Burt sat down next to his wife at the kitchen table and poured himself a cup of coffee. Carole gave him a kiss on the cheek and went back to looking at Kurt perplexedly. "What's he doing?" Burt asked her.
"I hear you, dad," Kurt said, not turning around from the sink. "I'm washing the silverware. It was spotty from the dishwasher; you know you really need to do this by hand. And especially today, I want everything bright and shiny."
"You weren't planning on decorating the house with forks and spoons, were you? Cause if not, if they're just going to sit in a drawer-"
"Don't be silly, dad. That's not the point."
"He's been up cleaning since four-thirty," Carole whispered. "If I prided myself on my housewifely skills I'd be offended."
"So Kurt," Burt said. "What are your plans for this morning?" The appointment with the doctor wasn't until one.
"Staying here with you. Doing a little brightening around the house."
"I think you should go see your friends in glee."
XOXOXO
So, Kurt was going to glee practice with them. Of course he was. Why wouldn't he? And Mercedes and Mike Chang were apparently going to be there too. Yay, reunion.
Kurt's dad threw them all out of the house way earlier than they had to leave. Probably because Kurt was driving him insane. He was certainly driving Sam insane. Okay, possibly for slightly different reasons. Burt shoved some money in Kurt's hand and told them to go have breakfast somewhere on him. And not to let the door hit them on the ass. He didn't actually have to say that last part.
The three boys walked toward Blaine's car. "So, the diner over by-" Sam started to suggest.
"I'm way more tired than hungry," Kurt interrupted.
"Me too," Blaine said. "Let's just go to the Lima Bean."
Of course they were tired. Sam knew they'd been together last night. He knew because when he'd come upstairs from the basement, where he was sleeping on the hideaway, to use the bathroom, Kurt's bedroom door was open and he could clearly see that Kurt wasn't in there.
"Lima Bean sounds perfect," Kurt said.
Blaine got in the driver's seat and Kurt took shotgun. Just like that. Just like, obviously I get shotgun, because Blaine is mine. Because, Sam, you're an afterthought at best. It wouldn't have been so bad if Blaine had stood up for him in some tiny way. Or like even just acknowledged him. But no, he just got in the car, like, obviously Kurt is going to sit next to me.
"You guys go ahead," Sam told them-before they got a chance to just drive off without even noticing he wasn't in the car. "I'm not really hungry or thirsty."
"Okay," Blaine said. "See you at glee." And he fucking drove off with his fucking so-called ex who he was apparently still fucking in love with.
XOXOXO
Brittany was still in bed with her temporary MIT roommate when she heard Sam's ring tone. "Sorry," she said, reaching over Ashley for her phone. "It's my ex. He's having a hard time with our breakup."
Ashley got out of bed and threw on some yoga pants and a t-shirt. "I'll give you some privacy," she said, and she walked out to the lounge.
"Brittany?" Sam couldn't believe he'd actually gotten through to her, finally. He hadn't really thought about what he'd say, in fact. "So, uh, how's MIT? Any hot girls go down on you yet?"
"Just one. She's not as good at it as you are. Kitty's a very lucky girl."
"See, that's the thing I've been trying to tell you, Britt. I'm not in love with Kitty. I barely even like her as a person. I'm in love with..." He couldn't continue; he was suddenly overcome with crying.
"It's okay, Sammy. It's okay. Don't cry. You're so sweet and so hot. I'm sure whoever it is loves you back."
"He doesn't," Sam choked out. "I thought he did but he's still in love with Kurt."
"I knew it was Blaine Warbler," Brittany said. "He was my next guess after Kitty. You always fall for the Cheerios."
This comment was so out of nowhere that Sam actually stopped crying to think about it. "What about Mercedes?"
"She was a Cheerio. It was only for like a week and it was before you came to McKinley, but once the Cheerios blood is in you there's no cure."
"Oh. Well, anyway. I just wanted you to know before I made it official with Blaine. But now..." He was crying again.
"Sammy. It's okay, Sammy, it's gonna be okay. Do you know what you need?"
Sam sniffled. "What?"
