Kurt stood in the area right in front of the opening that led into the West Gardens. He went through every acting skill he had learned to be ready to look relaxed, but angry enough to be believable when Blaine and Wes walked up. He began to hum "Home" while he waited. He thought the lyrics as he hummed.
Settle down. It'll all be clear.
Don't pay no mind to the demons.
They fill you with fear.
The trouble – it might drag you down.
If you get lost, you can always be found.
Just know you're not alone.
Before he got any farther, he could see the two of them and he stopped and schooled his expression.
"Kurt, just give me my phone and stop being all cloak-and-dagger about it."
"Let's go inside the building and talk for a minute."
"I don't want to talk. I just want my phone."
"Well, you're not getting it until we talk. Come on."
Kurt walked past the garden and looked back to see Blaine reluctantly following him with Wes trailing behind. When they got to the front entrance to the building, Kurt led them through the foyer and into the administrative area. He opened the door to a small room with a large conference table that seated ten where Daniel and his friend were waiting, sitting across from each other at the far end of the table. He motioned for Blaine to go first. Wes stepped close enough to Kurt that he blocked Blaine from being able to leave.
"Go on in," Kurt said.
Blaine reluctantly stepped inside the room. Kurt and Wes followed him in. Wes stayed near the door.
Wes said, 'You've met my dad. This is his friend Patrick McKellan. He's an detective with the Westerville Police Department. He called him to keep a uniformed officer from coming – to keep our issues more private."
Detective McKellan stepped forward. "Have a seat, Blaine."
Blaine sat at the end of the table farthest from the door.
"You called the police on me?" Blaine asked, completely blindsided.
No one responded to his question.
A couple of minutes later, Sebastian arrived with Mr. Anderson, with Cooper tagging along. Kurt and Sebastian took the seats across from the detective to Daniel's right.
"What's going on?" Mr. Anderson asked as he came through the door and saw the group of people seated at the table.
"I'm Detective McKellan from the Westerville Police Department. I received a report that Blaine Anderson was behaving erratically and that someone was under the impression that he might be drinking, so I've come to check up on that." He pulled a breath analyzer kit out of his jacket pocket. "The call specifically naming him gives me probable cause. You can refuse the test here and I can arrest him on possible underage drinking and we can go down to the station to do the test there."
Mr. Anderson said, "I'm sure there's been some misunderstanding, but of course let's do it here to avoid a scene and not miss more of the festivities."
"I'd like to see your ID, please." Detective McKellan placed a new mouthpiece on the PAS while he waited. Once he had seen Blaine's driver's license, he double-checked the time and date before explaining how to breathe into the machine. When Blaine finished, they waited a few long seconds for the results.
Detective McKellan showed the results to everyone. "Your result of 0.041 puts you under the legal limit for driving, but since you are under 21, the only acceptable score is 0.000. He used the bag the mouthpiece had been in to pull it off. He put it in his other pocket, placed the PAS on the table, and sat back down.
"I'll ask for a diversion," Mr. Anderson said. "It's his first offense." He sat down across from Sebastian. Cooper sat to his right, next to Detective McKellan.
Kurt interrupted. "It might be his first time of getting caught, but that's not the extent of my complaints tonight. Blaine also followed us to a restroom and took compromising photos of us, meaning me and Sebastian."
Mr. Anderson turned and looked at Blaine. "He's not serious is he?"
Blaine shrugged.
"That'a a Federal Video Voyeurism offense, Blaine. You could go to jail." He turned back to Kurt. "Do you have any proof?"
Wes said, "I followed Blaine following them because they had already served him with a Cease and Desist back in December from him harassing them over winter break." He moved away from the door and sat at the end of the table closest to the door.
"Harassing in what way?" Mr. Anderson asked.
"I have the security footage taken on my front porch. Sit next to me and you can watch it on my phone, if you'd like."
Blaine interrupted. "I'm sure that won't be necessary."
