Prologue: Broken

Burt Hummel was not the type of father to worry.  When his son was placed in his arms for the very first time, he gazed down at the squirming, wailing bundle in wonder, counting ten fingers, ten toes, and assuring that all else was in order.  That was enough and all was well.

He looked back to his soulmate, who was flushed and sweaty from labor but still, in his eyes, overwhelmingly beautiful.  “What are we gonna name him?”

“I was thinking of Kurt,” she replied after a moment.  Burt instantly conjured up an image of her favorite Von Trapp child in his mind.  “Even his cries are like music.”

Burt smiled.  “Kurt Hummel,” he announced proudly, “welcome to the world.  It’s got its fair share of problems, but it’s sure to love you.”  He paused for a moment before softly adding “I know I do.”

*******

For the first few years of Kurt’s life, Burt was proven right.  Kurt was a happy, bubbly child who easily delighted in the world around him.  As soon as he could walk, he developed a particular affinity for following his father around his car repair shop, pointing to each vehicle and exclaiming “Ka!”  He squealed loudly when he received his first toy truck for his second birthday and spent the entire afternoon pushing it around the house.  Burt couldn’t be more pleased. 

As predicted, Kurt also loved all things musical.  He would happily run through the house singing bits of songs he had learned from the radio, the TV, or his mother.  Elizabeth insisted they indulge his interest with piano and voice lessons starting when he was four years old.  It was unusual for a boy but not unheard of, and Burt thought that he would never get enough of hearing his son’s clear, joyful voice ringing through the air.

When Kurt turned seven, Burt and Elizabeth managed to save up enough money to take him to see a musical, Beauty and the Beast, in the nearest city.  The entire family enjoyed the trip, and Kurt’s eyes lit up like never before as he watched the magic unfold on stage.  During the car ride home, his parents felt in turns amusement and irritation as he belted out songs to the soundtrack he had insisted they purchase.

No, Burt Hummel had very little to worry about: he had found and bonded with his soulmate; he had a successful business and a bright, beautiful son.  And so the unpleasant shiver of fear that ran up his spine and tingled throughout his whole body took him by surprise when Kurt paused in his singing and innocently asked “Mommy, do you think I’ll have my own prince someday?”

*******

From that day forward, worry became the constant companion of Burt Hummel.  Maybe it was easier than the overwhelming sadness that lurked just beneath.  There were little things about Kurt, things that had slipped by him unnoticed in the past but screamed at him now, making him wonder and question and doubt.  Could his son be…?  No, he couldn’t bear to even think it.

A year later, when Kurt was only eight, there was an accident, and suddenly, mercilessly, Elizabeth was gone.  The pain was overwhelming—emotional, physical, all that he had ever been warned about.  And still he was expected to endure.  He had a son to raise, a son that didn’t, couldn’t, understand why his mother was no longer with them.  A son that had no idea why his father was suddenly empty and broken and so, so sad. 

Only maybe he comprehended more than Burt gave him credit for.  Kurt was standing next to his father, watching as his mother was lowered into the ground with tear-filled eyes, when suddenly he looked up at Burt.  There was a perceptiveness that far exceeded his years evident beneath the sadness that was pooling there when he said to his father “she was your soulmate, wasn’t she?”

“Yes,” Burt replied simply.  “She was my everything,” and he pulled his son into a hug.

*******

Not long after that the questions began. 

Kurt wasn’t stupid.  In the past, he had caught glimpses of the beautifully scripted names written on adults’ hands, though people generally tried to hide them under gloves.  He had noticed at a young age that his father’s palm bore the name Elizabeth Montier, the name of his mother, and his mother’s the shorter Burt Hummel.  He had been only five when it occurred to him to ask what they meant. 

His mother had smiled down at him next to a sink full of soapy dishes and caressed his cheek with a sudsy hand before responding gently “it means your father and I are soulmates, honey.”

He had then studied his own tiny hands, turning them over and over again as if looking for something.  “Why don’t I have a soulmate?” he finally asked.

Elizabeth had laughed.  “Don’t worry, sweetheart—you’ll get one when you’re older.”

Older apparently meant age thirteen, Kurt had soon learned, watching his cousin as friends and family congratulated him, gawking at his hand all through his thirteenth birthday party, his only chance to show his soulmate’s name off before donning his own glove.  Kurt had stolen a peek too, and read the name Kristina Parker there.

Now, Burt looked down at his curious eight year old and sighed.

“It’s like this,” he started awkwardly. “People aren’t meant to be alone in the world, so everybody has a soulmate, one person in the world meant to…” Burt fumbled for the right words “… to complete them, I guess.  When you turn thirteen, give or take a few days, a name will appear on your hand.  That’s your soulmate, buddy.  That’s the person you’re meant to be with.”

“But Daddy, how do I find them?”

“It may take some time, but usually fate will bring them to you when it’s right.”  And take them away again, he couldn’t help but think sadly to himself.

Kurt seemed to contemplate this for a moment, then peered up at his father fearfully. “But what if I never find them?”

Burt tensed at the question.  He studied his son for a moment, his special, precious boy, and could think of nothing to say.  Nothing truthful that was reassuring, that could ease Kurt’s worry or his own.

Burt still loved his son more than anything.  He always would.  But he was slowly coming to the realization that maybe the world didn’t after all.

