When they got back to the house, everyone showered and ate the tuna salad, chicken salad, and vegetable tray that Kurt and Sebastian had made the day before. They headed out to the pirate museum because Kurt thought it would interest Burt the most.

Kurt watched everyone more than he looked at the exhibits. They started out together, but Burt wandered off and started looking another area by himself. Kurt watched Carole join him, but his dad moved away before she had finished looking. He saw her notice him and she moved on to where he was, but he still moved on before she was ready again. Kurt saw Art see Burt do this. He and Nina were holding hands just like Kurt and Sebastian were. And despite Kurt and Art watching Burt, they were still participating in the discussion about the pieces in the exhibit they were looking at.

Kurt squeezed Sebastian's hand and let go. He went to where Burt was standing, mostly staring. "Are you not interested in seeing this stuff?"

Burt looked up. "What? No. This place is fine."

"Look." He turned his head towards Nina, Art, and Sebastian. "See. They're together. I was with them. You wandered away." He lowered his voice. "Every time Carole gets near you, you move away again in a couple of minutes. You're not interacting with her at all. Is this what you do when you go out with her? You just let her wander around and look on her own? Like you did when you used to take me to the mall? You'd just follow me into each store to make sure no one kidnapped me or whatever, but you never looked at anything I looked at."

"I guess."

"The four of us have been here before. Sebastian and I have been her twice. I picked this place because I thought you'd enjoy it, but we might as well be at the mall."

"No. I like looking at the stuff. It's interesting, not like the mall."

"Look at Art and Nina. They're holding hands. I was holding hands with Sebastian until I came over here. If you don't want to look with the four of us, at least interact with Carole. She loves you, Dad. Don't shut her out. I'll quit bossing you around, but I hate seeing Carole looking sad and alone when you're literally in the same room with her." He walked back across to where Sebastian was and was greeted with a smile. He wrapped his arm around Sebastian's waist and Sebastian followed suit.

Kurt watched Burt look at Carole and make his way back over to where she was looking. He wrapped his arm around her waist. Kurt saw Carole's face brighten instantly and she stepped into his embrace and leaned into him. After they finished looking at the display, Burt led them back over to the group. He caught Kurt's eye and just barely nodded.

"This place is really cool."

Carole agreed. "It really is. I'm excited to see that hotel we're going to go to after this too. I looked through a website about this area. There are so many cool things to see and do."

Nina said, "That's the main reason I picked this area to buy a house. The housing market here isn't that different from Columbus, so it's so much more reasonable than buying a lot of places and it's not a long flight. We had a place in New York City, but with Sebastian living there now, we figured we'd sell it and buy someplace that everyone could enjoy. Art's cousin, sister, brother-in-law, and our nieces came with us the last time. We'll have Ben, Laura, and their two boys down soon too. Maybe fall break. The house isn't huge, but it's not cramped with a lot of people because of the U-shaped layout. People can be in different rooms and feel like they have privacy, plus there are so many things to go out and do, people don't have to just be cooped up inside. You two are family now too. I know Burt has a few days here and there with congressional recesses. Please feel free to look at the website where I listed it and mark of dates you'd like to come down. Once I see it's you that's requesting the days, I'll just mark them as unavailable. I'll make you two copies of the keys when we leave here."

"Thank you. That's really kind of you to offer," Carole said.

She turned back to look at a display of gold jewelry. "I like that necklace." She pointed at one with emeralds inlaid in gold. "I'd like one about one-tenth the size it is though. Everything about it is beautiful, but it just so big. It must have been worn with one of those dresses with the deep scoop necks or a strapless dress."

Kurt said, "I bet you're right. Something that opulent would only look right as the focal point. I bet the woman wearing it also wore her hair up, maybe with a few curled tendrils hanging down artistically."

"That hairpin is beautiful," Nina said. "It would be fun to go to one of those old-fashioned balls just once."

"I'm going to go to one, someday, somehow," Kurt said with complete confidence.

Sebastian squeezed his hand.

X-X-X-X-X

Carole looked up as they entered the atrium of the former Ponce de León hotel. "This is the most amazing place. I've seen videos of places with domed ceilings and arches, but seeing it in person is so different. It's beautiful."

"I love it in here," Nina said. "I could just sit in here for hours and stare at the intricacy of everything. We've become so function oriented in so many ways that no one builds these types of places anymore. Rectangular rooms with rectangular furniture to fit most is efficient, as was as fairly boring."

