"Have you ever just wanted to step into oncoming traffic with an 18 wheeler driving by?" Kurt asked quietly, looking straight ahead and trying to ignore the raise of Rachel's eyebrow as she tried to formulate a response.

"What if you didn't die?" She finally questioned-and this was why he was confiding in Rachel instead of Blaine or Finn. She wasn't going to gush about how wonderful he was, how his entire life was ahead of him. She was just as melodramatic as he was, understood better than anyone where he was coming from.

He turned his gaze, meeting Rachel's worried look with one of nonchalance. "Maybe I should try a train instead."

Kurt was not suicidal. He didn't think about hanging himself in the closet (though he knew the irony alone might have been worth it), or shooting himself, or overdosing on pills. He didn't cut or drink or do anything to an excessive nature where it bordered on unhealthy, except perhaps shop.

But sometimes, when things were really bad, he pictured getting into horrible accidents. Accidents that would murder him, save him from teetering towards the edge where he did finally decide to kill himself.

He had been doing so, so well. He had a boyfriend that he loved. He had an on/off best friend who had the same dreams as he did. He had a step mom and step brother that he genuinely appreciated. He was doing well in school, and most of the main bullying had stopped.

He didn't want to kill himself. He just didn't want to live anymore.

"Hey," Blaine said quietly, later that night, and Kurt automatically tensed, worried Rachel had spoken to him, expressed concern, even if she didn't bring the subject up after Kurt let it die.

"What?" Kurt snapped, almost as an impulse, feeling regretful when Blaine's flinched, his eyes dropping as he shuffled.

"I just- I wanted to say that I love you," he shrugged, and Kurt's eyes narrowed.

"Why? What did Rachel say?"

"Rachel?" Blaine looked confused, and Kurt knew he was a good actor, but it looked genuine. "Rachel hasn't talked to me today? I haven't seen her since you two spent the afternoon together," Blaine shrugged. "Why, should she have?"

"No," Kurt said, his face softening a little as he pulled Blaine close to him, placing a soft kiss on his forehead. "I love you too," he whispered, feeling slightly comforted as Blaine's arms wrapped around him. There were moments, like now, where Kurt was glad he had never given in to the darkness that threatened to take over him, that loomed ever presently at the back of his mind. But he knew, when Blaine went home and he was alone again, it'd take over, and it'd take all his strength just to get out of bed again the next morning.

Rachel didn't say a word to Kurt about his statement for almost two weeks. She also didn't say anything to Finn or Blaine, because neither rushed over to him in a frenzy. He was grateful, for now, until one of them fucked over the other and hated each other. It was a cycle he wasn't sure either knew how to break, not with their personalities and pasts. But when they were friends, they were best friends. She'd support him and his decision to go to Parsons instead of NYADA, and he'd cheer her on during her theater performances. They were planning their lives together, even if Kurt spent every day wishing his own would just end.

He had started to hope that maybe she forgot about it, but her worried looks in his direction told him otherwise. And when she came up to his locker one day before glee, in a classic Rachel Berry storm out-esque stomp through the nearly empty hallways, he knew his luck had run out.

"We have to talk," she stated, and while he normally would have quipped back something sarcastic ('are you breaking up with me?' ran through his mind), he knew what it was about, so he resigned himself to the inevitable pep talk, preparing his 'I'm fine, it was a bad day, I won't do anything stupid.'

"Talk," he said, waving her on.

"Remember when you asked about-last week, when we were in the mall?" She asked, stuttering slightly over her words as Kurt nodded. She took a deep breath, and here it goes, he thought, fighting the urge to roll his eyes. "I feel the same."

He stared at her blankly, sure he heard her wrong. "But-but you're Rachel Berry," he finally stated. She sighed, running a hand through her hair and looking around them before deciding the hallway was too crowded, grabbing his arm and pulling him into a nearby empty classroom.

