Fic: "My Body Betrays Me," Chapter Four -- Part Two, Cont. Non-con Kurt/Karofsky, Kurt/Blaine
Chapter One: Dave
Chapter Two: Kurt
Chapter Three: Blaine
Chapter Four: Kurt -- Part One
Click here to go back to the first segment of Chapter Four, Part Two.
--
An hour and a half later, standard-issue school loafers crunching earth and twigs beneath them, Kurt half-jogs through the sparse woods that edge along the outskirts of the Dalton Academy campus. Although little more than a dusting of slender saplings past the track field, the idea had been for the trees to provide at least some privacy for what is to come.
The urge to sprint keeps flaring up in bursts, and he can feel himself starting to get slightly out of breath, hair beginning to fall out of place. Logically, Kurt knows he has enough time to get to the meeting place before anything starts to happen. The persistent note of what if I don’t make it continues to pound along his mind regardless.
Thankfully, only a few moments later the clearing becomes visible up ahead. The worn-looking wooden shed is the only structure; it is weather-beaten, and the planks along the base are still dark with moisture and earth from the last rain. Blaine is the clearing’s only occupant. He stands, the dark of his hair and clothes out of place against the airiness of the woods, with worry etched along his brow. The look of relief on his face when Kurt comes into view is practically palatable.
“Hey,” breathes Blaine, looking bolstered at Kurt’s arrival. “Did you send it?”
Pace slowing, Kurt winds himself down to a quick walk but does not stop until he is standing less than a foot away from Blaine. Face only slightly flushed and only a little out of breath, Kurt feels an out-of-place burst of gratitude for Dalton’s comprehensive physical education program.
“Done,” responds Kurt, giving his head a little shake.
“How long do we have?”
“Probably fifteen minutes?” Kurt reaches into his pocket to pull out his phone. He double checks the time, then nods. “I’ll get inside the shed in a minute just in case, though. Better safe than sorry.”
Intending to spout off some kind of sarcastic comment, Kurt glances up - but is stopped in his tracks by the look on Blaine’s face. There is concern there, amid the furrowed brows and darkened eyes. There is worry, and remorse, and a quiet shock at the way the world is that makes Kurt’s heart ache.
There is also pity.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” asks Blaine softly.
“Don’t,” says Kurt, shaking his head frantically. His voice is harder than he intends for it to be, because he can’t think about that right now. It’s hard enough to ignore the ache in his jaw and the way his stomach won’t stop twisting, a remnant of the sticky bitterness inside. He doesn’t need Blaine reminding him, too. “Just don’t, okay? Later.”
Blaine opens his mouth to speak before closing it again. His shoulders slump, and something in that change of posture reminds Kurt strongly of a kicked puppy. “... all right,” Blaine murmurs, quiet and reluctant. Biting down on his lip, Kurt racks his mind for something to say to distract him.
“You’re sure no one’s going to come by here, right?” he asks, leaving the bait for Blaine to take if he wants it. The secrecy of this place is something they’ve already discussed to death this afternoon, but Blaine is easy to distract when he wants to be.
Sure enough, Blaine shakes his head. “No. This used to be the groundskeeper’s shed a few years ago, when the school board decided having one on the main stretch would be ‘unseemly’. Having it way out here was pretty impractical, though, so they installed a new one behind the main building last year. Nothing important is even kept inside anymore.”
Nodding as though the information is new to him, Kurt reaches out and places a hand on Blaine’s shoulder.
“You don’t...” he begins, voice faltering. Because it’s hard to believe that only a few hours ago, he was slumped in this boy’s arms, clinging and crying and completely undone. So much has happened since then. But if Blaine wants to back out... Kurt takes a deep breath. “Blaine. If you don’t want to do this you don’t have to, okay?”
“I do,” Blaine maintains at once, letting out a humourless laugh. “God, do I ever. He’s... he’s done so much to you, Kurt. He deserves to be called out. He deserves to be called out by you, but...”
“But I’m a bit of a liability, I know.” One suggestion of how easy it would be for Dave to control Kurt were he to confront him in person was all it had taken to eliminate that option. “And before you ask again: yes, I want to stay here while it happens. Just in case anything goes wrong.” Kurt glances down at his phone, and anxiety bursts inside his chest. “Okay. Okay, it’s time. I’m going to get inside now, so just... be careful, okay?”
“I will,” says Blaine, and there is an awful moment where Blaine makes a half-aborted movement toward him; as though to step forward and pull Kurt into a hug. And god, more than anything in the world, Kurt wants that. Wants to be safe and warm and held by Blaine. Tight against his chest and with the smell of Blaine’s aftershave teasing along his nostrils. Tucked up in Blaine’s arms, where nothing bad can really happen.
Embraced by someone who actually means it.
Before anything can happen, though, Blaine stops himself. Freezing in place, Blaine exhales nervously - and indicates toward the shed. Without another word, Kurt opens the door and conceals himself inside.
It isn’t exactly pleasant. The wood around him smells of rain and rot and earth, and out of the corner of Kurt’s eye he catches the barest glimpse of several insects along the wall as they scutter out of sight. The only light comes from the crack beneath the door and a large, old-fashioned keyhole. Most of the space inside the shed is taken up by what seems to be a broken lawnmower, every inch covered coppery rust. Fortunately, he’s slender enough to squeeze into the space directly in front of the door without too much trouble.
