Lindsay wasn’t sure how she should feel about her first assignment.

On the one hand, it was incredibly huge for her to even have been offered such a big story on her first week out of the fact-checking department and she knew that if she nailed this one she was pretty much set for the rest of her journalistic career. She just wished her conscience didn’t literally cringe every time she thought about writing this story, pursing this interview. It was something her teachers had always worried about for her, her inability to detach from her stories.

Lindsay’s mom always assured her it made her work passionate, but passion did not belong in journalism.

The Anderson v. Ohio trial had already been highly publicized and had literally split the city nearly in half with outcries of prejudices inherent in the legal system. The Human Rights Campaign was furious and they weren’t the only LGBT configuration calling for mistrial.

Anderson, however, had shocked everyone yesterday when he had publicly announced that he would not be seeking an appeal. He’d requested only one interview with The Lima News (when asked why he’d chosen such a small paper to take the interview, he’d replied simply “our story started in Lima, it ought to end there”).

In the end, it wasn’t like Lindsay could’ve actually said no.

Lindsay had never visited someone in prison before and had sort of been expecting a scene straight out of Law and Order or something. But Blaine Anderson was not waiting behind an inch or two of bullet proof glass and he wasn’t shackled inside a padded or barred room either. In fact, the visitation room reminded Lindsay most of a high school cafeteria—a large rectangular room with sterile white walls and several square tables. Only three of the tables had occupants, inmates in orange jumpsuits exchanging empty words with the people they’d let down and left behind on the other side.

Anderson looked more broken then dangerous in his loose jumpsuit—it did nothing for his beautiful tan complexion—with his curls recently cut for the trial falling nearly to his ears and soft, sad hazel eyes.

“Hello Mr. Anderson, I’m Lindsay Freeman with The Lima News,” she introduced herself as she approached his table, tucking herself into the seat opposite him and pulling out her notebook and tape recorder.

“What a beautifully ironic surname for a woman interviewing a lifer inmate,” Anderson chuckled. For anyone else it might’ve come off as sarcastic but he seemed nothing short of genuinely amused.

Lindsay couldn’t help but smile. “That’s what I said too,” she admitted.

Anderson gave a full laugh then. “Good, a sense of humor. Kurt would’ve approved.”

“Do you mind if I record our interview for review later?”

“I’d think you were foolish not to. I tend to ramble.”

Lindsay nodded. “Okay,” she said, hitting record, “So Mr. Anderson, you requested this interview. Care to tell me why? Several LGBT agencies have questioned your refusal to appeal your judging and the HRC seem certain they can get a retrial. Why give up?”

To her surprise, Anderson gave a soft chuckle at her words and shrugged. “I’m not a brave man,” he answered after a moment, “Not like Kurt was. And honestly, I’m tired of reliving the worst day of my life, fighting for my freedom, when the man I love won’t even be there to share it with me.”

Lindsay tried desperately to squelch the sympathy she felt for the man at those words.

“Ms. Freeman, Lindsay, all I really want is the chance, one chance, to tell you our whole story, mine and Kurt’s, without interruptions from court proceedings or state attorneys, without judgment.”

“Why?”

“Because the whole world knows who we are, but they can’t understand it, not really, until they know who we were.”

Blaine Anderson was in a hurry for the first time in his Dalton career. His Lit professor had pulled him aside after class to see if he’d be willing to tutor some freshman and now Blaine was running late. There was a good chance Wes would kill him if he missed the performance. Literally. And probably with his gavel which sounded both painful and humiliating.

So when a soft voice called out “Excuse me?” and a slender hand tapped his should, Blaine actually considered ignoring the stranger and rushing on. (He’d admit to this only twice in his entire life—the first time to Kurt and the second time to a pretty brunette journalist). Unfortunately, schedule be damned, Blaine was a gentleman. So he turned around to help and met a pair of startling blue eyes which would irrevocably change his life.

“Love at first sight?”

Anderson laughed. “Unfortunately not. Sometimes I wonder how different our lives would’ve been if I’d just known it then. If it had just hit me. Kurt always laughed when I brought it up. He said if I’d known then, I wouldn’t be the beautifully oblivious man he fell in love with.”

