2034

But it's true, you've always liked sweets.' Kurt continued.

'Yes! The next year, we took you to see Santa at Macy's and you actually licked the fake lollipops.' Blaine added, smiling at the memory.

'She what?' Eli thought he might be able to use this story on his cousin.

'Yeah, yeah. As if you never did something silly when you were younger, huh?' Ava bopped her head. She would need to ask her dads to stick to the cool stories when her peers were around.

'Yeah, Eli. Haven't you?' Barbra frowned at her brother. 'Cause I think I can remember this one time: you were running after a frog in our garden. You wanted to catch it and turn it into a prince, so he could build you a castle. Together you'd be the Order of Lima. Right?'

Eli didn't answer his sister. He crossed his arms instead and turned to moping. Kurt was pretty sure he could hear Eli huff something that sounded a lot like 'girls'.

'Did he kiss the frog?' Ava asked, wiggling her eyebrows at Barbra.

'He did!' Barbra exclaimed and she started making kissing sounds.

Blaine felt sorry for his nephew, he knew far too well how teenage girls could be. 'Girls!' both he and Finn raised their voices at the same time.

'Yes. Lollipop story please.' Eli added, a bit too smugly.

2025

'You'd think they'd let him go first or something.'

'I know right. He has a Tony, so that makes him kinda famous, right? Oh, look at the little girl he has with him. That must be his daughter.'

'Of course it's his daughter. Who else would you take to see Santa? But is she his daughter though?'

'What do you mean Kate?'

'Yeah maybe she's the other one's.'

'Which other one?'

'He's gay.'

'I know. It's obvious, really. It's probably the other one. Her hair is much darker than his.'

'Ahum.' Kurt stage coughed. He was used to people whispering when he walked past them in the street or at some sort of event. The whispers had changed since high school, but they had never disappeared. He couldn't have that for his daughter. 'No, they don't let us skip the line. I wouldn't want them to. We're here to enjoy a typical family holiday outing. That includes waiting in line like everybody else. However, that does usually not include other's gossiping about you. Or them questioning who the kid's father is. Also. I can hear you.'

The two women looked at him in shock, not shame. They were clearly not aware of Kurt Hummel's tendency of speaking up.

The three adults in line between them and Kurt didn't really know what to do. Two of them just looked at the ground instead.

'Kurt Hummel:1 –Random women:0.' A very familiar voice said. Kurt turned around to see his husband approaching him, two take away cups of coffee in hand.

'Thank you B.' Kurt took his mocha from Blaine. 'For the coffee, and for being a human scoreboard. But I'd like to believe I've outwitted random women more than once, thank you very much.'

'Oh, but you have. 5840 times.' Blaine smiled broadly, seemingly very content about something Kurt couldn't quite grasp. 'We've been together for almost 16 years. 16 times 365 makes 5840. 5840!'

'And I thought that language people couldn't count. Silly me.' Kurt joked.

'Language people? How eloquent baby!' Blaine giggled.

'I seriously wonder who's more excited for this, you or Ava.' Kurt and Blaine both glanced down at their daughter, sleeping in her stroller. 'But yeah, language people. What you are.'

'Blaine Hummel-Anderson. 31. Husband to Kurt Hummel-Anderson and father to Ava Helena Hummel-Anderson. English and Glee club teacher. But yes, you're right, us 'language people' we can't do math. I calculated it on my phone while waiting for the coffees. I thought of it all of a sudden and just wanted to know.

'I love your brain, B.' Blaine was so romantic in the strangest ways, in the littlest things.

'That is the strangest compliment I have ever heard, I 'm going to put that in my phone. But I love it, I love you, thank you honey.'

'You're welcome.' Kurt finally took a sip of his mocha, which was still scorching hot. Blaine handed him his medium drip, so he could push the stroller a bit further down the line. Knowing him, if he'd push it with one hand, he'd end up knocking over a display or something.

'Thanks.' Kurt had handed him his coffee. 'I'm glad she's asleep.' Blaine looked down to his daughter, still soundly asleep, immune to the holiday cheer surrounding her.

