Before Burt knows it, the New Directions are leaving for Nationals. Blaine comes to the airport with them to see Kurt off and tries to hide the tears in his eyes as Burt and Carole drive him home. As Blaine gets out of the car when they drop him off, Burt offers a consoling, “He’ll be back soon, buddy.” Blaine only nods in response.

     The next evening, there’s a knock on the door, and sure enough, it’s Blaine, duffle bag at his feet. He mumbles something about not being able to sleep, and maybe, would it be possible if, just this once, he could stay over? Burt lets him in before Blaine’s even finished giving his explanation and request, clasping him on the shoulder and asking him if he’s hungry. Blaine declines all offers of food and companionship, heading straight up to Kurt’s room.

     Burt checks in on him after twenty minutes, and finds the kid asleep in Kurt’s bed, hugging one of Kurt’s pillow’s to his chest, nose buried in the fabric as if to trick his sense into believing that Kurt is with him.

     Burt covers the boy with a blanket from the foot of the bed, hoping that Blaine was just missing Kurt, and that there was no larger problem behind his visit. Burt keeps the master bedroom door open slightly, planning to keep one ear listening through the night.

     Morning comes and Burt finds Kurt’s bedroom empty. Blaine is in the kitchen, making a lunch for himself and what looks like breakfast for Burt and Carole.

     “Oh, uh, morning.” Blaine says awkwardly when he sees Burt. “The eggs are almost ready and there’s toast on the table.”

     Burt pours himself some orange juice and sits down at the table. He takes a piece of toast.

     “This is real thoughtful of you, Blaine.” Burt says cautiously, as he butters his toast. He notices a slight blush appear on Blaine’s cheeks.

     Blaine stirs the pan of eggs for a moment and then turns towards Burt, a winning and charming smile on his face. Burt finds it unsettling.

     “I just – I wanted a way to thank you for letting me stay over last night. I know that it must have been -”

     “Blaine.” Burt interrupts. “I’ve told you. You’re always welcome here. No matter what. I would say no questions asked, but I actually do have a few.”

     Blaine nods, emptying the pan of eggs onto a plate, carrying it to the table and then sitting down across from Burt.

     “I had a fight with my dad.” He volunteers. “It wasn’t bad or anything, just the usual disagreement and then I was going to call Kurt like I always would, but then I realized that we’d probably get charged like crazy for the long distance. So I tried to just, like, fall asleep early but I just couldn’t sleep. So I thought I’d come here and see if anyone was home.”

     “I’m glad you did, you know.” Burt says gently. “Not that you had the fight but I’ll get to that. But I’m glad you came here, that you knew you were okay to.”

     Blaine smiles weakly, and the expression on his face makes Burt remember a conversation they had a week or two earlier.

     “Were you thinking about cutting at all?” Burt asks, not sure he wants to hear the answer.

     Blaine cringes, and Burt wonders whether it was due to the accusation or actually being correct. He doesn’t have to wonder long.

     “A bit. I mean, it’s always in the back of my head.” Blaine admits. “It was my main coping strategy for so long. It’s hard to reprogram your brain with something like that. But then I started thinking, ‘Oh, I can’t cut my arms because then Kurt will see. I guess I can’t cut my stomach either, because what if he wants to go swimming when he gets back?’ I was trying to come up with places he wouldn’t see –“

     Blaine falls awkwardly silent after saying that, but Burt just clears his throat, more concerned with the rest of the story than the exact level of intimacy in his son’s relationship.

     “So anyways, eventually I realized that even if I could find a way to hide it from Kurt, I wouldn’t want to. I don’t want to keep secrets from him. And, more than that, I don’t want to have to tell him about relapsing. I know how much it would hurt him. I know how disappointed he’d be. So I tried to think of what he would say if I had called him, and I figured he’d tell me to come here. So I did.”

     Burt really doesn’t know what to say to that. He is relieved, so relieved to hear that Blaine hadn’t self-harmed. He’s glad that Blaine feels safe enough here to be able to come here on his own. He wonders about talking to Kurt sometime soon about helping Blaine get of rid of whatever it is that Blaine uses to hurt himself.

