[On the morning of October 31st, Blaine wakes up from a dream feeling panicked and uneasy. He can't remember what the dream was about, but he knows it was bad and he can't shake it. As he goes to class, he still hears the whispering. He knows it's about him. He feels the griffon staring at him. As he's washing his hands after a bathroom break between classes, he looks up and sees, written plain as day with thick black marker:] CONFESS. [After that, the whispers sound like a chorus of the word.]
Blaine really started to wonder if he should have just skipped classes today and stayed in his apartment. He had managed to do a decent job of ignoring the strange things that happened to him this week. Brushing them off as figments of his imagination, Blaine did his best not to put any stock in them. He was stressed about school, the whole situation with Rachel which included her meeting Cooper, the fact that he was cheating on her but somehow could not stop, and their whole relationship was a lie. Yeah, Blaine had some stress and anxiety present in his life to say the very least.
The dream is something that Blaine can’t shake and knows he won’t be able to for a while. The anxiety attack in the bathroom at the union the day before was...unfortunate. He felt embarrassed by it and prefers to ignore that it even happened in the first place. But waking up not knowing what you dreamed but knowing how you felt in or from the dream was almost worse. Yes, things like this had happened before where Blaine would wake up and still carry the emotions from a dream but unable to remember exactly why. This was different. His heart raced and every tiny noise or slight movement made Blaine jump and that feeling of being watched was back. It was terrifying.
He should have stayed home in bed.
The whisperings started back up as he went to class but it was just paranoia. The dream had caused his brain to think back to the events in the days before. There weren’t any whispers just Blaine’s mind playing a cruel trick on him. Even as Blaine told himself that, it wasn’t much comfort. But. Why wouldn’t the whole campus be talking about him? That gossip about his “secret secret identity’? Did someone know, other than Sebastian, that his relationship with Rachel was anything less than a complete joke.
He was a complete joke. Blaine could hear it in the tone of the whispers and the eyes he felt on his back. Focusing in class was impossible. He sat in the very back so he could keep an eye on every student in the room because, if he sat in the back there could be no eyes on him. NO eyes watching him from behind. Yes. He solved the riddle. Blaine was starting to feel insane by this point. He trusted no one he came across and he couldn’t trust anyone to understand what was happening or why it was happening to him.
He could have sworn he heard someone say that but no, that was just his brain.
Because you’re lying to Rachel.
Because you’re lying to Kurt.
Because you’re lying to yourself!
Blaine stood abruptly from his spot in the back of the class the moment it had ended and briskly walked to the bathroom. He just needed another minute alone and away from those fucking whispers. Away from the judgement. He went into the handicap bathroom and locked the door behind him. Alone. At last. He breathed a sigh of relief and closed his eyes leaning back against the door. He takes this time to use the bathroom for what it actually is used for and to just soak in the silence.
He turned the water on at the sink and let it run a moment before lathering up his hands with soap and meticulously cleaning them as he told himself that everything was fine and it was just in his head. He leaned down and splashed some water in his face and reached over for a paper towel. That felt better.
As Blaine stood up straight to do his best and brave the world and whispers outside he froze. He felt a chill wash over him as he stared at the mirror. Not the reflection in the mirror because it was just Blaine and obviously that was to be expected but there was something he wasn’t expecting. Something that couldn’t be there. He didn’t notice it walking into the bathroom and the door was locked.
Blaine let out a shaky breath and slowly reached out to the mirror to touch it. It seemed real enough. But it could just be another figment of Blaine’s elaborate imagination. He took the paper towel, damp from drying his hands and face, and extended it to the mirror. Blaine was terrified of what he was about to do and about to test. He rubbed the paper towel across the bottom of the F and sure enough, the black began to smear.
Blaine jumped back as if the writing on the mirror had shocked him. It might as well have. He felt his entire body buzzing with the signs of an oncoming anxiety attack. This wasn’t real. There was no possible way for that to be here or for anyone to know that Blaine would be here in this bathroom. He clenched his jaw in an attempt to prevent himself from breaking down and crying there on the spot.
It’s not real, Anderson. It’s just..not.
He thought to himself. Blaine backed away from the mirror never turning his back to it. His hands fumbled behind him to find the door handle and once his fingers wrapped around it, Blaine quickly left the bathroom and closed the door hard behind him.
He exhaled and slowly turned to walk away. This was just another thing he needed to pretend didn’t happen. After a moment or two of walking through the halls on his wya out of the building and to his next class, Blaine was met with a chorus of whispers but this time they all joined together to form one word.
Blaine threw his hands up over his ears and ran through the crowd of students and burst out the door into the open air, thinking it may stop. It didn’t. It was everywhere now pounding in his brain and on his eardrums.
“Please..stop..” He begged, his voice cracking. There were students looking at him now. They were all talking about him. Because he cheated, because he lied, because he was a fake.
Blaine felt sick, and his chest started to tighten. His heart beat wildly and it was hard to breathe again. Everything felt like it was spinning and he just wanted to sit down until it all stopped. He tried to get away from everyone but there were just too many students and too many whispers to get away from.
He rounded the corner of one of the campus buildings and found it to be empty of students on the other side and immediately he flattened himself against the bricks and slid down until he was seated on the cold ground. Blaine was trembling trying to get his anxiety under control but he was spiraling and there wasn’t anything in his mind that he could think of that seemed to help. Everything he thought about was turned around on him. Blaine slammed his eyes shut and brought his knees close to this chest wrapping his arms around them to keep them there and buried his face.
Please stop. I’ll do it. Just...stop. Please! He thought desperately just wanting this whole ordeal to be over.