Malik stormed through the front door of his house in tears. As he entered, he slammed the front door behind and ran upstairs to his room, passing his mother and Damien who were in the living room. Damien was putting new strings on his guitar and his mother was reading the latest James Patterson novel. Damien and his mother turned and watched Malik and saw the tears in his eyes.
Damien's mom looked at him and said, "What is the matter with that boy?"
"I told him not to get in the middle of it," he said, sighing, "but you know when he gets an idea in his head, he follows it through until he ends up getting stepped on."
"Get in the middle of what?" his mother asked.
Damien told his mother what Malik told him, explaining the whole situation between Malik and Blaine and how he wanted to fix it. "He feels absolutely terrible about that kiss, and he wanted to make it right, so I guess he just got home from doing just that."
"Let me go and talk to him," his mother said, as she stood up off of the couch. "There is no need for him to feel bad about something like that. There are things a whole hell of a lot worse that goes on in this world. Don't y'all let yourselves get depressed an upset about little stuff like this, ya hear?"
She made her way up the stairs to Malik's room and knocked on the door. "Malik, baby," she said. "Are you all right?"
"I really don't want to talk, mom." Malik said. He was lying on his side on his bed with tears rolling across his face wetting his pillow.
"Did something happen between you and Blaine today?" she asked.
Malik lifted his head up a bit. "How do you know about Blaine?" he asked.
"Damien told me."
Oh of course he did, Malik thought. He got up from the bed and went to open the door. His mother followed him back into the room and sat in the chair at his writing desk. Malik sat on the edge of his bed with his knees pressed against his chest.
There was a brief pause. "I really tried to make it right, mom," he said. "I didn't mean to cause trouble. When I saw Blaine at the Lima Bean, he and Kurt were talking I thought everything was okay. Then Blaine came up to me and started getting really mad at me, and then Kurt walked up just when Blaine mentioned the kiss again. Now Kurt won't talk to Blaine, and Blaine never wants to see me again."
"Aw, honey," his mother said, "they'll work it out."
"I'm really trying my best not to be like dad, mom," Malik said.
"Oh boy, please. You are nothing like that man."
"Because I'm gay?" Malik said, with a slight smile.
"Well that, but, Malik, you are so honest with yourself and everybody else. And you and Damien both make an effort to be better men than he ever was."
"Yeah, but I ruined someone's relationship—a good one, at that. I guess that make me a little like dad."
"You know what his problem was. Your daddy ruined every relationship he found. The difference between him and you is that you care enough to make it right. You see, he would just go around like he's all Mr. Big Daddy, pretending he was a man, just doing dumb stuff. And whenever somebody told him what he was doing was wrong, he'd ignore them and just keep on doing the same dumb stuff over and over again. He never learned. But you, the minute you know you've done somebody wrong, you go the extra mile to make it better—to fix the problem and learn. So don't sit here and think you're exactly like your father because you're not."
Malik never thought of it that way. There was so much he needed to learn about human behavior. It wasn't the things we did that made us who we are; it's the choices we make.
"Now are you coming down stairs for dinner soon," his mother said. "I'm making pork chops. And I made that salad you wanted because I know you trying to keep your figure. Whatever the hell that means."
"Yeah ma'am," Malik said.
"Good," his mother said. She then walked over to Malik and kissed him on his forehead, before leaving the room.
That night Blaine stayed up all night calling Kurt's cell. He needed to talk to him; he wanted to talk to him. Every time Blaine dialed Kurt's number, it rang only sending him to Kurt's voicemail. The more he called, the more depressed he became. Tears started to roll down his cheeks. Eventually the phone just stopped ringing and went straight voicemail. Blaine thought to himself that that was it. Kurt didn't want to talk to him and probably never wanted to talk to him ever again.
He placed the phone down on his nightstand and crawled onto his bed, still wearing his clothes from school. He spent half the night crying and staring up at the ceiling. He never realized how much it would hurt to lose Kurt. He loved him so much. And at this point, he'd do anything to have him back. All that time he spent focusing on himself he regretted. Maybe it was his selfishness that made Kurt walk away so quickly. If only he could talk to him. If only he could make things right.