Happy Saturday, my dearests :)

Thanks so much for all the great comments on the last chapter. I know Blaine's obliviousness is getting frustrating, but we're getting closer to the end, so... maybe things will work out soon? ;)

Kudos and love to Christine for being the best beta ever.

Lyrics for this chapter come from Older, a truly lovely song.

Enjoy!

Have I killed my thoughts right before their prime?
Have I bit my tongue one too many times
Have I said it all the way I really meant to?
If I wait 'til my tomorrow comes
Is the waiting all I've ever done?
And will I get to, get to know myself in the place I am
Get to fall in love with another man and understand?

Breathe in, breathe out. Breathe in, breathe out.

The tears stung in his eyes but he stubbornly refused to cry. There was no reason to.

Kurt lifted his hand and knocked on the door – it was late and he didn't want to scare the girls by letting himself in – and waited. Breathed in, and breathed out.

Rachel slid the door open, a green face mask on, her features stiff, only her big eyes moving and showing some curiosity until she found her friend standing in the hallway. "Urt?" She asked, her lips barely shifting to let the sound out.

"Can I stay here tonight?" He said, and though he tried to hide it, he could see Rachel noticing just how broken he felt.

The mask cracked on Rachel's face when she frowned in concern and reached out for her best friend. "Oh honey. Of course. Of course you can stay."

Kurt stepped into the loft, and wished he could leave his broken heart outside.

Blaine woke up the next morning, the other side of his bed long cold and empty, not even the imprint of Eli's head in the pillow, and walked into the kitchen to find that Kurt wasn't there, as he usually was. He frowned in confusion and, after checking his room, found that the bed was made.

He texted him, trying not to let the worry eat at him, and immediately got a reply saying he had stayed with the girls and that he would see him tonight.

Blaine put the phone down and went back to the kitchen. He didn't like how empty it felt, even emptier than his bed.

His last student of the day walked out the door and Blaine sat at the piano, feeling the silence of the apartment settle over him. It had been a lot like that in the past week – Kurt was rarely home, often running from rehearsal to meet with the girls, coming home late when Blaine was already in bed, if he even came back at all.

Blaine hated it.

He missed Kurt. He missed their chats, missed having breakfast with him every morning while they talked about their plans for the day. He missed sitting next to him on the couch and watching a movie, or getting home after a long day to have dinner with him and talk until they were too sleepy and they moved into the kitchen to do the dishes side by side, hips and arms and elbows bumping into each other, sharing small smiles as they passed plates and pots to each other...

Had he ruined everything? He had, hadn't he? Nothing had been the same since that night at the club, and Blaine hadn't meant to screw everything up and now he didn't know how to fix it. He just wanted things to go back to normal, he wanted Kurt to be a big part of his life again. He hated this. He hated being at the apartment. The past few months it had finally started feeling like a home, and now that feeling was gone again. It was just a roof over his head, a place to sleep. Kurt had made it a home the moment he moved in.

Sam was sitting at the bar when Blaine arrived, waved at him to get his attention and turned to the bartender to order a beer, all before Blaine had time to get from the door to the stool next to his.

Blaine took a seat and wrapped his fingers around the cool glass of the bottle. "Hey, sorry I'm late. The subway took forever."

"Dude, what the hell is going on with Kurt?" Sam said, clearly not in the mood to beat around the bush.

Blaine choked on his sip of beer. He slowly put the bottle down on the sticky wooden counter and turned to look at his friend. "I... what do you mean?"

"I don't know, man," Sam said, clearly frustrated. "Mercedes has been going over to the loft a lot, and I can tell there's something going on. Every time I'm around everyone gets really quiet, and Kurt looks like a sick puppy, and Santana glares at me like it's my fault. But I only see Kurt on Mondays for potluck dinner and on Thursdays for your gig, and I haven't done anything to him, so I assume it has to be something else..."

"Shit," Blaine said and ran his hand through his hair, which made Sam raise an eyebrow at him. That gesture usually meant Blaine was feeling stressed or nervous. "Yeah... I think it might be my fault?"

"Fuck, Blaine, what did you do?" Sam groaned. "Don't get me in trouble with Mercedes."

"What do you have to do with it?" Blaine asked, confused.

"You're my best friend. He's her best friend. I don't know how, but I'm sure if something goes wrong, this will end up being my fault because you're in his life because of me," Sam explained. "Just... what the hell happened?"

"I kissed him," Blaine admitted. Sam's eyes widened. "But I was drunk! Which... I guess doesn't really make it any better?"

"No, it makes it worst, dude!" Sam said, and punched him on the shoulder, not as hard as he could have, but still hard enough to make Blaine wince. "Why did you do that, Blaine?"

Blaine dropped his face onto his forearm. "I don't know."

He told Sam everything, filled him in on every detail, on the events that had led him and Kurt to the club and then on what had happened once they stumbled back to their apartment.

"I don't know what to do," Blaine whined after he was done. Sam studied him in silence as he sipped his own beer. "Do I talk to him about it? Do I keep ignoring it until it goes away?"