"No, I'm asking you. If you know what you need I'll try to get it for you. I can't stand for my Sammy to be sad, even if you're not my Sammy anymore."
"You're sweet, Britt."
"I just realized what you need."
"What?"
"You need Blaine."
XOXOXO
Sam was the last glee clubber to arrive for rehearsal. After he got off the phone with Brittany, he had decided to run to school instead of driving, so he was all sweaty and red-faced. Also he had slipped on an icy spot and fallen into a puddle of icy slush water, so his jeans were wet and freezing. It was shaping up to be a lovely day.
Oh, and look. Blaine had saved a seat for him. How thoughtful that Blaine remembered he existed. Mr. Schuester was writing something on the whiteboard when Sam tried to unobtrusively make his way to the chair. "Nice of you to join us-" Mr. Schue turned around and saw him, drenched with sweat and dirty puddle water, cheeks flushed, hair stuck to his forehead. "Sam, what in the world happened?"
"Does it have anything to do with why you and Blaine are grounded?" Tina asked. Everyone looked at Tina, then at Sam and Blaine. Sam wasn't the only one anymore whose cheeks were red.
"Tina, what are you..." Blaine said quietly.
"Sorry, Blaine," she said, quietly but not really. "I was worried about you missing glee yesterday...you and Sam...so I went over to check on you. Kurt's dad told me you were grounded."
"I knew something was going on," Mercedes said. "Didn't I tell you, Kurt?"
"Oh, that," Blaine said. He tried to chuckle. "Yeah. We were grounded from glee. That's why we weren't here. It's really...not a very interesting story. We should, uh, get on with practice."
The look Kurt was giving him-Blaine thought his head might actually explode. He could almost see the steam coming out his ears, his nose, his eye sockets-not his mouth, though; his lips were much too tightly pursed for that. All that pressure, about to burst. It made the quiet, controlled voice Kurt spoke in all the spookier. "My father has never grounded me. What on earth would he ground you and Sam for?"
Blaine whispered to him, "Can we talk about this later?"
"No, we cannot fucking talk about this later!" Kurt screamed. He looked around. "I apologize. The cursing was uncalled for."
Blaine took Kurt's hand. "Can we at least go somewhere private to talk?" Sam turned away in disgust.
Kurt very deliberately removed his hand from Blaine's and walked to the front of the room with all the dignity he could muster. "I came home to hear the results of my father's test results. To tell us if the cancer is still growing. I get home and everyone's acting like they just got probed by aliens. Last night I turn to you for some comfort and you totally blow me off." Sam turned to look at Blaine. Really, they didn't...? "Then this morning I try to make myself useful and get thrown out of the house for my trouble. And now you and Sam are acting more and more bizarre and refusing to tell me what's going on. Well. I am not moving from this spot until someone tells me everything."
"Guys," Mr. Schuester said. "I think we should let Kurt and Blaine talk privately." He walked to the door and held it open. No one moved. "Guys!"
"Come on," Marley said, standing. "Let's go." Joe stood up too, and then Mike. The three of them and Mr. Schuester were the only ones to leave.
"Well, see, it's like this," Blaine said. He stood up and started pacing. "Your father was a little...surprised-"
"Maybe you should back up, dude," Sam suggested.
"Right. Okay. Well, Sam wanted to bake a cake-"
"Maybe not that far," Sam interjected.
Blaine spun around and gave Sam an exasperated look. "Would you like to do this?"
"Sure." Sam got up and walked over to Kurt. "So...Blaine and I are dating."
Tina shrieked. Sugar clapped. Unique leaned forward to Jake and said, "You owe Unique ten dollars, baby." Jake reached into his pocket and pulled out a couple fives, which Unique snatched dramatically.
Kurt stood perfectly still. Perfectly still except for his head, which was sort of...vibrating. He stared at Sam, who had managed to maintain eye contact with him. "I don't understand," Kurt said.