Crouching down low and only wincing slightly for the fate of his trousers - they’re school issue and tacky and terrible, but some things are just instinctual - Kurt closes one eye in order to peer through the keyhole. The view is only partial and Blaine’s back is toward him, but at least it’s something.
Feeling very much like a character in a children’s spy thriller, Kurt watches Blaine stand alone in the clearing. The dark navy and black of his uniform is a marked contrast against the yellows, greens, and browns of the surrounding foliage. He watches as Blaine stands, rocking impatiently from foot to foot after the first five minutes. Time drags and pulls as they wait, and wait, and Kurt is just beginning to wonder if they’ve made some kind of mistake when he hears a noise coming from the direction of the school.
Blaine must hear it, too, because the change that comes over him is instantaneous. As though there is an invisible cord connected to the top of his head tugging upwards, Blaine straightens up as tall as he can. He stops fidgeting at once, placing his feet in a strong stance beneath him. Even from Kurt’s bad vantage point, he can see Blaine setting his shoulders back.
Before Kurt can even register what is happening, Dave Karofsky is crashing through the trees. Frantic, with his feet hitting the ground hard: another dark blur on the light landscape.
“Kurt,” Dave chokes out, stumbling over some root or dip the ground. And for a split second, Kurt feels guilty. Because even from far away, Kurt can see that the look on Dave’s face is one of heart-stopping terror. His voice is wrung-out with barely-concealed panic, and there is a franticness to his movement that Kurt somehow thinks has nothing to do with fear of having his sexuality revealed.
Don’t you feel guilty. Don’t you dare feel guilty.
When Dave stumbles into the clearing, his expression shifts. The fear doesn’t go away; instead it seems to merge into some sort of frightened anger, dangerous and harsh in its volatility. Dave comes closer to Blaine, eyes flashing, and for the first time Kurt feels a ripple of unease.
“Where is he, Anderson?” Dave practically shouts, a hint of hysteria edging at his voice. “I swear to fucking god, you tell me where he is -”
“I see you got my note.” Blaine’s voice is the epitome of control; calm, collected. Kurt can’t see Blaine’s face from this angle, and his voice is muffled from projecting in the opposite direction, but his posture remains entirely unintimidated.
For a moment, Kurt can see the note as clearly as though it was right in front of his eyes. Its contents had been a joint decision, huddled together in Blaine’s dorm room, and they’d spent enough time debating over the exact wording that Kurt could repeat it word for word. In the end, they had used Blaine’s laptop and printer to avoid using either of their handwriting.
After Dave had left Kurt sprawled on the floor of their dorm room, it had been less than a minute before Blaine had knocked at the door. They’d gathered up the most important of Kurt’s belongings to store in Blaine’s room and left the note - dark, neat words on clean white paper - on Dave’s bed.
The old groundskeeper’s shed, 4:15.
We need to talk.
Although he had expected that returning to the room and finding it empty - no Kurt waiting on the bed, hands folded, patiently awaiting his return- would make Dave agitated, he hadn’t expected this. The power of Dave’s body is on full display like this; posturing, defensive. It makes Kurt nervous, and in combination with the way his legs are starting to cramp from keeping still he can’t stop himself from fidgeting anxiously.
It’s so surreal, seeing Dave and Blaine in the same space. Watching two completely separate parts of his life interact in this way - two people that he’d worked hard and fought to keep as far away from one another as possible - is something he never thought he’d get to see outside of naively hopeful daydreams.
“Yeah, I got your fucking note,” Dave’s saying, lip curling into a sneer. “Now if you don’t tell me where the hell Kurt is -”
“You’re not going to be seeing Kurt anymore,” Blaine enunciates clearly, voice growing louder. “You’re not going to touch Kurt anymore, Karofsky.”
At once, Dave stiffens. And Kurt knows that expression on his face; it’s the same one he gets whenever he catches Kurt trying to evade one of his orders with a loophole. The same one that would steal across his face whenever he’d see Kurt chatting with a classmate in a crowded hallway. It’s Dave, furious, attempting to school his face into something normal.
Dave lets out a croaky, weak laugh. “I have no idea what you’re -” he begins, but Blaine doesn’t let him finish.
“I know what you did,” spits Blaine, fury and hatred and disgust dripping from every syllable, and Kurt doesn’t think he’s ever seen Blaine this angry. His body has completely tensed up, and his hands are curled into fists at his sides. “You’re sick, you know that? How dare you. You’re a rapist, Karofsky -”
Slightly too quickly, Dave throws his hands in the air in an expression of faux-surrender. “I’m a what?” he asks, barking out a disdainful laugh. “Kurt is my boyfriend, Anderson, I told you. Has been for months. You saw yourself how much he likes what we do together.” Guilt and disgust ripples dully in the base of Kurt’s stomach. “So if all you have are empty accusations, maybe you can tell me where the fuck he is.”
“You know, I was actually willing to believe that for a little while...” says Blaine, before his voice gets so low that Kurt can barely make out anything he’s saying. He strains at the shed door, listening so hard it almost hurts. Blaine’s words are rushed and furious, but Kurt is almost certain he can make out “curse”, “forced”, and “Kurt” amid the onslaught.
