"We need to talk," Blaine said plainly, walking into Nick's bedroom, his phone dangling from his hand.
"About what?" he asked curiously, looking up from his laptop. "The fact that that bowtie doesn't really go with that shirt?"
"My bowtie is fine. What is not fine is this situation between you and Jeff."
His friend scowled, returning his attention to his computer. "I told you I don't want to talk about that."
"Yeah well, when my boyfriend calls me saying that Jeff kissed him while murmuring your name, I think we do need to talk about it."
"He did what?!" Nick said, gaping.
"You heard me," Blaine ground out. "Now Kurt's with Jeff who finally wrapped up his dues to the porcelain god and cried himself to sleep because you don't have the balls to answer him."
"You can't blame me for this," Nick protested, setting the computer aside.
"I can blame you for being one of the causative factors. I've watched you ignore Jeff so many times this semester Nick, and I've asked you about it and you keep blowing it off. Now, I want an explanation because Kurt and I are now directly involved. Kurt told me what Jeff said. He told you he loved you and you just walked away? What kind of dick move is that?"
"I'm not gay Blaine," he shouted, "what else was I supposed to do?"
"Tell him that," Blaine shouted right back, "sit and talk to the boy you've literally known his entire life and tell him that you don't look him in the same way. You should have done that years ago, dammit."
"I didn't realise loved me like that," Nick said, in a softer tone.
"Bull," Blaine countered, "that's absolute bull Nicholas. You knew Jeff was in love with you. You've always known. We've always known. For a while we figured you were just sorting out your own feelings. But when you realised that you were straight Nick, when you were absolutely certain about it, you should have told him."
"Yeah well it wasn't the easiest conversation to start Blaine," Nick answered, dropping down onto his bed. "There's no way I could have turned him down without ruining our friendship and that's the one thing I don't want to lose."
"So instead you send him into the bottles for comfort," Blaine said, before clapping sarcastically. "Congratulations Nick, you're a genius."
"Blaine."
"Look Nick," Blaine said, cutting him off, "you're my best friend and I love you. But you've messed up here, and you need to fix this. Jeff is hurting, and I really hope you give enough of a damn about him to fix it before it's too late."
On that last, decisive note, Blaine stormed back out of the room. He flopped down on his bed, feeling a bit better now that he had gotten that out of his system. He hoped that between the realisation of what Jeff had done and Blaine's ire against him, Nick would finally be spurned into action so that the rift between the two friends could finally be fixed.
The deluge of snow had ended by the next morning, something Kurt was infinitely grateful for. The room was chilly, but not unbearably so, and so, with nothing more than an extra sheet wrapped around him, he settled into the rocking chair that Jeff's room surprisingly had, starting a gently rhythm as he went through the messages between him and Blaine sent over the course of the night. He didn't at all feel bad about the fact he had broken his promise to the blond, but truthfully, if Blaine had not yelled at Nick, he would have ended up calling him and letting go some Priscilla-level anger on him.
It had been a horrible night. Scarcely had they broken apart from the kiss had Jeff broken down into horrible, gut wrenching sobs that had somehow eventually led to them on the floor of Jeff's bathroom as Jeff's body rid itself of everything. Getting him showered and into bed was a task in itself after that, made worse by the fact that Jeff had never quite stopped crying. The last thing Kurt had managed to do, as per Blaine's instructions, was to force Jeff to chug down a glass of water, an act he repeated twice more during the course of the night in order to stave off the worse of a hangover Blaine had concluded that he would definitely end up with. Kurt was still hoping that his boyfriend was wrong about this. He really didn't want Jeff to be in any more discomfort than he was already in. He also kind of hoped that he didn't recall much of the night past the start of their drinking. Kurt really didn't hold the kiss against him, but he didn't want to add any more awkwardness to what Jeff was already fearing.
Kurt passed his time messaging his parents and Finn, carefully editing the events of the night, until, eventually, when he was just about to get really worried, a low groan erupted from the bed.
"Morning sunshine," Kurt greeted, decided upon normalcy.
"Shut off the cheerful," Jeff protested as he sat up, rubbing at his skull.
"Headache?"
"Not really," he answered, after a moment's thought, "more like a dull ache. That's new actually."
"Well I did force water into you," Kurt explained, crossing the room and sitting down on the bed bedside him. "Mrs Smith said you're grounded by the way."
"She found out?"
"Well you were retching rather loudly and I didn't have time to go down and repack the cabinet."
"Remind me to order her some roses," Jeff muttered, swinging his legs off the bed. "Bathroom," he added, stumbling off towards it.
He was in there a while, long enough for Kurt to recall what Mrs. Smith had told him the night before. He called her house extension, and within ten minutes she entered the room with a trolley. Kurt snickered at the volume of greasy food she brought up, hash browns, buttered toast, sausages, and bacon among other things. He would certainly enjoy the meal, but he was pretty certain this would be torture for his friend.
"I can be very evil when I need to be," she told Kurt with a wink, as she walked away. Kurt was pretty certain though that she heard her say, mostly to herself "I'll not be losing a second one" before the door had fully closed.
Kurt stored that statement away as something else to inquire about at a lazy time.
Breakfast was admittedly hilarious with Jeff refusing nearly everything with painful groans as the smells assaulted him. Kurt vaguely recalled Carole threatening to do the same to Finn one time, and it was definitely a method he was going to store away for future reference.
"Feeling any better?" he asked, still nibbling on a piece toast.
"Yeah, the I wanna die feeling is already gone," he answered, sipping at some juice. "You did good, Kurtsie. You can be my wingman in college!"
"I rather not have to do this again," Kurt admitted.
"I'll keep that in mind," Jeff said gallantly. "So are we going to address the elephant in the room or not?"
"I hope you don't mean that statue over there."
Jeff guffawed, "Didn't know you had it in you," he praised. "But no, I don't mean Trunks. I mean the fact that I kissed you."
"That did happen."
"Oh I know that," Jeff said. "Now tell me, was that the best kiss of your life?"
"Jeff!" Kurt gasped.
Jeff's roughish grin faded. "Right, now that the ice's been firmly broken, I suppose I can actually tell you that I'm sorry that happened. As you probably realised, I was in a bit of a mess last night. If you want me to tell Blaine, I will."
"Blaine knows already," Kurt informed him.
"And how dead am I?"
"Definitely not dead," Kurt said, reassuring him. "Blaine understands, and so do I, so no worries there okay?"
"Oh I wasn't worried," he said jovially, that grin of his firmly back in place. "Well maybe I was slightly worried that you'd decide that you preferred the Jeff Train than the Blaine Express."
"Stop it," Kurt said in exasperation, throwing a bit of bread at him.
"You wish I hadn't," he retorted, waggling his eyes suggestively before finally, relenting. "I'll behave," he promised. "But seriously, Blaine didn't give you any flack right?"
"None," Kurt confirmed, "I think he was more worried about you than anything."
"Which means Nick probably hates me more."
"What?"
"You told Blaine that I got drunk and kissed you. You probably told him everything actually. Blaine would have gone straight to Nick."
"I'm sorry."
"No, it's okay," Jeff answered. "You did the right thing. I was a mess back in middle school. Blaine would have gone into protective mode the moment he was done taking to you. That would explain the millions of missed calls and texts on my phone from Nick."
"What did he say?"
"Haven't read it yet. I already ruined our night, I'm not going to ruin the fruits of my labour with more depression. We have more Doctor Who to watch today."
"You did not engineer that snow storm Jeff. You are not that good a scientist."
"Oh Kurtsie," Jeff declared playfully, "you should never underestimate the level of my creative genius."