Hello my duckies! here's a new chappie for you! It may be the last one for a while...yes sad I know, but my life has just kicked up a notch or two. I hope it doesn't slow me down, cause lets face it if I go any slower I stop :D so I finished this one off for you to keep you happy so as always ENJOY!
Chapter TEN
Harry bolted upright accidentally knocking the arm around his hip off, he froze for a moment hoping Kurt didn't wake up. Then when Kurt murmured softly and snuffled into the pillow he relaxed slightly, his racing heart pounding violently against his chest.
He hadn't had a nightmare or flash back in weeks, he'd been doing so well, his PTSD seemed to be getting better, he was so hopeful. Now here he was tangled up in bed with two boys he barely knew hoping neither of them woke up to witness his horror.
He wondered what Hermione was doing now, or Luna, who was blinded in an attack and left an orphan when her father's newspaper was blown up. He sighed sadly, wishing he had been brave enough to stay for them, hoping they understood selfishly and sort of knowing deep down they were probably really worried about him. When Ginny died he had turned to them for comfort, Hermione had tried to help Ron through it the best she could, she'd been grieving herself for the only female friend she'd had for a while, but she'd still been there for them. He remembered the funerals. Leaning on each other and crying rivers, braving the speeches and standing there getting people's condolences like the world had been turned on mute. He shuddered slightly and tried not to disturb the sleeping boys as he left the bed. He had to face it, he ran away because he was so damaged he couldn't cope anymore. He'd left some of the only people he had loved because he was so damaged he couldn't face the ghosts haunting him. He didn't know if he would ever be capable of it.
He ran cool water in the bathroom and splashed his face. He couldn't help the selfish little pang in his heart that was angry he'd had another nightmare. That his new happier life had been interrupted, that he couldn't just be normal for a while.
Kurt woke up a few hours later with Blaine slumped into his shoulder, a slight space where Harry should have been still between them. He blinked groggily and stared around in confusion. Then he spotted a crisp white paper folded on the desk and plucked it up, reading by the soft dawn light.
'Hey guys, woke up early gone to get some stuff done, see you in class later'
He frowned slightly but figured he'd see Harry later and check up on him and turned to shake Blaine awake.
"We have an hour till class, let's get dressed and go to breakfast" he grunted slipping from bed and wondering just when sharing a bed had gone from a weekend thing to a practically every night thing. Then he shrugged and let it go, it was just so comfortable and easy to get together in the evenings and end the day with a film or TV show snuggled up like a puppy pile. Especially after a particularly hard day of class, it was very relaxing to go for coffee and then have a mutually quiet study group. The only time they ever spent apart these days seemed to be showering and separate classes. Maybe that wasn't exactly healthy either but none of them seemed to mind. Kurt certainly wasn't going to be the one to ruin such peaceful routines for nothing.
When they walked into the cafeteria they both noticed Harry sat at the Warbler table hair damp and slightly wavy looking rosy cheeked and calm.
"Have a good morning?" Blaine asked brightly stealing his toast with an impish smile.
"One day I will stab you with my fork" Harry warned mildly before turning back to Scott his roommate who was so used to them either invading his room or Harry disappearing he hardly batted a lash anymore, even when they behaved slightly strangely and threatened bodily violence apparently.
"I just think that if you're going to barge in on me at six am for jogging clothes you could at least be quiet about it, you don't even make that much noise when you three have sleepovers" Scott was busy complaining.
"Sorry, I'll be quieter next time" Harry blushed slightly fiddling with his fork and looking anywhere but at the boys surrounding him.
"You went for a jog at six am?" Wes asked with narrowed eyes "Do you know the school bylaws about that sort of thing?" he demanded.
Harry blinked at him slowly.
"I assumed they were pretty much void as no one has said anything about us three sharing a bed yet and that is certainly not supposed to be possible with weekly bed checks for curfew" Harry stated with a raised brow.
"Hmm well we allow that because you all are technically in a dorm before curfew and accountable for emergencies" Wes sniffed reprovingly.
"Oh, right so I can't go for a run in the morning then?"
"Well yes I suppose you can as long as you sign the log book at the doors so in case of a fire we know you're not in the building" Wes frowned
"Right" Harry stared at him with a mildly baffled look for a moment before shrugging it off.
"Why were you out so early?" Kurt asked softly staring at him intently
Harry flicked him a glance and a slight lip twitch that he supposed was supposed to be a smile.
"I woke up early and thought why not? I used to run ten miles at least a week, but I've been severely lacking this past while" he added slightly wryly.
It was the truth, in a roundabout way. He just failed to mention that he was hoping upping his exercise again would tire him out so much the nightmares would go away again. Really that was more of an omission than a lie, he reasoned internally when Kurt smiled slightly and nodded in appreciation.
