The next time Kurt opened his eyes was to a brightly lit room and a not-so-amused looking Burt Hummel hovering over his bed.

"What did I tell you last night, son?" he asked, eyebrow raised and a mug of coffee in his hand. There were another two on his nightstand so Kurt figured he couldn't be too mad at them if he made them coffee as well.

"I'm really sorry, Dad, I swear we didn't mean to, it was just-" He was interrupted in his apology by Blaine waking up next to him with an ear-wrecking scream, almost falling out of the bed with how fast he shot up. Worried, Kurt grabbed for his waist and pulled him closer, back to the middle of the bed, Blaine immediately going pliant and melting into his embrace, trembling all over.

"What happened, honey?" Kurt whispered into his wild curls, soothingly stroking Blaine's back and completely forgetting about his father being right next to them.

"Nightmare," Blaine whimpered, burying himself even further into Kurt's side, his hand clenching in the sheets until Kurt slowly loosened his grip finger by finger and entwined them with his own.

"Oh, honey." Kurt pulled him closer, nuzzling his nose against the parts of Blaine's neck he could reach and for once starting to deliberately purr, hoping it would calm Blaine down a bit. "I'm sorry. Is there anything I can do?"

"Can we just stay like this for a bit? And then curl up on the couch and watch Disney films and drink cocoa with marshmallows?" Blaine whined, clinging closer and inching down so he could press his ear to Kurt's chest to better hear the purr vibrating through him.

"Of course, of course we can do that," Kurt murmured softly, gently petting Blaine's hair and turning the purring up a notch, earning him a contented sigh from Blaine.

Burt cleared his throat next to them and they both jumped, clutching at each other before looking up at him with the exact same reproachful glare until Burt's stern expression fell away and turned into loud, booming laughter.

"Oh you two," he sighed, holding his sides. "Such scaredy cats." Another reproachful look from Blaine and a glare from Kurt, mouthing ‘not funny, Dad' at him over Blaine's curls. It took Blaine another moment but finally he seemed to realize that he was cuddled into his boyfriend's side, on said boyfriend's bed, with the father of that very same boyfriend standing right next to them and looking down at them. After he'd explicitly made clear that he didn't want them sleeping together in one bed the evening before. And when they'd just become official not even 24 hours prior.

"Oh my God, I'm so sorry, Mr.- Burt! I know what this must look like but I swear I didn't- we didn't mean to, and we really didn't do anything it was just that-"
"It's okay, kiddo," Burt chuckled, putting a hand on Blaine's shoulder to stop his endless rambling. "I'm not gonna say that I'm thrilled but you obviously weren't fond of spending the night alone after Kurt made you go into that film. I can understand where you're coming from, there was a reason not even Kurt's best pout could get me into that one after I've seen the first three. Also, you're still wearing your clothes from the evening before so I guess there can't have been a lot of funny business going on here."

"Dad!" Kurt cried, immediately turning scarlet, Blaine at his side faring no better.

"Calm down, you two," Burt laughed. "I'm just messing with you. Now get out of bed and we can talk about those pancakes and the Disney films and hot cocoa."

And they did just that. Kurt was surprised at how willingly his father joined them in the living room watching Aladin while they dug into their pancakes. But within minutes they were all laughing along, Kurt and Blaine curled up around each other under one of their warmest blankets, all three of them clutching their mugs with cocoa (and marshmallows, of course), eyes fixed on the screen. It felt like one of the family bonding nights they'd had when Kurt's mother had still been alive and before he knew it Kurt found himself tearing up, nostalgia washing over him in waves. Aladin even had been the last movie they'd watched with the three of them together, before Elizabeth had become too weak to stay at home and had been moved into that awfully cold, sterile hospital room for the remaining few weeks of her life.

"Kurt?" came Blaine's voice from where his head was buried into Kurt's shoulder, soft and hesitant. A hand came up, gently catching a few fresh tears with the pad of its thumb, following their tracks down his cheek. "What's wrong, sweetie?"