Looking directly at Blaine, Kurt stated, "On the contrary, I think it might be just what needs to happen. You broke every aspect of the Cease and Desist letter today, so our next step is a restraining order, but perhaps if you go to jail for the compromising photos you took, then maybe we won't need the restraining order."
Mr. Anderson was clearing struggling between his role of father and his role as lawyer.
While he was tongue-tied, Kurt turned to him and said, "I didn't realize that you had attended Dalton, Mr. Anderson."
"Oh, yes. I did. I was a Warbler as well, but as you saw, we didn't perform the types of music that the younger groups did. I did enjoy myself singing with the group, though. Cooper was a Warbler as well, as you saw tonight when he and a few of his friends sang back up for Blaine." He paused, and then turned to Blaine. "You kept looking to the side of the stage when you were singing."
"He kept looking at me," Kurt said disinterestedly.
"Where are your parents?" Mr. Anderson asked.
Sebastian answered. "Congressman Hummel, his wife, and my grandparents are here."
"And your parents?"
"They're deceased."
"My condolences," Mr. Anderson said kindly.
"Mr. Montgomery is our lawyer. There's no reason to involve my grandparents or for Kurt to get his parents involved. He and I are both 20 years old and married. All we want is for Blaine to leave us alone. Go ahead and come around the table to watch the video." He waited for Mr. Anderson to move to the chair next to him and then repositioned the phone closer to Mr. Anderson.
"I also have video of what happened on the stage between Kurt and Blaine earlier this evening. If you'd like to see that as well," Wes offered.
Kurt said, "I have Blaine's phone, but I'd rather not show you those photos."
Blaine haughtily said, "What you two were doing is against Dalton's regulations."
Kurt clapped back with, "And while that may be the case, what you did is a federal crime," "Plus, Dalton's rules applies to current Dalton students. We no longer attend school here."
"May I?" Mr. Anderson gestured towards Sebastian's phone. "I'd like to see whatever you have too." He paused not knowing Wes's name.
"Wes Montgomery. I'm Daniel's son."
"My apologies," Daniel said. "We should have introduced ourselves. Daniel Montgomery." He looked towards Kurt.
"Kurt Hummel-Smythe."
"Sebastian Hummel-Smythe."
"Cooper Anderson," he got up and moved to watch the video over his father's shoulder.
"Leland Anderson."
The shock of the situation had passed, and Cooper obviously began to process some of what had been said earlier when he heard Kurt and Sebastian say their names. "Wait. You two are married?"
"We are," Kurt stated matter-of-factly.
"Blaine what is going on? You begged me and my friends to sing back up for you to sing to Kurt, who you missed so terribly while in LA with me for the last nearly five months. But Kurt is clearly married to Sebastian." He paused and was clearly trying to figure something out. " Wait. THAT Sebastian?"
Blaine nodded.
Mr. Anderson looked confused. "What does that mean?"
Kurt insisted, "It has nothing to do with the issues we're dealing with right now."
Sebastian felt it better to just answer and get it out of the way. "It means that was a stupid teenager and did some things I regret. I was lead singer after Blaine left for McKinley. I wanted to win Regionals and go to Nationals, and I made some poor choices on how to make that happen."
"Which means?" Mr. Anderson asked.
Sebastian continued. "It means that I pretended to be interested in Blaine to make Kurt angry because I thought it would interfere with their ability to perform well. And in a poorly executed prank, I threw a rock-salt laced slushie at Kurt to ruin his outfit, which was yet another way to make him angry. Blaine was the one who told me about the tradition of slushie-throwing at McKinley. Anyway, when I threw it at Kurt's clothes, Blaine dove in front of it from the side. Instead of hitting Kurt's clothes, it hit Blaine in the face."
"An act not of gallantry, but to get our group to switch their focus on his martyr-like behavior and forget his traitorous actions of giving Sebastian our set list for Regionals."
Mr. Anderson stopped himself from laughing. "I see. And this was when?"
"Late January 2012," Kurt said.