'Me too, I think the excitement knocked her out, probably for the better. There's nothing exciting about waiting in line.'

'True.' Blaine agreed with his husband. 'Any idea how long we're going to be in line for?'

'The elf at the end of the line said it would take about 30 minutes, and I think you were gone for ten, so only 20 more minutes to endure. We're lucky we came this early in the season.' Kurt said as he bent down to adjust Bunny. Ava had had Bunny from the day she was born but the stuffed animal was now slowly sliding from under her arm and Kurt didn't want it to fall to the ground. Taking the thing away from Ava to wash it took far too much distracting.

'Sweetie, we're almost seeing Santa.' Blaine sat crouched in front of the stroller, gently stroking Ava's cheek. There were only a couple more people between them and the entrance to Santaland. When Ava reluctantly opened her eyes Blaine took her out of her seat and put her on his hip, her head resting against his chest and Bunny dangling from where she was holding him by his ear. It took her a couple of seconds to realize where they were but once she had figured that out, her eyes lit up.

'Aha, there's our Ava.' Kurt smiled at her, pushing the now empty stroller a bit further down the line.

'Daddy, are we seeing Santa now?'

'We are!' Blaine cheered, twirling Ava around twice, reducing his daughter to giggles, until she realized she hadn't asked him. 'Baba is not Daddy.' She announced, matter-of-factly and looking at Kurt, set on getting a response from him too.

'You're right, Ava. Yes, in a minute sweetie. Do you see where those elves are? Dressed in green and red? That's where Santa lives when he's in New York.' Kurt pointed down the line to the two elves greeting people as they walked into Santaland.

'Baba, Baba, can elves talk?' Ava now looked at Blaine for an answer.

'Why don't you ask them yourself, we're here!' Blaine flicked Ava's nose as they reached the entrance.

'What did you want to know, little girl?' The male elf asked Ava as Blaine put her down.

Ava took a step back when the elf crouched down to her level, looking at her Dads for support. Kurt nudged her on, but Blaine smiled at the elf and said 'She wanted to know if you could talk, but I guess she figured that one out already.' He then reached for Ava's hand. 'Come on, let's not clog up the entrance. Let's go see Santa!'

'Baba, no! I wanna ask!' Ava refused to move from her spot. Her dads looked at her in surprise - she usually did as she was told. Kurt turned to smile at the elf and the people behind them in apology.

'Well, ask away miss!' The elf grinned so broadly, his face was close to ripping. Kurt admired these people for doing this all day, to everybody.

'Does Santa have a husband?'

Blaine and Kurt both turned to each other in surprise. Ava had never really asked questions like that before, even though they had always been ready to answer them. But love in all of it aspects takes a lot more time to explain than the people in line behind them would appreciate.

'No, but he does love somebody very much-' The elf started.

'But if you love somebody very much, you get married and become husbands. That's how it works.' Ava was certain of this.

'You're absolutely right. Santa Clause loves Mrs Clause very much, but she's a girl, like you, so she's his wife.'

'Like Auntie Rachel and Uncle Finn, sweetie.' Blaine added, trying to help out the poor man.

'Can Santa play football?' Ava asked. She liked how Uncle Finn could talk about this game. Almost as enthusiastically as her Daddy reading her a bedtime story.

'When he's not busy getting everything ready Santa does enjoy the occasional game.' The elf winked. 'But maybe you should ask him the rest of your questions.' He added, eyeing the line.

'Oh look Ava, a train!' Blaine tried to distract her, pointing to the Macyland Express a bit further on. Kurt took Ava's hand and gently pulled her along to the next display while Blaine mouthed 'thank you' to Santa's little helper. Ava kept looking at the elf, waving him goodbye.

When the display in front of her had finally caught her attention, she kept pointing out things to her dads. 'A deer!' or 'Look! A lady comes out of that house!'. Kurt thought it might have been the cutest thing he'd ever seen, his little girl standing up on her toes, looking over the banister and pointing at something else every couple of seconds. There was so much to see, and she didn't want to miss anything. She seemed to have forgotten that the real reason they were here was to see Santa. But hey, if your kid already knew that the journey was more important than the destination at the age of three, you don't complain.