The use of the endearment sent a little thrill through him, just enough to give him the strength to gather himself and actually put his thoughts into words. "It's just... That film... that was the last thing we watched with my mom..." Kurt's voice became more quiet with every word, barely audible towards the end of the sentence. Burt still caught what he said, looking across the room and straight at Kurt with the same sad, forlorn look in his eyes he would get whenever either of them slipped up and mentioned Elizabeth. It wasn't that they wanted to forget about her or never talked about her. They just avoided the topic most of the time because it still hurt so much to think about it. It hurt to feel so hollow thinking about what she would have said, done, if only she could be here with them.

Blaine said nothing, just pulled Kurt further into his arms, leaning more of his weight against him. He felt warm and alive and grounding and Kurt just knew that Blaine knew that what Kurt really needed in this moment, rather than expressions of sympathy over someone Blaine had never even known, was just the physical contact, the reassurance that he was there and going nowhere, for now at least.

They just sat like that for a while, leaning heavily against each other and just reveling in the way their bodies molded together, exchanging warmth, their breathing slowly starting to match. All three of them just stared at the screen unseeingly for that time, Burt's grip around the arm rest maybe a bit tighter than usual.

"Do you want to talk about her?" Blaine whispered, interrupting the silence. Kurt's grip on Blaine's side tightened, his tail flicking nervously, his ears twitching. Did he want to? He sent a questioning look in Burt's direction, not sure if his father would be okay with that topic of conversation right now. Burt simply smiled at him and nodded faintly, leaving the choice up to him. Taking a deep breath, Kurt turned to Blaine, hazel connecting with glasz.

"Yes, I think I do."

For a while, they stayed quiet, Blaine waiting for Kurt to speak when he was ready and Kurt trying to find the right words and get them to leave his throat and not just pile up, staying unsaid and gnawing at him. Burt turned his attention back to the pictures flickering over the screen, keeping out of the conversation as best as he could.

After a while of trying to not only figure out what to say but also how to say it that didn't really help matters along, Kurt gave up with a frustrated huff. "I don't know where to start," he admitted, voice sounding small and vulnerable and if there was one thing in the world that made him feel more exposed than deliberately giving in to his cat instincts, it was admitting defeat. And talking about that loss that was still fresh in his soul even after almost ten years.

"Maybe.. Would it help you if I asked some questions? Only if you're okay with that and you really don't have to answer if anything makes you feel uncomfortable..."

"Blaine," Kurt interrupted him gently, nudging him a little with his elbow until he shut up. "I think that might help a lot, so go ahead."

"So..." Blaine started, ever so hesitantly. "This," A gentle touch to his ear that made it twitch against Blaine's palm and caused a small smile to spread on his face. "You got that from her?"

Kurt nodded softly. "She was a hybrid as well. The gene runs back I think centuries into that branch of my family but it's pretty dominant, so here I am," he mumbled, blushing and shrugging his shoulders, looking bashful.

"Well, I certainly don't mind," Blaine chuckled, scratching a bit behind Kurt's ear until he started to purr and broke out into giggles.

"I noticed," he whispered back, a fond smile spreading on his face, nudging Blaine's cheek with his nose before pressing a gentle kiss to his lips, Blaine responding eagerly. They pulled away sooner than they'd have liked to, but the sound of denim scratching over polyester as Burt uneasily shifted in his armchair brought them back to reality effectively enough.

"Can I see a picture of her? I always tried to imagine her but it's sort of difficult with how little I know about her. Though I think it's a safe bet to say that she must have been beautiful," Blaine murmured, eyes wide and so full of adoration as he gazed up at Kurt that it had Kurt's heart stuttering in his chest.

"Of course," he breathed. "You thought about what my mom looked like?"

"Of course," Blaine replied with a chuckle, booping Kurt's nose playfully. "I know how much you miss her. I told you I want to know everything about you, Kurt, and how could I not want to know about someone who was - still is - such a big part of your life?"

Kurt sniffled a bit, smiling weakly and pressing another kiss to Blaine's cheek before getting up to get the family album. Out of the corner of his eye he caught Burt trying to subtly wipe at the moisture in his eyes threatening to spill over and it stopped him dead in his tracks.

"Dad," he said quietly, not daring to speak any louder because he felt like one or maybe both of them would break into pieces if he did. "Do you want to sit with us on the couch and look through the album?"

