Title: A Family By Any Other Name
Author: an-alternate-world
Rating: M
Characters/Pairings: Kurt/Blaine
Word count: 6,268
Summary: Kurt hadn't known what to expect from his first year at college. He thought it would be difficult with the workload and being apart from Blaine, but he tried not to have too many expectations. Even if he had, he couldn't have envisioned it like this..
Warnings/Spoilers: No spoilers because the story builds on the prequel, A Sibling By Any Other Name. If you haven't read that, you'll definitely want to because this probably won't make a heck of a lot of sense. As for warnings, ANGST ANGST ANGST.
Disclaimer: I am in no way associated with Glee, FOX, Ryan Murphy or anything else related to the Glee universe.


General warning: Prepare thy tissue box.


"Kurt, we gotta go," Finn said, dashing over to haul Kurt to his feet and offering his hand to Blaine to pull him up.

"Why? What's going on?"

"It's Burt," Finn said shortly.

Kurt felt his heart seize in his chest as Blaine and Rachel bundled him into the car, shoes haphazardly thrown on as Finn climbed into the driver's seat and started the car.

"How do you know?" Blaine broached quietly, his hand being squeezed so tightly by Kurt's he feared for his circulation.

Stifling her cries, Rachel handed Finn's phone to them in the backseat. Kurt found the message and wondered if this was what it was like to have the world fall out from beneath you.


Finn had barely slowed the car down before Kurt was ripping himself from Blaine's arms and sprinting towards the emergency entrance. Everything felt loud and too clear, and yet fuzzy and surreal at the same time.

"My dad! Where's my dad?" he yelled at the startled receptionist.

"Kurt-"

"Burt Hummel, where is he?" he demanded again, tears streaking down his face.

"Kurt honey, how about we go sit down?" Carole said, looping her arms around his shoulders and steering him away.

"What's going on?" he sobbed, clinging to her blouse. "It's Christmas, Carole. Christmas. He can't- He-"

She cuddled him into her arms, rocking him back and forth as Finn, Rachel and Blaine ran in looking scared and frantic. She waved them over and Finn's hand tangled with Rachel's while Rachel fumbled for Blaine's.

"Carole, p-please," Kurt begged, his eyes already swollen. "He's going to be okay, right? He's- He's-"

She bit her lip and wiped the tears off his cheeks. "It wasn't a heart attack, Kurt," she said, and he stilled with shock. "It…it was a stroke, honey."

"A…no. No," he whimpered, shaking his head. "No, it's always been his heart! His heart was-"

"It was a possible complication from the medication they put him on after his palpitations at Thanksgiving," she explained, staring him full in the eye. "They said it was a small chance but your family seems to be cursed with getting the bad luck."

"But he's going to be okay, right?"

She looked up at Finn, her face drawn and sad. "It's not looking good."

Kurt erupted into loud sobs and Blaine hurriedly brushed his own tears away to pull Kurt into his lap. Finn moved to embrace his mother while Rachel crouched in front of Kurt and Blaine, rubbing his knee and feeling completely useless.

Hours passed and felt like years. Every time a doctor or nurse appeared at the secured doors, Carole and Kurt looked up hopefully, before someone else was ushered in to be checked over or see a family member. Rachel's phone chimed repeatedly with texts from the New Directions party asking what had happened, then what was going on, then for updates.

It was one thirty in the morning, Christmas Day, when a doctor finally called for Burt's family. It seemed ridiculous to Blaine seeing as the waiting room was empty and they had been there at least four hours, but he stood with his arm firmly around Kurt's waist, swallowing down his own emotions to be there for Kurt.

The doctor approached them, his bandana cap in his hands and looking between Carole and Kurt, who were clearly the most distraught.

"He's on life support," the doctor said, and Finn gave a muffled yell as his mother sagged and fell back into her seat, burying her face in her hands.

"But…but that's okay, right? He was on life support in Junior year and came off it…" Kurt sniffled, glancing between Carole and the doctor.

The doctor, Dr Huang according to his ID badge pinned to his dark blue scrubs, gave the tiniest shake of his head. "I'm sorry, he-"

"No! NO!" Kurt screamed, shoving Blaine away as he tried to grab Huang and shake him. Blaine moved faster to pull him back, and together with Finn pinned his arms by his sides as he burst into fitful cries, sinking slowly to his feet.