"So, not quite two and a half years ago?"
"Right," Kurt answered.
"And you obviously knew about it, Cooper."
"I did. He needed a small medical procedure from a piece of the rock salt getting in his eye, and I was on his list of people legally allowed to give consent, so I did. It was when you and Mom were on vacation and he didn't want to mess that up. I flew into Toledo and took him to the doctor."
"Well, I appreciate that, Cooper, but one of you could have at least informed us about it. But, Kurt is right. That incident has nothing to do with what has gone on this evening. From what I gather, Blaine disregarded a Cease and Desist letter that he was given in December. He's been drinking this evening. And he's allegedly taken some kind of photos of Kurt and Sebastian in one of the restrooms here in the school." He looked around and saw Kurt, Sebastian, and Wes nod. "I'd like to see the video from your front porch and the video from this evening now, please."
Sebastian nodded and pressed play on the video. Blaine put his arms on the table criss-cross and dropped his head down onto them. The rest of them sat in silence for ten minutes as the two of them watched the security video.
When it ended, Sebastian said, "Don't bother trying to erase it. Our security company kept the footage in case I wanted to go ahead and press charges in the future."
Wes handed Mr. Anderson his phone. "I've already made backup copies of the video."
Mr. Anderson nodded. He took the phone and watched the ten minutes of footage that Wes had taken. The color drained from his face as he watched the video. He returned to the phone to Wes afterwards. He and Cooper returned to their seats on the other side of the table.
"Detective McKellan, I'll bring Blaine down to the station tomorrow morning to face the underage drinking charge. You can file the paperwork. I'm going to sit here and hopefully come up with a way to keep the rest of this out of the court system."
Detective McKellan nodded. "If he doesn't show up tomorrow by noon, a warrant will be issued for his arrest."
"We understand," Mr. Anderson assured him.
After Detective McKellen left a copy of the citation, Blaine waited to speak until after the detective had left the room and closed the door behind him. "I don't get what the big deal is other than the photos. I didn't know that it was illegal. They were in a public restroom in a building open to the public. It's not like I broke into their house and set up surveillance equipment in their bathroom."
"Well, we can all be thankful for small miracles that you didn't," Mr. Anderson said. "It's going to be nearly impossible to get you cleared of those charges if Kurt and Sebastian decide to prosecute."
"Dad! Their lawyer is sitting here at the table with us."
"I'm aware. He knows as well as I do that you sat here and basically confessed. They have your phone with the evidence on it, and they also have a video of you doing it. Everyone who has studied law knows there's not much of a defense to be made in this situation. A rebuttal of 'I'm sorry, sir, but my client didn't know that it was wrong to take photos of people in compromising positions without their permission.' isn't going to fly. Ignorance of the law is no defense. Plus, anyone with an iota of common sense would know that it's wrong."
Blaine smarted back. "I saw you recognize your own tactics in that video. You're the one that insisted that being gay would ruin my chances of finding someone who would take care of me like Mom takes care of you. You said that I would miss out on having someone who truly loved me and would always be there for me. But then I met Kurt. I learned that finding someone who will be there for me and take care of me wasn't out of the realm of possibility like you said it was. Kurt was to me what Mom is to you."
Mr. Anderson looked sheepish. "This isn't really the place for this conversation, Blaine."
Cooper spoke up. "Don't try to sweep it under the rug. I've heard the same lecture. 'Find a nice girl, Cooper. Find someone who will love you like Mom loves me. Someone who will be there for you at the end of the day. Someone who will raise kids with you. Someone you can depend on and trust. I'm not saying you have to give up your fun, but you need someone who care for you when you're sick.' – and on and on. I've heard this so many times. I keep telling you that it's wrong. Mom deserves her own life, not to just be sitting home and waiting for you to return from wherever you've been for three days while she worries herself sick over you."
Mr. Anderson lowered his voice. "None of those women mean anything to me. I've told you that. They don't. They're just fun. It's a nice break from the stress."