"I get it, you're a bit of a fitness freak, I know you were really active when we were kids, I suppose I should have thought about that. You were always on the move, sitting around watching movies is going to be a bit sluggish for you all the time" he beamed and nodded relieved that he now had an explanation for Harry's slightly off composure.
"Yeah I think I'm going to try to get in at least an hour of something exertive once a day, that's the recommended amount of physical activity for teens anyway" Harry grinned slightly and Kurt nodded.
"Sure sure, you ever want company let me know"
Harry arched a brow and asked slowly disbelief ringing every syllable.
"What happened to no physical exertion that doesn't include dancing and singing?"
"I also said if you'd recall correctly that I wouldn't mind skating with you, there's an exception to every rule"
"Huh, yeah you did. You're on, skating this afternoon after Warblers?" Harry challenged and the look on his face saying he was waiting for Kurt to come up with an excuse goaded him on.
"I do actually have my skates, I picked them up last time I was home. Meet you at the dorm entrance"
Harry laughed face brightening slightly and he nodded excitedly suddenly his whole mood seeming to lift.
"This a private party or can anyone join?" Blaine asked tentatively.
Harry shot him an amused smile.
"You're always invited Blaine" he offered blithely before high fiving Kurt.
"You're going down Hummel, I've learnt a lot of tricks since last time you pushed me on my butt" he crowed mockingly
"Ha! I can still skate circles around you anytime wobbly knees" Kurt shot back with a hair flip.
"Pfft" Harry scoffed and they both broke into giggles.
Blaine watched them both with a warm glow. He couldn't even feel left out, because the way Harry just openly told him he was welcome in anything they did meant more to him than anything else he could have said or done to make him feel involved.
That afternoon after warbler rehearsal Blaine ran to his room and rummaged around the back of his cupboard for his bashed up skates. The boys usually had a sort of street hockey game on the tarmac basketball courts when they were bored or stuck at school for holidays. Otherwise he wouldn't have the chance to even do this, he was now very grateful to David for making him buy the skates to be able to join those mock games.
He raced down to the entrance hall to see Harry and Kurt stood there skates dangling by their laces. He grinned and practically skipped over.
"We going to do this then?" he asked brightly
"Yes, I checked with the sports coach and we're allowed on the jogging tracks around the outside of the courts or the courts if they're not in use, no going on the walkways between buildings or we'll be written up so fast our wheels will spin" harry snorted with an eye roll.
"Cool come on then" Blaine grinned giddily and practically dashed out of the doors.
They ended up on the tennis court, the nets had been taken down and it was empty so they decided to stay in there so they didn't roll over anyone's toes on the jogging track. They laced up and at Harry's insistence even put on the knee pads and helmets for safety.
"Kurt is bloody vicious with his elbows if he thinks he's going to lose, trust me better to be safe than in pain" He muttered out the side of his mouth when he thought Kurt wasn't looking.
But the slight curl of his lips behind Harry's back told him otherwise, it also warned him that Harry spoke the truth, there was an odd gleam in his eyes. A competitive little sparkle Blaine had only ever seen when Kurt talked about his Diva offs with Rachel or about getting a solo. It made him shiver slightly and then they were off.
Harry swept away powerfully speeding down one side of the court with a whoop of delight as he practically flew along. Kurt was on his tail yelling about cheating and jumping the gun. Blaine just glided along slowly letting the breeze flow through his hair and past his face like a calm cool caress. He watched in amusement as Harry pumped his legs harder and harder to try and overtake Kurt's easy long gliding pace. They looked so odd together. It was a bit like Kurt was a figure skater making it look graceful and sleek and Harry was a sports player, hard and fast and full of adrenaline. He half expected Harry to pull out a hockey stick and jam it between Kurt's feet and Kurt to leap in the air in a ballerina like pirouette.
"Blaine come help me!" Harry yelled suddenly reversing so he was skating backwards.
"I'm coming" he laughed and took off speeding up and enjoying the fact that for today they were doing something that was fun and all of them enjoyed.
It wasn't often they could all say they were fully into something and not just humouring the other two. This was perfection and just one more bonding experience in their growing friendship. They weren't just Disney loving oddities anymore.
Blaine grinned as he finally pulled even and Harry grabbed his hand and yanked him forward so they locked Kurt out, he couldn't over take them both unless he lost precious seconds trying to swerve all the way around the length of them linked together.
"Cheats! Betrayed by my own best friends! Tag teaming me, of the shame!" Kurt yelled breathlessly giggles erupting even as he waved his arms about exuberantly and grabbed their joined arms to get pulled along for a few seconds.
"You're just jealous you can't corrupt him to your camp cause I got hi9m first" Harry yelled with a laugh sweeping them around a corner and waggling his brows at Blaine.