Huang shifted his weight from foot to foot anxiously before motioning to a nurse that was standing by the doors. She walked over and he talked quietly with her for a moment. She nodded and sat in one of the chairs while Huang disappeared back into the hospital labyrinth behind the emergency doors.

Kurt eventually cried himself out until he was dry heaving and clutching at Blaine's shirt, his breathing wheezy as he struggled to get enough oxygen into his system.

"Hey, hey," Blaine said, cradling Kurt to his chest as Rachel moved from comforting Finn and Carole to kneel beside Kurt.

"Kurt, look at me," she said, wiggling her fingers into his tight grip and trying to encourage his gaze to move.

"Should I get a sedative?" the nurse asked, falling silent when Blaine shot her a wicked glare.

With Rachel's help, Blaine managed to get Kurt's breathing at least semi-regular, his occasional hitching breaths a sign of the agony he must be feeling. Blaine had never properly grieved for his parents but he knew how much Kurt had needed and relied on his father. Without Kurt, Burt had been like a third father to him the past six months, inviting him over to watch games and talk sports. When it hit, he knew it was going to hurt and leave him breathless with tears as well.

"Can I see him?" Kurt croaked, blinking his reddened eyes at the nurse. "Please, can I-"

"Of course," she soothed, touching his shoulder gently. "I'll show you to him when you're ready."

After another fifteen minutes, Kurt had contained enough of his stormy emotions to give a weak nod to Blaine and stand, swaying slightly as he gained his bearings. Carole was still weeping into Finn's chest, a tissue balled in her hands, so he followed the nurse with Blaine's hand tucked tightly in his and Rachel's body pressed into his side.

It wasn't as much of a shock as last time. He knew what life support meant. The only difference was the bandaging covering his father's head from the attempt at relieving the pressure. A machine in the corner timed Burt's breaths, the black pump rising and falling and matching the inflation of Burt's torso.

Rachel turned away to stifle a cry and Blaine rapidly blinked away tears as Kurt stumbled into a chair by his father's bedside.

"I can't believe you'd do this," he sniffled, lacing his hands with Burt's and shuddering with pent up sobs. "I can't believe you'd decide Christmas was the best time for your brain to explode."

Blaine gently massaged his shoulders and he choked on the emotion strangling his throat, his lungs, his stomach.

"I love you," he whispered brokenly. "I'm so-" He looked down at his lap, the tears splashing onto the dark denim he'd worn that night for the party. Oh God, the party. It seemed like a decade ago now. "I'm sorry."

"Kurt-"

"I'm sorry you aren't going to see me grow up and turn twenty-one or graduate from Tisch or come to my opening night on Broadway. I'm sorry you aren't going to hold your grandchildren or hold Carole's hand in a rocking chair. I'm sorry you aren't going to fix Mrs McHendry's car, even though I think she's a hypochondriac or whatever the term is for someone who fusses over their car as much as she does." He squeezed his father's hand, aching for even the barest hint that it would be returned. He hadn't given up hope last time, but last time he hadn't been on life support because his brain had shorted. There wasn't an opportunity to come back from this.

The carefully guarded hysteria shattered in his chest as he started crying again, sobs that dragged at his throat and made his heart painfully thud against his ribcage. His father as he knew him was gone. All that was left was a body that was being artificially kept alive.

He was alone.


As his wife, Carole had the legal right to determine when the life support machine should be switched off. But as Kurt's stepmother, she refused to do anything until Kurt had accepted the inevitability and, at the very least, it was no longer Christmas Day. She knew it would mar every Christmas for the rest of his life regardless, but she couldn't stand the idea that the official day of death would be December 25.

Instead, she left Kurt in the ICU room with Burt's hand clutched in his own, returning Rachel to her house before venturing back to a house that suddenly felt cold and empty, the TV still on and the living room in disarray from where she'd eased Burt to the floor before calling 911. She wiped the tears away as she righted the cushions and magazines and switched off the morning weather report, deciding that anything without a bleak outlook was a lie. Burt was gone. Almost.

She pulled the crumpled list of names and numbers that one of the nurses had given her, chewing at her thumbnail as she hunted for the telephone before eventually finding it under the couch.