"The stress of having an obviously devoted wife?" Kurt asked, completely baffled.
Sebastian asked Blaine, "Is that why you were so condescending when you asked whether my father was faithful to my mother?" He looked backed to Mr. Anderson. "Do you cheat on your wife consistently? Or is this an open relationship? Does she get to 'have fun' and 'have a nice break' from taking care of you?"
Cooper was the one to answer. "Of course not." He snorted. "If my mom so much as talks to another man for more than the length of time it takes takes to end the conversation, my dad acts like she's cheating on him, and he gives her the silent treatment for a week. Or sometimes, he intervenes and lays the charm on and openly flirts with my mom to prove to the other man that she's taken."
"And when she realizes that he's cheating on her again?" Kurt asked.
"Oh, he turns on the charm and brings her a couple dozen of her favorite flowers, takes her on a cruise or somewhere to worm his way back into her good graces."
Kurt shook his head sadly, "And convinces her that it was her fault somehow?"
"Pretty much," Cooper said. "I've been trying to get her to leave him for about five years now – pretty much since I figured out what was going on. But she's completely in love with him and keeps saying that she knows that he loves her too and that he'll stop – that the last one really was the last one." Cooper paced in place. "That's where they were when Blaine got hit with the slushie. Dad had taken her on another 'I'm sorry. I love you.' cruise."
Kurt's thoughts were bouncing around and something hit him hard. He turned to Blaine. "Wait, so the Sadie Hawkins story? And the story about getting bullied at your old school that caused you transfer to Dalton? Were those just ways to get me to trust you?"
"What is he talking about?" Cooper asked. "You never went to another school besides Dalton. Well, not until you followed him to McKinley."
"I see. You told me what you thought I'd want to hear." Kurt had rehashed his relationship with Blaine so many times and then he talked through all of it in counseling, but he could never quite fit all of the pieces together until that moment. "I finally get it. You weren't interested in me romantically when we met, but you enjoyed my attention. You enjoyed the fact that I looked up to you. You didn't even let on that you were younger than me." Scenes flashed through his mind. "It all makes so much sense now."
Sebastian said, "Except for the transferring to McKinley. Transferring to a low-performing public school makes no sense."
Mr. Anderson said, "The McKinley Glee Club had made it to Nationals and he was determined to get to go. He didn't think the Warblers could beat groups that used music and had girls. I argued with him about how Dalton would provide him with a better education and he insisted that he wanted to be a performer and that knowing how to do calculus was never going to benefit him. He turned 18 that summer and he took the inheritance that he got from his grandfather, my father-in-law, and rented that house in Lima."
"You turned 18 before you enrolled at McKinley? And you had already planned the whole thing out?"
"Yes, and yes," Blaine said. "I was born ten weeks early. The cutoff for enrolling in Kindergarten is July 1st. I was born in June. I was small for my age and I had been in therapy as a baby to catch up due to being so premature. And they recommended that my parents start me in Kindergarten based on my due date, not my birthdate, which would have put me just a few weeks older than the oldest kids in my grade, but I was still so small when I turned six that they decided to redshirt me to have any decent chance at being able to play sports when I reached middle school. So, I turned 18 in June after my sophomore year."
Kurt thought for a second. "So, we should have been in the same grade, all three of us. Not that it matters now. So, you're turning 20 next month?"
"I am. And clearly I never got that growth spurt the doctor said would be likely since my dad and Cooper are six feet tall. It would have been worse if I had gone to school right after I turned five or six. I would have been picked on for being so small. No one ever knew I was so much older, obviously. My parents hired a tutor and I already knew how to read long before I started school, so I was always at the head of my class academically. It worked out well since no one ever found out about me being older."
Kurt stopped him. "Okay. None of this has anything to do with the situation at hand. I am not going to be your Stepford wife, Blaine. I'm happily married to a man who won't cheat on me."
Blaine snorted.
