After the weekend he'd had, it went without saying that Kurt was not excited to return to work on Monday. He had nearly thrown his phone off his balcony yesterday on account of how many apology phone calls and texts Kurt had been receiving from Blaine. Now today Kurt had to sit across from him for eight hours, and he was not looking forward to it.

To be honest, Kurt still couldn't quite believe what had happened Saturday night. He had always regarded Blaine's powers with awe and fascination, but fear had never occurred to him, since Blaine had always been so careful and conscientious when he used his abilities. He cursed his naïveté and how blindly he had trusted Blaine. Thank McQueen Beyoncé knew what he was talking about, he'd had "Best Thing I Never Had" on repeat for nearly twenty-four hours straight. He braced himself as he entered the newsroom, doing his damnedest not to look at Blaine as he marched to his desk.

"Hi, Kurt."

Blaine's voice sounded so timid and gentle, so unlike the low and dangerous tone it had taken this weekend, and Kurt almost softened. No, I can do this, he told himself. He simply ignored Blaine and set his coffee down before unpacking his laptop.

"Kurt, I just wanted to say—"

He cut Blaine off. "Excuse me, but I have a lot of work today that I need to get done. So I can't talk to you."

Blaine wanted to scream. He wanted to rip off his glasses and yell at Kurt for being so obstinate and stubborn and that if he would just listen for two seconds, Blaine could tell him that how sorry he was and that he loved him. But he knew he couldn't, yelling would probably scare Kurt even more, so he kept his true feelings hidden behind his meek façade and replied weakly, "I understand."

And that was that. The day progressed on in silence between the two men, the only time they spoke was when they were on the phone with a source. That was until Mercedes and Tina stopped by his desk that afternoon.

"Hey," Tina greeted him. "It's raining so we've decided to hang out here instead of going up to the roof today."

"Oh, okay, sure," Kurt muttered, not looking up from his laptop screen.

"Kurt, what's going on?" Mercedes questioned warily. "Why are you ignoring us?"

Kurt finally made eye contact with his two best friends. "I'm not ignoring you. How were your weekends?"

Mercedes was not convinced. "Spill."

Kurt sighed exasperatedly. "There's nothing to spill, Mercedes."

Tina spoke before Mercedes could fire back with a retort. "Are you sure, Kurt? You know you can tell us anything."

"No, I can't," he asserted, glaring at Mercedes. "Some people are just going to say I told you so."

"So this is about Blair!"

"Blake," Kurt corrected her cautiously, trying to fight the magnetic pull between his eyes and Blaine.

"Please, Mercedes won't judge you. We all mistakes, right?" Tina said, shooting a warning glance at her friend. "Like that time she had a misguided crush on you sophomore year of high school."

"Yeah," Mercedes agreed with a tight smile. "Or like everything you wore during your goth phase in high school and college."

"Hey," Kurt interrupted the girls' staredown. "This is about me, remember?"

"Right," Tina said. "What happened between you and Blake?"

Kurt could feel Blaine's gaze out of the corner of his eye as he pretended to work. He shifted uncomfortably. "Do you think maybe we could take this somewhere else…like the girls' bathroom…"Kurt stopped himself. Blaine was probably going to eavesdrop on them anyway, so Kurt could at least try to make this as awkward for him to listen to as it was going to be to talk about. "…you know what? Never mind. So he took me out to dinner at Jean Georges—"

"Nice," Tina commented.

"—and then we went clubbing and everything was going well until we were headed back to my place."

Mercedes and Tina exchanged a knowing smirk but didn't say anything.

"So he was getting us a cab, and then two guys, probably drunk off their asses, started heckling us."

"Oh no." Mercedes knew where this was going.

"So, Blai—Blake got all tense and angry-looking, which really made him look quite constipated, but I kept telling him to just let it go, that they weren't worth it, which they weren't," Kurt stole a glimpse at a very rigid Blaine, "and he was beginning to leave with me but he began beating up the other guy instead."

"What's so bad about that?" Mercedes inquired. "I mean, yeah, that wasn't the most diplomatic way to settle things, but wasn't he just watching out for you?"

"Cedes, you don't understand," he told her. "This wasn't just one chivalrous blow to the jaw, he's a really strong guy and Blake beat this guy to a pulp. He kept throwing punches long after the guy had backed down, I was actually afraid he was going to kill him. He didn't stop until he knocked me down after I tried to break it up."

