KURT

Kurt was still thinking about Elliott's advice two days later. He knew Elliott was right, but it still felt strange to want to spend time without Blaine. The last time they broke up, it was because they had been spending too much time apart.

What if this "alone time" Kurt needed would be too much for Blaine? Would he cheat on him again? The hardest part (and this was something that he hadn't even told Elliott yet) was that Kurt wasn't even 100% sure Blaine wasn't doing that already, what with the lack of interest he showed in being physical with Kurt. Maybe crowding him everywhere was some sort of compensation tactic?

Kurt shook his head and sighed. What was he thinking? Blaine was doing his best to be around him because he loved him. And really, when would he even have time to cheat on him, when he was with Kurt every hour of the day?

Thus occupied in his mind, Kurt walked into the loft on autopilot, dragging his feet. As he looked up, he saw outlines of ugly yellow tape right in front of him, and a white desk and chair combo squashed between his closed storage (slash inspiration board) and Rachel's part of the loft. Rachel's shelves and the lightbulb star were unceremoniously shoved aside with a cable running diagonally over the floor to the socket. Kurt's flea market faux art nouveau lamp was perched on top of the desk, and right next to it stood Blaine's aluminium architect lamp, positioned so that Kurt's storage door would no longer open. What the actual fuck?

In front of it all: Blaine, looking pleased with himself. When he noticed Kurt, he smiled and said: "Hey, did you hear Sam got a jo-"

"What are you doing?" Kurt cut him off sharply. He did not care about Sam right now.

"This," Blaine said smugly, circling his fingers in the air around the taped off disaster, "is something I think would make a really great office-area." He caught his own reflection in the aluminium lamp, licked his finger, and started to rub at a smudge on it with his spit.

"Back away from the lamp, okay!" Kurt commanded. "What were you thinking? An office-area? Here? When someone enters their sanctuary, they don't want their eyes immediately drawn to a hideous work space."

Blaine shook his head. "I'm not done yet," he said patronisingly, rolling his eyes at Kurt. "Obviously the tape is gonna come off-"

"It better! If that stuff leaves traces on the exposed brick wall, I swear to god-" Kurt started threatening.

"And there's gonna be some pictures, and I was thinking a rug and some shelves-"

"No. No ," Kurt hissed. "This isn't McKinley, Blaine. You can't just barge in here and do whatever you want, whenever you want, okay?" He spread his arms in a gesture of utter disbelief. A rug ? He took a deep breath and tried to compose himself before he continued. "These things… you just can upthrow the chi of the place. Do you know how hard I worked to get everything right in here? To get the positive energy flowing-" Kurt broke off as it became clear from Blaine's expression that he wasn't listening.

He walked over to his own desk, feeling hollow and unsettled. Suddenly, for the very first time, he understood exactly why Finn had minded so much when he had redecorated their shared basement bedroom without asking for his input.

"You could have at least consulted me before making design decisions in my home," he said, a little humbled by his epiphany.

"I thought that this was supposed to be our home, Kurt," Blaine bit back.

Anger bubbled back up inside of Kurt at Blaine's tone. "Yes. Yes, it's our home. But you forget one thing, Blaine," he replied angrily, spinning around to face him again. He pointed his finger at his fiancé's face.

" You moved in with me . When you were back in Lima running around in superhero sidekick costumes and making felt puppets, I found this place. On my own. I haggled over the rent with the bitchy landlady, I scrubbed, sanded and painted. I scoured the flea markets to get it filled with furniture. I turned a hanger into a home, all the while balancing my internship with my college education. When our rent suddenly got raised after the first christmas? I got a second job. When we got robbed? I replaced our inventory and the locks. I dealt with roommates moving in, moving out - and none of them, not even Santana, ever had the nerve to mess with my feng shui ."

Blaine, who had grown increasingly annoyed during Kurt's tirade, now looked like he was ready to spit fire. "How dare you patronize me," he said, his tone threatening and deep with disgust. " I'm sorry I didn't graduate with you, Kurt. I'm sorry Dalton kept me back a year because I was bullied so badly at my old school I couldn't attend all my classes-" he spit out, his posture and facial expression making sure Kurt knew he wasn't sorry in the slightest. "But if you think that having a year of experience here in New York," he used air quotations sarcastically, "gives you some kind of maturity over me, then you're wrong. And you are not the indoor decorator genius you think you are. Believe it or not, not every single design decision you make is brilliant, or even functional. This whole area was empty. You had a prime piece of the floor plan going to waste! I know you keep saying you feel crowded, but the solution is not leave your apartment bare."

"Actually, you'll find that keeping 20-35% of your storage space unused for new ideas and the flow of fresh-" Kurt started to cite his Feng Shui For Millennials handbook, but Blaine cut him off.

"It's ridiculous! And I'll tell you something else. This whole 'privacy curtains between the bedrooms' thing is stupid, come on! We can hear every noise our roommates make at night. God knows what they hear from us!"

The more intense Blaine got in his anger, the calmer Kurt became. All of this was like the rerun of a bad show. He crossed his arms over his chest and stood his ground. "Your snoring, I imagine. And not much else." He raised an eyebrow and gave Blaine a pointed look.

Blaine's mouth fell open. "I can't believe you are bringing up our sex-life again!" he let out.

"Technically, not again , since you refuse to talk about it," Kurt replied. He shook his head. "You know what? Elliott was right, we're losing our boundaries."

Blaine blinked, and started to stutter. "I'm sorry, Elliott? Wh- what does Elliott has to do with any of this?"

"He just gave me some advice," Kurt started to explain.

"About what? Feng shui ? Our sex-life?"

"What? No! We were just talking about all of this, us living together-"

"I bet you were talking," Blaine scoffed. He took a few steps closer to Kurt, his hands balled into tight fists.

Kurt didn't like this insinuation at all, nor the way Blaine was walking up to him. "He's my friend," he protested.

Blaine rolled his eyes. "I bet he's your friend," he spit out.

Kurt lowered his arms and crossed the remaining distance between them with fast, angry strides. "Calm down, psycho," he said angrily, coming to a halt in front of Blaine. "And stop being so-" He raised his hands and waved them at Blaine's face. "Pouty and weird. It's annoying. Nothing is going on between Elliott and me, and if you'd let me finish for once I could explain what we-"

"Nothing? Nothing 's going on? Then what the hell was that picture all about? The one on facebook, with him kissing you?" Blaine demanded.

Kurt shook his head. "That was months ago, and I told you back then it was harmless."

"Yeah, right. Like those text messages from that frog face back in high school."

Kurt narrowed his eyes. He used his height advantage to glare down at Blaine. "You're a fine one to talk, Blaine Anderson. ' Oh, Sebastian's harmless, his texts are family-friendly, blah blah -'" Kurt rolled his eyes in disgust. "He wanted into your pants and you knew it. You liked him flirting with you, so you never stopped it. Family-friendly, my ass. And as far as I remember, you were the one who cheated on me . So don't you dare lecture me on what's harmless."

Blaine gaped at Kurt, lost for words.

Kurt took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "Okay. Let's just be adults, and put everything back where it's supposed - to- go." He enunciated his words distinctly like he was talking to a fussy four year old.

Blaine blinked, and started stepping backwards. "Okay, I got an idea," he said sarcastically. "Why don't you put it back where it's supposed to go, because it's your apartment?" He then turned on his heels and stalked out of the door.

Kurt let out an exasperated breath. This was the exact way Blaine typically left their arguments: in a huff of childish indignance. No apologies, no concessions or compromise. He usually just waited for Kurt to come around.

"Fine," Kurt called after him, though it wasn't fine at all. "I will!"