Disclaimer: You guessed it. I'm not Ryan Murphy or Fox. So I don't own Glee. If I did, it would be Klaine. Klaine duets. Klaine kisses. And Klaine sex. The end.
Warnings: Major character death, Angst, feels, and dead people walking but in a not-scary-at-all-way-because-I'm-a-super-chicken
A/N: GUYS. The reviews and story alerts…I can't even tell you how nice it is to come home to them. It warms my heart that this shy, quiet, and decidedly nerdy girl has people who actually want to hear what I have to say. **read what I write? Shrugggg** You have no idea! To answer many a question, we will find out how Blaine dies….eventually. Even dead people go on paths of self-discovery (or Blaine does. Because this is fanfic.) Anyways, now that I've spoken too much…ON TO THE STORY! :D
Blaine stared at the woman who was so like Kurt, and wondered. Kurt had only been eight when she passed away. But the way she carried herself, that little quirk of her mouth, the wide eyes full of love, kindness, and a terrible sadness ill-befitting someone as beautiful as her…It was all Kurt.
How many times could one heart break before one was driven mad by it, wondered Blaine.
"Hello, Blaine. I wish I could say it was nice to meet you, but frankly, under the circumstances, I rather would have preferred that we stayed strangers until about ninety years from now." Blaine was rooted to the spot. The woman's tone was unbelievably and completely Kurt's. Everything in his life had come down to Kurt. It now appeared that everything would come down to him in death as well.
"Mrs. Hummel…Have you any idea…" Blaine trailed off, unsure how to ask such a seemingly personal question.
"The amount of similarities that my son and I share?" She asked, eyes alighting with that teasing air that Kurt used on him every day. Blaine just nodded. She laughed, a laugh that Blaine felt in his bones. It wasn't happy. It was something more akin to depression and acceptance, all mixed together in a ridiculous combination.
"I have watched him grow more and more like me through the years that I haven't been able to be an active participant in raising him, yes. I never realized how like me he is until Burt realizes. People are unaware of the way they hold their bodies, the way they react to stress, that sort of thing. Burt knows those things about me. He spent years learning them. And every time something hits him, like the way Kurt's eyes go wide and his lips turn down in a semi-frown when he's surprised, I feel it." Blaine listened to her voice, losing himself in the far-off, dreamlike quality it had.
The two of them stood, side by side, staring up at the house. Blaine felt neither desperate to go inside to see Kurt nor a desire to stay here with his mother. He just felt. It was a rather strange and unwelcome thing. He always knew he wanted to do something. This unsureness was mostly foreign. Granted, he had his moments, but he always came to himself eventually. But he had no desire to. This being dead thing was really throwing him for a loop.
"What can we do?" Blaine asked, helplessness flooding him, making him take on a sort of apathy that he wasn't fond of.
"Be here," she said, taking Blaine's hand and lacing their fingers together. Her hands were cool and smooth, relaxing him instantly. Just like her son.
"How?" He questioned, even now feeling Kurt's despair in every breath, in every heartbeat. He wanted, needed to know how to stop him from feeling this way. Kurt was his eternal bright spot, and no bright spot had any business feeling this way. Blaine was determined to fix it.
"Like you did at the funeral. Hold him. But not too often." Blaine was taken aback.
"Why can't I hold him all the time?" Blaine demanded, hoping he didn't sound too much like an insolent child.
"Kurt is still human, darling. If you go round, constantly attached to him, you're depriving him of feeling the way he should feel. He still needs to grow, Blaine. People grow from their experiences." Blaine mulled it over for a moment.
"I don't want him to forget about me," Blaine admitted, in a voice so small and frightened that he was surprised. But it didn't make it any less true.
"Oh, Blaine," Mrs. Hummel said, releasing his hand and pulling him into her arms instead, holding him tightly. "The way you and Kurt love…It is permanent. It is a love with such permanence that it isn't something that just stops. It's the kind of love that changes you fundamentally at your core. The way the two of you share love is quite the rare thing. You shared so much of yourselves that it won't ever be clear where one of you ends and the other begins. Kurt won't forget about you, Blaine. He can't." Blaine was clinging to her, holding her perhaps too tightly, but he didn't care. He felt wetness in his eyes, surprised that he could still cry.
"But…What if he wants to?" Blaine asked, confiding his deepest of all fear into this woman that he both didn't know, and somehow knew very well.
