"IF YOU MARRY him, I totally expect to be the maid of honor."

These are the words that Beth quipped lightheartedly as she and Lindy sat at a bar in downtown Seattle, their fingers wrapped around glasses of cider. Beth had already enthusiastically ordered a second round, but Lindy, whose mind was focused on anything but drinking, had taken a sip of her drink and abandoned it soon after.

"I doubt there will be a marriage anytime soon," Lindy told her friend, nearly rolling her eyes at Beth's optimistic hope that she'd be walking down the aisle any day now.

"But he proposed," Beth reminded her, lowering her voice a few notches as the bartender wandered closer. "And he took you to Paris, Linds."

"Doesn't change the fact that he's married to a woman who doesn't want a divorce and is close to death because of drugs. And he didn't take me to Paris. I took myself."

On one hand, Lindy regretted that she was not bubbling with giddiness over the events that had taken place within the last month. Kurt's actions had without a doubt shown her how much he loved her, but there were other things she expected out of their relationship too. She expected them to happen soon, even if she tried to act like she didn't.

Her departure from Paris had not been easy. She and Kurt's goodbyes never were. But this one had been more difficult than any singular one before.

Lindy had clung to him, swallowing back cries that she knew would break Kurt's heart if he saw them. And even then, if she had cried, she wouldn't have done herself any favors.

"I'll see you as soon as I get back," Kurt had promised.

Lindy accepted this vow, but somewhere in the furor of her anxiety she felt that her night in Paris with Kurt was to be one of their last pure moments together. This feeling was worsened when she imagined it being the last time that she would ever see him again. 

Regardless of this, Lindy had gotten on a plane and rushed right back to Seattle to continue on with her usual routine as if nothing had happened. With it came the normal bouts of sleepless nights and worry. She was used to these things by now. 

Beth shushed Lindy upon hearing her speak so loudly, giving her a cautionary hint that they could be heard. Lindy didn't care. She was far past caring whether or not a stranger heard her babbling about her relationship woes, even if they could have guessed that she was talking about Kurt. And who would even know at that point anyway? Lindy had come to learn that the streets of Seattle were a heroin cove, and her frequent laments could have been about anyone.

"I'm sorry, Lindy. I know you love him a lot."

Lindy waved her hand at the bartender, mouthing the word 'water.' She was beginning to feel dizzy in the environment of the smoky bar, craving the haven of her bed where she could stress herself out to her heart's content.

"I've got my dad to worry about too," Lindy expressed, sliding a napkin under her freshly delivered glass of ice water. "He's getting so bad that Trae and I think we may have to put him in hospice."

She shook her head and sighed. "I shouldn't have gone to Paris. My dad's dying and I left and then I come back to everything being worse than before."

Beth frowned sympathetically. "You're a good daughter for doing this for him after all that he did. So your boyfriend wanted to fly you to Paris, who cares? I know you think that you owe your dad your life now, but you don't."

"Anyone with a heart would disagree," Lindy muttered, stabbing a straw through the ice in her glass and taking a long, refreshing sip. Telltale signs of nausea were rolling threateningly in her stomach, but as of lately it was rare that they didn't.

"When's the last time you talked to . . . you know," Beth said, bobbing her eyebrows, a clear reference to Kurt under the cloak of linguistic discretion.

"A few days ago. He wasn't doing well."

This was quite true, as much as Lindy wished it wasn't. She had called Kurt on his birthday, or rather, she had phoned Krist first and asked to speak to Kurt. With Courtney still away at a long distance, she was able to talk to him whenever she wanted, though the band was either usually busy or Kurt was too sick to talk.

"Happy twenty-seventh birthday Kurty," Lindy had told him gently. Although Kurt had thanked her for the well wishes, he'd immediately launched into a rant about wanting to end the tour, sounding far from the content man she had been with in Paris only a few weeks prior.

"But can you?" she'd asked, noting each subtle rise in Kurt's voice as he explained everything wrong with the tour along with everything wrong in his life.

"I will," Kurt had said firmly. "I want to come home to you."