"You know. Dating. Like, boyfriend and boyfriend." Kurt's expression was still uncomprehending. "We wanted to tell you first before we told anyone else," Sam added. They actually hadn't talked about telling Kurt or anyone. But if they had, they probably would have decided to tell Kurt first. Well, except Brittany. And, you know, pretty much all the parents involved, though mostly they had discovered the relationship independently.
Kurt turned to Blaine. "You're telling me that he...," he pointed at Sam, "...is your new boyfriend."
Blaine nodded.
"Sam 'Look at me, I'm the football quarterback' Evans. Sam 'I've never met a girl I didn't want to make out with' Evans. Sam 'I take my clothes off so old ladies will give me their money' Evans."
"That's not fair, Kurt, and you know it," Blaine said.
"Lots of old men paid to see me take my clothes off too."
"Not helping," Blaine whispered to Sam.
"Okay. Fine," Kurt said. "Let's assume, for the sake of argument, that you two are dating. That doesn't actually explain...anything. My dad wouldn't ground you for dating, he's not like that. And neither is Carole."
"He didn't actually ground us," Sam said. "He didn't, did he, Blaine?"
"No," Blaine said. "He must have just said that to Tina because he was upset."
"And he was upset because...?"
"He, uh. Sort of caught us," Sam said.
"Caught you..." Kurt gasped. "...in the act?"
Mercedes said, "Oh hell no," to no one in particular
"No! No, not in the act," Blaine said, glancing nervously at the rapt audience. "More like...after the act."
"We sort of fell asleep," Sam added.
There were several minutes of complete silence while Kurt processed this information. "Tell me the truth," Kurt said finally, as he looked at each of them imploringly. "Please, please tell me this did not happen in my bed."
"Um, okay," Sam said. "But which do you want? The truth, or for us to tell you it wasn't in your bed?"
XOXOXO
Carole froze and wrapped her unbuttoned shirt around herself. "Did the front door just open?" she asked Burt.
Burt lifted his head from her neck to listen. "If it's those kids skipping school again to..."
"Dad?"
"Oh. It's Kurt." He nudged Carole's shirt back off her shoulders.
"He sounds hysterical," Carole said.
"He can wait." Burt reached around to unhook his wife's bra. "We should probably keep it down, though." He let the bra drop.
"Lock the bedroom door," Carole said. "I don't think him walking in on us would help alleviate the hysteria."
XOXOXO
Sam really wanted to get out of the school at lunch, go somewhere with Blaine and talk. But Blaine didn't have his car; Kurt had taken the keys and stormed off. There wasn't really anywhere within walking distance, especially with Sam in his gym shorts, the only thing he'd been able to change into to get out of his cold, wet jeans.
So he was sitting in the cafeteria with Mercedes and Mike and Tina and Artie, who were grilling him relentlessly. Now he really wished he had just grabbed Blaine and gone somewhere with him, anywhere away from here, bare legs be damned. But that was the other problem: he didn't even know where Blaine was.
He resigned himself to his interrogation. Yes, they were practicing safe sex. No, it hadn't been going on that long. Yes, of course, they had been planning to tell everyone in glee. No, Sam hadn't been cheating on Brittany. (Telling this lie gave him a pang, but it wasn't really anyone else's business.) Yes, Brittany knew about the two of them. No, this wasn't why he and Blaine had been acting so weird lately. Wait, everyone thought they'd been acting weird lately? Well, Mercedes and Mike hadn't been around, but Tina and Artie said emphatically that, yes, everyone thought they had been acting very weird lately. It was the topic of a lengthy discussion when they failed to show up for practice yesterday. Okay, Sam conceded, yes, it was why they had been acting weird lately.
Thank God, there was Blaine. Sam scooted over to make room for him to sit. Blaine was immediately peppered with pretty much the same questions, but before he answered, he said to Sam, "I just got off the phone with my mother. The school called to report my 'unexcused absence' yesterday. Do they have your parents' number, or Carole and Burt's?"
"Shit," Sam said. Then again, maybe he'd rather deal with his mom than with these guys. He excused himself and walked outside. Yeah, it was pretty cold out without long pants or a jacket. He checked his phone and sure enough there was a voicemail from his mother.
"Hi, mom. I just got your message. Sorry to call you at work."
