Kurt rubs the tips of his fingers over his face, relishing in the warmth of the water as is slipped over his skin.
He swears that the shower is the only place that he felt entirely comfortable.
When he felt completely and totally alone, without distraction, without –
"Sam? Seriously, Kurt?"
Kurt had to grab the safety bar to keep from falling. "Jesus Christ!"
"He's human, you know." Blaine's shoulder blades were pressed against the glass of the shower, back turned to the naked Kurt still standing in the hot spray.
"Didn't I tell you to go away?"
Blaine tilts his head, just a little, to peek into the shower. Kurt turns away. "Did you? I guess I forgot."
"Well, let me remind you. Get. The. Fuck. Out."
"I can't."
"Why?"
"You need me."
"News flash, Blaine: I don't love you anymore."
"Really? Is that true?" He turns and presses his palms to the steamy glass, hazel eyes boring into the back of Kurt's soaked head. "Kurt, look me in the eyes and tell me that you don't love me."
Kurt presses his forehead into the tiled wall. It's cool against his skin.
His mouth stays firmly closed.
He hates himself for it.
The door of the shower slides open and a pair of lips press into the top of his spine.
"This isn't about love anyway, Kurt." He can feel Blaine's lips moving against his skin as he speaks. "This is about survival. You need me. I've given you time to come to terms with this. Now you figure out the rest of your time."
Kurt's elbow jabs backward; it hits Blaine hard in the ribs. There's a crack.
The short man doesn't even cry out. He just winces and backs away, taking careful steps out of the shower.
A towel is tossed onto Kurt's naked shoulder.
"You need to stop being so angry, Kurt. You need to at least listen to me. Your life might depend on it."
When Kurt stalks into the kitchen, one hand raking through his hair and the other skillfully buttoning his skinny jeans, he stops short.
Because Finn's standing, tall and dangerous, against the fridge, brown eyes locked ruthlessly onto Blaine's wary face.
"Finn." Kurt breathes, marine eyes widening between the two. "I didn't expect you today. Or any day, actually. How did you find my apartment?"
"I ran into Sam at the grocery store." Finn replies evenly, folding his arms across his impressive chest. Kurt wonders if he knew exactly how quickly Blaine could tear of his head off. "I thought you said this douche bag had the sense to leave you alone."
Blaine throws up his hands in exasperation. "You got Finn angry with me too?"
"Of course I'm mad at you, you huge prick! You killed my brother!"
"Only technically! He's still moving, isn't he?"
Finn starts forward, but Kurt's between them before the tall man even registers it, pushing him back with a force that Finn had no idea Kurt was capable of.
"Finn, now isn't a good time."
Finn let out a low rumble. "You have to be fucking kidding me."
"I need him." Kurt's voice drops to a whisper, even though Blaine would be able to hear him from across the city. Finn looks down and starts to shake his head. "No, Finn. I really need him."
"Fine." He stops struggling; Kurt removes his hands from the front of his chest. "But I'm not leaving."
Kurt decides that now would not be a good time to mention that Finn really wouldn't be able to help him at all when it came to Blaine, so he gives an agreeable nod. "Let's just…Let's sit down in the living room, okay?"
Kurt makes Finn go first; he shoves him toward the leather couch and forces him down onto a cushion. Blaine is ushered stiffly to the egg chair. Kurt takes a seat beside his brother, between the two men that were regarding each other with indignant, annoyed looks.
"What's this about, Blaine?"
The ex-Warbler looks down at his hands. "I owe you an apology. I understand that it might take years for you to forgive me…Maybe you never will. But I'm telling you now that I've never been sorrier about anything in my whole existence."
"Not accepted. Moving on."
"Have you talked to someone like us?"
Kurt's taken aback by the question; he cocks an eyebrow. "There are others?"
"Yeah. A lot." Blaine laughs lightly, shaking his head. "I knew you needed me."
"He needed you that night that you turned him, Anderson." Finn growls, shifting his weight around on the couch. "He needed you when he was puking blood and craving blood and screaming in pain. Do you understand that, you unforgivable bitch?"
Blaine looks down at his loafers. Kurt touches Finn's arm; he finds that his brother is shaking in rage. He takes Finn's hand and clasps it hard in both of his own.
"I know. But can you both tell me honestly that you would have even let me through the front door after that?"
They exchange a look that clearly states no, probably not and Blaine nods his head knowingly.
"Kurt, I'm here to help you. To answer your questions – don't look at me like that, I know you've had some – and facilitate your future."
Kurt shakes his head and his eyes find the window. "You're here to redeem yourself."
"Yes." Blaine admits. "But I'm also here to help you, Kurt."
"Are you sure you're going to be okay?" Finn whispers lightly, throwing his scarf around his neck. Kurt smiles and offers the taller man his heavy winter jacket.
"I'll be fine, Finn. I'll call you, okay?"
"Okay." He reaches for the doorknob, hesitates, and then looks back, meeting Blaine's eyes. "If you hurt him, douche bag, I swear, I'll drive a fucking stake through your balls."
Blaine gives a type of cynical solute. "Noted."
"Bye, Finn."
When the door closes behind him, Kurt turns to the fridge.
