1993.

‘Kurt, Kurt, Kurtsie. Do you know what day it is tomorrow? It's Christmas, and do you know what happens then? You get presents and wine, okay well maybe I'll have the wine, and cuddles and presents.'

‘Trust me kid, you've got enough presents to last until you're eighteen.'

‘Ssssh He's never going to grow up, are you my baby boy?' Burt turns his head away from his wife and their son held tight in her arms, he fixes his eyes on the coffee he's making, trying to hide the smile that he just can't seem to keep off his face and trying to stop staring at his wife, even after three years of marriage he doesn't think he can.

‘Well you certainly have far more presents than a 7 month old boy really needs.' His son just blinks his big blue eyes at him, in a manner which says far too clearly I neither understand nor care about a word you're saying. ‘He's got your eyes.' Burt muses, smiling at Kurt who seems transfixed by the spoon hanging limply from his father's hand. Kurt looks up suddenly, letting out a giggle as he meets his father's eyes and then going back to sucking on his own fingers and clinging to his Mum's shoulders.

‘No, I think he looks like you.'

‘Poor kid.'

‘Why? You're the most handsome man I've ever met.'

‘Don't you worry sweetheart, your presents are definitely expensive, no need for flattery.' Molly laughs, light and carefree, standing up on tip toes and holding Kurt tightly so she can kiss her husband on the lips. Kurt lets out an indignant squeak for attention as he is trapped between his parent's bodies and they both laugh as they pull away from each other.

‘Hush, you know I don't care about that. I just want to be with you.' Burt just smiles, blushing slightly under the unwavering gaze of those bright blue eyes, no matter how many times she says it he still never fully believes that it's him she could be talking about, that Molly Rochester-The Molly Rochester, the girl he'd been hopelessly pining after for a year before he'd even worked up the courage to talk to her- could have possibly fallen in love and married him.

‘Your Mummy doesn't know what she's talking about does she?' He asks Kurt, tapping the boy on his button nose and grinning at the smile he gets in return.

‘Here take him a second?' Burt happily obliges, holding Kurt close to his chest and watching Molly remove her cookies from the oven with intense concentration. The cookies are an old family recipe that is supposedly only allowed to be brought out at Christmas. They remind Burt of the long evenings spent working at Mr Miller's tyre shop in town and the times when Molly would bring cookies round for all the workers, he doesn't believe such a thing exists but if he did he might say it was love at first sight, it was certainly affection at first sight anyhow. Molly had bustled in, as she always did- bright blue eyes and flaming red hair and the sort of joyful smile that could make even the most miserable of men a little softer. Mr Miller- and Burt had come to the conclusion that even his closest of friends called him that- had been Molly's uncle, and as such she always had an excuse to spend time at his tyre shop, not that she'd really needed it until she met Burt. It had been a Friday the first time they met, Burt remembers that much, some of the details are a little fuzzy six years later, they've been romanticised over time- and their eyes met across the room, there was a spark of electricity, they were immediately drawn to each other- truth be told he was a 20 year old boy working extra shifts to try and afford a place of his own and she was just a very pretty 19 year old girl who happened to catch his attention. It wasn't until a year later that he'd seemed to grab a hold of hers. Even to this day he doesn't know quite how he managed to get her.

‘Hey.' Molly laughs, slapping Burt's hand away playfully as he reaches out for a still scolding cookie.

‘Your Mummy's mean isn't she?' Burt asks Kurt, receiving the same I-couldn't-care-less-what-you're-saying look he always gets from his son. ‘Do you ever get the feeling that he's constantly judging us?' Burt turns so that Kurt is facing his mother, the young boy smiles up at her, blinking his eyelashes that really shouldn't be allowed to be that long at his age and flashing her the beginnings of his very first teeth.

‘Of course not, we're his favourites, aren't we sweetheart.' Molly coos at the little boy, beaming just as bright as he is and tickling his pale cheeks.

