When Kurt realized that Blaine was going to sleep somewhere else Sunday night as well, he put his father's old flannel shirt on over his sweat top. He knew it didn't make any sense, but he was reluctant to wear it with Blaine anywhere around, as though he could somehow shield his dad from the knowledge of what had happened since his death.

Before going back to sleep, he texted or wrote emails to everybody in Glee. He told Rachel and Mr. Schue more about Ms Cordwain's voice lessons and the video collection, told Mercedes about the rest of his decorating ideas, and told them all about the campus amenities and how easily he had been accepted by the Warblers and that nobody at Dalton taunted or bullied him. He told them how David had gone back into the Warblers' carefully documented archives to get music and performance notes from the last time that they had "a countertenor of your caliber." There was a major Donor's Dinner coming up and the Warblers had been invited to do a retrospective of music from the past decades and they wanted to show off Kurt's talents. He snorted at what he'd produced, never lying but referencing Blaine and his own subjugation only as "some things are challenging." Maybe he could write financial reports or politicians' speeches for a living, with that ability to gloss over certain aspects of a situation. He must have fallen asleep after that, because he didn't wake up until a knock at the door the next morning.

"Come in?"

"The mighty Empress Josephine presents her condolences on your illness and offers rich gifts of consolation." Hamza brought in two mugs of coffee, with a small bag of muffins. "How are you feeling?"

"Much better, thanks."

"Now we can have coffee and at least as long as your voice holds out, I want to hear more about you." Hamza fixed his bright eyes directly on Kurt and if he hadn't been almost two meters tall, he would have looked like a little boy at story time. Kurt had to laugh at his eager attentiveness.

"Well, I've spent all my life in Lima. Have you ever been there?" Hamza shook his head and Kurt assured him, "You've not missed that much. For most of us, it's a place to be from rather than to go to. But it's where my friends are."

"And your family?"

Kurt still had to swallow hard before saying anything about Burt, even to a sympathetic listener, or perhaps especially to a sympathetic listener. "My mother died when I was younger and my dad died just a month ago."

Hamza gasped, "I'm so sorry, I wouldn't have brought it up if..." Kurt looked away and Hamza added, quietly, "In Paradise, they're still with you, Kurt."

"I don't believe in a god," Kurt snapped, and Hamza groaned, "I can't believe I keep saying all the wrong things. Can we restart the conversation entirely? Good morning, Kurt, how are you feeling? I see that a conversational klutz brought you some breakfast, while he himself will be snacking on his own foot, by the looks of it."

Kurt had to laugh at the other boy's dismay and that provoked a coughing fit. Hamza threw up his hands and then buried his face in them, which didn't help Kurt control his laughter. "Why don't you tell me about yourself, then?"

"So I can keep digging myself into this hole? Well, then, my parents emigrated from Lebanon in 2005 and my mother got a job in Cleveland. She is a hospital administrator and please don't stop believing in genetics when I say that my father was in the diplomatic service."

"Lebanon to Cleveland must have been a big change."

Hamza's face grew thoughtful, "It was, yes, especially for them. They didn't want to leave, but...they could tell that Lebanon was only going to be torn further apart, that in every community, too many neighbors had become enemies and too few of the influential wanted unity more than power. When they talk about unity and unifying Lebanon, they mean only to make the entire nation believe what they believe. There was a bombing in our neighborhood and two families were killed. One of them was my best friend's family. I couldn't even speak for almost a year and that was when we left."

"I'm sorry."

He laughed, "You actually do have an alibi for most of the bombings and assassinations, with a few exceptions. Since having too perfect alibis is always a sign of guilt, I don't think you really need to apologize. How did we get to depressing each other so early in the morning, anyway? For the rest of my story, I've more than made up for a year of not being able to talk, as I'm sure you can tell, and I want to go to Johns Hopkins for pre-med. And you?"

"I want to go to New York, but I'm not sure what I want to do or where I want to go to school. Sometimes I think I might not even finish high school." Hamza looked entirely confused and as though he were about to spout every single platitude and piece of common knowledge that Kurt had ever heard and the next thing he knew, he heard himself shouting. "At my old school, I was bullied every single day, every single day! I've been shoved into lockers until I'm black and blue, people came to my house to intimidate me there, I had to carry changes of clothing every day because people threw drinks all over me, and finally one of the worst bullies kissed me by force and it was my first kiss. He threatened to kill me and he acted like he was going to rape me if he ever got the chance and the only people who cared couldn't do one single thing to make it stop except say that they'd keep an eye out. So they could do what, stop him in the act of killing me? And now I'm here, where nobody bullies me and people treat me like I'm human and not a freak because I'm gay, but Blaine gets to have sex with me whether I want it or not." His voice gave way before he had finished, but he had to rasp out the last, "If Blaine had just waited...if he'd let me decide if and when...I'd be following him around with my tongue hanging out like some kind of puppy...I'd have wanted him so much..."

He hadn't realized how much he wanted to say all this out loud and how much he'd been holding back, not even able to let the words escape and burden somebody who cared about him. Hamza was looking at him helplessly and slowly reached out, tentatively gathering him into his arms and rocking him back and forth. "Shhhhh, it's all right, I'm a stranger, you can tell me...you can cry, Kurt, shhhh, it's all right to cry like this..."

When his sobs quieted, Hamza asked, "Kurt...have you considered asking Blaine...he's not cruel, I don't think he even guesses what you're going through, I don't know him well, but if you explain..."

"I've thought about it every time he touches me or kisses me." There were no words for Kurt to express the emptiness that started in his gut and enveloped all of his mind and heart as he whispered, "But what he if says no? Then I wouldn't have anything to hang onto...nothing." Part of him felt almost a miserable triumph as he watched Hamza try to think of the perfect logic to refute this and fail.

AN:

I hope this explains why Kurt's not told Blaine off!

Just a short chapter this time around since I'm not sure if no reviews for the last one meant that the chapter and direction weren't very good or if it was just one of those things. I don't want to drive too far in the wrong direction!