Burt took a hesitant look at Blaine who just smiled at him before his eyes wandered back to Kurt, still suspiciously wet. "I would love to, son."

Thus they ended up crammed on the couch, Kurt in the middle with the heavy photo album in his lap, all three of them staring down at it. With a deep inhale, Kurt opened to the first page, showing a picture of Burt and Elizabeth arm in arm with a tiny Kurt between them, playing with his own tail and grinning up at the camera along with his parents. The moment portrayed so much happiness, and it brought tears to Blaine's eyes that it could never be repeated.

"I was right," he whispered, tracing Elizabeth's face with a gentle finger and a sad little smile on his lips. "She was beautiful."

Kurt sniffled loudly next to him and Burt swallowed hard, but they powered through it. It wasn't until they were a few pages in, the photos not ordered in any certain chronology, that Kurt finally broke and started sobbing helplessly, burying his tear-streaked cheek into Blaine's shoulder, his grip on the album deadly and white-knuckled. Blaine could hear Burt almost choke on his breath as he looked down as well.

The picture in question showed a young Kurt, maybe seven or eight, sitting at a tiny coffee table with his mother, both of them delicately holding their tiny tea cups, grinning at each other, their tails entwined behind them. There was what looked like a birthday cake between them, complete with cat ears and a tail and seven little candles. Blaine didn't even have to ask, but Burt started to tell the story anyway.

"That's from the last birthday we celebrated with her," he said, voice shaky and making it obvious that he was one step away from breaking down like his son. "Before they diagnosed the cancer. She was still alive when Kurt's eighth birthday came around but only just barely and we didn't want to celebrate in the hospital..." There was a high, pained whine coming from where Kurt had buried himself into Blaine's side and Blaine pulled him closer, a second away from just throwing the album into a corner and make both of the Hummel men sitting on the couch with him another mug of cocoa, pulling them into bone-crushing hugs and make the pain go away. God, hearing Kurt in pain might just be the worst thing he'd ever felt, including when those jocks kicked in his already broken rips after Sadie Hawkins.

But he knew that eliminating the reminder from their imminent sight wasn't going to do anything for the feeling of loss deep down. There was nothing he could do to make the pain go away. But maybe he could do something to make it hurt less.

"I- I'd like to hear some more about her. Happy stories. I bet she was a wonderful woman," he said quietly and Kurt chuckled wetly into his neck. Burt smiled over at him, eyes still teary, and nodded almost imperceptibly.

So they told him. Stories about how Elizabeth had set out to make Kurt purr for the first time on his first birthday and she'd succeeded by singing to him for hours on end. How the song she'd picked had been Blackbird and that ever since that day she had sung it for Kurt when he'd been sick or sad. How they'd had movie marathons and Burt had been sandwiched between his wife and his son and they had both purred just to make him laugh because his sides were so ticklish and the vibrations were killing him. How Kurt had always chased after his mom's tail when he was really young and one day when they'd tried to bake cookies together she hadn't paid attention to what Kurt was doing behind her and basically tripped over him and covered the whole kitchen in cookie dough and when Burt came home he walked straight into a food fight that lasted another two hours until the kitchen was an incredible mess of flour and drying dough and eggs and milk spilled on the floor. How much fun it had been the next day when they'd made to clean up the mess and they wrapped wet towels around Kurt's feet and let him skate through it.

Or the day Kurt had wished for a pair of sensible heels for his third birthday and Burt had been all flabbergasted and hadn't known what to do and Elizabeth had simply dragged him to the next shoe store and hadn't given up until she found exactly what she was looking for and how they had both ended up bursting into happy tears when Kurt paraded around in his new, glittering tiny heels, looking happier than they'd ever seen him. Or the day when Kurt had climbed up that huge tree in the backyard when no one had been looking for a second and Elizabeth had climbed after him but had ended up just as stuck as Kurt because their cat instincts had made their fear of heights unbearable until they'd both been so panicked they'd just frozen and Burt had had to get them down one by one.

By the end of their stories they were all laughing, tears drying on their cheeks and they had cuddled close until they were one huge pile of human and half-kitten, Kurt purring up a storm as he wrapped his arms around his dad and swung his legs over Blaine's, pulling him closer.