Sebastian's anger flared. "Just shut up, Blaine. Whatever kind of screwed up family you grew up in does not reflect the way I live my life. Not that it's any of your damn business, but I had been with one guy in France. That's it. One. I told you the 'charm 'em' personality I portrayed was a stupid game. I meant what I sad in the Lima Bean that day I apologized. I didn't justify my actions. Nothing. I said that it was all 'fun and games' until it wasn't. Neither one of you was supposed to actually get hurt. I did what I did to get to go to Nationals. As was just mentioned, you switched schools for that to happen. People do crazy things when they're overly competitive teenagers."
Kurt added, "Jesse St. James transferred to McKinley to help Vocal Adrenaline win. My intentions for going to Dalton the day we met were to spy on the Warblers. It was Puck's idea. Rachel did a couple of shady things in the name of winning too. We were all ridiculously competitive. None of that is a reflection on what kind of a partner Sebastian is now. He's been nothing but amazing and supportive."
Sebastian blushed slightly from Kurt's praise, but the intensity of the pressing matters prevented anyone from noticing. "I didn't marry Kurt so that he'd by my stay-at-home 'wife'. We both cook, clean, and do household tasks. We both go to school full time. I want to be married to Kurt because I actually really like him as a person. He's my best friend. If I had to pick one person in the world to spend time with, it would be him. I wouldn't have married him if I wanted to live a life of hookups. I'm not slut-shaming anyone. Every person has the right to sleep with whoever they want and I'm not passing judgement. But if you want that lifestyle, then you should stay single. No harm, no foul. But don't tell some guy that he's the love of your life and then sleep with other people unless you agree to an open relationship where the other guy is also free to sleep around. That's just wrong to require a guy to be faithful to you when you won't be faithful to him."
"I've been saying the same thing for years," Cooper said. "Don't expect what your're saying to make any difference. I'm living the free-spirited life as Sebastian described. No commitment, no games. The girls I see know that. I'm not going to hurt someone like Dad has Mom. She's an amazing person, but he treats her–"
Mr. Anderson interrupted. "I treat her just fine. This is just how things are. Men have needs and women just–." He stopped. "Anyway, none of this has anything to do with the issue at hand."
Kurt said, "Actually, it has a lot to do with the issue at hand. I want to know what Blaine had planned to do with those incriminating photos."
Cooper responded, "If I had to place a wager, I'd say he was going to use them to try to get you in legal trouble for doing whatever you were doing in the photos in a public place, but he was going to offer to forgo using them to get you two in trouble if you would agree to break up with, well, I guess, divorce Sebastian."
"Well?" Kurt ask, staring at Blaine.
Blaine shrugged. "I figured you'd give in to avoid having the photos make it to a tabloid – to keep from embarrassing your dad about your lewd public behavior. It was a last-minute idea that came to mind as I waited for the two of you to come out of the restroom. I didn't know why you had gone so far away from where everyone else was just to go to the restroom, but it didn't dawn on me what you were doing until I slowly opened the door to see what was taking you so long. And then I realized." He stared directly at Kurt. "It had never dawned on me that you would do that in public."
"Well, we weren't 'in public' as you say. We were in a restroom behind two doors. The door into the room and the door to the stall we were in, which was supposed to be private. And as your father mentioned, Federal law does consider being in a public restroom to be a private location."
Blaine didn't respond to Kurt's statement. "Can I ask you something, Mr. Montgomery?"
"Sure. I may not answer, but go ahead."
"Have you been faithful to your wife?"
"Absolutely. I would never break that bond of trust I have with her. If there should ever come a time when I didn't want to be married to her faithfully, I would tell her and I would file for divorce."
"Wes?" Blaine asked.
"I've have never cheated on David."
Blaine looked down at the table. "I get that what I did with taking the photos was wrong. I'll delete them. Sebastian grabbed my phone from me before I had a chance to even look at them. I obviously didn't send them to anyone. I don't have my phone set to auto-upload them to the Cloud or anything. It takes so long to do that using data. Sometimes, I do that when I'm connected to WiFi if I'm running out of space to take new photos, but usually I wait until I can connect to my computer, so I can just save them to my computer with the extra hassle of upload and downloading them."