"Death doesn't stop just because it's Christmas," the nurse had said, pressing the paper into her hand. "Neither does the business surrounding death. These places will still be operating today. You should start the arrangements sooner rather than later."

She honestly wasn't sure how she was meant to do this.


"Kurt, are you hungry?"

"No."

"I'm kind of hungry."

"Go with Blaine then."

"Blaine, are you hungry?"

"Not especially."

"But I'm hungry."

Kurt balled his hand into a fist in his lap. "Then go get something to eat, Finn."

"I don't want to be alone," Finn whined, his knee bouncing with anxiety.

"Oh my God, what are you? A girl who can't pee on her own? Grow up, Finn. You graduated high school. You can go to the hospital cafeteria and get some shitty, expired sandwich and put on a Christmas hat and for the love of God, don't come back," Kurt snapped.

"Kurt-"

"Shove off, Blaine," Kurt growled, his anger rising. "Don't try and pacify me right now while my father is the epitome of dead in front of me. Go with Finn. Just get out."

Blaine glanced between Finn and Kurt. "Fine," he sighed, motioning he'd follow after Finn. Finn stood and left the room, shutting the door quietly behind him. "Is there anything I can get you? A coffee or a biscuit or something?"

"You can get me something that will take me back in time so I can stop all this," Kurt muttered, staring at his father's hand, willing it to twitch, willing it to move. "You can bring my father back to me. You can do whatever you like but it's never going to be enough, Blaine. My father is dead, don't you get that?"

"Of course I do," Blaine said quietly, clasping his hands in his lap and staring at them. "I lost my parents too."

"You were five. You didn't even remember what they looked like until a year ago," Kurt spat.

Blaine's eyes widened and burned with fresh tears. "That's not fair."

"Well then, I'm sorry," Kurt said, his voice short and vicious and not even faintly apologetic.

Blaine shook his head and stood. "Finn lost his father too, Kurt. Maybe we were too young to understand, but it's still a loss and we still had to grieve. Maybe when you realise you aren't so alone in this, you'll stop being so nasty."

He met Finn outside, mirroring him by shoving his hands in his pockets and silently leading Finn towards the cafeteria.


Kurt found a balcony that was protected from the wind but littered with snow, tucking his coat around his shoulders tighter and shivering. It was Christmas. This wasn't meant to happen, not now, not ever. And not this way. He thought his father would always recover from having a heart attack but a stroke… It was so left-field and he'd never considered it happening. He'd never considered not even being twenty and having no living parents. Without Burt, Carole returned to…what? She couldn't really be his step-mother and Finn couldn't be his step-brother. She wasn't his guardian because he was legally eighteen and living out of home. Where Blaine was adopted and found a second home and a second family, Kurt was left with nothing and no one that he could call his own.

With shaking fingers, he tapped at the buttons on his phone and pressed its cold surface to his ear.

Ring.

Ring.

Ring.

"Hello? Kurt?"

"Ty, I…" He slumped to the ground, his back pressed against the icy brick and sheltered himself further from the snow and the wind that bustled around the balcony. "I'm sorry. I know it's Christmas and everything but-"

"Stop rambling. What's going on?"

He bit his lip, wincing at how raw it was from chewing on it for hours while holding his father's hand. "My dad's in the hospital."

"Shit."

"He-" A sob escaped before he could cover his mouth. "Oh God, Ty. He had a stroke and he…he's…"

"Oh Kurt…" Tyler breathed, the sound of a door closing echoing through the line. "What can I do?"

"I don't even know," Kurt whimpered, tears feeling like icicles as they drifted down his cheeks. "I keep attacking everyone. Blaine and Finn went to the cafeteria hours ago and didn't come back. I don't want to be here, Tyler. I don't…I don't know what to do."

"Hey, you keep safe, okay?" Tyler said, voice firm and commanding.

"I can't stay here," Kurt murmured, tucking his knees to his chest. "I can't, Tyler. I need to get back to New York. I'll stay for the funeral but I…I can't stay."

"I fly back to New York on the 28th," Tyler said gently. "Do you want to come stay at mine for a bit when you get back?"

"Can I?"

"I offered, silly," Tyler teased and Kurt gave a teary half-smile even though Tyler couldn't see it. "But seriously, is there anything else I can do? A couch and a blanket isn't really much when you've lost your dad."