It doesn’t take much to figure out Blaine’s accusation. Dave’s eyes blow wide as Blaine speaks, eyebrows flying up high on his forehead. For the briefest moment, an expression of panic comes over him before it’s hastily covered up again. When Blaine finishes speaking, there is a long pause.
“Yeah, well,” laughs Dave, hard and empty. “That’s fucking ridiculous. Do you even know how stupid you sound?” Dave takes a step closer to Blaine, looking down on him with superior disgust. “You’re just jealous, aren’t you? You want him. He’s mine and you want him.” He lets out a tiny huff of laughter. “You’re pathetic. Good luck trying to prove that little story to anyone.”
“I don’t have to,” says Blaine coolly, and here it comes. Absently, Kurt realizes that he’s holding his breath. Muscles tensed hard and strung up with anticipation. “I have something better.”
“And what’s that?” Dave scoffs, crossing his arms defensively over his chest.
“This afternoon, David. What happened between you and Kurt in your dorm room. We filmed it.”
The hand-held camera Blaine had borrowed from Thad, tucked in behind the books on the shelf. Red light softly glowing as it recorded everything.
The look on Dave’s face freezes in place. He opens his mouth as if to speak, but no words come. Horror is seeping into his eyes. “What?”
“Yeah,” says Blaine, sounding vindicated. “And it caught everything. When he told you to stop and you didn’t. When you forced him onto his knees and assaulted him. We have it all on tape.”
“I... I don’t... there’s been some kind of mistake. Kurt -”
“-was the one who asked me for help. And as we speak that video is on its way to a number of people. There’s a note attached, too, explaining what to do if something happens to one of us.”
The two sets of envelopes Kurt had just deposited at the campus mail room before coming into the woods. One addressed to Burt Hummel, the other to Marita and William Anderson. Each envelope stuffed with a CD and a hand-written explanation from their respective son.
“So you leave Kurt alone, Karofsky,” Blaine continues, and Kurt can see his hands clenching again at his sides. “Make up some reason and get yourself out of Dalton, because if you come anywhere near us again we’ll send that video to the police. To your parents, David. And I’m positive you don’t want that.”
The silence that hangs between the two boys is thick and impossible. The tiny noises of insects and wind through leaves is amplified on the air. Blaine looks tense but stands tall, unwavering - as though he’d wanted anything to do with this plan in the first place.
In reality, Blaine had begged - had pleaded with Kurt to find another way. As if there was still something left in him worth saving, protecting. When Kurt had vetoed that particular objection, Blaine had spent precious time trying to convince him to send the video to the police right away. Again, Kurt had refused. Blaine’s confidence in the police to do the right thing was sweet, but naive in the extreme. Born of money and privilege and being given things all his life instead of having them taken away. Because if it comes down to it, and they have to give the video to the authorities... well. Kurt would prefer to avoid the questions and the denials and the calling into question of the evidence if they could just frighten Dave off instead.
A small, absurd amount of hope is beginning to curl around the edges of his mind.
It’s almost over, Kurt thinks in disbelief. It’s really almost over.
“Kurt,” Dave chokes out, shaking his head. “No. No, Kurt - Kurt wouldn’t do this to me. He wouldn’t.”
“Kurt hates you,” says Blaine in disgust. “Why wouldn’t he?”
And in the space of twenty seconds, Kurt realizes they’ve made a horrible mistake.
“You,” snarls Dave, shaking hard and drawing himself up to his full height. Towering over Blaine by at least a head, and for the first time Kurt realizes how small Blaine is in comparison. Compact and tiny in front of Dave’s bulk. Dave, who has gone from shocked disbelief to raging fury in a matter of seconds. “It’s you, isn’t it? This is all your fault. You’ve been - you’ve been talking to him, putting ideas in his head.”
“No,” says Blaine, clearly still attempting to imbue the words with confidence. But his leg twitches as if to step backward, and there’s a waver in his voice that he can’t seem to control. “Kurt doesn’t want to see you -”
“Kurt loves me,” Dave yells, his voice cracking. He shakes his head frantically back and forth, and his hand curls into a fist. “I’m going to kill you,” he mutters. There’s a half-mad look in his eye as he takes a step closer.
“If you touch me,” shouts Blaine, taking an involuntary step back. “ - the video-!”
“I’m going to fucking kill you!” bellows Dave, charging forward and slamming Blaine in the face with his fist before Blaine can even raise his hands in defence. The fist connects with a sickening crunch, and Blaine - who goes to a private school, and has a wealthy family, and has never won a fight in his entire life - goes crashing down onto the forest floor.
Horrified, Kurt watches him fall as if in slow motion - and realizes how very, very badly they’ve miscalculated. By making Dave mad enough not to care about the consequences; for taunting him, and letting slip that Kurt had some kind of hand in this intervention. By thinking they could do this by themselves, without any help at all. By choosing to do it far away from any crowds or onlookers, where no one can hear them or run to their defence. Privacy had seemed so important, but now it seemed like the stupidest thing they could have done.
Kurt hesitates for a half-second, stunned and desperately willing Blaine to get back on his feet. But Dave is on top of Blaine too fast for that, pinning him to the ground with almost comical ease. Blaine struggles, tries to scramble back, but it isn’t enough. Dave pulls back his fist and crashing it down into Blaine’s face again, and again, and Kurt can’t see what happens next because he’s already flinging the door open and throwing himself into the clearing.
