"What I don't understand, Kurt, is why you would tell my father that.  Of all things!"  Blaine throws his hands up in the air from where he's standing by the dresser, attempting to take off his tie.  They have just come from spending dinner with Blaine's parents and as usual have managed to come home arguing.

"I don't know, maybe because it's the truth?" Kurt bites back, flopping down on the bed to take his shoes and socks off.  "The man still intimidates me."  Kurt doesn't know why they continue to accept Mr. and Mrs. Anderson's dinner invitations after all of these years.  They do nothing but stress everyone out.  By the time dinner is over, barely anybody even talks to each other.  But Kurt continues to go along with the charade, if only to placate Blaine.

"That's no excuse!" Blaine shouts back, slamming a drawer then flinching, remembering they had just put Cavan down for bed.

"I'm not about to lie to the man, Blaine, just to save your pride," Kurt hisses, his fingers flying down the front of his shirt as he undoes the buttons.

"My pride?"  Blaine attempts to loosen his tie again before grunting in frustration, "Why can't I get this damn tie off?!"

Kurt strides over to where he's standing and hurriedly takes it off for him, throwing it unceremoniously into the hamper.  "Yes.  Your pride, Blaine.  Who the hell cares if you quit your job?  You hated it!"

"That's not the point!  You had no right-"

"No ‘right'?  Oh, no, of course not! I'm only your husband and father to our child.  How could I deign to think I could discuss your well-being with your parents?"  Kurt watches as Blaine angrily tugs down his trousers, not even bothering to pick them up from where they pool at his feet.  "And pick those up, dammit!"

Blaine fixes him with a steely glare before bending down and throwing them toward the hamper, just barely missing Kurt.  "Happy?  Are you happy now?"

"No!  And you weren't, either.  You were miserable, Blaine, and if your mother asks me how you are doing I think she has the right to know!"  Kurt goes into the bathroom to wash his face and Blaine follows.

"It's like you don't even know me.  You know how having a job is everything to my father.  It took me years to regain his respect and in one night you just threw that all away!"

"Stop being so melodramatic, Blaine.  And stop shouting at me," Kurt adds, pointedly looking at the closed bedroom door, where past it and down the hall their two year old son, Cavan, sleeps.

"I'm not-," Blaine starts loudly, and then lowers his voice, "I'm not shouting at you.  I'm merely trying to impress upon you how this is not okay, Kurt.  But as usual you're not even listening."

Kurt stops furiously rubbing his moisturizer into his chin to look at Blaine, "As usual?"  His voice rings high and his tone is incredulous.  "I have done nothing but listen to you since the moment we stepped out of your parents' house.  Not an easy feat when all you've been doing is waxing pathetic the whole time."  Kurt slams down the jar of cream and brushes past Blaine before roughly tugging the sheets back on their bed.

Again, Blaine follows him back into the bedroom and begins taking the decorative pillows off the bed, throwing them furiously onto the floor as he does so.  "God!  Kurt, you're so-so infuriating!"  Blaine has never hated those stupid, superfluous pillows more.

"Am I?"  Kurt asks sarcastically.

"Yes!"  Blaine slams a palm down onto the bed, and Kurt jumps.

"I am?"  Kurt pushes.  He knows he's pushing him but when Blaine gets like this Kurt can't help it.  Blaine throwing a tantrum because for once he didn't please daddy is so reminiscent of high school it makes Kurt's stomach churn.

"God, Kurt, I love you but sometimes I just don't like you," Blaine straightens up, staring Kurt down.

"Oh, come off it, Blaine," Kurt snaps, eyes burning right back into Blaine's and knowing full well that he didn't say it back.  "Are you done now?"

"No, I'm not!  And I'm not going to let you just sweep this under the rug this time," Blaine pinches the bridge of his nose then rubs the heels of his hands against his tired eyes.  When he looks back at Kurt, his eyes are rimmed red and he looks exhausted.  "I don't want Cavan to never know his grandparents.  I know you hate them," Kurt tries to say that he doesn't hate them, per say, but Blaine just bulldozes on, "But it is so, so important to me that our son, their only grandchild, knows them."