"This gives me an idea," Sebastian said, as they walked around the atrium. "You said that Sam is an artist."

"Yeah."

"We have that whole wall in the kitchen with nothing on it. Maybe we could paint a mural on it. It's about 10 feet long. It's big enough to paint something really cool and it wouldn't get potentially knocked off like paintings hanging there would, which I'd thought about before and decided against."

"We can ask him."

"I can't draw at all, but I bet we can find some Art Deco designs that would give us inspiration. We could paint it together and he could to his artistic touches to make it look better than us just painting it like a coloring book page."

"Sounds fun. I'm sure he would. This is your olive branch to him, isn't it?"

"In a way. I know he probably just went along with Blaine, but still."

"I get it. I'm glad you're willing to give him a chance."

"We all screwed up something in high school, right?"

"Yeah. I'm going to go talk to Carole for a few minutes." He squeezed Sebastian's hand before walking away. He walked around to the other side of the atrium where she had wandered. "Is everything okay?"

She opened her arms to hug him. "No, honey. Every day is a struggle, but it's really beautiful here. And Sebastian's parents seem to be genuinely kind people." She let him go.

"They are. I've never felt more accepted by a group of people than I do with the two of them and Art's sister Victoria and her husband Antony and their daughters. They just acted like I had always been part of the family. No hesitation whatsoever. I've never had that, even with my own family."

"You do know that I love you, don't you?"

"Yes. And I love you too. You've been a great friend. I'm trying to figure out how to get to the point where Dad and I can be friends too. I haven't been able to get past that hump of wanting him to really like what makes me 'me'. I've been thinking about it. It's not just that I'm gay. If I were straight, the only thing that would change would be that we'd both like women. We just don't have much in the way of common interests. I'm thinking that I really need to just grow up and realize that I need to move on from wanting him to learn to like doing anything I like to finding mutually enjoyable activities. We spend very little time together now and he's a very busy man. We played Poker that day he came to New York. We had fun doing that. I think rather than dragging Dad out to do anymore sightseeing, I need to talk to him. I think his idea of a vacation and mine are probably not at all alike. I planned two and a half days of fun things to do. I don't think he'll enjoy that now that I really think about it. I know you will though, so it's hard to know what to do. I just kept thinking that eventually something would click, that I'd find something that would appeal to all of us to visit while we're all here, but I think that's probably not the case. I don't even know what the two of you have in common, which is pretty lame on my part."

"I don't think it's lame, honey. I think that we can eventually all find things that we like to do together. Your dad is going through a lot. We all are. And rather than sharing, he's closing himself off. You come by it honestly." She smiled sadly at him. "There's so much rage and sadness inside that we're struggling to show any emotion for fear of it all slipping out uncontrolled. We're seeing someone. We are learning to work through things. I'm just going to tell you this because I don't think Burt knows how to explain it to you."

"What?"

"You said that he doesn't like what makes you 'you'. That's not true. Not at all. He means every word when he says he wants you to be you and to live your life in a way that makes you enjoy it. We both want that for you. What he struggles with is how he's contributed to your problems, both directly and indirectly. And that's not your issue to deal with. You can't just walk over there and tell him that you forgive him because he hasn't forgiven himself. And your track record with attempting to make his life easier will only make him think that you're offering forgiveness to make his life easier. So, I think for now, you're just going to have to give it a little time. The therapist is helping him work through things. At some point in the future, I think he'll go to New York and you two can have a long talk and hash things out and he'll be in a place where he can accept your forgiveness, whether you think he needs to apologize or not."

"Okay." Kurt took a deep breath and let it out. "I miss you." He wrapped his arms around her again. "Maybe you and Nina can get to know each other and you could come to New York with her sometime. I know you like to sightsee and Dad's indifferent to it, but she'd be a great tour guide. And I think if you give her a chance, you could be friends."

"You really love him, don't you?"

"Yeah. I really do."

"I'm really happy for you. I can see it in his eyes when he looks at you."

"If you come on a Monday, you can hear my band."

"You have a band?"

"I do. We haven't named ourselves yet, but we do covers and original music on Mondays at this place that has an open mic."

"Who's in it?"

"Me, Sebastian, Santana, her girlfriend Dani, Elliott, and Chandler. And before you ask, yes, it's the same Chandler I met in Lima at Between the Sheets senior year. He got into NYU and we ran into him at the open mic place. He's our drummer."

"So, six of you."