Lindsay couldn’t help but laugh. “That’s sweet.”

“That was Kurt. He always forgave my mistakes. Loved me in spite of and because of my flaws. Nobody expected us to make it, not really. Not even me sometimes.”

“Really? Why?”
            “Well, you know, high school sweethearts? We fell in love so young. And man, the year Kurt went to college without me? It was the hardest year of our lives.”

Blaine was not jealous.

He wasn’t.

Being jealous would be silly.

Kurt was his boyfriend. Kurt loved him.

Kurt had told Blaine he was going to a party last night and was going to miss their usual Skype date but would call in the morning.

So Blaine was not jealous because that would be stupid.

But that didn’t’ stop the ache in his chest as he saw the posts on Kurt’s Facebook page this morning.

Laura K.: Kurt, good to see you last night!! You have to come out more!!

Terry Milton: Yeah, stop pining for your bf, lol

Andy Richards: And do more dancing on tables, you wild child!! ;)

By the time his phone was shrilling a familiar ringtone, Blaine was fuming.

“Hey Baby,” Kurt greeted happily.

“Hey, yourself. How was the party?”

“Pretty boring, actually. You’d think hanging with a bunch of performing arts majors would involve a lot more impromptu opportunities to show off, but all they did was drink and dance raunchy. Not really my scene.”

“Your Facebook page would imply otherwise.”

“What?” Kurt sounded genuinely confused but Blaine had had way too much time to fume and wouldn’t be deterred.

“Dancing on tables? Wild child? Ringing any bells?”

“Blaine, I have no idea what you’re talking about. Why do you sound angry?”

“Because my fucking boyfriend is living it up in New York City forgetting about me and apparently lying about it,” Blaine said, his last words coming out as a shout of aggravation.

Kurt’s voice was tight and strained when he responded. “Don’t you shout at me, Blaine Anderson. I just logged onto my Facebook to see what the hell you were talking about. Andy is an idiot and he was the one dancing on tables last night. That comment was scarcastic, Blaine, because I was the only one sober enough to pull him down before he hurt himself. I have never lied to you Blaine.”

Blaine screwed up his eyes in self-loathing as Kurt’s voice cracked over the phone at the end of his explanation. “I love you, Blaine. What’s this about?”

Blaine didn’t realize he was crying until he spoke. “I miss you,” he admitted brokenly. “God, Baby, I’m proud of you and I love you, but mostly I just really miss you.”

“Oh Blaine—”

“I’m sorry I yelled and I know, I know, you wouldn’t lie and that you love me. But this year, it’s killing me.”

“Hey,” Kurt said gently, waiting a beat for Blaine to compose himself and listen. “Blaine, I love you and you love me and we will get through this. You know how I know that?”

“How?”

 “Because nothing can touch us.”

“Or what we have,” Blaine half-laughed, half-sobbed.

“Exactly.”

“I love you, Kurt Hummel.”

“I love you too.”

“Did you two fight often?”

Anderson smirked. “As only two people who truly love each other can,” he replied. “I told his father once, and I’ve never said truer words, Kurt was the most honest and compassionate person I’d ever met. But Kurt was stubborn. God, so stubborn. He’d get this idea in his head and he’d just make it happen, you know? I’ve never met anyone so driven. I learned early on not to doubt him. He worked hard for he wanted, sometimes so much so that he’d forget what he was working for. That’s where I usually came in, annoying the hell out of him until he took a break. He used to tell me I was like a puppy, eager for attention and affection.”

“But things were good?”

Anderson smiled sadly. “Things were fantastic.”

“Blaine Anderson, if you interrupt me one more time before I finish this last design for my project, I will personally burn each and every last bowtie in your drawer,” Kurt huffed as Blaine came around the corner from the kitchen with a pout.

“But you’ve been working on it for the entire day, Kurt. And it’s Saturday.”

“Baby, it’s my senior project at FIT, this is not the sort of thing you half-ass.”

Blaine literally whimpered. “I know. But I’m lonely left to my own devices and Project Runway reruns are only fun when you watch them with me and critique everyone.”

