Sugar Baby

Fourteen

"Are you going to come see me play the crazy hyena?!" Kurt asked loudly, bouncing in his seat as his parents climbed into the car, his mother turning to smile sweetly at him. "The tickets are ten dollars each, and you can have a seat with a lion cushion on it!"

"Come on, honey, seatbelt on," his mother ordered, and Kurt continued bouncing even as he secured himself in, overexcited and grinning as they drove, his parents talking happily in the front seat.

It was like a nightmare, or a scene from a movie, or a tragedy broadcast on the news after dinner. One moment they were driving down the road, and the next screams were sounding from every side, glass was shattering, metal was crunching, sirens were wailing, and Kurt was being carried away in unfamiliar arms, screaming and kicking and sobbing hoarsely.

Everything was a blur, a doctor with a gentle face and a soft voice kneeling down in front of him, wrapping a blanket around his tiny, shuddering shoulders and telling him, "Mr. Hummel, Kurt, sometimes people have to leave us, and they don't want to, but they go on to a better place, and they will always love you and watch over you and they're waiting for you when you have to leave your loved ones to. Kurt, your mother and father both passed away. They've gone to sleep with the angels."

"No," Kurt said, shaking his head frantically, tears running down his cheeks. His parents were both dead. He was alone. "No no no no no no no no no no no-"

"Kurt, for God's sake, wake up!"

Kurt jerked awake, cold sweat slick over his skin, breathing heavy and ragged and tears on his cheeks, to see Cooper standing over him, dropping into a chair when he saw he was awake. He sat up slowly, nervously, rubbing the tears tracks from his cheeks and softly asking, "Where's Quinn?"

"She's asleep, put her earplugs in so she could catch up on what she's missed this week," Cooper explained gently, patting Kurt's shoulder lightly. "Are you okay? There was screaming and crying and you kept yelling. Nightmare?"

"About the car crash my family was in that killed my parents," Kurt said shakily, sliding his hands down over his belly, just for the reassurance of feeling the swell warm and tangible beneath his fingers. "They stopped for a while after I met Blaine, and I got to be with him during the nights, but they're coming back now. God, maybe I should just go back to him and just be able to sleep through the night without hearing my mum screaming again."

"No, come on, don't be an idiot," Cooper said, shaking his head at him. "You can't just go running back to his arms, Kurt, you have to keep him on a string for a while. You have to act aloof and keep him on his toes." When he noticed Kurt's raised eyebrow, he added, "I'm in show business, I have a lot of friends who are women and get messed around by guys. In all seriousness, though, me and my brother are different. He's never really looked for a serious relationship with anyone, even when he was a teenager, he's always just slept around. Sure, he's had lovers he's stayed with for a while, but no one as long as you since He-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named Smythe." Kurt giggled, leaning back against the cushions. "He would never have expected to accidentally knock someone up, but he did, and I think he cares, just obviously not as much as you care about him. You just have to walk away for a while, and let him see that you are fine without him."

"Are you going to give me ice-cream and tell me I'm a strong independent woman who don't need no man?" Kurt quipped, and Cooper snorted and shoved him lightly. "Seriously though, can you cook? I'm so hungry, and your niece or nephew growing inside me would really like any flavour of ice-cream you happen to have in your freezer right now."

Cooper just shrugged, holding out a hand to help Kurt out of bed and steadying him when he stumbled slightly, blood rushing from his head too fast and making him dizzy for a moment. “You’re far too skinny,” Cooper observed, eyes raking over Kurt’s body. “Apart from that little bump, you look like you’d snap if I hugged you too hard. Come on, we’ve got sixty-five grams of fat to get down you in the form of some delicious mint-chocolate ice-cream.”

The disapproving arch of an eyebrow from Quinn when she came into the kitchen to find Kurt with his feet in Cooper’s lap, getting a foot massage, and licking mint-chocolate ice-cream off a spoon. “That is incredibly unhealthy,” she observed haughtily. “And those hands are mine to take advantage of for foot massages, so feet off, Hummel.”

Quinn left for an interview half an hour later, snapping the lid onto her travel mug of black coffee and sliding a packet of chewing gum into her pocket, bending down to drop a light kiss on Cooper’s lips, then to the top of Kurt’s head, smiling and saying, “Bye sweetheart. You too, Cooper,” and winking and sticking her tongue out as she left with a jaunty wave.

“Are you done with that yet?” Cooper asked, waving the fork he’d been spearing up his bacon with in the direction of the ice-cream carton in Kurt’s hand. “I would very much like to eat your leftovers, or all of it if you keep going that slow.”

Kurt clutched the carton protectively close to his chest, glaring at Cooper and saying, “I’m savouring it. And, really, if you’re going to have children someday you have to learn that pregnant people don’t share food.”

The phone trilled out, and Kurt looked up at Cooper, expecting him to answer while he finishes up the last of his ice-scream, smirking around the spoon in triumph and not letting his new friend eat any of it. “I can’t answer it, I’m not allowed to answer the phone here, since no one knows yet,” Cooper said cheekily, and Kurt got up carefully, trying to stop himself from getting light-headed, pressing a hand against his stomach as he leant over to answer with a cheerful, “Hello?”

“Where the hell are you, Kurt?” Puck’s voice came over the line, slightly worried. “You just disappeared yesterday, Blaine’s going crazy looking for you.”

“He is?!” Kurt exclaimed happily, eyes beginning to shine and a flush of pleasure rising in his cheeks as he clutched the phone closer to his ear. “How is he going crazy?”

“He’s really worried about you, you disappeared before he even woke up yesterday, where in the hell did you go?” Puck asked, sounding anxious and actually scared for him.

“Well, did he tell you that he said Sebastian’s name in bed?” Kurt asked, voice rising furiously in volume. “Did he tell you that he has been nothing but an inconsiderate douchebag to me since I found out I was pregnant? No, since we came out here for Christmas and he was around Sebastian again. I’m staying with Quinn for a while, at least to be with someone who actually cares about me!” He hung up the phone with a clattering, and turned on his heel into his bedroom to go change.

A knock came at the door an hour later, when Cooper had apologetically gone out for a rehearsal, and Kurt ran a hand through his hair to adjust its shape as he went to answer. He opened the door, but was barely able to take in who was in the doorway before a pair of hot, wet lips were on his, familiar hands on his waist and a broad body backing him up.

Blaine pulled away for a moment, cradling Kurt’s face between his hands and murmuring, “I care about you,” a kiss laid to his neck, making Kurt arch and moan despite how much he wanted to push Blaine away, “so much.”

“Oh, Blaine, I care about you,” Kurt breathed, nuzzling under Blaine’s jaw and giving him three short, light pecks to the lips. “Honey, I care more than you know.” Blaine smiled at him, pressing their foreheads together and wrapping his arms tight around Kurt, Kurt pressing his face into the crook of Blaine’s neck and swaying in his arms.

Blaine kissed his cheek softly and pulled back, looking deep into Kurt’s eyes. “We have to talk,” he said solemnly. Kurt drew his lip between his teeth, biting softly, and then looked up at Blaine and nodded seriously, curling into him one last time before Blaine pulled him gently onto the sofa, slipping an arm around him and readying them to talk.