson his professional opinion that Blaine was not batty. But Blaine told Wes and David that he believed that would be the end of it or that he would transfer doctors, when in fact he knew his mother would never allow either. For one thing, Marci Perkins was his mother’s best friend, and if she had recommended this doctor Angelica Anderson was very well going to use this doctor for a while. For another the insurance had already been forced to pay for another ten sessions during his mother’s slight bout of hysteria. The most important reason of all however, was one that his mother was decidedly not made aware of when he was telling her his thoughts on why he should go back and visit with Dr. Hummel again. He didn’t think she needed to know exactly how close he felt to Kurt after one hour with the man. So he kept her in the dark, just as he was keeping his best friends in the dark. But as with so many things (the full story of what had happened with Mark for instance) what his mother/ WesAndDavid didn’t know wouldn’t hurt them. It’s not like Blaine had any intension of perusing anything untoward anyway.

He smiled and laughed at something amusing Kurt said in his Why-Ravenclaw-Is-Vastly-Superior-to-Either-Bravery-Or-Cunning rant, and almost didn’t even finish his last thought. It was that much of a lie.

'''''''''''''''''''''

The decision to tell Kurt about Mark on the rainny afternoon of their third session was not a conscious one. His only excuse was that, deep down under their budding friendship, Kurt was his psychologist and you’re supposed to word vomit your feelings all over your psychologist right? Plus the receptionist, he was told her name was Brittney, had disarmed him right before his appointment with her general… oddness.

“Elf man!”

Blaine had not been amused.

At the look on his face she quickly backtracked. “I’m sorry, do you prefer the term bobbit? Santana said you probably would.”

He continued to stare at her, not quite knowing what to say. Was she being serious or fucking with him or what?

“Are you… not a bobbit?” It was obvious she was confused at his silence. “You have pretty hair. Your eyebrows are really fuzzy. You’re short. Santana said you were a bobbit. And San is really smart.”

“Are you trying to say…” He paused and shook his head incredulously, “hobbit?”

“Yes. That’s what I said. I looked it up online and it said you people like to bake cookies and stuff in trees. I think I remember Coach Sylvester talking about that once actually. But it was about Mr. Schue. So it could have been a lie. Hey you kind of have hair like Mr. Schue. I wonder if you’re his son too. Want some peanut butter?” She blinked up at him thoughtfully for a moment, and then reached down to grab a spoonful of peanut butter from the jar that had suddenly materialized at her computer and stuck it in her mouth.

“Um.” He was at a loss. “Ms… Pierce is it? I’m afraid I’m not a hobbit. Or an elf. Hobbits… aren’t… real?”

He was met with a blank stare. Meeting it with his own incredulous one, he slowly backed away and hurried through the door to Kurt’s office hallway.

When he arrived he must have still had somewhat of a stunned look on his face because Kurt took one look at him and burst out laughing.

“I see you’ve been talking to Brittney.”

“Yeah… She’s very… unique, isn’t she?”

His doctor smirked.

“That’s one way to describe her I suppose, though it’s generosity makes you sound like Santana. Her girlfriend.” He added when he saw the question forming in Blaine’s face. His eyes adopted a kind of fondness to them that Blaine had quickly discovered meant he was talking about the member’s of his old Glee club. “Oh! Her fianc�e I guess I should say. They’re getting married as soon as the new law passes. They’ve been in love since we were all in high school together.”

Kurt got this other look on his face just then. Like he was literally miles away, seeing something Blaine couldn’t quite see. It was only there for a moment, but it looked sort of like… fear. But as Kurt turned fully toward him Blaine could not find a trace of it in his face, leaving him to conclude that it was never in fact there at all.

“Anyway,” Kurt continued, clapping his hands together, his face bright and shiny once more, “Let’s get on with your psychotic evaluation shall we?”

A wide, vapid smile settled itself on Blaine’s face as he hurried from where he’d been standing in the doorway to throw himself onto the chaise in front of Kurt’s chair dramatically. “Oh doctor!” He exclaimed in an affected voice. “I have just the most puzzling problem! Why just yesterday I was in the shower and-”

“Okay, okay!” His laughing shrink threw his hands up in a gesture of surrender. “I won’t mention the E word ever again, I promise!”

“You promised that last time too.” Blaine accused, dropping the accent to narrow his eyes at the other man playfully.

“Well the difference between this time and last time is that this time, I mean it.”

This proved to be perfectly acceptable to Blaine, and they soon settled into a discussion about the songs Blaine had begun learning on guitar at Kurt’s insistence. Words just seemed to flow so easily between the two men. Kurt made Blaine feel different. Not safe. He doubted severely whether he would ever be able to use that word so freely again. Maybe the word was valued. Kurt listened to everything he had to say, had an opinion on it, and never held it back. For some indefinable reason the internal guards Blaine had on everything he’d held inside for so long were almost immediately lowered the moment the two struck up a conversation. Even knowing this though, it still surprised Blaine that he’d given up one of his most important secrets so quickly.

Kurt mentioned something about how he still kept in contact with his old Glee teacher, how he was such an excellent mentor and now friend. He started in on an anecdote about the habit he’d developed during his senior year of going over to his single mentor’s apartment to bake things in his quiet kitchen.

“It had just gotten so loud around the house, because when Finn moved in Puck might as well have moved with him with how often he came over. And Mr. Schue just looked so sad after all of his semi-girlfriend’s found out about each other and dropped him. My mom always used to say the smell of something baking in the oven brightens any home. He’d sacrificed and done so much for us, I wanted to do something nice for him you know? Blaine? Blaine, what’s wrong?”