Blaine watch in triumph as Kurt fought (and lost) a war to keep from laughing at that. “Thirty more minutes and I’ll take a break.”

“You know, when we talked about moving in together I thought there’d be a lot more sex and a lot less studying.”

“Welcome to the real world, my love,” Kurt chuckled.

Blaine smiled fondly and pulled out his last weapon in an effort to glean some of Kurt’s time. “Worth it if I’m sharing it with you.”

Kurt’s smile was absolutely radiant when he looked up. “Nice try, Anderson. It’s still gonna be thirty minutes, but maybe you can spend that time coming up with something fun to do tonight to celebrate the completion of this project,” he suggested with a sly wink.

Blaine laughed and gave in with an “I love you.”

Lindsay smiled gently. “You two were engaged shortly after graduation, is that correct?”

Anderson smiled. “His graduation, yes. I’m a year younger. He used to love to remind me of that. ‘I’m older and wiser, Blaine,’ he’d say. He’d just gotten his first job with an independent design company and I was in my senior year at NYU, studying music and psychology. I’d always known I was going to marry him, you know? I mean, since we were teenagers. It just felt like the right time.”

“The Lima Bean, Blaine? Feeling nostalgic?” Kurt teased as Blaine carefully untied the blindfold he’d insisted Kurt wear earlier on the drive over.

The two of them were on one of their rare trips to Ohio that did not coincide with some major holiday. Blaine was on spring break at school and Kurt had been given a week’s vacation (“paid, Blaine, paid vacation. I’m officially a grown up.”).

“Don’t make fun,” Blaine replied, stepping into line with Kurt and bumping his shoulder. “This is me attempting romance.”

Kurt chuckled softly, “You were never as bad at it as you seemed to think.”

“Good to know,” Blaine laughed before ordering their coffee with a dashing smile and then leading Kurt over to ‘their’ table (thankfully unoccupied). He waited patiently for Kurt to enjoy a few sips of his coffee and take in their familiar and yet somehow still strange surroundings before speaking again.

“You know, I fell in love with you sitting right here at this table,” he admitted.

Kurt smiled. “I thought it was my stunning rendition of Blackbird.”

Blaine laughed. “No, that was the moment when I realized that I was a moron and should’ve kissed you months ago. Here, in this coffee shop is where I found out all the things that make you tick; your likes and dislikes and how different and similar we are. This is where we fell in love Kurt.”

Kurt grinned, not one of his usual cheeky smiles, but the one that lit up his entire face, the one he reserved especially for Blaine. “It is,” he agreed finally.

“So it seemed like the perfect place to do this,” Blaine continued, pulling a velvet box from his pocket and moving onto his knee beside Kurt’s chair.

“Blaine, what are you—?”

“Kurt Hummel, you are the single most incredible man I have ever had the fortune to meet and I will never be more grateful for anything than the moment you stopped me on that staircase and asked me for help. You have saved me and I have saved you and to me, that’s just proof that we were meant to fit together like puzzle pieces. I want to spend the rest of my life with you, Kurt. I want to have children with you and a house in the suburbs—even though we swore we’d never be that couple—and I want to grow old with you.”

“Oh, Blaine,” Tears had started to cascade down Kurt’s porcelain cheeks.

“Kurt Hummel, will you do me the honor of marrying me?”

“Yes,” Kurt shouted almost before Blaine had finished asking the question. “Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes,” he continued, punctuating each word with a kiss and pulling Blaine closer so that the younger man was standing and bent over Kurt’s seated form. (It would never occur to them that this was almost an exact pantomime of their first kiss). The rest of the coffee shop clamored at the scene, some cheering and smiling, others grumbling or leaving with pointed stares of disgust. Blaine was aware of nothing but the feel of Kurt’s lips against his and the cool metal of the ring Kurt now wore pressing against his cheek.

            “So, that brings us up to March 2016, correct,” Lindsay asked, jotting the date into her notebook. She’d done some basic research on what information Anderson had already released or had been made public knowledge.

            “Yes,” Anderson nodded, his voice going a little shaky.

            Lindsay took a breath, both for her benefit and his, before launching into the question they’d both been dreading. “So tell me about what happened that November?”