There was more under the surface, Blaine knew. Questions he wasn't ready to ask out loud, not even to himself, and especially not to Sam.

"Look, there has to be a reason why Kurt's sort of avoiding you," Sam said, leaning a bit closer as if he needed his words to get through Blaine's thick head. "I can't tell you what they are. I don't know. I think Mercedes knows. You'll have to find out for yourself. But this won't work if you don't talk to him, if you don't figure it out. You two live together, your whole lives are intertwined..."

"I don't want to lose him," Blaine found himself saying. "But I don't know what that means."

Sam stopped and really, really looked at him, in a way that seemed to Blaine like he was able to see past his skin, past his bones, to where he kept it all hidden away. He nodded swiftly, mostly to himself, it seemed, and then pressed his hand heavily on Blaine's shoulder. "I think you do know. You're just too scared to see it."

And Blaine knew – even though he wasn't capable of putting it into words, not now, not yet, it was too tender, too fleeting, it could all go away so soon if he reached for it and he wasn't ready to grasp it – he just knew, that Sam was absolutely right.

Fingers poised over the keyboard, Blaine closed his eyes, always chasing after the right words, the right verse, the perfect rhyme. It had all been so elusive lately, even though he could feel it right there, on the tip of his tongue, on the tip of his fingers. He sighed in frustration and pulled away from the piano, standing up and walking to the kitchen for some water, and then stood there, the cold counter digging into the small of his back as he drank and purposefully ignored the silence.

He reached for his phone and checked his messages – the last three he had sent to Eli remained unanswered, ignored. It was always like this with him, Blaine realized. Eli only texted back when he was in the mood, when he wanted something from him, when he was horny. After they had made up the previous week, nothing had really changed, and Blaine wondered if he had been stupid enough to expect things would be different. Eli wasn't going to start acting like a perfect boyfriend – that's not what he was, and Blaine didn't want him to be. But what Eli had to offer had stopped being enough long ago, only Blaine had been too comfortable and afraid to admit it.

He headed towards the couch and dropped down heavily onto the cushions. He was tired and jaded. Relationships weren't supposed to be like this, but if he was completely and truly honest with himself, he wasn't sure what they were supposed to be like, either. Every single relationship he had witnessed in his life had been dysfunctional – his parents' mainly, and some of Cooper's, as well as some of the incredibly twisted ones he had seen start and end at the blink of an eye during high school – and he had never been able to visualize himself in one that was any different. Surely love had to be nothing but a fairy tale, right? There was no way people actually fell in love and stayed in love, not hurting each other every single day...

What he had built with Eli had made so much sense to him in the beginning. They had fun together and had great chemistry in the bedroom. But Blaine wanted someone who would listen to him when he was upset, not someone who would show no interest. He wanted someone he could watch a movie with, not just drag into bed. He wanted someone who would stay til the morning, not disappear as soon as he got down from his orgasm.

He wanted to be someone's boyfriend, not someone's boy toy.

And he was getting really tired of being used but not understood.

He had been afraid of commitment once, of spending his life with someone because he was supposed to and not because he wanted to, of settling down with someone who ended up being the wrong person, of going through life bitter and unsatisfied, like his parents.

But what he had now – it wasn't any better. And Eli didn't care about him, not really, not even as a friend. Maybe he had at some point, but since then he had stopped trying because he knew that it required no effort whatsoever to get Blaine to sleep with him.

God, Blaine had been really stupid, hadn't he? And after seeing him kissing some other guy, he had just agreed to let it slide and stayed with him?

He should have known better. He should have had a bit more respect for himself. He might not be perfect, but he had dignity, and he didn't deserve this. He deserved more. He deserved to find true love, if such a thing even existed...

Maybe it was time he started taking the first steps into finding it.

There was a knot in his back that had been bothering him all week, and Kurt tried to massage it as he opened the door and stepped into the apartment. He hadn't been home much lately, but he was tired, couldn't even think about commuting all the way to Bushwick after such a heavy rehearsal and then back again in the morning...

And he couldn't avoid Blaine forever. Eventually, he needed to get over himself.

It had been a kiss, nothing else. There was no reason to ruin everything because of a silly, spur-of-the-moment kiss.

Kurt began to shred his layers as he moved from the door – coat, scarf, even his boots because his feet were killing him – after he dropped his bag carelessly on the floor. He needed to get out of the clothes he had worn to rehearsal and get some laundry done soon, but right now he had no more strength and no more energy. He just wanted dinner and a bath, and hopefully he would be in bed before he knew it.

However, as soon as he stepped into the living room, he found a sad, Blaine-shaped lump on the couch, and he stopped in his tracks.

"Hey..." He said tentatively.

Blaine opened his eyes and glanced up at him. "Kurt, you're home."

Kurt ignored the way his heart clenched painfully in his chest. "Yeah, I'm really tired, so I'm going to take a bath and..."

"Can you..." Blaine stopped and shook his head, clearly frustrated with himself. "Can you sit with me? Just for a little while?"

He looked so pathetic, wrapped in a blanket, his big eyes on him, pleading and eager, that Kurt couldn't say no. He hadn't spent time with Blaine properly in over a week, and he missed him, missed his friend and roommate, the guy he was used to coming home to every day.