"I'm so happy I have you two," Kurt chuckled wetly, rolling his eyes at his own sappiness. Burt and Blaine almost bumped heads when they both moved in, Burt pressing a kiss to his son's head and Blaine to his cheek, making him giggle.

"I'm happy that I have you, too, kiddo," Burt murmured, yet again not-so-subtly wiping at his eyes.

"So, so happy," Blaine agreed, nuzzling into Kurt's shoulder.

They sat like that for a while, Burt's arm around Kurt's shoulder and his hand resting on Blaine's and it probably should feel weird but Blaine was just happy. He felt like he'd bonded with Burt as well over that morning full of happy tears and tears of loss and wet chuckles and fond memories that hurt but also made them feel whole again. Finally, Blaine's stomach rumbled loudly, setting all of them off until they were laughing so hard they had to hold their sides. Once they recovered they moved over to the kitchen, Kurt making the most delicious lunch Blaine had ever tasted from scratch and the conversation flowed so easily between them Blaine sort of never wanted to go home. He'd called his mom to tell her that he was staying at Kurt's (more or less on Burt's insistence) but she hadn't even let him tell her that he now had a boyfriend because she'd been too busy hurrying from one conference to the next to do more than tell him ‘oh that's nice, sweetie, I'll call you soon, okay?'. Blaine knew she was stressed out at work right now and that she didn't mean to hurt his feelings but that didn't change the way he felt hollow that he couldn't tell her what he wanted to shout from the rooftops.

Shaking his head to get back into the here and now, he just barely caught Burt's question.

"So, any plans for today?"

Blaine looked out of the window, though admittedly he couldn't see far with how much it was snowing outside. It had rapidly cooled down and before they knew it fall had seemingly turned into the middle of winter and everything was covered in white, even more coming down continuously and adding to the layers already there.

"Well, I think a walk is out of the question," Kurt said over his shoulder, following Blaine's gaze from where he was taking care of the scrambled eggs.

"I'm voting we do something indoors until the snow lets up a little," Blaine agreed, playing with his fork until Kurt put a plate full of food down in front of him with an eyeroll.

"Hey, why does he get food first? This is my house!" Burt pouted from the other side of the table.

"Because," Kurt huffed indignantly, setting down another plate in front of his father before getting one of his own. "The rule says guests should be served first. And because unlike Blaine, you weren't playing with your cutlery."

"Hey!" Blaine pouted, crossing his arms over his chest.

"Just eat your egg, honey," Kurt smiled at him, patting his shoulder and turning to his own food. Blaine kept up the pouting for another minute, until his appetite got the better of him and he dug into the food like he'd been starved for days. Burt just chuckled at him while Kurt glared.

"Where are your impeccable Dalton table manners?"

Blaine swallowed the last bite down before replying. "It's the weekend, Kurt. And your scrambled eggs are really, really delicious."

Burt and Kurt just chuckled and returned to their food. They didn't talk much until they were done and Burt stared out of the window wistfully. "Some cookies for the game this afternoon would be really nice," he sighed, following the snowflakes on their way down with his eyes. Blaine turned to Kurt with an eyebrow raised in question, handing him another plate to dry.

"Mom used to bake cookies and only get them out for special occasions like football games or Disney films as soon as the first snow started to fall," Kurt whispered into his ear, a slight hitch in his voice.

"Would you like to do that together?" Blaine whispered back.

"What do you mean?"

"I-" Blaine started, shifting on his feet nervously, almost dropping the glass Kurt handed him into the sink. "I know it's been a tradition between you and your mom and it's okay if you want to keep it that way and not- but I just thought I- if it would be okay with you I'd really love to make cookies with you today, Kurt." Blaine finished with a huff, irritated at how much he'd fumbled with his words.

"I'd really love to make cookies with you today, too," Kurt mumbled softly, blushing and inching closer to Blaine, curling his tail around both of their legs.

"I think we might have a deal then," Blaine chuckled, drying his hand on the towel in Kurt's hands before bringing it up to gently flick at Kurt's ear.

"Blaine!" he laughed, the genuine laugh that made Blaine's heart flutter, where his nose scrunched up and his eyes narrowed and his teeth showed. "I told you to stop that!"