"I don't know what I need right now. I've pushed everyone else away," Kurt admitted, wiping his eyes on his knees.

"Well, you need them. You need them as much as you can, and they know that. They know you're grieving, Kurt. Let Blaine help you," Tyler said.

He was well-aware that Tyler was right, but it didn't necessarily make apologising or accepting the comfort Blaine offered any easier.

"I need to get back to lunch but you know you can call me again or at any other time between now and whenever you get back to New York, okay?" Tyler said.

Kurt nodded before realising he was on the phone. "Yeah. I'll…I'll probably be back before New Year."

"Take care of yourself," Tyler reminded him.

"I will," Kurt whispered before Tyler hung up and the phone went silent in his ear.

He stayed outside until the cold was ravaging him and he felt like a frozen ball. No one else had dared come out here, not even for a cigarette, and he didn't especially want to pass out of hypothermia or something equally as stupid when there was a perfectly warm hospital room he could sit in silently while pretending his father was going to give some semblance of movement.

His teeth chattered as he re-entered the ward and walked the quiet corridor to his father's bedroom.

"Blaine…"

"Where were you?" Blaine exclaimed, standing quickly and brushing snow off Kurt's shoulders. "Okay, dumb question. God, you look like a popsicle. You shouldn't have been outside!"

"I n-needed t-to make a-a phone c-call," Kurt stammered, shivering as Blaine draped his coat over Kurt and helped him into the chair by Burt's bedside.

"I'm sure there are places you could have gone that weren't outside," Blaine frowned, grasping at Kurt's hands and rubbing them between his own. They were so much warmer that it felt like Blaine's hands were fire, comforting and relaxing as sensation returned to his fingertips.

"I'm sorry about what I said before," Kurt said, glancing at his lap before tentatively meeting Blaine's eyes. "It was so wrong and so terrible and I'm an awful person for saying it."

"You're upset," Blaine shrugged, kneading his thumb into the back of Kurt's left hand. "I get it. We all lash out when we're hurting."

"But I-"

"Stop," Blaine interrupted, "and listen to me. I'm not going to say it didn't hurt, because it did."

Kurt swallowed and dropped his gaze until Blaine tilted his chin and forced their eyes to meet again.

"But I understand and I accept your apology, if that's what it is you need to hear," Blaine conceded.

Kurt sniffed as Blaine brushed the tears from his eyes and kissed his hands.

"And now I'll ask again. Can I get you anything from the cafeteria? Can I do anything for you? Finn went home to get a few hours sleep or see Rachel or whatever, so it's just us here."

Don't give up on me.

Hold me.

Don't let me go.

Piece me back together again.

Bring my father back.

"No, there's nothing," Kurt whispered, his gaze drifting back to his father. What was the point in asking for things Blaine couldn't do?


Carole finally shuffled in just after eight. Blaine had dozed off on the couch and Kurt was drifting in and out of fits of sleep, jerking awake every time the smallest beep had a spontaneous increase in volume. Her eyes were puffy and her face was flushed from all the crying, and seeing Kurt so pale and distressed made her lower lip wobble.

"Kurt," she whispered, touching his shoulder softly. He sat bolt upright, glancing around wildly and waking Blaine with his noise, who tumbled off the sofa with a thud.

"s'goin' on?" Blaine mumbled, rubbing his head as he blinked blurry eyes at Carole.

Carole carefully examined Kurt's bloodshot eyes, a combination of crying and not enough sleep. "Honey, you need to go home. There's nothing for you here."

"Carole-"

She wrapped her arms around him as he broke down again, agonised but tearless sobs wrenching from deep in his chest. Blaine crawled back onto the couch, wrapping his arms around his knees as he watched mournfully.

"Carole, I can't…I can't…he…he's everything," Kurt cried, clinging to her as she rocked him back and forth slowly.

"I know sweetie, I know," she cooed, tears slipping down her cheeks.

Kurt eventually quietened again, pulling away to cover his face and breathe as evenly as he could, even though it clearly caught and hitched several times.

"What…what's going to happen?" he murmured through his fingers, swallowing the lump in his throat down as best as he could.

Carole prised his fingers off his face and she looked so sad. "I've…made arrangements," she admitted, and the gaze she'd been holding disappeared as Kurt looked at his lap. "But none of it will be set into motion unless you agree to take him off the life support."