Kurt was the one to respond. "You have gone against my wishes so many times in the last year and a half. You tried to propose to me a year ago in March when we had been broken up for over five months. I have said 'no' in every way that I could come up with. I'm married, and yet you still won't let it drop. I have no intention of ever splitting up with Sebastian. Continuing to pursue me will not change my mind. With your father, your brother, who are not friends of mine, as witnesses, I am resolutely declaring that I will not marry you, ever."
"I get that," Blaine said.
"Finally? After all this time, you do actually finally understand that Kurt will not be getting back together with you under any circumstances?" Sebastian asked.
"Yes."
"That is all I ever wanted," Kurt said. "I would also like to request that what happened today and the contents of the security video never be told to anyone else. And finally, I would like Blaine to be forbidden from discussing me or my life with anyone else. My life is not for his entertainment."
"What am I supposed to say if someone asks me about you?"
"The truth. You and are no longer in contact. End of story."
"Alright, I guess."
"No guessing," Kurt said sternly. "I'm keeping your phone until tomorrow morning. And, yes, I am aware that tomorrow is a Saturday. I'm hoping that Mr. Montgomery will meet with us."
"Yes, of course, Kurt."
"Fine. Then meet us at his office at 9:00. If you're not there, we'll take the camera and file those Federal Voyeurism charges down at the police station or wherever it needs to happen."
Mr. Anderson looked at Kurt skeptically.
Mr. Montgomery asked, "You're saying that your willing to drop the charges? You could sue in civil court for a lot of money, even if you don't want to file Federal criminal charges."
"I don't need Mr. Anderson's money. He didn't do anything to me personally. Maybe some kind of community service hours for Blaine. Something to teach him the value of of hard work. What I need is peace of mind. What I need is for this to end and for Blaine to do what I asked him to do nearly a year and a half ago in October – just leave me alone. If I ever want to talk to Blaine, I will make the first move. No gifts, no calls, no messages, no dropping by to try to seduce my husband."
Sebastian laughed. "As if."
Mr. Anderson took a deep breath. "So you're offering a settlement in lieu of pressing charges?"
"I am," Kurt stated flatly. "Blaine stays out of our lives permanently. If and when we ever attend the same event, like today, he'll refrain from speaking to us, unless there is a life-threatening reason like the building is on fire."
"We'll be at Mr. Montgomery's office at 9:00am tomorrow morning," Mr. Anderson said rather enthusiastically.
"Bring Cooper as well," Kurt said. "He'll be signing a confidentiality statement as well. I'll not have my life turned into a screenplay or a novel. Wes will come as well."
Mr. Anderson nodded. "Yes, of course. He'll come. I want to thank you for your willingness to keep this out of the court system."
"Oh, I'm doing this for Sebastian, for my father, and for myself, not for any of you. I don't want to talk about this or deal with this past tomorrow. The sooner this whole ordeal is over, the better. I'm done. My father came back early from DC to be here tonight to attend the concert and eat dinner with us." He looked directly at Blaine. "You've made me miss out on that. I'm going back to attempt to salvage my evening. Sebastian and I will leave now. I'd like the like the five of you to not re-enter the reception together. If you talk about this to anyone tonight, if this gets out – tomorrow morning you'll be meeting with an arrest warrant. I am not playing games this time. That means do not talk about this where anyone can overhear you. Am I understood?"
Mr. Anderson responded. "We understand. Your offer is very generous. We will take your request seriously." He looked directly at Blaine. "This means if you say a word about this or text anyone about it, you'll potentially end up in federal prison. Do you understand?"
"Yes, sir," Blaine repeated dutifully.
Kurt turned to Daniel. "Thank you. We'll see you tomorrow morning."