      “So you’re feeling okay today?” Burt asks.

     Blaine nods carefully, and then jumps to his feet, misinterpreting the question.

      “I’ll just get going now. Again, thank you -”

      “Sit down, Blaine.” Burt says firmly. “What happened with your dad?”

      “Oh, uh,” Blaine says softly, trying to find the words as he sits down. “I was just telling him about my plans for the summer – I’m auditioning to be one of the musical entertainers at the theme park. He wants me to work at his office, doing filing or something like that. He was going on about how good it would look on a resume, how I’d meet the right people, how it would pay me better than whatever job I would get as a ‘street musician.’ And, yeah, all that stuff is true but I don’t want to work there. I don’t want to be an accountant like him. Why is that so hard for him to understand?”

     Blaine puts his head in his hands, pulling at his hair in frustration. Burt is at a loss for what to say, until he realizes that he’s already said it.

      “Did Kurt ever tell you about the time last year that he started wearing Finn’s type of clothes and he went out with that weird girl?”

     Blaine nods, confused as to why Burt’s bringing it up.

      “Did he ever tell you why?” Burt asks.

      “He said he was just experimenting.” Blaine replies.

      “It was my fault.” Burt says. “We weren’t as close then as we are now, so Kurt thought that if he acted more, I dunno, just less like himself I’d like him better or love him more or something.”

     Blaine looks nearly comically surprised at this.

      “Complete crap, of course.” Burt adds. “He was totally wrong. Anyways, he ended up singing this huge dramatic song, and he was just himself and he was so good. And I told him after, his job isn’t to impress me. To earn my respect or my love or anything like that. His job is to be himself, no matter what. And my job is to love him, no matter what. No matter who he is. But it’s more than that. I can’t just love him in spite of the ways we’re different, the things we disagree about. That’s not good enough. I have to love everything about him, even the things I don’t understand.”

     Blaine has tears running down both cheeks as he listens to Burt.

      “So your job, Blaine, is to be yourself. Be who you want to be, do what you want to do. Be respectful, of course, and don’t do stupid, reckless things just for the hell of it. But be yourself. It’s your dad’s job to love you. It’s not your job to do things to earn his approval. And I’m sure he loves you. So much. He’s probably just trying to help you, so you just have to tell him that while you appreciate what he’s doing and you’re grateful and all, it’s just not what you wanna do.”

     Blaine leaves a short while after the conversation, still mumbling thank yous, but now for the advice, as well. Kurt emails Burt that night, saying that the New Directions did not win – didn’t even make the top ten and that, well, Finn and Rachel are particularly unpopular at the moment. Burt decides he’ll deal with that later.

     Blaine, of course, goes back to the airport with Burt and Carole. He’s bouncing in his seat, full of anticipation and nervous energy. Blaine’s on his feet before Burt even sees the New Directions and is breaking into a run when Burt finds his son in the crowd. Burt watches as Kurt’s face lights up at the sight of his boyfriend and the two boys share an eager hug. Watching the reunion, one would think that they had been apart for months.

     The ride home is uncomfortable. Kurt is eagerly telling Blaine about every second of the trip, but seems to be putting a lot of effort into ignoring Finn. When Kurt asks if Burt would drop him and Blaine off at The Lima Bean, Burt says yes without giving it a second thought. Carole has no luck getting Finn to talk on the ride home, but Burt’s sure that she’ll be able to fix whatever mess Finn’s made for himself.

     Kurt and Blaine come home about an hour later, giggling their whole way up the stairs and closing the door to Kurt’s room with a thud behind them. Burt goes out to mow the lawn, and wonders if he might want to bump forward a certain conversation.

     The next day, Kurt tells Burt that Blaine had said those three, all-important words. Burt doesn’t need to ask if Kurt said them back, because he can tell by the way Kurt’s eyes are shining. So instead of saying anything at all, Burt pulls his first son to him, hugs him tightly and pats him on the back in congratulations.