"There will come a time when he will beg of a god that he doesn't trust or believe in to reverse time, perhaps. To back before he knew you, maybe. That will be out of the pain he is going to endure. It will never be true. But fear not. For one to truly feel the wonder and purity of love, one must know pain in equal measure. Or that is my understanding. And Kurt will never want to unknow you, Blaine. When you came into his life, you brought the belief, the knowledge that he mattered. You swept in and gave him your heart and showed him that not all fairy tales have to be make-believe." Blaine let go of her then, suddenly full of desire to be next to Kurt.
"Can we?" He asked, not needing to finish the sentence. She seemed to read him just as Kurt did. She smiled at him, taking his hand once more. They were suddenly in the living room of the Hudson-Hummel home, and Blaine was nearly knocked off balance by the sheer weight of pure grief that seemed to thicken the very air they were breathing.
Burt and Carole were on the couch; Carole snuggled under Burt's arm. The television was off, silence hanging like a forgotten promise, like words left unsaid. Blaine's eyes were wet once again.
"How do I fix it?" Burt asked, broken. "He was happy for the first time, Carole. Really happy. And now…" Burt trailed off, tears rolling down his cheeks, overwhelmed by the heartbreak of his son.
"We've all three lost people, Burt. It isn't fair." Carole said thickly. There was a slight disturbance in the air, and Blaine looked up as he saw who could only be Finn's father, appearing right behind Carole, just looking on sadly. He said nothing. He nodded in their direction before leaning against the wall across the room, just closing his eyes.
"Is this how it works, then?" Blaine asked. "Anytime they hurt…we hurt?"
"Yes." Carole and Finn's father said together. They shared a look of grim understanding.
"What is it like…" Blaine trailed off, absolutely sure he was about to ask the hardest question he would ever ask of anyone in all his existence. "To watch them love someone else?"
Mrs. Hummel moved to Burt, almost unaware that she was doing so. When she was within arms reach of him, she stopped to face Blaine.
"It will the best, and most difficult thing you can imagine." She said. Well, that certainly cleared that up.
"What do you mean? And is it worse than I feel right now? How do I prepare myself for it?" Blaine demanded. He wanted to be ready for the day.
"That's still a long way off, darling." She said. Then, Finn's father spoke.
"Kurt needs you. Go to him." Blaine didn't need telling twice. He suddenly found himself in Kurt's room. He just looked for a moment, unsure of what seemed so different about the room. Nothing had changed. Nothing was out of place. Then, he saw Kurt sitting on the floor by his closet, and Blaine knew.
Nothing was different about the room except its occupant. Kurt, usually this never ending ray of witty, sarcastic, and beautiful light, was so drenched in such despair that Blaine was sure it was never going to end. Kurt had always been Blaine's star. More than that, he was Blaine's sun.
But looking on him now, hair disheveled, eyes swollen, wearing Blaine's Dalton hoodie and a pair of his ragged flannel pajama pants, Blaine knew that his sun had exploded. Sitting there with his arms around his knees, Kurt held all of terrible beauty of a dying star.
Blaine sat so near to him that he could touch him if he shifted. But he felt like this was a place that Kurt needed to feel on his own. Blaine wanted to reach out and feel the smoothness of his skin, to comfort, to cradle, to fix. Kurt wiped his eyes on his sleeve, and Blaine realized with a jolt that it must still smell like his cologne.
Kurt stood, moving with all the grace of a trained dancer to his bookshelf. Blaine stood and moved with him, unable to be more than a hair's bredth away from him.
Kurt reached out and gingerly touched the frame that held their prom picture, just with his fingertips. As his face crumpled, he grabbed the frame and threw it with all his might against the opposite wall. Kurt began pulling things off of his shelf, letting them all fall to the floor with an almighty crash. Within moments, Finn was pulling the door open. As he took in Kurt, destroying his possessions, Blaine moved to give him room.
Finn came purposely forward and moved behind Kurt, pulling his back against his much bigger chest, pinning his arms to his sides. Kurt struggled for a moment, thrashing and kicking his feet as his anguished sobs tore at the air, destroying what was left of Blaine's heart.
As Kurt's anger faded back into helplessness, he turned in Finn's arms, and Finn just held him. He said nothing, perhaps realizing that there was nothing he could say. If he said that it would be okay, it was a lie. How did he know? He didn't. If he said he was here for him, it wouldn't be enough. He would never be Blaine. If he told him they were all thinking about him, what did it matter? He would only want Blaine back, and none of them could do that for him, no matter how much they all wanted to. When Kurt's very loud sobs had faded into quiet sniffles and the occasional heartbreaking wail or hiccup, Finn carried him over to edge of his bed and sat down, Kurt in his lap, clinging to Finn for all he was worth.
