“Do you, Burt Hummel, take this woman to be your lawfully wedded wife? To have and to hold …”

Kurt sighs. Not a happy sigh, but the sigh of a boy watching his whole world transform (without his permission) in a thousand ways before his eyes. He starts looking at things to distract him from the event taking place, removing himself from the moment in the hopes that, without him, it might screech to a halt. He starts with the flowers. There are so many – roses, gardenias, peonies, lilies – overflowing out of bulbous, Grecian-inspired urns; affixed to the ends of pews; spread in raffia-wrapped bundles on the stairs and altar. His gaze moves to the runner on the ground - a strip of white satin leading from the spot where he stands, down the aisle, and out the door. He feels like following it right now and escaping, leaping into one of the waiting limos and heading straight for the airport. But he’s only twelve. He’d get caught. Everyone’s watching. He’d never make it.

He turns his head slightly and peers at the literally hundreds of people who’ve shown up to celebrate this blessed occasion. His father’s and his father’s fiancee’s dearest friends and family.

Yup. They’d turn on Kurt in a second if he tried to make a break for it.

The colors decided upon (without his consultation) are white and gold, so the church is bedecked with white and gold ribbon tied on to anything that couldn’t move or run for its life beforehand (including himself, a band of it tied securely around his right upper arm). Even though Kurt is not a huge fan of churches, he has to admit everything looks beautiful. The profusion of flowers is beautiful. Dressed in a vintage Vera Wang wedding gown, his soon-to-be stepmom looks beautiful. Even his dad looks … well, his dad looks handsome. Men can definitely be beautiful, but Burt Hummel was not one of those men. He had a certain rugged, salt-of-the-earth quality that could be described as attractive, but that’s as far as Kurt will go.

The whole scene in front of him, from the decorated altar to the glowing couple, is positively picturesque, like a snap-shot from the pages of Bridal Bazaar.

And as much of a sucker as Kurt is for that sort of thing, he is not okay with this.

Kurt never expected this day would come. His father getting remarried? Has Kurt been asleep this whole time because when did that even become a possibility? Wasn’t there a silent vow made after his mother passed away that his father would live alone from that moment on and die a widower? Aside from that, his father is committing two major taboos.

First of all, he’s marrying Kurt’s school teacher (from two grades ago, but that’s semantics. They started dating while Kurt was still a student in her class, ergo his teacher.)

Second, his dad is marrying the mother of the one boy in school that Kurt barely tolerates – Blaine Anderson. He competes with Kurt for every Glee Club solo, he ran against Kurt for student body president, and, because of him, Kurt is no longer captain of their school cheerleading squad. He’s co-captain, sharing that title with – you guessed it - Blaine.

Because Blaine doesn’t know his place.

The second Blaine and his mom moved to town after his parents’ divorce, Blaine swept in to Lima West Middle School and started taking everything that Kurt held dear – his best friends, the lead in the musical ...

… even his dad.

As soon as Burt found out what a huge football fan Blaine was, he replaced Kurt instantaneously.

Not really, but it sure felt like it.

Their parents marrying probably wouldn’t be so bad if they could still live in separate houses (ha-ha, yeah, right), but they made the decision to buy a new home together – The Ander-Hummel House, his dad calls it. Kurt won’t be forced to change schools or anything, but that’s not the problem. He likes his old house. He doesn’t want to leave his basement bedroom, their redecorated breakfast nook … or his mother’s garden.

This is all his father’s fault. He took a simple lunch date at Breadstix two years ago and turned it into a disaster.

Kurt turns his attention to the bride and groom two steps above him, pledging their lives to one another. But not just their lives; the lives of innocent children as well. Kurt frowns hard, hoping his father might see, might realize for a moment how not thrilled Kurt is with this. But neither groom nor bride have taken their eyes off one another since this whole shebang began. They look so happy, so in love.

Kurt sighs again. He shouldn’t be upset about this. That isn’t fair. Kurt will be eighteen before he knows it and on his way to college. He can’t begrudge his father this bit of joy. Technically, Kurt will only have to live with them for the next six years.

Maybe, in that time, Kurt can find a degree of happiness in this, too.

Kurt peeks over at the boy standing beside him in the matching tuxedo, ignoring him with ease. Okay, so maybe Blaine isn’t his favorite person in the world. Frankly, he comes right above cauliflower on the list of things Kurt wants to catapult into the sun, and cauliflower is third on that list. But maybe this can be the turning point in their lives; the thing that brings them together. Kurt can try, for his father’s sake, to extend the old olive branch.

