The first time he really loses control, he isn’t even aware it’s happening. He’s fourteen and wakes up to a sea of unfamiliar faces swimming above him, fading in and out of clarity.

Everything hurts, and there are other people’s hands on him, prodding him, manhandling him, hurting him. He tries to get away, pull back, escape, but he’s held down, can’t move. He’s only aware of the panic overwhelming him, drowning out the pain for a minute.

He lashes out with closed fists, tries to fight back instinctually, knuckles colliding with flesh.

He hits a nurse in the face hard enough to give her a black eye.

They have to sedate him to calm him down.

It scares him, that he doesn’t even remember doing it. No one blames him-“You weren’t aware of your surroundings” “You thought you were still in the parking lot.” “None of this is your fault, Blaine.”

The nurse smiles gently at him, but he can’t stop staring at the purple mark, her swollen eye. He hates himself a little bit more the longer he stares at it.

They have him see a psychologist, tell him he’s dealing with a severe trauma, will probably experience flashbacks, he has to talk to process what’s happened to him.

He doesn’t have the words to express himself, doesn’t want to look too deeply into the things he’s feeling, so he sits silently through his sessions, and lets everything wash over him.

He doesn’t talk about the attack for three months.

- - - -

The second time it happens, his physical wounds are healed, but emotionally he’s all over the place. The walking brace on his leg has just been removed, and he’s lost the crutches in favor of limping under his own power. School is becoming a chore-everyone in the halls knows what happened to him, and half the school whispers behind cupped hands while the other half openly mocks him.

He’s walking to the cafeteria when it happens.

Tommy Hilston hip checks him into a locker, and the pain in his newly-healed ankle flares up. Blaine sees red, chases after Tommy and grabs him by the shoulder.

“What the hell is your problem?”

Tommy shoves back, and suddenly they’re on the floor. He’s on top of Tommy, fist drawn back, when someone grabs him, twists his wrist, hauls him up and away.

“Break it up!”

He’s dragged to the principal’s office alongside Tommy, and they both get a three-day out of school suspension for fighting on school grounds. They call their parents.

Blaine’s dad is the one to pick him up.

Blaine expects a lecture, but his father is eerily silent the entire way home. The explosion comes as soon as the front door is closed, though, and Blaine feels oddly satisfied.

“What is wrong with you, Blaine? What the hell is going on in your head?”

“He pushed me.” There’s no emotion behind the statement; truthfully, Blaine himself doesn’t know what the catalyst was.

“He pushed-Blaine, we raised you better than this.”

Blaine shrugs, keeps his eyes trained on the floor instead of looking at his father.

“I don’t know what to do with you anymore, Blaine. You’re angry, you’re withdrawn-are you even talking to Dr. Whitman?”

“I don’t need a shrink.”

Blaine storms up to his room, effectively ending the conversation.

Mr. Anderson stares after him, at a complete loss for what to do.

- - - - -

The third time it happens, he’s just transferred to Dalton.

The way the teachers talk to him, treat him, the way the other students look at him-it unnerves him, and it bothers him. They all know why he’s there, how his parents had to pull him from his old school because of beatings and bullying and anger issues, taken out on other students.

He retreats to a bathroom, finds himself staring at his reflection in the mirror.

There’s still a vivid pinkish-white scar along his hairline, visible even though he gels his hair carefully over it. He doesn’t bother to look at the rest of his body when he’s getting dressed anymore-doesn’t really want to catalogue remaining nicks and scars and lingering bruises.

He doesn’t quite recognize himself, can’t place the look in his eyes. He feels like he can’t control anything that’s happening to him-he couldn’t stop them from hitting him, couldn’t stop the bullying, can’t stop his emotions. His dad won’t look at him anymore, his mom avoids anything related his old school, the beating, him.

Everything hurts and is too numb, all at once.

The mirror’s shattered in pieces on the floor before he feels the pain in his hand, sees the bloody cuts on his knuckles. He chokes out a sob, his hands shaking when he realizes what he’s done.

He’s out of control, hasn’t really had control since the first shout of “Where y’going, fag?” from across the parking lot.

He needs to take his life back.

He walks himself to the guidance counselor, walks directly into her office, sits in the chair, and cries for the first time since he lost consciousness in that parking lot.

- - - - -

It’s Dr. Whitman who suggests he try boxing, once the broken fingers and cuts from the mirror incident are fully healed.

She suggests an outlet, asks him what he does to let off physical steam.

He doesn’t have an answer, so she hands him a pamphlet for a boxing class, at a local gym.

“Maybe you need to redirect your frustrations, Blaine. You can’t keep bottling everything up like this.”

He’s skeptical at first, isn’t really sure this is going to work. A heavy bag isn’t the reason for his problems-the bag didn’t attack him three-on-two in a parking lot, it hasn’t ignored him like his parents have done since that night.

He finds instead that he feels incredible when he’s in the gym, can imagine each punch directed at the people who’ve hurt him and taken away his normal.

He doesn’t stop boxing after Dr. Whitman releases him from her care with the exception of his monthly checkup visits. Doesn’t stop after she tells him he’s made a lot of progress, that he’s gotten somewhere, has developed ways to deal with the trauma of the attack.

He doesn’t do it as often, once he’s got the Warblers (Kurt). Doesn’t feel the need to, most of the time. But sometimes, once in a while, there’s that lingering fear, lingering doubt that he isn’t good enough, doesn’t have the ability to control what’s happening.

So he boxes, and lets out his frustrations, and later, he feels better. Sometimes he ices his knuckles, sometimes he likes to feel the lingering soreness from overworking the muscles. Usually he lays off the bag before he needs his hands for anything especially delicate or important.

No matter what, he always feels a bit more like himself.

It’s his way of keeping everything in check, of processing and dealing and understanding what he’s feeling.