            “Kurt and I had never been happier,” Anderson started, his voice still trembling. “We were busy. I was finishing up my last year of school and Kurt was trying to get a name made for himself in the fashion industry which—believe me—is not easily done. We kept trying to plan the wedding, but things were crazy and we’d barely even managed to set a date. I guess Kurt just got tired of trying to pin down a plan. We were in Ohio again, visiting his parents on Saturday, November twenty-sixth, when he woke me with a plan.”

            “Blaine?”

            “Mmph.”

            “Blaine, get up. We’re getting married today.”

            That was an effective enough prod. Blaine sat up quickly, blinking sleep from his eyes and trying to let his brain catch up to his ears. “What?”

            Kurt’s eyes were steely and determined. “We’re going to the courthouse and we’re getting married today.”

            “But…but the wedding…”

            “Will still happen, I promise. I will plan us a fabulous wedding for next summer, June I think. Probably a rooftop wedding with a New York skyline in the background. It will be gorgeous and all our friends will be there and I will hand-design us each a tux for the occasion. But I want to be your husband, Blaine. Now. I want to call you mine and I want to be yours and I just…unless you’re not ready.”

            “Baby, I’m more than ready.”

            “Then let’s just go. Let’s just do it. There will be time for all the other stuff, but today I just really want to do this.”

            “In Ohio? Kurt I thought you wanted New York and—”

            “I did. I do. But, Blaine, Ohio is where we met. This is where we started. It’s where we got engaged. They legalized same-sex marriage  last week. Doesn’t it just feel like it was meant to be this way?”

            Blaine stared at Kurt for a minute in silence, taking in the depth in his blue eyes and the determined look on his face. Kurt had never been one to believe in fate or really even gut feelings. Kurt was the logic in their equation, Blaine shot from the heart. But this was obviously very important to his fiancé, so important that Kurt was thinking about doing it without his beloved family even around.  Blaine felt a smile creep across his face. “Okay. Yes. Let’s get married today.”

            “So you went to the courthouse alone?”

            Anderson nodded, his eyes shining with regret and unshed tears. “I wonder everyday if that would’ve changed things, you know? If Burt had been there with us. Or Carole, she’s a nurse. Or even Finn, he’s so big and intimidating. Maybe then it wouldn’t have been Kurt. Maybe we wouldn’t have looked like such…such easy targets.”

            Lindsay swallowed. “Tell me about when you got to the courthouse.”

             He wasn’t sure why he’d expected less protestors, the bill had only been signed a week ago. Kurt seemed to shrink in on himself a little as he took in the street filled with hateful signs proclaiming ‘God Hates Fags’ or ‘Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve.’

“You okay?” He asked, pressing a kiss to Kurt’s temple as they steeled themselves to get out of the car. “We can still wait. A June wedding in New York would be beautiful Kurt and nobody would bat an eye.”

Kurt took a deep breath. “That’s exactly why it has to be here, Blaine,” he whispered. “Easy is nice, but the way I love you…if they could see it, Blaine, if they could feel it, they’d put those signs down in an instant.”

“You are the most amazing man, Kurt Hummel.”

“Hummel-Anderson, if you please,” Kurt replied with a wide grin. “I’m almost a married man.”

Blaine laughed. “Let’s go make that official, shall we?”

It took just over two hours and a handful of signatures and suddenly, Blaine was walking out of the Lima, Ohio courthouse a married man. He was still reeling with overwhelming euphoria as they stepped out of the courthouse and slotted their hands together. “Hey,” he said gently, catching Kurt’s attention and ignoring the sound of the protestors to focus on the pounding of his own heart in his ears, “You’re my husband.”

            Kurt absolutely beamed at the obvious statement. “I’m your husband,” he giggled. “Let’s go home, husband. I have some explaining to do to my father,” he added with a wink.

            Blaine groaned. “How much trouble do you think we’ll be in?”

            Kurt laughed. “I guess I can let you bribe dad with a slice of wedding cake, just this once. I know you’re still scared of him.”

            “Kurt, you’re father is terrifying.”

            “He’s a teddy bear.”

            “Not when it concerns his baby boy,” Blaine sulked playfully.