“Stop it!” Kurt screams, sprinting as hard as he can. He grabs hold of the arm, managing to halt it mid-air probably due only to the surprise of his arrival. Dave struggles for the briefest of seconds before looking up - and his eyes widen. Blaine groans beneath them, struggling slightly, and Kurt thinks he can see bright red beginning to run down his face.
“Kurt - what -?” The barest hint of a hopeful smile tugs at Dave’s mouth.
“Please don’t hurt him,” says Kurt in a rush, terror and guilt clutching at his chest. Because it’s his fault, it’s all his fault, and Blaine didn’t have to help him. Didn’t have to go along with his stupid, terrible plan. He clutches onto Dave’s arm as hard as he can.
The smile disappears from Dave’s face. His lips tighten: he glances away, looking off at some unknown point in the distance as a shadow falls over his eyes. Dave takes a deep breath, letting it out in one long exhalation.
“Kurt,” says Dave, slowly and carefully. Blaine starts to struggle harder beneath him, and Dave pins him down hard and fast with his knees. The ruthlessness of his actions is so, so different from his quiet tone. “Let go of my arm.”
“No,” Kurt chants, already feeling the nausea beginning to build. “No, no, no - Dave, please, you can’t do this -”
“Let go of my arm!” shouts Dave, abrupt and unexpected. Kurt’s hands lose their grip and before he can even think, Dave is shoving him one-handed as hard as he can. Kurt shouts, falls backwards onto the clearing floor. His back collides with the ground, partially knocking the wind out of him. He gasps for air, but as soon as he hits the ground Kurt struggles to get to his feet again. “And stay there,” bellows Dave, and at once Kurt may as well be glued in place.
Dave looks at him for a long, hard moment before turning his gaze back to Blaine. Cricking his neck, Dave draws back his fist. Kurt gasps at the realization of what is about to happen a split second before Dave’s fist crunches into Blaine’s nose again. Blaine screams, voice muffled, and tries to writhe himself away. It’s useless.
“No!” shrieks Kurt, straining as hard as he can against the invisible restraints. Clawing at the ground, trying to pull himself forward, trying to get to Blaine. Dave’s hits him again, and this time his fist pulls back streaked with blood. “Dave, stop it, please!”
For a second, Kurt thinks it might have worked. Dave pushes himself off Blaine’s prone form, pulling himself up into a standing position. Groaning wetly through the blood pouring out of his nose, Blaine rolls onto his side attempts to crawl away. There is a pause - before Dave pulls back and kicks Blaine in the stomach as hard as he can. The scream that Blaine lets out is muffled by his arms, but the sound of it is more painful to Kurt than any physical harm could be; Blaine’s voice is like skin dragged over sharp rocks.
“No,” sobs Kurt, and he can’t stop the tears from streaming down his face. He wills himself to move, but his body won’t obey. “No, please.”
“It’s - his - fault,” grunts Dave in between hits, slamming his foot into Blaine’s ribs between every word. Blaine tries to roll away onto his back; Dave follows and slams his foot down onto Blaine’s hand, splayed on the ground. Blaine shrieks, trying to wrench his hand free and bury his face into the ground all at once. Dave pulls back and wails on Blaine’s side as hard as he can before rounding to face Kurt: his brown eyes are frantic, edged with hysteria.
“You - you were never like this before he came along, Kurt,” Dave mutters, seeming not to notice how wrecked his hand is. He’s breathing hard from the fight, but all of his attention is on Kurt. “We need to - we need to take care of it, and then everything can go back to normal, okay?”
“Please,” Kurt begs desperately, watching with horror as Blaine tries to curl in on himself while Dave’s attention is focused on him instead. “You’re bigger than him. He can’ fight back, Dave, just - just please let him go. Please.”
From the ground, Blaine tries to speak - perhaps to order Kurt to run, to get out. But the blood’s running into his mouth and choking him, and what is almost definitely a broken nose renders him unintelligible.
All that Kurt can think about is the fact that Dave isn’t hurting Blaine anymore. Blinking hard through the tears, Kurt looks up to see Dave coming towards him.
In that moment, the expression on Dave’s face is the worst thing that Kurt has ever seen. Worse than Blaine bloodied and broken on the ground, worse than his dad pale and unconscious in the hospital -even worse than watching his mother get lowered into the ground. It is soft. Reassuring. Calming, as though intending to speak with a small child.
And there is a resignation in his eyes that makes Kurt’s whole body recoil.
“Hey,” murmurs Dave, slowly lowering himself down into a kneeling position in front of Kurt. He reaches up to cradle Kurt’s tear-streaked face with his un-bloodied hand, and Kurt can feel that his hands are shaking violently. “Hey, babe, it’s okay. It’s okay now, yeah?” His thumb stokes along Kurt’s cheek. “You and me - we’re gonna run, all right? Together, just like it was before. I’ll leave him here and walk away, but you have to come with me.”
“No,” says Kurt faintly, shaking his head. His own voice sounds high and terrified on the still air. A few feet away, he thinks he hears Blaine groan out a garbled word of protest.