"Oh my goodness!" Tina clapped a hand over her mouth and Kurt saw Blaine wince. "Kurt!"

"I know," he agreed, zeroing his gaze in on a now-squirming Blaine. "Isn't it just awful, stupid, and abusive ?"

"Are you going to break up with him? I mean, if you haven't already," Tina asked.

For the first time all day, Kurt and Blaine made eye contact. Thankfully, neither woman picked up on the penetrating stare the two were sharing. Kurt looked away, swallowed the lump in his throat, and answered in a small voice, "I don't know."

"Aw, hell to the no," Mercedes joined in. "No one hurts my boy and gets away with it."

"Yeah, Kurt," Tina concurred. "If this guy is violent, he's obviously not healthy-boyfriend material."

Kurt didn't respond, choosing to be very distracted by an e-mail at the moment.

"This is how abusive relationships start out," Mercedes tried to reason with him. "Trust me, I've seen it with some of the women in my family. It all just gets a hell of a lot worse from here. Kurt, this guy isn't worth it. What if you two get in a fight and he hits you, like really hits you, not by accident?"

"I don't think he'd do that," Kurt mumbled.

"You don't know that," she contended. "I know you're really happy to be in relationship again, but it's not worth being Rihanna to someone's Chris Brown."

"Thanks girls," Kurt forced himself to smile. "I'll think about it."

"We should get back to our desks," Tina said after checking her watch. "The last thing I want to do is get on Sue's bad side today. I heard she lost the annual "Swingers" Dance Competition this past weekend."

"I heard she ordered the interns clean her entire penthouse with toothbrushes and then made them go to New Jersey on foot to get her soup from a certain deli in the ghetto yesterday," Mercedes added.

"Sounds like typical Sue," remarked Kurt. He chanced another glimpse at Blaine's desk, only to observe that his chair was empty.

0-0-0

Kurt kicked his front door shut behind him and he entered his apartment after work. He set his attaché case down in its usual spot on the kitchen counter and plopped down on the couch, loosening his tie and clicking on the TV. It took him a solid minute to notice that Superman was standing on his balcony with a bouquet of calla lilies in his left hand.

Kurt was rolled his eyes and pushed himself off the couch, not bothering to turn off the TV, since he knew this wasn't going to take long.

"I'm not in any mortal peril at the moment, so your presence isn't really needed here, Superman," Kurt informed the hero before moving to slam the door shut.

Blaine stopped the door from closing. "Kurt, please, I'm begging you to listen to me."

"I'd rather start setting my scarves on fire."

"Will you at least take the flowers?" Blaine pleaded, holding out the bouquet.

Kurt snatched the calla lilies. "Can I set them on fire?"

"If you want to, but it'd be petty and immature," Blaine replied as he tried to keep his temper in check.

"Look who's talking," Kurt shot back.

"Really, Kurt? Really?" Blaine's frustration got the best of him. "We can't have an adult conversation because you'd rather just insult me when I'm actually making an effort to try and fix this?"

"Well, I hate to break to you, Blaine, but I don't know if your capable hands are going to be able to fix this one," Kurt confessed, "because now whenever I look at you, I can't help but see that…that brute from Saturday night."

Blaine slumped in anguish. "You know I'm incredibly sorry for what I did. I know abused my powers, took advantage of my abilities…I know it doesn't excuse my behavior, but the way he was talking to me, the names he was calling you…it just rehashed a lot of bad memories and I guess I snapped. I made sure the guy and his friend were okay after you left, you know. Took them to the hospital and everything, luckily they didn't press charges."

Kurt considered what Blaine said for a few moments before continuing. "Have you ever done something like that before?"

"A long time ago, yes," he admitted shamefully. "But I swear to you, I'll never do it again, I promise."

"I just…I don't know, Blaine," Kurt sighed. "You really scared me. And now I'm afraid that it could happen again if we ever fought—"

"You know it's not like that!" Blaine interjected. "You said it yourself earlier today! I would never hit you…I'd rather stab myself in my eye with a dagger made of Kry—meteor rock than hurt you!"

"But you ALREADY DID!" Kurt shouted at him. "Or were you too busy bashing that guy's face in to notice?"

