I don't own Glee or United States of Tara.

One month later

Blaine lay in bed awake, the sun slowly creeping in through the blinds. He held up his hand, contemplating the striped effect the shadows painted upon it. It had been like this for a while now, he's wake up long before his alarm, even on Saturday mornings such as this one. He wasn't sure why. He tried staying up later to force himself to sleep in, but instead he woke up earlier and just spent his days exhausted.

It was the weekend before winter break and Blaine was surprised that he had actually managed to pass all of his semester finals. Not because he hadn't had the time to study, but because he seemed to spend hours staring at his textbooks without actually absorbing any knowledge. But somehow he'd not only passed, but done so with flying colors, landing himself at the top of the dean's list and putting himself in serious contention for the much-sought after and enviable prize of valedictorian.

Not that Blaine cared. Sure, maybe deep in the back of his mind, the part that worried endlessly about his parents' approval, he cared a little, but his mind was otherwise occupied as of late.

It had been about a month since his fistfight with Conrad and he hadn't seen or talked to Kurt since. Kurt hadn't been back to McKinley since that weekend, not even coming back to pick up his stuff. Even though Blaine had no idea what he would even say to him, he'd held out hope until two weekends ago, when Finn and Burt Hummel had shown up to gather his belongings, stopping only briefly by Blaine's room to explain that Kurt wouldn't be coming back to Dalton.

Blaine winced as he remember the way Burt had looked at him standing in that doorway. He knew without a word that Burt knew what happened that night with Conrad in the parking lot and he clearly was not happy about it. He could also tell that Kurt had put all the blame on himself, which made Blaine feel even worse than he already had. Sure, Conrad had thrown the first punch, but hadn't Blaine pushed him to it? And really, hadn't that been the reaction Blaine had been hoping for?

After Finn and Burt left, Blaine knew it was over and it left him feeling strangely empty inside. Until then, he'd held on to a small glimmer of hope. He'd read the papers, watched the news, and wanted so desperately to call Kurt and tell him how overjoyed he was that Mikey was safe and sound and back home where he belongs. He watched Kurt on the evening news, tears filling his own eyes as Kurt shed happy tears over the son he never knew existed. He wondered daily if Kurt and Mikey were bonding, if, with this whole mess over with, the transitioning had finally stopped for good.

He had so many questions. So many, he feared, that would never be answered because he was too chicken shit to simply pick up the phone.

He doesn't want to hear from you, the nasty voice inside of Blaine's head said every time he started to dial Kurt's number. You're the last person he'd ever want to talk to.

So Blaine didn't call or text or facebook or anything, he just…tried to move on, which was definitely easier said than done.

Blaine felt the bed shift as the boy who lay beside him turned over in his sleep. He threw a heavy arm over Blaine and nuzzled gently into his neck. He was so unlike his usual, wakeful self when he was unconscious. So much more pleasant.

Suddenly, the weight of the boy's arm became unbearable and Blaine began to feel more than a little claustrophobic. He needed to get out of that room, away from him. He just needed to think. Wiggling his way out of the boys loose but heavy grip, Blaine moved slowly and quietly so as not to wake him.

"Where are you going?"

So much for an unnoticed escape. "Out," he said.

"Out where?"

"Just…out for a while. I'll be back."

"You promise?"

Blaine let the door to his room close on his words, knowing he'd be back to sleep in a matter of seconds. He was almost disgusted by the brief conversation, how clingy the other boy had sounded. It didn't escape Blaine that he and Kurt had been this way with each other, and then it hadn't been clingy, but cute. This wasn't cute. This was rebound blown way out of hand.

And with Sebastian Smythe, of all people.

Blaine walked around campus for a few hours, ear buds in, volume maxed out, trying to kill time. Finally, at what he felt like was a decent hour, he made his way to his dorm room. The one he hadn't slept in in weeks. He knew Nick had been taking advantage of the situation by sleeping over there more nights than not and he was fairly certain last night would have been no different.

Sure enough, when he knocked softly at his own door, he was greeted by not only his roommate Jeff, but by Nick as well. Both looked sleepy and suspicious. Jeff had his arms folded tightly across his chest.

"Can I come in?" he asked, feeling sheepish about requesting access to his own room.

"Depends," Jeff answered sharply. "Are you still fucking Sebastian?"

"Jesus, Jeff," Nick scolded his boyfriend softly. "Calm down, it's his room too."

Reluctantly, Jeff stood aside to let Blaine squeeze into the room. He'd come with the intention of talking to his two best friends, and while he knew they were upset with him, he didn't realize the extent to which that was true. Now he just paced around awkwardly while the couple watched him in silence.

"Well? Are you?" Jeff finally prompted again. Apparently it hadn't been a rhetorical question.

"What? Yeah, I don't know, maybe," Blaine mumbled. "Why do you care who I sleep with anyway?"

"I don't care who you sleep with," Jeff answered in a bitingly mocking tone. "As long as that person isn't Sebastian. You can sleep with anyone else in the whole universe, I don't care. But Sebastian, Blaine? Do you hate yourself that much?"

"Jeff," Nick warned again. The look on his face seemed to indicated that he'd just ingested some bad sushi, which is to say, how it always looked in confrontational situations such as the one he currently found himself in.

"What makes you think I hate myself?" Blaine asked, ignoring Nick's vague plea for peace and finally stopping and looking Jeff straight in the eyes.

"Oh, I don't know," Jeff retorted, feigning deep thought. "Maybe you feel guilty for what happened that night at the Lima Bean, maybe you feel like a coward for not even trying to apologize to Kurt for this entire mess, or maybe, just maybe you haven't quite realized that fucking Sebastian Smythe is scraping the bottom of the barrel."

"Enough!" Nick yelled loudly, causing both Nick and Blaine to jump. "Jeff, that's enough."

With that, both boys were silent, Blaine distracting himself by clearing off the mess on his bed and Jeff looking away guiltily.

"Look, Blaine, we just miss you, okay?" Nick continued. "You haven't been you for a long time now, not just in the last month, but for a long time. We're worried about you."

"Don't worry about me," Blaine said, trying to sound nonchalant but instead he sounded like he was issuing a challenge.

"Too late," Jeff added quietly from across the room. His tough love approach hadn't gotten him very far.

"Well what am I supposed to do?" Blaine asked, flopping down on his bed.

Why do I feel like we've walked down this road before? Jeff asked himself. Oh right, because we have. "Maybe you could try calling him."

Blaine actually snorted.

"Well what else is there to do?" Nick asked, his saint-like patience being put to the test once again. "He's in a good place right now, maybe if you just try—"

"Try to get back together? I don't think so."

"Try to talk to him," Nick corrected. "You can't just expect to go from zero to power couple overnight again, Blaine. That's not how real life works."

Blaine thought about what Nick said. It was so simple. He'd been trying to think of how to build the pyramid in one day instead of focusing on putting each brick in place. Of course he and Kurt wouldn't be a couple. Not for a very long time at least. It was going to take work, he was going to have to take risks—

"You have to break up with Sebastian," Jeff pleaded, as if he could read Blaine's thoughts.

Blaine didn't respond. He was too busy brainstorming. Too busy planning how he was going to find his way back into Kurt's life.

Jeff was right though. If any of his plans were going to work, he would have to dump Sebastian. Of course, that would be the easy part. Picking up the phone to call Kurt after all this time?

That was a whole different story.