"I don't understand why it matters so much what they think," Kurt says it reflexively and his arms fold across his chest in defense without his realizing it.

"Kurt, stop it.  Just stop it, okay?  I know how you don't care what anyone thinks and sometimes I get the feeling that you don't even care what I think but this is important to me.  Why can't that be enough?"

"I-" Kurt starts to protest, so many things right on the tip of his tongue as he bristles at Blaine's words.

"No.  I don't want to hear it.  I'm-I'm going to go take a walk," Blaine finishes, grabbing his robe and striding out of the room.  A few moments later Kurt hears the front door slam and he flinches at the sound; left feeling helpless in the sudden silence of their bedroom.  The silence is soon broken when he hears Cavan start crying, calling for him, and he rushes to go comfort him.

When Blaine gets outside, he stands on the porch for a moment.  He can hear Cavan crying upstairs but knows that Kurt can handle it because right now he's too frustrated to handle much of anything.

He starts walking down the path past their house toward the pond not too far away, getting more and more worked up as he does so.  A branch sticking out from a bush on the side of the path catches on his robe and he lets out a noise of frustration, ripping the fabric in his attempt to get untangled from the stupid plant.  He can see the pond sparkling under the moonlight from where he stands but instead he briskly turns around and heads back to the house.

When he gets back to the drive he can no longer hear any crying, but the light of Cavan's bedroom is still on.  As Blaine makes his way to his car, in the back of his head he's aware Kurt must be reading him a story or singing him a lullaby but he pushes the thought away.  The purr of the engine calms him as he backs out and drives down the deserted street.

From Cavan's window Kurt can see Blaine drive away.  He bites his lip but pulls the shades closed and tucks Cavan back into bed before padding back down the hallway into the empty bedroom.  It is still littered with their clothes and not knowing what else to do until Blaine comes back-because he always comes back- Kurt starts to clean.

Blaine drives down the familiar route-the same one he always takes those few times he's had to get away-and the asphalt is glistening from the rain from a few hours before.  The sky above is still heavy with purpled clouds with the exception of the one small window where the full moon shines through.  Blaine leans forward over the steering wheel to get a better look, drinking in the scenery around him.

He doesn't know why or how his father still manages to get under his skin like this.  What he hates even more is how after all these years he still manages to come between Kurt and himself.  They have been together for nearly eleven years now and somehow things like this still happen.

They are all too damn stubborn.

Pride, Blaine thinks bitterly.  My pride?  What about Kurt?

What about Kurt.  Blaine tries to concentrate on driving, his head still muddled with frustration and he presses two fingers to his temple, attempting to will away the headache forming there.

Sometimes he wishes Kurt wouldn't be so headstrong, sometimes he wishes Kurt could just understand how lucky he is to have a father who accepts him no matter what, sometimes he wishes that Kurt could see how hard he is trying to keep their family together-all of their family.  He couldn't go on living knowing that Cavan despises his grandparents, or worse doesn't know them at all.

And then he wishes that he'd never wished those things in the first place.  Because he knows Kurt knows, in his own special way, and he is just trying to help in the best way he knows how.

Blaine furiously hits the steering wheel, finally allowing tears to form in his eyes.  It's been years since he's cried-not since they finally, finally had been given Cavan.  Cavan, the spitting image of himself but who had somehow gotten Kurt's facial expressions down immediately.

Kurt and Cavan are worth the arguments and Blaine never leaves to get away from them.  Never.  The need to get away is the sort that makes Blaine's skin itch because he's trying to get away from himself.  He doesn't want to taint the life they have built with his own problems.  The walls of that house have seen so much happiness-Kurt's first major paycheck, Blaine's promotion, Cavan's first steps- and for once Blaine wants a home that isn't stained with tears.

He takes a few shaky breathes as he crosses over one of his favorite places-a wooden bridge that leaps over a lake.  Doesn't matter that the lake is man-made.  Blaine has coaxed Kurt, and now Cavan, into fishing there a few times; the memory of his two favorite people slathered in sunscreen, wearing identical sun-hats as they watch Blaine with fascinated eyes as he threads the fishing line is one that he'll never forget.

