Chapter 3: The Children Were Cuddled, All Snug in their Bed

All the kids ended up sleeping in Ellie's bed. But it took almost an hour of Blaine and Kurt singing every kid's song they knew to do it.

Kurt was sitting against the wall when Blaine plopped down beside him. Their shoulders were touching. Kurt could feel his stomach tighten. He was flooded with warmth.

"Finally. They are all sleeping. Wow."

Kurt could only let a small giggle.

Blaine was leaning against Kurt. "No wonder my step-mom always looks so tired."

"They are adorable. I had fun."

"Thank you, I really appreciate this."

"Anytime."

"I would leave the cleaning until tomorrow but there is no way I'll be able to do it if the kids are awake."

"We should go do it now."

"You don't have to help. You've done enough."

"Of course, I'll help." Kurt bumped Blaine's shoulders. "Where should we start?"

"I thought I'd go deflood the bathroom. Then we can tackle downstairs."

Kurt nodded but he didn't move to get up. He wished they could stay like this-pressed against each other. He loved the warmth of Blaine, his scent, his…

"I am really going to owe you. Anything you need. Ever."

"You took on Karofsky for me. You've shown me the ropes at Dalton. I think I'm still in your debt."

"No, no, no."

"Of course, I did introduce you to the cultural phenomenon that is Candy Cane World at the Lima, Ohio Mall."

Blaine laughed, wishing he could think of something funny to say. Kurt was so good at that.

Blaine was throwing in a load of towels and Kurt went downstairs to start on the kitchen. As he came into the kitchen he almost slipped in a puddle of spilled milk. He caught himself on the counter. And looked around to make sure Blaine didn't see how clumsy he was. Kurt went to fill the sink with hot water so he could start wiping, and washing and-mopping apparently. The kitchen was an absolute disaster.

Blaine came into the kitchen, hit the same puddle of milk and went crashing to the floor When Kurt reached around to help stop the fall, Blaine grabbed on to him and drug him down too.

Again, they were side by side. Pressed up against each other.

"Are you okay?" Blaine asked.

"Peachy." Kurt said although his elbow was killing him. Not the elbow touching Blaine. That one was hot for a much different reason.

"I didn't mean to make you fall too. Ah, maybe I did." If it was possible Kurt thought Blaine might have pushed himself closer.

They lay there for a minute. "I'm glad you are here." Blaine said.

Kurt couldn't stand the tension one more second so he picked up a handful of spilt powdered sugar and tossed it up over Blaine.

"Look, Snow!" Kurt exclaimed copying Clay-or Will.

"Hey," Blaine laughed and rolled over so that he lay almost on top of Kurt, half pinning Kurt to the floor.

Kurt felt his stomach knot up and his breath caught in his throat. His eyes opened wide. Is Blaine?... This is his dream but what if he is misinterpreting this? What if it is nothing and the does something to ruin everything?

He looks terrified, Blaine worried, his own stomach knotting up. He was suddenly filled with doubt. What was he doing? He promised himself he wouldn't push.

"You have a little sugar on your cheek." Blaine voice came out husky. He leaned down and half kissed half licked it off.

He heard Kurt take a sharp intake of breath Blaine bit his lip. "Sorry."

"No, it's oh-"

Suddenly, they heard the front door opening and the crash of luggage in the foyer.

"Oh shit," Blaine said jumping up and carefully brushing powdered sugar from his clothes. "It's my dad."

Kurt jumped up too. He tried brushing his own clothes off but it was hopeless. Kurt noticed that Blaine didn't have a speck on him as he followed his friend into the hall.

"Hey," Blaine said. "You're home early."

"The service at that place was awful," Blaine's father said, throwing his gloves onto the entry table. "I'm not paying that kind of money for crap service." The man caught sight of Kurt. He looked Kurt up and down and didn't seem to like what he saw.

"And when did you ask if you could have a friend over?"

"Dad, this is Kurt." Blaine ignored the question. "Kurt, this is my father, Richard Weston and this is my step-mom Addy."

The woman, pretty, much younger than Blaine's dad, smiled warmly. "Nice to meet you Kurt."

"Are you from Dalton?"

"Yes, sir."

Mr. Weston made a disbelieving sound. "You don't look like Dalton material."

"Dad!" Blaine exclaimed. Addy bit her lip and shrugged sympathetically at Blaine.

"I just transferred." Kurt offered. "I am really liking it there."

There were looks between Mr. Weston and Blaine. "Why? Why'd you transfer?"

Kurt could have sworn he saw Blaine shake his head almost imperceptibly. "For the academics."