"He hasn't changed at all." Blaine says sourly, leaning against the kitchen table.
"Only on the outside."
"Actually, he looks bigger on the outside." Kurt snorts and throws a bag of blood onto the counter. Blaine regards it with a wrinkled nose. "Don't you have a glass or something?"
"Don't you usually suck it out of a person's neck or something?"
"Touché."
Kurt gives a sarcastic bow that makes Blaine's full lips pull up into a smile. Grudgingly, though, he throws an arm into a cabinet and retrieves two shot glasses that Finn had purchased for him one Christmas. Blaine takes one with a soft thank you and carefully punctures the bag; Kurt rips it open with his teeth and pours messily.
When Blaine is silent, Kurt gives a little wave of his hand and says, "Go ahead, bestow your incredible wisdom on me, oh wise one."
"Not to pry or anything, but how long has it been since you've had sex?"
Kurt chokes on the blood pouring down his throat; he has to pound himself with the heel of his hand a few times before he can respond. "Excuse me?"
"Sex, Kurt. You know…" Blaine makes a few crude gyrating motions with his hips, "…that."
"I don't see how that's any of your business."
"We get irritable if we don't have sex, you know."
"So?"
"There's also snappy and unreasonable." He gestures to Kurt's hand, which had somehow found its way onto his hip, which was popped dramatically.
"Fine! I get it! I'm sassy." Kurt sighs, exasperated. Blaine's lips slip into a smug smile. "It's been awhile."
"Naw, really?" Kurt shoots him a dirty look that the ex-Warbler returns with the shrug of one broad shoulder. "Anyway, fix that. I would offer to help, but I have a feeling that you'd rather walk through fire than come within five feet of me, so…"
There's a pang of guilt in Kurt's chest when he sees Blaine's down cast eyes; he takes another sip from his glass and clears his throat.
"I was never scared of you, you know." He says quietly. Blaine's hazel eyes flick back up to his face. "I went back to your house. After everything happened."
The silence is stifling. Blaine's bambi eyes are so intense that Kurt has to look away.
"But you weren't there."
"I had to leave." The reply comes before Kurt can even get the last sentence all the way out of his mouth. "I didn't…I honestly wasn't trying to ruin your life, Kurt. I wasn't trying to hurt you. I just knew that we were supposed to be together. Forever."
He laughs.
"Damn, that's so corny. But I really – "
There's a sharp knock on Kurt's front door that resonates through the entire apartment. Blaine furrows his brow, a question playing in his eyes, but Kurt doesn't have time answer it.
He also doesn't have time to answer his own door; the lock clicks and it's opening, slowly.
"Kurt, I know I'm back early, but I figured you wouldn't mind since you really don't have anyone else to…"
And there's Sam, arms laden with four bottles of wine and a bag of miscellaneous groceries, the cooler hanging off one obviously strained wrist.
There's Sam, eyebrows raised in confusion at the curly haired man that was standing in Kurt's kitchen, still sipping nonchalantly at his shot glass of human blood.
Kurt steps in front of Sam's line of vision and sighs. "This isn't a good time, Sam."
"Apparently not." He moves his head to the left, just a little, so he still has one eye locked carefully on the grinning vampire.
Kurt places one hand carefully on his bicep and starts to tell him to please, come back later when Blaine raises his glass and says, "Invite him in, Kurtie. This will be the most exciting conversation I've had since I talked Wes out of those jeggings."
"I'm sorry, Blaine, I thought you were supposed to be rotting in hell or something. When did they let you out of there?" Sam pulls away from Kurt's grip and carefully sets his armfuls on the counter. Blaine grins.
"I made bail."
"And you decided to come here because…?"
"I came back for Kurt, of course. What type of man wouldn't come back for his soul mate?"
"Blaine." Kurt's voice was sharp; on the counter, Sam's fingers curled into fists. "Stop. Sam, you really have to leave. I'm sorry, but this is important."
Sam looks down at him, taking in his panicked features, and realizes very slowly that Kurt was honestly concerned with his safety. He forgets, then, that Blaine is standing a mere ten feet away; he reaches up and brushes his fingers over Kurt's sharp jaw, pushing an askew hair from the countertenor's face.
There's a cough.
Kurt pulls away.
"You know what, Sam, I'll walk you to the door myself." Blaine drops his empty glass onto the counter. Kurt starts to protests, but Sam nods.
Being in close proximity to Blaine was like being in close proximity to a ticking bomb: Sam can feel the anger bubbling under the vampire's cool surface, and all the blonde really wants to do is run away.
He doesn't.
Instead, he grabs the front of Blaine's designer shirt, holds it tight, and has enough courage to murmur, "I can't stop you from hurting him, Anderson, but I swear I'll kill you if you do."
Blaine regards him with a thin smile and starts to peel away his fingers, one by one. "You know, I've lived for over three centuries. I've lived in every country you can name off the top of your head and I've seen all seven natural and unnatural Wonders of the World. I've seen love and hate and good and bad and the tiny gray areas that people overlook. I've been sickeningly rich and I've had everything I'd ever need at my disposal. I've seen things that you can only imagine, Sam, and I still love him more than anything in this entire world. Understand that."
Thickening drama and action next chapter!
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