“Yes,” Dave insists, nodding his head insistently. There is unrelenting affection in the lines of his face. “Kurt... we’re going to run until no one can find us anymore. And it’s going to be great, but -” Dave’s voice catches, and Kurt is shocked to see that there are tears in his eyes. Dave presses his lips together, shakes his head, and continues. “- but I’m going to have to stop being so easy on you, baby.”
Terror pulses through Kurt’s body with every breath, with every heartbeat. He shakes his head, but Dave’s hand remains firm along his cheek. “No. No, Dave, please. Please let us go, just - what are you talking ab -?”
“We could’ve made it work,” croaks Dave, one tear escaping and sliding down his ruddy cheek. “But - but I can’t trust you like this, babe.” As though in intense pain, Dave squeezes his eyes shut. His chin scrunches up and his whole face is turning red with some kind of emotion. When Dave opens his eyes again, there is a sadness there that Kurt doesn’t understand. “So I’m going to have to make a you I can trust.”
And that sentence doesn’t make any sense. Can’t make any sense, not unless - unless -
“No!” Kurt screams as hard as he can, throwing himself away from Dave but he can’t move. Thrashing wildly, mindlessly against the restraint with his whole body. Desperate to get away, please, God, let him get away - “No!” he wails, but Dave has him by the shoulders now. He flails the hold, but it’s no good. He’s too small, too weak, and even if he could break the hold the curse keeps him firmly in place. “No!”
“I’m sorry,” Dave chokes, more tears streaming down his face now too. “I’m sorry, there isn’t another way. I love you, Kurt. I love you more than anything. We can be happy this way, I promise. You’ll be happier this way.” He grabs the back of Kurt’s neck and holds his thrashing form still long enough to force a hard kiss against his lips, pressing and claiming and taking and apologizing. Kurt tries to pull away, but it’s no good, and before he even realizes what’s happening Dave is moving away again.
“Don’t,” Kurt sobs. “Please.”
“I’m so sorry,” whispers Dave, tears in his eyes. He closes them tight, holds Kurt close, and whispers: “Forget everything. Forget your family, your life, Anderson, everything. Only remember me, and how much you love me.” Dave’s voice cracks as he forces out the last of the words, blinking hard. “Love me, Kurt. Forget everything else.”
A few paces away Blaine shrieks something out, and Dave is barking something back, but none of it matters anymore. Kurt collapses onto the ground in a tumble of limbs as the command washes over him, and there’s no way out. There’s no loophole to find, nothing to hold onto. He pushes against it anyways, fights with everything he is because everything he is is being taken away from him, stripped down and peeled away and there’s nothing he can do. His body starts to shake uncontrollably, and he slams his hand over his eyes to block out the light because it hurts.
And all at once, Kurt can see it in his head -
-Dave leading him out the clearing by the hand, glassy-eyed and bewildered as they leave Blaine on the ground, bleeding and hurting and completely alone. Only he has no idea who the man on the ground is, and when he asks Dave tells him to hush, babe, no one important and guides them to pack their bags -
- sickness twisting in his gut and wrenching at him as he writhes on the ground, struggling struggling struggling struggling and it hurts as though it’s being turned inside out and stretched wrong, all wrong -
- finding an apartment in a city with no name after a long bus ride to nowhere, and Kurt putters around cleaning the house and making dinner for when Dave gets home because he loves Dave more than anything, and that’s what people do when they love each other and staring at the walls when there isn’t anything to do and just waiting for Dave to come home from his job so he has someone to be again, never knowing the address or what it looks like beyond the living room window -
-dizzy, so dizzy, never going to stop being twisty and upside down and the world won’t stop spinning, like a vacuum around him sucking him in and never stopping never stopping -
-Dave sliding into him at night in their bed with the sheets Dave picked out in the apartment Dave found and just pictures of the two of them littering the bedside table. Groaning into Kurt’s neck as he pushes all the way inside, nonsense words about how good he feels and how amazing he is as Kurt moans back, arching his back into it and loving every second. Truly loving it, because Dave told him to and Dave knows what’s right and he’s never known anything else -
-his head pounding straining breaking in his hands, skull shattering into fragments and the insides liquefying as he screams into empty air and don’t give in, you can‘t give in -
-no Christmas cards because there’s no family, no address book full of names and places because there are no names and places outside of this. His father never knowing where he went, and Kurt never knowing he had a father, or a mother, knowing when his dad dies or Carole or Finn or Blaine -
- neurons flashing in his mind, attempting to rewrite pathways and cancel out histories and block it block it block it OUT, make it STOP, cling to memories like a lifesaver at sea and don’t let go -
-and then one day a quiet piece of paper and a few witnesses from Dave’s work and a justice of the peace and it’s all legal and easy and straightforward these days, and Dave clutching him to his chest and kissing him and muttering it’s the happiest day of my life and saying it back because it is, it must be, Dave says it is and -
- getting darker dimmer harder dying, you’re dying, let it happen let him do it youhavetoyouhavetoyouhavetoyouhaveto and -
“NO!”
Something is smashing breaking shattering inside Kurt’s mind, and he doesn’t know what’s happening. Only knows that he can’t, he won’t, he won’t do it. Won’t let himself be drowned away and tossed aside like something that doesn’t matter, an empty person with his face for Dave to love and hold and kiss and fuck, because it’s just is not going to happen. Kurt won’t let it happen, and it doesn’t matter if he dies fighting it because dying is better than living like that and he just isn’t going to let it happen -
And all at once, the noise stops. The screaming and shouting and explosions inside his mind blink away, and the stillness of the clearing returns.
