Notes: I have never been to boarding school and I've never talked to anyone who has. Any representation is entirely made up with a bit of influence from various things I've read on the internet and books and films set in boarding schools (in other words, Harry Potter, St. Trinian's, Wild Child and a couple of Enid Blyton books). Basically, it's not accurate at all.

chapter ix

When Kurt entered the choir room, everyone fell silent and stared at him. He fought back a flush and managed not to fumble his step.

At least, until Mercedes asked, "Kurt, why didn't you tell us about Karofsky?" He stopped where he was – just in front of the bottom row of seats, closer to the band than where Rachel and Finn were sitting in the centre of the row – and stared at her blankly.

"You could've confided in us, Kurt," Tina piped up. "We care about you, we would've listened."

"Yeah, dude, you're our friend."

"Man, I can't believe he actually threatened you—"

"I can't believe you didn't tell us—"

"Why didn't you say anything—"

"What a load of—"

"Seriously?" Kurt exclaimed, and they all thankfully stopped talking again. "It's not like none of you knew he was bullying me!"

"Kurt, we're all bullied," Rachel said, "you can't expect us to be able to differentiate between what's normal and what's, well, rather extreme."

Rather extreme, huh? God, Rachel was lucky she was Finn's girlfriend again.

"He threatened to kill me," Kurt said flatly, feeling some vindictive pleasure when he saw everyone wince. They'd ruined his the-Wicked-Witch-is-expelled high with their self-importance, after all, they deserved to feel a little guilt in the face of the harsh truth. "And before that, he'd been targeting me specifically for weeks. Maybe instead of asking me why I didn't tell you, you should ask yourselves why you didn't notice."

"That's not fair, Kurt," Mercedes said quietly. The ache of missing Blaine flared up and caught Kurt's breath, and all he could do was bite out, "Sorry," and then hurried to his seat before his legs collapsed under him.

Blaine had noticed. Blaine had never even seen Karofsky, he had never seen Kurt being bullied or assaulted, and yet he was the only person in Kurt's life to notice that something was wrong. (Okay, Kurt's dad had noticed, but the man had for some reason never said anything so he unfortunately only half counted.) Yet all his friends, all his comrades in choir and fellow underdogs, were blind to what had been happening right in front of them – it had taken Kurt getting slammed into a locker for Mr Schue to even pay attention to him, for all the teacher did.

Kurt's joy lay in his chest like a deflated balloon for the rest of the week, except for when Kurt unpacked his clothes because god, he had missed caring about his wardrobe. He extended an olive branch to Mercedes, inviting her over to help him sort through his clothes for eBay-ready items and then a shopping spree in Columbus on the weekend.

"I thought being an atheist meant not believing in any sort of afterlife," she said out of the blue.

"It is."

"Then are you not an atheist any more?" Kurt gave her his most judgemental side eye.

"I am as much an atheist as I was two months ago."

"Then what the hell's with all this occult stuff? And is this . . . New Age? I thought you hated this stuff."

Kurt darted over to where Mercedes was looking through one of his boxes (which was very much not labelled with CLOTHES – FRAGILE, the nosy woman) and snatched the scrapbook from her hands. His heart thumped heavily, and he mentally cursed himself for just leaving his research book lying around where everyone would find it.

"Boy, you've been acting seriously weird lately."

"Yes, well, that tends to happen when one almost loses their only living parent and then is worried about their own life."

"So not what I meant. You've been kinda not quite there and distracted for months now, and you've had that weird look on your face like when you were crushing on Finn." Kurt flinched and hoped Mercedes thought that it was just at the reminder of last year's humiliation. Besides, what he felt for Blaine was infinitely more real than his infatuation with Finn. "And now you're, what, creating scrapbooks about souls and other planes and other devil stuff?"

Kurt meant to respond but he got a bit stuck on 'devil'. Could demonic powers be responsible for all this? he thought, and then had to stop himself from laughing at how ridiculous this all would have sounded seven months ago.

Mercedes snapping her fingers in front of Kurt's face brought him back to the present.

"You just did it again."

Kurt shrugged. "What do you expect me to say?"

"How about whatever the hell has been going on in that fashionable head of yours?"