"Yep."

"Why only on Mondays?"

"Santana is Rachel's understudy. She has to be at the theater for all of the shows. So, we rehearse on Sunday evening after she leaves the matinee and we play on Mondays because that's the only other evening she's available."

"And you two are friends now?"

"We are. She's not so angry now and on top of that, she wants to do something besides be a bitch now. She's still herself, but a lot of the meanness was from being so angry, a lot like Dave I think. She just used words rather than physical bullying, at least usually. She did get in a few fights."

The two of them made it back around to where the others were standing. They went into the dining area, which had over 70 amazing Tiffany windows.

Sebastian stepped closer to Kurt and took his hand again. While the six of them walked around the room, Sebastian began to rattle off a 5-minute rundown of the history of the hotel, which had been turned into a college back in the late '60s.

After they finished looking around, they took a scenic drive on the way back to the house. Kurt revised his plan on the drive.

Nina, Carole, Sebastian, and Kurt dropped Art and Burt off and kept the car to go to Uptown Saturday Night, which had been Kurt's original plan for all of them. The four of them enjoyed their evening together looking through the shops and exhibits, trying different food stands, and listening to the different music groups throughout the evening.

X-X-X-X-X

When they got home, they changed and joined Art and Burt out in the lanai for an evening swim.

Carole and Nina got in the pool in the shallow end near where Burt and Art were sitting. Kurt and Sebastian walked down to the deep end and slipped in. After he got wet, Kurt got back out and grabbed the lounge raft and put it along the edge and held it for Sebastian to get in. Once Sebastian was in place, Kurt got on and they lay facing each other and floated along the far edge of the deep end. Kurt could just make out what he other four were saying. He took Sebastian's hands and held them between them, playing with his fingers and tracing patterns on them.

Burt asked, "Did you have a good time?"

"We did. There was so much to see. Lots of art and music and food."

"Did you find anything that made its way home with you?"

"You'll see tomorrow." She winked at him.

"What about you, sweetie?" Art asked.

"Well, I didn't bring a dress and Carole and I decided we'd like to go out to dinner Monday night and go dancing afterwards, so I bought a dress that I really like. I'll leave it here so I'll have one whenever I need one. I'm going to leave the casual summer clothes I brought with me here as well. That way I can fly down without really having to pack. It's about to turn fall and I don't wear them in Ohio all that much anyway."

Burt looked down at the other end of the pool. "Are they always so touchy-feely?"

"Yep," Nina said as she glanced down to the end of the pool. "They're adorable. Sebastian's completely smitten. When we were here after graduation, before Sebastian moved in, I knew he was already head over heels for Kurt. This genuine smile would appear on his face every time he got a text from Kurt."

Kurt winked at Sebastian, who despite rolling his eyes grinned just like he had when Kurt texted him.

Art asked, "Does it bother you somehow?"

"I'm just not used to it. I rarely saw him in a t-shirt. He was the king of layers, even wearing long-sleeved shirts in the summer a lot of the time. He never even walked around the house without a shirt on. I think the last time I saw him without a shirt on he was under six. It's been so long that I can't even remember."

"Oh," Nina said. "From the first day we came down, he and Sebastian went to the beach and swam here shirtless, so I never thought anything about it."

Carole said, "I think being with Sebastian has boosted his confidence. He's more outgoing."

"Until I saw the way he walked around early today, I never gave any though to him always wearing so many layers. It was just how he dressed. Seeing him relaxed is a new," Burt said.

"Perhaps now that he's not living in Lima, he's just coming into his own more and he doesn't feel so tense in general," Nina offered. "I think too, confidence in who we are begins to develop as we meet people who choose to be our friends rather than just hanging around with whoever we go to high school with. When I came to the US, I didn't have any friends, but the friends I made were ones that accepted and liked me, rather than people I had science or math class with. Like with Kurt's band, he's branching out and trying things and they're really good and fun to watch."

Carole asked, "You've seen them?"

"Izzie sent me videos from when she went with them last Monday."

"Kurt has a band?" Burt asked.

Art chuckled and said, "Yeah. Sebastian asked us to send his cello and double bass to New York."

Burt said, "I don't get why that's funny."

"Oh, we'll get them to him at some point. We just have to either find the right company to do it or drive them there ourselves. I'm not trusting UPS or FedEx with $60,000 in stringed instruments. And there's not a chance I'd take them on a regular commercial airplane as luggage."