"I can't," he whispered, holding his arms over his stomach to try and keep himself together. "I couldn't do it in my Junior year, I can't do it now."

"But there's no hope this time."

"There's always hope!" he snapped, and she recoiled backwards. His face tinted. "Sorry."

She glanced at Blaine, who was staring over his knees at his feet. This wasn't any easier on him either. "If you really can't make the decision, then…then I'll have to make it but I'd rather that we were in agreement on it…"

There were so many thoughts that flooded through Kurt's mind, but all he could focus on was how Carole would willingly kill his father, she would just pull the plug like he meant nothing. But somehow that got swept away because his father was gone, his father wasn't coming back. His throat constricted as the reality of the situation started to set in, the fear overwhelming him as he struggled for breath. He could hear Carole and Blaine, but their voices sounded far away, like they were underwater, and their faces swam in and out of focus as he clawed at his chest.

"Kurt," Blaine repeated, cupping Kurt's cheeks and desperately trying to keep his gaze steady. "Look at me. Look at me. Carole, he's not breathing."

Carole pressed her thumbs into Kurt's back, hitting several nerves that made Kurt's mind short-circuit with pain and gasp, which led to him heaving in breaths as his hands started shaking in his lap.

"Hey honey," Blaine breathed, seeing Kurt's eyes sharpen as he came back to the situation at hand.

"He needs to go home and sleep," Carole whispered, her fingers lightly carding through Kurt's hair.

Kurt tried to shake his head but black spots erupted across his vision so he stilled again.

"Kurt, there's nothing you can do here," Carole said. "I'm sorry but…there's not."

A weight settled, somewhere over Kurt's chest and in his stomach, as Blaine led him out of the hospital room and away, away, away to the car that Finn had driven them in last night and then home, where Finn and Rachel were silently sitting at the bottom of the stairs.

"Kurt-"

"I don't want to hear it Rachel," he interrupted, avoiding her eyes as he walked past them and towards the door to his bedroom in the basement. Blaine squeezed his sister's shoulder and followed after Kurt, sinking onto the bed behind him and cradling his body close.

"It's Christmas," Kurt muttered, bunching a pillow beneath his head as he sniffled weakly. "He can't die on Christmas."

Blaine ran his fingers soothingly over Kurt's back and through his hair, at a complete loss for words. "I think he knew. After the scare at Thanksgiving and then a few weeks ago, I think-"

"A few weeks ago?" Kurt rolled over, his eyes wide and confused. "What happened a few weeks ago?"

"I thought…I thought you knew…" Blaine mumbled, his stomach twisting with the realisation that although Burt had assured Carole he would tell Kurt, he clearly hadn't.

"What happened a few weeks ago?" Kurt demanded, his voice more forceful and rising with the mess of emotions he was feeling.

"He had a bad headache that lasted a few days and so they checked him out and it was some sort of minor brain bleed or something because of the medication he was on," Blaine explained, his heart aching at the look of terror and fury battling on Kurt's face. "He said he'd tell you…"

"And you didn't think to mention that my father was in the hospital? Carole didn't? Finn didn't?" Kurt yelled, stumbling out of the bed in his haste to get away from Blaine. "How could you? You aren't his son, and yet I'm the only one who seems to have missed out on knowing this!"

"That's not fair," Blaine frowned, pushing out of the bed to approach Kurt.

"Don't you dare come near me right now," Kurt hissed, stepping back until he collided with a wall.

Tears burned Blaine's eyes as he raised his hands and retreated. "Okay, okay. I- I'm sorry."

Kurt turned away, his shoulders shaking as he gripped his sides. "Get out," he choked. "Get out and close the door behind you."

"Kurt-"

"Get out!" Kurt shrieked, spinning to face Blaine and his face so wounded that Blaine nodded and kept retreating backwards until he reached the stairs.

"I-I'm truly sorry, you know."

"That means nothing to me anymore," Kurt whispered brokenly as Blaine ascended the stairs and left. When he heard the door click shut, he slumped to his knees, no longer able to cry and yet racked by pain, guilt, hurt, denial, anger, and a hundred other emotions he could never hope to discern and name.