Yeah, and then she'd have him committed.

"I still think New Age stuff is a load of garbage but I think the whole scent thing is pretty interesting. As for being distracted . . ." He shrugged again. "Melancholy over the end of the summer?"

Mercedes hummed, looking unconvinced, but she didn't have that determined truth-seeking glint in her eyes so Kurt was safe from further investigation.

"If you weren't spending just as much time with me as before, I'd reckon you had a hot beau you're keeping from me."

Kurt turned around, in pretence to put his scrapbook away, in reality to hide his probably very telling expression from his best friend, and forced a sarcastic laugh. "Don't be ridiculous, Mercedes. As if I'd keep something like a boyfriend a secret. No, I'll have to get out this town before I find someone fabulous enough." One day – one day soon – he would be able to tell her about Blaine. There was no other option he would accept. "Besides, you know I'd tell you the second it became official.

"Yeah, you'd better."

Kurt was putting up the last of his shelf decorations when his dad knocked on his door.

"Hey, bud. Everything alright up here?"

"You mean now I've figured out how to store all my clothes in a regular closet?"

"Yeah." Burt's lips quirked up, in that way Kurt recognised as his 'I don't know what my kid is on about but I'll humour him anyway'. "What about school?"

Kurt smiled, teeth and all. There were still a few slurs and tossed balls of paper and notes shoved in his locker but most of the bullying was gone, at least for now. Kurt had had a worry that their ringleader being expelled would have incensed his other tormentors into physical assault; instead, it seemed to have made him almost entirely untouchable. "School's school. The jocks have backed off but the lessons are as dull as ever."

"Huh." Burt's frown caught Kurt's attention, and he turned around to face his dad fully.

"Why? Is something wrong?"

"I just got off the phone with your principal. She said she needed us both – and Carole, if she can – to come in before school tomorrow. Any ideas?"

Kurt shrugged helplessly. "I've got nothing. Sorry, Dad."

"It's probably nothing anyway. Just be ready to go early tomorrow, alright?"

Kurt groaned, but, "Sure."

He put the upcoming meeting out of his mind for the rest of the evening. It wasn't difficult, because he had to figure out the best placements for his photographs and ornaments and somewhere to hide his scrapbook, journal and print-out of one of Blaine's old Facebook profile pictures. But after he'd turned out his light and pulled up his covers, it became all he could think about. Principal Sylvester hadn't given a reason for tomorrow's meeting, but it could only be to do with Karofsky, and Kurt ended up only managing to doze restlessly through the night.

The next morning, Kurt forced down a plate of scrambled egg whites while Burt and Carole chatted idly. He appreciated their attempts at normality but he could see their nervousness in how tightly they held their own cutlery. Finn came down as the three readied themselves to leave and started shovelling the remaining eggs into his mouth, and Kurt had to quickly look away before the sight really made him throw up. He extracted a promise from Finn to drive Kurt's car safely and then joined their parents in his dad's truck.

In hindsight, he should have expected Principal Sylvester to say that the school board was overturning Karofsky's expulsion and the bully was returning tomorrow. This kind of disappointment was par for the course of Kurt's entire life. Carole and Burt exploded on either side of him, and Principal Sylvester looked just as unhappy.

"This psycho threatens my kid's life, and some school board made up of a bunch of people I've never met tells me there's nothing they can do about it?" Burt demands.

"Oh, they could do something about it – they just decided not to," Principal Sylvester replied. "No one reported witnessing him being violent, and there's no way to prove that he threatened you with violence. The school board president issued a verbal warning to Karofsky, and that's where we stand."

Karofsky was getting off with barely more than a slap on the wrist and a footnote on his permanent record. Kurt's stomach churned, and he gripped his elbows tightly to stop his hands from shaking. "I can't go back to being terrified all the time," he said, shaking his head. "I jump every time a locker slams shut; I flinch whenever I turn the corner . . . I don't feel safe at this school."