"No, Sam, that's great. Hold on a second." He heard her tell someone she was going to take her lunch break now. "Give me a minute and I'll call you back from my cell."
This could be a bad sign. It could mean she wanted to yell at him and didn't want her coworkers to hear. Well, not yell. She never really yelled. Or it could mean she wanted to have a heart-to-heart. Or it could just mean that she wanted the "long distance" call to be on her phone bill, not his. She didn't totally get that both their phones were on the same bill. Or that long distance didn't cost any extra. She was amusingly but endearingly clueless in some ways.
"Hi, honey. How's school?" It didn't sound like she was too mad.
Still, he was a little cautious. "Good..."
"Do you want to tell me about skipping school yesterday?"
"Yeah. Sorry. I skipped school yesterday. Well, only the afternoon actually."
"Uh huh?"
"So...I mean, you know how it is. Sorry."
"Sam. I'm not going to tell you I never skipped a class in high school."
"Really?" He kind of couldn't picture his mother ditching class.
"I'm actually more concerned that I haven't heard from you since my visit. And about how you sound now."
"How do I sound now?"
Mary sighed. "Like you need your mom."
Okay, Sam was not going to cry again. It felt like all he'd done for the last week was cry. And at school? No. "No, I'm good. I mean, not that I don't miss you..." Damn it, his voice was cracking.
"I've been thinking about that talk we had. After church? Remember?"
"Yeah."
"I want you to be able to be honest with me. I don't want you to have to hide things from me because you think I'll disapprove."
"Really?" Sam asked hopefully.
"I'm not promising I won't disapprove. I can promise I'll never disapprove of you, but I can't promise I'll never disapprove of anything you do. But whatever you do, you can be honest with me about it. Does that make sense?"
"I guess so." He didn't feel as hopeful anymore.
"So...is there anything you'd like to talk about?"
"I don't think so. Well. I'm not sleeping with Brittany anymore. We broke up."
"Sam..."
"Mom, I have to go." He spotted Blaine, who had come outside looking for him. "I have to get to class."
"Okay, honey. Call me later. I love you."
"I love you too, mom."
XOXOXO
Burt, fully dressed again, knocked on Kurt's bedroom door.
"Dad, where have you been?"
Burt looked around the room. The sheets and blankets were in a pile in the middle of the floor. All the surfaces-the dresser, the desk, the bedside table-had been cleared off. Everything that had been on them was thrown haphazardly in a cardboard box, and the wood had been scrubbed clean. Kurt was standing on a chair trying to reach the ceiling light to dust it.
"How are doing, Kurt?"
"I need your help, actually." Kurt lowered himself off the chair and walked to the bed. "I tried to flip this mattress, but I can't do it by myself."
"Kurt..." He really wanted to help Kurt stop freaking out. On the other hand, the mattress thing wasn't totally unreasonable. If he were Kurt and he knew what he gathered Kurt knew now, he'd want to sleep on the other side of the mattress too. "Okay, you grab that side, and I'll grab over here..."
"Thanks, Dad. I'm just going to take these sheets to the basement and wash them with a couple gallons of bleach. Unless...I don't suppose we could burn them, could we?"
"No. But I'll tell you what." Burt put his arm around his son's shoulder. "We've got plenty of time before we meet with the doctor. Let's go to the mall and pick out some new sheets. Any...any thread count you want." He wasn't entirely sure what thread count was, but he'd heard the term; he was pretty sure it was a thing with sheets. "Then we'll get some lunch and I'll even buy you a drink. You need to relax a little."
"I don't think that's a good idea, dad. You're a congressman. What if the press saw you providing a minor with alcohol? How do you expect to get reelected if you don't think of these things?"
"Okay. How about this? Have they taught you any...breathing exercises at that fancy song-and-dance school I'm sending you to?"
"Of course."
"Great. Teach them to me."
"Right now?"
"Yes, right now."
"Okay. But I still want to go to the mall for those sheets."
XOXOXO
Blaine put his hand on Sam's shoulder, but then he removed it immediately. He didn't want to out Sam before he was ready-and being out to glee was not the same as being out to the whole school. "Are you in trouble?" he asked.
