They’re at Dalton when the question is first asked, just friends curled up on Blaine’s bed tearfully watching the end of Titantic as Jack and Rose kiss on the staircase and all the other lost souls of the ship give an uproarious applause. The camera is circling and the light is shining bright and things are just gorgeous.

“What do you think heaven is like?” Blaine sniffles as the credits roll, flopping closer to Kurt.

“I don’t believe in it,” Kurt responds, shrugging and swiping at his eyes. Just fictional characters, he tries to tell himself in his head. They’re just fictional characters.

“Leonardo is gorgeous in this one,” he remarks, but Blaine isn’t ranting happily in agreement, just staring at Kurt with a crease in his forehead.

It occurs to Kurt (not for the first time) that Blaine is different than other boys, in more ways than being gay, and in a lot more ways than he lets on when he’s incased in his blazer. Something in his gaze is betrayed, and Kurt feels his own face contort to mirror Blaine’s perplexed expression.

“Do you?” Kurt asks as realization comes, and Blaine nods. “But I thought you weren’t religious?”

Blaine shrugs. “I don’t go to church or synagogue or mosque or anything, but I believe in heaven. I mean…there’s got to be something…you know…” The younger boy trails off and bites his lip. “What do you think happens when we die?”

“We’re dead in the ground.”

“But…that’s so sad.”

“Not to dead people. They’re dead.”

“It’s sad to the living.”

There’s a long pause, and it weighs heavy in the air until Kurt decides quickly that no, he’d had quite enough of this back at McKinley, and there’s no way he’s getting into it with Blaine.

“Do you want to watch Inception next? Personally, I think Leonardo’s even better with facial hair.”

“Kurt-“

“Drop it, Blaine.”

Neither boy sleeps well that night.

*************************************************************

The second time it happens they’re free of Ohio, and Kurt’s driven down from NYADA to visit Blaine at Duke. They’re miles off campus with dewy grass on their backs, the stars shining down on them, and Kurt’s head on Blaine’s chest.

“This is what heaven’s like,” Blaine says with confidence as they finish screaming their second Katy Perry song to the night sky. “Not this exactly, but this is what it feels like.”

“We have this here,” Kurt whispers, even though there’s no one around to overhear. “There’s no need to die to get it.”

“What about your mom, Kurt?” Blaine asks. “What about Finn’s dad? What about Cooper?” Kurt reaches out and grasps Blaine hand at that, running his thumb across Blaine’s because he knows how fresh that wound is, how raw Blaine is from losing his brother. “Don’t they get to have this?”

Kurt waits to answer, waits until Blaine’s ragged breathing is back under control and pretends not to see the tears he wipes away. When it’s nothing but the moon, the stars, the crickets, and their even breaths, Kurt answers.

“They had that while they were alive, Blaine. Just like we have this now.”

Blaine laughs, but there’s something bitter and unBlaine to it that makes Kurt flinch. When the singing starts again, he hates every word that comes out of those lips he loves so much.

I must believe
There’s more above us and below
I must believe
Stranded with this bitch called hope
It keeps me here
When all I wanna do is go
It keeps me here
When all I wanna do is disappear

If this is it
When all we have and ever will
If this is it
Time is running out and standing still
I’ll leave today
Cause there’s nothing left to keep me here
I’ll fade away
I’ll turn my back and disappear

*************************************************************

The third time things are much more urgent, on the side of the road with Kurt’s shirt pressed to Blaine’s side with his boyfriend fading quickly and help still ten minutes away.

“You’re going to be okay,” Kurt insists as he applies pressure. “Everything’s okay.”

“It’ll be okay,” Blaine assures back as he stares detachedly down at both blood-soaked shirts. “We’ll see each other again.”

“No we won’t!’” Kurt yells. “If you die you’re dead, and I’m alone. Just like that. So keep awake, okay?!”

Something shifts, through Kurt’s hysteria and Blaine’s onset of shock, something that’s been tucked behind a curtain for years, and Kurt is sobbing even more desperately, and Blaine can’t look him in the eye (for reasons other than blood loss, though Kurt was sure that can’t be helping).

After a minute, Blaine is unconscious and Kurt is still applying pressure with his words from years ago ringing in his ears.

Dead in the ground.

Six days later, when Kurt brings Blaine back home and changes his bandages, the shift becomes apparent. There’s a moment of tense silence before Blaine is hurling a glass at the wall and whispering at Kurt to please go, and Kurt can’t leave fast enough.

It’s been three hours of roaming the streets of New York when he wanders into a church and sits in the back and sobs because what if he was alone right now, what if Blaine was dead, and this will happen.

Blaine will die. Kurt will die.

Dead in the ground.

This place is peaceful and safe, but the book in front of Kurt as he curls up on a pew offers no comfort.

It never has.

*************************************************************

The fourth time it’s late at night and Kurt could swear that he dreams it, but he wanders into the nursery to see what all that crying is about and finds Blaine rocking her, holding a bottle and staring lovingly at her face in a way that does the most wonderful things to Kurt’s heart.

When Blaine looks up to see Kurt watching them, however, his expression becomes desperate.

“There’s just got to be something for her,” he begs Kurt, searching for agreement, approval, things that Kurt just can’t give when it comes to this one thing. “There’s something so much more for her.”

This is wonderful he wants to scream as he looks into his husband’s eyes, but instead he walks out of the room without a word.

*************************************************************

They talk about it again over the years, but not really. As healthy a relationship as they have, as completely and totally functional as they are in many respects, with this one particular thing they are separate. Any peace they reach on the matter is individual.

But then it’s not.

Suddenly it’s the last time, when Kurt is seventy-two and he’s been taken home to die and is it earlier than they wished, yes, but it’s time and that’s that.

They’re in their bed together, and it’s that hour of morning where no sane person is awake, but they are, because they both feel it coming.

Blaine’s not as young as he used to be but he still manages to pull Kurt tight against his chest and Kurt’s weak but he still manages to grip Blaine’s hand tightly, as he’s done from the very beginning.

There are stick-on glow-in-the-dark stars on their ceiling, because even in old age Blaine is unlike anyone Kurt has ever met, and in the absence of a skylight Kurt’s curly-headed love had declared that this would do.

They talk through their fear as Kurt’s grip slowly loosens, and when the time left becomes shorter, Blaine suddenly sobs out “Why?” and looks Kurt straight in the eye. By the light of the glow stars, Kurt sees Blaine’s expression and knows exactly what the question is.

“To think that there’s something greater out there is an insult to what we have here,” he murmurs, finally voicing what’s been weighing on him since that day in Blaine’s dorm, or longer, since the priest at his mother’s funeral spoke of a better place that Kurt couldn’t bring himself to picture as he clasped at his father’s hand.

There is a long, long silence, but soon I love yous are being whispered and they’re warm under the covers and he can feel everything giving in to rest as Blaine’s lips press themselves to his ear.

“Maybe when we’re in heaven together it’ll be so much greater that to compare it to this would be an insult.”

Kurt Hummel dies knowing he’s fine with it either way.