Burt had never been a fan of that whole ‘talking to your baby in a stupid voice thing', he'd scoffed at people who did, and cringed when they did it in Public and promised himself that he never would, but both he and Molly seem to be doing it more and more. The three of them smile at each other for a while more, lost in the feeling of having no commitments and too much food and that kind of blissful appreciation for everything you do have that people only seem to remember once a year.

‘Come on, I want to watch it's a wonderful life before we go to bed.' And just like that the moment is broken, not in a bad way, but in a way that promises there will be many more like it if only they let this one go. Molly turns swiftly with a plateful of cookies in her hand, bouncing out of the room in her usual overexcited manner-she's always so full of energy, Burt can hardly keep up- and continues on into their tiny living room. It has been decked head to toe in Christmas lights that twinkle and glare from every wall, they make the room look small and lazy and familiar, it feels like freshly baked apple pie and the smell of your favourite shampoo, it's like that feeling you get bubbling up inside you when you kiss someone you love and it's like the words to a song you've heard too many times but still listen to again. It's small and it's cramped and it's all they can afford for now, but it feels like home. The tree sits precariously in the corner, it's too big, Burt had known it would be too big when they bought it but his wife had insisted so he had complied. They'd spent an entire day decorating it with odd decorations they'd collected over the years. To be fair it had mainly consisted of Molly decorating and Burt and Kurt dancing around the room while the old radio they'd inherited from his parents crackled away in the corner. It had been a good day, one of those rare ones that takes you by surprise, when you wake up feeling expectant and excited and you don't know why but it just makes you so happy. It had been the kind of day where your hair parts just right and your food cooks exactly the way you want it and nothing anyone can say will make you stop feeling as happy as you do.

It had been a good day.

‘Isn't it time for someone to go to bed?' He asks cautiously, already knowing the answer. Molly pulls Kurt out of his hands and turns their son round to face him. Both Mother and Son pout, their identical sets of eyes glistening in the reflection of the lights and their mouths turned up in the most adorable of ways.

‘Come on, it's Christmas.' Burt doesn't think he could ever say no to those eyes or that tone of voice, he just shrugs his shoulders and settles himself down on their tiny two-seater couch, pulling both his wife and son towards him as the movie begins to play.

­

‘Blaine. Blaine. Blaine. Look at me. BLAINE!'

‘Cooper leave your brother alone, he's four months old he doesn't need you annoying him.' Neither of the two boys seem particularly bothered by their mothers words. Blaine sits in his chair on the floor, blinking groggily at Cooper who is knelt in front of him and trying to get his attention.

‘Look he's smiling at me.' Cooper grins back at the small boy in front of him. ‘When will he be able to do anything interesting?'

‘That's lovely Cooper but can you please stay out of my way I'm trying to cook dinner for tomorrow.' Cooper pouts at his mother, turning his winning blue eyes on her and putting on the pleading look he knows she can't resist,'

‘But I'm bored.' He whines, drawing out the last word and trying out his newest disheartened gaze, the one he's been practising in the mirror all week and is sure to be using a lot when all their relatives arrive. ‘Will you play a game with me?'

‘I'm busy, why don't you go take Blaine and watch TV or something, but you can't stay in here sweetheart, Mummy's working.' Angela Anderson pats her son on the head without looking down at him and continues with her cooking.  Cooper sighs, well that hadn't gone well, she was supposed to play with him not lumber him with the stupid baby.

Cooper stands up and starts to slink towards the door hoping his mother won't notice.

‘Don't forget your brother.' She singsongs from behind him. He freezes as she starts to speak and then turns slowly, rolling his eyes. He reaches down for Blaine, carting his brother out of the room without a backward glance at their Mum. It's not that he hates Blaine, sure he doesn't do much and he's always crying or taking up other people's time, but he is quite... cute, not as cute as Cooper, but cute nonetheless, and he's his brother, Cooper has to love him. It's just that everyone wants to spend time with Blaine, because he's small and adorable and smiles with no teeth and makes stupid gurgling noises. Blaine can't even appreciate the attention he gets, he certainly doesn't deserve to be the centre of everyone's attention without even working for it, no singing, no dancing, no perfectly chosen outfits. Blaine just sits there and everyone seems to love him while Cooper is always putting on shows for people and no one seems to notice unless precious Blaine is enjoying them.