            Kurt leaned in and kissed Blaine’s frown away.

“Go home Fags, you’re a disgrace!”

Blaine bristled and felt Kurt drawn tensely to his side. Suddenly, they both became much more aware of the crowd of hateful naysayers and the signs full of nasty slurs. He turned to see Kurt biting his lip, tears beginning to form in his beautiful blue eyes.

“Hey,” Blaine heard himself shouting to both his surprise and everyone else’s. “Show a little respect. We are celebrating our love.”

“Your love is an abomination,” A man called back angrily and Blaine found him this time in the sea of hatred they were surrounded by. A middle-aged man in a plaid button up and baseball cap. He looked so like Burt that Blaine wasn’t surprised by Kurt’s sharp intake of breath.

“So is your blatant homophobia,” Blaine told him angrily.

“Blaine,” Kurt whispered, tugging on his arms. “Blaine, please let’s just go home?”

“God sees what you are doing and he will condemn you to hell for it,” the man replied.

Blaine felt like his blood was boiling and, for probably the first time in their entire relationship, he ignored Kurt’s pleas to let it go. “Perhaps, but he sees what you are doing too and I’m sure he’s as disgusted as I am.”

“Blaine, please.”

“You’re time is coming, Fag. Judgment day is near.”

“I guess I’ll see you in Hell then,” Blaine answered, finally giving in to Kurt’s tug on his arm. “Okay,” he added in a softer voice, taking in Kurt’s wide frightened eyes. “Okay, we’re going. I’m sorry.”

“He’s not worth it, Blaine. He’s not—”

 A million things seemed to happen in that split second as a gunshot rang out through the streets, echoing off the buildings and the cars along with the screams that followed it; as Blaine dove for the ground, pulling Kurt with him; as a thousand protestors cried out in fear. Then everything went frighteningly still and Blaine took a breath, and then another and realized he hadn’t been hit.

Sighing in relief he turned to his fiancé, no, his husband, and felt his blood run cold. Kurt lay on the ground beside him, but he had gone horribly, frighteningly pale and his hands trembled where they were pressed to a blooming red stain on his chest.

“K-Kurt…” Blaine couldn’t get air into his lungs as he fumbled clumsily (why wouldn’t his hands stop shaking) with pulling his blazer off and forced Kurt’s hands from the wound to press his jacket there. “Somebody call an ambulance,” he shouted, his voice shaky and higher-pitched than normal. “Hold on, Baby, hold on, okay. It’s okay.”

Kurt’s lips trembled as he attempted a few times to say something. “Blaine,” he finally managed in a shaky whisper.

“Shhh, just…just hang on. Just hang on.”

Kurt shook his head and, to Blaine’s horror, a thin line of red fell from between his lips. “You can’t kiss this one better, Blaine.” Kurt said hoarsely, coughing a spray of red and gasping for a breath.

“You’re gonna be fine, do you hear me? You’re Kurt Hummel. You…you can do anything.”

Kurt smiled softly despite the tears streaking down his cheeks, mixing with the blood spreading across the concrete. He reached for Blaine’s hand. “Hummel-Anderson,” He reminded gently.

Blaine felt a sob break from his chest at that and he moved closer, cradling Kurt’s beautiful face. “I’m so sorry baby. I’m so sorry.”

“It’s not your fault. You didn’t know.”

“Don’t go. Please don’t go. Don’t leave me. I can’t do this without you.”

“I love…love you.”

“I love you too. Please, Kurt, don’t leave me,” Blaine begged. In the distance, he heard the sirens coming and watched in horror as Kurt’s eyes slid shut, as his gasps came fewer and fewer. And then he was gone.

Gone.

Blaine felt like the universe had just pulled the rug from beneath him and as the ambulance approached, his eyes shot around wildly for something, anything that made sense in the world without Kurt.

They landed on the gun, only a few feet away on the pavement, almost shining in the pale Ohio sunlight. And then he traced it up to the man who was tearing through the crowd as quickly as he could, running from what he’d done, from who’d he’d just killed.

