A/N Hi everyone! So, the last chapter of Makes the heart grow fonder is being written, but this didn't want to wait any longer. This will probably be quite angsty. I will post warnings when they apply; for now, only sadness.

Prologue

When Blaine comes home frome school, the front door is barred. He knows what that means, but he tries the back door anyway. Of course, it doesn't open.

He just stands there, in the front yard, he doesn't know how long. Still not believing. This is too much change, too soon. But then he sees the tell-tale moving box standing partly-hidden beneath the shrubbery, and even his subconsciousness can't deny it any longer. It has really happened. His parents have been divorced, probably already re-entered the system. They are not his parents anymore; he will never live with them, probably never even see them again.

Somehow, they must have found out about them fighting. He doesn't know how, they have always been careful, never rising their voices, sometimes even arguing in writing, but most of the time not saying anything. At all. Only trading hurt glances and heavy silences. He doesn't know how they found out, but they always do. Their precious society cannot abide fighting, not even in families. Those that are considered to be harming the peace are taken away, separated even from their children, remarried to someone more fitting, chosen by them.

Blaine opens the box. It is nearly empty; they are allowed one box of keepsakes between the three of them, and his parents must already have taken what they had chosen, back when the fighting had been going on for a while and they had carefully re-packed the box, knowing that something like this could happen any time. He knows what is in there, but he looks through the contents anyway, carefully caressing each item before putting them away in his schoolbag; they fit easily. There is so little left of his old life now.

He lingers longer over the framed photo, his fingers tracing the lines of his parents' faces. The photo was taken a year ago, more or less, and his parents' loving smiles are already directed at their only child, not at each other anymore. Still, they look happy. They had still believed, back then, that they could work it out, that they could stop the fighting for Blaine's sake if not for their own. In the year that had passed, that turned out to be untrue. They started fighting even more, over the smallest things; they couldn't seem to stop themselves, and gradually, the hope in their eyes turned into fear, for no matter how unhappy they were with each other, they never wanted for this to happen.

Blaine turns the photo and sees a piece of paper hastily tucked under the frame. He swallows when he sees his mother's familiar handwriting.

Blaine, I am so sorry. We both are. We love you. Be happy.

There is no signature. The paper is tear-stained, and the last letter is smudged; they must have dragged her away before she was finished. It is a miracle they let her write at all.

Blaine sees what she didn't write. Go away. And he will. He made a pact with them, long ago, to put his name into the poll when he is old enough. It had been a hard decision, because they had believed then that they would always be together, that this was never going to happen to them. And yet they had wanted him to leave, to put his name into the poll to go to the island, because they want him to be happy and safe and they had known, even then, that he could never be that here. He is just starting to realize that, too.

Blaine puts the photo and the note into his schoolbag. He has to be going. He doesn't know how long he has lingered here, but he is sure it is almost too long. Normally, children go into the orphanage when their parents are divorced, unless the families have made other arrangements. And they have. The papers are written and filed, the money in the bank; he will not go into the orphanage. Still, if he is still here when they come, everything will be much more complicated and he will at least have to spend a few days in the orphanage until everything is sorted out.

So he rises, dusts his knees, picks up his bag and glances, one last time, back to the house where he has grown up. Soon, another family will live here, another child will live in his room and play with his toys, but that doesn't concern him. He will be living with his best friend's family, and that makes everything a little less scary, although Kurt and he have lost touch a little over the last two years or so. Still, he knows them well, Kurt's father and his stepmother, one of the most harmonious couples he knows, even though they were assigned. And he will be happy to catch up with Kurt.

So he wanders about town, on his way towards his new life, and cannot but imagine everyone knowing, looking at him with pity and a little disdain.

His eyes are dry.

He is ten years old.