Besides, Blaine does kind of look handsome in his tuxedo.

Blaine feels Kurt staring and shifts his gaze to look at him. He gives Kurt a quick once-over, then rolls his eyes away.

Kurt does the same.

Turning point? Maybe not.

Kurt vaguely hears something about husband and wife, and looks at his father in time to catch him and Blaine’s mother kiss.

Kurt’s jaw drops. He can’t help it. This happened. It just happened. His father got married.

From his right, Kurt hears a choked-off gasp, as if something more was meant to be said but the words bitten back by better judgement and relegated to a single breath. Kurt looks over and sees Blaine staring at the couple in front of them, kissing long beyond what feels comfortable for the two boys.

“Your father kissed my mother,” Blaine utters in disbelief. He says it like an insult. Kurt tries to think of an insult to throw back, but he can’t. He feels the same way.

“I guess,” Kurt says, “that makes us … brothers.”

This time Blaine scoffs out loud. He leans sideways to talk to Kurt in a way that their parents won’t hear.

“I already have a brother, “Blaine says bitterly, side-eyeing the handsome young man in the white tuxedo who was chosen to be his mother’s Man-of-Honor, while Blaine was designated co-Best Man, getting the “illustrious” job of accompanying Kurt down the aisle … and little else. “My mother might have married your dad, but that will never make you my brother.”

Kurt mimics Blaine’s scoff, only louder and with more distaste. He probably should be offended by that remark, but he honestly couldn’t care less.

“For once, something we agree on,” Kurt says, sticking his nose in the air.

Six years later

“A … a little to the left …”

“Here?”

“Yeah. Yeah, and just … just harder … please …”

“You mean, like this?”

“Yes! Yes! Oh God, Blaine …” Kurt moans, a hair’s breadth away from another amazing orgasm. “Just … just like that. Don’t stop …”

“I won’t,” Blaine promises, snapping his hips in rapid succession when he feels Kurt’s body adjust beneath his – his ass inching further up while his spine curves down, his head relaxing into his pillow with a contented purr.

“Oh, yeah,” Kurt mumbles in a slightly higher voice. “That’s it. That’s the spot.” He groans long and loud with relief. When the familiar shuddering in his lower body starts, Blaine knows Kurt’s there, and he gives himself permission to let go.

“Jesus, Kurt,” Blaine moans, cumming inside him. “God. You’re so … you’re just so … God ...”

“Cat got your tongue?”

“Yeah.” Blaine chuckles, running a hand down Kurt’s spine, turning the knots on either side into shivers. “Somethin’ like that.”

When this started a year ago, they had opted to forgo condoms seeing as they were both virgins and, so far, monogamous. Kurt knows that’s considered taboo, but their whole relationship started with taboos.

He’s not going to pick nits over one more.

Barely out at home and not at all at school, they’ve kept their relationship under cover, so to speak, since it has yet to extend past their bedroom. That isn’t to say their involvement with one another is exclusively sexual.

They’re in love, in every sense of the word, and that’s part of the problem.

Lima isn’t the most open-minded city in America, and McKinley isn’t the most forgiving high school. So to ensure that they don’t get the crap beaten out of them every day after the bell rings, they haven’t said a word to anyone – not about their sexual orientations, and not about each other. They don’t hold hands at school, they don’t kiss. They don’t even sit next to one another in class.

And as far as they know, their parents don’t have a clue.

They’re certain they’d have their support if they did, but they prefer it this way for now, fooling themselves into believing that being accepted doesn’t matter as much as the fun they’re having.

Blaine slides out of Kurt and flops down on his back on the bed. Then he pulls Kurt on top of him and kisses him hard. Kurt laughs into it, struggling to catch his breath. Blaine always does this, waits until Kurt is breathless and then kisses him until he’s nearly unconscious. Blaine stops when he feels Kurt push him away, giving in because he doesn’t want Kurt to move away too far.

They lay side by side, and Blaine shakes his head.

“Thank God … I never … considered you … my brother,” he pants.

Kurt nods in agreement, looking at Blaine through the sweaty clumps of bangs hanging down into his eyes.

“Again,” he says in an equally breathless voice, “something we agree on.”