Ooookay! So we're back to the normal updates, and this one was prompted by fostinefoli who asked for the break up (not the one in canon) from Finn and Cooper's POV. I did my best, and there should be more updates soon so keep prompting, I have them all on a to do list. (Seasonal ones like Christmas and Halloween will be done around the times of year. Reading about Christmas presents in January makes me long for a time machine)

As always, review and prompt and I'll do my best. Thank you for being so patient with me!


Carole leaned forwards and made grabby-hands at the box. "Let me choose one?" she asked, smiling excitedly as she rifled through the pictures emerging with a picture of them in the Hummel's backyard in Lima.

"I remember taking that," Burt said quietly, glancing down at a sleeping Chloe in his lap.

"That was just after we got back together, wasn't it?" Kurt asked, glancing at Blaine, who nodded sombrely.

"Oh man, don't even talk about that break up, it was the most horrible two weeks of my life!" Finn exclaimed, grimacing at what was clearly an unpleasant memory.

Kurt frowned and glared at his brother. "Well it wasn't the easiest two weeks I've ever experienced either, Finn, but we're sorry for causing such pain for you!" he exclaimed, still stinging from the thought of one of the most unpleasant periods of his life, no matter how short it was. Blaine shushed his husband and gestured to their sleeping daughter who was stirring in her Grandpa's lap.

"I'm pretty sure all of us felt the effects of that break up," Jean said sadly, "You boys just didn't know what to do with yourselves, did you?" Kurt and Blaine shared a sad little smile and shook their heads.

"And that meant that the rest of us had to put up with you," Cooper teased, sharing a long-suffering look with Finn, who nodded.

"Dudes, it really was horrible," Finn reiterated adamantly.

Finn had been in the middle of the most awesome round of his game, on his headset with Puck when his cell phone rang next to him on his bed. He frowned when he saw it was Kurt and pressed pause on his game, saying a quick apology to Puck and pulling off the headset.

Usually Finn wouldn't have answered it; he'd been working his ass off at college and had finally finished his latest assignment, the one his tutor had been making him redo because he just couldn't get the marks he needed. But he'd gotten them, achieved an A and after a quick victory dance in the privacy of his bedroom he had dived right back into his video games, making the most of the respite from constant piles of work.

Finn answered it, immediately worried that it was something awful if Kurt was calling him about it. Why wasn't he speaking to Burt? Or Blaine? Surely those were the first choices?

"Kurt? You okay?" Finn asked nervously, immediately getting butterflies when he heard Kurt's sniffle from the other end of the line. He was no good with feelings, especially Kurt's feelings. Why the hell hadn't he called Burt? Then Burt could have passed him over to his mom and she could handle a crying Kurt much better than Finn could.

"No," came the muffled response from the other end of the phone. "Finn..." another sniffle, "oh god, you don't want to hear this, you probably have work to do, or friends to see. Forget it, I'll call Carole later," Kurt said sadly, the shakiness in his voice apparent no matter how much he tried to hide it.

Finn panicked, "No! No, no, Kurt! I care, I want to listen! I've finished my work and Mom isn't finishing work until late. What happened? Is Blaine okay?" he asked, wondering what the hell could have gotten his brother so worked up that he couldn't even talk to his boyfriend.

Finn's question, however, just made Kurt's sob's appear more openly.

"Dude! What happened?" Finn practically shouted down the phone, his mind flicking to every worst case scenario. It took at least several minutes for Kurt to finally calm down before he managed to get out the words that started the most annoying fortnight of Finn's life.

"I broke up with Blaine," Kurt hiccuped, and the sound of rustling tissues could be heard over the phone. Finn was silent for a moment. Blaine must have really screwed things up to make Kurt end it between them; but then again, things had been getting tense the last few times Kurt had visited Ohio.

"Why?" was the answer Finn thought safest. No blame on either of them, yeah, Finn said to himself, good move.

Kurt sniffled some more and Finn could hear him steadying his breaths before he spoke. "I just couldn't do it anymore Finn!" he cried, his voice wobbling again and Finn winced at how sore his throat sounded. How long had he been crying? "The distance, and Blaine wasn't going out with his friends because he was waiting for a call from me, and I missed him so much and I thought breaking up would fix that and I just miss him more now and I don't know what to do!"