"You never said you didn't like it!" Blaine protested, giggling and doing it again. "I just like to watch your ear twitch back like that, it's one of the most adorable things I've ever seen. Next to your cute scrunchy face when you laugh. Or see a horrible outfit."

They giggled together, Blaine flicking Kurt's ear one more time before pulling him into a sweet kiss, only stopping when Burt groaned from the kitchen table. "Didn't you say something about wanting to make cookies?"

"Oh, of course you'd catch that part," Kurt huffed, fondness seeping through his tone.

So it came that not an hour later, Burt was comfortably settled into his armchair again, watching the rerun of a Buckeyes game, while Blaine stared down at an empty bowl, completely lost.

"Let me guess," Kurt asked from where he was rummaging through the fridge, his tone teasing. "You never made cookies yourself?"

"Um... Does it count if it was cookie mixture?"

"No," Kurt snorted. "If you never made cookies from scratch then you never really made cookies."

"Well, I guess then the answer is no?"

"Oh, honey," Kurt chuckled. "I'll teach you my ways, don't worry." He rummaged through another cupboard until he had all the ingredients assembled, bending down in search of another bowl and the mixer.

"I like it," Blaine murmured, dreamily staring into the bowl in an attempt not to look at Kurt's ass in those truly amazing jeans.

"You like what?" Kurt asked when he came back to Blaine's height, devices in hand.

"When you call me honey," Blaine said quietly, still staring at the bottom of the empty bowl, feeling himself blush madly.

"Good thing I like calling you honey, then," Kurt chuckled and Blaine only had a moment's notice to prepare himself for what was coming when he looked up to Kurt's face already being so very close and then they were kissing. A sweet, soft peck that lingered and became more of a kiss as Blaine's lips parted willingly and Kurt started sucking gently on his top lip. One of Blaine's hands came up to Kurt's cheek and he could feel Kurt's jaw working under his fingertips, moving with the kiss, and he couldn't help himself when he surged forward, pressing harder until Kurt's lips parted in a gasp, letting go of his own. Blaine used that freedom to his advantage, catching Kurt's bottom lip and sucking it into his mouth, gently scraping his teeth over the soft skin before soothing over the slight sting with the tip of his tongue. Kurt shivered in his hold, gasping into his mouth and Blaine could feel the air moving the leg of his pants where Kurt's tail was twitching madly as his fingers dug into Blaine's shoulders.

When Blaine went in to do it again, this time less hesitant as his tongue swept over Kurt's lip, it was met with an obstacle. It took Blaine an embarrassingly long moment to realize that that warm, soft obstacle was the tip of Kurt's own tongue and his knees almost buckled with the thought. He opened his mouth wider, moaning helplessly into the kiss and welcoming Kurt's tongue in further, nudging it with the very tip of his own. Even that short second of contact sent sparks through him, charged him with electricity until he was vibrating in Kurt's embrace as much as Kurt trembled in his and then they were kissing even more desperately, their tongues entwining and curling around each other, Kurt invading the cave of his mouth, licking everywhere. Another quiet moan, muffled by their moving mouths, escaped Blaine when Kurt's tongue started to explore the roof of his mouth, the sensitive skin behind his teeth. It felt so good Blaine's knees started to give out under him, stars dancing behind his eyes. He thought he might pass out from the dizzying pleasure that came from their tongues moving together, dancing with each other.

Just as he started to lick into Kurt's mouth, wrenching a faint, oh-so-pretty moan out of him in return, his hand, searching for purchase, for something solid to keep him upright, knocked over the flour. Neither of them noticed until Kurt's next moan made Blaine pull him closer, stumbling back a little and knocking over the empty bowl as well. It landed on the floor with a resounding clatter and they finally pulled apart, breathing heavily.

"Oops?" Blaine breathed when they looked down and noticed the flour covering most of the kitchen floor and the legs of their pants.

"Those jeans were Marc Jacobs, Blaine. Marc. Jacobs." Kurt hissed, shaking his leg with a scowl.

"I'm sorry?" Blaine whimpered, preparing himself to pull out of Kurt's embrace and run for his life.