"Rachel Berry or not," she started, pacing back and forth as Kurt slid onto a desk, watching her warily, "I've been through just as much as you, Kurt. I might not have had an unwanted first kiss-" he winced, trying to block out the memory, "but I've spent nearly every day of my life being torn down as much as you have. I've been called every name in the book, slapped and pushed around by Cheerio's, cheated on by boys, mocked daily. It gets to you." She let out a small shrug, and Kurt just stared.

"Why didn't you ever consider transferring? Dalton has a sister school," he said pointedly.

"It wouldn't have mattered. It wasn't-isn't them, Kurt. It's me," she said, her voice so tiny he barely heard her. "No matter where I go, I'll be the same person. No matter where I go, the same things are going to keep happening. What's the point in transferring?"

"Rachel, you're-" he started, ready to launch into the speech he had been sure she would give him, only to be cut off with a glare.

"I don't want to hear that anymore than you do," she told him, and he nodded in understanding. If you didn't believe it yourself, it was hard to believe it coming from others. "I just wanted you to know, I understand."

"Thanks?" He said, unsure of how to really respond. She nodded, whispering a quiet 'you're welcome,' and walked out the door, leaving Kurt feeling even more helpless than before.

Kurt tried to corner Rachel, to talk to her about what she had said, but she seemed to glue herself to Finn's side more than usual. He couldn't very well walk up to the two of them and strike up a conversation with "Hey, Rachel, remember that time I said I wanted to die and you agreed?". But just as she had done to him when he mentioned it, he started watching her more carefully.

It was small things, he realized, that could tip someone off to how close an edge they were. Here the two of them were, fantastic students with a slew of possibilities for colleges and the real world, the future literally at their feet, with supportive boyfriends and relatively positive attitudes. Granted, Kurt was more of a cynic than the optimistic Rachel, but it wasn't the overly dark cynicism that had people worried.

It was more how sometimes, her laugh was a little too manic. Or how she had bags under her eyes that she tried to cover with make up. The sparkle for future fame and glory that had previously annoyed him wasn't as prominent, disappearing entirely for days at a time. She was quieter, less determined, less confident. But these were things you wouldn't notice until you took a hard look at who she was now versus who she had been. And you could argue that maybe she was growing up, maturing, but Kurt knew better. He knew that the dark edge was closing in on her, that it was only a matter of time before she broke down completely.

He knew, because the same thing was happening to him.

When he came home one afternoon to find Rachel sitting on his couch, fast asleep, he knew things were worse than he had previously thought.

"I don't know man," Finn said, appearing next to him, blanket in hand. "We came back to the house, and I thought since we'd have the place to ourselves-" he cut himself off with a grimace, and Kurt nodded. "She just collapsed though. I don't think she's been sleeping well, all the stress since her NYADA acceptance and all."

Kurt knew the feeling well.

He took the blanket from Finn, wrapping Rachel in it while Finn watched on, trying to fight back the sudden desire to sit down and cry. He didn't know how Lima's two brightest had fallen into such a dark place, and he didn't know how to pull them out.

That was Rachel's job. She was supposed to be the one to fix them, just like always. But she seemed worse off than he was, and if that was the case-Kurt just didn't have any hope anymore.

"I can't do it anymore," Kurt overheard Rachel whimper-actually whimper-from his own room. He hadn't meant to hear her, had been listening to music on his iPod and just happened to take his headphones out.

"What? Rach, you're not breaking up with me, are you?" Finn's voice sounded dangerously close to tears, and Kurt feared for her next words as he slid off his bed, pressing his ear against the wall to hear them better.

She didn't say anything, the room quiet for a few minutes, but when Finn spoke again, he sounded relieved. "What's wrong then?" Kurt fought off an eyeroll, knowing the answer before she even said it.

"Everything."

"Kurt, I'm worried about you," Blaine said one day at lunch. Kurt widened his eyes, trying to portray innocence as he asked why. "You're not yourself," he continued. "You're quiet and barely eating and-are you sure you're okay?"