"Kids who bully, for the most part, have been bullied themselves, and I for one don't flatter myself that that behaviour can change. Now this kid Karofsky isn't gonna all of a sudden be nice to you, and I won't stand by unable to do anything about it. Effective noon tomorrow, Figgins is back in charge, as I've tendered my resignation as principal in protest." Kurt's eyes snapped to meet his old cheerleading coach's, and he felt something settle in his chest by the determination he saw. He was surprised by her support. But perhaps she was just paying him back for him winning the school's sixth consecutive Nationals cheerleading trophy. "I can't help you behind this desk, but I can be an extra pair of eyes out in those hallways. Someone ought to have your back.

"Besides, I miss my office. This room smells weird. I can't shake the feeling that I'm inhaling a lot of dead skin."

Kurt's lips jerked upwards in an involuntary smile; the woman's offensive nature was, somehow, strangely comforting right now.

"Thank you for everything you've done," Carole said. Principal Sylvester nodded, and Kurt willed his legs not to collapse as he stood and followed his father and stepmother out of the office. It helped that Carole was gently resting her hand on Kurt's shoulder, and she squeezed it before letting go when Kurt stepped away.

"Well, I guess I'll try to enjoy the rest of the day before the terror starts anew," Kurt said, trying to smile to soften the truth. "I'll see you at home."

He turned and started walking off to join his friends in the choir room, but then Burt called out, "Hey, Kurt, wait up a second. There's something we want to talk to you about."

"What is it?"

"That school you were up against for Sectionals, Dalton?" Kurt nodded. "You said it had a zero-tolerance policy, right?"

"Right . . ."

"We looked into it before the last meeting. We can afford it, especially if we delay our honeymoon a bit."

"Which is something we would gladly give up for you, honey," Carole interjected, resting her hand on Kurt's arm. "Besides it's not like we've never been on honeymoons before."

Burt nodded in agreement. "And I've spoken to the headmistress about transferring, and she said there are a couple of spaces available in the dorms, and you can be a student by Wednesday."

Kurt's head span. They were really willing to do this for him? He was so lucky to have such great parents. And not just that, but Blaine had said that the anti-bullying policy was strictly enforced – he wouldn't have to worry about being taunted by his peers ever again.

"Dorms?" Kurt asked.

"It's a bit far and expensive to commute every day, though of course you can if you want to." Carole said.

"I . . ." Kurt looked between the two adults, who looked back at him with warmth and encouragement, and he felt like everything really would be okay. "Yeah," he said through the block in his throat. He breathed out a thank you and wrapped them both in a tight hug. They held him back just as tightly and he let a few tears of relief fall onto their shoulders.

"We'll let the principal know, and then home, alright?" Burt said.

Kurt swallowed heavily. "I should . . . I should let my friends know. The Glee club. We have Glee now." He pressed his lips together for a moment to gather himself. He didn't know how they would react, but it probably wouldn't be good. At least he wouldn't have to worry about leaving them in the lurch; Regionals was months away and with Lauren in the group, the New Directions still met the minimum number without Kurt. "I think it'd be easier to tell them all at once."

"You sure, kid?" Kurt nodded.

"I'll talk to Principal Sylvester," Carole said with a sympathetic smile. "You two go tell Kurt's friends and I'll meet you both in the car."

The two Hummel men made their way to the choir room in silence. As they got close enough to hear the clamour from the choir room, Kurt grew more tense, and Burt laid a supportive hand on his shoulder.

"Do you want me to wait out here?" he asked. Kurt nodded.

"Please. I'll be out in a moment." He gave his dad a shaky smile, drew a deep breath and entered the choir room.

"Kurt, there you are! Everything okay?" Mr Schue said.

"Can I make an announcement?"

Mr Schue nodded and grabbed a stool. Kurt stood in front of the room, feeling strangely calm, and waited for everyone to stop talking.

"I want to thank everyone for all the support you've given me over the past few weeks," he said, "not just with the more recent incidents, but with my dad's wedding too. It's nice to know I have great friends here. Which is why it's so hard for me to leave."

"What do you mean 'leave'?" Quinn asked.

"I'm transferring to Dalton . . . immediately. My parents are using the money they saved up for their honeymoon to pay for the tuition and board."

"Kurt, you can't leave," Tina said, as Finn straightened up and demanded, "What the hell, dude? How about you talk with me about this first?"

"I'm sorry, Finn, but there's nothing to talk about. Karofsky's coming back tomorrow, so that means I won't be."

