Just a quick note. I really, really, really hated the last chapter. It made me sick re-reading it today, and I don't know what I was thinking last night. So here is the replacement.

Jack wasn't surprised at Kurt's reaction. But the weight of his rejection pushed Jack into a deep depression. Kurt walked past him in the halls at school the next day without so much as a nod, but he didn't blame him. He knew was damaged and, he admitted to himself, he couldn't possibly love someone as much as Kurt needed to be loved in his state. And so Jack wondered through his days in a zombie-like trance, paying no attention to his peers or his studies. Halfway through English class- in which he forced himself not to look toward Kurt, he remembered that he had glee that day. He smiled, remembering how good he had felt while he sang Suffragette City, but he had no desire to go to the club that day. Instead, as school let out, he walked aimlessly across the town, watching all the people go about their day. He wondered why he continued to try to have a normal life- he knew he would never be normal. He longed to be back home in Yorkshire. He didn't miss his father or the torture he put him through, but he missed his freedom and the his excuse for turning to desperate measures to escape reality. He couldn't remember half of his younger teenage years simply because he was so coked out. He didn't know the names of his fuck buddies, or even whether they were male or female. He had left this part out of his story to Kurt- there was no need to add fuel to the fire. He knew he was gay- the thought of a woman's reproductive organs disgusted him- but he didn't think that would have mattered to himself after snorting a few lines.

He hugged himself with his arms as he cursed his past self. Why did it have to be this way? He wondered. He wallowed in his self pity as he moved his feet one after another in a steady beat. And then he thought of his parents, and what had come of them. His mind wandered to their rotting bodies covered by dirt and worms and grass fertilizer. His musings took an existential turn as he walked past billboards advertising useless technology and chemical enhanced meat. He saw twelve year old girls with designer bags and sunglasses. His anger swelled at the bumper of a car with a sticker reading man+woman=marriage, and he marveled at how people weren't jumping off bridges left and right in such a fucked up world. He felt like Meursault, as he wondered if the meaning of life really was simply death. He didn't consider suicide. What's the point of doing it yourself, he thought, if it's going to happen on it's own anyway? Why go through the trouble? He thought about Kurt and how much he truly wanted him. How innocent and lovely he was in the evening sun in the graveyard and how warm and affectionate he was in the bright lights of downtown Columbus.

He didn't love him. He thought maybe he could love him, but he didn't yet. It took more than a few beautiful moments for Jack to give someone the chance to say that they are loved by him. In fact, he didn't think he had ever loved anyone in his entire life. He was too young when she died to love his mother, and he didn't love his father for obvious reasons. But what does it mean to love someone anyway? he wondered. Does love even really exist? And if it does, why do human beings bother with it in the first place? As he lit a cigarette to try to quiet his thoughts, he asked himself whether this thought process was nothing more than a coping mechanism to deal with Kurt's repulsion at his past. But even if it was, he didn't think it mattered anyway. That didn't make any of his thoughts any less true. If Kurt had embraced his past and accepted him, he would still die one day. There would still be vanity and consumerism and hatred in the world. He still would have smoked the cigarette he was currently smoking. Only one small factor in the trillions and trillions that made up his life; past, present and future; would have changed. He had simply realized it sooner.

And with the acceptance of this, Jack decided to try to rush back to make the end of Glee Club. After all, if he was to be alive for an unknown amount of time, he might as well enjoy it, right?