It is like clouds opening up to see the sun. Something... something has broken inside Kurt’s mind like a dam, and water has come crashing out and purged the pain away. He feels... empty. As though he’s missing something that has always been there, something deep inside. Sweating and trembling and shaking like an infant, every bone and muscle aching as though it’s been broken down and set to rights again, Kurt slowly and tentatively opens his eyes.
The bright blue of the sky looks back at him, obscured by the yellow-green of sunlight streaming through leaves. The canopy. The clearing.
Dave.
Blaine.
Gradually, cautiously, Kurt pushes himself up into a sitting position. Dave is still crouched in front of him, tears streaming down his face and wiping them frantically away.
“Kurt?” asks Dave, voice broken and frantic and terrified. A small, false smile pulls at his trembling lips. A few feet away on the ground Blaine is choking, attempting to shout out something unintelligible. Trying to push himself upright with his good hand, and looking so frightened Kurt can barely breathe. “B-baby?” asks Dave, stammering slightly. He looks Kurt up and down nervously. “How... how are you feeling?”
Experimentally, Kurt inches himself forward on the ground. There is no pain. No nausea, no invisible restrains keeping him in place. His body doesn’t rebel against him: instead, he moves forward easily. As though it has always been this simple.
It hadn’t been enough, before. Being hidden away, or cut off from his family and friends, or having his mind twisted and wrecked and broken down. Being forced by Dave; letting his body be used like a toy while his mind screamed in silence. The pain, the humiliation, the terror. None of it had been enough.
But the threat of having everything that made him himself stripped away... everything that made him Kurt Hummel stripped and wiped clean and stolen... that had been enough.
And there is nothing - absolutely nothing - about the man in front of Kurt to frighten him anymore.
When Kurt pushes himself up onto his knees, Dave flinches. There is so much fear and uncertainty in his face, Kurt realizes now. So much self-hate, and doubt, and shattered self. The nightmare of the last two months is gone: all that remains of it is this scared, lonely little boy who breaks the things he loves. Dave’s eyes follow him apprehensively, clearly waiting with bated breath for him to speak. Without hesitation, Kurt reaches up and rests his hand along the side of Dave’s face.
“David,” he says, quiet and firm, with no room for argument whatsoever. “David, it’s over now.”
“W-what?” Dave asks, in a tiny voice, and the size difference between the two of them might as well not even exist. Shrunken in on himself and shaking, Dave seems small compared to the confidence and control Kurt can feel emanating from his own body like a physical force. “Kurt... I don’t...”
“It’s done,” says Kurt, voice high and clear and matter-of-fact. “I broke it. You can’t control me anymore, David. And you can’t ignore what you did.”
“Kurt, please, stop it. Stop... stop saying that. I love you -”
“I don’t love you.” The words are truer than anything Kurt has ever said in his life. “I never did, David. And you couldn’t make me.”
“No...” denies Dave childishly, shaking his head back and forth. Kurt’s hand remains firm along his cheek, and he doesn’t look away from Dave’s eyes. Holds their gaze hard and firm and unrelenting.
“Everything you did, you did for yourself,” says Kurt, shaking his head. His throat catches. “You... you hurt me more badly than I think I can ever say, David. I wanted to die. I wanted you to kill me. And now... now, you’re going to leave.”
“Kurt -”
“You can’t hurt me anymore, David. I won’t let you.” Slowly, Kurt pulls his hand away. Dave half-sobs as the contact is lost. But Kurt isn’t finished yet. “I’m stronger than you are,” Kurt says, shaking his head. “I always was. You’re weak. You’re weak, and awful, and you repulse me.”
Stumbling, Dave jolts back and makes it to his feet. Arms around himself like a child fighting off cold, he stares down into Kurt’s eyes with absolute terror in his face. Kurt stares back, cold and unforgiving, at the wreck of a human being in front of him. Tears are streaking down Dave’s face once more, and his whole body is wracked with shivers. He is shaking his head noiselessly, wordlessly.
“Now run,” hisses Kurt, voice lowering into a heartless whisper. “Run as hard as you can, and hope to hell you can run fast enough to forget this. Because I can hurt you so much more than you can hurt me. And if I ever, ever see you again - if I ever hear of you again - I will end you.”
Without speaking a single word, Dave chokes out a sob - and nods. Tears drip down his cheeks as he takes one step backward, and then another.
“Go!” Kurt screams, high and furious and horrifying as Dave turns and flees. Stumbling over his own feet in his rush to get away, not turning around to take one last look as he goes. Flying through the trees in the opposite direction from the school. Toward the highway, and out of Kurt’s life. “Run!”
It takes less than a minute for the dark blur that is Dave Karofsky to disappear into the foliage, and only a short while after that before Kurt can no longer hear his footsteps on the forest floor. And Kurt knows, with complete certainty that he cannot explain, that he is never going to see Dave again.
Kurt doesn’t have time to let any of it sink in, though, because a few feet away Blaine is trying to sit up. Groaning in pain and gasping wetly, blood still streaming down from his nose, and muttering.