Kurt woke up thrashing and screaming, the nightmare of being buried alive fleeing as he fell out of bed in his haste to get away. He fumbled with the lamp on the bedside table, flooding the room with light and trembling as he adjusted to being awake and alive. The room was empty except for himself and he wondered where everyone was. The clock beside his bed blinked that it was just after eleven fifteen and he figured someone would probably still be awake. He knew he should apologise to Blaine, or ask Carole about the brain bleed thing. There was just so much to take in and he didn't know how to hold himself together.

The kitchen lights were on and he could hear quiet voices. Swallowing hard, he shuffled towards the kitchen where Blaine was sitting beside Rachel, their eyes rimmed with red and clutching each other's hands. Finn sat across from Rachel looking lost and twirling his phone around and around on the table.

Rachel spotted him first. "Kurt. Oh Kurt," she breathed, stumbling to her feet and running over to him to pull him into a hug. Blaine didn't look up from where he was continuing to gaze at his hands and Finn reached over to squeeze at his wrist. It made Kurt's heart ache that his brother and boyfriend had gotten so close while he'd been in New York with Rachel, and now he didn't even know how to talk to any of them. He felt numb and distanced from the whole situation somehow, like he didn't belong or that it was some sort of murky dream.

Rachel pulled back to make him a cup of chamomile tea, even though he tried to protest he didn't want it. Mostly he just figured Rachel needed something to do to keep her hands busy and her mind occupied, even if it was getting mugs from a cupboard and staring at the kettle while it boiled.

Blaine still wouldn't look at him as Kurt slid into the seat beside Finn and exhaled shakily. "I'm sorry. For…for lashing out earlier."

Blaine raised one of his shoulders in a shrug and let it drop. "I get it, Kurt. I get that you're hurting. I lost my parents too, okay?"

"I know that," Kurt mumbled, crossing his arms over his stomach and trying to hold himself together because it felt like he was cracking into pieces. "I know."

He wanted Blaine to look at him, wanted to see that it would be okay, but Blaine's attention didn't waver from his bitten nails. Sighing, Kurt folded his arms onto the table and pillowed his head against them, ignoring Rachel's attempts at coaxing him into drinking the mug of tea she put beside his elbow. The four of them fell into a silence that wasn't awkward but was distinctly uncomfortable, filled with tension and emotion and expectation.

It dragged on and on until the phone rang shrilly, startling Rachel so badly she shrieked and held a hand to her heart. Kurt was already scrambling out of the seat, nearly ripping the phone off the wall in his haste to answer it.

"H-hello?"

"Kurt."

His heart dropped to his stomach, to his feet. It stopped. It broke. "No. No. P-please Carole, please…no…" His knees gave out on him and Finn caught him before he smacked into the floor too hard. "No, Carole…you said…y-you promised…"

"I didn't have a choice," Carole sobbed. "He had another stroke and then his heart stopped and…they couldn't bring him back, honey. He…I'm so sorry. Oh Kurt, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

The receiver fell from his hands as he burst into a fresh fit of tears. He was barely aware of Finn holding him, talking into the phone before he handed it to Rachel to return to the receiver on the wall. He didn't know where Blaine was. All that he could think about was that his father was gone and he was never coming back, and he hadn't even properly said goodbye.


He couldn't tell if Blaine was still avoiding him or if he was just too caught up in his grief to pay attention to where Blaine was and what he was doing and how he was feeling. Carole finished the funeral arrangements and Kurt felt like it was the worst time to die, not just because it ruined Christmas for every year to come, but because all of New Directions was home for the holidays and kept coming around to try and talk to Kurt, try and hold his hand, try and comfort him. It wasn't enough. It was never enough. It never would be enough.

He barely ate, slept or talked. Showering only occurred when Rachel shoved him in there on the day of his father's funeral, the 27th. It felt like someone had scraped out his heart with a spoon and now there was just this big blank void. It hurt so much that all he could do was cry. He cried himself to sleep, he woke himself up crying. Anything he did, anything he saw, resulted in tears and sobs that were starting to hurt his throat and chest.

