Nutella is magical and the perfect food for my muse.
My mom bought me a jar and, look, I actually got something written!
Granted, it's rather sad, but I hope you still like it!
Warnings before you read this: Some of this might be triggering to some people. There are mentions of suicide, cutting, bullying, etc. So, yeah. Just figured it'd be nice to warn you. Also, some spoilers from "On My Way".
You've been hit by, you've been struck by a smooth disclaimer: I don't own Glee, Blaine Anderson, anything at all.
Enjoy!
Five Times Blaine Anderson Broke
Blaine never had an "easy" life; he was not as calm, cool, and collected as everyone thought. He was great at acting like he was, he was a master at putting on a smile and pretending that nothing was wrong and everything was fine. There were only a few times when that broke, and only a few people that ever saw it.
1.
The first time he was only ten years old. He had gotten home from school on the verge of tears, dropping his backpack by the door and rushing up the steps to his older brother's room.
"Cooper," he called, pushing the door open gently and poking his head in. Cooper looked up from the paper he had been writing for class, dropping his pencil when he saw the tears glistening in his eyes.
"What is it, Blainers?" Cooper asked, turning in his chair and holding out an arm to motion for his brother to come in. Blaine hurried into the room, shutting the door behind him a little too roughly and scurrying across the floor straight into his brother's arms, burying his face into the cotton of Cooper's shirt. Cooper didn't say anything; just rubbed Blaine's back comfortingly and waited for his tears to stop as he whispered comforting words into Blaine's unruly curls. Blaine sniffled and looked up at his older brother, eyes red and puffy.
"Coop, do you think there's something wrong with me?" He asked, his voice breaking near the end. Cooper furrowed his brow, looking down at his brother and searching his face.
"Absolutely not, Blaine," he said honestly. "There's nothing wrong with you. Why are you asking? What happened today?"
"I said that I thought the boy from the movie we watched today was pretty," Blaine said, burying his face into Cooper's shirt again, his voice muffled by the fabric. "Everyone said that was icky and that there's something wrong with me and they started laughing at me. Why is it icky, Coop? All the boys talk about girls being pretty and the girls talk about boys being pretty, why can't I think boys are pretty, too?"
Cooper frowned and pulled Blaine away from him, holding him at arm's length and studying him as tears slowly rolled down his cheeks. Blaine, little Blainers, his brother was hurt. He had been ridiculed at school by some childish little bullies and he didn't even understand why. Cooper had always known that this would happen, he knew Blaine was gay when he was five and asked for Barbies for Christmas and said his favorite kid off of Barney was a little blonde boy.
"It's not icky, Blaine." Cooper assured him. "It's perfectly okay if you think boys are pretty. Some people just don't understand that, but you just have to ignore them, okay?"
Blaine sniffled again, wiping his sleeve under his nose and nodding. His wrapped his arms around Cooper's neck in a tight hug and Cooper wrapped his arms around Blaine's tiny waist, picking him up and sitting him in his lap.
"How about we watch a movie after I finish this paper, okay? I've just got one more paragraph." Cooper said, picking up his pencil again. Blaine smiled, wiping his tears off and nodded. Cooper gave him one last hug before setting him on his feet and telling him to go ask Mom to make popcorn and pick out a movie.
2.
Four years later, Blaine's fourteen and Cooper's eighteen. Blaine finally made the decision to come out to his parents. Cooper can hear the yelling from his room, his father's disapproval, his mother's crying.
"There is no way you're my son!" Their father was shouting. "I can't believe… we didn't raise you like this! What went wrong?"
"Nothing!" Blaine shouted, trying to be heard by his frantic parents. "There's nothing wrong, I just… it's who I am. I… I like guys…"
"No!" Their mother exclaimed. "Oh, Blaine… This… we were always hoping to have grandchildren, family dinners at Thanksgiving with little feet scurrying around the kitchen…"
"You can still have that," Blaine said. "You can, if I ever… get married, you know, we could adopt. It's not like two men can't have kids."
"Of course they can't, Blaine!" Mr. Anderson said. "Two men are just not fit to raise a child."
"Three men raised three children in Full House!"
"That's not the point, Blaine. The point is this isn't natural. Don't go around telling everyone that you're gay, either. This is just a… a phase, no need getting everyone's attention drawn to it…"
"But it's not, dad. Can you just accept that?"
"No! Now, we are done discussing this."
"Dad!"
"Enough, Blaine. Go upstairs. Now."
Blaine rushed up the stairs, burst into Cooper's room and dove onto his bed, burying his face into the blankets as Cooper got up and closed the door before coming back to sit beside his brother.
"How much did you hear?" Blaine asked, turning his head to face Cooper. Cooper rubbed his back soothingly, like he always did when Blaine was upset.
