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Kurt felt the old tug of anxiety as he watched from the celebrity viewing area. He knew how much Blaine loved this show, and how much he wanted to help his friends Benj and Justin and celebrate their success. And he knew that Sebastian wasn’t in any way a threat these days--not only was he in a relationship of his own, he had gone into television and therefore lived mostly in Los Angeles, and these days in Vancouver--but still the old jealousy flared up from time to time, just a little. It had made sense to invite Sebastian to sing and the audience had loved the surprise when he was announced, but somewhere in the back of Kurt’s mind, he would always be high school Sebastian, out to steal Kurt’s boyfriend. Husband. No, the Sebastian in Kurt’s head that wanted Blaine wanted Kurt’s boyfriend, not the real, 24-year-old husband on the stage right now.
To distract himself, Kurt looked out at the crowd. They were, as usual, going bananas and singing along to every word. Over to the side he saw the Event Manager chatting with the merch guy. She was amazing. When Blaine decided to start a music festival with some of his friends, Kurt insisted that he either drop most of his acting and singing work to manage the festival full-time, or hire a manager to do the work full-time. Blaine had hired Rachel (Not that Rachel--Rachel The Event Planner) and she worked hard around the year to anticipate problems, keep in touch with the fans, and grow the festival. No doubt at this moment she was resolving some fan complaint she had noticed on Twitter. Due to her work keeping Blaine on track, the festival was better every year than the year before.
Kurt and his friends took care of wrangling the celebrities and press who showed up, but Rachel (yes, that Rachel) and Santana were taking care of that at the moment so Kurt could watch Blaine sing. And in a little while he would be singing a duet with Blaine himself, an annual tradition that the fans loved almost as much as Kurt and Blaine did.
Suddenly Kurt’s focus was drawn back to the stage by a round of booing from the audience. Sebastian and Blaine were harmonizing on the line, “The only man that I love is my dad.” Kurt looked back at the audience and saw that the booers were smiling, so it was all in fun. They just didn’t like Blaine disavowing his homosexuality, even if he was playing Evan Hansen at the moment. Blaine winked back at them quickly before Will picked up the song with “Well, anyway” and Blaine had to sing his next line.
It was that kind of festival. Nobody was really under any illusion that Blaine was Evan Hansen as they would have been on Broadway. He wasn’t acting, he was just singing a song he loved along with some of his friends, and at this moment, “some of his friends” included a TV celebrity, a Broadway star, the band, and four thousand Broadway fans sweating and dancing and singing along in Central Park.
The song ended amid cheers and Sebastian moved center stage to sing another Benj and Justin song that he had sung once on a musical episode of his TV show. Blaine bounced off the stage, grabbed a bottle of water and joined Kurt on the viewing platform.
“I can’t believe I got booed at my own festival,” Blaine said with a chuckle. “I guess the audience didn’t like me implying I wasn’t gay. Or maybe they didn’t like me saying I only loved one man when I wasn’t talking about you.” He grinned at Kurt and gave him a kiss. “I guess if it’s me singing it, that line is an insult not just to you, but to Burt, and Cooper, and Sam. Who loves only their father?”
“That line always bugged me anyway,” Kurt sighed. “I wish Benj and Justin hadn’t leaned quite so far into the homophobia.”
“It works for the character, though,” Blaine countered. “He’s a messed up teenage boy and Jared has been goading him. Plus it’s kind of funny how self-conscious Evan is in that moment.”
“I want something better for America’s high school boys,” Kurt sighed.
“Well,” Blaine said, changing the subject. “I guess we’ll just have to use our duet to show them we’re more in love than ever.” He kissed Kurt quickly and ran to the stage entrance. Sebastian’s song was ending and Blaine had to go back onstage.
“I can do that,” Kurt whispered, a soft smile playing on his lips.
As the set was coming to a close, Blaine thanked everyone for coming and invited Kurt onto the stage for their duet.
“As you all know, my husband and I like to end this festival every year with a duet. I still get a kick out of saying that word. Come on out, Kurt!”
The audience was screaming, holding up signs that said “Klaine” with big hearts surrounding the word, and cheering heartily as Kurt jogged out and gave Blaine a kiss.
“It is pretty amazing being married,” Kurt continued where Blaine left off. “We’ve been married for about three and a half years now, but when we got married, marriage equality wasn’t a thing in Ohio, where we lived, so we had to get married in Indiana. Thankfully, the Supreme Court fixed that just a few months later, in June of 2015.”
The audience cheered some more, and Kurt spotted a few gay couples in the audience holding each other close or kissing. He was glad they felt welcome at Blaine’s festival.