He plops Blaine down on his lap, wishing the Nanny would come back soon; she's gone skiing with her boyfriend for Christmas so Cooper has had to look after Blaine a lot more recently. He's sulking, passively aggressively hitting the buttons on the remote and determinedly removing Blaine's fingers from the collar of his new shirt. He's annoyed, it's Christmas eve he should be running round playing games not looking after a dumb baby.

 But if after 10 minutes of watching A Charlie Brown Christmas Blaine starts to snuggle into Cooper's chest and Cooper starts to cuddle him close no one would need to know. If Blaine ends up drifting off to sleep in Cooper's arms and Cooper decides to let him stay there, well, nobody would notice. And if Cooper decides that sometimes Blaine can be rather adorable, then he doubts anybody else will find out.

Incessant crying penetrates the dark silence that has swarmed into the room, although it's less crying and more a shrill mix between wailing and screaming- that Kid sure does have a good set of lungs on him.  Burt rolls over still half asleep. He wraps an arm absentmindedly around his wife's waist and nestles his head further into his pillow.

‘No come on.' She swats his arm away and tries to wiggle her way out of his grasp. ‘It's Christmas we can both get up.'

‘It's 5:30!'

‘Get used to it, he's going to be waking us up at this time every year from now on.' Molly rolls out of bed completely and sweeps Kurt into her arms, positioning the crying boy on her hip and trying to soothe him. She's already wide awake, she's a morning person as it is but truth be told she never really got over that Christmas adrenaline rush you have as a kid.

‘Bloody hope not.' Burt grumbles, sitting up in the bed drearily. Of course he's woken up early every morning but Molly knows how to calm Kurt down so much better than him so she usually goes while he gets another half hour in bed. Not today though, today is Christmas and Christmas is family time.

‘Oh come on, do you not remember the excitement you used to feel on Christmas day, the way you could barely sleep the night before or how you'd try to stay up to see Santa but you'd always fall asleep. Do you not remember that feeling you get as soon as you wake up, before your mind has really caught on to what's going on and you're so excited but you can't quite remember why, and then it hits you- it's Christmas and you sit there for a second vibrating in your bed with excitement and breathing it all in before you leap out of bed and go running to wake your parents up. Can you not wait for him to feel that? Can you not wait to see the joy on his face when we give him his presents, when he gets that fire engine he wanted or a new baseball glove, when we get him his first bike? I can't wait for him to wake us up like this every year.' Burt just smiles slightly; sometimes he doesn't know what to say to her.

Cooper blinks his eyes open and is met with the same familiar darkness winter always brings. He feels strange, kind of tingly all over, like he's standing on his tippy-toes and is about to fall or like he's trying to remember a dream he's already forgotten. He plays with his blanket for all of two seconds before he realises.

 It's Christmas.

In a flash he's out of bed, the covers thrown to the side and his bare feet hitting the hardwood floor a little harder than intended. He rushes out of his room, turns quickly along the hallway and continues half-running until he reaches his parents door. He'd usually knock but today he doesn't, today is special, he pushes the door open with a bang that probably only sounds as loud as it does because of the shroud of silence the rest of the house is in. He has that lightheaded feeling in his heart, like it's a balloon floating up in his chest until it can't get any higher, his fingers and toes tingle with anticipation and he can't hide the smile that is overcoming his whole body.

‘Mum! Dad!' He whisper shouts into the darkness, not wanting to make too much noise but at the same time wanting his parents to wake up.

‘Ssssh Cooper be quiet you'll wake your brother.' Cooper had forgotten about Blaine, lying soundly in his cot at the side of the room and letting out these little mewls in his sleep.