Mr. Weston gave his son a hard look.

Addy passed by the boys, giving Blaine a light kiss hello as she passed him by.

"Oh my god," She said as she surveyed her kitchen. "Oh."

"There was a slight disaster. I'm going to clean it all up. I promise. The kids wanted to bake cookies-"

"You're right. This is a disaster." Mr. Weston came into the kitchen.

"I'll clean it up." Blaine repeated.

"When I talked to the kids before dinner they told me how much fun they were having. That's what matters." Addy smiled.

"Fun is one thing, Blaine, but discipline is important too. Discipline and Responsibility. Haven't you learned those things from Dalton yet? "Mr. Weston poured himself a drink. "You better go, Kurt. Blaine has a lot of work to do."

"I'll drive him home and come back and clean," Blaine offered.

"No, I can help clean. I don't mind helping. It will get clean faster."

"How were you planning on getting Kurt home if the children were in bed? So not only did you have a friend over uninvited but he," Mr. Weston put a lot of emphasis on the he, looking pointedly at Blaine, "was going to spend the night?'

Addy put a hand on her husband's arm. "C'mon let's go to bed. Blaine can take care of this mess. Let's us go upstairs and relax."

"You never care if Wes or David spend the night."

"We know Wes and David. We approve of Wes and David."

"You'll approve of Kurt, too."

"I am so disappointed in you Blaine. This just shows such a lack of judgment or forethought-I do not want" there was a pause for emphasis "strange…people in my home when I am…"

Abby tugged on her husband's arm. "C'mon. Technically, we are still on vacation. This can wait until tomorrow. C'mon."

Mr. Weston surveyed his son and Kurt and there was something there that reminded him of Karofsky-as if Mr. Weston wanted to slam his son up against the cabinets. Instead, his shook the ice in his glass and then shaking his own head allowed his wife to lead him upstairs.

As soon as Blaine's folks had disappeared upstairs, Blaine repeated his offer to take Kurt home.

"Not until I scrub this floor!'

"Sorry about that-" Blaine said quietly. Then the older boy got busy cleaning, serious, quiet.

Kurt tried to think of something to say. Somehow he didn't think, boy your dad seems like a jerk, was a good conversation starter. He wanted to let Blaine know somehow that he had his back. He wanted to be there for Blaine because something certainly seemed up between the two. Mr. Weston kind of reminded Kurt of a bully and Kurt couldn't help but wonder if he wasn't that okay with his son's sexuality.

Kurt decided to try to lighten the mood. He didn't like how grimly, Blaine went about cleaning. He wasn't his usual upbeat, confident, friendly self always ready with a smile or a word of advice. He scrubbed the floor murderously.

Kurt found another pinch of powdered sugar on the counter and held it above Blaine, "Look it's snowing!"

"Kurt!" Blaine said wiping it up immediately but it earned him a half smile.

Kurt waited a little bit and then walked up to Blaine who was wiping down the dining room table. He bumped shoulders with him, "Do you think your dad would think it lacked discipline if I pooped in your giant poinsettias."

"What?" Blaine looked a little shocked.

"I blew that one, didn't I. I was referring to our earlier poop related incident at the mall. Out of context..."
"In context it is still a mildly disturbing image."

"We've got an inside joke."

"Maybe not." Blaine said but he had a full smile on his face. "I don't know how we could ever use that in front of anyone else."

He bumped Kurt's shoulder again and then went back to wiping.

"Do you want me to scrub the floor in here since you did the kitchen?"

"Kurt, you're wonderful. I'll go grab the family room." But almost immediately Blaine's mood seemed to darken again.

Kurt scrubbed as fast as he could. He wanted to do a good job; he didn't want Mr. Weston finding pockets of missed flour to blame on Blaine. But he went as fast as he could because he wanted to go be near Blaine. Maybe there would be a repeat of earlier-when Blaine half-licked, half-kissed the sugar from his face-Kurt could swear that Blaine was just seconds away from really kissing him-on his lips? And if he'd wanted to kiss him that badly a half hour ago that meant the likelihood of it happening again was high, right?

I'm not reading anything into that, right? Kurt wanted to text Mercedes or Tina and ask but he was pretty confident that licking powdered sugar off of somebody else's constituted flirting. Right? He tried to remember if he had ever licked anything off of Mercedes. Definitely not, Kurt was sure that he has never licked anyone. If he could get Blaine in a good mood again maybe he'd get a kiss goodnight. His heart was pounding with excitement and desire and nervousness and fear.