Blaine picked up the story again. “Since we’re so incredibly thankful that we get to be married and have our marriage recognized in all 50 states, we were really touched by another song written by our friends Benj and Justin, that you may have seen in a movie last year. It’s about two adults who love each other but can’t get together because one of them is white and the other one is Black.”
“We’re sorry we couldn’t find a way to set up flying rigs in the park,” Kurt started to say, and had to stop because the audience realized what song they were going to sing and started cheering again. They both started laughing along with the audience’s joy.
“There’s no point in us singing if you can’t hear us,” Kurt laughed. “But feel free to sing along, especially if you’re with someone you love who can sing the other part.”
“Especially then,” Blaine agreed. “Kurt and I are firm believers that singing show tunes together is the key to a happy relationship.”
A loud whoop came from the celebrity enclosure, and Kurt and Blaine turned and both cracked up laughing when they saw that it was Jesse who was cheering with his arms around Rachel, both of them laughing and nodding to more cheers from the audience, who could see them also.
“Well, not just show tunes,” Kurt argued. “You have to work on all the connections in a marriage.” He nodded sagely in agreement with himself.
“Are you worried we might lose some of our connection?” Blaine asked with a wink, giving the signal to the band to start playing. “You know better than that, Kurt.” He began to sing.
You know I want you
It’s not a secret I try to hide
I know you want me (Kurt nodded vigorously)
So don’t keep sayin’ our hands are tied…
“Kinky,” yelled Will Roland, echoing his line from Sincerely, Me.
They continued the song, their voices rising passionately together, with Kurt’s rising through its natural range and once again blowing Blaine’s mind, though he’d been singing with Kurt for eight years now. The audience loved their annual duet because anyone watching could see how much they loved singing together. It was a joy to watch two people who loved each other bringing joy to one another by sharing something they both loved, and it made the audience feel like they were witness to their marriage, like they were all part of something beautiful together.
The audience sang along, couples with their arms wrapped around each other, friends swaying together (some swaying a little bit more than others).
When Kurt got to the last, heartbreaking lyrics and ended the song, the audience cheered and cried and cheered some more.
“Thank you so much,” Blaine quieted the crowd. “As you know, Central Park has a hard quiet time of ten PM, so we only have time for one more song.”
“That’s right,” Kurt interrupted. “And this year, I’m going to sing it.”
“But it’s my festival,” Blaine protested.
“And I’m your husband,” Kurt countered. “Go stand over there.” He pointed to the upright piano that Marie’s Crisis used in the downstage left corner of the stage. “I’m going to sing to you this time.”
Blaine was delighted, but also confused, and also surprised, but mostly he knew that if Kurt had something planned it would be amazing.
“Now, most of you will know that Blaine and I started dating when we were in high school,” Kurt spoke into the mike, and the audience responded with more cheering. “But what you might not know is that we met because I was sent by my glee club to spy on Blaine’s glee club.”
“In high school, I made my living singing girl songs. I still do, as a matter of fact. But none of the other boys at my school would dare to do them. (They wouldn’t want to catch the gay germs, or the girl germs.) Oh, my goodness, Blaine. How much better would those boys have been with some girl germs on them?”
“I do not know how to answer that,” Blaine responded.
“Anyway,” Kurt continued. “I went to this all-boys school to spy on their glee club and what do I find but the most gorgeous boy I’d ever seen in my life singing lead on a Katy Perry song! You can imagine my delight.”
“Katy Perry transcends gender,” Blaine interjected, once the crowd was done cheering Kurt’s statement.
“Music transcends gender, Blaine,” Kurt corrected (and Blaine conceded). “But you do not own Katy Perry, my dear.”
“Are you going to steal my song?” Blaine said, aghast.
The audience lost their collective shit.
Kurt just turned to look at Blaine straight on and began to sing a cappella.
You think I’m pretty without any makeup on
You think I’m funny when I tell the punchline wrong
I know you get me, so I let my walls come down, down.
And then he was joined onstage by the original Warblers and Sebastian (who couldn’t resist joining in, “Once a Warbler,” and all that) and they finished the song.
Kurt killed that song dead. Blaine almost died from laughing, and from all the love coming at him from his friends on stage, from the audience behind him, and from his amazing husband who could do anything with a microphone.
And as Kurt watched the tears coming from his husband’s eyes while Sebastian helped him make it happen, Kurt thought that maybe it was time to let his high school jealousy go for good.
But then Blaine turned to face the audience and Kurt was reminded of just how perfect his husband’s ass was. Probably best to keep an eye on it, just in case.