‘But it's Christmas.' Even Cooper's voice sounds like it's smiling. ‘I'm sure he's just as excited as I am.' Just at that Blaine wakes up, it's almost like he knows something better is waiting for him in the real world. ‘See he wants to get up too.' Cooper says over the sound of Blaine crying. He picks his brother up, bouncing him on his hip like he's seen their mother do and tries to explain to the crying boy why today is such a good day. Blaine doesn't stop crying but Cooper guesses it's just because he knows no one will buy him very good presents this year, he's only a few months old after all.

‘Come on then.' Their mother smiles at them, she looks genuinely happy for once, not using that fake smile she does where her cheeks don't dimple and her lips go all tight. She uses that smile a lot at the dinner parties Cooper's Dad is always making them go to, or whenever Cooper tries to show her his latest performance. She takes Blaine from Cooper, the minute his brother is out of his hands he's racing down the stairs ahead of her, catapulting through the living room door and stopping suddenly so he can stare in awe at the presents congregated under the tree.

It's one of those moments that seem to stick around for a lot longer than a moment. It hangs suspended in the air, the feel of Cooper's pyjamas hanging too long over his feet and bunching up around his ankles, the soft murmuring of Blaine in his mother's arms on his left, and the warm glow of the lights on the Christmas tree casting a cosy aura over the entire room. Everything feels red and warm and tingly in a lazy kind of way, it spreads up through his toes and along his skin, tickling and warming and filling him with the kind of excitement that you only seem to feel as a child on Christmas morning.

Then it's gone, broken by the whine coming from Blaine as he clamours for attention and the sudden movement from Cooper as he dives for his presents. Everything becomes frenzied and jumpy and excited, garish wrapping paper ripped away from shiny toys and tacky Christmas songs played loudly from the radio, chocolate for breakfast and the whole morning spent in his pyjamas.

The day passes quickly after that, aunts and uncles and grandparents crowd into their dining room and ask Cooper about school and sports and the Christmas show, they talk to him about his presents and how he feels being a big brother, they pull at his cheeks and give him extra servings of potatoes when his Mum isn't looking. He makes conversation with them, preening when they tell him how handsome or talented he is and managing to successfully boast about his breakout part in the nativity-he was the donkey, but hey that's the most important part right?- without sounding arrogant.

  It isn't until after dinner when Blaine starts to wake up from his nap that Cooper becomes more than a little disgruntled. One second everyone's watching him reprise his role as the donkey, proudly walking around the room on all fours and pretending to carry Mary to the stable,  and the next they're passing Blaine around like he's a pass the parcel, cooing and smiling and handing him bits of wrapping paper to play with. His fat little hands latch on to the brightly coloured scraps and his face lights up when he manages to tear it, everybody smiles at him in awe as if he's the baby frickin Jesus. And Cooper knows he shouldn't be miserable, he knows that just because people are paying attention to Blaine it doesn't mean they love him any less and he knows he should be thankful for having a little brother. But it still hurts, he still feels left out and he still wishes that Blaine would just go away, that he could just not be here for one day, but he guesses he'll have to get used to sharing the limelight now.

Cooper slinks off into the corner, settling himself under the Christmas tree to play with his new toys and casting disgruntled glares every few minutes or so towards whoever happens to be holding Blaine at that point. He keeps to himself for the next half an hour, managing to restrain himself from leaping up and putting on one of his impromptu prize winning performances- he has a lot of self-control- which is sure to win back their attention. It's not like he needs people to watch him and love him to live, it just helps, for 10 years he's been the centre of attention, the youngest in the family, the cutest, the one that everyone wants to talk to and buy presents, and it's a little hard to suddenly have to get used to sharing all of that with Blaine.

Then of course the pictures start.

He is called over into the drawing room- a place that is kept orderly for occasions exactly like this- and is being sat down and moved about by countless relatives. People pull him onto their laps and stand him up and put Santa hats on him and he's being whisked about in such a frenzy he barely knows what's going on, although at least everyone's paying attention to him again.

