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An attempt at reaction: 4x04
First, I'm not going to play the Better Boyfriend Olympics. I hurt for both of these boys. It's a terrible, horrible, awful situation they are in. I expect I may have more empathy for Kurt's situation, so that may make me seem biased, but I don't feel any less for Blaine, I just don't understand it as intuitively.
It's going to take me a long time to fully process this. Everyone (well, Finn, Rachel, Kurt, Blaine, Santana, Brittany) made me cry for them in their own moments of pain. The episode was well executed. Brutal, but well crafted. I haven't felt this emotionally drained by a show since the end of Babylon 5. Actually, I don't think I've ever felt this much heartache over a show. I did not know I was capable of feeling this way.
Onward.
While I do not think it was out of character, I did not expect Blaine to cheat, and certainly not so casually (it wasn't exactly casual, but I can't think of a better word for the ease with which he tore his own heart out; it was self-destructive and terrifying how glibly he slid that knife into his chest). I honestly thought the cheating spoilers were nonsense, but even with them in mind as a possible outcome, I was not prepared. I knew Blaine was an imminent emotional trainwreck, but I didn't believe it would get this bad. I know many are saying Blaine had to hit rock bottom, and maybe he did with Eli. But, man, sometimes the bottom of that pit is quicksand, not rock, and I think Blaine may still be sinking.
So things.
• Kurt is good at holding his breath. It's how he survives; he keeps his eye on the prize, he compartmentalizes, sets aside the things that hurt, and endures. Blaine cannot do this, not alone. Blaine is all process. What's happening now is not eased but what may happen later. The proverbial light at the end of the tunnel is impossibly far away when you're walking barefoot on broken glass. Even if the guy at the other end is holding your shoes.(Please pardon the mangled cliché)
• Blaine, while missing Kurt, summons Kurt's memory in the outfit Kurt wore the first time they met. That was when Kurt needed Blaine. Now Kurt doesn't (or so Blaine believes; he misses being needed). So maybe he was thinking, if Kurt doesn't need him any longer, at least someone else could use him.
• Eli the lighthouse was brighter than Blaine's north star in that moment. Eli is a Lie.
• I don't think the 'hook up' means nothing to Blaine, but he is perhaps terrified of what it does mean, which is why he can't offer any explanation to Finn. I don't think he got anything out of the encounter with Eli except an extra helping of self-loathing.
This is going to be the hardest thing for Kurt to come to terms with, I think. That Blaine can say it didn't mean anything, when clearly it has to, otherwise, the obvious implication is that sex with Kurt never meant anything either, because why would you destroy something precious with something that didn't mean anything unless it was never all that precious in the first place?
I think--and others have mentioned this too--that for Kurt sex means everything, so he probably views this as a binary thing. If it wasn't a sacred everything to Blaine, then it's a nothing now. I'm not sure Kurt's going to be able to see a middle ground here for a while. He cannot separate emotional and physical intimacy.
Blaine thinks he can. Or he thought he could. Or he is trying to convince himself he can, because the truth is too hard to realize. Sex doesn't mean nothing, but Blaine desperately wishes it did. Tries to prove to himself that it doesn't. But he fails and breaks himself, breaks Kurt. He tells Kurt it didn't mean anything, but he knows that's a lie as soon as it trips off his tongue like an accusation. But he can't believe the truth, so he says the lie. He needs to believe that. It didn't mean anything. He didn't mean anything. It doesn't matter. He doesn't... Oh. See, Blaine?
If Blaine's primary requirement for a relationship is to feel needed and valuable, then I think Kurt's is to feel safe. Everyone wants to feel valued and safe in their romantic relationships, but there are possibly varying levels of priority. And given what Kurt has been through, safety is I think what he requires most. Now it's gone, so this will be hard to process. Kurt will forgive Blaine, but I don't know to what extent he'll be able to repair the romantic relationship, it won't happen quickly. Kurt will, I think--because he has empathy as well as compassion, and he does love Blaine--come to understand that Blaine needs that safety too, and Kurt can provide it, if he chooses to. That's going to take a big leap of faith, but then, often times mature love does.
While Blaine is going to need to do a ton of work to regain Kurt's trust--and he needs to be able to own up to what he did rather than blaming Kurt (Without picking sides, that was awful, Blaine)--I also think Kurt is going to have to make some grand romantic gesture (which is not really his thing so much; he prefers to receive them, it seems to me) to reassure Blaine that they are possible again. His forgiveness and acceptance needs to be clear and complete for Blaine. And if hippo brooch is the talisman and omen I think it is, there may be something like a marriage proposal in their future this season, but I am not holding my breath. At any rate, the Teenage Dream is dead for now; they must transform or die.
• Blaine didn't sing the first verse of TD, and I know why. When he can sing the first verse to Kurt? That's when they'll be okay. Also when the bowties return?
And this is as far as I've got today with my thinking. I need to process more; there was so much to this episode.
Also, clearly I fail at predictions, but I am hoping for some sort of reconciliation at Christmas. Not romantically--that'll take a while--but I think Kurt will be able to forgive Blaine and be his friend again.
One more thing.
• Can we now agree Blaine has a mood disorder? I think he may indeed be bipolar and that club flyer was no mistake.
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This has been on my mind a lot, too! We know Kurt can reach out to Blaine like that, in terms Blaine understands. I think it took a lot for Kurt to put his love on display, even in the relative safety of Glee Club. I really would like something like this, Kurt being able to make such a gesture. I don't want to see Blaine having to grovel and punish himself more in order to get Kurt back; that wouldn't feel very functional to me. They'd just be setting them up for another failure. If Blaine feels that he does not have nor deserves Kurt's unconditional love, that he must constantly prove himself worthy, he won't heal either. (Ugh, I'm babbling.)