Fic: Dead Hearts are Everywhere - 1/11(?)+Epilougue
Title: Dead Hearts are Everywhere
Author: justdetails
Rating: T
Beta: abrokenkindofperfect
Pairings: Blaine/Kurt, past Blaine/Sebastian - Blaine/Quinn, Blaine/Mike, Blaine/Brittany friendship
Warnings/Spoilers: None for this part.
Word Count: 1, 254, this part
Summary: AU. Blaine Anderson’s father is dying. His mother is gone. His heart is withering away, but as it does, he realizes that maybe there’s something to this Love thing after all.
Author's Note: lyrics at the top of each part are by Stars, from their album The Five Ghosts. This fic is pretty much finished, I'm just sending each part to my beta and making minor changes to each part as needed. Also, this fic goes back and forth from Blaine's past, to the present. It can get a little vague, but I'm told by my beta that that's a good thing. :)
Disclaimer: I don't own Glee or any characters represented.
PART ONE:
In the way your hand hits the wave
In between the dreamer and the breath
Long beside the bitter of the skin
Today won't know when to begin
On a Wednesday, twenty-four year old Blaine Anderson will tell Kurt Hummel that he believes in love again, that the reason he now believes again that love exists, is simply because he loves Kurt.
The morning of this particular Wednesday, it will rain; Blaine will not yet know this as he runs out of his shop, without a coat. He will not know that as he smiles and laughs with Kurt, as they kiss in the rain, that his father is writing his last words at his desk.
On the day that Blaine starts to really love again, he will come home late to find his father, slumped at his desk, a pen still in hand. Blaine will sigh and attempt to wake his father, thinking fondly that the poor old man has once again fallen asleep writing.
Blaine will not yet know that his father will not wake this time.
-0000-
When Blaine is eight, he will hold his crying sister in his arms as they watch their mother leave the house, perched on the steps of the staircase. Their father will plead and try to reason with their mother, but she will leave anyway. Cooper will make them sandwiches, turn on a Disney movie and try to pretend that everything is okay.
Nothing is the same after that; none of them are the same.
-0000-
It is a sunny day when he finds out his father is dying. The boys at his school run around in unbuttoned dress shirts; birds fly around, chirping happily. Blaine will sigh as he walks to his car and deposits his duffle bag into the back seat. He will wave at his friends, Wes and David, and then make the drive home for the weekend.
He will miss a party this weekend - a party specifically thrown for him by the Warblers as a belated sixteenth birthday present - because his father requested his presence at home. This does not happen often, as his father is usually so busy typing away in his study, and Blaine would much rather stay at Dalton.
The news will not come about in a dramatic way; there will be no rushing to the hospital. He will not carry his father into the doors and shout frantically.
No, instead, the news comes with a cup of tea and his little sister clutching his hand.
There will be no tears, no confused frowns or shouting. They will accept this hindrance and try to live life normally, knowing that their father is slowly dying, day by day.
-0000-
Immidiatly after he graduates from Dalton - top of his class, naturally - they pack up and leave for New York. Blaine goes to college, his sister goes and starts her junior year of high school, and their father buys a book store. It is a small building, with a loft over the shop; the store itself is cozy and welcoming, the loft a cold and lonely little space.
Charles recruits Blaine to help with the shop, and soon enough Blaine is practically running it himself. Blaine finds himself splitting all his time between his family, his shop - yes, his, his father finally tells him one day - and school.
When Blaine graduates college, he does not celebrate or go out with his friends - Quinn and Mike, the only two friends he really does have - instead, he takes his weak father home, makes sure his sister gets back to her dorm safely, and falls asleep at his shop doing paperwork.
He doesn’t mind waking up alone, shivering, at his desk; it’s much easier this way, he thinks, to be alone, rather than let himself be with someone, only to have them ripped away.
-0000-
Blaine is closing up shop when a tall, blonde young woman knocks on the window. She startles him, and the pile of books he had been carrying falls to the floor. He lets her in, partly because she is soaked to the bone from the rain, and partly because he can’t seem to say no the hopeful smile on her face.
She thanks him as she steps inside, shivering, and sets the box she carries on the floor while he searches for a towel for her.
Blaine returns five minutes later to find the woman cooing at the box.
When she sees him she stands, takes the towel gratefully, and rubs at her face and hair while Blaine gathers his fallen books.
“I’m Brittany!” she says, a wide smile gracing her features. She sticks her hand out as she speaks, waiting for his to glide into hers.
He does, with a small smile, shaking it with minimal force.
“I’m Blaine,” he replies, in a quiet voice.
Brittany lifts herself onto her toes and laughs.
“I know! My girlfriend came by last week to pick up a book about cats for me! She told me all about you; she told me that you’re gayer than a dolphin in the Atlanta and that you ordered that book just for me. ‘Tana gave me that book for my birthday and I loved it, so I thought I could come by and thank you.”
Blaine’s not sure what to think, or do, so he nods dumbly.
Brittany claps her hands and bends down, reaching into the box. She pulls out a small, squeaking thing, and Blaine finally gets that it’s a puppy. It’s shivering violently, the coat pure white, the eyes a piercing blue.
“’Tana said we had too many dogs anyway and Lord Tubbington agreed so I thought this is the way I could say thanks. She doesn’t really like rain because someone left her and her family in a box and they were all wet, but you look like you don’t like rain too so maybe you guys can keep each other happy when it rains.”
She hands it over to Blaine, who fumbles with the puppy until he finally settles it against his chest.
“Her name is Boy, and she already told me that she loves you, so you should probably thank her by buying some mints. Boy likes mints, especially the green ones.”
Boy whimpers against Blaine’s chest, so Blaine tucks her into his sweater; he can feel her nuzzle into it and he tries more than anything to hate it.
“Why is her name Boy?”
Brittany looks at him as if he’s just said the most ridiculous thing she’s ever heard; it’s plausible it is.
“Because that’s who she is, silly!”
Brittany leaves with a kiss to Blaine’s cheek, and Boy’s head. She promises she’ll be back soon, and Blaine isn’t sure if he’s happy or sad about this. Brittany’s obvious joy is painful to Blaine’s heart, but it’s also infectious, and so he finds himself smiling as he locks the door and heads home to settle for the night.
He catches himself though, when he settles Boy next to him on his bed. Blaine knows that Boy will grow old and die, or will die early, either way, she will die; and so Blaine removes his hand from her head, turns over, and tells himself that he does not love Boy, that he never will.
When Boy dies, Blaine will not be affected, because Blaine does not believe in love, and he does not love Boy.
He tells himself this with conviction, and almost believes it to be true.
-0000-
part two