"Not really," Sam said. "You?"
"She doesn't know what's gotten into me. But no, not really."
"Are you willing to put up with another call tomorrow?"
Blaine shrugged. "I'm not getting that gold star now anyway. But...where do you want to go?"
"Anywhere? Just walk?"
Blaine insisted that Sam go back in for his jacket and pants. Even if they were still a little damp, he told Sam, they'd be better than shorts. The delay made it a little riskier to sneak off the grounds, since they were obviously walking the opposite direction from everyone heading in from lunch. But sometimes if you just act like you have a perfect right to do whatever you're doing, no one challenges you.
They didn't talk for a while. But once they were a couple blocks from the school, Blaine took Sam's hand. That was at least as good as talking. The hand-holding did remind Blaine, however, that there was something they needed to talk about, with actual words. "Now that we're official...we're official now, right?"
Sam brought Blaine's hand to his lips and kissed it. "Right."
"Thank God. So...now that we're official, have you given any thought to coming out?"
"Like...to my parents, you mean?"
"Oh. I guess I was thinking more, you know, in general. Are your parents going to be a problem, do you think?"
"Sort of. Maybe." Sam kicked an icy snow clump. "Yeah."
"Sorry, I don't know why I didn't even think of your parents being a problem. Your mom's so nice and you seem, you know, close."
"Yeah. We are. But, I mean, she's religious. They both are, my whole family in fact."
"So like, wrath of God and all that?"
"I don't think I've ever heard her put it like that, but-"
"No, I'm sorry. I shouldn't...It's funny, it's like they're the opposite of my parents. They're not religious, I mean not in any serious way, but we're not close."
"How did you tell your parents? How did they take it?"
"Well, it was a different situation from yours. I mean, I was a classic gay kid who always knew. And I never liked girls or even, like, tricked myself into thinking I liked girls. Not that I'm saying you tricked yourself."
"No, I know."
"So when I was twelve I fell in love with my best friend. I mean, 'in love' the way twelve-year-olds think they're in love. And I confessed to Cooper. I wasn't scared of telling my parents, exactly. It just didn't occur to me to confide in them. And Cooper was in college already, very worldly and cosmopolitan, so of course it didn't faze him in the least. Or if it did, he managed to hide it from me well. And he sort of told them for me, and if it freaked them out at first, I never saw it. So it was kind of really easy, actually. I really need to thank Cooper for that next time I talk to him. It's probably the best thing he ever did for me. So anyway. Sorry if that doesn't help you much."
"Sounds like you were lucky."
"Yeah. Yeah, I really was." School was a lot harder, though, for Blaine anyway. But he couldn't bring himself to mention that right now.
"You think Cooper would talk to my mom?"
"Maybe..."
"Nah, I'm just kidding. She kinda already knows, actually."
"Why do you think that?"
"She, uh, heard us. And so did Carole."
"Oh my God." Blaine's cheeks turned red. Redder that is-they were already a little red from the wind. "I guess that explains why it seemed like Carole was trying to keep us apart."
"Did your parents ever catch you and Kurt?"
"No! God no! Maybe part of the reason it was never that big a deal was that it was always kind of abstract for them. They never had a visual...oh Jesus. I'm lucky again, I guess. They've both been too busy with their own affairs to pay much attention to mine." He stopped walking and looked at his surroundings for the first time since they'd gotten out of sight of the school. "Hey, did you know there was a library here?"
"No. Wanna go in? I'm freezing."
"Me too."
They went inside and looked around. Blaine spotted an empty table in what looked like a quiet corner and pointed to it. They each grabbed a random book-so it would look like they were reading-and went to sit there.
"So your dad too?" Sam whispered.
"My dad too what?"
"Having an affair?"
"Oh. Yeah. So, remember when we left that horrible dinner with my mother and her douchebag boyfriend? And you asked what was wrong and I said I didn't want to talk about it?"
Sam nodded. "That's what you found out?"