"But why did you wear Marc Jacobs jeans to bake, anyway?" He didn't even need to look up to know that that was exactly the wrong thing to say.

"Because," Kurt growled, going dangerously still. "I didn't exactly expect you to ruin them."

When Blaine looked up hesitantly, Kurt's ears were flat to his head, eyes narrowed and tail twitching behind him in the way that Blaine knew meant he was about to pounce. And not the good kind of pouncing. Whimpering, he took a step back.

"Look, Kurt, I'm really really sorry and I'm sure we can get it out somehow, okay, just calm down for a-" He didn't get further before there was a cold trail of sticky egg white running down his face and clumping up his hair, the yolk following suit and almost landing in his eye.

"You didn't," Blaine huffed indignantly, trembling when it ran down his neck and under the collar of his shirt.

"Oh but yes, I did," Kurt chirped innocently, a satisfied purr starting at the back of his throat as he suppressed a laugh. He was just about to turn his back to Blaine and get out something to clean the mess up with when the unpleasant feeling of cold liquid running down his head stopped him dead in his tracks. As he whirled around it was to find Blaine on his tiptoes with the carton of milk still in his hand, his satisfied grin slowly making place for a look of terror.

This time, Kurt pounced.

They rolled around on the floor for what felt like hours, wrestling for dominance. They probably made a lot of noise with all the laughing and shrieking and yelling they did and they definitely made a horrible mess of the kitchen floor. Neither of them was sure when the butter and the chocolate chips started getting involved, but by the time Burt appeared in the doorway and started laughing hysterically before grabbing a handful of flour and joining in, Blaine was pretty sure that they had created an acceptable dough on the floor.

The battle went on until all three of them collapsed into the heaps of egg white and flour in exhaustion, trying to catch a breath.

"Who is going to clean that mess up?" Burt asked into the silence after a while.

"You're crazy if you think you're getting out of that one. You joined in, after all," Kurt huffed, following a little river of milk with his finger until he bumped against Blaine's hand and their fingers entwined almost automatically.

"Fine," Burt laughed, his hand immediately coming up to clutch his stomach because his muscles protested loudly. "I think we could wrap Blaine's feet in towels, he's tiny enough that we could twirl him around between us."

"Hey!" Blaine cried out indignantly and they were back to laughing until they really couldn't anymore.

"We really should clean up," Kurt sighed once they had somehow managed to stop, for once gracelessly stumbling to a stand and pulling Burt and Blaine up. Against Kurt's initial protest Burt actually wrapped Blaine's feet up in towels and pulled him over the floor, Blaine making silly ice skating poses and gracefully sweeping over the ruined tiles until he looked over at Kurt for too long and crashed into the fridge. Laughing, Kurt got out the mop and wrestled the towels from the feet of a protesting Blaine clutching at his nose, making quick work of the mess on the floor while Burt and Blaine took care of the sink and the bowls and the parts of the furniture that had suffered from their battle.

In the end, the kitchen was clean again and Kurt agreed to settle for the cookie mix they actually had lying around for emergencies such as this (obviously, there was some story involving Burt almost burning down the kitchen behind that) and as the cookies were safely stowed in the oven they all went upstairs to change into clean clothes and wash the stray ingredients from their hair and their bodies. The cookies were ready when they got back downstairs and they settled into the living room turning on Mulan as they waited for them to cool down. By the time they switched to Tangled they were already happily munching on their cookies, Kurt reluctantly agreeing that they actually didn't taste all that bad.

This time when Burt motioned for Kurt to get upstairs with him and sleep in his own bed, Blaine didn't complain, he just pressed his lips to Kurt's in a sweet goodnight kiss with just the tiniest hint of tongue involved to remind him of what had caused their cookie dough battle in the first place. He didn't think he imagined it when Kurt's eyes were a bit darker when he pulled away, his tail twitching a bit faster. With a last smile, they parted ways and Blaine didn't even spend a single thought on scary movies or the fact that he hadn't had such a fun afternoon with his own family in years when he put on Kurt's pajamas and snuggled under the sheets, his mind busy with the warm feeling of waking up next to Kurt - even if it was from a nightmare and with Burt right next to them - and the even better feeling of their tongues tangling with each other.