"Rachel wanted to know if you were up for visitors. Everyone from glee wants to see you. The Warblers, too." Finn said, gently rocking Kurt. Blaine had never felt so useless in his life. He had to admit, though, Finn was doing well.
Kurt seemed to weigh the options for moment.
"I'm not…" Hiccup. "Ready f-for the W-Warblers." Hiccup, sniffle. "G-Glee c-can, though." Sniffle.
Finn sat Kurt down and moved to the edge of his bed and left, presumably to text the glee club to get themselves here. Kurt always retreated in on himself when he was sad. He didn't like to be around others. That he wanted company spoke volumes to Blaine. He was afraid to be alone.
Kurt fell back onto his pillows, spent. He turned his face over into them, drying his tears while simultaneously inhaling their comforting scent. A light knock on the door broke his reverie.
"Come in," Kurt croaked, voice raw.
"Hey, Kurt," Rachel said, leading the way in, followed by the rest of New Directions, all in varying degrees of depression.
"Rachel," Kurt said, voice high, thin and reedy, reaching out to her. She immediately climbed up the bed into Kurt's arms, and they just held each other. Artie and Sam hovered by the door, unsure of what t say, or do. Mercedes, Quinn, and Tina followed Rachel's lead and climbed up on the bed, each comfortingly rubbing Kurt's shoulder, arms, knee. Brittany and Santana stood by the window, hands interlocked, both staring at the floor. Neither knew what exactly to say. They both wondered what right they had to be happy when Kurt was miserable.
Puck and Mike saw the damage that Kurt had inflicted on his belongings. The two silently moved around the room, putting things on shelves, sure they were all in the wrong places. When Mike found the bent picture frame with glass shattered, he held it out wordlessly to Puck. Puck took it and looked down at it, his eyes filling with angry tears as he pocketed the photo.
"Kurt?" Puck asked, and Kurt looked up, never letting go of Rachel. "I just…I…" He wasn't sure what he was trying to say, or how it would help, but he had to say something. "This isn't okay. Its not fair." As a tear finally made its way down Puck's cheek, the atmosphere shifted in the room. Puck had cried, sure. But never in front of Glee. Kurt simply looked on in shock along with everyone else. As Quinn moved to hug Puck, he bolted out of the room. No one followed.
"What can we do, Kurt?" Rachel begged. "How do we help?" Blaine was hanging on her every word. He had been asking himself this question for what felt like six million hours, and he was desperate to hear the answer.
"No one…No one ever told me it would be this hard. Why didn't anyone warn me that it would be like this?" Kurt asked no one in particular. "It was hard, when mom died. Even harder when I thought…my dad…But this?" No one seemed to be breathing.
"I knew I was leaving for New York, that Blaine was going to be hundreds of miles away, not able to hold me, or comfort me. But…dead." Everyone had moved to the bed now, all of them needing the support of their family for the pain of the loss of one of their own. Everyone was huddled close, each needing to try and lessen Kurt's loneliness.
"Why didn't anyone tell me it was this hard?" Kurt said, head falling over onto Rachel's shoulder. She quietly rocked him. Everyone was crying now.
Blaine was horrified. This was the worst thing ever. There was not a thing that he could do for these people who had quickly become the support system he'd never had. They were all hurting so much, and yet it still didn't touch how Kurt was feeling. Empty wasn't right. Hurt felt woefully small and not even close to being able to describe it. Lost was closer. Lost was it. He was drifting on a sea of despair so complete that it rendered him speechless, and he couldn't even find it within himself to care.
"I'm so sorry," Santana said, voice thick, without a hint of the sarcasm she always had right under the surface.
"I just want him here," Kurt said through his tears.
"I'm here, baby, I'm here! I swear, I'm never going to leave you. Please, hear me. Please, feel it. I love you so much, please!" Blaine sat at the foot of the bed, rocking himself. He cried at the top of his voice, not caring who heard him.
Then, he remembered no one could hear him. So he cried louder.
A/N: Sometimes, I hate myself. Other times, I write shit that literally has me sobbing into my pillow at 3:48 am. Let me know what you think?
Also, much thanks to Casey for her shameless plug. Let's hope she holds true to her words and FREAKING UPDATES HER FIC BECAUSE REALLY. I love her freaking fic. I also love you guys and your reviews, and truly appreciate that you are reading this. It means the world to me.
-Lainey