“Kurt,” he thinks Blaine is saying, but it’s hard to tell through all the blood. The word is unclear, stifled. “Kurt -”
Immediately, Kurt scrambles over to him. Crouching down on the forest floor, all the anger and fury and power gets pushed down inside. His voice lowers, turning gentler.
“Hey,” Kurt says softly, raking his eyes over Blaine’s body to take stock of the situation. Blaine’s face is a mottled picture of bloodied cuts and sure-to-be bruises: his nose is definitely broken, still streaming blood, and Kurt thinks he might be looking at at least one black eye. Blaine keeps trying to push himself up, but Kurt gently guides him back down to the ground. The way Blaine keeps wincing every time he tries to sit up says that there might be something wrong with his ribs, and his right hand is cradled right up against his chest. “Hey, honey, it’s okay. You’re okay. We’re okay.”
Placing one hand on Blaine’s shoulder to gently keep him down, Kurt reaches into his pocket to pull out his phone. At the motion, Blaine makes a confused noise.
“Wha -?” Blaine asks stupidly, blinking away sweat as it drips into his eyes.
“I’m calling the school. I don’t think I can get you back there by myself, and I don’t even know if you have a concussion. The nurse will know what to - yes? Yes, hello, this is Kurt Hummel. I’m a student, and my friend needs help right now...”
Once Kurt is finished passing on the most important information - where they are, who’s hurt, how bad the injury is - Kurt hangs up the phone. And then they wait. Clustered together on the hard ground, everything too unreal for him to even consider thinking about it yet, Kurt leans over his friend and tries his best to remember the sub-par first aid classes they had at his old school. Makes sure that Blaine is breathing all right through his mouth; rolls him onto his side so that the blood runs onto the ground and not down his throat.
Without even thinking about it, Kurt squeezes Blaine’s shoulder and whispers nonsense words to the beautiful boy lying broken beneath him. Tells him it’s okay now and I did it, Blaine, I really did it and they’re going to be here soon. Stroking back the sweat along Blaine’s forehead and making sure Blaine stays still, Kurt waits for help to come.
--
It doesn’t take long for the school nurse and three teachers to arrive. Kurt lets himself get pushed aside when they come stomping into the clearing, hovering quietly at the sidelines without ever taking his eyes off Blaine. After determining that there’s no obvious concussion, they begin the process of getting Blaine back to the nurse’s office until a family member can come to pick him up. It takes a little while. Getting Blaine onto his feet isn’t easy, and getting him half-way across campus takes a great deal of time and patience.
To Kurt, it seems like it only takes a moment before Blaine is seated on the bed in the nurse’s office. The world won’t stop spinning around him like a top. The sight of his friend like this - the nurse instructing Blaine to press gauze to his nose to soak up the blood, and gently feeling around his ribs for signs of a break - is almost too much. Too hard, after everything else today.
None of it feels real. The entire day feels like a dream; or, perhaps more accurately, like waking up from one. Kurt can’t decide.
After briefly excusing himself from the office to make a phone call, Kurt comes back inside with red-rimmed eyes only to see two of Blaine’s fingers being taped together. Blaine winces, but remains silent as it happens. He’s still pressing the gauze beneath his nose with his good hand.
“How bad is it?” asks Kurt to the teacher standing next to him, hating how dazed and raw his voice sounds. The woman is older, at least in her fifties, with long brown-grey hair. She’s wearing a snugly well-worn tweed coat and sensible brown heels, and Kurt is almost positive he should know her name.
“Nurse Manning says it’s not so terrible, dear,” says the woman comfortingly, nodding to the ginger-haired nurse currently taping Blaine’s fingers. “We’ve called his mother. She should be here soon to take him to the ER. Get those ribs checked out.”
“Oh,” says Kurt quietly.
Jenkins. Her name is Mrs. Jenkins, Kurt realizes dazedly, although he isn’t sure why it matters right now at all. Mrs. Jenkins clasps his shoulder with a shockingly good grip and gives him a tight squeeze.
“Don’t worry. He’ll be fine,” murmurs Mrs. Jenkins, before turning and heading out the door. Back to whatever she was doing beforehand, Kurt guesses. Teaching, or being on break, or in some kind of meeting. And then Kurt is left standing alone in the middle of the room, watching as his best friend gets patched up from wounds Kurt is the cause of.
Suddenly, Kurt feels incredibly awkward. Standing with his arms crossed in front of his unharmed body in this too small too white room, not knowing where to be or whether Blaine wants to see him at all. Kurt is just debating whether or not to attempt to slip unnoticed out of the room when Blaine looks up, catches his eye - and all at once, it doesn’t matter about the cuts and bruises, or the broken nose, or the sprained fingers, or what might be several fractured ribs. Blaine is smiling at him with such unbelievable, undiluted happiness that it lights up the whole room.
Nurse Manning glances over in his direction, and for a second Kurt thinks he’s going to be thrown out. Instead, the nurse nods at an empty chair on Blaine’s other side. Unable to walk away from that smile, Kurt steps forward and lowers himself into the chair.
“There we are,” says Nurse Manning competently, moving away from Blaine’s hand. Blaine hisses in a breath of pain, staring down at it. “Best I can do for the moment, Mr. Anderson. The principal informs me that your mother will be arriving soon, and they’ll be better equipped to deal with you at the ER. Now, how’s the bleeding on your nose coming?” Blaine pulls the gauze away, and the nurse leans in close to inspect. “Not bad, not bad... one moment while I get you some ice. You should have it with you for the drive over.”