He glances at the clock on the dash and sees that it's past midnight.  Blaine sighs and blinks a few times against the dark as the itch in his skin begins to dampen then disappear.  He drives until he gets into the town, the first streetlight glowing red in the quiet square.  Blaine waits patiently at the light, though there are no cars to be seen.

Blaine thinks about how he was teaching Cavan his colors with these same streetlights-it doesn't seem all that long ago.  Yellow, then Red, then Green.  Then back to Yellow and Red. Do you see that, Cavan?

And then Green.  Blaine spins the steering wheel as he makes the U-turn.  A flash of light to his right snaps him out of his reverie and he barely has time to register the sound of a horn honking and screeching tires before it's replaced by the deafening noise of crunching metal.

Kurt is lying in bed, in the dark, when he turns to look at the alarm clock on the dresser across the room.  It reads 1:13.  Blaine is usually back by now.  They've had worse fights than this and Blaine has always come home.  He sighs and sits up, picking up his cell off the stand and immediately hits speed dial 1.

It rings and rings until Blaine's voice-mail clicks on.  Hi, you've reached Blaine Anderson-Hummel, please leave a message and I will get back to you as soon as I can.

Kurt stares at the carpet as he hears the beep and slides his phone shut, not bothering to leave a message.  He tries to swallow the lump of worry caught in his throat; sure that Blaine is too busy driving to answer his phone.

His phone lights up and begins buzzing in his hands.  It's Blaine.  Kurt immediately answers, "Blaine?  Where are you?"

There's a crackling on the other end of the line and a whooshing noise Kurt can't quite place.  "Is this Kurt Anderson-Hummel?  Spouse to Blaine Anderson-Hummel?"  A man Kurt doesn't know practically shouts into Kurt's ear.  Kurt's heart instantly drops into his stomach and he leans forward, almost tipping off of the bed.

"Y-yes.  Who is this?" Kurt's voice edges on frantic, "Where's Blaine?"

"Sir, your husband has been in an accident at the corner of..."  the rest of what the unfamiliar man says fades out of Kurt's awareness in a hazy blur and he slides off the bed to his knees, not even caring that he bumps his head against the wooden frame along the way.

Blaine tries to open his eyes but all he manages to do is squint against the blinding white light.  Somewhere behind the pain crushing his ribs he is aware of the faint trickle of water sliding down his face.

Is it raining again?

There's shouting and a faint rumble that keeps going in and out, made staccato by the thrumming of Blaine's heart in his ears.  He can't hear Kurt.  Where's Kurt?

He hears someone shout his name before everything goes black.

When Kurt arrives at the scene, Cavan asleep in the backseat of his car, there are at least half a dozen men surrounding the twisted heap of metal on the street corner.

Kurt grips his steering wheel, still attempting to convince himself that it's not Blaine.  They have to be mistaken.  That can't be his car.  Not his Blaine.  Not when he-

It's started to rain again but Kurt doesn't even care as he hefts Cavan out of the back and makes his way toward the scene.  He feels like he's going to throw up as he sees Blaine's car-there's no mistaking it now, the stupid vanity plate Blaine had insisted on is in plain sight among the wreck, TNGEDRM1 shining in the rain.  The navy blue sedan is practically wrapped around a light pole, the side facing Kurt crushed inward like a stepped-on soda can.

The firemen around the car are attempting to pry the door open and Kurt lets out a strangled sob at the sight of Blaine's limp body falling out of the side, held back only by his seatbelt

Kurt can't bear to watch as they place him on the gurney, instead he buries his face into the blanket wrapped around Cavan and cries.

Kurt hates hospitals.

All throughout the ambulance ride he had been simultaneously trying to calm himself and a now screaming Cavan by muttering over and over, "I love you, Blaine.  I love you.  I'm sorry.  Shh, I love you," hoping beyond hope that Blaine could hear him.  The indifference of the paramedic with him as he tried to resuscitate Blaine pissed Kurt off, but he never stopped saying it.

