Let Me Be

Chapter 11

AN: Short chapter is short ... but sweet. I hope y'all like it. Only 3 hours til KLEX guys! Hopefully this will help tie you over til it happens.

Thanks to Kelly and Sami for their help with this chapter. Love ya girls.

-.-.-.-

Blaine showered before bed, which I have to admit was a little awkward due to the missing bathroom door. The fact of the matter was that we were not yet at the point in our relationship where we could just 'drop trou' and stroll around, comfortable with the concept of being naked in front of each other.

The very see-through glass shower door was directly opposite the missing bathroom door, which could have allowed me some quality perving time while Blaine was indisposed, had I actually had the desire to do it... but I didn't. When we did eventually get to that point, I wanted it to be through mutual agreement that we were both ready for it, not because I had cheated and taken advantage of a situation. Although, I have to admit that I was no longer freaked out at the idea of seeing him naked. It was more that it just felt unusual to not be able to give him the privacy that we usually afforded each other, even while sharing a room.

But hey, I'm still human. Just because I wouldn't do that to Blaine doesn't mean I wasn't tempted. I had long since been an avid fan of Blaine's backside, and I longed for the day when I could see it in the flesh, if you pardon the pun.

It was strange to realise just how much between us had changed. Only a month ago I would have certainly stated that I was the one of us who was holding back the physical progression in our relationship, but now, I kind of felt like there was nothing to be scared of any more. Blaine and I had experienced something together over the past few weeks that made the fear of intimacy seem terribly obsolete.

I retreated to the opposite corner of the room from the bathroom door. I sat at my desk with my laptop, deciding to use this time to do a little more research. I was determined to find out as much as I possibly could about Blaine's condition. Wikipedia had been invaluable in teaching me the ins and outs of 'Selective Mutism', and while the guidelines on treatment of it in adults were wavy, it was still very clear to me that Blaine's progress tonight at the table, speaking in front of three other people, was enormous. Even though he hadn't spoken to them directly at all, it was a major breakthrough for him to have spoken to me with them within earshot.

I heard the water shut off and the shower door open, and I deliberately kept my head facing the computer screen. After a few minutes I heard him come back into the bedroom, his footsteps coming towards me. I spun the chair a little to greet him, and my breath caught in my throat at the sight of him wearing nothing but boxer briefs and a smile. My mouth actually fell open - I felt it happen - at the delicious sight before me, and my face flushed as I glanced away and down at the floor, averting my eyes as my maturity caught up to and overtook my embarrassment at having an almost very naked boy in my bedroom.

If Blaine was at all aware of my inner turmoil, he didn't show it. He strolled casually towards me, the wet shower-dri bag covering the cast on his arm held out at an angle away from his dry body, while the other arm tried to awkwardly towel off his hair. I reached for his broken arm, quickly removing the bag and hanging it over a coat hanger to air out before I took the towel from him and sat him down so I could dry his hair properly.

It had grown quite long over the summer, but he had been complaining about it being too unruly and had spoken of getting it cut just before the attack... needless to say, that hadn't happened, and the wild dark curls now puffed out and away from his head like a small afro. It looked surprisingly good on him actually; I never thought I would like the scruffy look on Blaine, but it really suited his face.

I worked through his curls with the towel, drying his hair carefully so as not to let it tangle. With the wide tooth comb from my dresser I began to neaten it out, working slowly and loving the feel of his silky soft damp hair against my fingers. When I was done I scrunched the curls up a little in my palms, breaking them free of the conformity of the comb so that they would dry naturally in little ringlets.

From the top drawer I removed the bottle of vitamin E capsules, flipping the lid and shaking a couple out into my palm. Blaine reached across the desk to remove a pin from my note board, handing it to me so that I could split the capsule open. I just drew a small slit down the front of the plastic, careful not to lose any of the oil. Blaine sat up straighter, his chin raised so that I could start on the still raw looking pink line that marked his lower face.

I tried to focus on rubbing the small circles into his skin, but I was only too aware of his eyes locked on my face. My lips twitched into a small smile as a familiar warmth spread through me from the heat of his gaze, but I refused to be drawn in. I dipped my fingers into the oil again and gave one last gentle swipe over his chin before I motioned with my head for him to stand up.

"Switch," I said simply, and he stood, holding the chair out a little more from the desk for me to sit in, then moved back in closer to stand between my slightly parted knees.

I started on his back, gently tracing an oily finger across that one awful mark beneath his shoulder blade. Surprisingly, the mark here already looked so much better than I would have expected. We'd only been using the oil a few days, but it seemed to me that it had already made a difference.

With a gentle hand guiding his hip, I turned him around. I was suddenly aware that my mouth had gone dry, and I froze for a moment just to take in the beautiful sight before me.

Blaine's breath hitched, and I glanced up at him, only to catch his melted honey eyes boring back into mine with an intensity and passion that made me shiver. His hand came from his side to rest lightly on my shoulder.

"The way you look at me, Kurt. You make me forget about the scars."

My chest tightened at his words, and I let my oily hand fall to rest in the middle of his chest, just to touch.

"Blaine, you are the most beautiful thing I've ever seen."

I leaned forward, slowly, and brushed a kiss across his sternum, loving the feel of his warm, vanilla-scented skin against my lips. I felt him exhale a shuddering breath as his hand on my shoulder started to stroke and caress, holding me to him, and I gave in to it for a moment and just rested my cheek against his skin, wrapping both my arms up and around his body.

