Blaine dragged himself up the front steps, wishing for the millionth time that the Jetsons had been an accurate representation of the future.
It'd been a long day. Hell, it'd been a long week. All he wanted to do was get inside to dinner with his family, do the dishes while Kurt braided Liz's hair, curl up on the couch with the two of them, and give in when Liz begged to stay up for one more episode, please Daddy, I haven't seen this one I swear! Liz could jump up and down on his belly belting along with the Wiggles on the screen and he wouldn't so much as grimace, he'd sing along. Kurt could prattle on to them both about how much Simon's outfit clashed with Lachy's (Liz completely ignoring the diatribe; despite her young age she knew better than to interrupt Papa while he was animatedly analyzing anybody's fashion choices) and he would not only nod at the appropriate times, he'd actually be listening.
To Blaine, that scenario was the pinnacle of paradise. He just needed to be home.
Turns out what he returned home to was a lot less routine and little more oh my god why isn't the couch where I left it when I left the house this morning. But we'll get to that in a second.
As Blaine stepped into the foyer and closed the front door behind him he was met with a shriek from the direction of the living room.
"DADDY! YOU'RE HOME! ARE YOUR SHOES FIREPROOF?!"
Huh?
"HUH?"
"BLAINE DEVON HUMMEL-ANDERSON HOW MANY TIMES DO I HAVE TO REMIND YOU NOT TO YELL THROUGHOUT THE HOUSE? THE NEIGHBORS WILL COMPLAIN AGAIN. IF YOU WANT TO TALK TO US YOU NEED TO JOIN US IN THE ROOM THAT WE ARE IN, INSTEAD OF DISTURBING THE ENTIRE NEIGHBORHOOD."
Blaine hung up his jacket and kicked off his shoes, rolling his eyes at his oh so conscientious husband's request. He grinned, attitude already improved by the fact that he was home, even though he had absolutely no idea what was going on. He turned his head towards the living room while he fished his cell phone and loose change out of his pockets and responded not any softer than Kurt himself had. "DO YOU NOT HEAR THE IRONY IN WHAT YOU'RE SAYING RIGHT NOW, HONEY?"
"SHUT UP."
"DADDY DON'T BURN YOUR SOCKS."
...Okay. He tossed the contents of his pockets in a bowl on a small table beside the door.
He wasn't born yesterday, and neither was Liz, so he'd had some time to be acquainted with her and her games and while she didn't play them often, when she did she did it in a big way. He heard a voice that sounded an awful lot like Kurt's in his head, "If you're going to do something, do it right. Nothing halfway, Blaine." Despite the fact that Liz was biologically his, he saw more of Kurt in her than he saw of himself. He pulled himself back to the situation at hand and finished his original thought…
This was sounding like a classic the floor is lava scenario.
And sure enough, as he came down the hallway in his (thankfully completely whole and not incinerated) socks and rounded the corner into the living room his suspicions were confirmed.
The couch was pushed up against the far wall, the dining room chairs were surprisingly not in the dining room, and were instead set up almost as if they were stepping stones in a creek, making a path to the loveseat that was inexplicably moved up flush with the TV.
As for his shrieking family, Liz was in Kurt's arms. Kurt was standing, one foot on the couch, the other on the first "stepping stone". Both of them were looking at Blaine with wide eyes and wider smiles.
"DADDY THE FLOOR-" "BLAINE THE FLOOR-"
"Is lava?"
Their grins grew impossibly wider. Liz started to laugh, holding onto her Papa's neck tighter in a desperate attempt not to fall to her fiery doom. Kurt, for his part, hugged her closer to his chest, eyes twinkling at Blaine before leaning his head down slightly to whisper in Liz's ear.
Liz stopped laughing abruptly and her eyes grew comically. "Papa, what are we gonna do?"
"Well, sweet pea, Daddy's socks actually are fireproof. But I'd feel better if he was up here with us, wouldn't you?"
She nodded emphatically, loosening her grip on Kurt to beckon Blaine over.
Well, this wasn't exactly how he'd expected his evening to go. But as he jumped up onto the couch, reached over and pulled them into his arms, he thought, with these two, anywhere is paradise.