"We can protect you," Sam said, which made Kurt want to smile. He'd mostly stopped talking to the bleached blonde boy since his arrival to the Glee club but he wished he hadn't.

"Seriously," Puck agreed, which caught Kurt by surprise, "we can, like, form a perimeter around you like the Secret Service."

"Yeah," Finn added.

"The only thing that can really protect me is what they have at Dalton: a zero tolerance, no-bullying policy. It's enforced."

"Kurt . . ." Mercedes said, coming up to join Kurt at the front. She looks more confused than anything else, and Kurt's heart aches.

"I'm sorry," he said quietly, trying to convey how much he means it. And then he turned around and hurried from the room before they noticed the tears in his eyes. He kept his distance from Burt and Carole until they got back home, and then he let his dad pull him into a strong, comforting hug. He didn't cry, but he buried his face into his dad's familiar flannel and scent, closed his eyes, and breathed.

It took two days to finalise Kurt's transfer; Burt took the time off work to get it done faster and stop Kurt from falling even farther behind. They drove up to Dalton to meet with the headmistress, sign some paperwork and pick up Kurt's uniform, and on Wednesday morning, Burt helped Kurt pack up his car. Kurt hadn't spoken to his friends or even Finn over the last two days – they texted him, but they asked why and made promises which Kurt knew would be broken before long, and so he didn't reply.

"Call me when you get there, alright?"

"I will, Dad."

"Just worry about yourself, okay, honey? I'll keep the old man in line."

Kurt laughed and kissed his stepmother affectionately on the cheek. "Make sure he's in bed by nine and there's a list of numbers on the fridge in case of emergency."

"You got it." Carole winked, while Burt huffed and good-naturedly grumbled, "The lip I get in my own home."

"Oh, behave," Carole said, tapping him across the arm. Kurt laughed again, a little wetly this time.

"I'll miss you guys."

"We'll miss you, too." And now his parents' eyes looked watery too. Kurt wrapped his arms tightly around their necks and squeezed his eyes closed. He could barely breathe with how tightly they hugged him back.

"I'll call you before I start unpacking," he promised. And then he was off.

Kurt pulled into an empty space in the student parking lot and stared up at his dorm building. It was three floors – bottom floor for recreation, top two floors for bedrooms, Kurt remembered from his tour – and relatively unimposing. In fact, the building looked, anticlimactically average for such a huge change in Kurt's life, and unfairly small when Kurt thought about how he didn't know anyone here. Not really. Not when his only friend at Dalton was in a coma, and completely cut off from him, and he wouldn't be able to act familiar with Blaine's friends.

He closed his eyes and knocked his head back against his headrest. God, how he missed Blaine. Especially right now, when he needed a friend on his side. If Blaine were here – or even if Kurt could still get into the dream world, Blaine would smile at him and hug him and give him some crappy advice, and Kurt would tease him for reading too many fortune cookies, and then they'd both laugh and Kurt would feel a million times lighter.

He really, really missed Blaine.

After brushing his cheeks free of tears (but when had they fallen?), Kurt went into the building to find the head of the house (who also worked as a secretary in the main school), to whom he had been introduced yesterday, and together they moved Kurt's suitcases to his room. Mrs Shelley was a wonderfully warm woman, her eyes kind even though her silvering hair was pulled back into a tight bun. She reminded Kurt of the dorm rules (snacks, lights out, when homework time and leisure time were, the anti-bullying policy, when friends could visit, when significant others could visit, sanctions and rewards, tidying up) and who his dorm mates were, adding that he'd be introduced to everyone when extracurriculars had ended. Because Kurt was a junior, he was sharing a room on the second floor with only two other people.

"Is there a limit to how long I can use the bathroom?" Kurt asked.

"Well, considering there are only seven in the whole building, you should be as in-and-out as you can," Mrs Shelley said with a grin. She laughed when Kurt pursed his lips.

"Alright," he agreed reluctantly. He hoped his roommates wouldn't make fun of him for doing his moisturising every night. And that they weren't secretly homophobic. Sure, he could apply for a room transfer, but he didn't think he could deal with that on top of everything else at the moment – and besides, both Blaine and Headmistress Farhi had boasted Dalton's practically non-existent state of bullying, and Kurt would only be able to bitch out one of them.