This had not been the first downtrodden phone call Lindy had shared with him. There had been several others, all of them characterized by the same pleas and cries for the madness in his life to end.

Kurt had retold a story to Lindy about how in Spain, shortly after their time together in Paris, teenagers in the audience idolized him as a junkie king worthy of praise, showing off their own drugs in search of his approval. He had sobbed through this retelling, begging Lindy to understand that he had never wanted it to go this far.

There also remained the stagnant issue of a divorce with Courtney. Courtney herself was resolute in making sure Kurt did not leave her side, citing her reasoning as wanting to keep Frances's family unit intact. Kurt expressed the idea that Courtney only wished to stay with him for his money and fame, two things he cried that he'd openly give away to her if he could.

Reality rained down hard on Kurt and Lindy sensed that he was nearing the end of his already thinly stretched rope. Between his addiction, his desire to give his daughter a good life, his demanding job, and the mere fact that he could not be with the woman he loved, Kurt was going to pieces and an ocean still remained between them.

"I don't know what to do for him," Lindy murmured to Beth. "If I could put him on a plane and cancel his tour for him, I would, but I can't. I can't do anything for him anymore. It's up to him now to end this once and for all."

"You've done enough," Beth assured her. "You've given him all your love and that's all you can do right now. You flew to fucking Paris for one night just to be with him, Lindy."

She sat on the edge of her seat, eyeing Lindy peculiarly with the look of someone who had words resting on the tip of their tongue but hesitated to speak them.

"Can I see the ring he got you?" Beth asked nonchalantly. Lindy could tell the curiosity was eating her alive. She was dying to be made aware of the cut, color and carat of her secret engagement ring.

Lindy sighed, pulling her purse into her lap and unzipping one of the hidden pockets inside. From there, she pulled out the diamond ring, dropping it into Beth's surprised open hand.

"You carry it in your purse? Damn, I was just going to ask you to take me to your place!" Beth whisper-shouted, inspecting the ring with admiration.

"I can't bring myself to let it sit in my room and collect dust. He bought it for me, after all. I just won't wear it. Not while he's married."

"Well, duh, you're not crazy!"

Beth turned the ring over in her palm a few times, timidly stroking the diamond with her fingertip and raising her eyebrows impressively with approval.

"Oh boy," she said, handing the ring back to Lindy, who tucked it away swiftly into her purse. "You've got a hell of a lot on your plate, Lindy Clayton."

"I always knew my life would never be simple," Lindy said sarcastically, reaching for her water.

"That's what alcohol is for. Which, you're not drinking. So how can I feel bad for you if you're not going to drink?"

"To be honest, I don't want to do anything remotely fun right now."

Beth made a pouting face. "Your birthday is next week! You'll officially be halfway through your twenties!"

"I'll probably just drive to Aberdeen to see my brother and dad," Lindy said. It sounded funny to her, planning her birthday with Lee, but she had an instinctual feeling that it would be the last time that her father would ever see her age another year.

"Fine. But I'm only letting you get away with this because your dad is sick," Beth said vehemently.

"I also have to see Hannah. She's going to grow up and not know who I am if I don't visit more often," Lindy pointed out, feeling a strong stab of longing to see her young niece again.

"Hey, look," Beth said, raising her glass in gesture to the fuzzy television that sat behind the bar in plain view.

Through the muffled screen, Lindy made out Kurt's face on MTV, singing live on a stage in a place that Lindy did not know, surrounded by people from an entirely different country. He looked like he was trying hard to stand upright as he faced his adoring fans, clutching the neck of his guitar fiercely, but Lindy knew even through the separation of a television screen that he was about to lose his grip.

When Kurt would pause his singing, he'd look everywhere else but up, his eyes falling on his guitar, his shoes, and the stage. When he did glance forward, there was no feeling in his eyes; they roved around but appeared to process nothing.

Seeing this made Lindy suddenly ten times more sick than she already been. Wrapping an arm around her stomach and feeling her surroundings blur at the edges, Lindy grabbed her purse and stood up.

"I've got to go," she told Beth, willfully ready to fall into her bed and once more use sleep as an escape from the torment of being conscious.