Sitting in the cold waiting room of the E.R. Kurt is barely aware of the hand wrapped around his shoulder.  The usual sting of lemon-scented cleaners and the smell of sickness are intermingled with the familiar scent of Carole's perfume.  After his parents had shown up, Burt had taken Cavan off to... somewhere.  Kurt doesn't remember.  Maybe the cafeteria.

"Mr. Anderson-Hummel?" The annoying gentle voice of the doctor calls to Kurt but Kurt keeps his head down for a moment, trying desperately to hold on to that last string of hope he is clinging to.

When he looks up, the string breaks.

Kurt can't cry anymore.  Curled up on the floor of his bedroom-he can't sleep in the bed, not without Blaine-he heaves dry sobs, muttering over and over, "I love you.  I'm so sorry."

He's thought about it a million times over the past week.  He can't stop showering in a desperate to scrub off the itch, the feeling that only Blaine's warm hand could ever undo.  He thinks about it in the shower, when he feeds Cavan, when he talks to his parents, when he talks to Blaine's parents...

When he breathes and when he blinks, it's all he can think about.

His last words to Blaine were so angry and dammit, why was he too stubborn to say it back?  He took it for granted that Blaine would come home.  Because he always, always comes home.  The look in Blaine's eyes as he tore his gaze away from Kurt and left the house is only ever replaced by the image of Blaine's body stained with blood in that stupid hospital.

Twice Cavan has woken up from a nightmare this week, calling for Daddy and Kurt has had to explain to him that Daddy isn't coming home this time.  Cavan's eyes are exactly like Blaine's-wide and curious and a rich hazel, lined with long lashes- and Kurt has convinced himself that when he tells Cavan he loves him, that he's telling Blaine that, too.

That maybe it will make up for the chance he lost.

Kurt becomes obsessed with it.  As Cavan grows older, looking more and more like Blaine each day, the words I love you are a mantra constantly echoing throughout the walls of the house.

When Cavan is 5 and leaves for school for the first time he's so excited that he is practically vibrating.  Kurt chuckles fondly at his son's exuberance, so much like his father's.

When Cavan starts to run off to join his classmates Kurt panics, though, shouting, "Cavan Henry get back over here and give me a kiss!"

Cavan smiles sheepishly and skips back, planting a wet kiss on Kurt's cheek.  Kurt holds him close and mutters an I love you into his son's curls and Cavan bouncily replies back with a Love you, too, Papa before trotting off.

And when Cavan is 16, almost an exact copy of Blaine on the day Kurt met him, and they are arguing yet again about his curfew, Cavan makes to stride out of the house.

Kurt's heart pounds in his chest when he takes hold of Cavan's wrist and looks him in the eye, tears filling his own.  "Hey, I love you."

This is when Cavan looks most like Blaine.  His eyes soften and he straightens up as he wrenches his wrist out of Kurt's grasp.  "Yeah, I know.  Love you, too, Dad," he says with a crooked smirk.

"Go to your room," Kurt says simply.

"But I-"

"Just go, Cav," and when he does, Kurt collapses into a chair and heaves a heavy breath, refusing to cry.  After fourteen years he has cried too much and finally has begun to regain a sense of normal.  Or rather, what is normal for himself and his son.

Kurt tries to be both dads; he tries to remember what Blaine would do in each situation.  Kurt isn't a strict father but he holds true to one rule. 

"You always say I love you back because you never know if it could be the last time," it's a phrase that has been repeated so many times but Kurt has never allowed it to lose meaning, even when Cavan is being petulant and recites it back in a sarcastic manner.

The night of Blaine's accident Kurt calls Blaine's phone again.  He watches as it lights up in his other hand and ignores the strange looks of the people around him in the waiting room.

Hi, you've reached Blaine Anderson-Hummel, please leave a message and I will get back to you as soon as I can.

"Blaine.  I love you.  I'm sorry," Kurt swallows as the tears continue to stream down his face.  "I love you.  I love you.  I love you."