"I'll leave you to unpack now," Mrs Shelley said once she'd given Kurt another quick tour. "Feel free to come down and grab the TV before the other boys come back, if you want." Kurt nodded and thanked her, and then he was alone. He rang the garage as he look at his roommates' parts of the room. One of them had a bunch of pictures – of, presumably, himself, his friends, his family, and possibly his girlfriend – and of the posters there was a soccer player, a guide to guitar chords, the Hogwarts coat of arms, and a couple of low-in-plot, high-in-explosions movies. In conclusion, not obnoxiously straight, but not promisingly accepting either.

"Hummel Tires and Lube."

"Hi, Dad," Kurt said.

"Hey, Kurt! Was the drive alright?"

"Yeah, it was fine. Boring, and long, but fine. I came off the highway to have lunch at one point."

"Have you met any of the other students yet?"

Kurt smiled at the Hogwarts poster. "No, it's a school day, remember? No one's supposed to be back for another couple of hours."

Burt chuckled. "Alright, alright. But everything's okay?"

Kurt missed Blaine like there was a hole in his chest, and he missed his dad more than he thought he ever could, and he missed talking to his friends. But already, he felt the weight of the terror brought on by Karofsky lifting from his shoulders. "Yeah. Everything's okay."

"I'll let you get on with unpacking, then. Call me when you get the chance later, yeah?"

"As soon as I can," Kurt promised. "I love you."

"Love you, too. And Kurt – I'm real proud of you, okay?"

Tears sprang once again to Kurt's eyes. "Okay," he answered quietly. "'Bye."

"See you soon, kid. I'll let Carole know you called."

The next few hours passed quickly. He hadn't been able to bring his whole wardrobe – in fact, when he'd spoken to Mrs Shelley about it yesterday, she'd advised that there wasn't much point in bringing fancy clothes as they could only wear civvies after dinner and on weekends, and most of the boys just brought lounging clothes. Still, he had a few too many clothes to comfortably fit in the the drawers (there wasn't a wardrobe in the room, and Kurt was glad he'd decided to leave his finer shirts at home). He ended up storing his underwear in his smaller suitcase and filling his would-be underwear drawer with accessories. He was surprised when, as he was setting up his mock vanity on top of the chest of drawers, he heard chatter and laughter coming from the hallway.

"Hey, you must be the new roomie! Name's Jeff, and this idiot's Lukas, and these losers are day-timers."

"Kurt," Kurt managed to say before the 'day-timers' burst into boisterous objections. He looked at them in bewilderment, and then Lukas caught his attention to shake his hand.

"Boys," the other boy said, grinning conspiratorially. He had a rather lovely lop-sided smile, and he was small – smaller than even Blaine, and he was the smallest guy their age Kurt had previously met.

Kurt couldn't help laughing, his roommates' acceptance of himself (because Kurt was wearing his tightest jeans, a dusty pink vest and a grey cravat – if Dalton was going to provide a safe space for him, he wasn't going to pull any punches) such a relief he could cry. And screw social conventions, Kurt was going to give Blaine the best kiss of his life when he next saw him.

Well, he'd been planning to do that anyway, but now Kurt had another reason.

Jeff – taller than Kurt by a couple of inches, with hair even more obviously died than Sam's – draped an arm over Kurt's shoulders and pointed towards the bed with the guitar and Harry Potter posters. "That bed is mine. I'm sure Mama Shelley ("She'll kill you if she hears you calling her that," one of the unnamed day students said) has laid down the law, but I'm gonna have to ask you to also not touch my bed unless you're about to chuck my sheets in the laundry or you've washed your hands first. And that's my desk, but if you're running out of pens then you'll have to take one of Lukas'."

"Jeff's a germophobe," Lukas said, rolling his eyes.

"About one third of Americans don't wash their hands after using the bathroom," Jeff retorted. "And that's if I'm lucky."

"It's fine – my old school's guidance counsellor has OCD," Kurt interjected. "Just as long as no one touches my vanity."

Jeff looked at Kurt's drawers and grinned. "Kurt, I think you and I are gonna get along just fine."