Blaine would never be able to explain it, not to his own satisfaction or to anyone else’s apparently. All his life, Blaine had been calm and collected. He’d been almost entirely non-violent (but for those brief angry days boxing out his aggression at his tormentors). But in that moment, something fundamental, something that had always made Blaine who he was, snapped.

Before he even realized it had happened, he’d crossed the courtyard, scooped the gun into his hands and torn off after Kurt’s killer. He waited only until the man had cleared the crowd, no room for innocent bystanders, before squeezing the trigger.  

Lindsay swallowed forcefully. “Do-ahem-do you regret it?”

Anderson leveled her with his hazel gaze, tears streaming down his cheeks almost as if he didn’t notice them. “Everyday,” he whispered. “But that won’t bring him back anymore than shooting him brought me back my Kurt.”

Lindsay nodded and waited a beat to catch her bearings. “How…how is your relationship with the Hummels now?”

Anderson grimaced. “Burt still checks in, you know? He…he was sort of like a father to me when mine decided he didn’t want a fag for a son. He…he helped me get an attorney. He fought to get me to Kurt’s funeral but the courts wouldn’t allow it.”

“He refused to attend your trial though?”

Anderson nodded.

            The room was cold and dark and empty, which made it all sort of perfect because that seemed to be all Blaine could feel anymore. He knew he was in trouble, but it felt so hard to care. He’d killed a man. Killed a man in cold blood. His hands trembled at the thought. Perhaps it was good that Kurt hadn’t been there to see it. But the very thought of Kurt sent a shock of pain so intense through his system that Blaine longed again for the beautiful numbness of moments before.

A knock on the door pulled him out of his own head. And whatever façade he’d been maintaining crumbled completely when Burt Hummel stepped through the door. “Blaine,” was all he had the chance to say before the man in question had launched himself into Burt’s open arms.

“He’s gone. He’s gone, he’s gone.”

Burt’s voice trembled. “I know. I know, Kid. I know.”

For several moments the two of them just held each other, mutually trying to grasp the idea of the most spectacular man in their lives suddenly not being in it.

“I killed a man, Burt,” Blaine finally managed to say out loud.

Burt stepped back from the embrace, his face unreadable. “I know that too.”

“I didn’t, I mean, Kurt, he’d be so ashamed of me, but I just…I lost it, I think.”

Burt nodded. “Blaine, I have never once condoned violence, but I…if it were me, I’d be in this room too,” he admitted.

Blaine let out a choked sob of gratitude.

“I’m going to help you with this, Kid, because you meant the…the world to my son and I know what it is, to lose the most important person in your universe. But I can’t attend the trials, Blaine. It…it hurts too much and I’m barely hanging on as it is.”

Blaine nodded his understanding. “Thank you, Burt. I…”

“I love you too, Kid,” Burt said for him, pulling Blaine into one more hug before stepping out of the room again. It would be the last time they ever saw each other face to face.

Lindsay took in a shaky breath as Anderson wrapped up his story, his voice trembling, his hands knotted on the table, but something like relief shining in his eyes. “Thank you for your time, Mr. Anderson,” Lindsay said as she finished jotting down her notes. “Is there anything else you’d like to say before I conclude this interview?”

Anderson met her eyes across the table and nodded. “I know what people will say about us,” he said after a beat. “I know that we will be famous, made martyrs by the gay community and villains but those who would see our rights stripped away. I just…I just wanted at least one person out there to know that…that we were people too. Kurt…Kurt was going to change the world, you know? I just know he would’ve. He changed mine.”

Lindsay nodded and smiled softly at the broken man before her. Very deliberately, she reached over to her recorder and shut it off. “I promise you, Blaine,” she said gently, “The world is going to know your love story.”

Blaine sighed in exhaustion and fell back onto the uncomfortable twin mattress in his cell like a dead weight, which is exactly what he felt like. Dead inside. Suffocating. He closed his eyes and threw his arm over his face in an attempt to push back the memories he’d had to relive today, the beautiful and the painful.

“Hey there Handsome,” a familiar voice said from the doorway and Blaine blinked in his own created darkness before removing his arms to find the voice’s source.