Blaine was quickly depositing toys into their color coordinated and marked baskets. He was mad at his father and didn't like what his father was implying about Kurt or about him. Blaine was frustrated-how could he talk to Kurt about courage when here he was scared to even tell his own father-I mean his father had to know that he was gay after what happened at his old school. The boys you wrote the word faggot on his forehead with a sharpie after roughing him up in a back staircase. But his dad had made such a big deal about what an insult the word faggot was-because being gay to his dad is something horrible to be. So the two of them did a little dance-Blaine left that part of himself at the door to his dad's house and his dad-ever vigilant for anything less than his ideal of what Blaine should be-only came at him sideways.

And Kurt-who he was trying to impress had to see that- had to see that Blaine wasn't as confident as he seemed. Courage, my ass. I can't even stand up to my own dad.

And then Blaine kept replying the scene on the kitchen floor over and over. Blaine had wanted to kiss Kurt so badly but his new friend looked so unsure-frightened even- he couldn't tell if his advances were welcome. Did Kurt think of him as something more or just a friend? Would Kurt tell him if he went too far? Hadn't they been cleaning for hours now? Maybe…?

"Hey,"

Blaine jumped.

"I'm famished-do you think your parents would mind if I ate some of your Christmas decorations. You wouldn't happen to have any giant sized Styrofoam candy canes."

This got another smile from Blaine.

"Now we have two very bad inside jokes."

"Are we done in there?"

"I think so."

"C'mon, I'll drive you home."

Kurt got his small over night case from the hall, disappointed. Did Blaine seem to be in a hurry to get rid of him? Those were absolutely awful jokes. Why did his usual wit always abandon him when he was around Blaine?

"I'm ready whenever you are." Kurt wrapped his scarf around his neck.

"Alright," Blaine smiled but inside he was trying to figure out if Kurt seemed to be in a rush to get out of there. Not that he blamed him. Blaine was usually in a rush to get back to Dalton on the weekends his dad made him come home. He loved Addy and the kids. He was sure he loved his dad too but…

He fished his keys out of his pocket. "Let's go."

There was very little talking in the car on the way back to Lima. The music Blaine put on wasn't even very good in Kurt's opinion. Blaine seemed totally distracted and certainly not interested in kissing anybody.

"Blaine, I had fun today. You siblings are awesome."

"They are."

"Turn down Rock Dump Ave. There's a 24 hour Starbucks. I'm buying you a latte for the drive home."

"You don't have to…"

"If you fall asleep at the wheel on the way home I'll never forgive myself. Besides, I'm craving a caramel macchiato."

Blaine gave in and parked. They walked in and scanning the room, Blaine noticed someone sitting by himself in the far corner. Karofsky. He wasn't wearing his letter jacket and luckily Kurt seemed so focused on convincing Blaine to let him pay that he hadn't notice.

"You better not do anything." Blaine muttered silently to himself and then smiling at Kurt guided him up to the counter. "Fine. Fine. Your treat. Order me what you think I would most like and I'll tell you if you're right."

Blaine kept one eye on Karovsky and the bully was giving them an evil stare but he didn't make a move to get up. I wonder what he is doing here so late? All by himself. There better not be trouble. Blaine remembered how Karovsky was Kurt's first-well, unwelcomed kiss, and it made him want to shove someone into a locker. So Blaine couldn't help when Kurt took a sip and covered his upper lip in a milk froth mustache, to step dangerously close to Kurt and wipe of said mustache with his thumb. Then Blaine licked the froth it off his own thumb.

Kurt's belly flip-flopped.

"Wanna get a table?" He said breathless.

Am I frightening him again? Blaine wondered.

"No, we've gotta get you home."

And he steered Kurt out the door before the newest warbler could look around the room. Blaine could feel Karovsky's eyes burning into their backs.

The walk to the car was casual again. The moment seemed to pass and Kurt, disappointed, was desperate to get it back.

"Blaine," He started as they climbed into their seats, trying not to spill their mochas. "I am really glad you are my friend. You are like the best thing that has happened to me in a long time."

Blaine got stuck on the word friend. Friend. So he is trying to turn me down gently. Friends. Okay. That's okay.

"I'm glad we are friends too." Was the only thing Blaine said until he dropped Kurt off. "So I'll talk to you when we return to Dalton after break?"

"Uh, okay then. I hope the rest of your break is good."

"I head back to my mom's tomorrow so it shouldn't be so bad. See ya."

Kurt opened his door, confused. Like usual Blaine seemed to go hot and then cold. Was he flirting or just being friendly and then it was always like he had to rush off because he was busy or something? "Yep."

Kurt turned to get out and Blaine caught his arm. "Thank you-for everything. I mean it."