"Blaine...you'll help me won't you?" Kurt asked batting his lashes and trying to stifle his huge smile.
"Of course" Blaine grinned and Harry clutched at his heart pointing between them dramatically.
"Traitor! Scoundrel! Oh woe is me!" he wailed and let himself slow down before he made a great powerful leap and spin in midair before speeding off in the opposite direction. "I go to soothe my wounds and find new friends who are not so faint of heart" he yelled
Kurt looked at Blaine for a whole second before bursting into laughter and falling to his knees.
Blaine now saw where the need for protection came in, that had to have hurt. But all Kurt did was curl into himself clutching his stomach laughing so hard his whole body shook.
"Hey guys look what I found!" Harry was back holding out a soft foam football.
Clearly he had been watching Kurt laugh a lot longer than he'd thought.
"Are you hyperventilating?" Harry asked solicitously as Kurt let out a shuddering choked giggle.
"I'm fine" Kurt squeaked voice going up two octaves.
"Oh good cause I heard the bell going, its dinner, where do you think this ball came from?"
Blaine blinked, apparently Harry was slightly hyper, if the way he was blinking rapidly and twitching were anything to go by.
"Oh good I'm starved after all that racing about" Kurt sighed holding an expectant hand out to be helped up.
"Uh huh, no way I'm not stupid" Harry denied rolling backwards with hands up defensively.
"What?" Blaine asked hand already stretching out to help Kurt up
"This" Kurt grinned and lunged yanking Blaine off his wheels and onto the ground with him.
"Ooooow" Blaine moaned
"I told you so" Harry chirped
"No you didn't you just...you know what never mind" Blaine snorted scrabbling to his knees and then his feet.
"Let's go eat yeah?" Harry asked and took off for where they'd left their shoes.
Gleehpgleehp
Kurt rolled over in his sleep and reached out for the warmth of a familiar body. He snuffled slightly, before his eyes cracked open and he saw the empty bed. He turned the other way and saw Blaine curled up hugging a pillow and dead to the world.
This was becoming a recurring habit, ever since the day they'd skated together, which was over a week away now, harry had been disappearing on them and acting a little oddly. He sighed and wondered what he should do.
He'd given it a while, hoping that everything would settle down again and Harry would be fine. But as the days went on Harry's absences were getting longer, and his behaviour more worrisome. Just yesterday he had walked in on Harry scrubbing out their coffee mugs with a wire brush and bleach. He'd looked so frazzled it had startled Kurt. It was like the blinkers being taking off really, all week he had been putting Harry's oddities down to stress, or class work distraction. But seeing him like that had sort of opened his eyes, he was so worried. He'd let Harry shrug him off with a sweet smile and a vague response. But it was still stuck in his mind, like a broken record being played over and over, a little montage of all the little twitchy habits he'd been picking up on all week.
He knew on one level that Harry had told him he had PTSD but he was so normal and mostly happy that it was easy to shrug off. But now he was worried, he had no idea what PTSD did to you, what the symptoms and treatments were. Was Harry's case worsening, how could he help, was Harry going to be ok? Questions were crowding his brain and he needed the answers.
Blaine shuffled a bit behind him and he sighed tiredly. He also needed to figure out whether he should voice his concerns to Blaine. Because Harry was his friend too now, they all shared a bed regularly for God's sake. So Blaine had just as much right to be involved as he did right? It was all such a worrying mess. But he'd promised himself that if Harry wasn't in bed in the morning he'd do something about it. So he was going to keep that promise and figure something out.
Blaine woke up with a groan and looked at him blearily when he got off the bed.
"You ok?" he asked gruffly peering through one eye with a slight raspy cough.
"I'm fine"
"You don't look fine"
"I'm not the one who needs help" he muttered before he could stop himself.
Blaine sat up and suddenly he looked wide awake and alert, a little like an afro haired Labrador.
"Harry?" he asked softly
"You noticed huh" he asked with a sigh.
"It's sort of hard not to" Blaine shrugged biting his lip.
"What do you know about PTSD?" Kurt asked flopping back into bed beside Blaine with a sigh.
"Not much, but we could look it up, if you think it would help?" Blaine offered quietly
"I don't know what will help, but something has to" he replied picking at the quilt with a guilty frown.
"We'll figure it out together then ok" Blaine grinned slightly and petted his hand to still his fidgeting.
Harry walked in the door carrying a tray of coffee and blinked at them owlishly for a moment.
"Uh...I brought us coffee" he raised the tray slightly with a crooked sort of smile
"Thanks that's awesome, I'm going to need it, I have a pop quiz in English lit first" Blaine smiled back giving Kurt a nudge to get him moving.