Kurt eyes flashed and he looked at Sebastian, who shrugged, obviously not having known the cost of his instruments.

"I had him pick out electric versions and paid less than $1000 for them. And he can take them around town on the subway easily and if he gets them stolen, they're not that expensive to replace."

"I never considered the cost of string instruments. Although, I'm not surprised. The craftsmanship affects the sound, I'm sure."

Nina changed the subject back. "Burt, were your parents not affectionate?"

"Um, what?" he replied, the shock evident in his tone.

"Your parents. You seem to be bothered by Kurt's closeness with Sebastian in a way that never occurred to me to be. I grew up in France, which I'm not sure if you knew. I had studied English with an American tutor in high school and I came here young enough to have lost what bit of an accent I still had, so a lot of people assume that I'm American. Anyway, growing up in Paris, there was a much different atmosphere regarding PDA than you would have had living in a small town like Lima. I'm just wondering if that's why you seem to glance at the two of them so often when they're just being sweet."

"It very well could be. My parents didn't marry for love. I've never really thought about it much. They were respectful of each other and I think they loved each other, but it was an arranged marriage in the sense that their parents set them up and they dated in high school and got married as soon as they graduated. They had me a year later. She had a miscarriage a couple of years later and then had my brother Andy a couple of years after that. She had a second miscarriage after him. After that, she couldn't have any more kids. She never said why. I didn't find any of it out until not long before she died, which was a few years before Kurt was born. Her twin sister Mildred didn't cope well and turned to alcohol. I try to keep an eye on her, but she doesn't like Kurt, so it's hard. Andy looks in on her. Her husband died in Viet Nam before they had a chance to have kids."

Tears streamed down Kurt's cheeks. Sebastian slipped his hand out of Kurt's and wiped the tears with his thumb.

Art said, "Is your dad still around?"

Burt shook his head. "He died when my mom did. That's when I took over the shop." Burt turned to Nina. "Your story sounds a lot like Kurt's mom's. She grew up in France, in Paris. She came to Ohio to go to school." He chuckled. "I never could figure out why someone would want to leave Paris and study in Ohio, but she did. Lizzie was a character. Kurt is so much like her."

Kurt was unable to stop the tears from flowing. He hadn't known that. From what he had been able to piece together, he thought she had gone to Paris on an overseas study program in college.

Sebastian saw the shocked look on Kurt's face. He spoke without making a sound, "You didn't know."

"No," Kurt said silently.

Nina said, "What was her name?"

"Elizabeth Neveeyah. It looked like Neville, but I never could say it quite right according to her."

"She went by Aylee when I knew her. We didn't go to school together, but she went to the same American English tutor. We had group meetings once a month so we could practice together. We'd be assigned a topic and he'd go around and listen to us and correct our grammar and pronunciation. He said it gave us better real life conversation skills than just having practice conversations with him."

"Small world," Art said.

"I didn't know that she went to Ohio for school. The last time I saw her was over the summer before I left for New York."

"She went to the University of Cincinnati on scholarship. I don't get what you called her – Aylee?"

"E-L-I, in French says Aylee – ay-LEE-sah-bet," she pronounced slowly. "Éli for short, which Americans would have pronounced EE-lie."

Burt said, "Which is probably why she use the nickname Lizzie."

"Since Eli is a guy's name here, that would be my guess too."

"That's Kurt's middle name."

"Sebastian's middle name is my maiden name – Beaumont."

Kurt tried to scoot closer to Sebastian, but he caused the raft to tip in the process and they both fell into the pool.

They all quickly turned to see Kurt climbing out of the pool. Sebastian pushed the raft back to the edge of the pool and Kurt pulled it out rather than holding it in place again.

"I'm ready to call it a night," Kurt said quietly. He turned to grab his towel. He dried off as he walked towards the patio doors to go inside.

Sebastian climbed out and put the raft back in the small upright storage shed and closed the door. He stopped next to Burt. "We could hear the four of you. It seems to me that some of what you said were things Kurt didn't know. I'm going inside with him."

X-X-X-X-X

By the time Sebastian got to their room, Kurt was already turning the water on in the shower. Sebastian grabbed boxer briefs and knocked gently, while opening the door slowly.

"Hey, babe. Can I join you?"

"Of course. Always." Kurt turned the water off just long enough for Sebastian to get in and close the door. He took the sprayer down and rinsed Sebastian's hair before he handed him the sprayer and picked up his shampoo.