"Uh huh. I mean, I knew...or, I strongly suspected...that there had been one or two in the past. And it wasn't that big a surprise that he's having one now. He has been traveling a lot for 'business' lately." Blaine bit his lip and opened up his book on...what was that? World War II weaponry. He had it upside down.
"There's more," Sam said. He put his hand on his shoulder.
"Yeah, there's more. My mother's not the only one who had already been more or less planning to shack up with their, their co-adulterer. My father decided not to even come back to Ohio at all. Since he doesn't have any stuff anymore to pack up anyway."
Sam pulled him in and tried to put his hand in his hair. Fucking gel. Blaine was crying now, but silently. They were in a library, after all. Still, all Sam could think to say to him was, "Shh. Shh." It used to work on Stevie and Stacey when they were littler.
"That's not the worst part," Blaine said. "He wants to start a family with her. Start a family." His crying wasn't so silent anymore. He buried his face in Sam's shoulders to at least muffle the noise. And because he was Sam and he smelled good and he felt good.
Sam held him tight. And while he kept going, "Shh, shh," he prayed silently. Dear God. I'm sorry, I'm so sorry for everything I've done. Why do you have to take your wrath for me out on Blaine? Blaine's so good. Please, please stop hurting people I love and I'll do anything. And please don't let Burt's cancer be worse. You've already destroyed Blaine's family because of me, please don't destroy Kurt and Finn's too. Let Burt be okay and I'll do anything you want. Amen.
XOXOXO
"We would like a bottle of your finest wine," Kurt told the waitress at Breadstix. "Just for the adults. The four of us are minors." He indicated himself and Finn, Blaine and Sam. "We don't drink. Obviously."
"We have a house white and a house red," the server told Burt and Carole.
"Which goes better with pasta?" Burt asked.
"With the marinara, which I assume you mean?" Kurt said. "Red." He looked at the waitress and added, "Not that I would know from experience, obviously."
"I thought I'd get the meat sauce, actually," Burt said. "It's a special occasion."
"Fine, have the meat sauce. But still red."
"We'll each have a glass of the red," Carole said.
"And four Cokes," Finn added.
Kurt and Blaine and Sam all said, "Diet" in unison.
"Dudes," Finn said. "I want regular!" he called after the server, who was on her way back to the kitchen. He hoped she heard, because, Diet Coke. Ew.
When the drinks arrived-two red wines and four Diet Cokes-Kurt stood to make a toast. "First of all, here's to my dad's clean bill of health. Suck it, cancer!" They all cheered and clinked glassed. "I love you so much, dad. And I'm so relieved that you're going to be fine. I'm sorry, I know I've probably been driving you all crazy today-"
"Yes, you have!" Burt said.
"Well, and thank you, all of you, for putting up with me. And thank you for the new sheets, dad, they're lovely. And you two..." He pointed at Blaine and Sam. "I'm sorry I freaked out about you two. It was a surprise, I admit. A huge surprise. But if you two want to...date...or whatever it is you call what you're doing..."
"Wait, what?" Finn said. Blaine and Sam? Dating? And everyone else seemed to know this already?
"...then I want you to be happy. Just, please. Touch my new sheets and I will kill you."
Everyone clinked glasses again and drank. Finn still wasn't quite sure what was going on, especially that thing about the sheets. And he wasn't quite sure he wanted to know what was going on with that.
Sam stood and announced he wanted to make a toast too. "So, here's to Burt, and to Carole, and to cancer sucking it." More cheering and glass clinking. "And I'm so grateful to you guys for taking me, being a second family to me. I'm so sorry for all the trouble I've caused you lately, and, uh, I'm going to try to make it up to you."
"Sam-" Carole tried to interrupt, but he wasn't done.
"I think I know what I have to do, and the test results make me think I'm on the right path. So, finally, I'd just like to say thank you, God, for sparing this family any more of your wrath. Amen."
Sam sat down. Burt and Carole exchanged awkward glances. Kurt looked to Blaine for an explanation, but Blaine was looking at Sam, trying to get him to look back at him. Finn was the only one who could speak. "Dude, what the hell was that all about?"