He also couldn't tell you what happened at the funeral. He thought Finn might have spoken on behalf of the family, because Carole kept weeping and Kurt couldn't lift his eyes from his shoes or make his voice work anymore. There were a lot of gentle hugs and words that sounded empty and hollow. There was silent movement to the gravesite which was freezing and covered white with snow. Carole had managed to organise a grave beside the one where Kurt's mother lay and his stomach kept doing somersaults as he stared at the big blank hole and the dark coloured coffin resting above it on wooden slats. He remembered when his mother had died and all he'd wanted was to hold her hand, hold his father's hand, hold anyone's hand. Carole had his hand in a death grip and Rachel was on his other side but it wasn't the same, it wasn't enough. Where was Blaine's hand anyway?

The tears on his cheeks burned in the cold but it was the only thing he could really feel through the pain and the numbness. He laid the white rose on his father's casket and stepped back, shoving his hands in his pockets because he didn't want to be touching anyone else's right now. He wasn't really aware of people moving around him, touching his shoulder as they whispered words and started to move away. He just kept staring, wondering what there was on the other side. Could his father hear? Was his father some sort of spiritual ghost that could see? Death both fascinated and terrified him with all the elements of the unknown.

"Sweetheart?" Carole squeezed his arm as she clutched at Finn's other arm. "Kurt honey, we're leaving now. Come on."

He blinked, his eyelashes feeling awful with the half-frozen tears that clung to them. "I don't want to."

"I know honey, I know. But we need to go home. Your father…he wouldn't want you out in the cold and getting sick."

"Home?" Something inside him shattered a little. "I don't have a home."

"Of course you do," Carole frowned. "You have your broth-"

"He's not my brother," Kurt interrupted, the flash of fury turning into a simmering flame that was starting to spread through him and burn away all the numbness. "He's not my brother because you're not my mother."

Carole glanced between Kurt and Finn. "I know it's only semantics but-"

"It's not semantics," Kurt snapped and she closed her mouth. "My father is dead. The marriage you had is dead. You're back to being Carole and Finn and no longer family."

"Kurt-"

"And you aren't my mother or my sister either," Kurt hissed at Rachel, throwing her hand off his shoulder and glaring at her.

"Don't you talk to me like that, Kurt Hummel," she said, a fire burning in her eyes. "Don't you take it out on the people that care about you."

His laugh was broken and bitter. He wasn't quite sure why he felt the need to destroy everything like this but he just did. He knew it'd be better if he distanced himself from them. And it was true, Carole wasn't his mother or even his stepmother anymore. He was legally an adult. He didn't need her as a guardian or anything.

"God, do you even listen to yourself?" He stared down at her and curled his fingers into fists. "You're so full of patronising bullshit and no one cares what you have to say. No one ever did in Glee club either."

"Hey!"

"Shut up, Finn," Kurt yelled, stumbling in the snow as he tried to find a steady path through the graveyard. "You loathed her just as much as me sometimes!"

"I never-"

"Don't talk about her like that," Blaine broke in, and it was the first time Kurt noticed him standing beneath a tree, his head lowered and his face as pale as the snow beneath his feet. "You never loathed her."

"Don't tell me what I did and didn't feel."

"Kurt-"

"No." He flung Carole's hand away from his arm again. God, when would they stop touching him? "You aren't my brother," he pointed at Finn and then looked at Carole, "you aren't my mother. You're not my sister," he glared at Rachel, "and you're not-"

His voice caught when Blaine's head raised suddenly, his startled, frightened face meeting Kurt's.

"Kurt. No. No, don't. Please. Don't push us away."

"You're not…" He choked on the words and turned away from them all, hugging his arms to his stomach again.

"So that's it then? You're going to break up with me after burying your father? Classy, Kurt. Real classy," Blaine spat. "He'd be so proud that his son was shoving away everyone that gave a fuck about him."

Kurt launched himself at Blaine and managed to punch him in the shoulder. Rachel sobbed for him to stop as Finn tore him away. He kicked and flailed at Blaine and at Finn, desperate to lash out and cause the same amount of pain he was feeling. "You don't get it!"

"I lost my parents too!" Blaine shouted, shaking off Rachel's arm and stepping closer to Kurt. "I lost them-"

"And you forgot what they looked like!" Kurt screamed, making Blaine stumble back the few steps he'd gained in shock. "You forgot. I'll never forget my parents so stop comparing our goddamn situations because mine hurts a hell of a lot worse than yours."