Somehow he finds himself sat upright, alone, in one of the dining room chairs with half a dozen expensive cameras pointed his way. This is what the Anderson family does, stuffy, uptight photos shoots and countless games of ‘my camera is bigger than yours', Cooper is certain that in the past Anderson's probably did this whilst posing for oil paintings, arguing over who hired the most expensive artist and who's clothes looked the best, they are a family of honour and ambition, overachievers in their own right and every family occasions is just a chance to subtly insult the others and prove your own self-worth. Cooper hates it, of course he's thankful for his big house and his own room and his nice toys, but he doesn't understand why everything comes down to money. He'd be happy to perform for the homeless so long as they clapped at the end.

Someone puts Blaine in his lap and there is a chorus of ‘aww's as he wraps his arms around his younger brother- he wouldn't want him to fall off after all. Everyone takes pictures-promising to put them in the family album or hang them on their walls back home- but the minute the first flash hits him Blaine begins to cry.

‘Sssh, sssh Blainey, it's okay, you're fine. You've got to get used to this, they do it every year.' Cooper leans forward so his face is right next to Blaine's, he whispers in what he hopes is a soothing voice to his brother and kisses the small boy on the cheek. To his surprise Blaine stops crying, so he wraps his arms a little tighter around his baby brother and turns his perfectly aligned and sparklingly white teeth towards the camera.

‘I love you B.' Blaine doesn't reply but Cooper's sure he knows what he's talking about.

‘You know, I know I was a bit sceptical about not going to my parents for Christmas, but I'm really glad we decided to stay home, just me and my boys.' Molly smiles across the table at Burt, holding her hand out for him to take and eating with her left- it's a bit awkward but they manage. She can't stop smiling, all she's ever really wanted in life was to be a mother and wife and now she is. Of course she teaches piano to children in the week and she loves it, music is her passion, the thing that can drag her out of any bad moment in her life, but it's never really fulfilled her in the way the thought of a child has. She looks over Kurt, all pale skin and blue eyes- her eyes- she can actually see where her genetics have come in to play and she doesn't think she'll ever get over that. Every mother thinks their child looks like an angel, but Kurt actually does with his cherubic face and pudgy little cheeks, and that smile that he even gives random strangers in the grocery store; she's never wanted anything more than this in her life.

‘Me too, I'm glad it's just the three of us.' Burt startles her out of her thoughts; sometimes she gets so caught up in her own head. They sit on opposite sides of their tiny kitchen table, it's small and cramped and Kurt's highchair had barely squeezed in next to it, but it's warm and cosy and happy. They know they'll move into a bigger house soon, when they've saved up enough money and when Kurt's a bit bigger, but for now they're content.

Kurt whines in his seat, moving his food around in his bowl and staring longingly at his parents' Christmas dinners, they'd made too much food, as usual. The entire morning had been spent opening Kurt's presents for him, the poor boy hadn't really known what was going on but he'd done it all with a smile on his face,  and then cooking this dinner that could probably end up feed both their extended families for weeks, and was only meant for the two of them. They'd agreed that this year would be spent alone, just them and Kurt, it was a tradition they were planning to instil every year but their families needn't know that, they just wanted it to be the three of them, they wanted this time to be happy for Kurt, not the general stress and arguments they'd been brought up with every Christmas.

‘Just you wait kid.' Burt laughs as he watches Kurt stare at their plates and completely ignore his own. ‘Just you wait.' Kurt whines a little but goes back to eating his own mashed potatoes and parsnips when he sees he's not going to get any of his parent's food.

‘I love you.' Molly says absentmindedly, she doesn't look at Burt, her eyes are still transfixed on their son, but he knows she talking to him, well, she's probably talking to both of them.

‘I love you too.' He fixes her with a questioning look as she finally forces her eyes away from Kurt and looks her husband.

‘I just don't say it enough.'

‘You say it every day.'

‘Exactly.'