Epilogue: Love Yourself
Four years later.
Blaine is 21 years old.
"Alright, everyone, that's all we have time for today. Remember! Papers are due at the start of class next week. Get home safe, everyone!"
Blaine closed his laptop and stowed it in his book bag. He tossed his paper coffee cup in the recycling on his way out of the lecture hall. Checking his watch, he hurried his pace slightly. He wasn't running late exactly, but he was hoping to arrive early to his next appointment.
To his surprise, his boyfriend was waiting for him on a wooden bench just outside the classroom.
"What are you d-doing here?" he asked in delighted surprise.
"I wanted to wish you good luck. Not that you need it, but still."
"Kurt," he sighed. "That's ssso sweet of you. What did Dr. Ch-Chari think of your monologue?"
He shrugged. "She's doing written feedback so I'll have to wait until next class to know for sure. I think it went well but you know me, I'm already coming up with how I could have done it better."
"That's my-my-my little perfectionist," he said affectionately.
"Oy, watch who you're calling little, short stack."
Blaine waggled his eyebrows, never in too much of a hurry to flirt with the love of his life. "If you w-w-want to cover me in syrup all you have to-to-to do is ask."
Kurt winked. "Good to know."
"Oh, hey! I al-al-almost forgot! I ch-checked my email just before class and I g-got the internship!"
"Really?" Kurt clasped his hands together in excitement, his eyes shining bright with pride. "That's phenomenal Blaine! Oh, I knew you would get it. They would be crazy to pick anybody else."
Blaine ducked his head, blushing, but secretly pleased. "I mean…j-just because I ssstutter doesn't mean I'm an e-expert or anything."
"Are you kidding me? You're a total expert! You've lived it! After all, aren't you about to go speak to graduate students right now? That sounds like expert material to me. You stutter and you have a performing arts background; you're literally perfect for the SAY program! Those kids are going to look up to you so much, Blaine. Just think, for a minute, about how much that kind of role model would have meant to you when you were their age."
He considered the profound impact it had when he had started attending NSA meetings in high school. The idea of helping young people who stutter build their self-esteem and confidence through opportunities to perform really was a dream come true. Even if he wasn't being paid.
"Okay, yeah, ssssomething like this would have b-been revolutionary."
Kurt looked smug. Reluctantly, Blaine admitted that he needed to get going.
"You're coming to mine and Rachel's for dinner tonight, right?"
Blaine nodded.
"What about the roomie? Did he ever make up his mind?"
Blaine laughed. Sam was notoriously flaky and his unpredictable modeling schedule was only partly to blame. "Yeah, he should be coming, just sep-separately. I'm taking the tr-train straight from Steinhardt."
Blaine basked in Kurt's warm embrace as they hugged goodbye. He was feeling fairly calm about the whole thing, but soaking up a little extra confidence never hurt. Just to be on the safe side, he tilted his face up and pressed his lips to Kurt's for a kiss. Amazing. Somehow the effect had not lessened with time. If anything, Kurt's ability to turn his brain foggy and his knees to jello had only increased over the past few years.
"Go! Go! I don't want to make you late."
When Blaine continued to linger, not ready to let go, Kurt playfully spanked him and then shoved him forward. "Get out of here!"
Blaine laughingly departed, his cheeks hurting from smiling.
—
"Let's give a big round of applause to our guest panel today."
Blaine scanned the room, taking in the rows of students setting up laptops and taking long swigs from thermoses. Dozens of pairs of eyes looked back at him, a few looked bored but most seemed respectfully intrigued. The room was filled mostly with women, but Blaine spotted two guys as well.
"You can read your books, pour over research articles, and listen to your esteemed professors—like myself—but there is truly nothing more valuable than hearing from someone who has sat on the other side of the table. You may be the expert on the science but your client is always the expert on their own experience. This is going to be the most important class of the semester."
A few of the students who had looked bored straightened up in their seats.
No pressure, right?
"Our first panelist is actually an NYU undergraduate who receives therapy right here in the student clinic. Please give a warm welcome to Blaine Anderson!"
The professor handed him a microphone. Blaine nervously took a sip of his tea, taking a moment to settle down.
"Hello, uh, everyone. Thank you ffffor having me t-today."
He shared his earliest memories of stuttering with the eager speech therapists of tomorrow. He talked about how his first speech therapist, Ms. Shine, made speech therapy feel fun and how important that was as a small child. He blushed with embarrassment as he shared how hard he had tried to hide his stuttering and even—laughing as he recounted the story—how he had confessed his stuttering to his best friend Elaine, only to discover she had known all along. He even shared his thoughts about the parallels between coming out as gay and coming out as someone who stutters.
He kept wondering if he should give shorter answers to the questions but the students were rapt with attention and the professor kept encouraging him to expand on his answers.
"Alright, Blaine will now take questions from the class. Blaine, please don't hesitate to pass on any questions if you feel even the slightest bit uncomfortable."
He nodded. Hands shot up around the room.
The professor looked at him expectantly. I get to call on people? But they're grad students! They're older than me! Well, alright then.
He pointed to a young woman in the front row with blonde hair and glasses; she reminded him of Ms. Shine.
