After his friends left, Kurt had expected Dave to wake back up, but apparently, he was sincerely asleep. Dave didn't even wake up when the Hummel-Hudsons came in later that evening.

Burt came in smiling affectionately at his baby boy. Seeing Dave fast asleep he pulled the privacy curtain to separate the two halves of the room. "How you doin' Kurt?" Kurt gave his dad the thumbs up sign. Logically, Kurt knew he should be suffering from some kind of post traumatic stress disorder, but the day had dragged on so long, he felt as though last night had been years ago or nothing more than some hideous dream. And truth be told, if anyone would suffer long term affects from last night, despite his constitution, it would be Dave.

Kurt had been walking the grounds at Dalton just after dark when he had been grabbed from behind by three of the assailants and dragged into a utility truck. They had punched him several times in the face before lashing him up with the duct tape. The rest of the trip had been relatively uneventful until they got to McKinley.

They made the mistake of leaving Kurt unattended in the truck while they checked out the area and met up with the fourth member of their party. Kurt had heard them talking on a cell phone on the way to McKinley; the fourth man had been stationed as a lookout to follow the second victim, though Kurt didn't know until he got to the field that the second victim would be Dave.

While they were gone, Kurt had been able to pull himself up and hobble to the back of the truck. Unable to get the rear door open, he crawled over the center consol that divided the two front seats from the body of the truck and into the driver's seat. While getting the driver's door open, Kurt must have hit accidently hit the lever controlling the front headlights, because, according to Officer Lamarque, that's what had made him and his partner check out the area. They had seen the open truck with its high beams on and started checking around the school grounds to the find the owner.

Kurt and Dave's would-be murderers had kicked Kurt in the temple for good measure when they found him on the ground a few hundred feet from the truck (walking when your legs are fastened together around the calves is both slow and awkward work).

From there, they had dragged him to the track field where they were rejoined by their two buddies and David. Kurt knew Dave's side of the story, as well, from hearing it over and over again as he (painfully) related it to family throughout the day.

If Dave's uneasy sleep this morning and gentle whimpers for the past fifteen minutes were any indication, last night would haunt David for a good, long time.

Carol held Kurt's hand while she told him how much they loved him and that it didn't matter what anyone else thought about him. Kurt had never personally cared what people thought of him or his sexuality, but if Carol felt better telling Kurt he should be proud of himself for who he is, then Kurt wasn't going to deprive her of that.

Finn didn't have much to say since he had come with the glee club earlier; however, he did come with Kurt's MP3 player and a selection of Kurt's DVDs. "I figured you're going to start getting really bored really quick."

Burt took his other hand in both of his. Kurt could tell from the heavy look about his father's eyes that he hadn't slept and had probably cried lately. "The docs want you to stay until at least Saturday, so they can keep an eye on your…your, uh…" Burt touched his own neck tenderly. "They also want you to talk to a trauma councelor a couple-a times before you go." Kurt nodded. The doctors had told him all this earlier when examining his bandages and stitches. "They also say after you're done resting up tonight, they think you can start talking again tomorrow. Slow and easy, though. Just because your vocal chords weren't directly hurt, doesn't mean the muscles around them weren't." Kurt liked to hear that news…well, not that the area around his vocal folds might be injured, but that he could talk again in the morning.

His family stayed for around an hour before a nurse started ushering them out. The poor woman was only trying to do her job, but still had to physically drag Burt out of the room by the arm accompanied by a chorus of angry murmurs and curses (all coming from Burt, of course).

It wasn't too late yet and Kurt wasn't nearly as tired as David, so he pulled his headphones on and set his IPod to shuffle. Just before the opening chords started up, Kurt could hear a painful little sniffle come from Dave's side of the room.

Someday, when my life has passed me by

I'll look around and wonder why

You were always there for me