Finn sighed. This was so far out of his league it was untrue. "Dude, isn't it better to talk to Rachel about this? Like, it's great that you called and everything, but I'm not good at this stuff. Or I could get Mom to call you when she gets back?" He waited nervously for his brother's reply, and felt awful when a defeated voice from New York whimpered, "Okay, yeah. I'm sorry Finn. You have your own problems. Go, do some work, learn how to teach. Call me when Carole's home."

That phone call was the start of the tensest two weeks for everyone involved. Kurt constantly clung to Rachel and phoned home each night looking for comfort, which quickly resulted in tears. Blaine sat downstairs with his parents more, not wanting to socialize with anybody else; while at first the Andersons saw this as a welcome change, it soon lost its charm when their son would burst into tears at random moments. As for Cooper, well, in his opinion he was hit the hardest. Blaine would call him in the early hours of the morning when he couldn't sleep, always forgetting the time difference between the two states.

Two weeks later, when Kurt came home for Thanksgiving and announced that he was inviting Blaine over, Finn actually breathed a literal sigh of relief, before disappearing into his bedroom to avoid any fireworks that could come with Blaine's arrival.

Carole remembered the awkward few minutes when Blaine had stepped into the hallway and glanced around nervously before Kurt took him into the backyard. They were out there for at least an hour, long enough for Carole to finish marinating the turkey and chopping all of the vegetables for the dinner that night. She remembered the pleasant surprise when Burt had entered the kitchen, camera in hand, and pointed mutely to the boys outside. Carole had turned to see them pulling out of a chaste kiss, holding each other tight and leaning their foreheads together. The room flashed and Carole startled, glaring at her husband and quietly lecturing him about his son's personal space (why her rant was in hushed tones she never quite worked out. She had always assumed it was a result of the tenderness of the moment permeating the rest of the house), but Kurt and Blaine out in the garden were focused only on each other.

Blaine's phone call to Cooper that night was at a decent time, half past nine, and he spent two hours gushing to his brother everything that had happened that day with Kurt.

"...and then he said that he'd always love me no matter what the distance. Isn't that lovely, Coop?" Blaine sighed. "I guess it's just a relief to know that we tried broken up and it just didn't work for us. Both of us know now that this is it for us, we don't want anyone else-"

"I don't think that two weeks of crying is really a definite experiment, Squirt, but..."

"Exactly! We were so upset, it only makes sense that we were doing the wrong thing by splitting up!" Blaine exclaimed, oblivious to his brother's realism. Who needed common sense when you were floating on a cloud of euphoria?

"Are you happy for us, Coop?" Blaine asked, slightly nervous. For as much as he and Cooper had their differences, Blaine would always look up to his brother.

There was a pause on Cooper's end of the line before he said honestly, "I'm really happy for you, Blaine. And relieved." Blaine chuckled as his phone buzzed to indicate a message.

"Coop, I have to go, I have a text and it might be Kurt. I'll see you soon, happy thanksgiving!" he called as he hung up, diving into his bed to start a late night texting session with his boyfriend. His boyfriend who he would be living with pretty soon. In New York. With just Kurt. Blaine couldn't wait.

"I honestly don't know how you could have called that a trial period and still managed to make it to where you are today," Cooper said incredulously. "I mean, have you never been curious about other guys?"

Kurt and Blaine blushed, prompting Andrea to nudge Cooper with her toe and confirming his suspicions. There was an embarrassing story to be had there.

"Well, we had a mature conversation about that just after Blaine's first semester at college and we worked out a way for our relationship to work for us. It was simple really, we just made sure we focused on communication and understanding each other," Kurt explained, smiling gently at Blaine, who was still slightly pink.

"Well I suppose the important thing is that you made it work and that you're happy now," Jean said, looking proudly at her son. Blaine nodded and sat up resolutely.

"Moving on!" he said, digging through the box and pulling one out, showing it to Kurt with a confused look on his face. "Where did that come from?" he asked.

"Oh, Nick gave it to me. Trent took it after our first regionals together," Kurt smiled fondly at the memory.