There Kurt stood, a skin-tight pair of dark jeans, a baby blue button up that made his eyes sparkle and a black vest with broach. When Blaine looked closely he found that it was the silver canary broach he’d gotten for their third anniversary. He looked just as beautiful as the day he’d slipped out of Blaine’s life.

“I did it,” he told Kurt without greeting, his voice still tight from all the talking but more from all the emotion. “I told them our story.”

Kurt smiled softly. “I know. I’m so proud of you. I knew you’d find the strength.”

Blaine shook his head and bit back his tears. “You are my strength Kurt, and I let you go.”

“Oh, Blaine, my love, you have to stop doing this to yourself. This was not your fault.”

Blaine shook his head. “Maybe not, but I can’t keep doing this, being this. Not without you.”

Kurt nodded. “I know,” he admitted softly. “That’s why I’m here.”

Blaine felt something like hope trickle into his heart. “Will you stay? Until I fall asleep?”

Kurt nodded again, a true smile crossing his face now. “But I get to be the big spoon.”

“Deal,” Blaine agreed readily, scooting over on his tiny cot to make room. A small part of his knew this wasn’t real. It was all in his head, this beautiful boy who made his heart start beating again after lying dormant so long. A larger part did not care. As Kurt’s weight settled down behind him and his arms wrapped around Blaine’s thinning form, he swore he could feel the ebb and sway of Kurt’s breath on his cheek, could feel the heat of Kurt’s skin at his back. He could hear the soft, high voice of his love, singing their song to him.

“I finally found you, my missing puzzle piece. I’m complete.”

And it was real enough. It was close enough at least to allow him to shut his eyes for the first time in weeks and fall asleep with a smile on his face.

Lindsay had just finished her first draft when the phone call came through to her desk.

“This is Lindsay Freeman.”

“Ms. Freeman, this is Officer Mitchell with the Ohio State Correctional Facility.”

“Oh…did I forget something?”

“No, I just…I wanted to inform you that the inmate you interviewed yesterday, Blaine Anderson, was found dead in his cell this morning. The coroner is declaring it a death of natural causes. Apparently his heart failed sometime in the night.”

Lindsay forced herself to blink back tears and not let her voice tremble when she said, “Oh. Thank you so much for informing me. Do you…um…do you know if there will be a service?”

“From what I understand the Hummel family has made arrangements for him. I…there’s one other thing you should know about his death, Ms. Freeman.”

“What’s that?”

Lindsay fidgeted with the hemline of her best black skirt nervously as she survey the group of broken faces clustered before her in a tiny Ohio cemetery and wondered, not for the first time, what the hell she was doing here. A glance to her left, at the twin headstones and the sweet messages carved there reminded her soundly.

“My name is Lindsay Freeman, and you don’t know me.” She said finally, gathering her courage. “Mr. Hummel asked me to speak today at Blaine’s funeral because…well, because I was the last person he ever spoke to,” she admitted sheepishly. “I guess it’s unfair to say that one conversation is enough to really get to know a man. But I like to think that in his last day Blaine was probably more honest, with me, with the world and with himself, than most people ever get the chance to be.

“In those four hours, Blaine told me a story,” she sighed. “The most beautiful love story I’ve ever had the privilege to hear.” From somewhere in the crowd someone let out a shaky sob and Lindsay nodded her understanding. “And he asked me to share it with the world. At first, I had every intention of doing it because it was my job. Now, I plan to do it because it is the noblest undertaking I can think of.

“It is natural to morn for the loss of a life, of two lives really, taken so young and so tragically,” Lindsay continued, feeling tears pool in the corners of her eyes as she looked on at the family and friends these two extraordinary gentlemen had left behind. “But I want to leave you with one last thought, one glimmer of happiness on this sad day. When I got the call from the penitentiary informing me of Blaine’s passing, the officer on duty told me that Blaine had been found in his cell, curled onto his side, hugging his pillow and smiling. The inmate who shared the cell next to him swore to the guards when they came to collect the body that there had been two people in the cell the night before. He swears that he heard two voices talking softly through the night, singing each other to sleep. So perhaps it’s not such a sad day after all,” she glanced again to the two graves they’d gathered around, one nearly a year older than the other and smiled a little, “The world will know their story, and Blaine is exactly where he is meant to be.”