I soon came to my senses though … nothing could happen between us. It was all too soon. Blaine was still far too fragile for me to think that now was the right time in our relationship to move forward, intimately, no matter how tempting it was, or how right it felt in the moment. With a short cough, I pulled away and unwrapped my arms from him, dipped my fingers into the oil again and brought them to the scars on his abdomen, continuing my application of the oil. Blaine sighed a little, but when I glanced up at him to check on him, he smiled warmly back down at me, so I knew we were okay.

-.-.-.-

Blaine lay in a curled, almost foetal position in front of me. He wasn't asleep, I could tell. His heart was thumping loudly against his ribcage; I could feel it because I was pressed right up against his back with my arms folded loosely around him. He took one of my hands in his, fitting our fingers together.

"Kurt?"

His voice quavered a little, and I knew straight away that whatever it was he wanted to ask me about made him nervous.

"Yes love?"

He hesitated a little, and when he spoke again his voice held a tentative tone, like he almost didn't want to know the answer.

"Do you ever think about the future?"

I smiled against his back, pressing a soft kiss to his shoulder blade.

"Yeah, all the time."

He didn't respond, and after a few moments I decided to elaborate.

"I see you and me in New York. We are living together in some dingy, crappy apartment. Working our asses off to get to where we want to be in our careers, but we're happy coz we have each other."

I heard him chuckle low in his throat, and he raised my hand to his lips to kiss my fingertips.

"I picture our wedding, how beautiful it's going to be, how perfect you are going to be on that day, how amazing our lives are going to be together. Then, of course, that drifts into dreams of our little family; us with our beautiful babies. We're going to have twins, I've decided," I say with a smirk, and Blaine grins up at me... like you can plan these things. "A boy and a girl, just like Neil Patrick Harris and David Burtka had. I picture our son to be the spitting image of you, and our daughter as a dainty miniature of my mom... and we name her Lucy Elizabeth."

He nodded softly. "That's perfect, Kurt. I love Lucy."

I grinned, waiting for him to get the reference. I wasn't disappointed. He groaned aloud once he realised what he had said, turning in my arms to smirk up at me.

"Is that where you got the name Lucy from? 'I love Lucy'?"

I winked at him, and his laughter filled the room.

"Well!" I said mock-defensively, "You and I are like a modern day Lucy and Ricky. I thought it fit quite nicely."

He grinned. "And what are we going to name our son?"

I stroked my hand softly across his cheek, meeting his eyes with a lazy grin on my face. "I thought I should let you have at least some input. What do you like?"

Blaine's face got serious for a minute, and he wouldn't meet my eyes. "I've always loved the name Tyrone." he said softly.

I nodded, knowing he could feel the motion even though he wasn't looking at me. "I like that," I said simply, and his lips turned up in a smile.

"I picture the both of us being home with them a lot, especially when they're little. Of course we're going to be filthy rich by then, so we won't need to go out to work anyway."

Blaine grinned at that, finally meeting my eyes.

"You've put a lot of thought into this, haven't you?"

I met his eyes, all traces of joking aside as I nodded at him sincerely. My breath caught in my throat at the sparkle I could see in his eyes.

"Yes, I have. I can't even imagine a future without you. I know it's a long way off, all this marriage and kids stuff, but eventually, when we are both ready and older and way more mature than we are now, and we're done travelling and achieving our career dreams and we're ready to have more than just each other, then yeah, I want to have all of that with you."

I felt Blaine's chest hitch a little. I smiled again, playing with a loose curl near his ear.

"I'm glad I didn't scare you with that little admission, Blaine. Most seventeen year old guys would have an aneurism at the mention of marriage and children... but still, here you lie, dapper and as beautiful as ever, discussing baby names with me." I couldn't help but give him a little wink at the end, and he laughed once, low and deep, and his arms tightened around me.

"Yeah, but I'm not most seventeen year old guys. Planning a future with you is a lot less scary than planning one without you... "

He trailed off, and I caught a glimpse of his darkened eyes before he let them slip closed and snuggled in even closer to me. I rested my head on his bicep, cuddling into his side with an arm thrown possessively over his waist, and we both drifted off to sleep.

-.-.-.-

I was awoken the next morning by the buzzing of my phone, and thinking it was my alarm, I rolled over to punch it off before I realised what it really was. Startling awake, confused and disoriented, it took me a moment to get my bearings before I snatched my phone off the bedside locker and pressed a button. It was only a text message. From Aaron Anderson.

With a sidelong glance at Blaine's still sleeping form, I pressed 'view' and opened it, a sinking feeling of dread seeping into my heart as the words sank in.

[Hi Kurt. Mom and I want to

come over today to see Blaine.

Can you text me your address

please? Is after noon okay?]

I felt a chill as I read and reread the words, and for a moment I just wanted to tell him no. I didn't even want to mention it to Blaine. Blaine had been so hurt by his parents; would this now be a good thing for him, or would it make him worse again? I would have to check with him, see what he wanted to do ... but even as that thought went through my mind, I was certain I already knew what his decision would be. Despite their intolerance of his sexuality and their subsequent rejection of him, Blaine still loved his parents. He would never turn his mother away.

With shaking hands and a chill in my heart, I texted my address back to Aaron and told him we would see them at 2pm.

Then I turned to Blaine and gently shook him awake.

-.-.-.-.-

AN: Do me a favour please guys? If this chapter made you smile at all, even a little bit, then please hit that review button and tell me why. I thrive on feedback, and I would really love to hear what you all think about this story, and where you think I'm going with it. I'm like Tinkerbell, I need reviews to live. Won't you let me live! :D

BRL