"Most of it…" Cooper said. Blaine turned his face back into the blankets and let out a frustrated sigh. He could see Blaine's body begin to shake with sobs, and Cooper let him cry. It wasn't often that Blaine cried. But when he did, you just let him. Cooper stroked his hair calmingly, playing with the curls as Blaine cried, half sentences coming out between his sobs about "disappointing his family", "being a screw up", and "hating himself". Once he was finished, Cooper pulled him into a hug and told him that even if Mom and Dad didn't believe it, he was the perfect son.
Blaine believed him, he felt safe in his brother's arms. He felt like no one could hurt him, he felt protected. He never wanted to lose that feeling.
3.
The next year Cooper had to leave for college. Fifteen year old Blaine took it hard. He no longer had his older brother just down the hall when he needed someone to talk to or confide in or to just help him. Things at school were getting worse and he had to take it all by himself, no Cooper there to help him through it.
"Just remember, B, prejudice is ignorance. Don't let them get to you too hard." Cooper had told him before he left, ruffling his hair and dropping a kiss on his forehead before he headed for his plane. Blaine tried to remember that, he had even written it down to put on his wall so he would always see it, but some days it just wasn't enough.
He had formed a new nasty habit, a habit he was ashamed of, but it helped him. It started when he found a razor blade in the bathroom after a particularly rough day at school. He picked it up, examining it closely as the day's taunts ran through his head, fresh tears forming in his eyes.
"Oh look he's crying, guys. Now he's going to go home and cut his wrists or something."
Blaine wiped as his eyes, looking at himself in the mirror. He hardly recognized this Blaine, this sad looking excuse for a teenage boy. His eyes were tired looking, he had a nasty bruise on his cheek from a lucky punch the other day, and he knew he had matching ones on his shoulders and back from daily locker checks. His hair was even more unruly than usual since he had basically given up on trying to take care of it. Blaine looked back at the blade and didn't even think twice before he brought it down to his other wrist, just a shallow cut, but it felt good. It felt like a nice release of all the stress, all the pain, all the misery that he had to endure on a daily basis. It sent a rush through him that made him forget about his parents, his bullies, his classmates, his teachers that completely ignored how he was treated. He knew he didn't really want to cut his wrists, that would be too obvious, and he didn't want his parents to find out. He noticed a hole in his pants, a decent sized gap on his thigh. No one would see his thighs in regular pants…
A month after he picked up this new habit, he had been caught. His mother found blood stains on a pair of his pants and had started questioning him. As soon as his parents found out they sent him to therapy. A woman named Theresa with graying hair that was always pulled back into a tight bun, pinstripe suits with black high heels, and thin-framed glasses that were always perched on the tip of her nose so when she tilted her head forward she was looking at him over the frames. He hated her. He hated seeing her. He hated telling her about the kids at school because he knew she didn't care. But he also hated that he broke in front of her, he hated that tears sprung up in his eyes as he recounted every memory from the age of ten to her, every instance of ridicule, every feeling of self-hatred, everything that had led him to cutting himself, everything that he needed to release with a blade.
He sat on that black leather couch for a couple hours, just talking, pouring with the truth, his whole story, tears running down his cheeks even as he wiped at them furiously and sniffled constantly. Theresa handed him tissue after tissue until she finally just gave him the entire box, which he almost used up completely. Then finally he was done, it was all out, Theresa knew it all and Blaine was out of words to say and tears to cry. His eyes were red and puffy and sore and he was tired. He just wanted to go home and lay in his bed and sleep for hours and days and months and years. Theresa patted his shoulder, ruffled his curls, and looked him in the eye.
"Things get better, Blaine. I promise. You'll see." She said in such a promising voice that Blaine wanted to believe her. She gave him a couple pamphlets that told him different ways to deal with what he was going through and promised to talk more next week, or sooner if need be.
4.
Another year and sixteen year old Blaine is laying in a hospital bed, keeping his eyes closed and his breathing as even as possible as he listens to his parents and doctor talk, trying to keep them from noticing that he was awake. He didn't want to deal with his parents at that point in time, he didn't want to talk to the doctor, he wasn't looking forward to seeing the therapist again. He had just gotten done with his weekly visits, officially "cured", she had said. But she was wrong. It wasn't his fault that she was no help to him, it wasn't his fault that his life freakin' sucked, it wasn't his fault that he was gay and that everyone hated him for it. He didn't ask for this, he didn't want this. All he wanted was Cooper. He wanted Cooper to be there and to hold him and to remind him that there's ONE person that actually does love him even though he's "sick" and "wrong" and "fucked up". After a few minutes, the murmured conversations washed away as he drifted back to sleep.
He woke up a little later to a soft voice by his ear and someone shaking his shoulder gently.
"Hey, B, wake up, would you?"
He blinked up at Cooper, his eyes full of concern, but couldn't help the smile that spread over his face at seeing his brother for the first time in so long. Cooper pulled a chair up next to his bed and looked at him in that overly-caring-brotherly way and takes his hand and sighs and says, "What happened this time, B? I thought you were getting so much better..."