Sebastian kissed him when he turned back.

Kurt washed Sebastian's hair, taking his time massaging his scalp the way Sebastian liked. "Your mom knew my mom." Tears streamed down his face. He rinsed Sebastian's hair.

"Can I do yours?"

He leaned to the side a bit so that Sebastian could reach his shampoo. Once he had it, Kurt stood back upright and closed his eyes.

"If you look like your mom, she must have been beautiful."

Kurt nodded. Once Sebastian had rinsed his hair, he wrapped his arms around Sebastian and just held onto him. "I just don't get why he would tell your parents things that he's never told me."

"I don't know, but I think if you spend some time alone together, you can ask him." Sebastian ran his hands down Kurt's back.

"Would you be upset if we don't–?" Kurt grabbed a washcloth and began washing himself quickly.

"No. Kurt, look at me." Once Kurt made eye contact, he said, "I'm not with you for the sex, which is spectacular, I might add." He wiggled his eyebrows.

Kurt smiled.

"I'm with you because I want to be. I'm your boyfriend. Your lover. Your partner. Your best friend. I'm here because I want to be. I love you."

"I love you too. I'm going to get dressed in my pajamas and go talk to him or at least go tell him that I want to talk to him." He kissed Sebastian gently before he turned the water off long enough to get out and shut the door.

Kurt dried and dressed quickly while Sebastian finished his shower.

X-X-X-X-X

When he entered the living room, he could see that Carole and Nina were still in the pool. Art was in the kitchen doing the dishes from when he and Burt had eaten earlier. He looked up when he heard Kurt.

"He's sitting out in the sunroom."

Kurt nodded and went through the kitchen and dining room. He opened the door to the sunroom, stepped out, and pulled it closed behind him. Burt was sitting in one of the chairs looking out into the darkness with his head tipped up looking towards the sky. Kurt moved the chair that was next to Burt to face the window as well.

"Why would you tell people you barely know things about Mom that you've never told me?"

"I don't know, Kurt. I really don't. I never talk about her. I don't know what made me say anything. The only thing I can come up with is that in the therapy sessions that I go to separately, the therapist has been asking me questions about Lizzie, so she's been on my mind a lot lately. God, Kurt, I miss her so much and it just makes no sense. Just like Finn being gone makes no sense."

"It doesn't, but I think at some point, we just have to be okay with the fact that life doesn't make sense. I think you must have grown up with a much bigger does of 'God's in Control' than I had assumed you had."

"Yeah, that's possible. Lizzie wasn't religious. My parents hated that. But we didn't raise you the way I was raised. Anyway, I am sorry."

"So she went to school in Cincinnati."

"Yeah. She studied Marketing because she thought it would be a good stable career, but she performed too. She auditioned for their musicals and stuff she said. She couldn't be the lead because she wasn't a music major or whatever, but she had a good time."

"So, she was French. I just thought she must have gone on one of those study abroad programs to learn to speak it so well."

"She never talked about her life in France, so I guess it just never came to mind to tell you. She told me that she wished she didn't have to go back. She never really did say why. We got married before her student Visa ended, so she wouldn't have to. She never went back. I don't really know anything else to tell you other than she single-handedly helped me turn my dad's shop that only did tires and oil changes that was barely scraping by into a full-service shop that began turning a profit under her financial leadership. She taught me how to run it and keep people coming back."

Kurt smiled sadly. "Okay. Maybe you could write down or record the things you remember about her, even little things. I'd like to know more about her. I barely remember her now."

"I can do that. I guess I just never considered telling you a single piece of incomplete information when you were too young to even know what Marketing meant or what a Visa was. I knew so little that I felt like saying anything would be a let down, if that makes sense. I felt guilty for not knowing anything to share with you. She never talked about anything before her college years. I never asked. I figured that if she ever wanted to tell me that she would."

"I get that. I really do. I wouldn't push Sebastian for information either."

"I never talked about my parents basically arranged marriage because I didn't know what purpose it would serve since you never met them."

"I get that." Kurt took a deep breath and put the chair back. "I'll see you in the morning."

"C'mere." He stood up and pulled Kurt into a hug. I'll do what you asked. I'll record myself telling whatever I can remember about her. I'll use the old tape recorder at home. I still have plenty of blank cassettes. I'll let you figure out the technology part of how to store them digitally or whatever." He let Kurt go.

"Thanks. Good night, Dad."

"'Night, bud."