The nurse stands and leaves, and all of the sudden the two of them are alone again. And Blaine... Blaine is looking at Kurt in a way that won’t stop breaking his heart. Earnest and relieved and excited and so, so caring.
“Kurt, you did it,” whispers Blaine, as soon as the nurse is out of earshot. The words are still muggy and stuffed-up-sounding, but they’re more comprehensible than before. “I don’t - I didn’t even know that could happen like that. You did it, I don’t even believe... Kurt... Kurt, it’s over.”
There’s a buzzing sound inside Kurt’s head that won’t stop getting louder and louder. Thrumming along his skin and tugging at his chest, ever-present and un-ignorable. Kurt can barely comprehend what Blaine is saying to him.
“Yeah,” says Kurt quietly, and he winces at how high and unsteady his voice sounds. “Yeah, I...I can’t believe it, I... god, Blaine, I’m so sorry.” He lets out a ragged breath. “I’m so sorry this happened to you. It’s my fault -”
“No,” insists Blaine, flinching when he accidentally jostles his hand. “No, Kurt, it was worth it. I heard what he ordered you to do, and I tried to help, but... just... thank god, okay? Thank god you managed to break it.”
Tears are beginning to sng at Kurt’s eyes, but Blaine doesn’t notice.
“And besides,” says Blaine, trying to smile with the gauze pressed against his nose. He looks like he should be in too much pain to be allowed to be happy at all, but Blaine has always been one to defy expectations. “Kurt... you know how I feel about you. Of course I’d do anything to help.” He lets out a laugh, but stops quickly when the movement seems to make his ribcage hurt. He winces. “Also? This is nothing compared to how bad it was after my Sadie Hawkins dance last year.”
And all at once it hits Kurt how little he knows Blaine. How very, very little he knows about the things that really matter: his family situation, his past, anything other than school or the Warblers or music. They’ve only been friends for four months, and only two of those were real. After Dave, everything was stunted and secret and pushed aside, and then Blaine had kissed him, no warning at all. And everything afterward - the frantic planning, everything going wrong, and Blaine getting hurt and the curse being broken -
Amid all that, he hasn’t had any time at all to think about after.
Kurt has no idea how he feels about Blaine. Not really. Not in the ways that matter.
And Kurt is almost positive that Blaine doesn’t really know him at all.
“I can’t do this.”
Confusion clouds over Blaine’s face, and it takes Kurt a moment to realize he’s spoken the words out loud. He can’t take them back, though. He won’t. Kurt throat feels thick and choked. The world is getting blurry, and when he blinks a tear escapes and rolls down his cheek.
“Wait, Kurt... you can’t do what?” Blaine asks. Soft and reassuring and confused, and that just makes everything harder.
“Any of it. Blaine, I can’t -” Kurt lets out a deep, shaky breath. His heart hurts, and the innocently perplexed look on Blaine’s face is just make the ache worse. “My dad’s coming to pick me up. I called him once we got inside the school. He should be here soon.”
“That’s good... Kurt, I’m sure he’ll be -”
“We never thought this would happen, Blaine. Not really. I thought I’d always be... so he’s coming. And. And it’s really important. And I just -” A sob wells up inside of him and escapes before he can help it. Hard, and making his entire body shudder, and if he starts Kurt is almost positive he won’t be able to stop. “I just can’t be here anymore, Blaine. Not after what happened with Da - Karofsky. And... and I just can’t handle you right now.”
“Me?” Blaine draws back, horrified. “How -?”
“It’s too much,” chokes Kurt, scrubbing away tears. “It’s just too much right now. I’m... I’m going to leave Dalton. Do the rest of the semester by correspondence, challenge the exams, I don’t care. I just need some time.”
“Of course,” says Blaine quietly, and Kurt realizes that the nurse has been gone for an awfully long time. “Kurt... all the time in the world, of course. But... but don’t push me away. Please.”
From inside his blazer pocket, Kurt’s phone vibrates. He pulls it out and checks the message: be there in 5 mins - Dad. The realization that his father must be texting and driving, something he’s warned Kurt against from the day they bought him his very first cell phone, makes another sob well up inexplicably in Kurt’s chest. And the tears won’t stop coming now. Hard and fast and he has to get out.
“I have to go,” Kurt says in a quietly-choked voice, tears streaming down his face and shaking his head back and forth. “You... you make this so complicated, and I just can’t, I’m sorry.” Not able to stand the devastation on Blaine’s face for another second, Kurt stands and turns to leave. Walking quickly and with purpose and not looking back, never looking back. Because if he does, Kurt is almost positive that whatever is left of his heart will shatter. He makes it all the way to the door before he hesitates, clutching the door handle so hard it almost hurts.
“I’m sorry you got hurt,” says Kurt, refusing to look away from the door. “And... and I’ll call you when I can.”
Behind him, Blaine makes a choked-off noise that Kurt can’t think about. Head down, Kurt turns the handle on the door and walks out of the room.
Chapter Five: Kurt, Blaine, and Dave
(Edited to Add: glitterp_fic has gone and drawn absolutely stunning fanart for this fic! Go see how pretty it is!!)