(Burt’s POV)

He’d pretty much known since Kurt was three and asked for a pair of sensible heels that husband would be the word he’d call whoever his son decided to spend the rest of his life with. Until Kurt came out there were still moments that he wondered if he’d be standing at a family gathering and saying this is ‘insert woman’s name here’ my son Kurt’s wife. Those moments went away and soon the sentence became ‘this is Nick or Chance or Nathan my son Kurt’s husband’ the name changing each time that Kurt got a new boyfriend.

Nick was the first, a sweet boy Kurt met when he transferred to Dalton Academy for a few months his junior year of high school. They dated for just over a year before parting ways when they went off to college and soon Kurt was mentioning Chance a boy that when Burt met him he didn’t like. That relationship lasted all of four months before ending in what Burt hears from various friends of Kurt’s ‘fireworks and screams’. Nathan was next and Burt he liked Nathan, he was smart as a whip and he treated Kurt like he was royalty. Nathan was the longest lasting a year and a half but that ended in a bittersweet moment when Kurt informed him that he’d just fallen out of love and he didn’t think he would fall back in it with Nathan.

In all those times though he never expected that when he met the man that would one day turn out to be Kurt’s husband, he already would be his son’s husband. Yet here he was sitting across from his son-his just turned twenty one three months ago son-that he hadn’t seen in person for almost six months because he was studying abroad in Italy and his son’s husband. Seven hours ago he’d woken up to a phone call proclaiming that Kurt was bringing someone special home with him, two hours ago he’d picked Kurt and said special someone, a nervous yet joyful boy named Blaine, up from the airport; and now five minutes ago Kurt had sat him down and confessed that Blaine wasn’t his boyfriend oh no Blaine was his husband. To say that Burt was shocked was an understatement because up until seven hours ago he didn’t even know there was someone special in Kurt’s life let alone someone special enough to marry.

“Dad will you please say something?” Kurt finally asked.

“I’m sorry did you just tell me that you’re married?” He asked because he had to make sure he heard that right.

“Yes,” Kurt answered and Burt let out a breath and took off his hat to rub at his head wondering where he should go in his line of questioning next. Underneath the shock and utter disbelief he was a little angry and worried and he didn’t understand exactly how his son went away for six months then came home with a husband. He expected fancy Italian stuff but he didn’t expect this.

“Kurt, buddy I’m trying to stay calm and rational with all of this but you gotta explain how exactly I sent you off six months ago and you were single and now you come back with a husband of all things. I mean this with no offense to you Blaine you seem like a nice boy but Kurt this isn’t like you! You’ve known each other for less than a year.”

“Actually um we met each other at Dalton Mr. Hummel,” Burt turned his head to look at Blaine who shrunk back a little at his gaze after his admission.

“At Dalton?”

“Yes we didn’t know each other that well though, I was sort of shy back then, but we had a couple of classes together and we were paired on a history project once but that was well the most of our interactions,” Blaine told him rubbing at the back of his neck and Burt watched as the sun from the window behind him caught the metal of the silver band around his finger.

“So you didn’t keep in touch then?” Burt asked.

“No, but Dad listen I know you think that I’m crazy, that we’re crazy, for doing this but it doesn’t feel crazy. We didn’t keep in touch but we spent some time together at Dalton and I thought he was sweet and funny and cute but then I started dating Nick. The last time I saw him was at Nick’s graduation, and then the next time I saw him I was jetlagged, cranky, and looked like a hot mess in an airport in Italy. There he was though looking just as worse for the wear but then he looked at me and smiled because he remembered me and it was like the world just stopped,” Kurt said making Burt want to trust him but knowing that he couldn’t just yet.

“Look Kurt that’s a very nice story but you’re twenty one years old, you have one more year of college, and you two have barely even met let alone lived together,” he replied trying to make Kurt see where he was coming from.

“Dad…he makes me feel like Mom told me you made her feel. I would ask her all the time what being in love with you was like and she said it was the most amazing feeling in the world. That she felt like she could do or be anything she wanted because you’d be there supporting her. How you made her a better person and how you never made her feel anything less than the most precious most wonderful woman in the world; that with you she was home. That’s how Blaine makes me feel, Dad. All of those things that Mom felt because of you, I feel those because of Blaine. He’s the best thing that’s ever happened to me,” Kurt looked so earnest and Burt could tell that Kurt was being truthful with him. He couldn’t shake the feeling though that this wouldn’t work out and it would be a short marriage followed by a quick and easy divorce or annulment.  

“Mr. Hummel, sir I know that you don’t believe either of us when we tell you that we really truly know that this is what we want but sir…Kurt’s my everything. I’d do anything for him no matter what it was because I love him with everything that I have and I know that he loves me just as much. And this, us getting married, wasn’t just something we jumped into with drunk hearts and irrational minds we talked about it, you might not believe that but it’s true.”

“Dad you know me, you know that I wouldn’t jump into something as serious and permanent as marriage if I didn’t know with every fiber of my being that what I had with that person was what I know you had with Mom and what you share with Carole now. When he first proposed I thought he was crazy dad, we’d only been reconnected for three months and I felt like things were moving way too fast and I stepped back from it to get a different perspective. I just kept thinking I’m too young to be engaged or married we’ve only really known each other for three months but then…” Kurt trailed off and Burt watched as his eyes glazed over a bit and a smile came to his face as he turned his head to connect gazes with his husband and they looked like they were in another world entirely for a moment before Kurt continued not breaking his eyes away from the man he loved,

“…then it was later that night after he proposed and I was walking around Rome, just walking aimlessly until I sat on this bench. And I was sitting there and this old woman sat next to me and she turned to me and said, ‘young man you look troubled someone so young should not look so troubled’. She smiled at me then and it…it reminded me of Mom and so I told her everything and she just sat quietly while I talked and then when I was done she said, ‘forget what the world says about age and time needed to cultivate everlasting love listen to your gut’ so I did. My gut said go back to Blaine and tell him yes, tell him you love him, tell him that you think you’ve been in love with him since the first time your eyes met when you were just sixteen years old in Mr. George’s history class and he ducked his head and blushed before giving you the sweetest smile you’ve ever seen,” Kurt looked back at him then eyes shining brightly in a way that Burt had never seen in his life.

He’d seen those eyes shine with tears of anguish, fear, and happiness but he’d never ever seen them shine with such joy and love and utter devotion. That showed him that maybe, just maybe, he was wrong, that this would work for Kurt and Blaine. And he was proven wrong, he was proven wrong each year that went by, and by the time the end of the fifth year since he sat on his couch and was told his son was married to a man he didn’t know, he started to finally trust in Kurt and Blaine and what they were building. He was proud on the day when he got to stand up and give a toast when Kurt and Blaine renewed their vows after twenty years of marriage and two kids. So yeah he’d known since Kurt was three that one day he’d have a son-in-law and while the way he got one was unconventional by most people’s standards he was pretty damn proud of Kurt and the man he called his husband.