"I'm fine," he replied, instinct really. No one really wanted an answer besides that, and Blaine would never understand. Blaine, who had been through so much, was still a picture of sunshine and optimism. He wanted everyone to be happy, fought hard to keep them all happy. Kurt felt a pang of guilt, wondering what would happen to Blaine if anything happened to Kurt.

You won't be around to find out, a voice scolded in his head. Even still, he grabbed Blaine's hand, offering what he hoped was a reassuring smile, and Blaine smiled back.

"How come you never killed yourself?" Rachel asked as she appeared at his bedroom door, Finn downstairs playing xbox loudly.

"It would have killed my dad," Kurt shrugged, looking up to see her nod. "What about you?"

She gave a wane smile, moving to sit on the edge of his bed and pulling at his comforter. "I always saw it as weak, you know?" She started, and Kurt sat silently. "Like, you're given this whole life, and to just end it-it seemed so selfish and childish and weak. It would almost be like you're biting off your nose to spite your face. It was giving up."

"Seemed?" Kurt asked, already dreading her response.

She let out a low laugh, completely unhumorous in it's nature as it sent out a chill down his spine. "Now it seems like the opposite. It's more selfish to keep drawing in people, having them become close to me when in the end-it won't matter. I'm just going to hurt them all when I finally find the courage to do what should have been done a long time ago." Kurt fought off the waves of tears threatening to leave now, refusing to take her seriously.

"Just don't mention to Blaine that you're feeling weak," he joked, the stinging in his eyes starting to overpower the rational thought that screamed to gain control before he bawled in front of her.

"If there was anything to push me off the edge, it might be getting some variation of 'courage' sent to my phone 127 times a day," she tried to joke back, neither laughing as they stared at each other sadly.

"What are we going to do?" Kurt finally said, and she sighed, dropping her head into her hands.

"I have no idea."

Kurt was sometimes amazed at how downright normal he could feel. Depression was this horrible, horrible thing, and yet sometimes he'd feel like maybe it wasn't really depression. Maybe he could laugh and sing and dance like normal teenagers again. He and Rachel could still laugh and smile and it was like when he was with Blaine, when he was glad he was alive, because sitting on his living room floor cracking up about Quinn's latest scandal while Blaine and Finn and Puck were busy playing video games was a perfect moment, where he almost felt free from all the pain that burdened him the rest of the time. When Rachel squeezed his hand, he knew her message. I know, it seemed to say.

When they went into the kitchen to get snacks for everyone, he let the words "Maybe we're not so bad off after all," slip out, almost unaware he did so.

"Just because we can feel happiness doesn't mean we're not still depressed Kurt," she chided, arranging cookies on a plate.

"How do you-"

"I do go to a therapist," she replied, cutting him off. "I was on antidepressants for awhile, but they didn't help and I didn't want to become dependent on pills." She looked at him, her expression serious. "Or have spares around the house to potentially swallow."

"I just want to feel better," he muttered, and she nodded in understanding.

"Me too," she said quietly.

Kurt wasn't sure if it was a good or bad thing that the two had become comfortable discussing these kind of things with each other. He supposed, in the long run, it was better for both of them. They couldn't go to Finn or Blaine, and it was better than no one.

Still, Kurt was a little pissed off that Finn seemed so concerned about Rachel and didn't seem to notice anything off about Kurt at all.

He knew why Finn was concerned towards Rachel, why he was constantly asking if she was okay and looking like a hurt puppy whenever she snapped at him. He understood that Blaine was doing the same to him, and that he had no reason to be jealous of Rachel's attention from Finn.

It wasn't even that he wanted his attention, really. He just wanted Finn to notice him, to notice that he was basically wasting away to nothing and his skin was starting to break out because he wasn't keeping up with his nightly routine as much. He wanted him to see that Kurt was sleeping until noon on the weekends-not that this would be something Finn could notice anyways, since he rarely awoke before 2 in the afternoon. He wanted Finn to look over, concerned, and say "You okay dude?"

