Chapter Eleven

September 24th, 2010

Noah was dressed in dark wash jeans and a dark shirt, on his way to school, a bag slung over his shoulder he stepped into the hospital room, giving Burt Hummel and his son a weary look. Kurt was still hooked up to various machines pumping life into him. Burt glanced up from his newspaper and breakfast and smiled at Noah. "Good to see you decided to come."

Noah shrugged, "Ma said you wanted to talk to me."

"I do. Take a seat," He pointed to the edge of the bed.

Noah dropped his bag in the nearby chair and took a seat at the edge of Burt's hospital bed. "Noah, I've known you since you were six years old. And there have been times where I was thankful for you being friends with my son, and other times where I wished you'd gone away." Noah had the decency to turn a little red at that. Burt continued all the same, "Noah, you are a fantastic young man, you aren't perfect-and that's okay. I want you to know that while you haven't always been the best person to my son and other kids like him…that doesn't have to define you."

"But-"

Burt shook his head, "When I was your age I wasn't any different than you, I made mistakes, I was an idiot and sometimes I was downright mean. But then I had a son and I realized that as a parent I never wanted those things to happen to my child." Noah nodded knowing exactly how that felt despite that they hadn't kept his daughter. "What makes a man great, Noah, is his ability to see past mistakes and grow from them, I think you're doing that now. You've told me that you want to be with my boy-"

"I do," Noah said immediately, "It sounds stupid, but until Beth I didn't see myself doing anything. Like I said Kurt was the only kid to tell me I could do whatever. But now…now I want to follow him to New York, I want to create a life with him…and maybe even a family some day." It must have been the right thing to say, because Burt looked pleased by the statement.

"Noah, any man would be lucky to have you as a son-in-law, but I'm proud of who you have become, and I'd be proud to call you son."

Noah looked at him, reaching out in a surprising gesture for both men, he hugged Burt Hummel. Burt smiled and hugged the boy back. "Now go to school before you're late."

"Yes sir." Noah stated, before he left though he rounded Burt's bed and stepped over to Kurt. He gripped the boy's hand and smiled sadly. "I'm waiting," he whispered and pressed a kiss to Kurt's forehead.

The love and kindness in those two gestures made Burt believe maybe anything was possible.

Later that day, Noah stepped into the choir room surprised to find Sue Sylverster and his mother standing there…oddly enough talking quietly. "Uh…" He paused, "Everything okay?" He asked his mother.

"Everything's fine Mohawk take a seat." Sue stated.

Looking a little unsure of himself, Noah took a seat in his usual back seat, while the others began to file into the room. They all looked unsure of why the two women were in the room, even Will who stepped in allowed his eyebrows to furrow, "Uh-Sue-"

"Can it William, I'm here for a reason and nothing your oddly sharpen hair says will convince me otherwise."

Sarah chuckled softly as she shook her head. Once all the students were inside, both women closed the door. "We aren't going to be shot are we?" Tina asked quietly.

Noah smirked slightly but shook his head, he'd basically avoided his fellow glee students last week, but his mother had insisted Monday he had to return to school.

"No one is getting shot," Sarah offered, "But we are here to talk to you guys about tolerance and respect, because despite how different each of you is and the friendships you've created in this group, you're all lacking those two key elements." She took a calming breath, "Yesterday Kurt Hummel, your closest friend until last week went into cardiac arrest. He was dead for three minutes." She looked at the grim and stricken looks on each of their faces, a couple of the girls were crying. "He's not on life support with a serious staph infection; the doctors are highly concerned about him beating this. And how many of you have come to visit him since this occurred-or his father for that matter, and for those of you who didn't know, he woke up two days ago."

Everyone looked around as only Finn's and Noah's hands went up in the air, and Artie's to their surprise. "Congratulations," Sue spoke, "You are all failures." She offered, "Except you three…you're just idiots." She stated, causing the three guys to smirk slightly and shake their heads. "You all call yourselves friends, and sure you support one another occasionally as needed, but when Ladyface needed it the most every damn one of you was busy shoving religion down his throat-you didn't care that he didn't believe, you didn't care that he'd asked you not to, you just went ahead and continued to do it anyway-except Mohawk." Noah looked around.

"We only wanted to help," Quinn offered to her coach.

"Kids, religion isn't about making everyone realize you call yourselves Christians, Jews or whatever, it's about making yourself known to God. It's not your job to convert every non-believer or specifically ones you think should find God. If Kurt didn't want you to pray, then don't pray in front of him, you can continue your prayers elsewhere, but you have to remember, Kurt was in charge. And what he wanted should've been the MOST important thing to all of you," Sarah stated.

"Instead what you all should've been doing was asking him how he was, giving him a supportive shoulder-"

"Like you did with telling the school board."

"It helped Kurt, he had a little less stress to handle when he was in this class," stated Noah.

"So you're saying all of this was our fault?" Rachael asked.

"No, this wasn't anyone's fault but the idiots who decided to hurt your friend. But you each played a part in him being caught off guard. As friends, what you should do now is be there to support Kurt and his father, because they have got a very long road in front of the both of them, it will likely be a very long time before you ever find your lives back to normal."

"Spirituality, religion, beliefs are about each individual person and how they approach them. It's not your place to try and force others to believe, or to think you can save them. Kurt will die one day, hopefully far into the future, and if God is real, he'll judge Kurt at that time. But I think you'll all find that god doesn't judge on gender or sexuality, he judges based on the life you've lived and last I checked Kurt's lived a beautiful life." Sarah spoke before turning to her son and giving him a soft smile, "I'll be at the hospital, Noah, if you'd like to stop by and check on your sister."