A warm hand dropped to his forearm but he barely felt it. No, god no. This was not the time. He’d indulged himself after that first session with Kurt, when his friends had dragged up all those memories. He had allowed himself to be swept away in reminiscences, worries, regrets. But as he forced himself to sleep that night he’d also shut them all back into that convenient box inside his head and locked them tight. He would not allow it to be opened here, with Kurt. He could not.

But the warm hand moved down to his own hand, and a musical voice said his name in a concerned tone. He felt his eyes moving to stare into azure pools laced with alarm at his unresponsiveness. He felt his mouth moving to form the words he desperately wanted anything but to say. In the nick of time he shut it, his brain working fast in an attempt to come up with a cover story.

“Nothing Kurt.” The words came out sounding forced to his own ears. Pull yourself together Anderson, he thought around the disturbing images still assaulting him. “It’s nothing. You bake? I didn’t know that.”

Kurt stared at him for a moment.

He hesitated for a fraction of a second, looking down at their joined hands, then leaned slightly closer to Blaine, an almost hard look in his eyes.

“Tell me Blaine. Please.”

And just like that everything came tumbling out.

'''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''

“Wow.”

“Yeah.”

Silence.

“I won’t tell anyone you know. I can’t, legally, since you’re nineteen and my patient. I mean I’d have to if you were underage. I wish something could be done about it now but- Anyway. But I wouldn’t, even if you weren’t my patient, as long as you were overage. You can trust me Blaine.”

Hazel eyes blinked back at him through half dried tear tracks. Kurt shifted his arm so that it was tighter around the younger man’s shoulders.

“Yeah I know.” The response, so simple and yet so meaningful, shifted something within Kurt. He felt it’s tug in the vicinity of his heart and he suppressed a shudder. To be honest, it had started pulling at him somewhere around the middle of Blaine’s disturbing story. To be uncomfortably honest, it had begun the second the boy had opened his mouth that first day.

What are you doing Kurt, you ridiculous fool? That boy should not be in your arms right now. He should be on this couch, alone, and you should be in your big scary shrink chair. He is your patient, and you are a stupid man who is afraid of everything.

Brainless or wise, Blaine had him seeing through different eyes. And quoting musicals. As much as part of him wanted to laugh, he was almost too paralyzed with fear to do much more than reach his hand up to stroke the still softly crying nineteen year old’s curls in what he hoped was a comforting way. Kurt was caught in some weird cross between friend and psychologist auto-pilot as thoughts whirled and twisted around themselves in his mind; his conversation with Abbey, his near break down, and this debilitating feeling that seemed to be overtaking his body among them.

But at the forefront was a sickening rage. Rage at this man who he didn’t know but had every right to hate. Rage at he who had made Blaine, the beautiful creature in Kurt’s arms, hurt like he was hurting right now. Rage that almost completely blinded Kurt to the fact that a) this was not a normal thing to feel on behalf of someone you’d known less than three weeks and b) this was not something Kurt ever felt for anyone outside of his small circle of friend’s and family. (Later he would placate himself by pointing out that Blaine had inserted himself with an almost inhuman speed into the place where he could safely be called Kurt’s “friend”)

Kurt wanted to rip someone’s guts out. For the first time in recent memory, the normally obsessively sane and rational man felt some of the old fire from his high school days settle back into his bones with a vengeance. He knew, without a doubt, that if this Mark character were to stumble through his office door right now, he would receive a lot more than an infamous Kurt Hummel Bitch Face. In fact, half of Kurt desperately wanted to ask Blaine for information on the bastard so that he could take matters into his own hand’s, maybe call Puck up and ask if he wanted to take a walk down badass memory lane. But the slight tremors still stirring the creature that was settled in his arms kept him grounded. Vengeance could wait until Blaine was recovered. Actually, the part of his brain that had retained some sense pointed out, vengeance could probably wait until Kurt had recovered considerably as well.

Feelings spread through him on a tidal wave, before he knew it virtually eclipsing the fear he had come to know so well in situations like these.

Before the attack there had been a few fun flings once he’d reached college, nothing too serious. But after, when he was well enough Abbey had suggested that if he must date he should try his hand at relationships with a little substance. So first there had been James, about a month after he had gone back to school, which he probably should have known was going to end in tragedy. He’d gone back to seeing Abb once a week after that disaster had met its untimely end. Then Antonio, when he was studying abroad right before graduation. That had been nice for while, but then Antonio started talking about following him back to America. After that came Robert, but not until after Kurt had finished his book and started his practice and things had settled down slightly. Rob had seemed so promising. Funny, intelligent, caring, understanding, smoking hot. All the things Kurt thought he should probably want in a potential mate. So it would be easy to imagine his confusion when Kurt found one day that he just could not make himself relax in his arms.

A boyfriend, Kurt had always assumed, should make one feel safe. And for whatever reason, Rob didn’t do this for Kurt. Being in a relationship with him for whatever reason, as had happened in so many relationships before him, brought back the always-looking-over-your-shoulder feeling Kurt had only seldom had since finding Abb. It was right after breaking up with Rob that Kurt came to the conclusion that something within him was irrevocably broken, beyond even his comprehension. And like so many things about his condition, he accepted this fact without question.

But this felt good. Blaine in his arms, he was realizing, felt right. Amazing as it was, Kurt finally felt safe. The twenty-six year old had not felt this way in a very long time.

He kind of liked it.