A journey through the Enchanted Forest, beyond Santa's Holiday Magic Show Wagon, past Rock Candy Mining Site, where they literally had to pry Ava away and over Rainbow Bridge later, they had finally arrived at The Sweetery. Their walk had taken them considerably longer than other families', but Kurt and Blaine didn't care, they had time, it was only morning. If their little girl wanted to look, she could look. So that's what they did. They let her explore the display while they stood back a bit, enjoying the lights and distant holiday buzz. Christmas Candy was, very fittingly, playing in the background.

'Blaine! Blaine!' Kurt hissed 'Photo!', bumping his elbow into his husband's side. Blaine had been the photographer that day, whipping out his phone every now and then. To record the beautiful displays, or his beautiful family. 'That is our Christmas card right there!'

Kurt pointed over to where his daughter was trying to lick a plastic lollipop, twice the size of her own head, but conveniently placed at exactly the right height .

'Don't you think we should tell her?'

'What?' Kurt played innocent.

'That it's not exactly edible.' Blaine laughed. 'Why is she still licking it, it doesn't even have a taste. Does it?' Blaine took a step forward as if he were inspecting the mysterious but apparently very attractive lollipop, phone still in hand.

But at that exact moment one of the supervising elves shot both Blaine and Kurt a dirty look, realizing that they were the little girl parents. After all, having a kid lick your displays wasn't exactly clean and she clearly did not want the other kids to get any ideas.

Kurt quickly grabbed Ava's hand , leading her to the next stop along their magical journey, Tasty Town, which they also passed through faster than they should have. All three of them were giggling as they left the Sweetery. But unlike her parents, Ava held her head high in the sky, no shame to be found on her face whatsoever.

'Santa!'

The Hummel-Anderson family had passed the Checking It Twice Institute without any difficulties, being labeled 'nice' as soon as the elf set eyes on Ava, and were now finally able to meet Santa. Ava crawled right onto his lap and immediately started telling him about all the things she wanted for Christmas. Little did she know most of her gifts, and there were plenty, were already hidden in her parent's closet. Kurt Hummel was an expert at Black Friday, thank you very much.

'and a puppy! And to decorate the tree, I wanna do that! Do you love Mrs Clause, Santa? Cause you're married, aren't you? The elf told me. And my daddies they're married too and they love each o-'

Ava kept babbling on, barely giving Santa time to even answer her questions.

'Do you think we should go save him?' Blaine looked up at his husband, watching his joyful daughter from the corner of his eye.

'Probably best.' Kurt nodded and they joined Ava and Santa, ready for their picture to be taken.

'Smile!' The elf next to the photographer got Ava to look at the lens. The four of them beamed their biggest smile, in true Christmas spirit.

When the photographer had taken three pictures, Blaine picked Ava right off Santa's lap, hoisting her on his own hip. 'Say bye bye! Until next year.' He told her.

Ava didn't say anything, but waved at Santa instead, blowing him a little kiss as they exited the cabin.

2034

'I've never seen that picture!' Ava exclaimed as her dads were wrapping up the story. 'The lollipop one, you've told me the story, or actually my friends to embarrass me, but I've only seen the one with Santa. Please tell me you got rid of it. Please.' She crossed her fingers as she looked at her parents for an answer, but her grandfather beat them to it.

'Your dad actually put it on the Christmas card that year, and we keep all of those. So it must be here somewhere.' Burt got up out of his chair, a little slower than he used to when Kurt still celebrated all of his Christmasses at home. He pulled open one of the drawers in their massive dining room dresser and then flipped through a container inside 'Yes. Here it is!' he exclaimed as he pulled out a card and put it on the table next to his youngest granddaughter.

Ava looked down at the card. It had all of the typical Christmas colors, but remained classy, clearly a Kurt Hummel design. It also had a picture of 3 year old Ava on Santa's lap on it, one of her playing in the snow, one of the three of them in front of the fire and last, but certainly not least, one of her licking a giant lollipop.

'Oh my god! Dad!'