Daniel nodded and smiled. "Of course. Come at 8:30 so that everything will be ready for them at 9:00."
"Will do." Kurt got up from his chair.
Sebastian stood up as well. Kurt reached out and took Sebastian's hand and they left the room together. They made their way through the administrative area and instead of going out the front and around the side of the building, Kurt stepped inside an open office and left the lights off. He stood with his back along the wall near the door. Sebastian stood next to him.
"Unless you want to spend the next who-knows-how-long in jail, you'll keep your mouth closed about this and you'll stay away from Kurt and Sebastian. This is the only time I will intervene. I'm going to enter that Diversion request on your behalf, and I'll go tomorrow to represent you as your lawyer. But that's it. The statue of limitations is pretty long on this, so if you decide to talk about this in a couple of years, you'll still end up in federal prison. I won't defend you from the charge. You'll have to hire a lawyer with whatever you have left of the money you got when you turned 18. I'm not going to defend you behaving stupidly. Get over Kurt. Something like 5% of the population is gay. That means there are plenty of other fish in the sea, as the expression goes. Find someone else. I will still pay your tuition for college, but another screw up like this and you'll have to find a way to pay for college yourself. You're nearly 20. Childhood is over." His words became faint at that point.
Wes and Daniel came out and didn't talk on their way out of the administrative area.
Kurt looked out carefully and didn't see anyone. He turned back to Sebastian and stepped to face him. He reached up with his free hand and ran his thumb along Sebastian's jaw and slipped his hand behind his neck. He tipped his chin up just a bit and kissed Sebastian softly. He stepped back and led them out of the room and through the school instead of out the front door.
Kurt and Sebastian took their seats at the table with their family.
"You get it taken care of?" Burt asked.
"Yes, finally," Kurt said.
"Good,' Burt said. "So, tomorrow afternoon we're coming over and you two are going to finally go do your spa thing that Kurt won, right?"
"Yes," Kurt replied. "I'm sorry I forgot to tell you that we did get that all set up."
"No problem," Carole said. "We planned on doing it and figured we could do something else if it didn't work out."
"We'll have everything ready for you," Sebastian said. "We'll put the Murphy bed down and make it and everything."
"Thank you, honey. We should be there at 4:30, right?"
"I think 5:00 will be the earliest we can leave, so that would work." Sebastian turned to Dotty. "You know if you two ever want to come and spend the weekend with us, you're more than welcome to."
"That'd be nice," Dotty said. She watched her words carefully. "Maybe one Saturday you two could pick us up instead of coming over for lunch."
Kurt smiled and nodded. "That could work. We could cook for you instead."
Sebastian began to talk about the CAD class he was taking and moved the topic away from anything that could accidentally lead to them mentioning the girls. It was a strange feeling to intentionally avoid talking about them around their family.
A lot of the people that were missing when Sebastian and Kurt came back began to return in groups. They realized that current students had taken former students on a tour of the campus. Fortunately, the part of the building they had been in hadn't been part of the tour. Once everyone was seated again, Headmaster Matthews gave a short closing speech thanking everyone for attending. He invite everyone back the next day for the Field Day event, which Kurt and Sebastian had planned to attend, but would end up arriving late to since they had to deal with Blaine first.
Once Headmaster Matthews finished his closing remarks, everyone finished up and left for the evening.
Sebastian pulled out of the lot and drove out towards the highway. Once they were on 271, he asked, "You're sure you just want to offer a settlement?"
"I just want him to go away and whatever will make that happen the fastest is what I want. I don't want revenge. What he did was stupid and mean, but I don't want to go to an open courtroom, sit on the stand, and testify that we were having sex in the stall of a high school restroom. What we were doing was silly and reckless. And absolutely fun. But if we're going to do anything similar again, let's try for a dressing room with a floor-to-ceiling door so that we don't risk being video recorded or photographed."
Sebastian chortled. "So, what I'm hearing is that we need to plan better," he teased.
