"Frank, go with Cooper and Blaine. I'm going to ski ahead and order lunch at the restaurant. By the time you get down the food will be ready." If Megan Anderson was good at anything, it was taking charge. Her boys had been on the slopes all morning and were acting like they were about to starve to death.

The skiing trip had been her husband's idea. Now that Blaine was five and old enough to ski on his own without needing too much help, they decided to spend spring break in the mountains.

"Mommy, I wanna go with you," Blaine whined, popping off his helmet as they got off the lift. Megan gave him a pat on the back.

"Go with Daddy and your brother," she told him. "You'll have more energy after you eat. This hill isn't very big, but there're some trees so you need to be careful, honey. Put your helmet back on. Frank, keep an eye on them. Coop, have fun!"

Her ten-year-old waved as she started on down by herself. Megan got their meals ordered, and waited for the rest of her family to join her.

When it had been twenty-five minutes with no sign of her family, she began to worry. She had a clear view of the slope, and hadn't seen them come down yet. Perhaps Blaine was having a little trouble, but they should have still already made their way down.

Megan tried not to let herself be concerned, until she saw a Ski Patrol sled make its way down to the small mountain clinic, followed by her husband and oldest son.

Something had happened to Blaine.

Megan abandoned their lunches and rushed to meet her husband, who had seemed to be on his way to find her, as well.

"Where's Blaine?" she asked desperately. "What happened to him, Frank? I saw them coming down with a sled. Was that him?"

Her husband tried to calm her as he led her inside. "He skied into a tree, face first. He's okay. He's conscious all right, he was crying the whole way down. His nose was bleeding everywhere."

Megan looked up and saw her baby, sitting with Cooper on a stretcher he looked much too small for. Blood painted the majority of his face, pouring out of his nose and the scratches that criss-crossed his forehead. His upper lip was busted, and she wouldn't be surprised if he had knocked out a baby tooth or two.

"Mommy!" he howled, raising up his arms. Megan scooped him up, as bulky as he was in his little ski bib. His sweaty curls were matted on his head, and there was even some blood in his hair.

"Shhh, you're okay, sweet boy," she soothed, holding his little hands in hers to warm them up. "It's okay, baby."

"I took his gloves off since he was getting blood on them," Cooper explained. "I should've waited until we got inside."

Megan squeezed her son's arm. "It's okay, honey. He'll warm up. Frank, what in the world happened? How did he manage to run into a tree?"

Her husband scratched his head. "I took them off the main run to get down a little faster," he admitted. "I think Blaine was just trying to keep up and he picked up speed and lost control. I just wasn't thinking, or I would have slowed down for him."

"Was he wearing his helmet?" she asked, looking at her son's injuries closer.

Her husband froze. Megan remembered so clearly seeing Blaine take off his helmet. If he had put it back on, if her husband had made sure he had his helmet on, then it wouldn't have happened.

"Mommy, my head hurts," Blaine sniffled, his nose running and dripping off his chin. Megan tried to clean him up a little, but he was in too much pain when she touched his face, so she just held him and tried to calm him down a little.

Some nurses and a trauma doctor finally showed up to take a look at him. Blaine cried the entire time they examined him, refusing to cooperate unless his mother could hold him. He was finally diagnosed with a broken nose, a concussion, and sent off with a few dozen stitches, as well.

Megan spent the rest of their trip in the cabin with Blaine, tending to his injuries and just being thankful it wasn't worse, but in the back of her mind, she was terrified what a head injury like that would do to him in the long run. She just couldn't live with it if Blaine had permanent brain damage from a concussion...

"I can't do it." Blaine threw down his pen and leaned back in his chair so the front two legs were off the ground. "Kurt, this sucks. I don't care what you think, McKinley is so much harder than Dalton. Especially AP! I should never have signed up for statistics."

Kurt looked up from his copy of Hamlet. "Are you done ranting? We can take a break, if you want."

Blaine shook his head, but he slammed his chair back down and rested his chin in his palm. Kurt could see his frustration, and he felt terrible for him.

They had been sitting in the McKinley library, doing homework after school until their four o'clock glee rehearsal. Kurt had never been around Blaine very much while they worked, but he had no idea his boyfriend struggled with his schoolwork as much as he did.

"Can I try to help?" Kurt asked. "I didn't take stats, but maybe I could take a look?"

Blaine shrugged as he slid his textbook across the table. Kurt looked at Blaine's disorganized and sloppy notes, and frowned. That was his first problem.

"You didn't take very good notes in class," Kurt told him. "Why don't you start there? You can't do well on the assignments until you have something to go off of. Can you redo your notes?"

Blaine took his book back and ran his hand over his face. "I have a headache. Let's just go to rehearsal early. I can't do this all right now. I'll get my mom to help me."

Kurt didn't want to argue with him, not when he was in a mood. He put his book away and grabbed his bag. "Have you been having this hard of a time all year? I had no idea, Blaine…"

Blaine grabbed a drink at the water fountain as they walked out of the double doors down the hall towards the choir room. "It-it's been like this for awhile."

Kurt stopped walking as Blaine paused to elaborate. "When I was really young, my family went skiing, and I wasn't wearing a helmet. I hit my head on a tree, and I broke my nose and had some cuts, but they told my mom I just had a concussion, but ever since then I've gotten some really bad headaches, and it makes it hard to concentrate and for new things I learn to stick in my head. That's why Dalton was such a good fit, because the teachers new how to help me with it. But here I don't get that help, and my grades have been slipping all year." His eyed widened. "Kurt, you can't tell anyone about this. If anyone else found out… just, please don't. Okay?"

Kurt paused, trying to process the amount of information that had been thrown at him. It felt like the final pieces of a puzzle coming together. Suddenly he had an explanation for Blaine's numerous headaches and his frustration with his schoolwork at McKinley. At Dalton he had seemed so much happier, but he had left all that behind to be with Kurt.

"No, I won't tell anybody," he promised. "You can trust me."

He left it at that, and they finished walking to rehearsal, the subject already changed, but it would forever remain in the back of Kurt's mind, a million unanswered questions.

Author's Notes:

Hi friends I finally filled a prompt! Well, mostly cause this actually happened to a friend of mine. He broke his nose when he was ten and he still has issues, especially with taking tests and such.

So there's some baby Blangst.