Harry walked through his first few lessons mind whirling. He wasn't very aware of the world around him, hadn't been truly focused for the past week or so if he admitted it. But walking in on Blaine and Kurt this morning had sort of jolted him out of his daze slightly. Well enough to make him aware that he should have seen this one coming. Blaine and Kurt were together together now, they'd been holding hands and murmuring together in bed. Sure he often shared that bed with them. But what if in his dazed out drug induced calm he'd missed them trying to hint that he shouldn't be there anymore? What if they weren't asking him outright because they were afraid of his reaction? They certainly had kept it quiet, the two of them getting together, if he hadn't walked in on them like that he'd have missed it entirely. But then again even if they'd been kissing each other's faces off the past week he'd likely have missed it. In between the manic phases of exercise and cleaning and studying, he'd been so doped up on calming potions and stress relievers to help him sleep at night that he'd have missed a naked girl doing the cancan if he were honest. He felt the sinking feeling in his chest and knew the selfish hurt that he was being left behind. That he was going to be the spare wheel and they were going to be too polite to not include him in their usual after school activities. He felt the mad urge to scream and cry and beg them not to leave him, not to change the way they all were. But he couldn't do that, because if they were happy together he couldn't stop that. Not after watching so many other loving couples separated by death before they got the chance to truly be happy.
He felt like bashing his head against something, but then the itching urge to clean the whiteboard of all those faded black marks swept over him. He twitched in his seat and the all consuming urge got it's claws in his brain, all he could see were the sweeping black smudges where the teacher had rubbed things off and left marks on the bright white. His fingers twitched and he fought to keep his seat. He wasn't even sure what class this was, what was the teacher talking about anyway? Why wouldn't he just clean his board properly it was infuriating.
The class buzzer went and he had to force himself to leave without attacking the board with some cleaner and a sponge. He got outside and fled to the bathroom where he knocked back a calming potion and a specially designed potion by Snape that had been made with those suffering Post War stress in mind.
He felt the whoosh of calm, almost detached glaze take over and he smiled faintly amused by the cartoonish etching of a naked girl marked into the condensation on the mirror.
Blaine pulled Kurt into the library in their free period before lunch.
"They should have some psychology books in here that may help" he muttered lowly as they passed the librarians.
"I brought my laptop so we can look online too" Kurt whispered looking slightly jumpy and guilty.
"We're doing this because we care" he reiterated for what felt like the millionth time since this morning.
He didn't know who he was trying to convince though, they both felt awful about this.
"I know but what if he gets mad when he finds out we did this?" Kurt asked for what must be time ninety eight.
"I don't know Kurt, we'll try to explain and hope he forgives us"
"Ok, ok you go get the books I'll set the laptop up" He whispered and rushed off to a secluded study cubicle.
"That's not suspicious at all" Blaine snorted to himself as he checked the aisle labels for the section he needed.
When he finally found three useful looking books he slid in beside Kurt in the cubicle and checked the website he was on. It was a medical health site with PTSD in bold at the top.
"Well if this doesn't help us I don't know what will" Kurt muttered sounding slightly frazzled.
"Me either" Blaine sighed softly leaning in to read the smaller print.
Harry couldn't even build up enough emotion to be surprised when he found them like that half an hour later. Both huddled up in a single person booth together. He just sighed and moved himself out of sight to work quietly on some research for a class project that had to be done or he'd fail the whole module. He made sure the towering bookcases hid him from view and let his face fall into his books. Then he sat back up and focused on the work he needed done. His vague haze would only last so long and he needed to make sure all his work was done before he had another episode. His grades had taken quite the nose dive while he readjusted to the increase in medicinal support he needed to focus. Now he was left scrambling to pick them back up and try to fix the mess his life was becoming.
He didn't even check the cubicle again when he left halfway through lunchtime. His haze was wearing off and he needed to get back to his room before he had an episode in the corridor and started doing something insane like cleaning the windows.
Luckily Scott was rather bemused by his odd little idiosyncrasies. He thought Harry had OCD about germs and let him too it, even when he hovered under his bed and found his porn stash. Since Harry's only reaction had been to alphabetise them and stack them neatly beside his bedside cabinet and wall so they were hidden from view, Scott just let him do whatever he wanted. He even seemed quite grateful to find his uniforms freshly laundered and all his school work organised on his desk. The only time Scott had actually asked if he was ok was when he saw him taking his potions after a morning run.
AN: HI! So here we're starting the little relationship drama for ya, this is my way of hooking them up and ,making them realize the lurve each other :D I wanted to develop Harry a bit more now, cause his problems have been kinda sidelined while I set everything up and now we get to see it more, and of course its awesome to get them together with loads of drama and misunderstandings and emotions :D
Also to my lovely reviewers who wanted a threesome name :D hehehehehehe Blurry is a good attempt! I in no way mock you for it :D But I do submit to your challenge ^_^ I went for Pomulson- their last names or Hartle O_O; waddya think? lol have fun with it x