Noah nodded watching his mother leaving, while she wasn't perfect and occasionally was a little clueless, she was a caring mother.

Sue stood there for one more moment looking at all of them, "Each one of you needs to consider where you stand and how you view Ladyface before you see him. Because he may never look at any of you the same way again. You need to decide now if you see him as just another non-Christian gay kid you can change, or Kurt Hummel, the kid you love to gossip and hang out with." Without another word she left. Everyone just sat there in shock and awe.

Sarah arrived at the hospital nearly forty minutes later to find Burt sitting up in bed talking quietly with Carole who was holding his head. Kurt was nowhere to be seen. "Where's Kurt?" She asked almost panicked.

Carole looked over her shoulder and squeezed Burt's hand, "They moved him into isolation in hopes that it would get rid of the staph infection quicker."

Sarah felt her heart drop, "He's getting worse?"

"His fever was at 104 when they moved him…they were worried if they didn't bring it down he'd suffer brain damage-they said something about a ice bath and then isolation…we haven't heard anything since."

"He's fighting Burt." Sarah whispered.

The door to the room opened just then, and both Kurt's doctor and his own doctor stepped into the room. "Mr. Hummel, we'd like to speak to you alone for a moment."

Burt glanced at the two women, feeling his hands begin to shake slightly, but he nodded and watched his future wife and best friend leave. He looked at the two of them, "He's dying isn't he."

"Yes," Dr. Loyle answered softly. "Yes your son is dying. He's a very sick little boy. However, we've recently started looking into a newer way to beat infections such a staph, it's a stronger dose of antibiotics-"

"Why are you asking me?"

"Because you are his father and we have to, in addition, it's possible that the concoction could kill him."

"You just said the staph infection would kill him-"

"No, the staph infection will kill him; it's already showing signs of seeping into his blood stream. We're at a dead end, if this antibiotic doesn't work…he'll be dead within 48 hours of it entering his blood stream."

"So I don't have a choice?" Burt whispered his eyes burning at the fear of losing his only son.

Dr. Loyle sighed as she came over and sat down beside Burt, "Your son displayed strength unlike most kids his age when he sat with you. While he ran himself into exhaustion, he did show that strength, and I believe he's strong enough to beat this, the antibiotic may just offer a little boost to his system. You always have a choice Mr. Hummel. You can decide to let your son go as peacefully as possible, we can put him into a medically induced coma so he doesn't feel the pain of the organ failure and he'll die in his sleep."

Burt shook his head, "I can't lose my boy." He whispered softly. "I just can't." He looked at them and nodded, "Give him the antibiotic…"

With a nod Dr. Loyle headed out of the room, leaving Burt's doctor in the room with him. "You're doing the right thing, Mr. Hummel, we've only tested the medication in the trials a few times, but so far we've headed excellent numbers."

"Yeah well…let's hope they stay excellent." Burt replied softly.

"Get some rest Mr. Hummel; we should know fairly quickly if this new drug will destroy the infection."

Burt closed his eyes, and leaned his head back against the pillow and felt the pain beginning to build in his chest, not from another heart attack but the thought of living without his child.

"Hi Burt," the soft voice greeted him.

He smiled warmly at the sight of her. "I haven't died have I, I thought I was sad-"

She chuckled as she took his hand, "No, Burt, you're very much alive and doing very well. But Kurt was right, you've got to start eating better."

Burt rolled his eyes as he accepted her hand and followed her out of the hospital room until they were at Kurt's room. Stepping inside they both looked down at him. "You've done such an amazing job with him." She whispered reaching out to caress his forehead.

"He's dying, I didn't do that good a job, sleeping on the job."

"This wasn't your fault Burt Hummel so don't blame yourself."

He nodded, "Hard not to," He replied sadly. "God Ange, I just…" He shook his head, "That amazing feeling of fatherhood hasn't changed in eighteen years." He whispered.

"You are an incredible father, and I promise you, Kurt will pull through this."

"Then why are you here?"

She smiled, "I spoke to him at his darkest hour, I figured it only fair to come visit my hubby too."

He laughed. "I miss you."

"I know."

"We're never going to be the same again are we?"

She shrugged, "I'm inclined to say you'll be better than ever. This…jarred Kurt, I think he's realized he's taken advantage of the simplicity of your relationship at times. Kurt…adores you Burt, more than I think even you know."

"Feeling is mutual."

"This will ground the relationship, and maybe make it easier for the two of you to connect. Parenthood isn't easy Burt; certainly you've figured this out by now."

"No kidding. So many times I wished you'd been there to help."

She chuckled, "You never really needed me, Burt. Sure he missed me to pieces and so did you, but you still would've been a fantastic father with me there too."

"I think we're going to need a really good therapist after all of this."

Angie laughed softly, "I think you're probably right. It's going to take awhile before he feels safe again, but you're the one who's going to help him with that."

Burt nodded, "Don't s'pose you know if he's going to end up married to that Mohawk kid."

"I do know, and all you need to know is at this moment he'll be happy with a family and you."

"Right…just thought I'd ask."

"I have to go now, Burt. Take care of yourself and our wonderful son. You've got so many more wonderful moments to spend together."