But he wasn't, barely talking about anything besides how their sex life had died down considerably, and shouldn't it last longer than just a couple months? Or how Rachel wasn't vying for every solo in glee anymore, why would she not want them? Why wasn't Rachel watching Barbra movies every time she invited him over, and better yet why was she spending less and less time with him period?

Kurt wanted to scream at Finn, demand his attention for just five minutes.

Instead he sat, silently stewing, his countdown til New York being ruined by Finn's sad expression anytime it was mentioned.

"I think we should do it Kurt," Rachel said sadly one morning between classes.

"Thanks, but I'm gay," he replied dryly. She scoffed at him and he turned to look at her, noticing how worn down she looked, how her hair wasn't even curled anymore. He thought back to that day when she came in to school even though she had laryngitis, eating soup out of a bowl and wearing what he was sure was a blanket. He hadn't deemed to talk to her back then, they had still been relative enemies, but he remembered being envious that she could look as downtrodden as she did and Finn would still be trying to fight for her.

"You know what I'm talking about," she accused, and he nodded.

"We can't, Rach, it's-I know we want to, but it's dumb," he said, keeping his voice quiet as Blaine wandered up, planting a kiss on his cheek.

"What's dumb?" he asked, frowning slightly at Rachel's rumpled appearance, Kurt quelling the surge of jealousy that flashed when Blaine pushed back a piece of Rachel's hair.

"Nothing," Kurt snapped, and he hated the feeling of jealousy over Rachel, it made it nearly impossible to be her friend, and he almost wanted to agree to whatever she had been ready to suggest just so he'd never have to deal with it again.

She didn't let the subject drop though, and Kurt became acutely aware that she was going to go through with it whether he did or not. He thought about going and getting her help, about telling someone-anyone. But the truth was, he was tempted, way more tempted than he should have been.

"We could get into a horrible accident," she mused one afternoon while they were pretending to do homework to avoid Finn and Blaine.

"There's a good chance we'd survive it," Kurt said simply, wondering why he was even allowing this conversation to take place. There was a part of him that wanted to fight back, to tell him to stop, to tell her to stop. To remind her that she was Rachel Berry, and she was destined for fame, regardless of what happened to Kurt Hummel.

But that was the thing-they weren't really Rachel and Kurt anymore. They were shadows of their past selves, so lost in the despair and depression that neither could see a way out. The only thing they had left was each other, and even that was wearing down.

"We could wait until we're in New York, jump off the Empire State building," she suggested, and he sighed, wary.

"I'm pretty sure they have good security against that Rachel." She frowned, but nodded.

"Makes sense." They were quiet, Rachel staring at his ceiling while he stared at his hands, trying to remember how they got into this, when there was ever a time he had been completely happy. "We only have a couple weeks until graduation," she said after a bit, and he looked over at her.

"Then we have New York."

"And the rest of our lives."

"This should be a good thing."

"I wish it was."

And so graduation came, with a smile that even Burt commented wasn't half as large as he had expected. "You're supposed to be happy kiddo," he said, slinging an arm around him. "This is your freedom, your ticket out. There's only two months until you get to leave."

Kurt let out a forced laugh as Blaine fought his way through the crowds, a huge smile on his face. "Aren't you supposed to convince me to stay dad?" he asked, and Burt shook his head.

"New York is where you belong Kurt. You're going to make it there, I know it," his dad said, giving him a hug while Blaine beamed from his spot. Kurt tried to make his smile bigger, for his dad, for his boyfriend, the entire time thinking maybe something tragic will happen so I can just go home and sleep.

The summer started, hot and slow and so much more unbearable than the winter had been. He had had hopes that maybe it was just the weather bringing him down, that when the sun was out and Blaine was forcing him to do activities outdoors-including fencing of all things-he'd get all the vitamin D that had been missing from his system, feeling instantly better and everything righting itself.

But he had also been through this for the last 18 years or so, and he wasn't sure why he had been expecting that summer to be any different.

And when it wasn't, when he still felt lonely and useless and sad and every other negative emotion in the world, it seemed ten thousand times worse with the addition of disappointment.