*******

Burt knew their conversations would only get harder after that.  He watched Kurt grow older, watched as he learned more about the world around him and absorbed its painful realities.  The sadness that had settled into them both after Elizabeth’s death grew sharper and heavier in a slow, creeping way.  They didn’t talk about soulmates again for quite some time.

Then on one perfectly ordinary day Kurt, eleven years old, walked into the shop after school.  Mindless of the other workers, he slumped into his father’s arms.  “Dad,” he pleaded simply. 

And Burt knew.

After asking an employee to close up for the day, Burt led his son into the house and settled them at the kitchen table, pushing a cup of coffee into Kurt’s hands.  He knew Kurt was too young to be drinking it but could never seem to deny his son the vice that seemed a small comfort to him after his mother’s death.

A few moments later, Kurt spoke.  “Dad, my soulmate… they aren’t going to let us be together, are they?”

Burt closed his eyes and shook his head, a pained expression on his face.

“What’s going to happen to me, Dad?  What will they do to me when they see that my soulmate… is a boy?”

Again, silence.

“Mercedes, a girl in my class,” Kurt continued, “her brother disappeared yesterday.  He turned thirteen a week ago, and she saw the name on his hand… it was a boy’s name.”  Kurt struggled to keep his voice even as his words pushed out at a speed that betrayed his inner panic.   “Where did he go?  Am I going to disappear too, Daddy?  I don’t want to leave you!”

“I won’t…. I won’t let them…” Burt tried.  But what good would it do Kurt to lie to him?  He hung his head, unable to meet his son’s eyes as he spoke.  “There’s a law, Kurt.  Within a week of their birthday, every child has to show their mark to government officials.  If a boy has another boy’s name, or a girl has a girl’s name, they’re sent away.   I don’t know many details; I’ve not known anyone this has happened to personally.”  Until now, he thought to himself.  “I do know that they usually come back after a few months.  But they’re… different.  And their marks are gone.” 

Finally he looked up, and Kurt could see that there were tears in his eyes.  “I don’t want that to happen to you, Kurt,” Burt said with conviction, reaching for his son’s hand.  “We’ll do everything we can.  I won’t lose you too.”

*******

For the next two years, the Hummel men divided their time—searching for a solution to their impending problem and trying to avoid it.

Kurt began to hear whispers around school of a place called Dalton, a safe-haven for those who were different.  He asked his dad about it, and secretly they did some research.  Unfortunately, all they could learn was that Dalton did indeed exist and that it was very difficult to get to.  Families with the right connections and deep pockets could send their children there if they wished to spare them.  Burt had neither.  Kurt didn’t want to go, anyway, when he realized that it wasn’t a place his father was likely to be able to follow.

Kurt also got excited once after glimpsing the name “Jordan” on a football player’s hand while in the locker rooms.  “Jordan can be a boy’s name or a girl’s name,” he proudly showed his father in a book of baby names he had gotten from the library.  “What if my soulmate’s name could be both, too?”

“I guess that could be possible,” Burt answered hesitantly.  “We might be able to get you by if that were the case.  But Kurt, don’t get your hopes up.  He’ll have your name too, remember.  ‘Kurt’ is definitely a boy’s name.”

Watching his son’s face fall into a frown, Burt almost regretted his words.  But it would do no one any good to sugarcoat.

“I’m never going to find him, dad, am I?” Kurt said quietly after a moment.

Burt sighed.  “It’s a cruel world, kid,” he said slowly.  “You have no idea how much I wish it could be different for you.”

Kurt crumbled, defeated, and once again sought comfort in his father’s embrace.

*******

Kurt grew more and more melancholy as his thirteenth birthday approached.  Each night was spent fixated on one worry after another.  He couldn’t decide what hurt more.  There was the very real possibility of being separated from his father, at least for a few months.  There was the unknown of what would be done to him during that time, and where he would go.  Rehabilitation, they called it.  The very word made him shudder. 

Perhaps the worst thought, however, was of the years stretching out in front of him, his entire lifetime—alone.  Empty.  Incomplete.  He hated what losing his mother had done to his father.  How could he go on forever never knowing his other half?  Already he was beginning to feel the pull towards… something.  Someone.  And oh, how it made him ache…

As fate would have it, his soulmate’s name began to appear the day before his birthday.  He woke up to a tingling in his left hand and peered down to see the letters beginning to take shape, half eager and half fearful.  By midmorning, there it was.  Kurt quickly shuffled through the baby names book, hoping to confirm…. he sighed in relief.  Joyfully, he pushed the open book towards his father and pointed to the words that read:

Blaine – Male, Female.  Pronounced Blayne.  Irish or Gaelic in origin, meaning “yellow.”

He would slip past the government.  He knew without a doubt that his soulmate was a boy, but Blaine could be a girl.  And that was all that mattered.

*******

By the time he went to bed that night, Kurt’s elation had long faded.  Without a doubt, he was relieved that he would remain with his father and would not be forced to endure Rehabilitation, whatever it entailed.  Still, he had come to a new, equally harsh realization about what that meant.  Hiding.  He could never be fully himself lest anyone suspect.

He would never be with Blaine.  He wondered what his soulmate might be enduring right now.  What tragedies might Kurt’s name bring him?  It pained him to even think of it.

Blaine Anderson, I will never know you, he thought, tracing his fingers lovingly across his own palm.

Then he cried himself to sleep.