And Blaine started crying again, completely broken and just not feeling like being strong anymore and he told Cooper everything that's happened at school. All the guys shoving him into lockers, cornering him outside and punching him until he's reduced to tears, kicking him until there's blood, and all the teachers turning a blind eye, not caring about the bruises or the dried blood as he exits the building. Blaine told him that mom and dad and Theresa all figured it was self-inflicted for the most part and he just didn't feel like telling them that they were wrong. He didn't want to bother Cooper while he was at college. And earlier that week, when he walked into the school and saw three letters across his locker, and his desk in almost every class, and taped to his back and arms and everywhere all throughout the day, he just couldn't take it. The anonymous phone call was the last straw; they had told him that he should kill himself, so he was going to do just that. He went to the bathroom, grabbed some pills, and did just that. He poured the remainder into his hand and swallowed them. If his mother hadn't have gotten off earlier and found him on the floor, shaking and pale, he probably would have succeeded this time.
Cooper took his brother's hand in his and squeezed it.
"I'm so glad you failed," he said. "I don't know what I'd do if you were gone, B. And I never want to find out. Don't do that again, you scared me so much."
Blaine sniffed, looking over at his brother and feeling bad, and he nodded. He promised he would never do that again, and if he ever wanted to, he'd get help.
5.
When Blaine met Kurt he thought he was done. He thought he was actually "cured". He could put the razors away for good, in the back of his desk drawer, and not feel the need to use them again. He was happy, he was in love. He had called Cooper on multiple occasions to tell him about this guy that he met, this amazing, beautiful, talented boy with the voice like a choir of angels that was just magnificent and awesome. He called him to tell him that he had kissed him, that he now had a boyfriend. That he was in love with him. That he wanted to marry him someday, and he was completely and hopelessly in love.
Then the stuff with Dave happened.
Blaine and Dave had gotten off on the wrong foot, Blaine thought Dave was a lost cause; Blaine hated Dave completely for what he did to Kurt. When he got the news about Dave trying to commit suicide he felt sick to his stomach for ever thinking those things. He hated himself because he shouldn't have thought of him that way, he should have been with Kurt and they could have helped Dave through this.
That, plus the fact that Blaine was still trying to adjust to a new school, caused a lot of stress on him. He had trouble with Finn, and Sam, and even Puck one day. He had been shoved into lockers already, and he knew that once Kurt was gone next year it would only get worse. If he were being honest, he was completely terrified. He missed Dalton; he missed the safety of the navy blue blazer, the feeling of finally fitting in that he had there. But after Sebastian through a slushie-laced-with-rock-salt at him, he figured that not even the Warblers would want him back.
Blaine was slowly descending back into that place, that place inside of him that itched for the cold metal digging into his skin, the feeling of release as the blade dragged across his thighs. He tried to resist, but the more he resisted the stronger the urges got. Finally, he snapped.
It was just a normal Friday afternoon for Blaine and Kurt, they were on the couch in the empty Anderson household, Kurt laying against Blaine's chest between his legs and Blaine's arms looped around his boyfriend. He pressed soft kisses into Kurt's hair, taking deep breaths and just letting himself relish his scent. Then Kurt brought up The Subject. The Subject that made Blaine's fingers itch to grab that box of blades in his drawer, that made his skin tingle with the need to drag sharp metal over flesh. He couldn't blame Kurt for it; Kurt had no idea that he had ever done anything like that. The scars on his legs were mostly gone, unnoticeable unless you were looking. Blaine knew that Kurt just needed to talk about Dave, because he blamed himself for Dave trying to kill himself, and he just wanted Blaine to hold him and reassure him, but Blaine couldn't. Not that day.
But then he just snapped. He pushed Kurt off of him a little too roughly, leaving him lying on the couch gaping up at him and asking what he had done, but Blaine ignored him and ran upstairs, glad that his parents weren't home. He rushed into his room, aware of Kurt's footsteps behind him, following him and asking every so often what was going on but getting no answer. Blaine opened the top drawer on his desk, nearly ripping it out of the frame and reached to the back, pulling out the small black box, flipping it open and pulling out one of the small metal blades.
Kurt's eyes widened as he watched Blaine's hand, shaking, going toward his own wrist. He stretched out a hand, grabbing Blaine's and yelling, "BLAINE, STOP IT." Blaine stopped. He looked up at Kurt, surprised. Kurt never yelled at him, Kurt never even raised his voice at him. Kurt had never used that tone with him, and it scared him, and he knew he had upset Kurt and it just made him want to cut more because he hated the idea of disappointing Kurt. But he didn't. He just fell to the ground, tears slipping down his face, the blade falling from his grasp, and Kurt's arms encircling him almost instantly as he sobbed and told Kurt everything about his past, everything he had been feeling lately, just EVERYTHING. And Kurt just held him, leaving soft kisses on his head, his temple, his forehead, his cheek. Just listened to him, tears falling steadily but quietly, as he listened to his boyfriend, broken like he'd never seen him, recollect every terrible moment from his past.
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