"IT WAS AN ACCIDENT!" He roared. Kurt stared at him with the same wide-eyed and staggered stare like he did on Saturday night. "Shit, I'm sorry…"

"I think you should go," said Kurt, his voice a whisper.

"No, Kurt…" Blaine appeared to be on the verge of tears. "I can't make one mistake, can I? Do you know what it's like? I literally feel like I have the weight of the world on my shoulders all the time…I can't enjoy any time to myself because every time I see that someone got shot, or raped, or a bank got robbed, or some building got blown up, I feel like it's my fault for not being there. I'm always putting everyone else before myself and I know it's the right thing to do but sometimes it just gets really exhausting you know? I'm just one person and I know I have all these gifts but I'm not perfect, and I'm pretty sure Jor-El is going to smite me or something for being in a relationship with you one of these days…but the only time I can turn it all off is when I'm with you, Kurt. I get that you're mad at me and I know you're not going to forgive me, but…I mean the only other time I really let a guy have it was when this asshole swindled my dad into a bad business deal and they were going to take the farm away…the only time I really snap is when someone threatens the people I love and that guy was harassing you—"

"Wait," Kurt cut his catharsis short. "What was that?"

Blaine looked confused. "What was what?"

"You said…you said you loved me," he clarified, astonished. "I mean, you didn't say it in so many words, but indirectly, one could infer that—"

"Of course I love you," Blaine told him simply. "I loved you from the moment I saw you. Like the third time I tripped when I was walking over from Sue's office, I actually tripped, I wasn't just pretending to because I was so stunned by the sight of you. And you can call my mother, I never trip unless I'm faking it, or I'm around meteor rock or something."

"Really?" Kurt choked out.

"Really," Blaine promised him, the corners of his lips twitching upward into a small smile. "Well, I guess I didn't really fall in love with you until I saw you sing Blackbird. That was the moment when I…never mind."

"Blaine Anderson, you tell me what you were going to say right now or I'll…I'll…something is going to be set on fire," Kurt threatened, even though he was sure he wasn't coming off at very intimidating at the moment.

Blaine blushed. "I…I was going to say that when I saw you sing Blackbird that was…I just thought…oh, there you are. I've been looking for you forever."

Kurt was speechless.

"Aw, shit, you're freaked out, aren't you? Do you think you're going to faint again?" Blaine said, although it seemed he was talking more to himself than to Kurt. "Crap, Kurt, if it makes any difference, I didn't want to tell you like this…I was going to wait at least another couple months…you think I'm a creep don't you? We've only dating for a month and I go and drop the L-word. How do I always manage to fuck important stuff like this up—"

"How were you going to tell me?"

Blaine gaped at Kurt incredulously. "Wuh-what?"

"If you hadn't fucked everything up, how were you going to tell you that you loved me?" Kurt elucidated.

"Oh, um…well, I was going to make you dinner, no matter how much you argued with me about it…and then I wanted to take you flying again, because you seemed to enjoy that and…well, yeah, that's about it," Blaine finished feebly.

"No one's ever told me they loved me before," he said, his gaze fixed on his shoes.

"Well, they're idiots," Blaine replied. "But, at the same time, I'm glad that I'm the only one."

Kurt looked Blaine square in the eye. "Do you mean it?"

"Do you love Alexander McQueen couture?" He retorted, matching Kurt's stare.

"Friday. You're going to make me dinner and take me flying and any other romantic activities you can think of," Kurt informed him as-a-matter-of-factly. "But, I need my space until then. I'm not going to let you off the hook that easily."

Blaine's brow furrowed. "Does this mean..."

"I'm giving you another chance," Kurt explained. "Well, not just you. I don't think I can say the L-word back yet—"

"I don't expect you to," Blaine assured him.

"But I'm…getting there. And I don't want this to be over yet…I want to 'get there' with you, Blaine. But the whole Jekyll and Hyde thing…or whatever that was on Saturday, that can never happen again, do you understand?"

"Never," Blaine swore.

"I know I don't look very formidable, but I'm not a little helpless flower that always needs his big bad boyfriend's protection," Kurt continued. "I've lived in this city for eleven years, Blaine, I can take care of myself."

"I know, and I'm sorry I didn't respect that," Blaine said. "Can I kiss you?"

Kurt let out a quick laugh of relief and grinned. "You better."