"I just wish Rachel would talk to me, you know?" Finn mumbled, and Kurt felt himself crack, turning to stare at his brother.

"Are you fucking kidding me right now?" he said quietly, trying to reign in the desire to shout, to scream in his face, and Finn just kind of blinked in his direction. "Did you ever think that there's someone besides Rachel who might be going through a hard time? That maybe someone else deserves your fucking attention?"

"I-dude, wow, okay, I know you've been a little weird lately-"

"Just as long as Rachel has!"

"But I figured Blaine would mellow you out," Finn shrugged, looking helpless.

"You're my brother Finn!" Kurt screamed. "You're supposed to care more than Blaine does!" Finn continued to stare in shock, and when he didn't retaliate, Kurt stormed out of the room, feeling more of a murderous rage than he ever had before.

"We leave tomorrow," Rachel said, and for the first time in months, Kurt looked at her smiling face. "Do you think-do you think it'll fix us? Being out there?"

"I hope so," Kurt answered, his smile as genuine as he could make it.

"You don't think it will though, do you," she said, her smile faltering a bit, and he shook his head 'no', both their faces falling. "We're going to fail, aren't we?" she whispered, and now she was on the verge of tears, and Kurt-god he hated this, that they were going through all this. They were supposed to deserve good things, their lives were supposed to improve, but she was right-their chances of surviving were slim to none, the city would eat them alive.

"No," he said, his voice breaking as he fought off his own tears. "We're going to-we'll do it. We'll-"

"We're not, why are we even going Kurt, the city is going to make everything worse," she cried, letting the tears fall, her face contorted in pain as she sobbed next to him, and he couldn't help it, he started crying with her, because they fucking deserved better than this.

They said their goodbyes to their parents before security, Rachel holding onto Kurt for support as they headed through the metal detectors in the direction of the gate. She felt sick, nervous in a way she hadn't before, and Kurt couldn't entirely blame her. "We have about an hour before we can board," he said. "Do you want to get food?"

She shook her head, finding them a spot and pulling out a book to distract herself. "I just-I feel something is wrong with the whole day," she said after a few minutes.

"It'll be fine Rach," he assured her, patting her knee and she nodded, taking a deep breath before submerging herself in the book while Kurt took out his iPod, decided to listen to music to take the edge off.

Kurt was nervous, wasn't sure how he felt about flying, but it was the quickest way-and being stuck in a car with Carole, Finn and his dad for two days seemed like a horrible idea. So he and Rachel had decided on flying, together, because they were adults, and they could handle this one simple task. He made sure they were in the right section when it was time to line up for boarding, made sure they found their seats-way in the back, Rachel complaining about how long it was going to take to get off the plane as they walked.

When the turbulence started, he felt like his heart dropped, and Rachel's hand immediately grasped his own. The captain explained that it was normal, and they should be through it soon. But it only seemed to get worse and worse, and by the time the oxygen masks dropped from the overhead compartment, Rachel turned to him with a grim expression, his own matching hers. "We knew this would be the day our dreams came true," she whispered, and he nodded.

"Too bad we weren't more specific with them," he replied, giving her a small squeeze of the hand, ignoring both their tears as he closed his eyes, not knowing whether to be grateful or upset that the end was finally upon the two of them. "Maybe next time, we can take a vote, check off which of our dreams we'd prefer."

"Fame or death? The eternal question," she tried to joke, people panicking all around them, children crying and people around them calling loved ones. It wouldn't do any good, Kurt realized, there was no hope for them now.

"It's ironic," he said quietly, but he knew she was listening. "We spend all this time fixating on death, and here it is in front of us, and we're not in the least bit dramatic over it."

"Maybe we just don't have any more drama left," she whispered, placing her forehead against his shoulder, and he could feel her tears, his hand squeezing hers once more. "I'm sorry Kurt," she said quietly, and he nodded.

"Maybe one day they'll write a movie about us," she said, and Kurt laughed-really laughed, knowing that it was the last thing he'd ever do.