Blaine gaped at him, his eyes dark with betrayal. "Wow, Kurt. I've known you more than a decade and I don't think I've ever seen you be such a selfish, heartless bitch."

"That makes two of us," Kurt whispered, shoving Finn off him and storming away from them, storming away from the gravesite, storming away from the skeletonised remains of his mother and his recently dead father, and feeling like he'd rather be dead beside them than facing a life without them.


He wasn't sure when or how he got home, only that it was dark outside and dark inside the house. He wasn't sure where anyone was, but figured Finn, Rachel and Blaine were probably at the Berry's, and maybe Carole was there too, giving him some space to calm down. It didn't matter. He'd walked for hours in the cold, his hands purple and his feet frozen in their soggy socks as he unlocked the front door. He knew what he wanted to do, or needed to do.

It didn't take him as long as he'd thought, to be honest. Hours spent wandering around had given him the time to think about what was important in his life and what he could leave behind. As he packed up the few remaining items in the house or his room he wanted to take with him, he couldn't help wondering why it had had to happen now, over Christmas.

He chewed his lip as he found a notepad and a pen, writing a brief letter to Carole and Finn that they were welcome to the house, regardless of what the will might say. He didn't care about a will and inheritance anyway. It felt too real, like accepting money that had been his father's meant that his father was completely gone.

He only startled a little when he tasted blood, realising he had stripped off so many layers of skin from his lip that it had started to bubble with blood. The coppery taste cleared his head enough that he debated whether to write something, anything, to Rachel or Blaine. But he also knew that he needed to get to New York and clear out the apartment he shared with Rachel and she would go there eventually. He'd have time on the plane to figure out what to write to her, which left Blaine.

No matter how many hours he had spent walking around in the cold, he could still see Blaine's heartbroken expression when he'd realised where Kurt was going in declaring who people weren't. It was as good as a break-up. The words they'd shouted at each other... There was no coming back from that. His heart clenched as he left the solitary note folded up on the kitchen table and called for a cab to take him to the airport.

With a final once-over of the house, he decided he'd gathered anything and everything he wanted and the rest…well, he didn't care about the rest. The cab arrived and he loaded in his bags before locking the door and pressing the key beneath the tiny crack at the bottom of the door.

Kurt Hummel was leaving Ohio and he had no intention of looking or coming back.

It was time to start fresh and leave everyone behind. And it began with making sure he stared straight ahead as the cab pulled away from the curb of his house and ignoring how sick he felt as it drove further and further away.


A/N: So um. I'm going to relocate somewhere that has an untraceable IP so I don't get killed...

An apology that this has been so long coming. It literally took me six weeks or so to write it because I kept breaking down myself, and then I always like having a spare chapter for it. It's been nearly a month so I thought I owed it to you to upload this even though I was hoping to have chapter nine done first. Alas.

A few quick things about the plot: While yes, Burt has only ever been diagnosed with heart problems, it is actually possible for him to have had a stroke due to medication complications. My father has had heart troubles for 30+ years and landed in hospital six months into my first year of Uni and was warned that the medication he was on were substantially increasing his risk of a stroke, which freaked him the hell out. So while you can bite my head off for what I did, don't bite my head off for medical inaccuracies. I am well aware strokes and heart attacks are different, and I'm aware that it is actually possible for it to happen.

Second, I always knew what was going to happen to Burt. Hence the ANGST ANGST ANGST warnings. There's actually been a few hints throughout the story (apart from the Thanksgiving scare) if you knew what to to look for. The particular plot of an off-the-rails!Kurt after Burt dying has been kicking around in my head before I even started ASBAON but I was never going to actually write it as Anderberry/a sequel until it came together better in my head when I was in the process of finishing up ASBAON.

Third, there will be a lack of visible Blaine in coming chapters, but it's still a Kurt/Blaine fic. Kurt might have run, but at some point, Blaine will give chase. Think Prom last year. Their relationship isn't permanently over, so don't kill me for the cruelty of separating them. There will be a reunion some chapters down the track (roughly 10 or 11 in my head). There will also be a side story published when this finishes which is basically letters/diary entries from Blaine's perspective of their time apart.

Um. Yeah. I think that's all I have to really say here for now before I start packing my bags and running away from axe-wielding murderers for making Burt die. I swear there's nothing that traumatic happening again..