"I was wondering…what are you working on now in speech therapy? It just…it sounds like you've come so far, it makes me wonder what there is left to work on."
"That's a gr-gr-gr eat question. I'm still working t-to improve my fluency, and practicing with a —speech therapist has been really helpful. I know that I st-still st-stutter quite a bit, but if you can b elieve it my st-stuttering used to be much more severe. So, we hone my st-strategies. It's a…a lot of working through those—you know, those, uh, difficult speaking situations, like t-t-talking on the phone or ordering at a-a-a restaurant. It's —been pretty fun, actually. We go on a-a-a lot of outings around the-the-the city so I can pr-pr-practice in the 'real world.'"
He took another few sips of his tea, glancing around the room for the next person to call on. One of the few male students had his hand raised, sitting near the back of the room.
"Have you, uh, uh, have you e-e-ever considered be-be-becoming a speech therapist yourself?"
Holy shit, he stutters too!
"First of all, I have t-t-to say I think that's…so cool that you are. I w-w-would love to have a sp-sp-speech therapist who stutters."
"Thanks, man!"
"As f-for me, I'm st-st-studying vocal performance but I hope to also do some, uh, uh mentoring as well. Alright, how about you in the-the second row." He pointed to a brunette girl with ramrod straight posture. She reminded him of Rachel.
"What was the most valuable thing you learned in speech therapy?"
Blaine chuckled. "Honestly…it w-w-wasn't any of the strategies or-or t-t-t- techniques. It was changing the way I related to my—to my speech. I used to hate it. I'd lie awake at night hoping that one day, someone would in-in-invent a surgery to cut it out of my br-brain. But sp-speech therapy—and honestly just life—helped me see that my st-st-stuttering is as much a part of me and my identity as being gay or loving to sing. Learning to be…okay with my stuttering, to love myself, stutter and all, that was the-the biggest gift I ever got from therapy. If there's one thing you can —pass on to your clients, it's that. If your cl-cl-client can get to that place of self-acceptance, well, then you're d-d-definitely on the right track."
Please review! I'm not above confessing that I probably wouldn't do this if I didn't get to hear feedback from readers. Especially if you haven't until now, I would love to hear from you here at the end of all things! What did you think of this 200,000 word story? Did you have a favorite part? Any unanswered questions?
Coming Up Next: This story may be over but my writing has only just begun. I plan to keep right on writing. I have a million and one ideas for stories so if you like my writing, don't forget to subscribe so you can check out my next project. I'm currently writing a one-shot for a Fic Exchange that will be posted April 1st.
Acknowledgements: My deepest and most heartfelt gratitude go out to my amazing beta-reader BlurglesmurfKlaine who had never beta-read before but without whose boundless energy and positivity this story would have suffered. She was my constant cheerleader through a complete story reorganization, abandoned plots, writer's block, and general self-doubt. Thanks to her, now the only way I know if my work is any good is if it made BlurglesmurfKlaine cry in public, yell at me in all caps, or reduced her to commenting only with the laughing+crying emoji. Thank you for keeping me on the right track! If you liked my story, then I recommend you check out There From the Start on Ao3. While the stories are different in many ways, there are a bizarre number of similarities between her story and mine...enough so that our running joke is that we are FIC TWINS.
I also want to give Mirvly a final shoutout for all of their help with "Express Yourself." Even though they were not involved with the sequel (because they had real life shit to deal with, not because they weren't amazing) there would be no Love Yourself without Express Yourself, so it feels only appropriate to thank those who supported me way back in the beginning. Thank you for having enough faith in this story to offer to beta-read it after only *two* chapters.
Finally, thanks to HKVoyage for being my most loyal commenter. As far as I can tell, she is the only person who commented on every single chapter of this entire series over on Ao3. Thank you for all the advice and support!
Esperanto's Stuttering Corner
What you thought we could get through the ending without one of these? Psh, you know me better than that by now!
What's SAY? Why did you include it in the epilogue?
SAY is the Stuttering Association for the Young which I only heard of this past week. When I saw that the organization was 1) in New York City, and 2) used performance to help young people who stutter build their confidence and find their voice, I just knew that my version of Blaine had to get involved somehow. I came across it through advertising for this amazing-looking documentary about stuttering called "My Beautiful Stutter." The teaser trailer already has me dying to see it.
Panel?: Yes, we had a panel similar to this when I was in graduate school for speech. It was the most impactful part of my stuttering course and the thing that most helped me understand the emotional component of stuttering and how critical it was for therapy to also foster self-acceptance. We talked about it in class but I didn't really *get* it until I heard from real people who had been through it. I imagine that Blaine's speech therapist he sees at the NYU student clinic would have invited him to this panel.
Student Clinic? Universities with a speech-therapy master's program will typically have a "student clinic" where students in the master's program provide speech therapy under the supervision of a highly experience "clinical supervisor." While the student is usually doing all or most of the treatment, the supervisor is ultimately responsible for the quality of the treatment and will provide continuity since student clinicians will be ever-changing. Therapy is provided at a discounted price and sometimes even for free to university affiliates. While the treating clinician will be less experienced, on the other hand you will get really personalized and creative therapy from a student who is constantly trying to impress their supervisor and has just been taught the most up-to-date practices.
LOVE,
Esperanto