He realized he hadn't really been mending his slightly broken heart by staying away, he had only been cracking it even further. He missed Blaine. Even if nothing happened between them, which was fine, it had never been the plan anyway, he cherished their friendship more than anything. Blaine had been there for him during some hard, trying times. He had given him his hand and pulled him out of the darkness when he couldn't find his way. He couldn't turn his back on him now, no matter what.

Slowly, Kurt approached the couch, as Blaine sat up and lifted one end of the blanket as if to invite him into his little cocoon of warmth. Kurt reluctantly accepted, though he tried to keep enough of a distance between them that they wouldn't brush against each other as they shifted.

Blaine was clearly having none of it, though, because he scooted closer until he could drop his head on Kurt's shoulder. "I missed you this week," he said in a soft, tentative voice. "Is everything okay?"

Kurt's breath hitched slightly and then he slowly began to relax. He couldn't deny how nice it was to be here with Blaine. He would deal with his stupid feelings later. He had missed this so much, missed Blaine so much... "It is now," he whispered.

Blaine was silent for a long, long moment, and Kurt allowed him to, waited, because he knew Blaine would tell him what was going on when he was ready. And it was nice to just be with him like this, Blaine pressed against him. It would be so easy to lift his arm and wrap it around Blaine, pull him even closer, tuck him to his side like a missing puzzle piece that would fit so, so nicely...

"I broke up with Eli," Blaine blurted out at last.

Kurt tensed. Not this again...

"Well, not really." Blaine scoffed. "You can't break up with someone you really weren't with in the first place."

Kurt took a deep breath and chastised himself – he needed to get over his own issues and be there for his friend now. "What happened?" He asked, and now he did lift his arm, but instead of wrapping it around Blaine, he pushed his fingers into the loose curls at the base of his neck.

"I didn't like the way he made me feel about myself," Blaine muttered quietly, almost brokenly, and it made Kurt's chest hurt. "I'm not... I'm not great at relationships, and it was my fault that I let this get as far as it did. I haven't had the best role models when it comes to adult relationships and loving relationships, and I thought what he had to offer was comfortable and easy and it was just... I don't know. Very toxic in the end, I think. I shouldn't have forgiven him after last week..."

"You really shouldn't have," Kurt said before he could stop himself, his tone sharp. He closed his mouth immediately, frantically searching for something to say to excuse himself.

Blaine looked up at him, his head still on Kurt's shoulder as if he didn't want to move. "I'm sorry about everything."

Kurt felt as if he was choking. He hadn't thought Blaine would bring it up... "It's okay."

"It's not," Blaine muttered and he looked so sad, so upset, that all Kurt wanted was to hold him forever. "It's really not and we should... we should talk about it."

Kurt's stomach felt as if it was filled with stones. If Blaine wanted to talk about it and said it wasn't okay, then it meant he regretted the kiss, something Kurt had suspected after he had immediately gotten back up with Eli, but to have the confirmation...

"Not tonight," he said, hoping he could deflect enough for Blaine to forget about it. "You're upset. It can wait."

It looked like Blaine wanted to protest, but after hesitating for a few moments, he simply closed his eyes and nuzzled further into Kurt's shoulder, which wasn't helping at all.

"It's not Eli I'm upset about, not really. I guess he was a distraction. I've always known things wouldn't get serious between us and I didn't really mind," Blaine explained, still in a quiet, small voice. Kurt began to absently rub his back. "It's just... what if this is all I have to offer? What if I never fall in love? What if I'm incapable of making someone happy, incapable of finding someone to make me happy?"

"Oh honey," Kurt said, tilting his head until his lips were pressed to Blaine's forehead. "We all think that, at one point or another... we all think there's something terrible about us that will make everyone look past us. It's just part of being human, doubting, being afraid..."

"I screw everything up," Blaine almost whined, his fingers finding Kurt's sweater and grabbing onto it. "I don't... I don't like hurting people. I don't want to hurt anyone, and I don't want to be hurt. I don't want to be alone either, I just... how do I..."

"Hey, hey," Kurt murmured, looking down at him in concern. "Shh, it's okay. Blaine, come on..."

It would be so easy, Kurt realized, to lean in and press his lips to Blaine's, to quiet his fears with a kiss... but it wouldn't be right. Because Blaine was upset, and because Kurt didn't think he wanted it.

And Kurt felt devastated, deep inside of him, because he knew they had the potential to be amazing together. He looked at Blaine and the world opened up before him, a realm of possibilities and love, and it scared him, really. It scared him too, to feel like this after just one drunken kiss.

But all Blaine wanted, all there would ever be between them, was friendship. And Kurt realized he was okay with that, if it was the only offer on the table. He would take it.

Having Blaine Anderson in his life – he decided, as he tightened his arms around him and pulled him close, letting him bury his face in the crook of his neck – was the most important thing, even if this was all there ever was.

BYE ELI. NO ONE'S GOING TO MISS YOU.

Hope you enjoyed! Can't wait to hear your thoughts on this chapter :)

Love,

L.-