"Exactly. It's not just our reputation on the line. My dad is fighting for equality and us doing something like getting caught having sex in public will not help that cause."
Sebastian chuckled. "I know, but honestly if it hadn't been for Mr. Will-Not-Leave-You-Alone, no one would have caught us today. I planned carefully. He's not going to be an issue anymore though."
"He's not," Kurt said definitively. He reached out and put his hand on Sebastian's thigh. "So many things make a lot more sense now, but I honestly I'm not even going to dwell on it. I am so far past 'Over Him' that it can't be seen in the rearview mirror." Kurt squeezed his leg gently. "You. Only you. You set my heart afire. You're all I want."
"You are making it hard for me to drive."
Kurt cracked up. "But I love making it hard, and then not."
"Kurt!"
"I love you so much," Kurt said, still laughing.
"I love you too. You, me, and the shower as soon as we're alone."
"Definitely. Now, you're making me wish I hadn't invited Sam and Trina to stay for a movie after we get back."
"We could just stall them by 15 minutes and tell them we want to shower and change into our pajamas first?"
"Sounds like a plan. Also, as much as I love and trust Sam and Trina, I don't want them to know about Blaine's behavior. If we tell them, it just perpetuates more thoughts about him. The less anyone thinks about him the better."
"I get that. If I feel the need to talk about what happened, it will just be between us, or me and my therapist."
"Thank you."
"I wouldn't have said anything to them, even if you hadn't asked me not to. We're spending time with our friends, not bemoaning the stupid choices we made in our past. God, what an unpleasant topic. I'm ready for the past to stay in the past."
"Amen!"
Sebastian laughed. "We chose poorly the first time. We did stupid things as teenagers. I'm pretty sure that makes us fairly normal."
"Bite your tongue!" Kurt chided. He turned his nose up haughtily. "Kurt Hummel-Smythe will never be normal. What an absolutely boring way to live!"
"You're married. You have two kids. We have a house with a fenced-in yard. All we're missing are the pets. Dogs or cats?"
"Neither."
"You don't like dogs or cats?"
"Like? I love both. I thought you meant which one do I want to get. Neither right now. It makes me want to gag to think of a dog picking up the girls' toys and licking them and then the girls picking them up and sticking them in their mouths."
Sebastian started laughing. "That would be disgusting."
"Later, though. Maybe we could get a couple of dogs when we come back from New York after you finish your Master's program. The girls will be five when we move back. That's old enough to learn how to take care of a dog with our help."
"Sounds reasonable."
"But we have to consider whether it's practical if we want to travel to France every summer to visit your family."
"Our family."
"Our family," Kurt repeated. "I'm excited to meet them in person. Skype was a great invention, though. A lot better than just phone calls." He paused. "We're really spoiled. A hundred years ago people were excited to get letters that took weeks to arrive. Now, we video chat and send letters instantaneously."
"We are spoiled. Totally. And tomorrow evening, we're going to be even more spoiled because I'm going to give you a fantastic massage and I'm not going to neglect a single spot on you."
"Mmm. That does sound amazing. I want to do the same thing to you."
"I was hoping so."
A little past 11:00 the next morning, Kurt and Sebastian sat atop the ferris wheel looking out over the Dalton grounds. Sebastian had his arm across the back of the seat behind Kurt's shoulders so they could sit as close as possible.
"Kiss me?" Kurt asked.
"Always." Sebastian turned his head and kissed Kurt, gently first, but he pressed in before backing off again, remembering where they were. Instead, he brushed his lips along Kurt's jaw and kissed him below his ear. "I love you."
"I love you too." He looked out over the area again. "I hadn't considered that there would be a mini carnival."
"Me either. When they said Field Day, I expected that." Sebastian pointed over to the soccer fields where people were running 3-legged races.
"Me too. We could do some of those things if you want."
"I just want to enjoy our time together. It's over. Mr. Anderson accompanied Blaine and Cooper to the airport. He's going to school in California this fall. We're free."
"Finally."